Gold banners ripple from every pole, embroidered with the glaring sun of Yohazatz and █████ flowers that look less like blossoms and more like many-fingered hands. Smoke from braziers curls under the canopy, thick with spices and incense, half-hiding the beams overhead.

  Qaloron Khan sits at the high table, laughing too loudly. His fur-trimmed robe glitters with borrowed jewels. ΓO??? Consort is a painted stillness at his side, expression soft and unreadable. Her niece, today’s bride, kneels nearby like an ornament someone is about to put on the wrong shelf.

  The guests are a bright, rustling river of silks and armor plates. Serving girls weave through them with trays piled high. Children chase the edges of the crowd until slapped back by anxious parents.

  Puripal can hardly see over anyone’s elbow.

  He carries a tray of honeyed wine jars, both hands straining under the weight.

  He stops beside the first cluster of jars set out for a group of L???????????????????????????O????????????????????????????????T???????????????????????????????????U?_???????????????S????????????????????????? relatives. The clay glows warm in the lamplight. He can hear Mother’s rhyme in his skull like a drum.

  Smile. Bow. Serve.

  A plump aunt with ????? embroidery on her sleeves laughs and ruffles his hair. “Little prince!” she coos. “So dutiful, carrying drinks for your elders.”

  Puripal forces his face into a smile. His cheeks feel wrong, too big for his skull.

  He stirs each jar with the little wooden stick Mother gave him, always clockwise. He doesn’t know why clockwise matters.

  Around him, the feast hums. Lutes and flutes tangle overhead. Dancers spin, skirts flaring, bells chiming at their ankles. Men are already red-faced from earlier toasts. The smell is a mix of roasted meats, sugared fruits, perfume, and too many bodies in enclosed space.

  It all becomes a muffled blur.

  He lifts his head once and scans the hall.

  Aral?n stands not far from the high table, just behind one of the carved pillars, arms loosely crossed. His face is calm, almost bored. His eyes are not.

  When their gazes meet, Aral?n gives the smallest nod.

  I’m here.

  Puripal swallows. His feet carry him on.

  By the time he reaches the high table, his stomach is a tight knot of acid.

  Qaloron looks down and sees him, and his booming voice rolls out over the music. “There you are, my clever mouse,” he says, hauling Puripal one-handed up onto the dais as if he weighs nothing. “Running errands already, are you? Make your mother proud, eh?”

  The hand on Puripal’s shoulder is heavy, affectionate, oblivious.

  ?L????O????T????U????S???Consort’s uncle—broad-shouldered, hawk-nosed, wearing a smile he thinks is charming—leans forward with his cup.

  “To unifying bloodlines,” he proclaims, loud enough for the nearest six tables to hear. “May old roots entwine, and the new trunk be strong.”

  There’s polite laughter, scattered applause.

  Puripal’s hand shakes. Honeyed wine sloshes; a few drops spill onto the man’s embroidered sleeve, blooming dark on the silk.

  Mother is at the far end of the pavilion, half-hidden by a column, surrounded by women in fine robes. She doesn’t move, but Puripal can feel her gaze like a knife at his back.

  He steadies his hand. Smile. Bow. Serve.

  The man pats his head before lifting the cup. “There, see? Useful already,” he says.

  Puripal steps back, tray clutched to his chest. His heart is pounding so hard he can feel it in his gums.

  He backs off the dais, nearly bumping into a musician tuning his dopshul. The music swells again as the toasts begin in earnest, families and factions trying to outdo each other in metaphor and flattery.

  A woman covers her mouth with her scarf, shoulders shaking. Someone beside her laughs. “Too much spice,” they say. “Or too much of my joke.”

  She tries to laugh back and can’t.

  The cough keeps coming, tearing up through her chest like something with claws. Her eyes water; she reaches blindly for her wine as if that will wash it down. The cup slips in her grip and thuds back to the table, slopping crimson over her fingers.

  “Careful, Auntie,” her nephew chuckles, dabbing at the spill. “You’ll stain—”

  Her scarf darkens where it presses to her lips.

  Not wine.

  He stares, confused, as a thin red line leaks between the threads and tracks down her wrist.

  “Auntie?” he says.

  She pulls the scarf away, gasping—and blood sprays in a fine mist across his face, bright and shocking against his silks. The sound she makes is not like a cough anymore. It’s a wet, bubbling bark, as if her lungs have decided to come up and see the party.

  Three seats away, a man sets down his cup with a faint clatter, fingers fumbling. “Hot,” he mutters. “Too… hot.” His throat spasms around the words. He claws at his collar, nails scraping skin raw, as though he can drag the heat out with his bare hands. A vein pulses grotesquely at his temple, then vanishes under the sudden slackness of his face.

  The dancer nearest him misses a step, foot landing wrong. She wobbles, recovers, smiles too wide, bells chiming as if trying to distract from the way her pupils blow wide. Her next inhale hitches; the one after that never finishes. She takes one more turn on instinct and goes down like someone cut all her strings at once, dress flaring around her in a perfect flower as she hits the floor.

  The music stutters. One pipa keeps playing, the musician staring, hands moving on reflex while his brain frantically tries to catch up.

  For a heartbeat, no one understands.

  Then the woman with the scarf gives a gurgling shriek, clutching her throat. Her eyes bulge, the whites veined with sudden red. Foam flecks at the corner of her mouth, tinged pink as if someone has ruined a bowl of cream with a drop of paint. Her husband lunges to catch her, but she collapses against him, dead weight, blood soaking into his lap like some obscenely intimate gift.

  “Auntie?” wheezes the nephew again, wiping frantically at his face. “Auntie, stop—stop joking—”

  Another guest at the same table coughs once, twice, then spews vomit and wine across the dishes, half-digested meat splattering over roasted duck and sugared plums. Someone shrieks, “The food—!” as if the real tragedy is the ruined feast.

  A goblet slips from numb fingers, wine spilling dark across the table like an accusation.

  “Are you choking?” a L?????????????????????????????????????????????O??????????????????????????????????????????T????????????_??U??????????????????????????????????????S???????????????????????????? uncle demands of his brother, slapping his back. “Spit it out, fool—”

  The brother spins toward him, eyes rolling, and vomits a slurry of red and bile straight into his lap. His hands scrabble at the tablecloth, dragging plates and chopsticks down with him as he drops to his knees.

  The pavilion becomes a chain of falling pieces.

  A man in ????? blue staggers to his feet, knocking over a stool. He raises a hand for help—and three people flinch away, suddenly unwilling to touch him. He takes two jerky steps, clawing at his own neck, leaving deep red grooves where his nails tear skin. His tongue lolls out, darkening from pink to purplish-black as veins stand out along it. He makes a sound like a kettle boiling over, then drops face-first into a platter of roasted meat. The pig’s glazed eyes stare serenely back as his fingers drum once, twice, then still.

  A child screams as her aunt slumps sideways, knocking the girl’s head against the table. The child’s wail rises pure and thin over the thickening chaos. Someone tries to drag the body off her; the aunt’s jaw hangs at an ugly angle, lips flecked with foam and teeth slick with blood.

  “Hold her, hold her!” a grandmother howls, gripping her convulsing granddaughter’s shoulders so hard it leaves bruises. The girl’s legs kick, knocking dishes to the floor. Her heel cracks a wine jar; it explodes in shards and sticky spray.

  Wine jars overturn everywhere, their contents glugging out and mixing with vomit, blood, and piss on the floor. The sweet smell of honey turns sour with bile and fear. Incense smoke fights with the stench and loses.

  “Poison!” a man shrieks, voice breaking into a high, cracked note. “Poison!”

  He claws at his own tongue as if trying to rip the taste out, then falls backward, knocking over two stools and a child. The child vanishes under a tangle of thrashing legs.

  “Close the doors!” a ???L??? ???O??? ???T??? ???U??? ???S??? retainer bellows. “No one leaves!” He takes a step toward the entrance, dragging his sword free of its sheath—

  —and freezes mid-stride, eyes popping. His sword clatters from numb fingers as his knees hit the floor. His body keeps going forward, face smashing into the wooden threshold with a hollow thud. Blood from his nose pools in the carved grooves like it’s seeking letters to spell something out.

  A drunk guest grabs Puripal by the sleeve, fingers digging in hard enough to bruise. His eyes are bloodshot, the veins spiderwebbing out in frantic red.

  “What did you—” he starts, spittle flying, breath reeking of fermented fruit and meat.

  His face contorts halfway through the sentence. The sound that comes out instead of the next word is a wet crackle. His grip tightens painfully for a second, then vanishes. He releases Puripal as if burned and staggers back, hands flying to his throat. His nails leave bloody crescents where they dig. A bulge moves under the skin of his neck, pulsing once like something trapped trying to get out.

  He crumples at the boy’s feet, legs twitching. His heels drum the floor in wild, uneven beats, splashing in the mess already spreading there. One shoe flies off and lands near a fallen chopstick, absurdly upright.

  Puripal’s tray slips from his numb fingers.

  It hits the ground with a hollow sound that feels too loud and somehow entirely swallowed by the chaos. The jars bounce, roll—one shatters, spraying wine and ceramic splinters across his ankles. The liquid splashes his toes, sticky and cold, seeping between them. For a dizzy instant, he can’t tell if it’s wine or blood.

  He cannot hear the music anymore, though the musicians still play on by reflex, hands jerking over strings and flutes like puppets whose master has died. Their notes screech and wobble, slipping in and out of tune, while bodies slam into their stands.

  All other sound narrows to the ragged breathing of dying people and the roar of blood in his own ears.

  In his mind, the only thing he sees, is the satisfied face of his mother.

  ...

  The city is still burning in places. Smoke crawls out of shattered windows, limping up into the gray sky. Militia drums thud in distant streets. The gutters run with water, ash, and thin threads of blood.

  Shan Xi ignores most of it. Her boots splash through puddles that are probably not rain.

  When she reaches the narrow alley where she left Lizi, she slows.

  The wall is still there, blackened. The smear of blood on the cobbles where a prince died for a boy he barely knew.

  No Lizi.

  Shan Xi stands in the middle of the alley, hands on her hips, as if Lizi might materialize out of sheer defiance.

  “Little rabbit,” she mutters. “If you died on me after all that, I’ll raise you and kill you again.”

  There’s dried blood on the stones—more than before. Bootprints, scuffed and overlapping.

  Shan Xi stares for a breath, jaw tight. Then she snorts.

  “Good,” she says, to nobody. “If you walked away, you can walk back.”

  She turns her back on the alley and heads toward the safehouse.

  ...

  Pirates sprawl on crates and barrels, weapons in their laps, arguing quietly over a deck of cards made from torn tax ledgers. A few of Puripal’s Yohazatz warriors sit apart, backs to a wall, cleaning spears. Sen lounges on the windowsill.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  The door bangs open.

  “Miss me?” Shan Xi announces.

  Half the room is on its feet before she finishes the sentence.

  “Captain!”

  “Boss!”

  “You owe me three silver, I told you she wouldn’t get decapitated,” someone crows.

  A few surge forward, then stop when they see the dried blood on her sleeves and the empty space around her.

  “Where are the twins?” a pirate asks. “They didn’t get bored of us, did they?”

  “Died of complaints,” another suggests.

  “Wouldn’t dare,” Na’er calls. Relief loosens her shoulders a fraction. “Captain. You’re late. I was about to start charging rent.”

  “Put it on my tab,” Shan Xi says. She flashes the room a grin, quick and bright as broken glass. “Pragya and Pragati are busy impressing someone with their needlework. They’re fine. Loud. Mean. You know. The usual.”

  “And Ta?” The name knifes through the chatter.

  Dukar is already moving, pushing through pirates with less than his usual care. He reaches Shan Xi in three long strides, eyes wild.

  “Where is he?” he demands. “Where is Ta?”

  Puripal doesn’t move at first. He’s been standing near the far wall, a map tacked up beside him, fingers resting on the edges as if pinning the city in place. At Dukar’s question, his hand tightens on the parchment until it crinkles. He looks up, across heads and shoulders, and locks onto Shan Xi.

  “Captain,” he says. His voice is steady in the way ice is steady. “Where is he?”

  The room waits.

  Shan Xi’s grin fades.

  “He’s dead,” she says.

  No softness. No padding. The words land like dropped stone.

  Sound empties out of the room.

  Dukar’s breath leaves him in a harsh noise. “What?”

  “The shot and the blood did their work,” Shan Xi says. Her tone is flat, almost bored, which is how she sounds when she is cutting deepest. “Chest, neck, courtyard, bullet, you know how it goes. We tried. We failed. He’s dead.”

  Dukar’s fist curls. “You left him,” he says, hoarse. “You left him in some alley to bleed out like a—”

  He lunges.

  It’s not subtle; he’s too furious for that. But he’s quick, and his shoulders are broad enough to push two pirates aside. His fist is already drawing back.

  Steel flashes.

  Shan Xi’s sabre is out and up before he can blink, the curved blade angled just so against his throat. She doesn’t press; she doesn’t need to. The promise of the edge is enough.

  “Careful, Big Brother,” she says lightly. “I’ve killed many men who tried to raise their hands against me.”

  Dukar freezes, chest heaving. A single trickle of sweat crawls down his neck toward the blade.

  Puripal hasn’t moved. The map under his hand shakes once.

  Dukar’s voice cracks. “He was my—”

  “Yours? Really?” Shan Xi’s smile is sharp. “Funny. I thought he belonged to himself.”

  The two of them breathe at each other for a long, ugly heartbeat.

  Then Shan Xi drops the sabre point, stepping back. The room exhales with her.

  “Listen up,” she says, turning away from Dukar as if he’s no more dangerous than a kicked dog. “This nest is blown. Baek Miju walks personally now. We move.”

  “Move where?” a pirate asks.

  “A place with fewer firing squads,” Shan Xi says. “Bo’anem still has corners that don’t know us. Yet. We’ll fix that.”

  She jerks her chin toward the back door. “Pack light. If it doesn’t fit in two hands, leave it.”

  Pirates start moving. A few glance at Dukar, at Puripal, at the Yohazatz warriors, measuring whether they’re coming.

  Puripal tears his hand from the map. “Captain,” he calls.

  She looks over her shoulder.

  “Are you…?” He gestures between the pirates and the safehouse. Between running and staying.

  Temej speaks before Shan Xi can. “We’re not moving,” he says, from where he’s been sitting with his back to the nearest pillar, one leg stretched out, the other tucked in. He rises, wincing. “Naci knows about this place. We promised to wait. So we wait.”

  Sen hops down from the windowsill, rolling her shoulders. “You don’t leave home before the crazy steppe queen arrives,” she says. “Bad luck.”

  Shan Xi snorts. “You’re calling her crazy,” she says. “Adorable.”

  She looks Puripal over as if assessing a horse for purchase. “Your war. Your funeral,” she says. “Stay, then. Try not to get executed without me; it’d be rude.”

  To the pirates: “You heard me. We move. Now.”

  They file past her—rough hands clapping her shoulder, quick questions about routes and rendezvous, someone trying to hand her a half-eaten bun. In a breath, the room that felt crowded is half-empty, pirate color draining out like tidewater.

  The door shuts on the last of them.

  Silence creeps back.

  Left in the safehouse are the Yohazatz warriors, Temej, Sen, Puripal, Dukar and Notso.

  Notso lies on the floor by Dukar’s boots, chin on his paws, tail thumping once every few heartbeats as if reminding the room that, technically, life goes on.

  Dukar doesn’t move. He leans against the wall where Shan Xi pinned him with steel a few moments ago, fists still curled, breathing shallow. The world has shrunk to the shape of a younger brother’s absence.

  Across the room, Puripal is still by the opposite wall, one hand braced on the map as if holding Bo’anem in place might keep everything else from slipping. His knuckles are white against the parchment.

  He should go to Dukar. He knows that. Every part of him that isn’t numb knows that.

  He can’t make his feet remember how to walk.

  Temej studies them both from his post by the pillar. Sen’s eyes flick between Puripal and Dukar like she’s tracking two faulty engines.

  “This is stupid,” she mutters under her breath.

  “Agreed,” Temej says. “You go.”

  “Me?” Sen squeaks. “He’s scary.”

  “Your job is to fix things that don’t work,” Temej says.

  “Machines,” Sen corrects. “I fix machines. Not… feelings.”

  “Same principle,” Temej says.

  Sen grimaces. “And what do you do?”

  “I supervise,” he says calmly. “I’m management.”

  She gives him a flat look, then sighs and hops down from the crate. “If I die,” she says, “I am haunting you.”

  “You’ll have to stand in line,” Temej calls after her.

  She approaches Puripal the way she approaches a live mine: cautiously, with respect, ready to yank her hands back at any second.

  “Sir Khan?” she says.

  He doesn’t answer. His eyes are fixed on a point somewhere in the middle distance, where only he can see.

  “Mister Puripal,” Sen tries again, softer this time. “You’re wrinkling my map.”

  He blinks, as if dragged back through several walls. “Your what?”

  She taps the parchment under his hand. “That’s my work. Took me three days and two near-arrests to get the measurements on those sewers.”

  He looks down, notices the deep creases under his fingers, and lifts his hand like it suddenly weighs more.

  “Sorry,” he says automatically.

  “You can pay me back by not standing there like a broken cart,” Sen says. “Go talk to him.”

  Puripal’s gaze flicks toward Dukar, then away so fast it’s almost a flinch. “I… can’t. Not yet.”

  Temej strolls over, hands in his belt, like this is just another campfire problem. “Why not?” he asks.

  Puripal’s jaw tenses. “Because every time I open my mouth, I hear myself saying ‘He’s dead’ like it’s the weather,” he says. “And I don’t know how to tell him it’s my fault.”

  “Your fault?” Temej raises an eyebrow. “Did you shoot your own brother in the neck?”

  “No,” Puripal says.

  Temej nods. “Did you drag him into that palace and decide he wasn’t worth saving?” he presses.

  Puripal’s face twists. “No.”

  “Then what exactly,” Temej asks, “is your grand crime?”

  Puripal’s eyes flicker. “I brought him here,” he says. “Into this city, into this mess. I told him he could help. I told him we’d change things. I told him—” The words jam. “I told him to do as he wants.”

  “And he did,” Temej says. “That’s on him.”

  “That’s not comforting,” Sen mutters.

  Temej shrugs.

  Puripal huffs a breath that might be a laugh if it had more strength.

  “Our people have a saying,” Temej continues. “When a foal breaks its leg in the gully, you don’t stand on the hill and think about how sad the bones are. You climb down and see if it can still walk. If it can’t, then you kill it yourself.”

  “That’s… worse,” Sen says.

  “It’s about responsibility,” Temej says, not taking his eyes off Puripal. “You are already down in the gully. You may as well see if the horse is still breathing.”

  Puripal glances at Dukar again. Dukar’s head is bowed, hands braced on his knees. Notso has edged closer, pressing against his leg, muzzle nudging his palm. Dukar’s fingers twitch, then finally curl in the dog’s thick fur.

  “He thinks I don’t care,” Puripal says quietly.

  Sen snorts. “You’re shaking the way I do when someone tells me we’re out of powder,” she says. “If that’s what not-caring looks like, I don’t want to see you affectionate.”

  Temej leans in a little. “Puripal,” he says, without titles this time. “If you don’t go to him now, you will regret it for the rest of your life.”

  Puripal’s throat works. “What am I supposed to say?” he asks. “‘Sorry I didn’t throw myself in front of the bullet instead’?”

  Sen opens her mouth, then closes it.

  “You say his name,” Temej says. “I will be honest, I don’t know anything about those things.”

  Puripal stares at him for a long beat. Then he nods once, sharp, like a man walking into cold water.

  “Watch the map,” he says.

  Sen salutes with two fingers. “I’ll scold anyone who tries to conquer the city without you.”

  Puripal’s lips twitch. Then he squares his shoulders and crosses the room.

  Notso lifts his head as he approaches, ears pricking. Dukar doesn’t look up until Puripal is almost in arm’s reach.

  “Dukar,” Puripal says.

  The name hangs there, fragile as glass.

  Dukar’s eyes are red-rimmed but dry. He looks at Puripal like a man hauled back too fast from deep water. “Don’t,” he says. “If you say his name, I’ll break.”

  “I wasn’t going to start with his name,” Puripal says. “I was going to start with yours.”

  It takes Dukar a second to process that. “Mine?”

  “Yes,” Puripal says. His hands hover in the air between them, unsure what to do. “Because you are still here. And I’m not sure you realize that. And I am very, very bad at losing people.”

  Dukar laughs once, a sound like a snapped stick. “You’re Khan,” he says. “You lose people every time you give an order.”

  “I lose soldiers,” Puripal says. “That’s expected. You’re… you’re not soldiers. You’re…” His mouth twists. He gives up on words and reaches, fingers wrapping in the front of Dukar’s shirt, pulling him forward just enough that their foreheads almost touch. “You’re mine,” he says, raw. “And he was mine. And I don’t know how to–

  –how to fix this.”

  Notso whines softly, inching closer until he’s wedged between their shins, a warm, confused barrier.

  Dukar’s hands, which had been hanging uselessly at his sides, come up on their own and catch at Puripal’s wrists. For a moment he just holds on, like the contact is the only solid thing in the room.

  “I don’t know how to do this without him,” Dukar admits into Puripal’s coat. “He was… he was always there. Being loud. Being stupid. Reminding me that I was smarter than someone else.”

  “I know,” Puripal says quietly. “He did that for me too.”

  Something in Dukar’s chest gives. The first tear spills hot and humiliating down his cheek.

  “Don’t,” he warns.

  “Too late,” Puripal says quietly.

  His own eyes are wet now. They stare at each other, two grown men, ripped open in a burned-out tenement.

  Notso, obviously deciding this is unacceptable, stands on his hind legs and tries to lick both their faces at once. He gets nose, chin, and one eye, tail wagging furiously.

  “Stop,” Dukar splutters, pushing half-heartedly at the dog. “Notso, I swear by all the spirits—”

  “He is participating in your grieving process,” Puripal says, voice thick. “Let him have this.”

  “His tongue smells like old soup,” Dukar complains, rubbing his face on his sleeve.

  The dog leans into the touch, groaning with bliss, tail thumping the wall.

  For a few breaths, that’s all there is: shared heat, shared grief, a ridiculous dog insisting that if there are hands free, they should be petting something.

  Puripal takes a shuddering breath. “Dukar,” he says again. “I am sorry. For… everything that led to this.”

  Dukar swallows. “I’m sorry too,” he says. “For trying to hit you. For… thinking you didn’t care.”

  Puripal huffs. “If I cared any more, I would evaporate,” he says. “Ask Sen. She keeps threatening to bottle my anxiety and use it as fuel.”

  From across the room, Sen calls, “I reckon it has excellent combustion properties.”

  Dukar actually smiles, crooked and helpless.

  They stand there, leaning into each other, tears drying in streaks. The hurt doesn’t vanish, but it becomes something they are holding together rather than being crushed under separately.

  Then the door opens.

  All three heads turn—two men and one dog.

  Ta stands in the doorway, one hand braced on the frame, the other pressed lightly to the bandage at his neck. He is pale under the grime, lips cracked, eyes too bright. His shirt is half-buttoned and mostly blood, and his left leg drags a little when he shifts his weight.

  He grins at them, shaky and glorious.

  “You two,” he croaks. “You look like shit.”

  For a heartbeat, nobody moves.

  Dukar’s brain produces a series of thoughts in rapid, useless succession: ghost, hallucination, Shan Xi has achieved necromancy, he really does look bad, Notso sees him, so he must be real, right?

  Notso lets out a yelp that is half bark, half scream, and launches himself.

  “Wait—” Ta starts.

  Too late. The dog slams into his knees, almost taking him down. Ta windmills with his free arm, manages to stay upright, then bends awkwardly to catch Notso’s head as the dog frantically licks his hands, his bandage, the air.

  “Ow,” Ta complains, laughter and pain tangled. “Gentle, Notso. I just learned how to stand again.”

  Dukar is already moving. So is Puripal. They hit him a heartbeat after the dog, less impact but more weight, arms wrapping around him from both sides.

  Ta wheezes as his ribs protest. “Okay,” he gasps. “Ow. I rescind my earlier complaint. You two look like slightly better shit.”

  Dukar’s fingers dig into his shoulders as if testing for substance. “Ta,” he says. Just that. Just the name, over and over, like a prayer or a curse. “Ta. Ta.”

  Puripal doesn’t say anything at first. His face is buried against Ta’s hair, shoulders shaking. When he finally manages words, they are muffled.

  “You were dead,” he says accusingly.

  “I got better,” Ta says.

  “You were dead,” Dukar echoes, voice breaking. “She said—Shan Xi said—”

  “Shan Xi is a liar,” Ta says. His throat is raw; words scrape.

  They cling to him, three grown men, one dog weaving in and out around their legs like a happy spirit determined to trip someone.

  Across the room, Sen puts a hand to her mouth. Temej coughs once and looks away, very interested in a crack in the wall.

  Puripal pulls back just enough to grab Ta’s face in both hands, as if checking each feature for authenticity. “You idiot,” he says. Tears run down his nose. “You absolute, impossible idiot.”

  Ta’s smile wobbles. “Hi, Puripal,” he says.

  The use of his full name hits like its own arrow.

  Dukar blinks. “What did you call him?” he asks.

  “His name,” Ta says, as if it’s obvious. “Puripal.”

  “You never call us that,” Dukar says. “You always say ‘Brother.’ Or ‘Fourth.’ Or ‘Oi.’”

  Ta’s gaze slides to him, warm and fierce. “Hi, Dukar,” he says.

  Dukar actually staggers. “Don’t do that,” he says thickly. “My heart is busy already.”

  Ta laughs, and there’s a thread of hysteria in it, but also something steadier. He reaches blindly and catches both their wrists, squeezing hard.

  “Between dying and not dying,” he says, “I realized something.”

  “‘Don’t get shot’ would have been a good realization,” Puripal mutters.

  “That too,” Ta says. “But this one’s better.”

  He looks from one to the other, eyes shimmering. “Names,” he says. “I used to hate them. Because why is mine just a number while everybody has a unique one. But the truth is, whatever they are... they’re… everything. They’re what you get before the titles, before the ‘Khan’ and ‘Regent’ and ‘Bastard.’ They’re what your mother says when you’re in trouble and what your friends shout when you’re drunk. They’re yours before the world gets its hands on you.”

  He licks cracked lips. “Yotaka died with his name intact,” he says quietly. “He died for me, and I don’t even know if he hated it or loved it. The least I can do is speak the names I’ve been given properly. Yours included.”

  Puripal swallows hard. “Ta,” he says. Just that.

  Ta grins, tears spilling over now. “See? Feels different when someone bothers to aim.”

  Puripal snorts, half sob, half laugh. “You’re insufferable,” he says. “I’m glad you didn’t die.”

  “I’m glad you two didn’t either,” Ta says. “Would have been embarrassing to be the last idiot standing.”

  Notso barks, as if to remind them he’s here too.

  “And you,” Ta says solemnly, bending as far as his stitches allow to rub the dog’s head. “Notso. Best of us all.”

  Notso woofs again, tail whacking Puripal’s shin. The Khan Regent yelps, which breaks something in the room; suddenly everyone is laughing and crying at once, the sounds tangled like threads in a knot.

  Sen sniffles, then abruptly blows her nose on her sleeve. “Awful,” she says. “You’re all awful. I hate you. Don’t ever do that again.”

  “Apologies,” Ta says. “I’ll schedule my next death more politely.”

  A flicker of light catches the corner of Temej’s eye. He turns toward the small, grimy window.

  Outside, the sky over the harbor is bruised gray. Against it, a sudden streak of color claws upward—a thin line of fire that bursts high above the water in a harsh blue-green blossom, spitting silver.

  Temej’s breath catches. “That’s her,” he says softly. “That’s Naci.”

  Sen is already scrambling for the crate in the corner, the one with the carefully guarded tubes and paper-wrapped cylinders. “Our turn,” she says. “Before the seagulls steal the credit.”

  Temej guides Ta gently down onto the nearest chair—Ta protests, but only a little—and strides to the window. He kicks it open, cold air rushing in, carrying the distant echo of drums and waves.

  Sen shoves a launch tube into his hands, fuse already threaded. “Angle at thirty-five degrees,” she instructs. “Unless you want to set fire to the next street over instead of the harbor.”

  “That’s an option?” Ta asks.

  Temej rolls his eyes. “I know how to shoot things into the sky,” he says. “Eagles do it every day.”

  “That is not how—” Sen starts, then gives up. “Fine. Light it.”

  He touches flame to fuse. It hisses, eager, sparks racing.

  “Everyone not wanting new scars, back away,” he says over his shoulder.

  The little group clusters behind him by instinct—Puripal, Dukar with a hand on Ta’s shoulder, Sen bouncing on her toes, Notso squirming in the middle, whining with excitement.

  Temej points at the firework at the horizon that announces Naci’s arrival and fires his own in the sky in response.

  “Ah, by the way,” Puripal says conversationally, eyes still on the firework, “now that that’s settled and you’re in a good mood and I finally feel strong enough to say it… there is a small possibility that while we were away Nemeh killed your parents, and your sister and I may have planned it together.”

  It takes a whole second for Dukar’s brain to register the words he has just heard.