‘Initially, yes. But I foresee a certain usefulness to his presence, once matters fully ... unfold. Be sure to awaken him some time tomorrow night, if he has not already done so on his own.’

‘Very well, since you insist. Although I am already deeply fond of my newfound peace and solitude.’

Cotillion seemed to study her a moment, then the god said, ‘I will leave you then, since I have other tasks to attend to this night.’

Lostara reached into the pouch and tossed a small object towards him.

He caught it in one hand and peered down to study it.

‘I assumed that was yours,’ she said.

‘No, but I know to whom it belongs. And am pleased. May I keep it?’

She shrugged. ‘It matters not to me.’

‘Nor should it, Lostara Yil.’

She heard a dry amusement in those words, and concluded that she had made a mistake in letting him keep the object; that, indeed, it did matter to her, though for the present she knew not how. She shrugged again. Too late now, I suppose. ‘You said you were leaving?’

She sensed him bridling, then in a swirl of shadows he vanished.

Lostara lay back on the stony ground and contentedly closed her eyes.

The night breeze was surprisingly warm. Apsalar stood before the small window overlooking the gully. Neither Mogora nor Iskaral Pust frequented these heights much, except when necessity forced them to undertake an excursion in search of food, and so her only company was a half-dozen elderly bhok’arala, grey-whiskered and grunting and snorting as they stiffly moved about on the chamber’s littered floor. The scattering of bones suggested that this top level of the tower was where the small creatures came to die.

As the bhok’arala shuffled back and forth behind her, she stared out onto the wastes. The sand and outcrops of limestone were silver in the starlight. On the rough tower walls surrounding the window rhizan were landing with faint slaps, done with their feeding, and now, claws whispering, they began crawling into cracks to hide from the coming day.

Crokus slept somewhere below, whilst resident husband and wife stalked each other down the unlit corridors and in the musty chambers of the monastery. She had never felt so alone, nor, she realized, so comfortable with that solitude. Changes had come to her. Hardened layers sheathing her soul had softened, found new shape in response to unseen pressures from within.

Strangest of all, she had come, over time, to despise her competence, her deadly skills. They had been imposed upon her, forced into her bones and muscles. They had imprisoned her in blinding, gelid armour. And so, despite the god’s absence, she still felt as if she was two women, not one.

Leading her to wonder with which woman Crokus had fallen in love.