Imeria’s father tried to free the island from its ignorance. But when he was alive, he lacked the power to make himself heard. He’d died when Imeria was a girl. What she knew of him, she’d learned from her mother’s stories and from the damning testaments of recent history. He was more myth than memory, yet her thoughts wandered to him more and more as she aged.

“Datu Kulaw! They told me they saw your sails approaching.”

Imeria turned at the sound of a deep voice. Vikal, the captain of her family guard, had come on deck. He was an imposing man, with trunk-like biceps and a boxy face, who came from a long line of warriors who had served the Kulaws for generations. He had been teaching her son, Luntok, to fight since he’d been old enough to walk. Vikal loved Luntok⁠—of this, Imeria was certain. Unlike with dozens of other individuals under Imeria’s command, she’d never had to buy Vikal’s loyalty.

“You have no idea how good it is to see you, Vikal,” she said. He was one of the few souls in Maynara whom she greeted with a smile.

“My lady.” Vikal bent low at the waist, planting a chaste kiss on her knuckles. “You must be tired from your journey.”

“Exhausted.” It took several days to sail to the capital from her ancestral lands in the south. She would have arrived earlier had they not hit choppy waters crossing the Untulu Sea.

Same as the dirt-streaked provincials Imeria saw milling around the docks, the most important members of Maynaran society flocked to the capital for the week. This included the other highborn datus, who no doubt had been counting the days until their next opportunity to eat Imeria alive. Every one of them relished the feast days; for Imeria, they were a bloodbath of a subtler, more sinister kind.

“Where would you like me to put this, my lady?” another voice called. A young man emerged from belowdecks, hauling behind him a heavy mahogany trunk packed with Imeria’s finest clothes. He was younger than Luntok and sturdily built, unlike most serving boys his age.

Vikal blinked in surprise. For the past few months, he had been giving this young man sword lessons at Imeria’s instruction. She had failed to tell Vikal she would bring him, along with a dozen other battle-trained serving boys, to Mariit. He cleared his throat. “I see you brought, uh, reinforcements.”

Imeria cut him a sharp look. “The town house was horribly understaffed last year, as you recall,” she said airily. “And I need not tell you, Vikal, that beyond the south, well-trained servants are impossible to find.”

He gave her a tactful nod, then rushed to the serving boy’s aid. “Let me help you with that, son,” he said, heaving the other end of the trunk in his arms.