“I know your pride’s hurting. That’s why you set the prisoners free. For that act alone, Makrov wanted you hanged. The Akadra name you loathe so much is the only reason you’re alive. Josiri Trelan would be crow-food by now.”

“They were my prisoners,” Josiri bit out.

“I recall playing no small part in their capture. But yes. They were your prisoners. And for whatever it’s worth, I understand why you acted as you did. I might even have aided the endeavour, had you trusted me with your intent.”

“I’ve trouble believing that.”

“We’ll never know, will we?”

“Your manner tells me enough. I placed your enemy beyond your grasp.”

To Josiri’s surprise, Viktor laughed. “You think that’s why I’m angry? Kai Saran’s fate isn’t worth a brass shilling to me. His wildcat daughter’s far less. But I would have parleyed their deaths into freedom.” The laughter faded into bitterness. “Instead, I must seek another path, when every bone in my body calls me southwards to search for Calenne. I am riven by duty. Worn down by it. And in great part the fault is yours.”

Josiri cast about for a rebuttal. To his dismay, he found none. “The princessa . . . I wanted to spare her my burdens.”

“Compassion for your enemy, brother? I fear Ebigail Kiradin will never approve of you. But compassion isn’t enough. Not if we’re to spare our people Makrov’s cruelty.”

Our people. Viktor was far easier to loathe from a distance than in person. “You believe that’s possible, even now?”

“Makrov, Ebigail . . . even my own father. They mistake bigotry for the tinder of great days gone. They scry the past for comfort but are blind to its lesson.”

“And that is?”

“That if those in power refuse to change, others will take the decision from them.”

He spoke with laconic, deliberate passion. The sentiment, aggrandising in another, offered only an ascetic’s humility.

Josiri’s cheeks warmed with shame. “I’m as trapped as any of them. As my mother once was.”

“Not so,” Viktor replied. “Even at the end, when she’d nothing more to lose, Katya couldn’t bring herself to trust me. To hope for something better. We needn’t agree on everything, you and I. But from here on out, we must work together. Everything we love lies in the south. That alone should bind us.”

Calenne. Anastacia. How was he to help them now? “I’ll not be your puppet.”

“No, but if I’m to shoulder the aftermath of recklessness, I’d at least partake in the joy. Can you make me that promise?”

Josiri hesitated. His mother would have warned him against. But Viktor was right. The past was the past, and Viktor Akadra – of all people – was the only source of light in a bleak feature.

“Yes.”