It had often been described in stories, both on parchment and tongue, the strange, unbalanced sensation one might experience when awaking in an unfamiliar place. ‘Where am I?’ they might ask, or at least think the question to themselves. They would spend a few moments in complete bewilderment while their sleep heavy mind struggled to recount the happenings of the previous night.

Of course, it was hard to mistake the hard, wood dip of a boat with the soft, warm comfort of a straw-stuffed tick, but even so, upon awakening the next morning, I twirled back to consciousness in a state of dizzy confusion.

Why hadn’t my mother called me yet?

Where had my blanket gone?

Why was my bed rocking side to side like a cradle, and why in all the Seven Hells was it so cold?

As soon as I spotted Sashada sleeping next to me it was hard to dismiss the memories that came flooding into my mind, along with the heavy weight of grief and fear that settled itself stationary in my stomach like a stone.

James was dead. My mother had sent me away, and I was lying in a boat with Sashada Faye and a strange man of whom I still knew nothing about.

And I was hungry. Dreadfully so.

I sat up, careful not to cause the boat to rock any more than it was, and of course, just as careful not to wake the others up. I needed a few moments in peace, in silence, to think. Our boat sat, bobbing in the small waves of the blue ocean, a bit like an egg in a boiling cauldron. The sun had only just begun to rise, and nothing could be seen but water.

Once, as a small child, I had gotten myself stuck in a cupboard, and had been stuck inside, screaming, for an hour before my father found me. It had been one of the most terrible experiences of my life. The hot, dusty air; the impossible, thick black in front of my eyes, and the wood walls that pressed at me from all directions. I had never been farther from that cupboard; the air had never been clearer; the walls had never been further away, so why was it that I was suffocating? I wanted to cry, scream, and laugh at the same time. To run and stay put. I was scared, for my life, for my parents, for the world. I was angry at the Radkkans; for forcing themselves upon our town and ruining our lives; for killing James. I was angry at him as well, though I couldn’t isolate the reason from the countless other emotions running wild through my body.

But I was also relieved. I had left. I was no longer in Saje, and this filled me with a thrill that was deeper and more fulfilling than I might have ever expected it to be. Had I really wished to leave this deeply? A part of me had always known, even if I didn’t like to admit it to myself, that James’s wish to go had been the principal reason for leaving to become my goal as well. But somewhere along the way, it must have truly become etched in my heart, for I felt, burning like the last few embers of a fire, almost drowned in the ashes of my unhappiness: joy. Real, pure joy.

When had it happened? When did I change?

A soft moan brought my attention back to my companions, who I had failed to properly consider since awakening, and felt a knot of guilt tighten in my gut. Sashada shifted and opened bleary eyes to peer around in foggy puzzlement. Then, as it had with me, I could see it dawned on her, and her face went pale. That was the first warning sign. The next was her clamping her hands to her mouth.

Within fewer than three seconds, I had her leaning over the boat, and she retched, releasing the entire contents of her stomach into the murky depths of the ocean, until there was nothing left to come out, then, wiping her mouth with her sleeve, collapsed back into the boat, shaking.

A deep chuckle reminded me that there was someone else with us.

“Not much of a sea girl, are you?”

Now seen in the faint light of the dawn, he bore a startlingly familiar resemblance to someone I knew.

“Kobe?”

I knew as soon as I said it that it wasn’t him. Kobe was tall and lean, with a stern, sharp voice. This man was shorter and far more muscular, with large, sloping shoulders, and hints of a fisherman’s accent when he spoke. He might have been handsome if he were a few years younger, cleaner, and if the ugly scar running across his upper lip was less prominent.

“You’re not him, are you?” I corrected myself.

“Nope. But I am his brother. Name is Balro.” His dark eyes gleamed at me from underneath his harsh, thick eyebrows, and he explained my confusion aloud. “You didn’t know Kobe had a brother, because if it had been up to him, he wouldn’t have one,” he said, leaning back comfortably, his hands behind his head. The plain, cheap grey fabric of his tunic strained at the seams.

I waited for him to continue, temporarily forgetting my worries.

“About eighteen year back, we had a fallout. I had the chance to make a lot of coin for the family; I chose something else instead, and we were left poor. Kobe decided I was responsible, which I was, I suppose. In any case, he had me take myself out of his life entirely and lives denying my existence.”

“Then why—“

“About two month ago,” he interrupted me, picking his teeth with a dirty nail, “I received a letter from my nephew, of whom I had known nothing of until then. He said he had heard of me from his mother and was in need of someone with a knowledge of seafaring. He wrote that he and his lady friend were planning on leaving Saje, and he was hoping he could persuade me to take them both to Kora.”

I let my eyes wander back to the ocean while I mulled this over in my mind.

“You know James is—You know he’s dead.” My voice came out flatter than I had meant it to.

“Ay. I arrived in Saje three day ago and held out in an old hay barn. When I heard James had been killed, I decided to make my way back.”

“And why didn’t you?” I asked.

“Your mother found me.”

“My—How?”

He shrugged. “Beats me. Came blustering in and said that I was to take her daughter and another girl to Kora in my boat and she’d knee my balls up into my throat if I did not.”

“You agreed?”

“I’m here, aren’t I?”

I had so many questions. So many thoughts swirling throughout my mind, but he didn’t wait for me to ask them. Instead, he sat up and nodded at the horizon.

“Sun’s about to come up. As soon as it does, you’ll see Kora just ahead of us.”

Sashada lifted her head. We both fixed our eyes on the line separating the ocean from the sky as the tiny prick of light, which was the sun, grew.

The clouds turned pink and blue and orange, and a silvery mist danced across the water. When at last it dissipated, I could see the shimmering outline of land.

“Won’t be long now.” Balro picked up the oars and began to row.

Sashada sat up. Her dark hair was loose and blew gently around her neck in the slight breeze while she held her face up to the sky, eyes reflecting the sunrise.

“Are you still ill?” I asked.

She shook her head once, her lips parting breathlessly. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

My gaze traveled to the horizon. The dips and dents in the clouds where the color became darker, the wisps of orange fire with the swirls of blue. It was beautiful. Mockingly so.

Kora and Thessè, though two separate lands, were under the rule of one man. As port islands, full of trade, and people from all over the continent; a free land, where the notorious were rumored to find welcome just as easily as the good, neither were places I would ever have decided to live. Though, I imagined them, of course.

It was difficult to go awry, trying to picture Kora. It turned out to be just as I thought it would be: Crowded.

Balro rowed our boat up beside a large dock, while Sashada and I gazed wide-eyed at the vast ships that loomed around us like giants in the shifting fog. After climbing onto the thankfully solid wood of the dock and giving ourselves a moment to find our legs for the land again, I became immediately aware of the sound of life. Footsteps, horse hooves, and voices. So many voices. And—I breathed in deeply and felt my stomach rumble, —smells. Food. Fish, meat, fruit, and other unrecognizable, more exotic scents hit my nose with a welcome force.

My stomach voiced its desire.

Balro smirked at me and nodded to the gangway that led up from the bay to the city. “I’ll find us an inn and we can eat there.”

I nodded and looked back at Sashada to see if she was on her feet, which she was. She gestured to my face. “Perhaps . . .” She trailed off, and I suddenly remembered that my eyes remained outlined in mourning black.

In normal circumstances, those bereaved, and grieving would wear the black around their eyes for at least a week and then dress in black for another month. But here, now—I glanced down at my reflection in the water. My hair was tangled. My eyes rimmed with red combined with the black dust that smudged my skin. My face must have painted a terrifying image.

“Leave it,” Balro suggested flippantly. “People here are more likely to show hospitality to a widow than a runaway girl.”

“But I’m not a widow,” I protested. “James and I—He never—“ The sound of his name caused a solid blockage of helpless sorrow to lodge in my throat.

“They don’t need to know that.” Balro brushed aside my distress and waved at us to follow him. “We’ll pretend that you’re a grieving widow looking for a new home and a new life, and she—“ He jerked his thumb over his back at Sashada. “She’ll be your late husband’s sister who came with you.”

“And you?” Sashada asked him quietly. “Who shall you be?”

“The kind man who offered to guide you.”

We set off walking; him leading in the front, me and Sashada trailing behind. I closed my eyes briefly against the ache that reared behind them, and cleared my throat, searching for a topic of conversation.

“Why do you not dress in grieving?” I asked, then regretted it as the light in Sashada’s eyes dimmed.

“I made a promise,” she said. “To Jaushuea. He made me promise him, a long time ago, that if something should happen to him, I would not grieve.”

“Jaushuea—your brother?” I asked.

She stopped and blinked for a moment, looking puzzled, then said, “Oh, yes,” and began to walk again.

I found it hard to peg my curiosity but was given ample assistance once I realized where we were. Kora was by no means the largest city on the map, but it was plenty large compared to Saje.

There were stalls everywhere, selling everything from food, to charms that would, as one vendor tried to convince me, make me the most beautiful girl in the world or even, this particular one whispered in my ear, his boney fingers clasped around my wrist, protect me from Lingerers; the souls who had yet to depart and attached themselves to unfortunates in the living world and caused devastation to reign wherever they set foot.

Balro wrestled me away, muttering something very ugly to him that caused my eyes to widen.

“Sard these asses.” He let out a frustrated hiss. “Where’d your friend go?”

I turned my head to look behind me. Sashada was nowhere to be seen.

I called her name. No one answered. No one even glanced at me. Everything was so loud and busy I doubted they would pay mind if someone was murdered on the street.

For one panicked moment, I thought I had lost Balro too. But then he reappeared, forcing his way between two arguing men.

“I found her,” he told me, taking my arm, and leading me over to the other side of the street, where I could see Sashada sitting on the paving, eyes fixed intently on a young boy who sat cross-legged next to her on a large, dirty cloth.

He wore nothing on top, and I could count every rib; terribly prominent through his brown skin, darkened by the merciless sun. He looked as though he were made of leather.

He was speaking to her, and the moment I was close enough to listen, I stopped.

“The answer you seek lies in the path you choose,” he told her, in a soft but deep voice unusual in a child. Sashada was transfixed, hanging on his every word. “Two paths lay before you. And two choices to be made. The head or the heart. By the end of the next high sun, which you should choose shall become clear to you.”

“And my sin?” she urged. “Shall my sin be forgiven?”

The boy’s mouth drew into a firm line. “Lady, only the spirits may answer that question.”

“Shall I visit a temple? A priest?” she pressed, leaning forward in her eagerness, eyes gleaming with urgency.

“If the spirits chose to speak to you, Lady, they shall reach you through their own ways. Not through the men who claim to possess their tongues.”

Suddenly, it seemed they both sensed my and Balro’s presence. Sashada stood up, looking guilty, while the boy swiveled his head in my direction, and I stifled a gasp as I saw his eyes: large, white, and diaphanous. His chest rose and fell with quickened breathing, and he reached out his hands toward me.

“Let’s go.” I turned away, feeling strangely uneasy.

“Wait!” the boy cried, and it was as though every urge to flee was sucked from my body, replaced by a strong desire to stay. I pivoted to face him and knelt so that we were on the same level. Balro and Sashada exchanged glances.

His stick-like fingers shook as they reached out to brush my hand, and though I was near enough now to see the flies hovering around his body; to see the lice writhing in his hair, and to smell the stench of starvation and dirt and sickness on his skin, I did not draw away.

“You have a significant part to play,” he told me.

“In what?” I asked, like Sashada, finding myself unable to tear my gaze from his face.

“The war. Either the end of the world of men or the true end to the mortal gods.”

His expression was gentle, caring, and almost sympathetic as he took my face between his hands and pressed our foreheads together.

“What do you seek, sister?”

“I seek—“ I swallowed. “I seek answers.” Answers to questions I never even knew I was asking.

He withdrew and reached into a small, furry sack that hung at his waist, pulling out a handful of trinkets. These he shook gently in his fist and tossed on the cobblestones before him.

It was as though the people and noise around us no longer existed. An eerie calm enveloped me in a loose embrace, and I watched, just watched, simply curious and with no worries for what I would see, and what would be revealed.

The boy picked up the first trinket, the broken half of a necklace. It looked simple, as though carved by a child out of a strip of wood; but it also looked beautiful, as though it were made with the purest love.

“Your other half is missing. But who you need awaits you in the truest heart.”

He picked up another one. A large, slightly rumpled, black silken feather.

“Your shadow is not your own. There is a dark scar on your body that should not have been yours, but it is, and you must bear it.”

He took my hand and placed the third and last trinket in my palm, closing my fingers over it and patting my fist comfortingly. “Your burden is a heavy one, but don’t despair, sister. There are those waiting to bear it with you. You aren’t as alone as you think you are.” He smiled then, a wide, gap-toothed smile that made my heart squeeze and my eyes prickle with the threat of tears, and I felt the need to cry even though I would be witnessed by countless people.

“You there!”

The boy’s head snapped in the direction that the voice had come from and he sprang to his feet, gathering up the cloth he had sat on, and ran away, so fast I hardly had time to comprehend it. So fast I would never have guessed that he was blind if I hadn’t seen the milky film over his eyes myself.

I felt Sashada’s and Balro’s hands on my arms, pulling me up.

“Best get a move on, looks like we have company.” Balro jerked his chin at a man weaving his way through the crowd.

The moment I saw his blue eyes and black hair, my blood ran cold.

“Is he—”

“He’s almost certainly not looking for you. They’ve been working on ridding every town of its Seers and spirit-believers since ways back. It’s more likely he’s after the boy.”

I looked back, but if the child had lingered, I didn’t see him.

“Will he be alright?” I asked, as we began to walk, quickly but not so quickly as to seem suspicious.

“Probably.” Balro shrugged indifferently. “Brats like him get used to being hunted like that. Chances are he has somewhere to hide.

“What did he give you?” Sashada asked me, and I remembered the object that had been placed in my hand. I opened my fingers. Lying in my palm was a smooth stone; oval-shaped and perfectly rounded. The type that children liked to skip in the lakes. Only when I turned it over, I saw that there was something scratched on it. The illustration was rough. I could hardly make it out, but I thought it must be a bridge of some sort; one of the elegant, curved ones that were built over small rivers.

Out of all the objects, why was this the one I had been given, apparently, to keep?

“I wouldn’t worry about it too much,” Balro told me, as though he could read the worry on my face. “It’s a rare thing to meet a real Seer, and even if you do, not everything they tell you is true. The future isn’t set in stone. It can be changed by any decision.”

“You don’t believe in fate, then?” I asked.

He snorted, as though affronted I had even asked, but I wasn’t convinced, and I didn’t think he was either.

“I once had my fortune told,” he said. “Old crone told me I’d fall in love with a woman named Sciella and have three daughters. One would become rich, one would be rich and lose her money, and the other would die in the cradle she was born in. It’s all ridiculous.”

“It might not be,” I told him, feeling bold. “You seem to me like the sort who likes to mess around if it suits you. For all you know, you might have three children out there and just don’t know about it.”

He glared at me. “I might do. But that messing around had nothing to do with anyone named Sciella, and I know it. Anyhow, what would you know?”

If I were to answer, I would have to admit that I probably didn’t know that much at all, and I didn’t want to admit that to him.

“You ever even been kissed?” Balro nudged me in the ribs with his elbow. It was all firm muscle and rough cloth and a bit of bone, and not at all comfortable.

“No,” I answered hotly. “But I have been in love, and James—“ I stopped. “James . . . he loved me too.”

“Bah.” Balro looked away from me, focusing his gaze on the road ahead of us with a look that almost seemed to reflect remorse, and something wistful.

“You young people don’t even know what love is.”

“Ocean,” Sashada said. “Sciella means ‘Ocean’ in the Grey Tongue.”

“Yeah, so?” Balro didn’t look at her.

She drew her fingers through her hair, easing out some of the knots as she spoke.

“Seers like to deliver their messages through riddles. The old woman meant that you would fall in love with the ocean. The three daughters are three outcomes of three choices you shall make. One leads to becoming rich, one leads you to lose everything you have, and the other will bring about your death.”

We both stared at her while she just smiled serenely at the hair that she had woven between her fingers. “My grandmother claimed to be a seer,” she explained. “She taught me their language.”

“Can you explain this?” I held out the stone for her apparent expert inspection.

“A gateway, I think. Or a bridge,” she answered after squinting down at it for a minute.

“But what might it mean?” I pressed.

She shrugged. “I don’t know.”

I let out a frustrated huff. “But—”

“And here’s our inn.” Balro stopped in front of a large, tall building, from which I could hear loud chatter and taste the scent of cooked food emanating from the stone windowsills. And something else. My nose wrinkled in disgust as I caught a thick whiff of smoke, singed hair, and charred flesh.

“What is that?”

Balro and Sashada both lifted their sleeves to their noses to ward off the offensive stench, and Balro pointed at the neighboring edifice; triangular, imposing, built entirely out of smooth blocks of stone, taller than any structure in view, with a black column of smoke billowing out of the tip.

Little bits of ash fluttered over us like grey snow, and stuck to my hair, skin, and clothes, smudging when I tried to brush them off.

“It’s the Pyre. For those who can’t afford ceremonial grave space. They bring their dead in there and for a few Krullè, they’re turned to ash.”

I squeaked and shook out my hair, scrubbing my palms against my skirt.

“Why was it built next to an inn?” Sashada asked breathily, her eyes watering.

“By now there’s something taking up every bit of land available, and then some. You have to take what’s on offer. Don’t fret. As soon as a breeze comes along, it’ll go away.”

Thankfully he was right. A west blowing wind took the tower of smoke and bent it in the opposite direction. We breathed relatively clean air again.

The sun was well up in the sky now, and the hungry knot in my stomach had turned into a clawed hand that scraped at me from the inside. I was more than ready to step inside the inn, no matter what waited for me there. Pig feet. Rat. I could eat grass if I had to.

Balro slung one arm around my shoulder. “Time to play your part, dear.” He grinned. “Feel free to start crying your heart out now.”

I squared my shoulders grimly, a sick feeling settling in the pit of my stomach. James was gone, and surely, he would want me to have a safe place to rest, but why did I feel so guilty? As though I were using him wrongly.

“Twelve Krullè and three Sefts,“ the short, grouchy-looking man behind the counter snarled the moment we stepped up.

“All of us, for three nights?” Balro suggested hopefully.

The man gave him a look; the look I would see on the faces of shop owners as they bargained prices for their goods. The look that said, ‘not a chance.’

“For each person, for each night.” He crossed his arms stubbornly and sniffed.

“Isn’t that a bit unreasonable?” Balro looked pained.

The man placed his hands on the counter and leaned on them. “I got people from all over the continent, and off it, trying to house here to get away from them Radkkans,” he said. “People who pay. If you think the price for sleeping’ in one of my beds and eating some of my food is too high, go make hay in the barn.”

Balro dug about in his pockets for a while, finally pulling out five red brass Krullè and two blue-gold Sefts, which he closed in his fist and knocked against the wood, sheepishly.

“This girl—” He nodded at me, and flicked my hair out of my face to give the man a better look of the black around my eyes.

I resisted batting him away.

“This poor girl just lost her husband a few days ago in the invasion. She has no money and no home.” He patted me consolingly on the shoulder. “I’ve spent much of my own coin trying to help her out with food and clothes and such, but I have very little left.”

The innkeeper stared at me, and I stared back, allowing the bitter pain in my memories to flow back into my body and hopefully, into my eyes.

“She also lost their first child. A terrible, tragic accident.”

“I’ll let her in,” the man said after a moment of carefully considering my breasts. “But I don’t see why I should help you, or her.” He pointed at Sashada.

“I lost my wife and three children.” Balro looked at the floor, blinking rapidly.

The innkeeper looked unimpressed. “Course’ you did. And her?”

“This girl is the poor widow’s sister-in-law.”

He didn’t budge.

“And she’s pregnant.”

Nothing.

“Both of them, actually.”

I barely caught my jaw from dropping and felt my ears burn.

Sashada stiffened, and I held her hand, that we might endure the embarrassment and shame together.

I had lied before. It was a lie when my mother asked if I had eaten the last of the apple cake after dinner and I’d said that I hadn’t. It was a lie when I told her I had never snuck biscuits from the jar up on the shelf when I was little and found my fingers regularly wandering within it

I had told many lies, but none of them had ever made me feel this way.

Wicked and dirty.

“Oh, you poor dears."

A hand brushed my shoulder and a woman with snow-white hair placed a key on the counter.

“It’s a shameful thing to turn away creatures in need of help,” she scolded the innkeeper. “Especially grieving and in their conditions. This generous man—” she gestured to Balro, who looked surprised, “—helped them with money from his own pocket, and here you are, unwilling even to spare a room.”

She petted my hair gently. “It’s alright, dears, don’t worry about a thing.” She glowered at the flustered man unapologetically. “They can have my room.”

“Oh, no!” I cried.

“I was leaving anyway,” she assured me, and took one of my and Sashada’s hands in her grasp. She looked at us with such kind and welcoming eyes that I wanted to collapse into her.

“You two have been through the Seven Hells,” she whispered in a swollen voice. “I too lost my child and my husband. I understand what suffering you must be going through.”

Her hand was tight around my own as she spoke, and I felt that, even though almost everything that had been said about our situation was a lie, she did understand us. “If my daughter had grown up under my love, I would have let no one harm her. And since she did not, I will at least manage you both a warm bed and food.”

I looked over at Balro, expecting him to be smirking in triumph, but was gratified to see that he looked quite as guilty as I felt.

“Alright, alright,” the innkeeper whined, waving his hands at us. “I was going to give it to them in the end, you know, no need to make a scene.”

We had not made a scene. Everyone went about their business. They smoked their pipes. They ate their food. They drank their ale. They talked and laughed and scowled and jeered, and none of them looked at us for more than a passing moment. We were just three more people in this inn. If we weren’t about to hand out coin, lift our skirts and dance on the tabletops, or commit a massacre, who we were didn’t matter.

Even with one hand holding Sashada’s, and the other held by the kind woman, I was so very, very alone. For the first time in my life, I was surrounded by people who didn’t care. Didn’t care for me. Didn’t care for each other.

My hand was released, and the woman stared at Balro. “You! Take good care of them.”

“On my honor, Mistress.” Balro placed his hand over his heart where I supposed there must have been at least some, because he had taken us this far.

The stern expression melted, and she smiled at us once again. “What are your names, dears?”

“Etheldreda,” Balro jumped in quickly, pointing first at Sashada, then to me, “and Desislava.” He placed his hand over his heart again. “I’m Iddithos. Humble servant of the sea.”

“Such beautiful names, girls.” The woman sighed. “I am Nahara. It was a pleasure to have met you.”

I watched her leave, my heart squeezing painfully as though I grieved for her loss as well as my own.

“Here’s your key.” The innkeeper thrust it out to Balro, his voice soaked in vinegar and salt. Balro snatched it from him and requested that a hot meal for three be sent up to our room. Then he led us away.

“Why did you give us different names? It’s not as if we’re being hunted or chased,” Sashada said we walked, one behind the other, up the creaking, narrow wooden staircase that led to the next floor.

I couldn’t see Balro’s face, only his broad shoulders in front of me, which shrugged nonchalantly. “It’s better to do it that way when you go to a new place, just in case. And anyway, it might be nice to take a new name. Help let go of your past and start a new life.”

“Why would we do that?” I asked.

“Isn’t that what you’re trying to do? Ah, here we are!” He had led us into the hallway, also very narrow, and stopped at one of six rooms I could immediately see, sticking the key in the keyhole.

It took a bit of shoving, but we finally got the door open and tumbled inside gratefully.

There were two beds sitting a little way apart from each other against the wall, which was plain wood and stone. No paintings. No patterns. No shelves.

There was one window, with some ratty yellow curtains hanging down in front of it. The sunlight streamed through them in a pale, dusty smoke, and Sashada went right away to open them, while Balro announced that he had forgotten something and went back down.

“Look!” Sashada beckoned to me, and I joined her at the window where we could see the ships, some of them leaving the harbor.

“We’ll be on one of those,” she whispered. “Judeth, can you imagine being on one of those ships?”

I was sure I could, but something was bothering me.

What was it that I planned to do?

I had thought that I was merely running away, but was I really looking to start a new life?

“Sashada,” I said.

“Mmhmm?”

“What is your plan now?” I asked the question slowly, for it was for myself as much as it was for her. What was my plan now?

“I’m not all that sure,” she admitted.

“Me neither.”

“Don’t worry.” She smiled at me. “I’m sure all shall become clear in time. The Seer boy said that by the next sun high, I would know which path to take.”

“He didn’t say that to me.”

“Judeth.” She took my hand gently in hers. “You have been the greatest comfort to me since we left Saje. I have hardly known you for a day and yet I feel that this friendship is one that is precious. Whatever home I may find, shall be a home to you for as long as you need one.”

My throat felt strangled yet again, and I had to blink rapidly to keep the tears from slipping down my cheeks. I felt a rush of self-loathing at remembering all the years I had spent disliking this wonderful, wonderful girl.

“You are truly as good as everyone spoke of you,” I said, my voice coming out tight and rough, and for once I felt no resentment toward her in acknowledging it. For she was.

Her face fell, and she turned away, lips drawn taut. “No, Judeth,” she said. “I live in the shadows of my sins, the same as anyone else.”

“What do you mean?” She was deathly pale again, and I led her quickly toward the nearest bed so she could sit down. Just in case she fainted.

“Oh, Judeth.” She buried her face in her hands. “I have done a terrible, terrible thing.”

“It’s alright,” I rubbed her back comfortingly. “I’m sure that whatever it is can’t be as bad as you think it. And you needn’t tell me.”

“I will tell you.” She lifted her fingers away from her cheeks and clenched them at her knees. “I will tell you, Judeth, because I must tell someone. And I believe you shall not turn me away.”

“I would not!” I promised. “Even if you have killed someone, I won’t be cruel to you.”

I brought an arm around her shoulders for extra comfort. “I’ve done my fair share of bad things in my life. Just today, I lied to innocent people for my own selfish needs and used someone’s death to do it. Could it be that you feel guilty of this as well?”

“No.” Her voice was quiet. “No, I feel no guilt, for it was not a lie. Not all of it. Judeth . . .” She looked at me and exhaled through pursed lips. “Judeth, I am carrying a child.”

I blinked at her. “You are?”

“First, let me assure you something.” She took a deep, shaky breath. “I know that you’ve disliked me for quite some time.”

“Oh, that’s— “

“It’s because you thought I had my sight set on James. I know.”

I let myself fall silent as I waited for her to continue. She tucked her knees up to her chest and rested her head atop of them.

“In truth, I always admired him. He was kind, handsome, chivalrous, and heroic. No one was ever surprised if their daughters claimed to be in love with him. But I was not. I hope you will believe me.”

“I do,” I affirmed, and had the pleasure of knowing I really did. Though what did it matter now? James was gone.

“I hope you do.” She paused. “Because I have only ever loved one man. Jaushuea.”

“Your . . . brother?” I coughed.

“No.” She slid her nails over the prominent vein on the inside of her wrist. “We aren’t related by blood. My parents adopted him from our stables because he had a talent for architecture. Real talent. And as the Lord’s architect, you can see that my father was tempted by this. Since my mother failed to produce a male heir, Father decided to find one instead. Jaushuea.”

“And you fell in love with him?”

She rocked herself gently back and forth on the bed, her hair swinging over her shoulder to curtain her face.

“He was so gentle and kind to me, in a way no one had ever been. I know I have people who love me. I knew it back then too. I knew my parents cared for me more than anyone else in the world; but he was the only one who showed me he did, every day.” She tilted her head back and studied the ceiling, dry lips parted. I saw her swallow nervously, and perfectly appreciated the emotions warring in her delicate face. The warmth, and the ache of memory, rotted and tainted by the incomprehensibility of what had happened.

“I did not expect him to return my love, so when he told me that he did, I was . . . thrilled. Happy. But now . . . Oh, I am so ashamed.”

“If you were in love with him, isn’t that all that matters?”

“Is it?” She laughed weakly. “Is it really? I thought so. I told myself it was the truth. But no, it cannot be. For there is such a shame within me. I cannot believe I shall ever be forgiven.”

“There can be no shame in loving,” I said. “Surely, love is the least shameful thing of all.”

She gave a weak twitch of her head and rested it on her knees.

“Was Jaushuea upset?” I asked, laying my hand on the blanket near her. “About the child? Is this your shame?”

“I never told him.”

“Why wouldn’t you tell him?”

“Because . . .” She lifted her face and her eyes glimmered with a sheen of tears. She bit down on her bottom lip and suppressed an empty sob. “It isn’t his. Oh, Judeth. It is a terrible, terrible thing that has happened.”

“Tell me,” I pleaded softly. “I will not treat you poorly for it.”

“It . . . He followed me home. It was dark. I’d gotten back too late, and he said I was to be killed for such an obedience.”

“Who did?” My mind caught up and I sat straighter, suddenly cold. I took Sashada’s wrist in my tightest clutch. “A Radkkan?”

“I begged him to let me live,” she whispered, head hanging. “Oh, gods. I should have let him kill me.”

“Did he—Did he . . .” I couldn’t bring myself to say it. The mere thought of the vile word brought bile into my throat.

“I didn’t know.” She released her tears, and I let her hand go so she could press her palms over her eyes. “I didn’t know about the act. I’d heard of it, only a few times. Snatches of gossip whispered by the servants. But mother never told me anything for fear that it would spoil me. I had no idea what takes place, between a man and a woman. When he told me he would let me go if I tended to him, I thought . . . I thought he would have me as his servant. And I agreed. I am a wicked, wicked person.”

I’d had every reason to envy Sashada all the years I had known her. To envy her Lady’s upbringing, with all its refinements and sensibilities. But her gentle learning, and her delicate hands had left her ignorant and unprotected in the worst possible ways. Her lessons and manners; her dresses and dolls; her pure mind and heart, and untainted reptation of the daughter of the Lord’s architect had failed her when she needed a savior the most.

And now she bore the brunt of it alone. She must live with what her assailant had left her with. A broken soul. A child. A future where she was assured the title of ‘whore’ anywhere with her people, and no future at all with people of the child’s father.

I might not have known silk against my fingertips. I might not have known curtsies and how to walk as though on air. But I knew which hands to take and which to fend away.

“Why must you be ashamed?” I asked shrilly. “What he did . . . You cannot blame yourself for it. Jaushuea, if he was a good man, would not have blamed you for it.”

“I as much as gave myself to the man. Willingly.”

“You gave him nothing. He took what was not his to take. He is a thief. He stole. When a thief steals, it is the thief who hangs, and not his victim. If you had resisted, he would have done what he did anyway, and then killed you after. Would that have been better? Sashada, do you really believe that would be better?”

She began to nod, and then hesitated. The tears were drying on her cheeks, leaving her eyes red and weary.

“And what of the child?” I asked, letting my eyes rest on her midriff. “There is no mistake?”

“No mistake.” She exhaled a quivering breath and lifted her head, resting her hand where a Radkkan child was growing. “I know he’s there. It’s soon, but I know. I knew two days after.”

“And . . . what shall you do?”

Perhaps there was something unkind in my features. A bitterness toward the baby that could hardly even be seen yet. For she rested her other hand atop the one that was already there and met my eyes. Hard eyes. Determined eyes. A mother’s eyes.

“I will raise him up to be sweet, and kind, and gentle. I will love him and teach him to care for every good thing in this world. This is my child, Judeth. Mine. Not his. When he is born, he shall have tender eyes, even if they are blue. They will be good.”

I dropped my eyes again, penitently, and pictured the child again.

Sashada’s child. Not a Radkkan’s child.

Sashada’s.

“I know he will,” I murmured.

She smiled at me, a real smile, and felt strong pride in her, as well as a new kind of jealousy. One that did not curl at the edges with resent.

She’d been wracked with grief and self loathing only minutes before, and now she was strong. She had someone she must protect. Someone of her own, and so she must be strong.

But she shouldn’t have had to be. She shouldn’t have had to be strong alone.

“I am truly, truly sorry.” I pressed my hands to my breast as it ached from the sincerity of my words. “So, so sorry.”

“Whatever for?” Her expression turned confused, eyebrows drawn together, head tilted to the side. “Why, Judeth. Whatever for?”

“I am sorry because if James hadn’t been so . . . foolish, none of them would have been killed and Jaushuea would be alive with you.” I bowed my head, feeling oddly as though being in love with James made me responsible for his actions, or at least that I had something to do with them.

“James did not demand the others fight with him.” Sashada rested her hand on mine. “It was their decision alone. They knew what they were risking.”

“Men," I muttered. “They like to fight, don’t they?”

She heaved a tired, sorrowful breath. “They don’t like being unsure, and when they are, I suppose they don’t know how to handle it.”

We said nothing else after that and just waited there together. Eventually, Sashada fell asleep.

I only remembered vaguely wondering where Balro might have got to while sinking my head into one of the pillows. Then one more thought, a stray passing question that hardly lingered before exhaustion pulled me into sleep.

What happened to the satchel my mother had stuffed into my hands as I left?

And what might be inside of it?