The wind on the rim of the volcano bowl didn’t blow from the sky.
It blew from below. It carried with it a dry, baking heat that smelled of liquid glass, scorched copper, and un-burned hundreds of years. Mira Vale stood at the jagged edge of the dark rock cliff edge, two thousand paces above the volcano bowl floor. She held the frayed edges of her charcoal wool shawl tight against her throat with her warm left hand.
Her right arm hung heavy at her side, naked to the gale.
From her fingertips to her collarbone, and across three-quarters of her right ribs, her flesh was many-sided, smoky quartz. Beneath the pale arctic light that filtered through the slate-colored cloud cover, the internal planes of the crystal refracted the fire from the pit below. It glowed with deep violet and amber embers. With every breath she drew, a clear, high pitch rang within her thorax. A crystal-clear hum that sounded like a bowed glass violin, steady and mournful, answering the clockwork thrum of the world beneath their feet.
“Don’t stand so close to the verge, Mira,” Lord Ren said.
The Ash Emperor stood three paces behind her, his heavy iron mantle lined with rough grey wolf pelt, his black plate shin guards planted shoulder-width apart in the fiery scree. He didn’t look at the view. His short-cropped dark hair was dusted with white foam-stone, his scarred jaw set in a rigid line as his eyes scanned the outer edge trenches…
