Dirva’s face was hard as stone. He was a mountain of steadfast, brutal reserve. The surface of him was sheer, and stark, without any ledges or handholds. “You are too free with your words. You have no sense of the man to whom you speak, Ariah. Get the money from Cadlah. Tell her I will repay her.”

I left. My heart broke as I crossed the threshold. I felt very alone, indescribably empty. I had nowhere to go. My only real choice was to return to the squat house, to wake Cadlah, and hope she gave me money and directions back to Rabatha. I walked slowly. I was wounded and unguarded, and the feelings and voices of the passers-by on the street sunk into me. I was only half-myself. It is a very strange way to be.

I had hoped, of course, that I would not have to face Sorcha. Certainly he would have business to attend elsewhere, I told myself. At the very least he would be out somewhere complaining about me to one of his friends who had never much seen the point of having me around in the first place. I had convinced myself that he would be gone by the time I reached the Square, but he wasn’t: he sat on the platform playing his violin. A Qin peacekeeper yelled at him to stop under threat of arrest for disturbing the peace. He yelled that the racket was disrespectful to the courts. Sorcha played anyway. And the thing he played cut me to ribbons. Sorcha, like most musicians, communicates best through song. It’s his language. His violin spoke of hurt and confusion and resignation. Of loss. It told me that he, too, thought he’d overestimated me.

He spotted me. I felt it when he spotted me; it was like a crashing wave. I wanted to hide, but where could I have hidden? There was nothing to do but face him. At least it was on the street, where certainly my gifts would not get the better of me. He dropped the violin and jumped off the platform. He fell twelve feet and landed graceful as a cat. The Qin peacekeeper ordered him over, but Sorcha spat at his feet. “The racket’s over. Only one disturbing the peace now is you.” He darted away when the peacekeeper lunged at him and disappeared into the crowd. A handful of seconds later, he reappeared right in front of me. It was around noon, and the Square was a crush of people moving from one side of the City to the other. The flow of people parted around us like we were stones in a river. “So,” he said. “Rough morning.”

“I’m not like you,” I said.

He frowned and crossed his arms. He stared down at his feet, and then peered up at me from the corner of his eye. “Thought you said you were only a little bit shaper?”