“Weh-sheh, I heard what happened to you, and I am so sorry. You didn’t deserve it.”

Weysh examined his empty glass, tipped it back to drain the remains, and reached for his bottle to pour another.

“And I’m sorry I said you were nobody.”

Weysh saluted her with his glass and took a swig.

“Please say something,” said Yenni. “You—I have never seen you like this. I don’t like it. It scares me.”

Weysh leaned back in his chair and inhaled deeply through his nose, then shook his head, frowning. “How’s your papa?” he said, though his voice was flat.

“Better,” Yenni said, she took off her uniform glove to show him the rune. “See?”

He took her hand, and Yenni’s heart fluttered at the warmth of his large palm. He squinted at the rune, and traced his finger along the red line of the injury to her palm, causing her to suppress a shiver. “Good, I’m happy to hear that.” He let her hand go, and Yenni frowned at the twinge of disappointment, how cold her hand felt without his.

“And your studies? Are you confident you’ll pass?”

“Yes, I’m doing well on my practice exams.”

“Very good,” he said. A cold silence settled between them, and Yenni let out a small noise of distress.

Weysh propped his face in his palm, looking moodily out the sitting-room window. “Are you even my Given anymore if I can’t smell you?”

Yenni’s stomach dropped but she threw on her royal poker face. “So your feelings are gone, then?”

He chuckled bitterly. “At the very least your scent is no longer driving me to distraction. Perhaps I’m a severed dragon after all.”

“Severed dragon? What does this mean?”

“A dragon with no Given.”

Yenni’s stomach dropped further. “I see,” she all but whispered. “Har-tha told me you might never be able to smell again. Is this true?”

Poor Weysh sighed right from his core. “It’s possible. According to the healers at the hospice, that sizzling rat shit hit me with pimentel.”

“What is pimentel?”

“Illegal is what it is. It’s a concoction of poisonous minerals and spices used in the Colonial War to knock out a dragon’s sense of smell. How he even came by it the Watcher only knows. I wonder if it wasn’t some sick poetic justice on his part, since I’m part Islander.”

“I am so, so, sorry Weh-sheh.”

Suddenly his eyes snapped to hers. “Why did you come?”

She opened her mouth to tell him something, anything other than the truth. Some merciful fib that would let him go peacefully, if not happily on his way. But something had finally flickered in his dead eyes. The faintest flash of hope, and just like that she couldn’t bring herself to lie.

“I care about you.”