“My dear,” said the woman. “Lady Arwa. Welcome. I am Lady Roshana, and I must say I am very glad to see you here safe. My companions are Asima, who is seated, and Gulshera. If you need anything, you must come to us, understand?”

“Thank you,” Arwa whispered. She looked at the woman’s face. The shawl she wore over her short hair was plain, as one would expect of a widow, but it was made of a rare knot-worked silk common only in one village of Chand, and accordingly eye-wateringly expensive. She wore no jewels but a gem in her nose, a diamond of pale, minute brilliance. This woman, then, was the most senior noblewoman of the hermitage, and the two others were the closest to her in stature. “It’s a great honor to be here, Aunt,” Arwa said, using a term of respect for an elder woman.

“You are so young!” exclaimed Roshana, staring at Arwa’s face. “How old are you, my dear?”

“Eighteen,” said Arwa.

A noise rippled through the crowd, hushed and sad. Noblewomen could not remarry; to be young and widowed was a tragedy.

Arwa’s skin itched beneath so many eyes.

“Shame, shame,” said Asima from her chair, overloud.

“I truly hadn’t expected you to be so young,” Roshana breathed. “When I heard the widow of the commander of Darez Fort was coming to us—”

Arwa flinched. She could not help it. Even the name of the place burned, still. It was just her luck that Roshana did not see it. Instead, Roshana was still staring at her damply, still twittering on.

“… have you no family, my dear, who could have taken care of you? After what you’ve been through!”

Arwa wanted to wrench her hand free of Roshana’s grip, but instead she swallowed, struggling to find words that weren’t cutting sharp, words that would not flay this fool of a woman open.

How dare you ask me about Darez Fort.

How dare you ask me about my family, as if your own have not left you here to rot.

How dare—

“I chose to come here, Aunt,” Arwa said, her voice a careful, soft thing.

She could have told the older widow that her mother had offered to take her home. She’d offered it even as she’d cut Arwa’s hair after the formal funeral, the one that took place a full month after the real bodies from Darez Fort had been buried. Maryam had cut Arwa’s hair herself, smoothing its shorn edges flat with her fingers, tender with terrible disappointment. As Arwa’s hair had fallen to the ground Arwa had felt all Maryam’s great dreams fall with it. Dreams of renewed glory. Dreams of second chances. Dreams of rising from disgrace.

Arwa’s marriage should have saved them all.