Cassius shrugged back into the leather harness-style armour too soon for his liking, his reconciliation with Zeke cut short by the return of Clarissa Herondale and lovely Sera from the Adamant Citadel. By the tone of the voices rising from downstairs, it sounded as though they had somehow managed to convince the Iron Sisters to part with their precious gift of pure angel blood. All that remained now was the corruptisia blooms...

...and one thing more, he lamented silently as he twisted to refasten the straps and buckles that had only recently been undone. Zeke had retreated from him to lean back sullenly against the wide desk that dominated the east side of the room. Shafts of sunlight peeked through breaks in the heavy burgundy velvet curtains partially drawn across the floor-to-ceiling windows, the light illuminating one side of his face while leaving the other in shadow.

"You're not going to listen to me now any more than you were before, are you?" Zeke grumped sourly.

The Faerie crossed the distance between them and pressed a gentle kiss to stubbornly unresponsive lips. "No," he whispered, half an apology and half a command. "No Nephilim can withstand the perils of Deep Faerie. The land can twist reality until it is impossible to tell truth from fantasy, while the mind reels and shatters in horror from what may be revealed. The madness it causes leaves permanent damage, and I would not lose you so." He trailed the fingers of his right hand along Zeke's jawline wistfully.

The ex-Shadowhunter caught his mate's hand and pulled it down until it rested against his collarbone instead. "Then tell me why it's so much safer for you to go. Tell me that I should just sit here and not worry about a goddamn thing." He paused to wait for an answer, but Cassius remained silent. Zeke swore in low voice. "You can't, because you can't tell a goddamn lie, you Faerie bastard."

Cassius closed his eyes, filled with remorse for the anguish he was causing. He took a deep breath and hardened his voice. "But I am not a bastard. I am a scion of the seven Archangels of Heaven, the last living son of-"

"Yeah, yeah," Zeke interrupted irritably, "The son of the Angel of Solitude and Tears, Cassiel's kid, blah blah blah. I've heard it all before. I know who you are, Cass. I know what you can do." He jabbed a finger at the Faerie's chest. "And I know what you can't do. You won't even be able to teleport once you're that deep in the Faerie realm. I doubt you'll even be able to get yourself all the way in. That means you're going to be on foot for at least part of the way, and that means you're going to be in danger."

Guilt continued to flood through Cassius, but he steeled himself against it and turned away to find the familiar gloves he wore to safely handle the torahk-na looped at his hips. "I am aware of the risks, Ezekiel," he answered more sharply than he intended. "I have walked the lands of Deep Faerie before. I will avoid what dangers I may and engage only as a last resort."

Zeke buried his face in his palms and rubbed at his eyes in frustration. "Just go," he growled bitterly. "I can't stop you anyway, can I?"

Cassius bowed his head to hide the pain in his eyes. He knew that their final farewell would come all too soon, and still he was not yet ready to face it. "No," he whispered again, almost too quietly to be heard.

The Faerie folded his remaining wing around his body and vanished, the faded majesty of Morgenstern manor replaced an instant later by the endless rolling fields of red and purple grass that marked the edge of the realm of Faerie. As before when he had come with the body of the Unseelie King, he could penetrate no further into Deep Faerie with his power. Navigating the Courts and the Rift with his gift was only possible because those places were tethered to the Mortal realm by necessity; pathways existed between the two and served as anchors that dulled the twisting and turning of the Faerie lands. The warping could be felt further out from the centre of Courts, particularly along the seams where the two incongruous worlds were joined and the protection was weaker. Mortals often manifested headaches when they passed through those areas - the first sign that the nature of the Faerie realm was seeping through to tug at the edges of their minds.

Mountains reared up from the gentle hills of grass in the distance, their bone-white, craggy faces slicing up into the soft orange sky. It was neither day nor night in the Faerie realm. The light was reminiscent of a sort of perpetual dawn with no sun. Red, orange, and yellow streaked through the wisps of clouds to his right while the colours faded into the twilight hues of purple and blue to his left. From experience, he knew that he could chase the horizon in either direction until he gave in to exhaustion and still never catch the source of the light or the darkness. The land seemed endless at times, but he knew well enough where to find the shrouded valleys in which the corruptisia plants bloomed and spread their insidious madness to the rest of the Faerie realm on tainted winds.

He turned toward the looming mountains and broke into an easy, loping jog that covered ground quickly and efficiently, his decision already made to take advantage of the easier terrain while he still had the opportunity. There was very little to worry about on the open plains around him - many of the creatures of Deep Faerie preferred to dwell deeper in the realm where they would not be disturbed by the comings and goings of their Seelie and Unseelie cousins. The Fey of this realm were not like those who walked the Mortal plane and traced their lineage back to the angels and demons who had fought to claim the world eons before. Here, there had been fewer boundaries to hold back the worst of the demons, and they had left a very different sort of children behind. Trapped in what would become the Faerie realm with too much demon blood in their veins, the darkest Fey were barred access to the Mortal world. Here, the creatures of legend lived on outside the pages of storybooks. Chimeras, gorgons, furies, and many other monsters made their homes here, only just capable of brushing the Mortal world through the dreams of Men to bring colour to their nightmares and breathe life into the terrors of their stories. Mankind could barely grasp how fortunate they were to never meet those monsters face to face.

But not all monsters are imprisoned behind these borders, even when they ought to be, Cassius thought to himself with a grim set to his mouth. His bargain with Jiahao weighed heavily on his mind, but it was the loophole he had left in place that served as the source of his recent sorrow, a tiny detail that rendered the deal little more than a clever farce to gain possession of the recipe the exiled Seelie had devised.

You might not care for the price, Jiahao had teased as he had allowed Cassius to skim the lines of looping scrawl upon which all their hopes now rested.

Following the assortment of common ingredients had been the rarer components that he had shared with the Nephilim upon his return: pure angel blood and a corruptisia bloom. But he had concealed the third and most disturbing requirement by tearing the page in two to carefully omit the last line before the brewing instructions prior to returning to the manor. Another tear had removed the final directions for administration.

Is it truly necessary? Cassius had asked.

And it was.

Jiahao's explanation had been quick and concise.

A willing sacrifice of life - the vessel through which the concoction would be consumed by the Eternal Forest. To even think that it would be possible for barely an ounce of potion to be able to affect the Forest externally was foolish beyond reason. For the mixture to have any effect, it would need to work from within; the Forest baited into swallowing the very poison that would kill its malignant parasite. Once the life force of its final victim was absorbed, there could be no reversing the damage. The power of pure angel blood was the only thing strong enough to combat the dark stain of taint that stemmed from Lucifer's essence. The corruptisia blooms would bind the elixir to the evil consciousness that had taken root within the Forest, their polluted essence sufficiently potent to penetrate the demonic influence and allow the blood to smother it for good. Only a life given willingly was pure enough to serve as the catalyst between the two extremes of the volatile brew; if it were imbibed by anyone with less than the truest intent in their heart, the entire thing would be rendered useless.

In that moment, Cassius had made the decision to sacrifice himself. He could not bargain for the recipe and expect another to give their life. But he could accept the solution and the consequences that came with it.

The long shadow of the centuries that fell away behind him hid a great number of terrible things that he could not undo, and he had lived many more lifetimes than a Mortal would care to count. In a way, it seemed only right that this would be how his immortal life came to a close. It would be on his own terms, and for something greater than himself. He had seen and done so much that he had just one regret in his heart.

Ezekiel, my Zeke.

He felt a tightening in his chest that had nothing to do with the incline of the hills that he had begun to climb as the land sloped upward into the mountains. Stripped trees began to dot the landscape around him, their thin trunks worn smooth in places by the passing Ûngreln herds that grazed along this area.

Leaving Zeke was an impossibility for which he had not planned. He had long-since reconciled himself to the bleak expectation that the ex-Shadowhunter would one day pass from this world, and all that Cassius would have to remember him by would be the scores of journals and sketchbooks he had carefully created over the years. The Queen's gift to Zeke kept him whole and healthy, but no spell could completely stop the steady march of time for a mortal. So long as her magic held, he would retain his youthful appearance and strength right up until the moment he died from old age, if he did not perish in battle first. His choice to remain in the Courts had helped to slow his aging, but it still continued unseen beneath the veneer of the Queen's enchantment. It was something they had long ago agreed never to discuss once they had unravelled the truth of Sammaradriel's weaving. Come what may, they had vowed.

Just as they did not touch on Zeke's inevitable mortality, they never spoke of Cassius' immortality. Like so many other immortals, he had rarely been given cause to consider his own death, or chance to worry about preparing for it. Sammaradriel herself had fallen into that trap when tensions in her Court had forced her to make decisions that would secure her line of succession, and had ultimately had the unexpected consequence of hastening the very death she feared at the hands of a son too eager for throne.

But now that he could at long last see the final days of his very long life, Cassius found himself at a loss for what to feel. It all seemed so very alien to him, like something out of a dream that would surely vanish if only he could awaken himself. His decision to ferry what he could of his private collection to Morgenstern Manor for safekeeping had been one of the few things that had made sense to him. What he had once intended to treasure when Zeke had passed from this life, he would now leave for his mate as a comfort for when he himself was gone instead.

Better that this should happen now, Cassius tried to convince himself as he wound his way upward into the gap between two high, white cliff faces. Skeletal trees that had shed their foliage in ages past now pointed gnarled limbs down into the throat of the pass like crooked signposts to mark his way. Overhead, the sky remained unchanged, its orange light never wavering despite his progress.

Now he will not be alone when I am gone. For the better part of two decades, Zeke had found himself in an unusual family, cloistered away at the edge of the Seelie court with Rayce, Arynessa, and occasionally, Baelerithon. Although Rayce had long since ceased to require any more training or care from his tutor, Zeke had chosen to stay with the boy while the child remained tethered to the Court by his mother's cruel leash. Quite unintentionally, Zeke had become the father the boy had never known, and in turn, Rayce had been the son that Zeke had never had. Despite the closeness of their bond, though, the ex-Shadowhunter had continued to conceal his relationship with Cassius, too fearful of judgement for his chosen mate, and he had refused to take up permanent residence in the Rift when pressed.

Now, all of the secrecy had been dispelled, and both men were free to live their lives in the Mortal realm. Zeke would find happiness with his new family as Rayce and Sera welcomed their children into the world. A Consul with no hate in his heart now ruled the City of Glass, and bore Zeke no ill-will even in light of his checkered past and the sentence of exile handed down by Imogen Herondale all those years ago. At long last, Ezekiel Hightower was home, his life come full circle, and he would be safe without his powerful Seelie benefactor.

Cassius nodded to himself. They will all be safe. His would be the final life given in the defense of this world against demonkind. Too well did he know the histories of other realms that had not succeeded in their great battle against the darkness. The story of Edom had been told time and again in recent memory as the Shadowhunters and their allies had been drawn into its wasteland in their battle against Sebastian Morgenstern and his Endarkened. They had had a bracing reminder of the price for failure, and had spread the tale far and wide upon their return until there was hardly a Nephilim alive who did not know of the doomed last stand of the Shadowhunters there.

The air around him grew heavier as he neared the far end of the pass, and he slowed cautiously, skirting sideways to take what shelter he could along the rock walls. His keen eyes darted left and right in search of threats, but all remained quiet around him. He inhaled deeply through his nose and was greeted by a fetid reek that smelled of damp leaves rotting in a pool of their own decay. The mouth of the valley yawned open a few hundred meters ahead.

Deep-seated instincts rumbled a warning in his chest, and he dared to glance up at the craggy outcroppings above.

Withered, dried-out husks of unrecognizable plants poked out from niches above, poorly-woven as if by mad birds, their brittle chaff supported by twigs and branches torn from the barren trees that lined the entrance to the pass on either side. Bits of feather and fluff fluttered gently around the edges, stirred by the light breeze that exhaled with every sigh of the land. Dark stains ran down the cliff faces below the ledges as macabre heraldry.

Nests.

No sound reached his ears, and he took care with every step he laid, each one softer than a cat's paw. As Zeke had warned him, he was completely unable to use his gift this deep in the twisting realm of Deep Faerie, and he had no desire to test his torahk-na against the creatures who had made those nests.

He only dared to breathe freely again once he was clear of the pass and striding more quickly down into the dense thicket of vegetation that had consumed the valley. He glanced back frequently, his eyes scanning for any sign of movement up along the cliffs, but the land remained dead between the white walls in stark contrast with the great, thorn-covered shoots that emerged from the harsh soil and curled in on themselves before plunging back into the earth in places. Each one was at least ten feet across, with some swelling to nearly twice that. Thorns of a deep shade of red erupted along the twisted coils, each one wickedly tipped with blackened barbs. A tangled network of smaller creepers and trailers arced overhead between the archways created by the unnatural plants, closing away the sky as he descended further into the valley with each step. Smaller, thinner versions of the thorny roots grew all throughout the increasingly thick underbrush, their spiky leaves mottled by a creeping black and green spotting that seemed to choke away their native red colouring.

As if to toy with him, the light of the land dimmed above, fading quickly to a murky periwinkle over the vale. Shadows fell around him, and the air became noticeably cooler as a false night approached. Any other Seelie caught so far from home in this wicked place may have felt fear, felt the subtle warning to turn back, but Cassius only allowed himself the tiniest of smiles. The throats of corruptisia blooms were a luminescent orange once they opened, and they would only become easier to find in the coming darkness.

He slipped through the thicket like a shadow, grinning to himself, much as he had in Brocelind Forest when he had led Jace Herondale on a merry hunt just...

...days ago?

Doubt wormed its way into his mind, tinged with worry. There was no way of telling which way time would turn this deep in the Faerie realm. It was just as likely that he would emerge ten years too late as it was that he could return ten minutes after his departure. For all his strength, even he could not bend the land to his will. With the wrong twist of fate, Baelerithon could win. A flash of foreboding rippled through him. An image of Idris took shape in his mind, its verdant landscape drained of life until all that remained was ash, the world systematically siphoned by a creature that should have remained forever barred from its lands by the wards set in place ages ago.

He shook his head distractedly and pushed away the thought dismissively through a light fog that had crept insidiously into his consciousness.

Cassius froze.

He counted his shallow breaths as he forcefully expelled the lingering corruption from his mind and drew his mental shields in tighter.

I should have thought to do so sooner, he berated himself silently. How long had he been quietly falling under the influence of the subversive flora of the valley? Not even the Greater Fey were immune to the effects of Deep Faerie. This place had a way of pulling one's thoughts this way and that until they lost sight of their goal and found themselves wandering aimlessly, easy prey for the darker creatures that made their homes here.

No sooner did he have the thought than he heard a rustle low in the brush to his right.

His hands drifted down to the handles of the torahk-na looped at his hips. He remained absolutely still, his eyes straining to pull in more of the fading light to see what manner of creature had crossed his path.

The dim outline of one chitinous claw peeked out from under a clump of broad, flat fronds at about the height of his thigh, nearly twenty feet away. With growing dread, Cassius took in the tangled, enclosed nature of his surroundings and came to accept that his favoured weapons would not fare well in close quarters.

He heard the tell-tale clicking of eager mandibles just as two clusters of three glowing red eyes each blinked open through a gap in the leaves.

Ravagers.

The insect-like monsters dwelled in the low-lands of Deep Faerie, and he had not been careful enough on his approach to detect their presence, lost in dark thoughts no doubt fanned to life by the nearby corruptsia.

A old memory flickered in the back of his mind with a hint of unease.

They hunt in...

Stabbing pain lanced through his left calf, drawing a yell of pain and shattering the silence of the vale.

...packs.

Cassius snapped the silvery length of one of the torahk-na in a tightly controlled lash before he even had a chance to turn around to spy the monster that had crept up behind him while he had been paying mind to the one before him. Ear-splitting screeches followed the swipe as he parted the ravager's head from its body in one quick motion.

Answering shrieks mewled from the darkness and the greenery around him rocked angrily in response as more of the beasts rushed forward to attack the intruder in their midst. The Faerie crouched low and pivoted on his right heel, searching for an opening that would allow him to flee. He was swift; he knew he could outrun-

He stumbled as he unthinkingly placed weight on his injured left leg and sent a new wave of teeth-gritting agony through his body. His breath hissed in response as he quickly shifted his balance back to his right side just in time to meet the first of the ravagers that barrelled into him.

Snarling wordlessly, he slashed out long and low with one of the serrated edges of the torahk-na, skimming just above the ground and carving through hardened chitin in a powerful stroke that cut the legs out from under three of the monsters on his right side before they could reach him. His left hand flicked in a seemingly delicate arc that left devastation in its wake for two more of his attackers. Each movement was made small out of necessity for the tight confines of the thicket.

Screams ripped from the gaping jaws of the pack as papery wings rose from deep red carapaces banded in black markings, their dry membranes vibrating with rage as they lifted. The noise was ungodly, and it was all Cassius could do not to drop his weapons and cover his sensitive ears.

He twisted dangerously to his right as a ravager charged in behind the leading edge of one of his attacks too late for him to reverse its momentum, so he hunched in on himself while flaring his remaining wing wide to keep it out of reach as a claw tore down his left shoulder in a furrow of searing pain. As quick as thought, his right-hand torahk-na sliced around low and fast to peel the monster off in an upward cut fueled by anger.

His entire arm jerked awkwardly and he nearly lost his grip on the handle as it stopped abruptly, unintentionally smashing the grip up into the spittle-flecked maw of the ravager before it could sink its teeth into his wounded shoulder. Something very close to panic shot through his chest as he flicked his eyes to the right and saw that the razor-sharp edge of his weapon had bitten deep into one of the huge, thorny shoots that coiled up out of the ground.

Cassius dropped the handle immediately and slammed his right hand into the creature's skull, desperately pushing back against its strength as it struggled to reach his vulnerable neck with its teeth again. With a scream of fury, the Faerie jammed his thumb down into the cluster of glowing eyes and pushed in sickeningly.

The ravager went berserk, its clawed limbs flailing wildly as it piercingly shrieked its agony. Black blood poured down Cassius' hand and coated his wrist and forearm as he savagely tore into the other eyes with his fingers and ripped away part of the monster's face.

Only instinct saved him when the body dropped, and he swivelled on his back foot to duck even as he cracked out with his left-hand torahk-na from low to high. Venom dripped from the jaws that snapped shut just inches overhead, and then the two halves of the ravager landed on either side of him, showering him with hot, sticky blood. He dashed his forearm across his eyes to clear his vision and switched the torahk-na to his right hand.

The high-pitched keening that tore from the ravagers shrilled down his spine and burrowed into his brain to shred his mental defenses. The surviving three monsters quivered at the edge of his reach, their wings fully-extended menacingly as they teetered forward and back, no longer certain they wanted to continue the fight. They shrieked and spit their hate for him.

He cradled his left arm close to his body, but squared with them, his own wing lifting behind him to add to his size. He brandished his remaining torahk-na, twisting the handle cruelly to illustrate his intent for them if they wished to press the suit. Blood streamed down his left side from both shoulder and calf, but he allowed no weakness to show in his stance.

The lead ravager hissed and slavered at the scent of so much blood in the air, and Cassius read its decision in its six red eyes a moment before it launched itself at him with the help of its wings. The other two hung back just a moment longer, waiting for him to engage before initiating their own strike. It was lose-lose.

The torahk-na hummed through the air in front of Cassius in a corkscrewing whirl of deadly steel to intercept the ravager screeching toward him with outstretched claws. The other two creatures scrabbled after the other, each one flanking the wounded Faerie to box him in.

Killing edges sheared off first the right and then the left wing of the ravager in flight as the length of the weapon spiralled tightly around the beast, and then Cassius snapped his arm down and back. The torahk-na looped around the ravager's thorax and severed it cleanly from the rest of its carcass. The fine mist of blood had not even reached him when the final two ravagers struck from each side.

Already favouring his left side, Cassius spun to protect it from further damage, and the monster leapt instead onto his back. The other creature bowled into his legs and sent all three combatants tumbling down into the blood-slicked grass around the Faerie. The remaining torahk-na slipped out of his gore-soaked hand, useless now.

A sickening crunch lifted a howl from Cassius' lips as he crushed his own wing between his back and the ravager that still clung to him when they landed. He kicked furiously at the other even as its claws shredded his thigh. It was too dangerous to even think about trying to reach for the short dirk in his boot while those gnashing teeth snapped so wildly.

Mandibles clicked in his right ear and he used the sound as locating, his powerful hands reaching up over his shoulder to grasp the creature's jaw and pull... pull...

The maddening screeches rose to panicked chittering as the pressure built. Cassius struck out with his knee blindly and connected with the other ravager, buying himself the moment he needed to finish the first.

With a brutal wrench, he tore out the ravager's jawbone and gagged as its blood spurted over his face and into his gasping mouth.

The last monster disentangled itself from Cassius' legs and punishing kicks, rearing up on its back legs in fury before slamming back down over him, its talons driving into his chest to pin him for the kill.

Hard, black-leather armour held firm under the strike, the harness saving his life from what would have been a fatal blow.

Putrid yellow underbelly loomed over him, and Cassius stiffened his fingers under the links of the gloves he wore to handle the torahk-na. He struck up into the soft spot just below the mesosternum, punching through the thinnest part of the ravager's carapace easily, the shell breaking like spun glass. A gush of ichor splashed out as he closed his fist around something soft and hot and tore downward with the last of his strength.

The body spasmed manically and dropped heavily across his torso to ooze steaming blood and entrails down his abdomen. He rolled onto his right side with a low groan that was a mixture of pain and disgust. He shoved at the carcass and wiggled out from under it gingerly, careful to avoid the slashes ripped along his thighs and shoulder.

He levered himself up into a sitting position and exhaled, shaken by the encounter. The shrill calls of the dead ravagers echoed in his ears like an annoying buzz that refused to be dispelled as he worked the dirk free from his right boot top and set to work slicing strips from the bottoms of his favoured leather pants to bind his wounds. He did as much as he could, but when it came to the sharp pain in the radius of his wing, there was nothing for it. When he tried to fold it tight against his body to lash it in place, the bone screamed in protest and he was forced to leave it as it was. He rose unsteadily to his feet and tested its weight. It was all he could do to keep the tip from dragging in the grass.

Clenching his teeth, he tried a few steps and let his breath hiss quietly through his lips. He would not win any footraces any time soon. He shuffled to retrieve his fallen torahk-na and looped them at his hips once more. Wary of leaving the dirk out of easy reach if he were to become entangled once more, he slipped the sheath behind the low-slung waistband of his pants so that he could feel it pressing into the small of his back.

A dull, throbbing pulse started to build in the Faerie's head from the echoing remnants the ravager cries, and he rubbed at his temples wearily. His fingers left smears in the thin mask of blood across his face.

With greater care than before, and a new limp that compromised his ability to move quietly, Cassius crept forward through the tangled thicket that protected the valley below, eager to leave the scent of blood and violence behind. It would only be a matter of time before more creatures were drawn to the fresh carrion, and he needed to be long gone before they came.

The sky continued to darken overhead and true night began to fall, as deep as that of any new moon in the Mortal realm. Worry edged his thoughts, and he no longer cared to push it away. For the first time in a long time, he was afraid. Shadows ran parallel to him in the underbrush, but he could not seem to get a lock on them, as if they were not there at all. He blinked rapidly to clear the phantasms with only partial success, and more doubt crept into him at his ability to continue fighting the Faerie realm.

While he could measure neither time nor distance in this place, he marked the passing of the land using landmarks, and it was not long before he broke free of the constrictive underbrush and knelt silently on the valley floor to survey the deceptive quiet of the darkness.

Wind that was not wind whispered through the long grass and made the stalks sway soothingly, beckoning him to lay down and rest his tired body, if only for a few moments. The temptation was overwhelming. His injuries ached and burned, and mounting fear gnawed at him that the ravagers may have had venom in their claws. He wondered how long he had left if they did.

Zeke.

Cassius brought his mate to mind and struggled to bend the image into a shield to hold back his weariness and keep it from consuming him. He allowed himself to imagine what sort of raging abuse the ex-Shadowhunter would hurl at him if he could see the state the Faerie was in now. The quick explosion of anger followed by gruff coddling mixed with quiet reprimand. He permitted himself a small smile in response.

Glitters of orange twinkled at the far end of the open field like ghostly candles, sparkling in and out of sight as the false breeze played through the drooping leaves that lay hidden by darkness and distance.

He felt his heart speed up in response. Finally.

The feathery light touch of the grass under his feet was cool, the blades somehow dampened as if by evening dew that surely did not exist in this place. He advanced in a low crouch despite the burning in his leg, the curve of his back level with the tallest stalks, his injured wing draped across his shoulder limply and trailing behind him.

He expected to be attacked with every step, to see eyes rise out of the sea of grass and converge on him, but nothing moved in the shrouded valley save himself.

It was not until he was once more enfolded by the edge of the next thorny thicket that continued its sprawl toward the heart of the valley that he allowed himself to breathe freely again. Under the sheltering coils of the great limbs, he dropped heavily to his knees in front of the first orange bulb he saw.

Deeper veins in shades of amber and russet pulsed in a delicate network around the luminescent, rigid lobes. The flower was longer than his hand, if only half as wide as it tapered to a point. The pure white stalk of a pistil rose delicately above the deeper gold filaments supporting anthers coloured like burnished brass. Strange, that such a beautiful flower could have such an insidious purpose.

A slight tremor ran through his right hand as he reached back to draw the dirk from its sheath, and he could not tell if the quavering stemmed from fear, exhaustion, or relief. A runnel of sweat slid down his upper lip and he tasted the tang of salt.

Instead of the smooth leather he was expecting, his fingers brushed along the soft skin of a hand already wrapped around the hilt. Alarm crashed through him as he twisted around awkwardly and pushed himself away in a panic, his heels digging into the grass. His wing shuddered alongside him, carving a ragged swath of hissing pain in its wake.

Tilted black eyes regarded him bemusedly, their empty depths a promise of everything Cassius had hoped to escape through his duplicity. The meagre light threw sharp shadows across a cruel face. Jiahao's tongue snaked out to taste the blade in his hand, and his generous lips lifted into a smile of pleasure.

"Too long since last I had a taste of you, my love," he drawled languorously.

Disbelief warred with fear in the Cassius' heart. "You... you cannot be here." He closed his eyes and willed the other away, but the Seelie Lord still crouched casually before him, dirk in hand.

"Who else would be strong enough to follow you to this place?" Jiahao sallied back in challenge.

Confusion clouded the one-winged Faerie's mind. It was impossible. "You... why?"

"To protect my investment." A hard edge crept into the other man's voice. "Did you think I would not unravel your gambit? That I would not be wroth with you when I learned that you had no intention of honoring your word?" He tsked under his breath. "No, no. I am quite disappointed in you."

"The Queen will lift-"

Jiahao sprang forward and bore Cassius to the ground, pinning him. "The Queen will be dead or worse long before she can ever make good on her mother's bargain," he seethed angrily. "I have seen the monster that wears her brother's face, seen what he has done to the Mortal world, and seen what he still intends to do. His rage burns for her, the half-breed, and that golden-eyed chit. They will vanish into his madness and never be seen again."

In his weakened state, Cassius could not overpower the other, as once he had. With all the grace of a practiced predator, Jiahao used his superior strength to flip his one-time lover face-down, grinding a knee into the small of his back.

"But you," the sadistic Faerie continued in a snarl, "You will not run from my side nor betray me again. You will not vanish so easily, not after today." Steel glinted in the soft orange light thrown by the corruptisia, and true terror ripped through Cassius when he felt the sickeningly-familiar fingers seize the base of his wing. He bucked wildly, frantic to throw the other off before the blade-

White-hot agony sliced through his flesh followed by the jarring, ragged sawing of the dirk through muscle and sinew as it savagely cut to the bone.

A throat-rending scream tore out of Cassius and his already-bloody fingers ripped fistfuls of earth from the ground. He thrashed and writhed in agony, his hoarse cries overshadowed by the dark laughter of his tormentor.

There had never been anything like this blazing, searing pain in all of his centuries, not even when he had lost his right wing. Back then, it had been a gift given in a haze of intoxication and years of hidden manipulation as Jiahao had treacherously dangled hooks into his mind to reel in the greatest prize of his immortal life. But this...

The final crack as the cartilage broke reverberated through his entire body and he collapsed forward, the familiar weight gone forever. He could not see the exiled Seelie Lord above him, but he felt as the other sat back on his heels and lifted the severed wing reverently.

"I have always wanted the set," he breathed reverently, a beatific smile stretching across his face even as blood dripped from his fingers and Cassius shuddered under his knees.

Shock began to set in, and he felt himself drifting into unconsciousness gratefully. Oblivion would be welcome after this horror. He felt Jiahao's weight shift above him, but he found that he no longer seemed to care. The last scion of the Angel of Solitude and Tears finally felt those tears that were his birthright fall upon his face, and if he had had any strength left, he would have felt a sob wrack his tortured body.

I am... broken.

He did not know for how long he laid in the grass insensate before a piercing cry screeched across the sky from the way he had come, shattering the stillness of the night as surely as his own screams had. The noise irritated him, stirring him from the stupor that had settled in. The call had the sound of a bird of prey, and it was answered by others, as if a cast of falcons had taken wing.

Taken... wing...

He pressed his face into the earth more insistently as if he could drown out the clarion call and caught himself on the edge of wishing for death. He did not recognize what was left of himself, and that startling unfamiliarity jarred him back into a mind left ravaged by the vicissitudes of Deep Faerie.

Silently, without moving, he performed a slow inventory of his body and was further roused by the surprise that registered. Jiahao had visited no further horrors upon him while he had laid helpless. One grey eye slipped open and he turned his head painfully to the left, his neck cramped from the angle at which he had sprawled in the grass. The dark expanse of his wing stretched out down his side, and he instinctively flinched away from the memory of its mutilation.

It moved with him.

A sharp ache spiked along the radius that had been injured in his tussle with the ravager, but nothing more. He pushed himself up, stunned, and reached back to feel where it rose from his back.

Still whole.

His mind struggled to catch up, to understand, even as his eyes scanned the area for Jiahao. Instead, they settled on the innocent-looking corruptisia bloom just a few feet away, its glowing lobes pulsing gently as the wind tickled the bulbs of its anthers.

All... in my mind.

Revulsion turned his stomach at the horrific effect the plant could have, and it was with a grim sense of finality that he took hold of the dirk that had never left its sheathe at his back. He crawled forward and pinched the stem below the calyx, cutting the heavy flower free without ceremony.

The same, shrill call sounded from the darkened sky again, closer this time, and brought Cassius fully back to himself as he pieced together the mystery of what it was. His pitched battle with the ravagers had been too close to their nests, too loud, and he had so conveniently given away his location here by falling under the influence of the corruptisia. They knew there was quarry in the field, and all that remained was to run him to ground.

Like an animal.

Shadows dashed through the grass all around him and he took a swipe at one with his torahk-na. Stalks sheared cleanly in half with hardly a sound.

No cries, no blood.

Nothing... there.

He pressed his palms to his eyes and pushed until he saw stars, silently fighting back the urge to scream his frustration away. The hard mesh of the gloves dug in to his skin and the pain grounded him again. He groped at the mush his thoughts had become and held on to the most important.

Have to move. Staying means death.

As if to mock him, his injured leg throbbed insistently when he rose to his feet. He kept to the deeper shadows beneath the towering coils of thorny roots, slipping as quietly as he could along the edge in an effort to put some distance between his original track and the path he would need to take to get back out of the valley.

No stars shone overhead, no twinkling lights to betray where the monsters were in the sky. The only comfort his fear-touched mind took was that they would be equally blind to his presence. Stealth was his only ally in this chase.

When he had judged that he had gone far enough, he cut sideways into the long grass once more, crouching even lower than he had the first time. Only an immortal lifetime of discipline gave him the patience to move just inches at a time, conscious of how much more of an advantage his pursuers had from the sky, how easy it would be for them to spot their prey if the land had not sought to play with him by shifting to true night as a deterrent from his purpose.

Despite the blood that ran in his veins, despite all that made him one of the Greater Fey, he was not of this realm, and it was keen to punish him for his intrusion so deep into Faerie where both the Seelie and Unseelie alike were so very unwelcome.

Dawn began to break on the horizon, faster than any sunrise in the Mortal world.

Although schooled to outward silence, Cassius allowed a veritable flood of Zeke's most creative curses to spill through his mind, only to cut them off a moment later when they were drowned out by a wave of anxiety. He was running out of options.

The Faerie picked up his pace, biting the inside of his cheek to keep from crying out as his leg protested. Bent as he was, he was forced into an ungainly hobble, his wing dragging in his wake and disturbing even more of the grass. He winced, already knowing that he was far too visible in the growing light, but also knowing that the treeline could not be far now. He lifted his head to check his progress and stumbled in dismay.

The distance had doubled.

Frustration howled through him and he abandoned his commitment to stealth, breaking from his meagre cover to dash across the sea of grass, adrenaline masking the pain.

Renewed shrieks shattered the false morning, and he caught a glimpse of red wings and pale bodies banking in the sky above where he had clipped the corruptisia bloom. The sturdy lobes in his hand still burned with their strange light. He only had until the glow completely faded to get it back to the warlock Magnus Bane before it died and its power was lost. He had to protect it until then.

He was one hundred paces from the edge of the thicket when the first stones cast by crude slings shot past him, and an arrow that looked to have been carved from bone buried itself in the ground an arm's length to his right. He did not dare look back to see how close they were, and put on a fresh burst of agonizing speed while he darted from side to side unpredictably.

He practically flew through a gap in the prickly shoots and ducked under a snarl of creepers that dangled from another. Hardly slowing at all, he lost himself under the canopy and ran for his life. Adrenaline pumped through him and kept the worst of the pain at bay. He knew what the monsters were, and they were still creatures of the sky, unaccustomed to the ground as he had been forced to become.

A sliver of confidence crept into his heart.

A stone punched through the leaves overhead.

Cassius' feet went out from under him as the projectile sent an explosion of pain rocking through his right hip and he skidded forward on his chest along the dry-scraped valley. He could not take back the groan of dismay that escaped his lips and pinged his location to the hunters. They would close on him in seconds. With no other choice, he was forced to jam the corruptisia bloom down the front of his pants and hope that he would find a way out of this.

With a soft whistle, a thin dart fletched with a strange, springy red feathering nipped into his shoulder and he knew no more.

The first thing Cassius became conscious of upon waking was the reek. The sickly-sweet tang of rotting meat and unwashed bodies assailed his nostrils, rousing his bruised mind even as it resisted returning from the darkness once more. He struggled to command his thoughts to obey him, but it was as if his head was filled with cotton. Cautious of where he might be, he peeked through slitted eyes to observe his surroundings without revealing that he was awake.

He was laying on his back on rough stone, his wing carefully draped above him so as not to bear any of his weight. A flutter of fear rippled in his heart when he felt the cold burn of chains around his wrists securing his arms over his head, his ankles shackled similarly. It had been a very long time since he had felt the touch of cold iron upon his flesh. In sharp contrast, his wounds felt cool somehow, itching faintly under what felt like caked-on mud, but they no longer pained him. What was left of his leather half-harness had been stripped away so that he lay bare-chested upon the slab.

The tall, knife-thin cliffs of white rock that formed the pass through which he had entered the valley now rose into the sky overhead, and he felt a sinking feeling when he caught sight of more of the derelict nests lining the narrow ledges.

"You may look freely upon the Yan'tua, Seelie Lord," a woman's voice called mockingly from his left side. A faint rasp tickled the words, lending a throaty feel to the invitation that gave it an uncomfortable shading of flirtation.

Caught in his deception, Cassius turned his head to see who was speaking to him.

A sharp-faced woman reclined imperiously on a throne of crumbling bones with one leg thrown over an armrest. Greasy black hair hung in long, thin braids down to her waist, some of them knotted with bits of leather, cloth, and even what may have been teeth. Twin arches of dull, red-feathered wings stretched behind her, the ends sweeping down to the pale grey stone of the canyon floor. She had a vulpine cast to her dark features, and could perhaps have been considered lovely if it were not for her clawed feet and the talons that curved out from each finger.

The harpy trailed one of her too-long nails down the hilt of one of the torahk-na that were wound around the throne like trophies. "Beautiful weapons... beautiful Faerie..." she murmured appreciatively in a tongue he had not heard in centuries. "...lucky Sarelya."

An angry hiss on his other side signalled the displeasure of one of the other harpies, and Sarelya rose in an instant, her wings flaring wide as she hissed back at the dissenter. Once-fine scarlet cloth wrapped around her thin body and fell in strips down to her knees, shredded at some point. Cords of leather bound the material at her waist and criss-crossed up her torso to keep it in place while she flew. Shiny patches of burn scars adorned each of her shoulders, faded with age. A close-fitting choker of mismatched beads and finger bones encircled her throat, and dented bangles clattered around her wrists.

Out of the corner of his eye, Cassius watched the smaller harpy back down and skulk back a pace from the cracked altar upon which he lay. He also saw the shadows stretch and swarm, but he blinked away the hallucinations and struggled to focus, but it was difficult. His mouth was dry as dust and he wished desperately for a drink of water.

Sarelya turned her attention back to him once more, her snarl erased by a feral smile in an instant. She drew alongside him and brushed away a stray bit of hair that had escaped his braid during his fight against the ravagers.

"Forgive the less-evolved of my tribe," she purred in the same strangely-accented dialect of Faerie speech. "They look at you and see nothing more than their next meal, but I see what you are, smell what you are." She darted in quicker than thought and pressed her lips to his, breathing in deeply in satisfaction. "Taste what you are." She looked down approvingly. "Rarely do the Greater Fey of the Courts come so far into our realm, and your blood sings of your Seelie heritage. Such strength must not be wasted."

Cassius reeled from the kiss and wrenched at the chains binding him, wishing for the strength she charged him with, but it had first been taxed by the flurry of teleportation in and out of the Rift, twice bearing the children and the Queen. His pitched battle with the ravager pack and falling prey to the touch of the insidious corruptisia plant had eroded much of what had remained, and the realm had stolen away the bits that held it all together. He had never felt quite so... helpless.

Sarelya laughed in delight and ran a clawed hand lightly down the taunt muscles of his chest as he strained. She waited patiently for him to give up, using the time to instead admire his form, her touch only angering him further. He thrashed fruitlessly and felt the links burn deeper into his flesh. He drew on the pain and tried to use it to clear his head, but it only fragmented him further as panic took hold and despair began to set in. He collapsed back against the stone in defeat and fixed her with a baleful glare.

"Tribe," he spat in disgust, dredging up the nearly-forgotten words of the Deep Faerie language. "The marks of your tribe were burned from your flesh long ago. You may pretend at being a princess, but I see truly. Your tribe is nothing more than deserters and scavengers."

Sarelya nodded as if she had not just been insulted. From above his head, out of his sight, she produced a worn wooden rod with a length of leather running from either end. She seized his jaw and forced the bit between his teeth roughly, securing it in place while he thrashed his head futilely.

"My brood," she continued, waving to the others on the far side of the altar, "dwindles." A half dozen wild faces watched him, some sullenly, others excitedly, but all drew forward when Sarelya beckoned them closer. A low mewling sound escaped the lips of one as she dared to stroke the curve of his hip bone just above the low-slung waist of his pants.

The harpy leader slapped the hand away and replaced it with her own, her fingers sliding across his abdomen thoughtfully. He glared up at her with murder in his eyes. The anger gave him clarity, and he tried to use it to break free from the fog that lay across his mind.

She raked her talons against his skin almost hard enough to draw blood and bit her bottom lip thoughtfully. "It has been some time since last we had any sort of... breeding stock."

An uneven wave of tittering laughter ringed him as the harpies pressed in around the altar, and then reaching hands stretched out to skim along his body from every side. Sarelya boldly slipped her hand lower, unknowingly cupping the firm bulb of the corruptisia bloom instead of her prize. Her eyes widened in surprised excitment as she misread the situation.

Dread flared through Cassius, overpowering his fury at being pawed at like a common whore. It would not be long before the harpies progressed far enough to discover the hidden bloom, and they would no doubt destroy it as a precaution against its lingering potency.

Even knowing it was useless, he pulled at the cold iron chains with what was left of his strength, willing the links to burn deeper in another attempt to shake off the haze and confusion clouding his thoughts. The cold iron seared into him and only leeched his vitality further, weakening him even more.

One of the harpies leaned in and licked up his neck to nip at his earlobe playfully, and he wrenched his head away in disgust. His struggles only seemed to excite them further, and another of the creatures eagerly clamoured up atop the altar to straddle his hips. Her chipped claws scratched shallow lines across his abdomen as she began tearing at the button of his pants. Cassius closed his eyes and would have prayed if the Fey had worshipped any higher powers. Instead, only the patron of his mate's people came to mind, and he whispered the name in his mind.

Raziel.

Three things happened in almost the same instant.

A fleeting shadow darkened the backs of Cassius' eyelids, a yowl of pain screeched in his face, and then the weight across his hips vanished.

Sarelya disapproves, he thought to himself distantly from within the floaty void to which he had consigned his mind to spare himself bearing witness to his own rape.

A heavy crash of bodies hitting the canyon floor would have confirmed his suspicion if not for the enraged hisses, Sarelya's chief among them. A very, very familiar roar of bellowing anger followed it, and Cassius dared to look.

One bloody hand gripping his signature short sword, the other dropping a tangled clump of hair freshly scalped from the harpy who had dared to sit astride his mate, Ezekiel Hightower spat on the stone at his feet and wobbled.

"Which one of you bitches wants to go next?" he slurred, the smell of drink on him evident to Cassius' sensitive nose even from this distance.

From above, an arrow punched through the throat of another of the harpies as the shadow wheeled around again for another pass. Grim-faced Mark Blackthorn reached back for another shaft and sighted his next shot as he effortlessly guided Windspear with only his knees. Nothing of the broken Shadowhunter remained, his own fear and trauma washed away by the adrenaline high of the rescue mission.

The harpies exploded out from their ragged group in fury, two of them unfurling their dirty, unkept wings and lifting off in pursuit of the one-time Hunter. Wind rushed through Mark's white-blond hair as he banked sharply and drew them away from the rest of the tribe. Long years spent fighting from the air with Windspear under him brought memories rushing back, but they brought him no pain this time. The whisper of Kieran's voice in his heart urged him upward with the savage pleasure they had both known together for a hundred hunts before. He let his instincts take over and lost himself in the flow of battle, a true Nephilim in his prime. He raced away, the pair of harpies hard in pursuit.

Just a few feet from the altar, Zeke dropped into a defensive crouch as the remaining three harpies, Sarelya included, drew their bone blades and closed ranks against him. He teetered back on one foot for a moment, his balance not as steady as he might have liked after nearly an entire bottle of tequila, but that was all the opening they needed to spring forward on the attack.

His twin short swords, so similar in length to the seraph blades he had once wielded in his youth, parried the first four slashes from the coterie of harpies. His superior steel bit deep notches in two of the weapons and cut right through the third as he twisted away, but he was less fortunate with the fifth and sixth strikes. Both scored long rents along the gear set he had snuck out of Rayce's room while the boy had tended to his violently-ill wife in the ensuite bathroom. Sera had unknowingly provided all the cover noise he had needed to escape unnoticed. The jacket was too tight across his shoulders, limiting his movement, but he managed to dodge back and pivot away from the next sallies, ducking under one bony arm and slicing back with his off-hand to spill the now unarmed harpy's guts.

They were faster and had the advantage of sobriety, but he was better armed and armoured. Fighting drunk was not as foreign to him as it probably should have been, but Cassius had left him with very little choice in the matter. He was gambling that the alcohol would give his mind a cushion from the effect of deep Faerie, and if all else failed, getting black-out drunk would hopefully scrub his entire memory of ever being in this Angel-forsaken place.

A bone blade came arcing back in toward him to scrape along the tough panel that protected his thigh, and he forced himself to focus on the matter at hand. The smaller remaining harpy danced away from his three quick retaliatory thrusts, luring the ex-Shadowhunter further from Sarelya and giving her the time she needed to free the blowgun she had used to bring down Cassius.

As if sensing the danger, Zeke unwisely whipped his head around and a wave of dizziness caused him to lose his footing just in time, the feathered dart puffing past him harmlessly.

"Now that -," he huffed, "wasn't -," he heaved himself back to knees, "very -," he dropped the hilt in his right hand and closed his fingers around the neck of the tequila bottle tucked into his belt, "nice!" He hurled the glass bottle across the distance between himself and Sarelya and felt a deep sense of satisfaction as it connected solidly with her face, temporarily stunning her. "Bloody waste-," he parried a thrust from the other harpy, "of perfectly-," he belched and deflected the riposte that followed, "bad tequila." He buried his blade in her chest after a failed overhead feint and then tore it free, spinning away partially for style points, and partially because he couldn't quite remember which foot was supposed to be holding his balance. One of them, for sure. I've said it once and I'll say it again. Damn good feet. Put up with a lot of sh-

A second dart whistled past his head as one of those damn good feet failed to support him, and he stumbled to his knees in a fall that seemed to happen all at once. One second he was standing, the next he had an up-close view of the hair on the backs of his fingers as he braced himself heavily on his hands.

Clawed feet swam into his line of sight, filthy and trailing anklets woven with feathers and beads.

The fu-

Understanding clicked, despite the tequila.

He flung up his right arm in a wild arc and was rewarded by a scream of pain, a spray of blood, and the addition of four taloned finger tips to the ground in front of him. A blackened-bone kris bounced harmlessly off the back of his jacket and, inspired, he launched himself forward in a roaring rugby tackle. Zeke bowled into Sarelya's ribs hard enough to hear her brittle flyer's bones snap, and they both plowed backwards in a tangled mess until he crushed her against the side of the altar where Cassius lay in a daze.

The harpy howled in pain at the impact, and the ex-Shadowhunter fell sideways as the abrupt change in momentum disoriented his hopelessly inebriated body again. Silver stars shot across his vision as he landed, and he foolishly shook his head to try to banish them. Everything spun around him and he felt his stomach lurch traitorously. He swallowed the gorge and tried to push himself up again with his empty left hand, the short sword lost somewhere.

"Stop!" The harpy seethed, her breathing shallow as she cradled her mutilated right hand to her breast. Zeke squeezed his eyes shut for a moment and commanded the two harpies standing at the altar to merge and become one again. A semblance of clarity returned and he was able to see that the claws of her left hand were clenched tightly over Cassius' throat. Blood pumped from the stumps of the fingers on her other hand, darkening the already-scarlet dress and staining the bits of cloth braided into her long hair as she wound what was left of her hand into the folds to try to stem the bleeding. "Drop it," she hissed, her eyes intent on his remaining short sword.

Zeke's head felt like someone had stuffed a bass drum full of angry raccoons and abandoned using the pedal in favour of simply kicking it as if it had done them a great, personal injustice. Although he could see Cassius, the harpy bitch, and where her claws were, it was not registering the way it should. He remained as motionless as a man can with that much alcohol in his blood, which is to say, he swayed unevenly.

"Now!" She squeezed lightly and four beads of blood welled up under the tips of her talons to run freely down Cassius neck. To his credit, the Faerie waited impassively, unable to tell if this was any more real than his encounter with Jiahao had been, or if he were still locked in the prison of his mind by the influence of the corruptisia bloom.

The blade clattered to the stone.

"Lie face down," she ordered the ex-Shadowhunter, her teeth gritted in pain. Escape was still an option, and she fully intended to buy her freedom with the Seelie's life if it seemed to mean so much to this insane Mortal. She was a survivor, not a deserter.

Dread filled Zeke. He didn't know if harpies knew how tequila worked, but he was pretty sure that if he laid down right now, he would black out. The only thing keeping him going was the adrenaline of the fight, and that precious juice was draining away with every passing second of the stalemate. So he did the next best thing.

He flashed his most winning smile with however many of the muscles in his face were still obeying his will, and he waved merrily at her.

Sarelya's confused scowl transformed into a surprised gurgle as for a second time that night/day/whatever, an arrow tip ripped through a harpy's throat. Her hand spasmed open in shock and she made a motion as if to try to grasp the killing shaft.

Zeke pointed up and slurred happily, "Betcha forgot about him, didn'tcha?"

Mark guided Windspear back down to the canyon floor with ease, his movements filled with a confidence that had been absent for the better part of two decades. Battling the two harpies who had come in pursuit had woken the part of him that he so desperately wished to have back, and he let himself enjoy what it meant to feel fully alive again. Whatever part of him the Hunt still claimed, it could not take this part away, not entirely. He whispered soothingly to the Faerie steed and rubbed one flank affectionately after he slid down to help his newfound friend find the key to Cassius' chains.

When Zeke had barged into Mark's room and seized him by the scruff of his neck, reeking of drink, the younger man had not resisted, and that had only seemed to enrage the stripped Shadowhunter further.

"You have to fight back, kid! You're not a goddamned mouse, you're a Shadowhunter. Act like it!"

Mark had tried to protest, to explain, but the other man had seemed possessed, pulling him down the servant's staircase at the back of the manor and well away from where Cristina was keeping a careful eye on the girls while they played in the orchard. His target had become clear as the roof of the stable became visible.

Inside, Zeke had jammed a finger into Mark's chest.

"Now you need to make a choice, and I'm gonna tell you the same thing someone I love once told me: You can either keep playing the victim and letting all the bullshit that's happened to you continue to tell you what you can and can't do, or you can tell it all to fuck right off." He had taken a long draw on the bottle jammed into his belt, the foul drink inside sloshing below the halfway point. His breath could have caught fire if his eyes had burned any hotter. "Well, he probably said it prettier, but it's all the same shit, different pile."

They passed a black horse quietly nibbling at some hay in one of the open stalls and then a familiar white-maned head poked out of the adjacent carrel. Windspear whickered happily in recognition upon seeing Mark, and a tendril of fear crept into his belly, twisting his gut.

Zeke's arm had slammed him into the wall, startling both steeds with its suddenness.

"No," he had snarled. "Don't give in to the doubt, the fear. I don't need a goddamned coward right now, I need a Hunter. You're the only one who knows how to get into that place, and you can do it without going batshit crazy. The good news is that I'm already batshit crazy, and you're gonna get me to my idiot." He had touched his chest, over his heart. "He's in over his head this time; I know it. So make a choice, boy. Be a mouse or be a hero."

So he had chosen. Chosen to return to Deep Faerie, chosen to embrace all the memories that riding Windspear brought back, chosen to find a way to say goodbye to Kieran's memory at last. He might never have the chance to find the Hunter who had murdered his one-time lover, but he could at least do this small part in bringing them all down. He was not like the others around the Manor, he knew that. They had all come together to find a way to put an end to all of the newly-Unbound Hunters and Rayce's half-brother, Baelerithon. Mark had only brought his family there to hide. But this... this felt like he was part of the fight, part of something more. He felt the same way he had when he had heeded the Horn's call to the hills outside of Ojala, when he had helped them bring down the dragon demons. This was how he was supposed to feel. Not a creature of the Hunt, but one blessed by the Angel.

Zeke threw a small rock at Mark to snap him out of his reverie. "Are gonna help or not?"

By the time Mark found the key hidden in a skull on the armrest of the throne of bones, Zeke was in bad shape. He retched once, twice, the liquor burning through him like fire. His hands shook as he took the key and struggled to fit it into the lock of the manacles. Cassius' grey eyes fluttered open at his touch, still drifting in and out of lucidity with the waxing and waning of the harpy drug in his system, the sustained influence of the corruptisia, and the very nature of Deep Faerie wearing at the edges of his poorly-defended mind.

"Ezekiel..." he whispered wonderingly. "Wh-... what are you doing here?"

Zeke grunted in satisfaction as he finally managed to get the key in and turn it. "What does it look like I'm doing, you idiot? I'm saving my goddamned damsel in distress." He belched, felt a lump of bile rise with it, and swallowed uncomfortably. "I told you that you needed me."

A faint smile curled the edges of Cassius' sculpted lips and he closed his eyes for a moment. "I will always need you."

"Now you're getting it."

Slowly, gingerly, Zeke peeled the chains away from the cold scorch tracks burned into Cassius' wrists, the grisly work keeping his heart grounded even if his vision was blurring miserably and fading in and out. Once freed, the Seelie sat up carefully and edged off the altar, anxious to get away from it. His wing sagged behind him under its crude bindings and he grimaced for a moment before giving up and letting it hang limply.

Mark twisted his left hand over his heart in a Faerie gesture of respect and knelt before him. "My Lord, if you will direct me, I can find the valley of which you spoke and bring back the clipping with all haste." His blue-green Blackthorn eyes shifted sideways to glance at where Zeke was leaning heavily against the stone block with his head in his hands. "We must not tarry long."

"Nor shall we, " Cassius replied. Without a trace of shame, he produced the corruptisia bulb from its hiding place and lifted it for a quick examination. The muted orange glow still pulsed lightly from within, kept safe by the Faerie's body heat and only a little worse for wear despite its treatment.

Zeke inhaled sharply and choked on his own spit.

"Did you... did you just-" He coughed violently to clear his airway. "Was that an evil plant in your pocket, or were you just happy to see me?" He dissolved into a fit of drunken giggles and doubled over the altar, wheezing.

Mark turned away politely and nickered to Windspear to bring the mount closer to the weakened Faerie and his completely hammered mate. Without a word, Cassius slipped his uninjured right shoulder under one of Zeke's arms and hobbled toward the waiting horse despite the revival of the pain in his leg from the ravager wounds under the crude harpy poultices. Mark swung up into place and reached down to help haul the ex-Shadowhunter up behind him. Zeke was utterly unhelpful in the process.

When the man was fairly well-settled and muttering protests that he was fine, Cassius limped back to the throne to reclaim his torahk-na and the gloves he wore with them. He left the remains of his harness on the canyon floor; it was more trouble than it was worth to bring it back. With his weapons back in place on his hips once more, he clenched his teeth, took what little room remained behind Zeke on Windspear's back, and reached forward to twist his fingers into the Blackthorn boy's belt loops, safely caging his mage between them.

"Take us home, master Hunter," Cassius urged in a quiet voice, more than a little concerned for Zeke.

"No no no nonono, wait," Zeke mumbled quickly.

All three of them went still.

With a sudden, lurching wrench, the human heaved the contents of his stomach over Windspear's flank in a splatter of regret. The Faerie steed danced sideways in annoyance at the mess and tossed her head. Zeke twisted his face down and scrubbed his mouth against the shoulder of Rayce's gear, then let his head fall forward against Mark's neck gratefully with half a grin plastered across his face.

"I'm good. I'm so good now. I'm goooooooooooood."

**Author's note:

I got some excellent insight and advice on my writing back in January when I had the opportunity to meet Pierce Brown on the Iron Gold tour (he is WAY cooler in real life than you can imagine if you haven't met him - it's completely worth whatever distance you need to travel or line you need to wait in to do so, if the opportunity arises). Now that I've gotten clear of Ch 16, I'm going to try to apply some of his direction to Ch 17, so let's hope it comes faster. -.- Still cut off physio since the last posting, but trying to get treatment through alternative avenues while I continue to battle my insurance company. The sooner my neck is back in one piece, the sooner I'll be able to withstand my 13-hour days of solid writing that I used to do :(