He gave me a hard look. “You know I’m not a good reader. I get news from merchants about them now and again. I’m not like you. I don’t write letters. They never sent word to me.”

“Oh.”

“He married.”

“That’s why Vathorem was in the Empire. I came back with Vathorem after the wedding.”

Sorcha ran a hand through his hair. He drew in a breath and swung his head to the side, away from me. “I wonder if Ro knows.”

“He does.”

Sorcha looked at me again. “How do you know that?”

“Liro came to the Empire. It was before it was set, but Dirva knew that’s where it was going with Nisa, I think, and he told him. I’m sure Liro knows. I’m sure Liro told Amran.”

Sorcha threw up his hands. “Fuck! Fuck, Ariah, everyone knows but me? People crossing borders to find out, and I’m in the fucking dark?”

“I’m sorry! I thought you knew!”

“You’ve been here two years! You couldn’t have mentioned it?”

“You don’t like to talk about him! I thought you knew!”

“I didn’t! I didn’t know!” He passed his hands over his face and took a breath. He glanced up at the sky. He did his best to compose himself. “All right. Lor went and got married. Now he’s having a kid. A little silver kid with a little silver wife in a little silver house. All right. And he wants you to play falo?”

“He wants me to be falo.”

“He wants you to be a red godfather to a silver kid?”

“Yes,” I said. “He does.”

“And you’re going to.”

“I am, yes.”

Sorcha waved his hand at me, dismissive, imperious. “Go on then. Run on back. In Rabatha you’ll just be a glorified babysitter, and no one’ll touch you with a ten-foot pole. You want that life, go and take it.”

“Sorcha, I…”

“You’re a lot like him, you know, with all this leaving.”

“Sorcha, you should come, too,” I said.

He blinked at me. “What?” he asked softly.

“I think you should come.”

“What fucking for? There’s nothing there for me.”

I frowned. I chewed on the inside of my cheek. “I want you to come for me. You don’t have to, of course you don’t have to, but I want you to. For me. Rabatha will eat me alive without you there, I know it will. And if you don’t come, I’ll miss you. And nothing will feel right. And I’ll miss your music. And…”