Chains glinted in the fog.
There were open auctions in the lower plazas. Men and women bound to poles, bartered for like animals. Their prices called out by oily men with thick tongues. "Strong teeth! Fertile! Barely sick!"
The House of Ash wasn't hidden. It was Cinderdeep. Every shattered alley fed it. Every scream echoed from its belly. The city above was merely its mouth.
And the fog. The ever-present fog. It rolled in and out like breath, infused with sedatives and spores. A tool to keep the desperate docile, and the obedient dull.
Raphael and the boy kept their heads down.
They ducked into an alley. The boy pulled his hood tighter, face pale and tense. Raphael stopped beneath a rusted pipe and looked up. Lines of clothing hung between broken beams—robes, tunics, rag scraps.
"Wait here," he said.
He scaled the side of the building quickly, a shadow moving through shadow. He tore down two sets of clothes and dropped them to the boy. Worn, tattered—but common. Unremarkable.
They changed behind a burnt-out husk of a vehicle. The boy, now dressed like a beggar, looked even younger. More vulnerable. More invisible.
Good.
Raphael adjusted his own disguise. No cloak. No symbols. Wings tucked. His glow dimmed.
No longer angel. Just another shadow. He had already changed his appearance to a typical human.
They moved with the crowd.
---
"See them?" the boy whispered as they passed a chained caravan. Three children their age, collar-locked and bruised. One had a brand on her face. She stared at them with dull eyes.
Raphael nodded, jaw clenched.
"This place is built on bones," the boy said. "Even the bricks feel like they scream."
They passed what used to be a church—its altar now a pit of gambling and flesh trades. A once-holy statue of an angel had been shattered, its wings turned into blades, its face worn down by knives.
A voice called from the mist.
"You two."
They froze.
A hunched man stepped out from an alcove, one eye missing, the other sharp as broken glass. He wore scavenger leathers and a belt of tools.
"You ain't from around here."
Raphael remained still. "We pass through."
"No one just passes through Cinderdeep."
The boy reached for a blade.
"Easy," the man said. He held up one hand. "I ain't a rat. I ain't a slaver. You're heading down, aren't you? To the Pit?"
Silence.
Then Raphael said, "You know how to get in?"
The man grinned. "Depends. You looking to live through it? Or just bleed slower?"
---
They followed him through the mist. Down alley after alley. Past watchers. Past broken souls.
And as they walked, Raphael whispered to the boy, "Keep your eyes open. If he turns on us—"
"I'll handle it," the boy said.
And Raphael didn't argue.
Because he believed him.
Because in this city of ash and ruin, the boy had already survived more than most.
Cinderdeep was a place of shadows.
But so were they.
---
The alleys narrowed. Tunnels arched overhead like the gaping ribs of a dead titan. They descended into an old shaft, the scent of ozone and soot thick in the air.
"Almost there," the man muttered. "One more turn."
Raphael narrowed his eyes. Something felt off—the air, the way the dust fell, the scent of old copper.
But it was too late.
Ten shadows leapt from the ruins, surrounding them in an instant. Blades drawn. Eyes gleaming beneath masks and rags.
The scavenger stepped back and smirked. "Told you you'd bleed slower."
Raphael stepped forward, wings flaring slightly. "You don't want this."
The man raised a hand. "There's a bounty, wing-blood. A high one. Not for you. For the boy."
The boy looked up, face pale. "Why?"
"You killed the last Ash Lord," the man said. "His wife didn't take kindly. Wants your head on a spike."
Steel flashed.
The fight exploded.
Raphael moved first—a blur of light and fury. His fist crushed the first man's skull like fruit, sending blood and bone into the air. He spun, catching a blade with his forearm, and drove his elbow into another throat.
Raphael had had enough,all this just to kill this little boy.
The boy ducked low, stabbed upward, blood spraying. But he cried out—a shallow cut across his ribs. He dropped, rolled, kicked a foe in the kneecap and drove his blade into the man's neck.
Raphael roared.
No more restraint.
He seized a man by the spine and hurled him into a wall, bones shattering. Another tried to flee—he grabbed her by the ankle, yanked her back, and stomped her skull into the stone.
The scavenger screamed orders. "Don't let the boy live!"
Two rushed the child.
Too late.
Raphael flared his wings wide, unleashing a pulse of raw celestial force that shattered ribs and armor alike. The air lit with silver fire. Ash rained down.
"He's not human!!" A scavenger screamed.
The boy, bloodied but defiant, rose again and stabbed his blade deep into the last attacker's chest.
Silence.
Only the drip of blood.
The scavenger tried to run.
Raphael stepped forward. One blow. A crunch. A scream. Then silence again.
"You alright?" he asked the boy.
The boy nodded, pale but upright. "I'll live."
Raphael looked around the chamber. Broken bodies. Smoke.
He whispered, almost prayer-like, "No more mercy."
They moved deeper.
Toward the Ash Lord.