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her forehead had been grazed on the uneven stone of the dungeon floor.
    He stepped into the room, his only thought to see if she was alive, and it was only after he was crouched beside her that he realized he hadn’t thought whether her spell would affect him or not.
    It seemed not.
    He touched her neck, looking for a pulse.
    It beat, thready and quick, and he resisted the urge to draw her into his arms. Warm her cold limbs.
    Instead, he got back to his feet, standing over her, an invisible sentinel. He would need darkness and no guards to carry her out of here. If he tried it now, he would be caught, and the moonstone taken from him.
    “It wasn’t Mirabelle who did that, was it?” William looked over at her, and frowned when he saw her tossed in a heap. He turned to the guard, who was still crouched up against the cell door.
    He shook his head. “She was completely unconscious.” He looked into the cell and went still, as if suddenly realizing they were alone in the room. “The prisoners are all gone.” His voice was hushed.
    William looked into the empty cell, then back to the dead sorcerer at his feet. “I . . .” He rubbed his eyes. He was a man whose world was crumbling around him. “I knew someone was trying to take Halakan from the inside. Those men were sent by a sorcerer, and somehow he’s got them loose, and he bespelled this room.” His face was worried as he looked through the door to the outside, as if he expected an attack at any moment.
    Soren didn’t feel any sympathy. One look at Mirabelle, and he only wished things were worse for the liege lord.
    “What should I do with Miri?” the guard asked, and the familiar way he said her name, as if he were speaking about a friend, jerked Soren’s attention to him.
    Irritation and some hot, prickly emotion he couldn’t quite name rose up in him. If the guard was her friend, he’d stood by when she’d been mistreated. No matter how gently he’d carried her, he’d still carried her to a dungeon. And when he’d been frightened, he thrown her to the ground to protect himself.
    “I don’t . . .” William hunched, stepping around the sorcerer to get back to the door. He stopped before he stepped over the threshold, looked back into the room, and Soren noticed he’d straightened up, was pulling the mantle of leadership back over himself.
    “Lock her in the cell. Put her on a pallet and we can wait to see if she recovers.” He tugged at his ear, a man contemplating begging forgiveness from the only possible ally he had left.
    “There are no pallets.” The guard looked deeper into the cell.
    “Why not?” William frowned.
    The guard who had the keys, just visible in the stairwell from where Soren was standing, pushed himself up against the wall, and looked into the room with eyes that couldn’t settle. “You said to make things uncomfortable for them.” His voice wavered.
    William turned sharply to him. “I didn’t mean treat them like animals. Why would you think that?”
    The guard said nothing, hunching over himself and shivering. He kept his eyes on his feet.
    “So they are loose in this stronghold, have a powerful sorcerer to hand, and they have a legitimate grudge, as well.” His voice was sharp. “Get a few pallets for her, and then put her on them and lock her in the cell. And be sure she has water and food right beside her when she wakes up. Is that specific enough for you?”
    Both guards nodded.
    “And the . . . body?”
    William jerked at that. “I’ll get Henry to sort it out.” Then, barely giving the guard in the stairwell time to jump back, he stalked up the outer stairs.
    Soren kept watch as the guards got pallets, water and food, and others came to get the dead sorcerer. He struggled with himself when they lifted Mirabelle up again and locked her in the cell, but there was no way to stop them without making himself known. He kept himself outside the cell itself, even though he had a strange urge to be inside with