Sometime in between that collision and the bouncing and the lack of air, the world went red and black and he lost everything.

Some time later, he regained consciousness with a gasp. Teia was standing over him with a knife in her hand, and he was covered with the dust of broken green luxin. It took him a few heaving, deep breaths to regain his wits. He’d passed out.

Teia had cut the seal of the green luxin. The squad were speaking to him, but he had nothing for them. Couldn’t understand.

They pulled him to his feet.

“Where’s Daelos?” Kip asked. Everyone else appeared to be here. Wherever here was. At the bottom of the slaves’ stairs, maybe? Ben-hadad and Ferkudi were reloading the blunderbusses, preparing to breach a door.

“Broke an ankle jumping over some bodies,” Cruxer said. “We had to leave him.”

“You left him?” Kip demanded.

“We gave him a Lightguard cloak and tunic. The chirurgeons will help him and he can get away. The Blackguards will help him, Kip,” Cruxer said. He was defensive. He hated leaving someone behind, too.

Orholam damn it. We’re children. Even Cruxer.

“It was the right thing,” Teia said. “Now shut up and let’s go.”

“Fire in three!” Ben-hadad announced.

Ferkudi fired before any of them could cover their ears.

“Sorry, I heard fire,” he said.

Ben-hadad fired right behind him, and he winced at the deafening sound. “Deserved that,” he said.

“Reload,” Cruxer said. “Everyone, ready luxin.”

Kip took a step to take a defensive position at the stairs, and almost fell again as his orange-luxin-coated foot shot out from under him. Ugh, he had orange luxin goop everywhere, even in his hair. Someone handed him the lit orange mag torch. He drafted a wad of orange luxin into his hand, and then used that to suck the open orange luxin off his body and out of his hair. Mostly.

He checked himself quickly. His green spectacles were unbroken, and the spectacle case on his left hip had successfully protected all his other colors.

He listened closely at the stairs and thought that he could hear the groans and whimpers of the injured and dying above, and maybe distantly, the sound of reinforcements coming down. With the musket fire, the Lightguards had figured out where the squad was. Now they could concentrate their forces. The noose was tightening.

“Where are we?” Kip asked. He filled himself with green luxin rapidly, then swapped spectacles and pulled in blue off one of the white mag torches. The torches were already getting low, and Kip could feel the bruises he was going to have tomorrow. Provided he had the luxury of seeing tomorrow.

“Main floor,” Ben-hadad said. “Main hall should be that third door on the left.”

“How do you know that?” Kip asked.

“I don’t really get lost,” Ben-hadad said. “I was eight years old before I realized a person could.”

“Where did Ironfist go?” Kip asked. “I mean, he was leaving, too, right?”

“No time,” Cruxer said. “Let’s go.”

Kip followed, but he couldn’t shake the thought. Ironfist was getting out of here, too. He hadn’t gone toward the lift.

So Ironfist had some other way out.

But Kip didn’t know that for sure. Maybe Ironfist had stopped on one of the other floors, grabbing some personal items, and got stuck on the wrong side. Maybe he planned to make his escape later. Maybe he’d bluffed his way through the Lightguards.

They ran through the empty halls, fanned out, weapons drawn. Everyone but Kip was a bloody mess. Big Leo had his left arm in a makeshift sling, half cloth, half luxin, and the skin was bulging in his forearm. Nasty break, but he didn’t seem to be feeling it yet.

Cruxer’s nose was bloodied, and he had a cut down his forehead, seeping blood into his mouth. Ferkudi had drafted what looked like a fighting glove around his left hand. Probably had broken some bones punching someone. Winsen was grinning broadly. He looked insane. He was carrying a short bow with bodkin arrow nocked. Teia had wiped blood off her face, but she was careful to wipe it onto her grays, not on the shimmercloak. It was a steely, metallic gray now, not the dull gray of an inductee’s cloak. Maybe this was its true color, if it had such a thing. On the back of the cloak Kip noticed barely touching circles, one white, one black, with the black over the white a little, like an eclipse of the moon.

“They know about the cloak,” Teia said. “At least, they know enough. I told them while you were out.”

“I wouldn’t say we know enough,” Ben-hadad said. “I have got a hell of a lot of—”

“We know enough for now,” Cruxer said. “Enough to use her. Teia, take point.” She did. As they moved down the hall, people’s mag torches began sputtering out. “Fill up,” Cruxer whispered.

But they’d all been drafting long enough that the order was unnecessary. Each of them drew in as much luxin as they could before the torches burned out.

As they reached another door, Teia made the hand motion to Cruxer: scout? He nodded permission, and she put her hand to the crack in the double doors, lowering her head, her eyes flaring wide.

She stood there for perhaps a full minute. Then she came back. “Fifteen, maybe twenty. Semicircle of musketeers around this door. It’s a death trap.”

Kip’s heart dropped, and he could tell that all of them were thinking the same thing. They hadn’t run fast enough. If the Lightguards at the base of the Prism’s Tower knew that they were coming, this wasn’t the only choke point available. The Lightguards could also cut them off at the Lily’s Stem. With enough men and muskets in narrow places, the squad’s skills would be beside the point.

“I could go green golem,” Kip said. “I’ve done it before. I stopped bullets once.”

“Can you do it reliably?” Ben-hadad asked. “Can you differentiate between friend and foe when you’re golem?”

“No,” Kip admitted reluctantly.

“There’s some other way out,” Ferkudi said. “My parents mentioned it once. I overheard. Some way to get to Cannon Island directly. No boats.”

“Where?” Cruxer asked.

“I don’t know,” Ferkudi said. “It’s hidden, that’s all I know.”

“Well that doesn’t help us, does it?” snapped Big Leo. It looked like the pain was starting to come through his initial shock from his messily broken arm. He was rarely irritable.

“Breaker?” Teia prompted.

“I know another way out exists,” Kip said. “My father told me that. He didn’t say where it was. But it’d have to be in one of the lower levels if it goes out under the bay?”

“If we want to go to the lower levels, we’ve still got to cross the great hall,” Cruxer said. “The slaves’ stairs don’t go down there. The only access is on the other side.”

“Well, that’s a stupid design,” Ben-hadad said. “Why don’t the slaves’ stairs go all the way down?”

“It’s for defense,” Cruxer said, “and as you can see, it’s working.”

“Breaker, that wasn’t what I meant,” Teia said, giving him a significant look.