LITMIR.BIZ

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Come, pull your unit together—tea and cakes ought to be ready on the kator.”

      Hoarse chuckles broke out among the northern irregulars and southern conscripts within earshot. Brushing past Yatrin, Mesar hurried to Konrad’s side in a bid to converse during their walk to the kator. But he resembled an overzealous schoolboy, as sycophantic and hamstrung by ideals as any of the students Anna had known in the kales.

      Anna simply wrapped her arm around Ramyi’s shoulder and pulled the girl closer, warding off the glances and grins that Konrad flashed her.

      If Mesar had forgotten the rules of the game, Anna would craft her own.

      Chapter 5

      Anna had never known how opulent a kator’s capsule could be. It was a pastiche of gold leaf and swaying velvet drapes and aged, varnished wood, thick with the scent of rosewater. Lanterns sustained by rattling vials of sparksalt solution and magnetic beads bathed the capsule in an otherworldly crimson glow. It stood in opposition to the cramped, rusting furnaces Anna remembered, which she hadn’t experienced since leaving Malijad. But wealth alone seldom brought comfort.

      They’d been gliding along the impeccable Nahoran rails for well over two hours, and during the kator’s occasional stop, Anna glimpsed cities that grew more lavish and clean, gleaming in the sunlight like diamonds pressed from portico and vibrant greenery. Cities so stunningly adapted to the rugged mountain passes and damp, grassy lowlands that they made Zakamun seem like a Hazani outpost.

      Across the divide of a low table and four-armed silver hookah, Konrad adjusted the cushions lining his rattan sofa. He exhaled a thick coil of smoke and shifted himself into a wider stance, settling his boots on the silk covering and splaying out his arms. Without a neck sleeve, his rune was a pale, blinding distraction.

      More fittingly, it was an accusation. Anna stared at its precise cuts, searching for the faded fingerprints of a girl she could hardly recall. Memory was a damning stain of guilt, a constant reminder of crimes once committed using her face, her hands, her mind. At times, especially when in the depths of meditation, she was overcome by the sense that she’d inherited her flesh from a monster. The same flash of panic came over her as she recognized her marks.

      “If only you knew how long I’d been waiting,” Konrad said in flatspeak, jarring her. “Most of the others were certain they’d find your bones dangling from the rafters in some Gosuri den. But I—well, you know me. I had faith.”

      She didn’t know him. Not really. “Faith can be dangerous.”

      “Once a wise girl, always a wise girl.” Konrad took another inhale and peered at Ramyi, who’d barely touched her tea or flat pistachio cakes. He seemed to take some delight in the girl’s shyness, in prodding her with his eyes and coy words, much like a hound with its crippled prey. It wasn’t malice, but his nature. His truth of the world. “Is she your servant? A droba, maybe?”

      “No,” Anna said. “Treat her with dignity.”

      That provoked some latent curiosity in him. “Do you speak any Orsas?”

      Ramyi shook her head.

      “Do you speak?” he asked, venting the smoke out through his nostrils with a smirk. “She learned well from you, panna.”

      “I remember you,” Ramyi whispered.

      “Is that so?” Konrad asked.

      “You were a captain,” Ramyi said, unblinking and tense at the edge of her chair. “Sometimes you waved at us when you patrolled with your men.”

      Konrad shot a curious look at Anna. “She’s from Malijad?” A tincture of worry, thinly veiled as surprise, laced his words.

      “One day you even brought pears for us,” Ramyi continued. “I liked you. We all did.”

      Anna flashed the girl a warning gaze, but it went unnoticed.

      Ramyi leaned closer. “We remember your name, and your face hasn’t changed much at all.”

      “Southern vitality.” He gave a shaky laugh.

      “None of us forgot about you,” Ramyi said. “Especially not me.”

      “Huh.” Konrad stroked his bare chin. “Anna, come off it. Was she an Orzi’s babe?” He met Ramyi’s gaze directly, but it unnerved him in a way Anna had never witnessed. He fussed with his shirt and picked at the silk around his legs, fidgeting as though Ramyi’s stare had hatched spiders between his fingers. “Is your father a saltman? Forgive me if I can’t nail a name to your flesh. It was a while back, after all.”

      “We always thought it was strange that a paper-skin would come to Hazan for fortune,” the girl said, picking up her tea for the first time. “Maybe you just don’t have a home anywhere.”

      Sighing, Konrad propped his chin up with his hand. “This girl thinks she knows the way of the world,” he said to Anna. “Doesn’t it grate you just a bit? You were humble when you had her years. Who is she?”

      “What do you want in Nahora?” Ramyi pressed. “Do they feel like your people, or are you just a greedy whorespawn?” Even as Konrad began to speak, uttering a retort that was buried beneath the kator’s chattering, Ramyi’s eyes remained piercing. “Maybe they’re the same thing.”

      “Oh, she’s precious,” Konrad groaned.

      “And you’re pathetic.”

      Leaning more heavily on his arm, Konrad yawned. “We have some catching up to do, Anna. Don’t you think?”

      Ramyi’s frustration was plain, but no more telling than water on the surface of the sea. Her sentiments ran deep, and even Anna hadn’t probed their depths. But it wasn’t worth exploring them on a whim. Anna nodded somberly at the girl.

      “Eat with the others,” Anna said quietly. “I’ll fetch you soon.”

      “Anna,” she hissed.

      Anna tilted her chin toward the door. “It’s all right.”

      Those words settled the girl somewhat, at least outwardly, and she tucked both her hands and her gaze into her lap, then rose and moved to the egress. Though it took some effort, she worked the swinging mahogany door open and slipped out. The silence was charged now, bursting with every rustle and muted thump of the cogs.

      “Sharp wit on that one,” Konrad said.

      “Did you earn your rank, or is Ga’mir awarded to all of the traitors?” Anna asked.

      His lips stirred, but didn’t part. “Are you still bitter about Malijad, Anna?”

      “I’m not here to work with you.”

      “Oh?” he prodded. “It’s curious that you chose to come to us now. Something must really be stoking the fire under your boots.”

      Anna thought of the scroll case in her pack, wondering if the Ga’mir’s smugness had anything to do with leaked missives. But there was a time and place to play her hand, to bargain for what she wanted once they’d glimpsed what they needed.

      “Whatever you might think of me,” Konrad continued, “I’ve proven myself as a tactician.”

      “The fact that your troops are sharing this kator with innocents is a testament to your discretion.”

      “You’re saying the Council ought to seize civilian infrastructure.”

      “No,” Anna hissed. “But you’re not taking this fight seriously. None of your masters are.”

      “Have you considered that it’s not so serious?”

      “Our breakers have been following your diplomacy. You haven’t even reached out to Kowak. They’re the last foothold you’ll find in Rzolka.”

      Konrad cocked his head to the side. “Volna hasn’t declared war on Nahora. As of right now, it’s neighborly

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