The Boarhound shook ver head, huffing out a breath through ver nose. Ve stood, stretching out slowly with a wince and a grunt: maybe playing up the old soldier angle, maybe not. Ve loped into the kitchen area, exchanged words with Owl. Made them laugh. The Shark brightened as Boarhound entered. Ve stretched to reach a cabinet, not quite getting there. Owl did so more easily, opened the cabinet, passed a bottle down to Dormarch. Boarhound performed a salute which ended in vem swaying as if drunken, and the other two both laughed again. Whether Dormarch was just a drifting fighter past ver prime or had a much more significant role in the organisation than ve seemed, ve was certainly well-liked.

Boarhound settled back in the seat beside her with a grunt and a curse. “Here,” ve said, thunking the bottle down on the bench. It was ominously unmarked, a plain and dusty bottle. Orfeus cocked her head at it. She patted at her cloak, fetching some of her herbs to make at least a decent trade, but Dormarch grabbed ver hand. Kindly, but with a grip like steel. “I’ll drink to your joining, Fox. Not every day we get someone new.”

“Well,” Orfeus said, studying vem. She shrugged, pulling her hand back, secretly relieved when Dormarch released it. “There’s no day in the week when I’ll turn down a free drink.”

Boarhound shuffled out an array of small cups, pouring a slug of liquor into ver big tankard. Ve took a sip and hiccuped, pushed the bottle towards Orfeus.

Orfeus poured out a cupful and set it aside. For the Green and the burned and any god that would want it.

She felt Dormarch’s eyes on her, and poured another shot and drank it down.

The night blurred by tolerably fast. A while later, she was sitting at one of the mess tables, food in front of her, a tidy line of the little cups stretching off to the side. “Help me eat this bread,” the Boarhound had said, “I’ve a bad tolerance for wheat.” Orfeus had eaten maybe half of it, and then used the rest of it to illustrate a point, and now it had gone to the side somewhere.

“What do you believe in, then, Orfeus?” Boarhound said.

The Green, but she didn’t deserve to, not anymore. Orfeus said, “Me.” Her head was on the table, and had been for some unknown length of time. Many things about life were mysterious, and she accepted this with equanimity. “So right now…nothing.”

Dormarch’s hand thumped reassuringly against her back. She wondered if ve knew how hard ve hit. “You can believe in us, if you’ve the need.”

“Haha,” Orfeus said and heaved her head up with a titanic effort, resting her forehead in her hands. “I’m not a fool. Not a Faol. I don’t think I could convince myself of that.”