“I came to talk.” Yavena slumps onto the edge of Iraline’s cot. “Why are you doing this?”

“Doing what?”

“This. This… dying you’re planning on.” Yavena spits the words, the taste of them like poison on the tongue.

“Because I belong to the Court of the Dead,” Iraline replies, slouching against a wall, arms crossed. Outside, the night is silent, heavy with anticipation. Tropical heat steams through the iron slats of Iraline’s window. “Why else?”

“You’re a Mother. A fertile Mother. You have decades before you even need to—”

Iraline palms her face, nodding, her answering smile taut. “Oh, sweetmeat. I—do you want the truth? The truth is, I am tired. Tired of watching children die, of raising other people’s children to watch them die, of feeding bright-eyed innocents—”

“Everyone gives of themselves willingly, don’t they?” Yavena cannot contain the slither of petty viciousness.

“Yes. No. We are taught to forsake self, you know. What matter is one life when it can purchase happiness for so many?” Iraline chuckles, wan. “Not all of us are strong enough for this duty.”

The moonlight bleaches the color from her feathers, turns the glow of her eyes feral and strange. “It doesn’t matter. Go home, Yavena. I’ll talk to the Lord-General. He’ll let you forfeit without repercussion, I’m sure of it. He’s a kind one, if nothing else. Go.”

“I promised I would always take care of you, sister,” Yavena answers, loathing the petulance that worms through her voice.

The older Ovia lowers herself to her knees. Their hands interlock, her touch edged with a gentleness that makes Yavena ache. “I know. But this is—I have my reasons for courting the Black Hound, beloved. Now go.”

Yavena considers the puzzle of their lives, the parameters of love. She strokes her claws over Iraline’s own, measuring the topography of knuckles, the texture of her palms, the width of their lives. She nods once. “Not without you.”

No Ovia is harmless. Each and every one of the Ten Thousand Colors is taught the balletic elegance of the kris, the soft places common to all sapient life. But Iraline is only a Mother, and Yavena a Keeper whetted on desperation. She strikes before Iraline can protest: a needle plunged into a vein.

Betrayal widens Iraline’s gaze for a heartbeat before she collapses into a boneless heap, inert and unfeeling. Yavena gathers her sister’s form and pads towards the door. The Dog-King had only said to win Iraline from herself, had not he not? Not how it needed to be accomplished. He would appreciate this, certainly. More importantly, he would understand.

She steps into the hallway. It is time for a different game.

This is a dance: a ballon of escape, arabesques performed on razor-point steeples, entrechat between battlements, Iraline’s weight on her shoulder like a lifetime of guilt.