Anji glanced about and spotted a matching brass cup near her foot, dented at the rim but otherwise in fine condition. She handed it over, careful not to let the fire’s heat bite at her wrist. The Bear plucked it out of her hand and filled the cup, the lumpy contents of the pot dolloping in and splashing over the rim.

She offered it to Anji.

The Ox coughed behind her, and Anji whirled. She’d forgotten the woman was still at her back. It made her nervous that she hadn’t bothered to sit down. Or hadn’t been ordered to. The Bear cleared her throat, and Anji wheeled back to the proffered cup.

Though her father would have called her a fool, she took the cup and wolfed its contents down in two swallows, sparing a thought for how the Goat had laughed at her the day before. The spice caught at her tongue, the scalding liquid and lumps of meat and slimy vegetables tumbling like lava down her throat. She didn’t care. The hunger writhing in her gut had become more than a nagging, passing thing. It had taken over her vision, her hearing, and even her exhaustion.

The Bear leaned back, hands settled into her lap, the leathers she and the rest of the Menagerie wore creaking like the bits of splintered wood in the fire.

“Good?”

Anji bobbed her head and set the cup down with a hollow thunk on the destroyed carpet. A gust of wind tore through the scattered holes in the cathedral walls. One of the horses bleated outside. The Bear passed Anji the cutting board, on it a pair of bread slices and a hunk of yellow cheese. Anji accepted it, balled a piece of bread in her trembling fingers, and pushed it into her mouth. The rough texture made her jaw cramp, but she chewed and swallowed and began balling the second piece as the Bear’s mask twitched up.

“Goat?”

“We were interrupted,” the Ox said. She shuffled into Anji’s line of sight. “I can wait for him outsi—”

“Stay for this, Ox.”

The Ox halted, setting her boots shoulder-length apart, hands behind her back. The Bear untangled her legs and rose to her knees. She stared across the flames at Anji, the light gleaming in those carved pockets of black.

“‘The Nine’s Gift,’” the Bear said, gesturing toward the ridged ceiling. “Those filthy Order priests’ celebration of their so-called stewardship.”

Anji thumbed the second wad of bread into her mouth. Swallowing past the pain in her throat, she said, “There’s still a cathedral in Linura.” She gestured around the ruin. “They taught us all about—”

“Then you know also,” said the Bear, “of the Latent Truth, the first of the One’s Dialects, spoken in the Earthen Ash?”