“I don’t want to be separated from you, Leftrin. But I’m going to stay here and keep working. I want to learn as much about the city as I can before the Traders descend on it and tear it apart.”

Leftrin sighed and pulled her in close. “My dear, I have told you a hundred times. We’ll protect this place. No one else knows the way here, and I don’t plan to pass my charts around. If they try to follow us back here, well, they’ll discover that Tarman can move by night as well as by day. Even if they manage to follow us this far, they’ll have the same problem docking a ship here that we do. I’ll hold them off as long as I can, Alise.”

“I know.”

“So. Can we talk about the real reason you don’t want to go back to Trehaug?”

She shook her head, her face against his shoulder, but then admitted, “I don’t want to go anywhere that I have to remember that I was Alise Finbok. I don’t want to touch any part of that old life. I just want my life to be here and now, with you.”

“And it is, my lady, my darling. I’m not going to let anyone steal you from me.”

She pulled back and looked up into his eyes. “I had an idea today, while I was working. What if you reported my death when you went back? You could send a bird to Hest and one to my parents, saying I’d fallen overboard and drowned. As clumsy and foolish as they think me, they’d surely believe it.”

“Alise!” He was horrified. “I never want to speak such words aloud, not even as a lie! And your poor family! You couldn’t do that to them!”

“I think they’d be relieved,” she muttered but knew that they still would weep for her.

“And there is your work to think of. You can’t be dead and do your work!”

“What?”

He let go of her and stepped back. “Your work. Your studies of the dragons and the Elderlings. You’ve worked too long on all that just to let it go. You need to finish it, if it’s a thing that can be finished. Keep your logs, make your drawings. Meet with Malta and Reyn the Elderlings and tell them what you’ve found. Share your findings with the world. If you claim to be dead, you can’t very well take credit for what you’ve discovered. Let alone protect it.”

She had no name for the emotion that flooded her. It was hard to believe that anyone would say such words to her. “You . . . you understand what that means to me?” She looked away, suddenly embarrassed. “My writings and my silly little sketches, my attempts at translations, my—”