Duja’s eyes lit up in realization. She took in the alchemist’s language and his western clothes. Suddenly, everything made sense. “You’re Orfelian,” she gasped, unable to contain her shock.

Orfelia was one of their closest neighbors, lying about a week’s sail from Maynara. Like countless other islands in the Untulu Sea, they fell centuries before to foreign invaders with faster ships and paler skin. Maynara was the sole kingdom in that corner of the world to have survived conquest. For generations, mighty Gatdula kings and queens had kept the invaders at bay. None of Duja’s ancestors had wished to entangle themselves in the troubles of their fallen neighbors, and for good reason. The western masters were a selfish breed. They’d had their greedy eyes on Maynara’s wealth since their ships first cut through their waters. If the Gatdulas had learned anything from their neighbors, it was that conflict with the west would prove costly. Fortunately, Maynara had steered clear of it thus far.

As for the alchemist, Pangil must have discovered him in Orfelia, that sad little island across the sea. That wasn’t the island’s true name, of course. The conquerors rechristened it in honor of their foreign king, then scorched any trace of its original name from history. From what Duja understood, Orfelia was a land of forgotten names and stolen riches. Its plundered, impoverished villages had nothing to offer the likes of an exiled prince. Duja wondered what on earth had brought her brother there.

“Yes, Your Majesty, I am from Orfelia,” the alchemist said. Behind his spectacles, a shade of sadness flickered in his expression. “I came here because I needed to escape. That man⁠—Pangil. He said he could help me.”

Duja stiffened. How strange it was to hear her brother’s name uttered from a foreigner’s lips⁠—although she suspected her brother must have befriended a great number of foreigners during his many years in exile. Twenty-two years earlier, she’d watched her men drag him onto the first ship out of Maynara. The ship had disappeared into a blanket of fog on the horizon, and her brother along with it. In the beginning, she had her people track his whereabouts. They followed Pangil north to Wakon, then west to Xitai. Last she heard, he had ingratiated himself with the sultan of Mandoo, who’d financed his trip to the Sunset States. Before discovering his letter in the king’s stack of books, Duja had never expected to hear from Pangil again.

And now, the alchemist rose to his feet before Duja⁠—a common Orfelian and a strange choice for a messenger. How he had wandered into Pangil’s path, Duja didn’t know. If she hadn’t been afraid her brother had sent him to waste her time, she would have almost felt sorry for him. He looked haggard, confused, and out of his depth.