With the news of Bautix’s corruption getting out, and the Inosen rallying to stand up for their rights, maybe more people would be confident to proudly practice their faith. Her parents still had no justice, and they wouldn’t get any. She didn’t know if she could accept Kalaan and Isar into her own life like her parents had, but she wanted to believe in something—the right to freedom that everyone should have, and for the future of the city that had taken so much from her, but that she’d give everything to protect.

Her parents would be proud of her for doing whatever she’d had to do in life to obtain her own bit of freedom; they’d done the same, after all.

She remembered her father laughing and telling stories, her mother sleeping next to a copy of the Nos Inoken every night. There were so many things worth fighting for—the warmth and happiness she’d felt at her parents’ side, and the happiness she felt now with the people she cared for—but most of all, standing up for something. Believing in something. Hoping for something more.

After staring at the house for a moment, she continued on her way to the southeastern shore of the Minos River.

The Dom loomed on the bank, its shadow covering her as she approached the manor without fear. She supposed she should stop thinking of it as “Kohl’s tradehouse” and start to think of it as … mine.

For the first time in ten years, she breathed air that felt free.

When she entered the Dom, she found Tannis, Mirran, and the three young recruits Kohl had brought in sitting together in one of the second-floor bedrooms. Aina’s eyes flicked to her own bed once—the last time she’d slept there, she’d still been under Kohl’s rule—then waved at the others. Tannis had been speaking, explaining the events of the past few weeks to the others. At the sound of Aina’s footsteps, Tannis turned, her gold eyes brightening with a smile instead of a glare.

“Tannis said Kohl is gone,” Mirran said with a shocked expression. “You fought him?”

“I almost killed him,” Aina clarified. “Tannis and I will be in charge of this place now. You’re all welcome to stay if you want, or you can leave. We won’t stop you.”

Without waiting to see what they decided, she walked the length of the hall. Memories of training and living here with Kohl hit her with every footstep, leaving a bitter taste in the back of her mouth and an uneasy sensation in her stomach. They’d taken Kohl’s tradehouse from him, they’d taken a lot of his money, they’d stopped his plans with Bautix, and they were on the verge of ruining his reputation. Her head spun with the thought—had she and Tannis just guaranteed their own deaths?

But she shook the thought away. He had nothing left to scare her with, and in the end, she’d gotten what she’d wanted: a place to call her own and people who respected her. She’d even gotten Kohl to see her as an equal, if the fear in his eyes and the plea on his lips when she’d fought him were any indication. She’d taken the Dom for herself rather than simply accepting whatever was left for her. She’d kept her promise, the silent one she’d made to other kids who slept on the street—that she would rise, and she wouldn’t fear falling again.