“There was nothing I could do. She responded poorly to all tonics. I could barely keep her conscious. Her pulse had fled by the time I cut the baby from her.”

“Cut? You cut the . . . Where is Indie? I want to see her!”

“There’s nothing to see. We’ve burned her remains. She’s at peace now.”

I stagger back, certain I’ve heard her wrong.

“We stripped the body before the burning. You can have her clothes, of course.”

“I don’t want her damn clothes! I want my sister. How could you burn her body without letting me see her first?”

“She’d already sat cold while I worked to save the baby,” Zuly says calmly. “Would you have risked your sister’s soul being damned merely so I could fetch you for a pyre?”

Folks say that the sooner a body is burned after death, the more likely the gods are to accept that soul among the stars, but I don’t care about superstitions at the moment. “I paid you to save her!” I erupt.

“You paid me to do what I could. I saved her child. A life for a life. It could have ended worse, but the baby is strong.” The newborn starts in Zuly’s arms, little fists flailing as a wail escapes her. It is an awful sound, shrill and angry. “You should feed her again,” the woman adds.

“I don’t want to feed it,” I say, backing away. “I don’t want to even look at it.”

Zuly tries to hand me the child, but I turn and flee. My boots pound on the pitched deck. The gardens are a blur in my vision. Suddenly I’m at the other end of the ship, my hands grabbing the railing as my body comes up against the metal.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. If anyone was to die, it was the baby. A stillbirth, maybe, because it came too soon. But Indie was supposed to be fine. We should be heading home together, everything returning to normal. But now she’s gone. My sister, who told jokes and pointed out stars and laughed freely, gone forever.

I don’t realize I’m crying until Zuly reappears at my side and hands me a rag for my eyes. The baby’s missing, off for another feeding probably.

“Do you see that, Delta of Dead River?” Zuly nods toward the horizon. It glistens like a river of metallic liquid.

“A mirage.”