At daybreak, Din and Malo search Gorthaus’s Treasury vault and find only ordinary valuables, family letters, and transport documents. They then search Gorthaus’s sparse room in the leaning tower and notice scratches on the floor beneath a bookcase. Hidden under a loose stone, they find a small cache of about three hundred talints, which suggests Gorthaus may have sold out the Empire for a surprisingly small sum or was trapped into further service through blackmail. Despite continuing to search, Din and Malo find nothing that identifies Pyktis’s court contact, his present location, or the missing reagents.

An Apoth militis summons Din and Malo to the medikker’s ward, where Kardas has recovered enough to speak with Ana and Thelenai. Kardas is in good spirits because he does not yet know what happened in the High City, so Ana tells him about Gorthaus’s death and betrayal. Kardas is horrified by the revelation, but when Ana questions him about suspicious figures at court, he cannot identify anyone who might have helped Pyktis move unseen through the palace or kill the king and attack him.

Ana then shifts the conversation and reveals her real suspicion: the Treasury has been hiding a second set of negotiations from everyone. Pressed by Ana, Kardas admits that the Empire was not truly working toward Yarrow’s adoption. Instead, if the titan marrow could be secured, the Treasury planned to withdraw from Yarrow entirely, because the Empire no longer wants the cost and risk of conquest and occupation, and because many in Yarrow do not want imperial rule. Kardas explains that Satrap Darhi handled secret talks based on extending payments and building in terms that would allow the Empire to stop paying and begin withdrawal, though Darhi did not know full withdrawal was the actual goal. Malo is appalled that this plan would leave Yarrow, including the naukari, to its fate, and Thelenai angrily points out that Gorthaus’s corruption helped put the marrow itself in danger.

Thelenai then shares urgent news of her own. Because Pyktis remains a threat and Yarrowdale is no longer safe, the Apoths plan to move the marrow not through the canals but east across the ocean to the mouth of the Great River Asigis and then into the inner rings. Thelenai says the voyage may be possible but will be difficult, costly, and uncertain. Ana reminds her that the Treasury did not create Pyktis, but agrees that many normal paths are now closed; she asks Thelenai for a private meeting to discuss more radical options, and Din leaves with the uneasy sense that Ana is turning toward a dangerous new strategy.