The transition from the wild to the civilized was a shock of cold metal and sulfur. The Iron Spires didn't rise from the earth so much as they pierced it—monolithic towers of soot-stained steel held together by rivets the size of a man's head. At the base of the central spire lay the Low-Quarter, a sprawling maze of shanties and market stalls that lived in the perpetual shadow of the city above.
Kaelen walked through the gates of the Low-Quarter with his hood pulled low. Beside him, Vane had retracted his obsidian needles, looking like a large, albeit strangely angular, black hound. Pip was tucked deep into Kaelen's breast pocket, grumbling about the lack of "good light" in the smog-choked air. Lyra hovered high above in the soot-clouds, a silent sentinel, while Rend remained a subtle vibration beneath the cobblestones.
"Stay sharp," Kaelen whispered to the air. "The Spires don't like Binders who don't wear the Guild's colors."
"The air here tastes of dead things burned in oil," Vane's thought-voice was heavy with disgust. "And the humans... they smell of fear and grease."
They navigated the narrow alleys until they reached a derelict workshop at the edge of the Scrap Districts. The sign above the door was a rusted gear with a hole through the center. This was the "Empty Socket," a known neutral ground for those who lived outside the Iron Spires' strict laws.
Inside, the air was warm and smelled of cedar and ozone. A woman stood at a workbench, her back to them. She wore a heavy leather apron, and her right arm was a clockwork masterpiece of brass and silver.
"I don't buy Warden scrap on Tuesdays," she said without turning around. "And I don't buy from men who travel with Shard-Wolves."
"I'm not selling Vane," Kaelen said, stepping into the light of a flickering gas lamp. "And I'm not here for coin, Elara. I need a bypass for the Spires' scanners."
Elara turned. She was younger than her weary voice suggested, with sharp eyes and grease-smudged cheeks. She looked at Kaelen, then at Vane, and finally at the faded Lexicon on Kaelen's arm.
"The Warden's mark," she whispered, her clockwork hand clicking as the fingers flexed. "I heard a rumor that someone broke the Forge. I didn't think the man who did it would be foolish enough to come here."
"I need to get to the High-Quarter," Kaelen said. "The Warden was just a symptom. The Guild is still harvesting hearts. I'm going to stop the next shipment."
Elara sighed, wiping her hands on a rag. "You're a madman, Kaelen. But you're a madman who needs a place to rest. Sit. The scanners won't find you behind my lead-lined walls."
The Resting Scene
For the first time since the Spine of Oros, the pack found a moment of peace. Elara set out a bowl of high-grade protein mash for Vane and a jar of bioluminescent nectar for Pip.
"Sweet light!" Pip chirped, diving head-first into the jar. "It tastes like sunrise!"
Kaelen sat by the hearth, watching Elara work on a small, mechanical bird.
"Why help me?" Kaelen asked.
Elara looked up, her brass hand pausing. "My brother was a Binder. A Guild Binder. They pushed him to bridge with a Storm-Drake before he was ready. The Feral Fade took him. Now, his 'weapon' powers the lights in the High-Quarter, and he's... just a shell in a sanitarium. If you're going to break their cycle, I'll sharpen your teeth for you."
She spent the next few hours working on Kaelen's cloak, weaving thin threads of lead and disruption-mesh into the fabric. It would make him invisible to the city's magical detection. She also gave him a small device—a "Pulse-Trigger"—that could temporarily disable mechanical locks.
"She is a good human," Rend's voice rumbled from the floorboards. "The ground is warm here. Rend will stay awake just in case."
"Rest, Rend," Kaelen said softly. "Tomorrow, the work begins."
The Battle for the Heart-Vault
Morning in the Spires was heralded by a deep, metallic bell that vibrated through the marrow of Kaelen's bones. Guided by Elara's maps, the pack moved toward the Heart-Vault—the central processing hub where the hearts of captured Primordials were drained of essence.
They bypassed the outer sentries using Pip's strobing light and Rend's ability to hollow out the ground beneath the patrol paths. But as they reached the Vault's massive iron doors, the alarm shrieked.
From the balconies above, the Guild's elite "Enforcers" descended. These weren't Binders; they were soldiers equipped with "Null-Lances"—weapons designed to sever the mental bond between a Binder and his creatures.
"Protective formation!" Kaelen barked.
Vane leapt forward, his obsidian fur extending into a jagged shield of needles. The first wave of Null-Lances struck his fur, the blue energy dissipating against the kinetic frequency of the glass.
"Your toys are blunt!" Vane roared in Kaelen's mind, launching a barrage of shards that pinned three Enforcers to the steel walls.
Then, the vault doors hissed open. Out stepped the Guild's trump card: a Cinder-Behemoth. It was a creature of molten rock and soot, its body glowing with a lethally hot orange light. Behind it stood a High-Binder, his Lexicon a brilliant, clinical white.
"The rogue Binder," the High-Binder sneered. "Your 'friends' will make excellent fuel for the city's winter."
The Behemoth slammed its fist into the ground, sending a wave of liquid fire toward them.
"Lyra, the vacuum! Rend, the vent!"
Lyra dove from the heights, her wings beating with such force that she sucked the oxygen out of the air around the Behemoth, momentarily dampening its flames. Simultaneously, Rend burst from beneath the creature, creating a massive sinkhole. The Behemoth stumbled, its molten legs struggling to find purchase in the shifting earth.
"Now, Pip! Overload!"
Pip didn't just flicker. He became a sun. He flew directly into the High-Binder's face, releasing a burst of light so intense it bypassed the man's eyelids and seared his retinas. The white Lexicon on the man's arm flickered and failed.
Without the Binder's control, the Cinder-Behemoth went wild. It roared, its flames turning from orange to a volatile, blinding white.
"Vane, the core!"
Kaelen and Vane moved in perfect synchronicity. Kaelen threw the Pulse-Trigger Elara had given him at the Behemoth's chest, where a mechanical regulator kept its heart-essence stable. The device clicked, the magnets engaged, and the regulator hissed.
Vane launched himself, a living spear of obsidian. He drove his weight into the regulator, his needles vibrating at a pitch that caused the metal to shatter.
The explosion was a contained sun.
Kaelen was thrown back, his ears ringing. As the smoke cleared, the Behemoth lay as a pile of cooling slag. The High-Binder was unconscious, and the Enforcers had fled into the upper levels.
Kaelen stood up, his hand resting on Vane's head. The Shard-Wolf was panting, his fur dull but intact.
"The heart is broken," Vane said. "The city will go dark tonight."
"Good," Kaelen said, looking at the vault where dozens of captured Primordials were kept in stasis. "Let's give them back their voices."
As the pack began to smash the stasis pods, Elara appeared at the vault entrance, her brass hand carrying a satchel of explosives to finish the job.
"You did it," she said, looking at the chaos.
"We did it," Kaelen corrected. "But the Guild won't let this go. We leave for the Salt Marshes tonight. They won't follow us there."
Elara nodded, her eyes bright. "Then I'm coming with you. Someone has to keep your 'weapons' from falling apart."
The pack was growing. And for the first time in the history of Aethelgard, the monsters and the humans were walking out of the iron walls together.