As there was no means of easy conveyance in the rest of the citadel, Kano passed through a seemingly endless series of stairways before finally reaching the lowest floor. It was a few levels below ground, but given the fortress’s lack of windows, being underground didn’t make much difference. Himin, probably realizing they’d do her no good, had ditched her escorts and taken her guests down personally. Though Kano doubted she was very happy about it.

Himin stopped at the bottom of the stairs, where long rows of bars partitioned into little cells spread out before them. “You should be able to find your own way from here. I don’t know which of these they’re in, exactly, but they must be in one of them.”

Planting her feet, Kano turned back to the imperious ghoul. “That wasn’t the deal. You were supposed to lead me to them.”

“Isn’t this good enough? It’s not like I’ll be any better at finding them than you will.”

“Fine,” Kano said. “Then you can forget whatever favor you had in mind.” She believed what Himin was saying, but that didn’t mean she trusted her enough to let her out of her sight.

Shorin’s former aide sighed. “Okay, I’ll help you search.”

The collection of cells was rather pointlessly vast, but they were easy enough to search. They were all well-lit and empty, so Nove and the children should be easy to spot.

“What’s even the point of this place if there are no prisoners down here?” Urick asked.

“How am I supposed to know?” Himin replied, sounding harassed. “It’s not like I built this place.”

“What did Shorin use it for?”

“Mostly just storing people before their execution when they annoyed him enough, so I don’t think he kept anyone here for long.”

“Why didn’t you turn them into something more useful, then?” Urick swept his hand to indicate the whole floor. “It seems like an awful waste of space.”

Himin snorted in amusement. “That’s a pretty accurate description of most of the citadel. There’s far more space here than we need, especially with all our recent losses.”

Focused on her search, Kano tuned out most of what the other two were saying. Walking quickly, her eyes darted between the cells on either side as she passed them until she spotted a familiar figure. Covered in bony plates and hunched over to keep their horns from scraping against the ceiling, the abomination sat nearest to the door in the wide cell with the little bodies of the children behind her. Kano called out to Nove and ran over.

Blinking as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing, Nove leaned forward. When Kano reached the door, the abomination’s jowls retracted to expose her sharp, predatory teeth in an unpleasant smile. Despite it looking more like a grimace than an expression of joy, Kano knew her well enough to tell Nove was happy to see her.

“Kano,” Nove said, “what are you doing here?”

Kano rolled her eyes. “I’m here to rescue you, duh.”

“Oh, good. We were getting tired of sitting in here.”

In a show of unity, the children behind her let out a chorus of complaints. As far as Kano could discern, their primary grievance was that it was boring. If that was all they had to complain about, then their stay mustn’t have been very bad.

Kano was about to tell them that she’d free them now when she realized she had no way of doing so. Without thinking about it, she’d assumed she’d just be able to free them once they were located. It seemed she wasn’t used to not having a force field to rely on. Well, maybe this was a good opportunity for Himin to prove herself useful.

Kano turned to her and said, “Let them out.”

Standing with her hands on her hips, Himin commanded the door to open, only for nothing to happen. She tried again with no more success. “Uh, the lock doesn’t seem to be responding for some reason.”

“What? Why not? Don’t you have a key or something?” Kano stalked toward the ghoul, letting out a string of accusatory questions.

“No, I don’t have anything like that. You can just break the door, though, I don’t mind. It’s not like we have a shortage.”

Kano would happily break the door if she could, but it looked pretty sturdy. “Give me a second.” She moved right beside the cell and whispered to Nove, “My force field doesn’t work anymore, I don’t think I can break you out of there.”

“Oh,” Nove said, speaking in her usual booming voice, “you need the door broken? Why didn’t you say so earlier?” The abomination grasped the bars with her huge meaty hands. Muscles flexing, she tore the door from the wall and placed it down carefully inside the cell.

Kano’s expression withered. “I can’t believe what an idiot you are. If you could break out this easily, why have you been sitting in here the whole time? Do you have any idea how much work I had to do to find you here?” Far more work than they deserved.

The far larger creature shrank back in the face of Kano’s ire and mumbled, “I thought it would be best to wait and see. It’s not like we were in any danger, so I thought we’d stay put for now.”

Her excuse made sense, but somehow that just made it all the more annoying. Couldn’t she at least have had the good grace to be wrong so that Kano could yell at them? Well, whatever. She was sure to do something she could yell at them for sooner or later. Kano would just have to be patient.

With Nove in the lead, the prisoners filed out of their cell. The children were mostly yawning or looking around with dull eyes, but as it dawned on them that they’d be leaving, their excitement grew. Soon they were chatting animatedly amongst themselves, though to Kano’s relief they had the sense to stay together. She’d spent more than enough time searching these cells without having to chase after ghouls who’d wandered off.

“Where’s Thirty-Six?” Nove asked as they were walking.

Kano faltered. She was thinking about telling Nove what had happened, but that didn’t seem wise with Himin here, and she wasn’t up to talking about it in such a public setting. “I’ll tell you later.”

That seemed to satisfy her bestial companion, who lapsed into silence and went back to minding the children.

“You’ll have to tell her eventually,” Urick said, butting in of his own accord.

“Yes, I know,” Kano snapped. “I hardly need you to tell me that.”

Their group reached the entranceway and found two dozen armed ghouls waiting for them. Standing behind them was a woman with dark violet eyes. It was Miusvon, the natural who’d been working for one of the necromancers Kano had killed. She still couldn’t remember his name, but she recalled that he was the one who’d made the children in the first place.

“Who the fuck are you?” Himin shouted. “And are those my ghouls?”

Miusvon shrugged. “They were, but they’re mine now. Same goes for this whole citadel.” Their eyes sought out Kano. “Hi there, Kano. Fancy seeing you here. Are you working with Himin now?”

Kano looked at her like she’d lost their mind. “Of course not.”

“Then you don’t mind if I kill her?”

“Not really.”

“Wait!” Himin shouted. “Kano, are you really just going to let her take over this town? Don’t you know who she works for?”

“Who?”

Himin blinked. “Um, I was kind of hoping you’d know. But it’s probably a necromancer or something. Who else would be able to control these ghouls?”

“So, you’re saying I should help you, then?” Kano asked, amused.

“Just this once. I’ll give you anything you want.”

It was a somewhat of a tempting offer. Himin did have the power to make a lot of things happen for Kano. But only if she remained in control of Shorinstown—without that, she was nothing. And her hold over the town seemed awfully tenuous right now.

Even if Kano did stop Miusvon, there were sure to be other people who’d challenge her rule. And looking at her fellow natural with her small army of ghouls, Kano doubted she could deal with them without her force field. She was much more likely to get herself killed.

But somehow, abandoning Himin to die didn’t feel right either. They had helped her rescue Nove and the children. After a long moment of consideration, Kano took a deep breath and said to Himin, “Sorry, I can’t help you.” She turned to Miusvon and continued. “But there’s no real reason you have to kill her, right? It’s not like she’s any threat to you without the citadel or her minions.”

Miusvon frowned. “You’re right, but I am supposed to kill her.” The natural drummed her fingers against the stock of her sleek matte assault rifle. “I suppose I can make an exception based on the grounds of our past association. But if I ever see her around the citadel again, she’s dead. You got that?”

“Fine.” It didn’t seem like any great loss. It wasn’t like there was anything Himin could accomplish by hanging around here.

“Then I believe our business here is concluded. I hope you don’t mind if I escort you out.”