He Who Breaks the Earth (The Gods-Touched Duology)
He Who Breaks the Earth: Chapter 30

When Noa loaded the last of the candlesticks and herb packets and fancy chairs she’d taken from Montanne Keep, she began to hum. Mostly because she wasn’t actually the one loading things since she had Gilesh and Bane to do it for her. Right as they lined up the last load of crates of the deck, Lia came calling from the house.

“Gilesh!” she yelled, sword in her hand. “Are you ready for me to destroy you?”

Gilesh gasped, both hands clapping over his mouth. “My sword. Where is my sword?” Bane chortled like a little girl, darting into the hold and coming out with both their blades, and the two of them ran happily down to meet Lia on the grass. Altahn frowned from the far end of the deck where he was rigging sheets of wood stolen from the house into safe stalls to transport the horses and came to the railing to stand beside Noa as Gilesh faced off against the former Devoted.

Both of them flinched when Lia disarmed him before he’d managed to even attack her. Crowing something about not following rules, Gilesh convinced her to let him pick up the sword, and was only a little grumpy when she suggested Bane join in to give them better odds.

“I don’t think I can watch,” Altahn breathed. “Oh good, Anwei is coming, so I don’t have to.” Galerey came crawling out from behind his neck to see what was causing the strain in his voice, but when there was nothing to see, consented to a few pets from Noa.

“How did you end up bonded to a firekey, anyway?” Noa asked, pulling his attention away from the healer as she approached. “Is it like Lia and Vivi, where he seems to know when she’s mad and sometimes he bites things when she wishes she could?” The auroshe was still quartered in the stables, Lia sneaking off to feed him treats of bloody meat. Rosie had opted to stay out in the forest, visiting often enough to give the servants nightmares.

Altahn’s brow furrowed, reaching up to run a finger down Galerey’s side. “She was sick when I found her. I helped her, and she stayed with me.” He twitched when the lizard climbed down his back and scrambled onto Noa’s shoulder instead. “Traitor.”

“Good taste is what it is,” Noa countered, nuzzling Galerey’s cheek.

“I don’t really know why she chose me. Or why she added you to her very short list of acceptable modes of transportation.” Altahn fixed Galerey with a perplexed stare. “There aren’t any other bonded firekeys in my clan. Usually when we replace wounded ones, they’re killed for the wet salpowder in their guts. It’s more potent than the bones and fossils we dig up.”

“You saved her, and she loves you for it.” Noa smiled, liking the story.

Anwei walked up the gangplank, Knox behind her. He had lost his belanvian darkness, his body just blocking light from Calsta’s sun rather than casting hungry shadows behind him.

Galerey jumped back to Altahn as Noa ran to wrap her arms around her friend, not sure what to say in parting. She was grateful to have been pulled away from everything she hated so much in Chaol, but also grateful to no longer feel eclipsed by her friend. Anwei didn’t speak for a moment, holding her just as close, as if she couldn’t bear to stop.

Finally, Anwei pulled back, her smile a little too tight. “So you’re leaving me to take these ridiculous hangers-on back to Trib land.” She shot a playful glare toward Altahn, who smiled, though he looked away after a moment, the past between them something not so easily forgotten. Anwei closed her eyes a little too long before turning back to Noa. “I feel like I’ll never see you again.”

“You have to keep an audience wanting more,” Noa said, nodding sagely. But then she lunged forward, hugging Anwei close again. “It won’t be hard to replace you. I’ll just look for signs of Yaru—rich people happily stabbing one another in the back.”

“I never stab.” Anwei squeezed her tight. “But I’ll miss you.” Lia came on board to hug Noa goodbye as well, softer somehow than she’d been before replaceing her sister. Anwei and Lia waved as they headed back down the gangplank, Anwei pointing a finger at Gilesh when he passed the two of them, sword heavy in his hand and a dejected set to his shoulders. “Don’t think I didn’t notice you skipping that tincture you were supposed to drink this morning. I can smell your humors clotting around the bruises those Devoted gave you. Don’t slack just because it tastes funny.”

“Like dead caterpillars and thistles,” he muttered through his teeth, setting his sword down to pick up one of the crates he’d abandoned on deck.

Knox waited until Anwei was a safe distance away before giving Noa a tight smile. “I don’t think I’ll miss you.”

“You’ll do more than miss me.” Noa grinned. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten about what happened in the rowboats after that whole bathtub incident.”

He blinked. “You mean when you almost died and then I saved your life?”

“That time you almost killed me, then got your mouth all over mine? Yes, that’s what I mean. And if that’s what you count as kissing, I mean, poor Anwei.” She couldn’t help the laugh that burst out when his cheeks turned rosy. “Don’t worry, I’ll be back to help.”

“I’m not—you’re not—I didn’t…” Knox couldn’t seem to get the words out.

“Go on.” She waved him off toward the gangplank. “I don’t have time to show you right now.”

“You offer classes?” Gilesh’s head popped out from the hold. “I mean, I remember you saying you went to the university in Chaol, but I didn’t realize it was as an instructor. I guess that explains why you tolerate Altahn hanging around—”

“Gilesh—” Altahn looked out from behind the load of boxes. Galerey snarled from her perch on his shoulder.

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of, Altahn,” Bane chimed in. “We all heard the rumors back home about how you need all the help you can get. Otherwise your dad wouldn’t have had such trouble replaceing you a wife—” He whooped with laughter, dragging Gilesh behind him down the gangplank. Altahn swore, dropping a box to chase after them.

Once the horses were settled and the gangplank was up, Noa didn’t like the feeling of pulling apart from Anwei and the others. But as she eased the boat down the now-open channel to the main river, the promise of seeing them soon was nothing to the feel of water beneath her and wind in her hair because she didn’t have anything to run from any longer.

Altahn came up from tending the horses, watching as Gilesh and Bane moved when Noa told them to untie things, then retie them mostly because she wanted to see how long it would take before they realized what she was about. She grinned at him. “I want to put a new house mark on the prow. And the canoe, of course.”

“You don’t want to keep your father’s mark so Ellis stays away from you?” Altahn grabbed hold of a rope with a humorless chuckle. “The Butcher.”

“Oh, I need a good nickname!” She pulled his hand off the rope to stop the sail from turning. “Maybe I’ll come up with one when you’re finished sanding my father’s house mark off the canoe. I’ll put out flyers or something so people know to be frightened of me. Go on.” She pointed to the canoe when Altahn shot her a less than enthused look. “You didn’t think I was going to take you clear to Trib land for nothing, did you?”

“Don’t you want it to be perfect?” He shot back. “If I sand it—”

“Oh no, I’m captain. I can’t get sawdust all over me.” She tapped her lips, squinting at the little vessel. “What house mark would suit me? Something like that window we left for the First Scholar, perhaps? Hands so soft you can tell they’ve never done any sanding, and your face.”

Alarmed, Altahn looked up from Galerey sending sparks down his collar.

“What’s she talking about, boss?” Gilesh called from the bench.

“A man who obviously knows his way around the bilges—”

“Fine, I’ll sand it!” Altahn’s face flushed. “Just… don’t put my face on any windows. Or house marks. Or signs, or… flyers—”

Bane stood up to help Altahn pull the canoe onto the small, unoccupied bit of deck between the benches. “Why do I get the feeling that Altahn’s been rejected again?”

“Again?” Noa dug deep for her most scandalous voice.

“You didn’t even properly ask her, did you?” Gilesh sighed, setting down his oar. “Remember? We talked about asking for a nice meal. A stroll by the water.” He waggled his eyebrows at Bane, who shoved something into his mouth and chewed noisily. “Girls outside the clan don’t know they’re supposed to pay their way into the kynate’s family, Altahn. Can’t have hard feelings that the poor girl didn’t throw herself at you like you wanted. You knew sailing down here to catch her attention was a ridiculous venture. Just look at how shiny her hair is. You thought that girl was going to follow you back to Trib land?”

“We both know I didn’t—wait, what is this?” Altahn threw down the canoe properly glaring at Gilesh. “Aren’t you supposed to be on my side?”

Gilesh shrugged.

“Fine,” Altahn said. “We all like Noa, but no one ever thought she was going to sparkle her way north. She likes throwing fire around and teasing boys until they cry. So as much as I would like—” He looked around, as if suddenly noticing Bane waggling his eyebrows.

“You can’t say it like that.” Gilesh sat down with the sandpaper and began to scratch at the purple house mark carved into the curled nose. “You have to start with a question, like ‘Miss Noa, when we get to Trib land, would you like to meet my fiancée’s eight cows?’ ”

“I did not agree to—” He was actually frustrated, his cheeks even redder than before. But then he started to laugh. “Miss Noa.” He gave her a bow far too deep with a flourish that was probably meant to mock Mateo’s ridiculous fluttering but actually looked quite handsome. “Would you like to sail straight into our side of the bay and sell my extended family some of the stolen candlesticks you’ve got in the hold? I have a cousin who likes stealing things too, you know.”

“I don’t take cows as payment,” Noa said haughtily, going to the bench where she’d seen paints. Looking them over, she picked up the dark green. “You think I haven’t noticed you mooning around after me like some kind of lovesick narmaiden, which coincidentally also happens to be your dancing technique.”

She laughed when Altahn started toward her, his placid smile unfolding larger as he scooped the paint away from her and picked up the brush. “You can teach me.”

“I don’t want to teach you. Laughing at you is more fun.”

Bane moved to help Gilesh with the canoe, the two of them squatted at the prow with a bowl of sand she’d brought from the beach. Altahn dipped a rag into the bowl while Noa tended the sails, wondering at the sight of her father’s house mark being rubbed away so easily as if it had never been more than a bit of paint. When they were finished, she took some paint and went to examine the blank new space, full of possibilities.

“Green?” Altahn cocked an eyebrow. “I thought you were joking about going pirate.”

Noa dipped the paintbrush and put it to the wood, starting with a swish that looked like a skirt, another that made raised arms and a head, then a third a bit of flame. A fire dancer. “Green matches my eyes.”

“I think those are sails upriver,” Gilesh called. “What do you want to do?”

Setting down the paint and brush, Noa went back to the tiller, liking the way Altahn watched her for a moment with that calm smile on his face. She made a show of shading her eyes to peer into the distance. “We’ll meet them head-on, of course.”

Lia sat on the floor in the study, holding a terrible, terrible book that seemed to be the only one Noa had left behind: One Thousand Nights in Urilia. She held it away from her to turn the page, flinching at the words and quickly flipping to the one after that. “You read this?”

“He read it to me while I was… asleep, or whatever that was. Why do you keep stopping?” Aria’s voice was still a little faint, her face pale where she was propped up on the couch.

Lia turned to look at the formless lump of blankets huddled on the couch opposite. “Mateo Montanne, what is wrong with you?”

“I didn’t do it,” he mumbled, his hand flopping over the edge to grab for the sweet roll Hilaria had brought. “I’m damaged. I need lots of rest, a good helping of pity—”he took a bite, chewing noisily—“and lots of sustenance before we have this conversation.”

He was damaged. Anwei still wouldn’t say anything when she looked at Mateo or Aria, just kept mixing herbs and powders and other things she’d raided from Tual’s office. But every day the healer looked a little less blank, as if maybe it was as Abendiza had said when she sent out the last of her energy to plant the seeds of her stolen life in Mateo and Aria. They’d started growing again.

Lia snapped the book shut. “If this is the kind of book your father read to you, then I’m beginning to understand why you are such a terrible person.”

“At least I’m entertaining.” Mateo took another bite. “Are we going to talk about the fact that you totally kissed me?”

Aria’s hands went to her mouth. “I knew it.”

Lia stood up. “I think both of you have had enough excitement for one day. No, you can’t have this.” She tucked One Thousand Nights under her arm, dodging Aria when she tried to swipe it on her way to the door. Aria stuck her tongue out before Lia shut the door on her.

It was odd, staying in Tual Montanne’s house. It was even more odd the way Aria had asked for Mateo right after she’d woken to replace Lia at her side. The color in her cheeks was returning, and Mateo seemed to like needling her as much as she needled him back, though Lia had still found him sitting in a corner with his hands over his face more than once after talking to her. But then Anwei would come sit next to him and let him tell her a story about copying tomb reliefs, or Knox would bring out a hand of cards, and it was almost as if the four of them hadn’t nearly killed one another.

Lia walked out into the hall toward the dining room, where most of the cots had been set up. There weren’t as many as she would have liked, only eleven of the Devoted who’d come to claim Tual clinging to life. They’d taken Anwei’s tinctures and powders without complaint, the reality of their lives being saved by a Basist making the dining hall where their cots were all set very quiet.

The Warlord hadn’t survived, and a new monument to her and the Devoted who had been with her, Cath, had appeared in paint that felt like Mateo alongside the memorials in the tunnels below the island. Lia hadn’t asked, but she was fairly certain Mateo’s affinity for stone hadn’t returned.

When Lia entered the dining hall this time, the Devoted all looked up to her as she went to the head of the table. “Anwei says most of you will be well enough to return to Rentara within the week,” she said quietly.

“Anwei is planning to let us return?” Berrum’s voice held a note of bitterness. Lia wondered if he still felt awkward about being left tied in a boat by a healer.

“You’re not prisoners.” Lia fiddled with her sleeve. “I’ve had too many people tell me where to sit and how to do it properly to want to start dictating things myself.” She sighed and sat down. “But all of you saw what happened here. The Warlord was keeping Tual next to her like a pet, and he sipped her down with his tea. He did it to all of you, and no one noticed. It was Anwei and Mateo—both Basists—who managed to stop him.”

None of them said anything.

“The way Devoted do things right now isn’t healthy for the warriors who follow Calsta. Or right. Basists aren’t any more corrupt than Devoted I’ve known.” Mateo’s words came back to her, said in a moment of quiet as they looked at his painting of Calsta and the nameless god reaching for each other in Chaol. “It’s not power that’s good or bad. It’s what we do with it.”

One of the Devoted near the doors eased himself up from his pillow and set his feet tentatively on the floor. A plate of plain bread sat next to him on a table, and Lia wondered how long he would last before Hilaria tore through the room and forced him to eat every bite. “I knew a girl who was touched by the nameless god when I was young. She used to feed birds, making little houses for them that would stay up. Like castles. She would sit and watch them for hours, and…” He looked down. “It never sat well with me what happened to her. Even after I took the oaths. Hunting for the Warlord didn’t feel the same because… the people I found were angry. Dangerous. I never got to see them tending birds.”

Lia nodded. “How many of you even wanted to leave your families for the seclusions?”

None of them answered, because Devotion was silent obedience. Giving things up for the goddess meant pretending you hadn’t wanted those things in the first place.

Finally, she shrugged. “I’m not saying I have a solution. But I hope that maybe if we all went back to Rentara together with the Warlord’s body and explained…” She stood and started toward the door. “The first Warlord erased even how shapeshifters are made because she was so afraid of anyone doing it again. Not only did that cause us to lose many innocent and valuable lives, none of us had the education we needed to spot an actual shapeshifter in our midst. In dispatching him, we managed to destroy a caprenum sword. Something the first Warlord certainly never managed.” She stopped at the door. “What if we went to the scholars and helped research? Tried to figure out what was lost when we decided it had to be a choice between Calsta and the nameless god? The one Basist and two shapeshifters I’ve known had vastly different affinities for magic—Tual couldn’t move a single stone. Why? Do Devoted have similar affinities? If so, what are they, and why have we been so focused on war?” Shrugging, she turned back toward the hallway. “I think Calsta would approve of us trying to get a more complete picture.”

When Lia left the room, she heard their voices begin to murmur. It was difficult to know what to do to fix five hundred years of pain and bloodshed, but it wasn’t only her choice. Devoted listening to her despite her diminished aura was something. Even beginning the conversation was something. But it wasn’t enough.

Back in Aria’s room, Lia found her sister was sleeping, her freckles stark against her pale cheeks. Mateo seemed to be asleep too, at least until he rolled over to look at her, head lolling a bit to the side when he rolled too far. “Do you really mean all that?”

“All what?”

“There are air passages here that let out in the dining hall. You want to do research? To replace the things we lost?”

Lia lowered herself into the chair by Aria’s bed. “Isn’t that what you were trying to do? Maybe Tual would never have become a shapeshifter if he hadn’t been so afraid, or… the person he killed hadn’t been afraid—”

“I’m not sure exactly what happened. Only that… fear was part of it. My father wasn’t a Basist to start with. I think he focused so much on herbs and healing because… whatever had happened before, whatever he’d done, he couldn’t fix it. So then he tried to fix everything. Including me.”

“In all the wrong ways.”

“Right.” He tried to prop his head up on his hand. “Gods above, there are two of you.”

“Your worst nightmare.” She chuckled.

“Exactly.” He let his head flop back down. “I want to help you, Lia. Can I help?”

Her eyes pinched shut for a frustrated second. “I’m glad you’re not dead, Mateo, but that doesn’t mean I want to—”

“Wait.” He put up a hand. “Before you say anything else, can I make a request?”

Lia frowned. “You can request anything you want so long as you realize I probably won’t give it to you.”

“Fair enough. I just hoped that… if you’re going to say, ‘No, thank you, Mateo, I’ve seen your soul and I don’t think the color of it matches my eyes,’ could you maybe hold off rejecting my offer to sit next to you and take notes on how to save the world until, I don’t know, tomorrow?” He rubbed a hand tiredly across his face. “We were friends enough before for, say, a twelve-hour grace period, right?”

Lia snorted. “You need twelve hours before you’re willing to face whatever I was going to say?”

“It’s been a difficult few weeks.” He slumped back to stare at the ceiling. “I’ve even found myself being grateful for how slow Aria’s recovery has been, because she’s the only one around here who knows how to properly murder someone.” When Lia didn’t laugh, he tipped his head toward her, sighing. “Too soon, I suppose?”

Lia looked away.

“It was an accident. But… she should never have been here in the first place. I never should… There were a lot of things I did wrong, that ended in… wrong.” He tried to sit up again, and Lia suddenly realized that with Aria asleep, Anwei off brewing something, and Knox out in the courtyard doing forms, she and Mateo hadn’t actually talked alone since the night in the tent.

When, as hed so helpfully informed Aria, she’d kissed him.

He was slurring a little, trying to speak too quickly as if he were afraid Lia would run away before he could finish. “I never should have sat in that carriage and let my father drive us away knowing she was with us. I didn’t know about what he did to your family, but I didn’t know a lot of things because it was easier not to know.” Mateo sighed, his eyes slipping shut. “You know I’m a terrible person.”

“I do.” Lia nodded. “But I guess it’s hard to stack that up against the fact that you were raised by… well, not exactly a paragon of virtue.” She turned toward Aria, smoothing a curl back from her forehead. “It makes me wonder what I’ve already done wrong.”

“She loves you.” Mateo’s eyes opened. “Maybe that’s why she talks about stabbing things all the time.”

Lia sat back in the fancy chair, the windows so tall she could stand in them and see over the tops of the cliffs to the bones moldering inside. What she knew she had to say next felt like a boulder perched at the edge of a cliff waiting to fall. A decision she both wanted to fight for and didn’t all at once. “I think your perspective would be helpful in Rentara,” she finally said. “If you ever manage to focus your eyes again, I mean.”

He laughed, but it was a little strained. All of him was, as if he didn’t feel like he fit into his body, his mind. After so many years of fighting to live, he wasn’t sure he deserved it anymore.

If that was a thing. Deserving to live. That was part of the problem the Warlord had set rolling through the Commonwealth, dictating which people lived and which died, no better than any shapeshifter.

“Do you remember that time you pulled the scarf off your face like some kind of Tanlir dancer?” Mateo’s voice was quiet as he stared up at the ceiling. “And then I almost died of shock?”

Lia went still, the question in his voice one that made her feel wary. “I think you tried to swallow an entire sweet roll whole and then proposed to me.”

“I didn’t propose. I’m not stupid. Usually.” Mateo turned to look at her. “I’ve always wanted to paint you. Just like you were that day.”

“You make it easy to forget who you are, Mateo.” Lia stood up. “I like talking to you. Just you and me.”

He didn’t move, cheek digging into the couch’s arm and his hair in knots. “Who do you think I am?”

“I shouldn’t like you. Aria shouldn’t like you. None of us should.” She swept a hand through her hair. “But I do. I didn’t really expect that after everything.”

Mateo blinked twice. “Am I really so bad? Would it really be so bad if…?” He closed his eyes, pressing his cheek harder into the bright upholstery, and Lia’s stomach turned a somersault. It was a nightmare sitting here waiting for Mateo to say something she wasn’t sure she should want to hear.

But wanted to hear anyway.

“You make it easy, too,” he finally said.

Lia slid out of her chair and sat on the floor, her back against his couch, his knees curving around her and his head pressing forward to see past her shoulder. And they sat, Aria snoring quietly across from her.

“Things are going to change,” she said quietly.

“Calsta above, I hope so.”

Anwei stood at the back of the turquoise boat as the sun went down, the wind playing with her braids as she stared out at the southern horizon, all of it gray like the underside of a storm. Beilda. Home. She toyed with a braid for the first herb she’d learned, the one her brother had sectioned off and tied before he’d shorn off his own and become someone new. She’d had it rebraided many times, re-oiled and waxed, but still his touch seemed to be there.

He’s not a different person. The nameless god’s familiar rumble no longer sent arrows of discontent and anger stabbing into her humors as it had just a few days earlier.

Are you? she whispered to herself and to him both, his voice stronger now than it ever had been.

Probably. It’s hard to remember after being so quiet for so long.

She thought for a moment, remembering her medicines brewing, the Devoted in the dining hall, and the promise of what them existing in the same space she was in could mean. You’ll get stronger, won’t you, as more people are allowed to believe and make oaths—

There are more oaths for you. He almost sounded like an instructor at one of the universities, ready to give her a list. After a beat, he added, If you want them, I mean.

She was already supposed to only use her smell for others. Then to use the larger healing and moving of matter only with the nameless god’s approval. Or maybe that was just in bodies. Or maybe—

Anwei frowned. I hardly know what I’ve already agreed to. Don’t push it.

How about you don’t push it, he blustered back.

She felt Knox approach, and she turned to meet him as he came out of the shadows. The bond between them felt less like light and more as if it had been forged in iron, stronger every day. “You want to go back?” He pointed out to the ocean. Toward Beilda.

“Maybe.” She twisted to look at him, his jaw still tight, hair a collection of loose ends that never could stay in their tie. “I’m surprised you didn’t start running the moment you got out of the sword. Since the moment I met you, you were set on bribing your way over the Lasei border. Was that Calsta’s idea?”

“No, it’s just where I thought I could work on letting Willow free. That was all I wanted—to let her go. Well, then I wanted to not have to take care of your spiders for you.”

“I still want you to deal with the spiders.” Anwei shivered.

Knox breathed in slow and let the breath out like a prayer, as if he’d shed a weight that had been riding inside him and could finally fill his lungs all the way. “Calsta is still bugging me about Devoted and things. I guess Lia’s going to start working with them, but she no longer has her oaths. Something about swords not being the way she wants to do things anymore.”

“I honestly can’t imagine that.”

“I can’t imagine anything.” He took Anwei’s hand, staring out into the sea. “I’m glad to be done, but who are we without Willow and the snake-tooth man?”

Anwei looked down at their hands clasped together, as if he were trying to keep her grounded for once instead of the other way around. “I could open an apothecary.”

“Where the goddess Yaru answers prayers to those truly heavy in purse?” Knox sketched a hand across the horizon. “Maybe with a few gaming tables where we can pick up any gossip. Three khonin knots at least or you’re out.”

Please spare me this nonsense, the nameless god groaned.

Anwei grinned. “It’s the lower khonin who know all the secrets. In Lasei I think high khonin wear their hair free like Trib.”

“Well, with Noa stealing up the river on a boat, you behind the apothecary counter, and Altahn with all his salpowder and contacts through Trib land, I feel there may be some potential benefit to us all working together, don’t you? You never could devote yourself to healing full time. So maybe there’s room for a little side business I could help you with?” Anwei’s stomach twinged when Knox squinted at her. “Healing hurt you, didn’t it? Almost as much as it hurt not doing it.”

He was right. Healing was one of Anwei’s many pieces that made her both sharp and smooth with no way to separate them. “You want to go back to stealing things at night and trying to pretend you weren’t terrified by little jars of dead plants during the day?” She couldn’t quite look him in the eye. “Knox, after everything that happened—”

His hands were on her shoulders, and suddenly she was looking up into those dark eyes, and for the first time, he felt there. Solid and secure, as if he’d chosen to stay all on his own, despite the fact she wasn’t holding on to him. “What about it?”

“I killed you. I chose all the wrong things.”

“And then held on to me just like you always have until you could bring me back. I couldn’t have saved my sister if I hadn’t gone into the sword. And you… held steady. Just like you always do.” Knox leaned closer, and she could feel the heat of him trilling down her arms, her neck. “I know what you did to get me back out. You chose me instead of everything else.”

“And you’re choosing me now?” she breathed.

Before the words were properly out, he was kissing her, lips soft against hers, and Anwei couldn’t remember what it felt like to be alone.

Later, much later, they walked toward the house, Knox’s hand in Anwei’s as if it had always been there. “If you want to work at my apothecary slash den of thievery, you’ll have to carry my bags. And learn how to do sutures.”

He grinned down at her. “All my favorite things.”

You could do more. You have a name that could mean something.

You do too, don’t you? Anwei thought for a moment. Why haven’t you told me your name?

I don’t remember it anymore. And I’ve changed since it was last spoken. My old name would probably be wrong.

Names hold power. You need a name. Anwei thought for a moment. I think I’ll call you Potato.

You will not! The god’s voice rose inside her. Anwei Ruezi, you will not destroy what little pride I have left—

Potato is a good name. Earthy. Like you.

And, with the rumbles of a less-than-content god in one ear and Knox at her side, Anwei couldn’t help but feel that instead of her replaceing something, her life had finally found her.

Mateo couldn’t sleep, especially after Lia left him to stew in the room alone, confused and full of hope and electricity and worry. Brushing crumbs from a day’s worth of sweet rolls from his shirt, he limped out of Aria’s room toward his own. He stopped when he got to his own bed. It was made, the blankets tight, and there were still snakes carved into the woodwork. After a moment, he knelt down and crawled underneath.

Spine pressing into the floor and the scent of wood and wool rug in his nose, Mateo closed his eyes to the underside of his bed. When he breathed in, the air felt close, his thoughts even closer. He could almost feel Tual there beside him, the echoes of the silly stories he told until Mateo was no longer scared making it feel all the more empty.

After a moment, footsteps quietly entered the room and bare feet appeared by his bedside, white scars across the tops of her feet. Anwei.

She bent down, her snaky braids pooling on the floor, some large, some small, some short, some long. Some tied with leather, others with twine. Mateo moved over to make room when she slid underneath to lie next to him. “We used to do this when we were little,” she said quietly.

“When we were scared?” he asked.

“No, it was where we went to replace each other. It was a secret—maybe our parents knew, but they’d let us sit under there to make all our plans and… just be. It was our spot.”

Mateo closed his eyes, trying to remember, but so much of it had gone. Blocked out for so long, he couldn’t replace it again. But somehow, his body had known. His mind. That when he’d come here, he’d wanted to replace her. Swallowing the feeling down, he pointed to the braid closest to him on the floor. “Why are there a hundred?” he asked.

“You don’t remember?”

“Only that purple frosting was somehow a part of tying them.”

Anwei snorted, one hand going to her mouth. “You were the one who was so sure the frosting had to be purple. Mostly because then Father wouldn’t know which of his extracts we’d stolen to flavor it. We were going to open an apothecary bakery combination.”

Mateo flinched. Fathers. Every time he uncovered more about the man who’d actually brought him into the world, he felt as if he’d pulled up a bit of bark from a rotten log and the sight underneath wasn’t for the weak of stomach. “Will you show me?”

She took the braid in her hands, holding it up. “This one was for the first herb. Calia. We use it to treat sore throats and…”

Mateo breathed in as she spoke, trying to remember why the salty, herby smell of her was so familiar, echoing in the blank spaces of his mind as he strained to replace the memory that went with it. Propping his head up on one hand, he thought he could remember something about the way his bones and humors were supposed to fit together, his neck to his spine, his spine to his ribs, humors cradled inside their cage. Every word Anwei said as she picked up her next braid were like parts of a story he’d been told as a child, the words coming into his mind even as she spoke. His bones seemed to hold him steady despite Willow’s absence, as if she hadn’t been his skeleton at all.

Perhaps he’d grown a new one.

All Mateo knew was that now he couldn’t smell death.