“The empress must not engage in actions that damage her reputation,” the boy continued. “For our purposes, your image must remain unsullied. You must retain the trust of the Arit populace.”

“Whose purposes?” I shrilled. “Who do you work for?”

His childish features wrinkled, as though I had asked a question for which he had not been fed the answer. “I am your servant,” he repeated. “The empress must not . . .” He took a step forward. I fumbled for a weapon, but my hand found only the trinkets on my belt. With a cry, I unstoppered a vial of holy water and hurled its contents at the boy.

The water would have dissolved an evil abiku, turning it to ash. But the boy merely flinched, staring emptily at his splattered clothes.

“What are you?” I demanded again, seizing his shoulder and attempting to take his memories.

For seconds, all I saw was a long, yawning void. I blinked—this had never happened before. Even babies had some memories, though fuzzy and disorganized. But after a moment, my Hallow managed to salvage the dimmest echo of a memory, lifting it to the surface.

The boy stumbled back from my grasp, his gaze growing suddenly childlike. Unfocused . . . as though recalling a distant dream. “I’m,” he mumbled, “I’m called Fergus. I was born in Faye’s Crossing. Far north, in Mewe.”

“Who do you work for? Who are your people?”

The boy shook his head slowly. “My parents . . . went away. No. They died in battle. At Gaelinagh.”

“Gaelinagh?” I echoed the foreign word, and battle records raced through my memories. “But that’s impossible. The Battle of Gaelinagh was a Mewish civil war, and they haven’t had one of those in centuries. Not since—”

Disbelief stole the words in my throat.

Peace had been established in Mewe five hundred years ago—during the reign of Emperor Enoba. Back when Redemptors were born all over the continent, and not just in Songland.

The Mewish child was sinking before my eyes. The ground was—was swallowing him. My fingers grasped at his clammy pale skin, but my Hallow found nothing—only cold emptiness.

What kind of creature had practically no memories at all?

“Your map’s still blue,” he said. The monotone had returned, and he nodded absently at the symbols on my forearms. “It’ll go purple once you join us.” Then the ground closed over him. He vanished, leaving me alone with Thaddace’s body as a gaggle of courtiers rounded the corridor.

CHAPTER 3

“You can’t hide forever, you know,” said Kirah.

“I’m not hiding,” I lied, humming with manic cheer as I swept through the gilded Imperial Suite hallways, balancing a sloshing tureen on one hip and a bundle of scrolls on the other. “I’m busy. You haven’t had your coneflower tea yet, have you?”

“Tar.”

“Can’t forget your tea. Temple duty tomorrow. The crowds will expect you to sing, and you’ll never heal all those people without drinking your—”