Shaliondor da Alama leaned against the railing. His auburn hair blew around him. He had a sharp face, neither handsome nor pretty, but striking. His skin was so freckled it looked a shade too dark. He grinned. “Ah, me. I’m an excuse, that’s all, a reason to make the trip. He’s valuable, Vathorem is, and my ma had to have a reason to send him on a long trip, a dangerous trip, into country that don’t like us all that much. He told her my Semadran needs work, that I need to see the Empire firsthand to deal with it proper when the time comes.” He watched me as the words sunk in and grinned a hair wider when they did.

“You’re a prince.”

“One of several. Though having her as a mother don’t really mean much. We’re not like your Exalted. Or the Lothic kings. She picks an heir; blood don’t mean nothing.” He shot me a sly smile. “You know what they say about us, though. All us reds are related to each other one way or another.”

The light was beginning to turn. I was late. I had more questions for him, but I was late. “You said your Semadran needs work?”

“That’s what Vath says.”

“I know someone whose Athenorkos and Lothic need work. Would you like to meet a friend of mine?”

He pulled himself off the railing. “Would be a pleasure.”

Dor took stock of the neighborhood as we walked through it. He noticed everything, things I myself had never noticed. “No fruit sellers?”

“Not here, no.”

“They were all over the Tahrqin streets.”

“We go to market for them.”

“Why?”

“I’m not sure. They are expensive.”

He whistled. “Expensive to you. Not so expensive to the Tahrqin, eh?”

Things like that. Why were the streets narrower in the borough? When did curfew get established? When we passed the schoolhouse, he had a thousand questions about it—who built it and when, how was it funded, had there been raids, that sort of thing. He asked me insightful, informed questions about Semadran history. As we walked, conversation drifted into Semadran. “Your Semadran is very good,” I said. “It’s really just slang you’re missing.”

“I know. Vath knows. It was an excuse. This is useful, though. Walking through like this. Getting answers from you, this is very useful.”

“Useful for what, may I ask?”

He looked out at the street. A clutch of children stared at him—hard, careful—and slipped into a back alley. “Things down the line. Decisions down the line.”

“May I ask you something personal?”

“Yes,” he said. He said it without hesitation, without alarm. I found it charming.

“Why did you lie about remembering Dirva?”