Her question brings back that familiar heavy feeling. I rub the back of my neck to ease the tightness. “Perhaps it means we still have something to accomplish in this world,” I say. It’s hard not to wince at the triteness of my words.

Mehtap looks at me with her large eyes, and she speaks as if she’s explaining something to a child. “But how do I do anything, for anyone, if I can’t even leave these walls?”

Chapter Twenty-four

Trials for Neju’s Guard start at dawn. Naudar and I climb out of bed before sunrise and march, bleary-eyed, to the training fields.

“Nervous?” he asks.

“I don’t know enough to be nervous. People don’t actually die in these, do they?”

Naudar purses his lips. “Not often,” he says.

Not the most comforting reply, but the threat of danger feels right, somehow, like an old friend. I wonder if it’s normal to feel this way. “So why did you decide to try out?” I ask him. “Walgash convince you too?”

“I’ve been watching Neju’s Guard march out of the city since before I could grow a beard. I’ve always wanted to wear their colors, serve the empire as best I can.”

I’m starting to see why the others tease Naudar so mercilessly. With his idealism and unrelentingly immaculate appearance, it’s hard not to. “You really are insufferable, aren’t you?”

His grin is unrepentant. “You’re just jealous. Don’t feel bad. Everybody is.”

There are scribes seated at a table out front, and we take our place in line.

“Dineas, no family name,” I tell the scribe.

“Neju’s Guard, Dineas?” I jump. I hadn’t realized Arxa was also sitting at the table.

“Yes, sir.”

“You understand that the trials are hard?” he says matter-of-factly. “We make no allowance for the recently ill. Many healthy men who have been training for months do not make it through.”

I square my shoulders. “I understand, sir. I want to learn my limits.”

Arxa holds my eyes for a second, and then motions toward the training fields.

I take my place among the soldiers on the well-trampled grass as we wait for everyone to drift in. The hundred current soldiers of Neju’s Guard are lined up at the front, facing us, wearing the black-and-silver sashes of their unit. I see a few familiar faces—Walgash, Masista, Cas. I reach into the pocket of my tunic and pick up the flower Zivah gave me. It’s dried by now, and I take care not to crush it. I’m already looking forward to the next time I can make it back to the rosemarked compound. Walgash and company are friendly, but nobody listens quite as well as Zivah. I can let my guard down around her without worrying about saying some stupid amnesic remark that the guys won’t let me live down for days.