Wil drew his bow from across his back, but Dixon stopped him with a hand on his arm.

Too much smoke, Dixon signed. He’d pulled his scarf out from under the collar of his jacket and set it over his nose and mouth. His eyes narrowed and watered, reddened and irritated by the smoke. You’ll miss.

Wil’s own eyes burned as he pulled his scarf over his nose and mouth. His vision blurred. Right. Close combat it was, then.

Wil vaulted down to the street from the rooftop, leaving Dixon behind, his knives already drawn. He wielded a pair of daggers, each wide and sturdy, the length of his forearms. He held one with a hammer grip and the other in a reverse grip, his hands up to shield his face. He rushed the white-haired woman and slashed with his blade while her back was turned.

And she stepped aside, dodging and spinning out of his reach.

The Ghost tumbled out of his reach, whirling to face him. Her white hair whipped across her slender, pale neck, right where his knife had been aiming. She smirked at him, one eye bright blue and the other dark brown. Her smile was crooked and wolfish, dimpling her cheek.

Rage flared in his chest and—ridiculously—heat rushed to his face.

He lunged at her again, swiping his knife across his body and stabbing forward. She danced away from him and pulled something from her belt. It was just a hilt, impossibly, until she twirled it in her hand and a curved blade like a crescent moon appeared. The metal glinted in the light of the fire, iridescent and bright.

She swung it immediately, hard and fast, and he jumped back. He felt the sharp whoosh of air as her sword whipped a hair’s width from his abdomen. She swung her arm wide, slicing her sword at him again.

He blocked it, his daggers crossed in front of him, and thrust her sword away. She ducked and spun behind him, and her blade almost embedded in his side as he turned to dodge.

Their blades rang and sparked as they struck, his two daggers against her sickle. He was much bigger than her, taller and thicker, but she matched his pace and his strength.

Dixon finally joined the fray as the Ghost gracefully spun out of reach of Wil’s daggers. He brandished his own pair of daggers, and though he was a bit smaller than Wil, he fought with the same grace and speed. The pair had trained together for years—they fell into the same sweeping movements as they traded strikes with the Ghost. She pulled a second hilt from her belt, and the blade that shot out from it was a dirk like the ones the men bore.

Dixon thrust his blade at her, but even against two Venandi, the white-haired witch held her own. She dodged and sprang out of their reach, countering and parrying their blows.

The witch gave another crooked smirk, and Wil almost missed the way her fingers drummed on the hilts of her blades. But he couldn’t have missed whatever magic she performed with the movement.

The smoke from the fire rushed at him and Dixon, carried on some phantom wind. Wil squeezed his eyes shut against the sting of it, raising an arm against the searing heat. He stumbled back, and he felt Dixon’s fingers grasping at his sleeve.

When he opened his eyes, the white-haired witch was barely visible. She stood grinning surrounded by the teeming smoke. Her lips moved, but Wil couldn’t see them well enough to know what she said. He imagined the worst.

The smoke blinded him once more, the heat billowing over the small square. And when it finally began to dissipate, the Ghost was gone, the stake and barracks still burning.