“We found the mosses that fed your people in the tunnels.” Laia’s voice is arch, and I scowl. “If not for us, you’d have all starved to death.”

“You’ve made a just case for your people.” Livia’s voice is so calm that tension dissipates instantly. “As Empress regent, I decree that every Scholar who escaped the tunnels is now a freeman. Lieutenant Faris, pass the news to the Paters of Delphinium. Captain Dex, ensure that the Martial response is not overly . . . emotional.”

I step into the room then, and Livia takes a step toward me, stopping short at my warning glare. I shift my attention to the dark-haired bundle on the bed, freshly fed and fast asleep.

“He got bigger,” I say, surprised.

“They do that.” Laia smiles. “You should not yet be up and about, Blood Shrike.”

I wave off her fussing but sit when my sister insists.

“Did you see Elias, Laia? Did you . . . speak with him?”

Something in her face changes, a fleeting pain I know all too well. She has spoken with him then. She has seen what he’s become. “He’s returned to the Forest. I have not tried to find him. I wanted to make sure you were well first. And . . .”

“And you’ve been busy,” I say. “Now that your people have chosen you as a leader.”

Her reluctance is written all over her face. But instead she shrugs. “For now, perhaps.”

“And the Nightbringer?”

“The Nightbringer has not been seen since the siege,” she says. “It has been more than a week. I expected him to have set his brethren free by now. But . . .” She takes in my expression. The rain pours down hard now, a steady lash against the windows. “But you feel it too, don’t you? Something is coming.”

“Something is coming,” I agree. “He wants to destroy the Scholars—and he plans on using the Martials to do it.”

Laia’s expression is unreadable. “And will you let your people be used?”

I do not expect the question. Livia, however, appears unsurprised, and I have the distinct feeling that she and Laia have already had this conversation.

“If you plan to take the throne back for your nephew,” Laia says, “you will need allies to battle the Commandant—strong allies. You don’t have the men to do it on your own.”

“And if you don’t want your people utterly destroyed by the jinn and the Martial army,” I retort, “you will need allies too. Particularly ones who know the Martials well.”

We stare at each other like two wary dogs.

“The Augur mentioned something to me about the Nightbringer a few weeks ago,” I offer finally. “Before the siege on Antium. The truth of all creatures, man or jinn, lies in their name.”

A spark of interest in Laia’s face. “Cook told me something similar,” she says. “She said that to know the Commandant’s story would help destroy her. And I know someone with unique skills who can help us.”

“Us?”

“Help my people, Blood Shrike.” I can see how much it costs Laia to ask this of me. “And I—and my allies—will help you win back your nephew’s crown. But . . .”

She cocks her head, and as I’m trying to puzzle out her look, she whips a dagger from her waist and flings it at me.

“What the bleeding hells—” I pluck the blade out of the air on instinct and turn it on her in the time it takes to blink twice. “How dare—”

“If I’m going to carry Serric steel,” Laia says quite calmly, “then I’d like to learn to use it. And if I’m going to be an ally to a Martial, I would like to fight like one.”

I gape at her, distantly taking note of Livia’s quiet smile. Laia looks down at Zacharias and then out the window, and that shadow passes over her face again. “Though I wonder, would you teach me to use the bow, Blood Shrike?”

A memory rises from the haze of the past week: Cook’s strong hands as she shot arrow after arrow into the Karkauns. I love you, Laia, she’d said. Laia’s face as Cook howled at her to get me to the Augurs’ cave. And older memories: Cook’s fierceness when she told me she’d murder me if I hurt Laia. The way, when I healed that old woman, some distant music within her reminded me of the Scholar girl.

And suddenly, I understand. Mother.

I remember the face of my own mother as she went to her death. Strength, my girl, she’d said.

Curse this world for what it does to the mothers, for what it does to the daughters. Curse it for making us strong through loss and pain, our hearts torn from our chests again and again. Curse it for forcing us to endure.

When I meet the Scholar girl’s stare, I realize she’s been watching me. We do not speak. But for this moment, she knows my heart. And I know hers.

“Well?” Laia of Serra offers her hand.

I take it.

LVIII: The Soul Catcher

It takes many days for the ghost to speak his pain. Listening to it chills my blood. He suffers each memory, a rush of violence and selfishness and brutality that, for the first time, he must feel in all its horror.

Most of the ghosts have passed quickly. But sometimes their sins are so great that Mauth does not let them move on. Not until they have suffered what they inflicted.