Kingfisher reflects on surviving like a lone wolf while moving through Ammontraíeth with the god sword Nimerelle. After leaving Saeris’s chambers, he senses a vampire stalking nearby by reading the faint emotional residue in its recently fed blood. He tracks the vampire into the lower palace and impales him before the creature can attack or speak.

The vampire, who appears to have sought final death rather than a fight, thanks Kingfisher for ending what he has become. Kingfisher rejects the idea of mercy, saying he kills for the vampire’s victims, not for the vampire. Before turning to ash, the vampire warns that Saeris has been seen being destroyed and that the court will fall with her inside it, but Kingfisher insists he will keep Saeris safe.

Carrion finds Kingfisher and urgently leads him to a narrow smoked window. Carrion has spotted a white shape racing across the dead fields: Onyx, Saeris’s fox, who has somehow crossed from Cahlish over the lethal Omnamerrin mountains and through enemy territory to reach Saeris. A horde of feeders is chasing Onyx, so Kingfisher races to the outbuilding where his horse Bill is stabled, mounts without tack, and charges out; Carrion refuses to stay behind and vaults onto Bill behind him.

Kingfisher, Carrion, and Bill close the gap just as the feeders are about to catch Onyx. Carrion catches the leaping fox but falls from Bill, forcing Kingfisher to dismount and fight. Kingfisher uses Nimerelle to cut down feeders, while Carrion draws his own god sword, Simon, and survives long enough to help hold them off. Once they gain a brief opening, Kingfisher gathers Onyx, pulls Carrion back onto Bill, and they ride hard for Ammontraíeth.

Back at the Cogs, Lorreth angrily confronts Kingfisher and Carrion for charging into danger. Kingfisher asks whether Lorreth has found Foley, a missing friend from Ajun believed to still live somewhere in Ammontraíeth, but Lorreth has found no trace of him. Kingfisher then carries the injured Onyx through the waking palace, killing vampires along the way until they reach Saeris’s rooms.

Saeris is crying when Onyx is returned to her, and she fears Kingfisher will have to kill the fox to end his suffering. Instead, Kingfisher takes Onyx to the balcony and uses the last of his finite healing small magic to mend the fox’s cracked paws and fractured leg enough for him to recover. Saeris realizes Kingfisher sacrificed that magic for Onyx, and Kingfisher admits he did it because there is little he would not sacrifice to make Saeris happy; their bond and affection deepen, though Kingfisher still jokes that Onyx would make a good hat.