The corridor lay empty. No footsteps. No voices. Just the faint stink of damp stone and old herbs.

'A disguise then.'

He reached inward and slid his will along the quiet threads that bound his other lives.

Sail Knife rose to meet him. Gaunt and thin. Skin like old parchment stretched over brittle bone. Eyes sunken and pale.

The sort of man people looked past or whispered about later. In the half light he could pass for a hungry ghost that had forgotten to fade.

Radeon let Giovanni sink and pulled Sail Knife over himself, layer by careful layer. Joints stiffened. Breath rasped.

'Weakest ones do the cleaning. Strongest errand runner smokes or loiters on the Crooked Cauldron.'

He pushed the door of an alchemist room open and slipped inside.

Not the grand halls with gilded sigils. One of the smaller eight. The one with the best vents and the cleanest racks.

Radeon let his face finish the warp. Skin sagged along the jaw. Cheeks hollowed.

He shoved the alchemical room door wider and lurched inside with the uneven gait of a man who had lived too long.

An errand boy straightened from the cauldron, a rag in his hand. His eyes went round at the sight of the stranger.

For a heartbeat he looked at Radeon as if he were a ghost that had stepped out of the smoke.

His mouth opened. Qi snapped from Radeon's fingers and tightened around the boy's throat.

No sound came out. The boy clawed at his neck. One sharp tap to the side of the jaw dropped him limp.

Radeon hefted the small body and folded him into the cold cauldron. Limbs tucked. Head tilted as if he had only slumped in exhaustion.

Then he took stock. Shelves. Jars. Bundles of dried leaves and roots. Nothing else.

'If someone checked this place, the room needed a story it could tell without me.'

He moved along the racks and plucked a small leaf from each bundle he passed.

Rubbed them between his fingers until oil slicked his skin and scents layered on his hands.

Bitter. Sweet. Sharp.

He did not stop until one smell crawled up his nose and turned his stomach.

A thin, sour tang that made his tongue prickle and his head feel a fraction too light.

'Sleeping agent or hallucinogen. Should buy me enough time.'

He started crushing the herb between his fingers. The sickly scent thickened. Oil seeped out and glazed his skin.

Radeon hauled the unconscious boy back out of the cauldron. He smeared the pulp across the boy's face and nose.

Rubbed it into the skin until the cheeks shone damp and blotched.

Then he pried the boy's hand open. Curled the fingers around a tight little ball of the same crushed leaf. Pressed it into the palm and closed the fist.

He slid that hand into the boy's pocket and left it there. Cause and proof in one neat bundle.

When he was done he moved to the rear of the room. A metal trapdoor sat flush with the floor. Cold. Heavy.

He lifted it and slipped through into the space below where the blood pool waited.

He paused on the edge and let his eyes adjust. The pool spread out across the chamber.

Wide as a small field. Over a hundred square meters of dark red that never quite stilled.

The array rippled in twelve distinct places on the surface. Each pulse tied back to a single control array that floated at the center.

The ripples made a low, wet sound as they moved. A sick rhythm that kept the bloody surface from clumping.

The stench of iron hit like a fist. Thick. Metallic. Old. Radeon barely noticed.

His nose had long since stopped bothering him with such things.

He sent a thread of qi into the silk coils at his waist. Needles leapt free and shot upward in a glittering swarm.

They bit into the ceiling stone in clusters of ten. When he reached a hundred anchors he gave the web a hard tug. The ceiling held. No dust. No crack.

"Good enough," he muttered.

He stepped off the ledge. The silk tightened and lifted. The light, old body of Sail Knife swung out over the blood.

He let the lines carry him to the center of the chamber. There he lowered himself until he hung directly above the array core.

Runes swam in the dark liquid below. Each sigil pouring silent orders into the pool.

Do not spin. Do not clot. Hold steady warmth so the blood believes it still runs through living veins.

As he studied the pattern something caught at the corner of his sight.

Below the level of the pool, half buried in shadow, squatted a huge vat.

Its surface glowed a murky yellow. A barrel worth of some other liquid he had not seen on his last visit.

'Some kind of solution. Maybe to keep the blood living, hold its vitality. The yellow part likely keeps it alive. Nutrient, maybe?'

Radeon eyed the yellow solution below. Not the liquid itself. The container. If he could borrow that, the rest of his plan might hold.

He drew a slow breath and reached down with a thread of qi. The array core rose from the blood with a wet sucking sound.

Once it must have been alabaster white. Now it was stained a deep rusted crimson. Age and years of spinning in this pool had eaten the shine away.

He pulled the core closer and ran his fingers along its surface.

'Seems the array core itself was the lid.'

The same hole the yellow liquid had been fed through again and again. He braced both hands against it and tried to twist.

Nothing.

The shell had hardened around it. Years of blood cycling and drying had sealed the seams.

The cover clung tight, as if the whole core resented the thought of being opened.

'Cannot stay here long. Ten minutes is mine. Twenty is generous. Thirty needs a miracle.'

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