Is it the same for everyone, I wondered many times, then and afterward; that when one finds oneself happier than they have ever been, something terrible happens? Was it? Was it the same for everyone or was I alone in this curse?

Grieda promised to stay with us for three weeks after my daughter was born, and at first, I was grateful, despite her sharp tongue and stern words. But by the end of the first week, I was growing increasingly tired of her company.

“I told you,” I snapped when she tried to force the seventh cup of foul-tasting tea on me in a day. “I won’t have any more of it. It’s disgusting, and I’ve already had far too much of it. If I take another sip, I’ll be sick.”

“Foolish, pigheaded girl! Do you want to be bedridden for the next six months? I am trying to help you.”

“I don’t want your help,” I said viciously.

“Then you’ll live in this bed for the next eight years and I won’t be blamed for it.”

“I don’t care.”

“Good for you.”

We glared at each other in an intense battle of wills until Taelon entered the room, holding the baby in his arms.

He glanced between us warily, then crossed the floor and placed the child in my eager hands before balancing on the stool beside the bed.

“And that’s another thing,” Grieda said suddenly. “When are you two going to give her a name? It’s been a week. A full week already!”

“Grieda,” Taelon stopped her before I had the chance to open my mouth and say something scathing in reply. “Perhaps I could have Ingrith to myself, for a moment?”

She stood up angrily. “Oh, yes,” she hissed. “I will only break my back to help you both, but don’t bother thanking me. Send me away, why don’t you. Very well, I’ll go walk down to the village and leave you alone to your love nest.”

As soon as she had stomped away, I felt trickles of guilt ease their way into my irritation and asked Taelon worriedly, “Will she be back?”

“Of course, she will. Don’t take to heart her behavior. Grieda isn’t—Well, she isn’t all that used to living so closely with others; at least not those who don’t obey her every will and command. She’ll be back, and no doubt sooner than you expect.”

“Good.” I let the tension ease from my body and sank in a peaceful state of relaxation into the mattress, pulling down the neck of my gown and letting the baby suckle.

“We should, you know,” Taelon said. “Give her a name, I mean.”

“Yes, I suppose we should,” I agreed. “We can’t very well leave her without one. I wonder . . . ” I patted the infant gently on the back. “What would be a good name for you?”

I saw Taelon’s lips pull into a grin out of the corner of my eye, and I blinked at him. “What?” I asked.

“You’re thinking of something terribly unfitting now, aren’t you?” He drummed his fingers lightly on the blankets. “Let me take a guess. Corn? Seawater? Horse?”

“You—” I pursed my lips sourly and threatened, “If I weren’t an invalid holding an infant, I would hit you.”

“You can hit me. I don’t mind.”

“It would hurt.”

“I am sure it would,”

After a moment I found my own lips itching to twist into a smile and I looked away to hide it.

“Well, you weren’t wrong,” I admitted through the veil I had made of my hair. “The first thing I thought of was ‘goat’.”

Taelon shook his head, biting his lip to keep from laughing.

“I wouldn’t go through with it!” I defended myself, and, taking on a more serious tone, looked down at the baby thoughtfully. “Something in the Grey tongue would be my preference. Anything and everything sounds elegant when said in the Grey tongue, doesn’t it? ‘Dog’ isn’t at all a beautiful name, but Ye’inacth is perfectly lovely.”

“This is true,” Taelon said. “We don’t have to decide now. Let’s wait until we both think of something perfect.”

“Yes.” I smiled at him in agreement. “Names are important. You wouldn’t want to rush one.”

And yet, a voice whispered inside my head. You threw yours away. You took another. What would your mother think?

My name was important to me, I argued. And I haven’t thrown it away. I’ve buried it. Judeth is a part of me, just as Ingrith is. Judeth was before, Ingrith is now. There is no shame in what I have done.

Looking down at the newborn in my arms, I imagined giving her a name, and her casting it away for another. The thought was unexpectedly unhappy, and I held her closer.

I shall give you a name that you shall love, little one. I promised silently. And I shall keep you safe, so you shall never be forced to part with it.

“What are you thinking, Ingrith?” Taelon’s voice broke through the silence of the room. “You are frowning.”

“It’s nothing.” I smiled reassuringly.

His blue eyes were concerned, and I knew my smile hadn’t had the effect I wanted.

“You know, Ingrith,” he said sorrowfully. “I pride myself in general in feeling as though I know you, possibly more than anyone else. But there are times when I feel that there is a part of you which I don’t know at all, and it bothers me.”

“We all have our secrets, don’t we?” I said, watching as the baby unlatched from my breast. I pulled my gown back up and held her out for Taelon to receive.

“I don’t,” he told me seriously as he accepted her. “I don’t have any secrets when it comes to you, Ingrith.”

“Neither have I, when it comes to you,” I told him. “I only have a part of my life that I no longer consider mine, that is all. Ingrith, and everything about her, is yours.”

His frown was thoughtful now, as though he had heard something that confused him. But he asked no more questions, and only said, “I love you, Ingrith.”

“I know,” I grasped his free hand and squeezed it tightly. “And I love you. If nothing else, you may always be sure of this.”

By the end of the second week, I was feeling reasonably recovered. I could get out of bed and walk around a bit if I felt the urge, or maybe wrap myself in a quilt and stand in the doorway outside, breathing in the cool, fresh, air, teeming with spring.

I could never manage it for long, unfortunately. Soon I would become weak and sleepy, and I would have to make my way back.

Grieda assured Taelon and I both that this was perfectly normal in my particular case.

“The body does not welcome magic,” she explained, careful to avoid my eyes. “It sees it as something harmful, and so attacks itself in an attempt to be rid of it. You needn’t worry. It shall pass.”

The weather was growing increasingly warmer, and I was pleased that winter had finally loosened its obsessive hold.

His Lordship had taken to flying out early in the mornings and rarely returned until after dark. Taelon often expressed his worries that the little fellow would one day simply up and leave, never to return.

“He used to be friendly,” he remarked sourly on one early morning while we both watched the crow hop his way to the windowsill, spread his dark, glossy wings, and flap off into the pink sky. “I’m of half a mind to just shut him in.”

“You know you mustn’t do that,” I scolded. “And besides, he’s just jealous. There’s no need to be upset about it.”

“Jealous?” He sounded incredulous. “Why would he be jealous?”

“Because you’ve someone else to take up your attention.” I nodded at the sleeping infant in his arms.

Taelon looked down at her, then at the speck of black in the sky that was the bird. “I don’t believe it.” He didn’t sound sure.

“It is up to you.” I shrugged and let my head drop onto his shoulder.

“Are you tired again?” Taelon asked quietly.

“I’m alright.” I yawned. “It’s getting better.”

“Grieda told me I should go to the village tomorrow,” he said. And I could tell by the tone of his voice that he was not happy about the idea. “The Feignt is beginning again, early this year. But I want to stay until you’re completely better. And I don’t like it when the water is cold.”

“I am better.” I stretched my arms out in front of me comfortably. “And we’ll run out of things to eat soon. I haven’t the energy to churn butter or bake, yet. Why don’t you ignore the Feignt, if you’d rather, and take a few small tasks for the things we need most? You needn’t be gone long if you don’t want to be.”

“Do you want me gone, Ingrith?” His expression was injured.

“No, don’t be silly.” I elbowed him in the ribs. “But I do want some bread, and meat, and other things that were scarce during the winter.”

“I suppose that would be nice.” He sighed and settled his gaze to the window where the pink had become a gentle blue, smudged with orange and purple.

“Don’t be mad at me.” I nudged him in the ribs again, gently this time. “I truly don’t want you away.”

“It isn’t that,” he said, and when he turned his gaze back to me, I saw his eyes were troubled. “Do you have a feeling,” he asked evenly, “that something terrible is about to happen?”

I let myself become still, waiting, and listening. There was a definite presence of foreboding in my heart, but then, it had been with me for some time. Who was to say what it foretold?

“It’s most likely nothing.” Taelon shrugged nonchalantly. “Perhaps I’m only worrying, because I’m happy, and I have someone else to protect if anything terrible does happen. Forget I said anything.”

I wouldn’t forget, even when I told him that he was right and that it most likely was nothing. I knew I wouldn’t forget. The sunset was too beautiful. The colors were too rich, and I was too joyful. Perfection was unnatural and could never last, so it was not nothing. I smiled and pushed away all worries and pretended that they were nothing but superstitions, because in the end, what could I do? Nothing. I could do nothing. Nothing then, and nothing later when it happened.

Together, Grieda and I convince Taelon to venture into the village the next day. He was very dour about it, but when he came back, he was bearing a gift, which must, I decided, mean that I had his forgiveness.

“Oh,” I gasped when he placed it in the palm of my hand. It was a beautiful, oval pendant of glass, perfectly smooth, and inside, a familiar plant with four leaves instead of three.

“Is that—” I breathed, “—Is that my clover?”

“I was thinking,” he said, and his eyes were cast low with a gentle pink flush along his cheeks, “that you might worry, sometimes, that I don’t mean to keep my word and marry you when there is another Bonder. So,” he closed my fingers over the present, “I decided to give you something to strengthen the promise. Now it is like this, you can keep it with you—Would you keep it with you?”

I threw my arms around him and embraced him to me with affection. “I shall keep it with me always,” I told him. “Thank you.”

The next day was almost ridiculously dull. I spent the morning in bed soothing a headache, and the baby at the same time. In the afternoon I was visited by my four clucking friends, and Bronagh, who came bearing the touching and unexpected gift of fourteen quilt squares, made by well-wishers and friends from the village. It was not nearly as many as she had been given, but I didn’t mind. I would have been glad to have had three.

They made a magnificent fuss over the child, and myself. Loud and very friendly, by the time Grieda had glared them out of the house, my ears were ringing.

In the evening I had a headache again and put myself to bed. The baby was irritable and refused to go to sleep no matter how I shushed and rocked her.

The darkness came swiftly, coating the island in a damp, grey mist, and casting me into an uneasy state of agitation. Taelon would be back soon, I told myself soothingly as the baby cried. I stroked the smooth stone of glass around my neck as I tried to relax. He would be back soon, and all would be well.

I didn’t comprehend the screams at first; at least not for what they were until a sharp cry echoed through the open window.

I sat up, the hair on my arms and the back of my neck standing at attention, and an icy chill shivered over my skin.

There were pounding footsteps, and then Grieda burst through the door, just as my mother had done, all that time ago. Her face was white as a clean sheet; her lips were bloodless and tight; her hair was wild and her hands which braced her on either side of the doorframe were trembling.

“Ships!” she cried. “Radkkan ships have landed!”

I ran to the window and felt my heart stop mid-beat.

Giant, dark, sleek ships. Three of them beached on the sand, with trails of lights leading away from them.

“How is this possible?” I whispered. “How did we not see them?”

“The mists,” Grieda took my hand and tried to lead me from the room. “You must hide, Ingrith!”

“Do they mean to harm us?”

“I don’t know!” She wrung her hands in the air. “They’re taking the young women and children. All of them!”

My blood ran cold, and I was a statue. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t breathe.

“Where’s Taelon?” I asked.

“They’re holding the men hostage. Move girl, if they find you here, they shall take you! And your daughter!”

I managed to lift my feet from the ground, and, clasping the baby to my chest, walked in swift, jerking steps out of the room. There was one place, one place I knew. One place I could hide.

“The pantry,” I croaked. “There’s a trapdoor in the pantry.”

“Get down there.” Grieda gave me a harsh push. “Go!”

“But you—“

“They won’t want me.” She pushed me again. “Go! Now!”

Each step to the panty seemed to take a year. I ran inside and pried the small, square door open, breaking my nails in the process. I didn’t feel the pain, nor the fear of the dark. I rushed down the rough stairwell, closing the door overtop us with a loud thump, and waited, sitting still, and shivering in the blackness.

The little girl’s blue eyes were wide and afraid. I prayed with all my heart that she wouldn’t begin to cry. “You must be silent,” I whispered to her. “You mustn’t make a noise, or they may find us.”

I pressed her small hands to my mouth and closed my eyes.

Everything was still, then . . .

Thump

I froze as a sound echoed throughout the house. My breath caught in my throat, and I waited.

Harsh voices, speaking, shouting; no words that were distinguishable. A sharp cry of pain.

Then nothing again.

A minute. Two. Three. Five.

Still nothing.

I stood up, as quietly as possible, and pressed my lips to my daughter’s head. “Be silent, and wait for me, yes?”

I opened the top of a barrel and placed her inside. It was full of the thick, yellow flour, and looked comfortable enough.

“I won’t be long,” I said, then I made my way up the stairs, stopping every time there was a creak. The moment I lifted the door and poked my head out, there were hands.

They grabbed me by the shoulders and hauled me out and onto the floor. I stared into six pairs of blue eyes. Blue, terrible eyes that glittered with malice.

“Tried to hide, did you?” one man said, a confident, twisted smirk playing with his lips.

“See, I told you. I told you I knew someone else was here. You owe me three Wrema.”

“Shut your mouth.”

“Get off me!” I shrieked, struggling to pry myself away.

There was a splattering of laughter, and I shuddered as one of them ran his hand roughly underneath my dress, slipping his fingers between my legs. I kicked at him, but the others held me down.

“Don’t like that?”

Now there were hands reaching down the front of my dress, groping my breasts with unkind, rough fingers.

My skin erupted in gooseflesh. I screamed, again and again, while my lungs burst, and my throat ached. I screamed while I begged, silently to whoever was listening, that they wouldn’t go down into the cellar. That they wouldn’t find the babe.

“Alright, that’s enough.”

I broke off as a swift, brutal blow was delivered to my stomach and convulsed on the floor, retching as stars and spots of color danced before my eyes.

“Aram! Anyone else down there?”

No. No, please. I tried to lift my head, but my neck couldn’t support it.

“No, just some barrels.”

“What’s in them? Anything worth taking?”

“No. It’s flour. Stale, most likely.”

“What does it matter? We got the cow.”

“Alright then.”

Vaguely, through my haze, I felt relieved tears dripping down my cheeks as I was lifted and tossed unceremoniously across a pair of large, muscled shoulders.

They didn’t find her. She was alive.

“Get her down to the ships with the others.”

No. I cried. No, don’t take me.

“And set fire to this shack.”

Please . . .

Footsteps. The wood of the floor beneath me turned to dirt and grass, then sand, and at last, darkness. Black, sickening darkness full of the faraway scent of smoke and seawater, the distressed call of a crow, and then nothing.

Taelon

The small tongues of flame that licked at the first house were so many different shades of red and blue they were almost beautiful. Beautiful enough to keep us perfectly still as we watched. Watched as they spread, crawling from roof to roof, snagging wood, heating stone, until the entire village was alight with a roaring blaze. It was so beautiful, so warm, that it was terrifying, and my heart was a bird beneath my ribs.

I turned my head to the small house atop the cliff, thick dread stewing inside my stomach; and then suddenly the fire wasn’t beautiful at all, because instead of a house, there was a light. A flickering, gleaming light of blue and red shining like a beacon in the black of the night.

The moment I moved, there was a shout, and vicious, seething pain to the back of my head.

When I awoke, I was covered in ash. My skin, my clothes, my mouth. My tongue was bitter with the taste and my lungs were full of it.

When I turned over, I was in a different world. Gone was the green, prospering village I knew, and in its place was nothing but smoke, soot, and the charred remains of what was.

I lifted my hand to the back of my head; it came away with flakes of crusted blood from a wound that had dried hours ago.

There were others around me, other men; and I knew without having to check that at least half of them were dead.

But where were the women?

I stood up on shaking legs and peered through the thick plumes of smoke that rose up here and there from a burnt house or barn.

My heart remembered before I did, and I ran faster than I ever had in my life through the village and up the steep dirt path to the cliff. My chest heaved and sweat dripped down my cheeks. My legs threatened to collapse beneath me, but I steadied myself against the charred frame of the doorway as I gazed hopelessly at the desolation that met my eyes. The house. The lean-to stall. Everything was destroyed.

“Ingrith!” I called and was met with empty silence.

She couldn’t be gone. I refused to allow even the possibility.

Ashes coated the ground in a thick carpet. When my boot hit something large and hard, I felt my stomach drop, then I let out a breathless gasp of relief when I saw it was only a cup. The metal was black and dented from the fire. I kicked it out of the way and went deeper into the house, searching each room meticulously for anything. Anything at all that would give me an answer when no voices would. Once I stopped when I saw something that looked like bone, and for the second time that morning, I was trapped inside of a nightmare, and I couldn’t breathe.

It was a stone. I rolled it between my fingers and might have laughed at myself if I had the energy to spare. Just a smooth, white stone, with an image scratched on one surface. I brushed away some of the ash to better make it out. A bridge. I knew it must have been Ingrith’s. I had never seen it before in my life. So, I tucked it into my pocket and continued my search.

The thought of the trap door came to me the moment I was about to collapse. My head throbbed and stung. Every movement was a punishment but daring to hope gave me the strength to withstand it. When I dug open the door, my heart was all I could hear.

“Ingrith?” I called again into the darkness.

There was nothing.

I made my way slowly and carefully down the stairs with no light to guide my footsteps. The air was mercifully cool and clear. I breathed it in deeply, ignoring the pained protest of my lungs.

She wasn’t there.

Tears stung in my eyes, and I pressed palms against the lids, under which my sorrow threatened to spill.

When I heard the noise, I hardly noticed it. Only when it came again did I let my hands slide away and I looked toward the source of the sound, which was one of the large, wooden barrels that stood against the dirt wall.

A soft thump.

I stood up and creeped toward it.

The moment I took off the lid I was struck by such a powerful wave of shock that it numbed every other emotion running wild inside my body.

The child was swathed in the square patch blanket Ingrith had been working contentedly over the last two days. Her pale skin and golden head were coated in the flour that made her bed, and she had freed her arms from the cloth that had bound them tightly to her sides.

She was waving her miniature fists about in a silent fit of temper, as tears wound winding paths down her plump cheeks.

I lifted her out of what I knew had been a deliberate hiding place and cuddled her close against my chest.

Ingrith, you clever, clever thing.

My throat squeezed, and I pressed my cheek against the soft, downy head that was tucked underneath my chin.

“Forgive me,” I whispered to her. Each word came out strangled and hoarse. “Forgive me, I forgot about you. I won’t, ever again. I promise. I shall never forget you again.”

My sigh shook with emotion as I added, “Where is your mother? She saved you, didn’t she?”

“She’s gone.”

Grieda sat on the stairs, silhouetted black against the pale dawn.

“Gone?” I knew it, but I repeated the word anyway.

“Gone.” Her voice was flat. Empty. “She and every other young woman and child on this island. That little girl—” she looked to the child in my arms, “is the only one left.”

“You say, ‘gone,” I came toward her, ducking my head to avoid hitting it on the low ceiling. Nausea threatened to make me sick as I waited to hear the words which I feared above anything else. “You don’t mean—”

“I saw them take her away.”

I was close enough now to see the blood oozing from a gash along the woman’s shoulder, the tangles in her hair, and tears in her dress. Her lips trembled as she looked at me. When I took her hand, it was cold as the dead. “I saw them take her away, down to their ships. I had been injured. I crawled out after them, but I couldn’t do anything—”

She cupped her hands over her mouth, and she uttered a gasping wail. “Forgive me,” she cried. “Forgive me, Taelon.”

My cheeks were wet with my own tears as I pulled her into a tight embrace. The child between us. Grieda clutched at my tunic, and I buried my head into her shoulder. We held each other there, on the steps, and shared our sorrow, providing the warmth and support that we both lacked.

“How could this happen, Grieda?” I asked after she had fixed up the back of my head and I had helped her bind her shoulder.

I was numb to my fingertips and exhausted. We sat inside the ruins of the house on any piece of furniture that was more than a pile of ashes

Grieda held the child in her arms, with a cloth soaked in milk to suckle on. Not once had the small thing made the slightest noise.

“This is war,” Grieda said bleakly. “They know that there is a rebellion, and they know a rebellion runs on courage and hope, so they take that courage and hope from everyone they can, in every way possible. In this case, they took the life of the island: The young women, the children, our homes, and left us with nothing but ourselves.”

“I hate them,” I spat, fury making itself known through my shock and grief. “I never understood when Ingrith spoke of them in such a way before, but now I . . .” Fire pumped in my veins instead of blood, and I gripped my hands together tighter and tighter until they turned white. “I hate them all, more than anything.”

“What are you to do now?” Grieda asked, and I could see through her eyes that she heard my anger and that she felt the same. “You cannot raise such a young baby alone.”

“No, you are right,” I agreed. “And neither can I remain here.”

“Don’t tell me.” Grieda’s eyes were sad and empty. Gone was the sharp sting of confidence and pride and everything else I knew her to embody. “Don’t tell me you wish to find her.”

“She was alive when they took her away, wasn’t she?”

“I believe so. There’s no reason for them to take a corpse aboard their ship.”

“Then I shall find her.” My fire cooled, replaced with iron determination. “I won’t leave her in their hands to rot. Not if there is a chance I may save her from them.”

The child turned her head away from the cloth Grieda offered and opened her mouth in a silent wail.

“May I hold her?” I asked, reaching out my hands, and Grieda reluctantly complied. I felt better with her small, soft warmth close to me.

“Perhaps you should leave her here,” Grieda suggested gently. “She’s not yet three weeks old. Give her to me, and I shall take care of her until you return, I promise.”

“No,” I said it sharply, and Grieda flinched. “Forgive me,” I lowered my voice and looked down into the deep, glittering blue eyes of my child, which seemed to wordlessly confirm inside me what I knew must be the way.

“Forgive me, Grieda.” I raised my head to speak to her with my full attention. “I know you would take care of her, certainly far better than I ever could. I know this, but I cannot be parted from her. I refuse to be. I don’t think I could bear it when she is all I have.”

“Then—” Grieda twisted a corner of her apron in her thin brown hands and said, “Then what shall you do?”

I looked back down at the small creature which now lay still in my arms, confused and grim, and I spoke as the idea came to mind. “My sister lives on Thorus with the rest of my family. I shall stay there for a time.”

“But the ship . . .” Grieda’s voice was pleading. Begging me to reconsider. “The journey is long.”

“It is only two weeks from here to Thorus Ragnagh, if the weather is fine,” I promised her. “I can manage it.”

Grieda stretched out her hand and brushed her fingers over my daughter’s head. “Then I shall come with you,” she decided softly.

“You told me—” I frowned at her unexpected declaration, “—when we first met, that your roots are here. You belong to Seaggis.”

“They are, and I do.” Her pale lips were drawn up in a tight smile. “But you are my family, Taelon. You, and this child. I won’t abandon you like I did her mother. I shall accompany you, just for the journey, to keep her fed and well. Then I shall return.”

“Will you?” I whispered and cursed myself for the tremor that sounded in my voice. “Oh, Grieda, would you really?”

“Yes.” She took my head in her hands and pressed her lips to my hair. “I promise, you won’t be alone, my dear, sweet boy.”

When she pulled away, she tore a strip from her dress and told me to clean the flour away from the baby’s skin. I paused just before touching it down to her cheek, where a smudge of grainy, yellow dust remained.

Millet, my numbed brain informed me placidly.

Immediately, Ingrith’s voice filled my head, loud and clear as though she stood beside me herself.

‘Something in the old tongue would be my preference. Anything and everything sounds elegant when said in the old tongue, doesn’t it? ‘Dog’ isn’t at all a beautiful name, but ‘Ye’inacth’ is perfectly lovely.’

“Grieda,” I blurted. “Grieda, I have thought of a name for her.”

“Yes?” Her smile was tender and pained.

“Rhaoette,” I said it once for her, the once more for myself. “Rhaoette.”

“Millet-flour?” Grieda blinked at me in bewilderment.

I laughed and looked down at the child who now had a name. “Rhaoette, what do you think?” She didn’t answer me, only turned her head to the side, her blond lashes fluttering against her cheeks. “It is perfect.” I made my own answer. “Your mother would approve, wouldn’t she? Who in their right mind would name their daughter Millet-flour?”

Then I pressed my face into my hands, and my shoulders shook with such grief as I had never experienced before.

I wondered, when that afternoon the ship was revealed, thanks to the council’s unanimous vote, if I should have taken Ingrith with me and fled with her before the worst had the chance to happen. Why did I wait? Why had I done what no man should ever do, and trusted fate? My anger toward myself ran nearly as deep as my fury toward those who had taken her from me, and the only consolation was the thought that I might one day find her again.

The ship, as Grieda told me, had been built and hidden by the villagers long ago in case it was ever needed. We were a lone island, after all, isolated from the rest of the continent; and unless the world came to us, we could have nothing to do with it, whether or not we wanted it. Ingrith had been right. There was something hidden beneath the cliff, under the house I had lived in for years. I could hardly believe my eyes when they pushed aside the stones hiding the entrance and led it out.

It was a magnificent beast, though its sails were old and worn, and it creaked and groaned like the bones of the ancients.

We all took part in fixing it. Mending the sails, scrubbing the decks, fixing the rigging. I gave each chore my all, grateful for the distraction from my thoughts. By the time it was decided it could safe the sea, midnight was fast approaching, and I wanted nothing more than to be off Seaggis for good.

Still, we waited so that we might bury those who had died. Among the entirety was Harid, whose golden-brown skin had turned pale in his death. Blood was dried on his clothes from a puncture to his stomach. And Verity, one of Ingrith’s friends from the fishmonger’s shop.

I caught myself thinking, as I gazed down at her matted red hair, and empty, staring eyes, that Ingrith would be heartbroken to learn of her death, and I should go tell her, as gently as possible; before I remembered the truth of the situation, and I turned away from the body to avoid being sick.

When it was done, I was caked in blood, sand, soil, and sweat. I let myself wander into the ocean and savored the cool waves as they washed each away from my skin, for once, glad of the numbing cold.

My teeth were chattering when I emerged, and I instantly regretted my swim after I realized I had no more clothes. Luckily, I had taken off my coat beforehand, and I shrugged it on relievedly.

Above me, gathered forlornly in the skeletal branches of the cliff tree was a murder of crows. I wondered briefly if our crow was one of them, or if he had been stuck inside the house when it burnt down. I hoped he was free. I hoped he was one of the dark creatures gathered in solemn witness as our lives were irrevocably changed forever.

I was surprised when only forty people, including myself, Rhaoette, Grieda, and a sheep made it onto the ship.

“Why do they stay? There is nothing for them here,” I spoke, as we moved away from the beach. I felt each wave through the floor of the ship and steadied myself against the edge.

“Those who stay are they who love this island,” Grieda said. The sea breeze toyed with her hair, picking up each wild strand and twisting it in the air, causing it to lash against her face. She made no move to tame it.

Her eyes were wistful, and I knew that she was one of them. The island was as much a part of her as the waves were the beach. But I wouldn’t tell her that she needn’t accompany me. I wouldn’t, because I knew I needed her. Instead of an apology, I thanked her, silently, by wrapping one arm around her shoulders, and I knew she understood. She always understood me, just as I understood her, and knowing that as I walked blindly in my life, someone was with me who understood, was a comfort like she could never know. Except she did. She knew because for her it was the same.

“You’ll find Ingrith,” Grieda told me fiercely. “I know you shall. I can feel it.”

“Yes,” I agreed. I felt Rhaoette’s small fingers gripping the collar of my tunic. Yes, I would find Ingrith. I would search every bit of the continent until I did.

Rhaoette opened her blue eyes and watched me intently. I wondered whether she understood what was happening. I didn’t know whether I wanted her to.

I do, I told myself. I won’t let Ingrith fade away from us. Just as she is a part of me, she shall be a part of you too, Rhaoette, both in memory and soul. Just as I won’t forget her, I won’t let you forget her either.

“You look so, very like her now,” I told her, as cheerfully as I could manage. “Only, her eyes were—are grey. A beautiful grey, like the mists that come in the early mornings, or the clouds before they begin to rain. And her hair . . . it is much like yours. Gold, with threads of red, like fire spun into thread.”

Ingrith, I promise, I’ll never let her forget you. Her or myself.