Issari spoke to Queen Rasha for a long time, eating little. She spoke of Requiem in the north, of the Abyss gates open, of Eteer and Goshar falling, of the refugees in the hills, of the dragons who were joining her cause. She spoke for what seemed like hours, spilling all these words like a wound spilling its poison. A weight seemed to lift from her; it had been so long since she'd spoken to anyone who could help, anyone older, wiser, stronger. For a blessed short time, it seemed as if the burden of leadership, this yoke she had carried for so long, was shared—if only for a morning.

Only one thing she did not speak of. She dared not speak of Sharael, the Deceiver, the demon who had visited her in her tent. She had not spoken of him to Tanin; she would not to the queen of Tur Kal. That was a secret she would bury with her, a shame too painful to bring to her lips.

Finally, when all her words were spoken, she ended her speech. "And so, my queen, we must fight united. All the thirteen city-states of Terra. The soldiers of Eteer and Goshar who walk with me. The dragons of Requiem. And the armies of all standing cities, your own included." She took a shuddering breath. "We must march to Eteer, we must slay my father, and we must close the gates to the Abyss."

The queen rose to her feet. Her hand tightened around her staff. "My darling child, the south will rise. All of Terra will fight. I will find you a chamber in this palace. Sleep here. Rest here. Heal here. In the morning, you will fly again—and you will find more dragons."

"I will stay among my people tonight," Issari said. "I will walk among them and spend the night in the hills. I won't live in a palace while they sleep under the stars."

Night fell upon the land.

In the city, men still buried their dead. In the hills, tents rose and campfires crackled like a field of orange stars. Queen Rasha sent forth wagons of grains, and the refugees cooked flat breads upon metal sheets, and they fished in the river and hunted deer upon the hills. For the first time since leaving Goshar, bellies were filled.

Issari lay in her tent, in her bed, in her lover's arms. Tanin slept beside her, his chest rising and falling, his breath soft. She looked at him—his scruffy face, his shaggy brown hair, the lips she had once loved to kiss—and she saw him, the Deceiver. When Tanin mumbled in his sleep and tightened his arms around her, Issari winced and her belly twisted, and she remembered the demon making love to her, claiming her, and she remembered herself moaning with her passion, enjoying the creature's touch, loving it, craving it.