That made Isyllt flinch. Her spoon shook, spilling broth back into the bowl. She sopped bread instead and forced herself to chew and swallow. It burned the back of her throat, but she felt more alive after a few mouthfuls.
“So you work with me now?” she asked, trying to put aside thoughts of plague.
Dahlia shrugged, perching on the edge of a chair. Her eyes flickered around the room; Isyllt hoped she wasn’t casing it. “I convinced Meka to help you. And you might need more help, looking for Forsythia’s killer.” She lowered her voice at the words, and Isyllt didn’t blame her. The memory of Forsythia’s sobs was enough to steal warmth from the room.
“I might,” she mumbled around a mouthful of bread. Isyllt didn’t insult the girl by mentioning the danger. She’d come back after witnessing an unpleasant summoning, and risked a sickbed; that didn’t speak of cowardice or squeamishness. She swallowed and studied Dahlia more closely. “You want more than a few weeks employment, don’t you?”
The girl’s jaw tightened. “I’m not asking for anything besides what my time is worth. Forsythia was kind to me-I want to see her avenged.”
But Isyllt had seen the desire in her at the Arcanost. And she had come back now, when any fool knew that necromancers weren’t safe or pleasant company. “Shiver or spark?” she asked.
Blue eyes flickered and met hers. “Shiver.” Her chin rose with the word.
Sparks, as those with the talent for projective magic were often called, were accepted at the Arcanost no matter how poor or connectionless, if only because an untrained pyromancer was a threat to everyone around them. Shivers-those who could sense magic or hear spirits-were eight for an obol, and without something else to recommend them would go untrained, or find work as hedge magicians or ghost-whisperers. Or go mad from voices they couldn’t stop.
Isyllt shrugged, setting the tray and empty bowl aside. “That doesn’t mean you can’t learn to do more. A well-trained sorcerer can do a little of almost anything.”
“Can you?”
She snorted again and shoved back the covers. “I’m too well-trained. Overspecialized. I’m so steeped in death and decay that my magic isn’t good for much else. But I can teach you theory. If you want to learn.”
Dahlia watched her, eyes narrow and wary. Isyllt remembered that chariness. Was her need to learn worth the possibility of hurt and betrayal? She looked away before the girl was pressed to answer, concentrated on getting out of bed. The room had grown while she was ill, or at least the wardrobe seemed much farther away than she remembered. “Are you an orphan?”
Dahlia shrugged. “I don’t know who my father was, or where he might be. My mother is alive, but all she cares about these days is opium. Since I wasn’t going to steal to help her buy it, I left home.”
“She named you Dahlia.”
Another shrug, this one almost fierce. “It was her name when I was conceived. The Rose Council took it away later, before I was born, when her habit started interfering with her work. She said it would save me time choosing one when I grew up.” Her mouth twisted, pinched white.
“Charming,” Isyllt muttered. She made it to the wardrobe, leaning heavily on the carved oaken doors. “You don’t have to keep it.”
“Why not? She was right, after all. I’ll be back in a few years, no matter what else I do.”
The bitter resignation in her voice distracted Isyllt from clean clothes. “It’s hardly that bad. Even if you don’t want to study magic, there are plenty of trades that will let you work off apprentice fees. The temples, if nothing else-”
Dahlia laughed, sharp and startled. “You don’t know, do you?” When Isyllt raised expectant brows she laughed harder. “I’m androgyne. Not a boy or a girl. I’ll be hijra when I turn sixteen.”
Isyllt blinked, closed her mouth on whatever words had died unspoken on her tongue. She had seen skirts and a lanky adolescent prettiness and given it no more thought. But now, studying the length and weight of bone, the shape of her face, she supposed Dahlia would make an equally pretty boy. She had glimpsed the veiled and marked hijra and heard the normal rumors, but knew next to nothing of the truth.
“And that leaves you with no choice but to be a prostitute?”
Dahlia raised her hands. “It’s what they do.”
“The Pallakis Savedra doesn’t. If we’re being charitable, anyway.”
The girl-Isyllt would be hard-pressed to change that thought now-snorted. “She’s the prince’s mistress, and one of the Eight besides. She doesn’t have to do much of anything. Some of us need money. Food. A place to be.” A hint of wistfulness threaded the last.
Isyllt tried to quash an upswell of sympathy. There was only so much she could do. But she could offer something, at least.
“You have a few years to decide, at least. I’ll hire you as an assistant until I catch this killer, and my offer of instruction stands. Are you interested?”
Dahlia chewed her lip, twisting her hands in her skirts. “All right,” she said at last. “For Syth. I’ll help you.”
“Good.” Isyllt smiled and gathered an armful of clothes. “For your first job, you can run me a bath.”
“I’m sorry,” Savedra said, not for the first time. She lay propped in her own bed, into which the court physician had scolded her after inspecting her stitches and changing the dressing on her arm. A bottle of opium- laced wine sat on the table beside her, as yet unopened-she needed her wits more than a surcease of pain at the moment.
Nikos and Ashlin had traded their normal places. He paced the length of the carpet at the foot of the bed, and she leaned against the doorframe, arms folded tight. Savedra couldn’t bring herself to look at either of them. “I never should have put the princess at risk,” she said to her lap, to her scabby white-knuckled hands. “It was foolish and thoughtless and-”
“I take my own risks, thank you,” Ashlin snapped. The talon scratches were stark and red on her cheek and brow. She was pale, despite her unabated temper, eyes shadowed. “None of this is your fault.”
She meant more than demon birds, but Savedra couldn’t accept the absolution. She carried a store of little secrets daily, like a child’s cache of treasures, but this one was too big, too heavy.
Distant voices rose to fill the silence, the sound of shears and wheels and rakes. In addition to the looming solstice celebration, the palace staff now had an extra strain. A rider had passed Savedra and Ashlin on the road back from Evharis, and they had seen the dust of a marching army blurring the sky behind them. The king would be home soon.
Nikos stopped his circuit and lifted a hand before either of them could speak again. “There’s no point in recriminations. I’m only happy neither of you was harmed worse. What exactly did you find, anyway? The secret history of the vrykoloi?”
He joked, but Savedra’s mouth pinched too tight to smile. She caught herself fidgeting with the edge of her bandage and dragged her hand away. Ashlin stayed quiet, waiting for her to speak. Something blossomed behind her breastbone, so hot and sharp she wanted to cry. Saints help her. She’d dared one foolish love; she wasn’t sure she could survive another.
“Please,” she said at last. She couldn’t lie, not to him, but neither could she lay the inadequate story bare. “Let me keep this for a time. It’s… a family mystery. Let me look for answers before I share it.” Her hands twisted in her lap, till her stitches itched and throbbed. “Forgive me.”
“Vedra. Love.” Three swift strides brought Nikos to her bedside. He cupped a hand against her cheek, tilting her head up. “You’ve done nothing that needs forgiveness. Keep your secrets. I trust you.”
She was her mother’s daughter. She didn’t flinch. That felt as damning as any lie. “Thank you,” she whispered. From the corner of her eye she saw Ashlin flinch for both of them, turning her face to the wall.
No, this wasn’t a secret any of them could survive.
Despite her promises of rest to the physicians, Savedra was out of bed within the hour. Her maid frowned and
Fog drifted heavy through the streets, and even with her cloak and the shelter of a carriage, she was chilled
