When the dreamfire began to fall, the first gouts of color drifting down from the sky, one of the less senior mystics, a boy Mehr had seen sweeping the corridors from time to time, brought them clothing that was a close approximation of Amrithi costume. Fanned cloth trousers, a blouse, and a length of cotton shot through with faded color were given to Mehr to wear draped across her torso. She dressed in silence, her back to Amun, allowing them both some privacy.

She missed her own Amrithi clothing. She missed the joy it had once given her to drape herself in cloth and mark the edges of her eyes with kohl. Mehr felt nothing but nervousness now. Nothing about this storm was as it should be. She felt drab and colorless in her clothes, her stomach filled with butterflies and her skull heavy with all the things she couldn’t forget: sigils, secrets, vows.

As she began to try to apply kohl to her eyes without a mirror to guide her, she heard Amun’s voice.

“Let me help you.”

She turned to him. Froze.

He looked nothing like his old self. No longer swathed in a heavy robe or ill-fitting tunic, he was tall and strong, his blackened eyes otherworldly, his expression serene. In Amrithi clothing he looked like the self she’d seen flashes of, through his usual garb of hunched shoulders and self-loathing. He looked clear-eyed and strong.

The sight of him—oh, it brought a lump to her throat. What could Amun have been, if he had never made vows to the Maha? What kind of man could he have grown to be among his own people?

A kind man, a voice inside her said. Just as he is now.

Mehr held the kohl out to him wordlessly and he took it. She closed her eyes as he applied ash to the lids, fanning the color out. “You remember everything I taught you?” he asked.

“I remember.”

She heard him let out a breath.

“Then I suppose we’re ready,” he said.

They were followed outside by a procession of mystics, who sang in bright voices for the Empire’s glory. She didn’t try to look into their faces, which were concealed from the sand by low hoods. She didn’t wonder if the Maha stood close, or if Hema followed her in the procession or kneeled praying inside the temple instead. She and Amun, exposed as they were to the burning light and sand, had other things to worry about.

The mystics nearest to them carried weapons. Mehr tried not to think about that either.