Nona said, “What did you think of me?” knowing the answer.

“I thought I didn’t know you at all. You were new.”

Nona always loved this answer unreasonably; the idea that that was when Camilla met her, that was her birth. She said, “I don’t remember much about back then.”

“Not surprised. We didn’t let you meet many people.”

“And we lived here and I got better and Pyrrha went out to work and you taught me how to speak. And then things went wrong.”

That had been a hideous time.

Camilla said, “Yes. Then things went wrong. The light appeared. We found out Blood of Eden had lied to us … or at least, didn’t have the power to look after us anymore. That’s it.”

Nona stretched her toes out until her ankles burned.

“That was still the kiddie version,” she said, faintly accusatory. “I’m more sophisticated, Cam. I can understand more.”

“Okay. Keep in mind I never had to practise an adult version.”

“Can I ask questions?”

“Go ahead.”

“I don’t understand why We Suffer hates Pyrrha.”

“Pyrrha’s best friend killed We Suffer’s boss.”

That made sense.

“Why did you want to take your families away from the other place?”

“We didn’t feel we could be there anymore … not until we really understood what we were doing, morally. The Warden is our leader, and our families listened to what he had to say. We voted on it … made promises we couldn’t keep.”

Camilla’s voice was bitter. Nona was sorry.

“If I remember who I am, can’t I help to find them?” she said.

“That’s up to you,” said Camilla.

“Will your families like me? Will they say, ‘Well done, Pyrrha, well done, Camilla, well done, Palamedes’?”

Camilla smiled audibly.

“No,” she said.

After that Nona slept, or thought she was sleeping: she lay in the heat feeling it itch across her body, rolling over to find the cool part of the pillow where Camilla had tucked the frozen blocks in the pillowslip like she did every night. She heard Camilla breathing and felt nearly completely at peace, happy despite everything. Sometimes it was hard not to be happy; sometimes it was so difficult when everyone else had that hard, hurt look at the corners of their eyes that meant they didn’t quite know how to carry on: the men at the dairy, Pyrrha, Palamedes, the nice lady teacher at school, Kevin.

When she was 90 percent asleep, she heard the door very quietly unlatch and close. Then she counted, and at the end of five counts there was Pyrrha at the door saying, “Ah, my darling hearts, my sleeping babes, Daddy’s own treasures,” and Camilla saying without opening her eyes, “Go to bed. I just got her to sleep.”

Nona fell asleep and was happy.

Order Nona the Ninth now!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

TAMSYN MUIR is the bestselling author of the Locked Tomb Series. Her fiction has won the Locus and Crawford awards, and been nominated for the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, the Shirley Jackson Award, the World Fantasy Award, the Dragon Award, and the Eugie Foster Memorial Award. A Kiwi, she has spent most of her life in Howick, New Zealand, with time living in Waiuku and central Wellington. She currently lives and works in Oxford, in the United Kingdom. You can sign up for email updates here.