“No,” the Avatar said. “You would not; the language has not been spoken among your kind for a very long time.” He turned to them and said, “You will find it helpful if you speak High Barrani instead.”

“But she always understood us before,” Amaldi then said—to the Avatar, and in the requested High Barrani.

“Yes, and that is a question for scholars. You will need to become proficient in her tongue the more traditional way. I believe it will be necessary; An’Teela believes understanding of High Barrani is not common among your kind.”

Teela spoke two words; Kaylin immediately felt the sting of the Barrani Hawk’s magic as a full-body slap. “Apologies if this is uncomfortable,” she told Amaldi.

Amaldi blinked and took a step back, into Darreno, who had not moved. “You—you can see me?”

“I can see you now, yes.” Teela turned to the Avatar.

He shook his head. “They are mortal, to me. Entirely, utterly mortal, in a way Lord Kaylin is not. We can assume, then, that the enchantment was harmless to mortals.”

Kaylin’s nod was slower. “We can assume that it was harmless to these two. I’ve got four dead children as a counterargument. Maybe she was attempting to re-create this spell; maybe she had an entirely different motivation.”

“They are unharmed, and unaged; physically, their bodies appear to have been perfectly preserved. I believe, however, that their presence—in spirit—was essential.”

“Why?” It was Teela who asked.

“You could not see the enchantment as it unraveled. The power of the Halls and the power of Shadow were entwined around the...lives of the two mortals. It was not the same enchantment that entrapped the Barrani in their portraits; there, the two powers were not binding a third power. If life itself can be considered a power.”

“It has been considered power historically. The Emperor frowns very heavily upon research related to live sacrifices.” Teela glanced at paintings that no longer contained people. “Do you believe that she somehow gained power from the two mortals?”

“No more than she might have gained from her servants, although the invisibility might allow for undetected surveillance and the gathering of information.”

“Do you think the bodies would have been released when the enchantment was broken?”

“I do.”

“Would they have remained empty?”

“Yes.” He paused, and added, “Here. Is that now your concern? Do you believe that enchantments were broken in such a way that the bodies were then occupied by something else?”

“I think that’s the only possible explanation for what occurred. But...I can’t see how that would have been of value to Azoria. If power couldn’t be gained by human sacrifice—and I wouldn’t put that beneath her—I don’t understand what she was even attempting.”

The Avatar nodded.

“But if we don’t understand what she was attempting, we won’t understand where it went wrong.”