The vishwa dragged Rowan over the edge. She hung from her chains, kicking and twisting as the drone spider-crawled down the wall. At least he hadn't thrown her over like a sack of night soil. Her ribs were already injured, and her head was still throbbing. A fall might've knocked her out. Warg healing was fast, but not fast enough.

Merritt and Meera were sitting huddled on a small ledge just above the waterline. It was a narrow length of rectangular rock hemmed in by rapid water and sheer walls of rock. The narrowest width was abutted by the same drop-off the vishwa was currently scuttling down. It was an inescapable trap. An oubliette, accessible only from above—and only if you were a vishwa! If the water didn't kill you, the queen would.

Rowan decided she'd rather drown than watch Hessa eat Thrax. The thought shot through her like poison, a debilitating insidious thing that seeped into her bones. She tried to focus on something else lest it numb her to death.

From this new vantage point, she could finally see the eggery. A privilege that'd only cost her her freedom. Things had happened so fast when she'd been caught that she hadn't noticed it before now. It was a giant egg, hewn from black Myrkheim rock. Borne out of the depthless, swerving water like a towering island. There were strange widow-like vents spread in a spiraling way towards the top, but the lowest one was high above the waterline. Too high to reach even if she could swim across that terrible water. Which, obviously, she couldn't. Nor was there any way to climb from the roaring moat up the smooth rock. Only a single stairway, like a sky bridge, connected this strange eggery to the main crescent mother chamber.

When the vishwa reached the jagged bottom, Meera and Merritt scrambled out of the way. Rowan barely made a sound as the drone dangled her from the wall by her iron chains. She let loose a cry of frustration, wishing she could shove her thumb in its eye—let the nixrath burn its brains. She was eye level with its dead gaze. Then it pressed two links together, one over the other.

With a sharp gasp, she watched it raise her dagger high above its head as though it meant to stab her. She squeezed her eyes shut as the dagger hurtled downward. But the vishwa plunged her mirok dagger deep into the rock, impaling the wall through the iron links. She was now fixed to the rock with iron and mirok ivory.

"Bastard!" she spat, aiming a kick between its legs. The pincers flared in a weird grin as though she'd merely tickled it's sexless groin. "Ugh!" She gave up, shoulders slumping as it withdrew up the rocky overhang.

It stumbled a little, looking slightly enfeebled. Rowan threw a vengeful glare at it clawed its way up the wall, knowing the prologue proximity to her ring had enervated it. Would that it had killed the thing altogether.

She gritted her teeth, pain shooting through her shoulders. A few hours of this torture and her bones would slip out of their sockets! She tried to point her toes towards the ground, but it was just out of reach. With a frustrated sob, she stopped fighting. Hanging meat, that's what she was now.

Poor Meera was limping and bleeding from her head, but she hurried over nonetheless and hugged Rowan around the waist. She held her up as best she could, taking some of Rowan's weight. It helped a little.

Meera'a tear-stained face was trembling with a smile. "I hate that you're here, but...it's so good to see you, milady!"

Rowan's head dropped back against the rock, her eyes filling with tears. "Stop calling me that, Meera. I'm just Rowan. Useless, stupid Rowan."

"But you're my lady! You always have been and always will be." Meera hugged her waist even tighter. "And you will get us out of here. I know you will. You're never without a plan!"

But this time she was. Her head was a complete blank except for the black spots swimming in vision. Her mind numb but for the throbbing in her skull. She turned her face away, not wanting to destroy Meera's fragile hope. But with her face averted, she was now looking at Merritt. He was sitting with his knees under his chin, his arms shivering around his shins.

"I see your traitorous plan backfired," she said, but her accusation held no bite. She was feeling too sick, her voice wobbling.

"I wish I'd never come here," he murmured. "I wish I'd listened to my mother and married someone else."

"I wish you'd stop mumbling like a lunatic and help me get her free!" Meera snapped. "I never liked him," she whispered up at Rowan.

"And go where?" Merritt shook his head, prodding the gash on his knee.

"Into the water," Rowan said. "That's the way out. It joins the Jorg." Which was the same waters that eventually fed the slithering Nevermoor Bog and the black sucking mud that surrounded West Gate.

Merritt's eyes swiveled up. "How do you know that?"

"Thrax said so." Which was all the credence required.

His look narrowed as he turned to contemplate the churning black water. His mind seemed to be churning, too.

Not that she cared, he was as useless as lips on a snake. And just as trustworthy. She sighed and turned back to Meera with a grimace. The iron was gnawing at her wrist bones. "I wish I knew what my mother would do if she was here instead of me." A shuddering breath wracked her chest. "What a joke! The High Lady wouldn't be here in the first place, would she? Elgret's much too clever for that."

Meera glared across Rowan at Merritt. "This is his fault, not yours!"

"That's Lord Marwort to you, girl," he sneered.

"You're not a lord," Meera rejoined. "Not down here, anyway."

"You think we're equals now? Because we share a dungeon?" Merritt stood up to glower at her, his fists bunching. "Shall I prove just how wrong you are?"

"Shut up, Merritt," Rowan said. "You're nothing but a sack of seed. Now sit down." She dragged her nose over the side of her shoulder, what she could reach of it, tired of sniffling. "Save your strength, both of you."

Merritt dropped back down onto his haunches, glaring at the water.

"See what I mean?" Meera whispered. "You disarmed him despite being chained to a wall. You're every bit the High Lady."

"Meera, stop, I'm nothing like my mother. I wish I was, but—"

"Never say that! The High Lady's strength is only as formidable as the wall she hides behind. She hasn't left the Iron Girdle even once in her life, yet she sent you out here like a sacrificial lamb..."

Rowan smiled despite herself. "Hardly a lamb."

"Exactly! You're all the wilier for being a wolf disguised as lamb! But your mother didn't know it then because she doesn't know you as I do. She didn't care that you were unprepared. What's worse, she sent you into the outland without a mother's kind word or even a farewell kiss! You aren't your mother, Rowan, I heartily agree with you there. And glad I am of it, too." Meera's gaze was stark and welling with tears. "The High Lady would never be here fighting for a friend."

"Technically, I was dragged in after you."

Meera chuckled, wiping her eyes. "However you came to be here doesn't matter because the moment I saw you, you gave me strength and hope. You're stronger than your mother, Ro." Her lashes glistened with tears. "She relies on iron walls and you rely on your goddess given mettle. You'll save us, I know you will."

Merritt ruined the moment with a jeering cough. "The key point you're missing here, girl," Merritt muttered, "is that she's chained to the rock. No one's saving anyone, so shut up and—"

"The key!" Meera gasped, palming her injured head. "Maeda forgive me!" She rooted around in her dress pocket and then, with a soft squeal, she produced a key. The key! The one evidently rescued from the mud before Merritt had snatched her away.

Rowan's heart skipped. "Careful, Meera." Her gaze shot up to the ceiling to scan for spying vishwa eyes. But wherever the drones had got to, they weren't back yet. She expelled a sigh, ignoring the queen's echoing cackles. "Gods, I love you! You clever, clever girl!"

Meera grinned and reached up to unlock the cuffs. But her hand was suddenly seized in Merritt's grasp. He swiftly plucked the key out of her hand. "Not yet, I still have to teach you some manners—how to talk to your betters!"

Rowan kicked out, striking him in the nose. "Merritt, you little bastard!"

He yowled, clutching at his hemorrhaging nose. "You broke it!"

"Keep your gods-cursed voice down!" she hissed back. "Are you mad! Give her the key!"

Meera was trying to grapple with him for it, but he shoved her away and slammed her head into the rock. Meera groaned and turned onto her back, dazed. There was a fresh cut on her temple, oozing dark blood.

Rowan tried to see past the red blaze in her eyes. Tried not to wish him dead. "Listen to me, Merritt, we're on the same side here, you have to—"

"Shut up! You got me into this mess." He rooted around in her overdress with rough fingers. For a moment she honestly thought he meant to rape her. But his hand plunged into her pocket and it was the red wolf stone he yanked out. But he looked disappointed to find it was only the pendant. "Where's the rest of it? Where's the nixrath chain?"

"Gone," she bit out. He didn't deserve an explanation. "Give it back, it's useless to you."

"It's a ruby. Hardly useless." He narrowed his eyes at her and tucked the jewel into his surcote. "To remember you by..."

Rowan glared at him in disbelief. "I never knew you were this stupid and cruel. All this time you were the savage, not the warg that rescued me from you."

He slapped her across her face, the whites of his eyes like a terrified doe. "I loved you and you dragged me into Hekki's lap!" He shook his head and turned towards the water. "You deserve what you get."

"Where are you going, you mad fool?" She glanced up to make sure no one was watching. Thankfully, the chaos of the water was drowning out their quarrel.

"Where does it look like I'm going?" He nodded to the river. "You said this was the way out."

Meera was cradling her head as she slipped to Rowan's side, trying to hold her weight up again. "You're leaving without us?"

"Can you swim?" he asked, glaring over his shoulder at them.

Meera and Rowan swapped looks. "No."

"I'll send help when I get back to West Gate." A lie. Gods, he was so bad at them. "I'll take my chances with the water. It's not my problem you can't swim."

"I wouldn't if I were you," Rowan said. She was staring past him now, eyes fixed on the water. Her body turned rigid.

Merritt followed her gaze and staggered back with a yelp as he, too, spotted the pearly scales weaving in the water.

The jutting horns and boney frill broke the surface first, then the curved tusks rose up, and the nostrils burst open for air. The green eyes blinked, the inner translucent lids sweeping sideways above the waterline.

"You're not going anywhere," said Rowan. Her gaze held the mirok's. But the serpent eyes betrayed no emotion. Nothing. So she was left unsure of its intent. Friend or foe, she didn't know.

The dark bones scattered along the waterline, embedded in the rock, hinted at the latter. Chained to the wall, without any silver to barter with, she'd never been more uncertain in her whole life. But no, that wasn't true. She had one last piece of silver to barter.

Her father's ring.