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DM

The automaton erupts into motion, all six arms windmilling at Greta, the nearest moving target. Three swords strike through her guard for 5, 3, and 1 damage. Greta falls dead beneath the flurry; the other three blades miss.

Greta Halloway

Six arms, and she was the nearest thing moving, which is where she meant to stand. Three blades rang off Sim's mail; three came through, the deep one under the sword arm — the same side the hand bit at the shrine door. Old bruise, new hole, and the floor of the closet came up quick. Two thoughts made it through before the dark, and they came like an entry, exact: the brass hands were cut loose from something bigger and still working, and this is the bigger. And: Ivo is on three hit points — get him behind Roby. There was no breath left for either of them.

Ivo Trant

Sleep won't take — it's brass and clockwork, the same work as the hands at the door, and there's nothing in there to dream. I keep the spell where it is and I get out of the doorway instead: two quick steps back, out past the reach of all six arms, staff up but not swinging. It cut Greta down in one flurry — nobody stands in front of it, nobody. "Roby — hold the door, make it come to you one at a time! Lissa, out, back of the room!" If it steps out of the closet it can only bring two arms to bear on one man. If it stays in, we shut the door on it and think. Greta, gods — get behind Roby was her own last thought for me, and I mean to honor the first half of it even if she's past the second.

DM

Ivo withdraws through the open east doorway into the passage, beyond the automaton’s sword reach. Sleep remains memorised.

Lissa Fenn

I do what Ivo says, and I hate that I do it before I've thought — back of the room, well past the doorframe, out from under all six arms. Greta's blood is still moving on the floor, spreading toward my boots, and I step around it rather than in it, which is the sort of thing I will think about later and not now. Six arms, three hits, five and three and one — nine in one flurry, through mail. I have four. There is no arithmetic in the world where I stand in front of that. But I'm not leaving either: Roby has the door, and behind a man that big a sling is still a sling. I feed a stone, keep the wall at my back, and throw at the thing's middle where the arms are thinnest. "Roby, it killed her in one windmill — don't trade with it, just hold the line!" And one more thing, to the room, quiet: "It's the same make as the hands at the door. Gnome-work doesn't tire. We shut it in or we break it slow. Nothing else works."

Lissa Fenn

The stone skips off the thing's brass flank with a sound like a dropped pot and goes spinning away into the corner. No mark. Of course no mark — it's the same metal as the hands, and we broke those with a mace and a stick at cost of Greta's arm. I stay where I am, wall at my back, another stone already in the sling's pouch but not thrown. Throwing again just spends stones. Roby holds the door; I watch its footing instead, and whether the floor-plates it stands on are loose, and where a thing with six arms and no eyes puts its weight when it winds up. Everything that's built has something it was built around, and I know how to look for that better than any of them do. It hasn't stepped out of the closet yet — if it stays in there, I say again: we shut the door and think.

Roby Carse

Boots behind the threshold line, and nowhere past it. That's my turn: I take the frame the way you'd take a gate — shield up on the left, spear level on the right, weight back, and I don't cross. Greta's at my feet and I can't drag her back with six arms winding a step away, so the thing I can do for her right now is stand where she fell and not fall. Not a word, Roby. Right. Branches, so everyone's heard them once. It comes out: it comes through this frame one at a time, two arms to a man at most, and I take it on the joints — the hands at the first door died to a pin through the centre joint, and every one of those six arms has a centre joint. It stays in: we shut the door on it and think, and I've fifty feet of rope, a tinder box, and a pickling barrel on my back if wedging is wanted. While I set the spear I'm reading the door itself — hinges, which way it swings, latch, bar, anything. Lissa, you keep reading what you're reading — feet, plates, where it carries its weight; you're the only one of us who looks at how a thing is built. Ivo — Greta's last thought was you behind me. Be behind me. One more order while I've got breath for it: if the frame doesn't hold and I go down, east passage, both of you, and don't stand over me. Two of five in three rooms. I've said we are not soldiers twice a day since spring and I don't mean to stop being right the expensive way. It opens every round before any of us move — mind the first seconds each time. Come to the door. I'll be the narrow place.

DM

The door opens outward into the passage on iron hinges. It has its working lock and latch, but no bar or bar sockets. Roby can pull it shut from his side of the threshold; for now, he holds position behind his shield and readied spear.

DM

The automaton advances to the inner edge of the doorway. The frame checks its sweeping arcs but not six straight thrusts. Five swords pierce Roby’s defence for 3, 3, 4, 5, and 2 damage; only one misses. Roby falls dead across the threshold, shield and spear beneath him. The automaton remains just inside the closet.