Adam lay on his side against the wall, helmet crooked, blood sliding down his temple. His fingers twitched as if the hand belonged to someone else.

  Even so, Adam forced a palm up and rasped, “Forgive me, my Lord. I failed you.”

  Wilt Norcutt stiffened at the title.

  Behind Coop Bevin, where empty air had been a heartbeat earlier, a man in white stepped in as if the room itself had made space for him. No flash. No sound. Tall, pale hair falling to his shoulders, eyes the color of a winter sky. In a bar full of smoke and blood, the spotless clothes looked obscene.

  The newcomer studied Adam and spoke with calm sympathy. “It’s all right, Adam. You did what you could. This isn’t your fault.”

  A hand rose, palm up.

  “I grant you mercy.”

  Adam Graf did not slump. His body broke into dusty light, into a fine haze, and vanished as if erased. Only blood and dented metal remained.

  Something hot climbed the back of Wilt’s throat.

  The giant swung first.

  A chainblade arced toward the man in white and stopped in midair, metal meeting something like invisible glass. Sparks skittered and died.

  Coop fired the plasma rifle. The shots struck the same unseen point and simply disappeared.

  Wilt snapped, “Coop, back. Now.”

  Coop obeyed at once. Bevin gave ground in two heavy steps, reading the warning in the air itself.

  The man in white turned those blue eyes on Wilt. “Norcutt, congratulations. You killed an opponent who surpassed you in knowledge and power. That was good work.”

  Wilt did not blink. “Who are you. Sperare’s leader.”

  A thin smile answered. “Sperare is a hired gang. Leading it would be beneath me.”

  Lothar von Finsterherz pushed up onto an elbow, skull ringing, throat raw. He rose anyway, swayed, and drove an ugly surge of aura straight at the stranger.

  A fist tapped the air.

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  The aura tore apart like cloth. Finsterherz stumbled back, nearly losing his footing, copper blooming on his tongue.

  Wilt tried something else. She slammed into the blond man’s mind, fast and vicious, the way doors got kicked in on bad nights.

  There was no fight waiting there.

  Only a flat wall of stone.

  The shock made her hesitate for a blink.

  The giant attempted a flank. One step, another, and the giant was suddenly behind the man in white. The chainblade dropped.

  The man in white slipped aside with effortless timing. “Giants,” he said, almost curious. “Only giants carry powered armor without the body tearing itself apart. Exotic.”

  A fingertip brushed Bevin’s armor.

  The plates jolted. A thin black outline flashed around the seams and vanished.

  Blood burst from under the joints.

  Coop made a strangled sound and dropped to one knee. He spat dark red onto the tile.

  Wilt swore. If the stranger finished the giant, the rest of them would be picked apart in seconds.

  She drew a breath and spoke the dragon tongue she hated to waste.

  “Khān-e mā, man-rā komak-kon: āsmān-rā gushā. Bē ra’d az āsmān oftad u in kerm-rā mahv-kon. Gom-sho dar miyān-e kharābehā!”

  She coughed, and blood threaded down her chin.

  Thunder hit like a hammer.

  The bar blew apart. Glass turned into shrapnel, tables jumped, walls shuddered. Heat rolled through the room.

  When the glare faded, the man in white still stood untouched.

  Everyone else was still alive too, as if a dome had taken the blast and let it spill away from flesh.

  The stranger watched Wilt with new interest. “A spell that strong. You taught Adam that, didn’t you. Beautiful. Adam used it against me once.”

  Wilt wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, barely getting air past the burn in her throat. “What are you.”

  The man in white looked down at Bevin, who tried to rise and couldn’t.

  Coop’s voice came out through a cough. “Inquisitor, move. This is a high-caliber load. He can fire it only once.”

  Wilt grabbed Finsterherz by the shoulder and hauled him sideways, wrapping both bodies in a thin layer of aura.

  Coop raised the weapon and fired.

  His hands shook hard, but the aim held.

  The blast was brutal. Metal screamed. The barrel smoked. A heavy casing clanged across the floor. The impact slammed into the man in white.

  Nothing gave.

  “Not bad,” the stranger said quietly. “It’s been a while since anyone rattled me like that.”

  In the next blink, he stood beside the giant.

  A hand tore the chainblade free as if it were a stick, then drove it into the giant’s torso.

  The giant folded, tried to stay upright, then toppled onto his side.

  Finsterherz understood what came next.

  “Now the finishing stroke,” the man in white said.

  Something growled inside Lothar, deep behind the walls of the inner fortress.

  “Boy, let me out,” roared Lóng Tiānyán.

  Lothar clenched his teeth. You want his body, don’t you, he asked in thought.

  “No, idiot,” the dragon snapped back. “That one isn’t for me. If this goes on, everyone dies. Buy time and make him withdraw. I’ll give the body back at once. This vessel won’t hold my weight anyway.”

  Lothar looked at Wilt. The inquisitor was barely standing.

  So Lothar opened the gate.

  Not wide.

  Just a crack.

  Pain exploded as the chainblade dropped onto his arm. Metal bit, and alien strength flooded in with it. Azure scale raced up his forearm. Fingers thickened. Bones shifted under the skin.

  The man in white finally reacted. The calm face changed, just a fraction, when dragon eyes stared back.

  “Oh,” the stranger murmured. “That’s interesting.”