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come back, and Malachi will have his turn." He flashed his deadly grin and now I am sitting here, as the rest of them sleep, wondering what will happen to me tomorrow.
    Day 729
    I went through the dark tower and came out the other side. Takeshi said that means I am strong enough to do it again. He said we’ll go back in the morning. But he’s wrong. I don’t think I can do it again. I’m sitting next to him now. He’s sleeping. If I sneak out, would he track me down?
    He just opened one eye, grinned, and told me that he’s posted two Guards outside the door, just in case I’m tempted to run away. I hate him.
    Day 735
    I haven’t felt like this since I first arrived here. Shaky and angry and ready to kill I don’t want to remember any of it but I can’t get it out of my head Takeshi has decided I have had enough. We leave for the Station tomorrow morning. I’ve been through the dark tower seven times. I survived every time… if you want to call it that.
    Each time, when I considered lying down and letting the building have me, Heshel spoke to me. He told me to endure. I don’t know if he was real, or if it was in my mind. I wish he would speak to me when the nightmares come. They are nearly as bad as the tower itself and hit me whenever I close my eyes, just as often as they did in my early days as a Guard.
    I may have made it through, but somehow I still feel defeated.
    Day 796
    Nine patrols to the Southern Quarter. Five Mazikin to the dark tower. Two Guards injured (not counting me), one severely enough to be retired.
    But we’ve done it. We’ve found the nest. We are planning our assault. It will be my first. Takeshi estimates that at least sixty Mazikin have made this cave-like monstrosity their home. It looks like someone tried to grow themselves a mountain of mud, and the Mazikin have turned it into a human anthill. We saw them taking in another recruit this evening, and the rage and helplessness was overwhelming. The victim was a boy who couldn’t have been older than sixteen when his earthly life ended. He is lost twice over now. Takeshi said it was not possible to save that boy because he’ll be one of them by the time our platoons arrive from the northwest.
    He said that the next time I see that boy, I should drive my scimitar through his belly, and I shouldn’t think twice about it.
    Day 797
    Tomorrow at dawn we make our assault. Not that “dawn” means very much, because only Takeshi can easily identify when it comes. To me, all is darkness unless I focus very hard on seeing the light.
    I can’t sleep. Twenty Guards are packed shoulder to hip in one of the apartments on the fourth floor, snoring and snorting and farting and grunting, so I am spending the night on the roof, where it is slightly easier to breathe. From here, I can see a sliver of the dull mud slope of the Mazikin nest between two rickety towers directly to the south. In a few hours, we’ll gear up and leave in pairs so that the Mazikin aren’t alerted to our presence.
    We have fire and fuel. We’ll throw our firebombs through all known entrances and then block all but one. We’ll kill anything that emerges. Then we’ll wait for the fire to die and go in and kill anything that’s still moving. Only Takeshi and I can do that—the other Guards are too large to fit through the openings, which is probably why the Mazikin chose the place.
    We know they might have laid traps. We know tomorrow may end us. But Takeshi says every day is like that, only we don’t usually pay attention. It’s easy to hate Takeshi, but hard to argue with him.
    Day 798
    “I’m only sixteen!” he cried. “I only came in here for shelter! I’ve done nothing wrong! Please don’t hurt me!”
    Those were the last words he said before I followed Takeshi’s orders and shoved my blade through his gut.
    We know something the Mazikin always seem to forget: the residents of this city do not ever beg for their lives.
    Day 799
    We went back to the nest site