There are fates worse than death, but I don’t say it. “Is healing that important to you?”

She casts her eyes toward the twin swords resting at my feet, carefully wrapped in oilcloth to avoid attracting attention. “How would you feel if you could no longer wield those? If every blade you touched turned on you instead?”

I follow her gaze to my blades. Even though I’ve only owned them a few months, they already feel like extensions of my arms. I know their reach and their weight, and it makes me nervous to have them on the floor of the boat instead of on my back. “Your fellow villagers spoke highly of your skill,” I say. “They say you were touched by the gods.”

“We only have one Goddess. She holds healers in her hand because they guard the door to her domain.” She stops abruptly. Then comes that faint smile again, but there’s no mirth in it. “The Goddess might have taken an interest in me once, but she’s long forgotten me by now.”

I don’t answer. Leave it to a priest to defend the gods to her. I won’t fight that losing battle.

As we come near to the opposite shore, I pull the oars in and jump out. The beach on this side is rockier than the other, and pebbles scatter under my feet as I pull the boat to land. I’d purposely steered us to a more remote part of the border, out of view of checkpoints, docks, or any other Amparan trappings. Still, as I wade onto dry ground, a weight presses on my chest, clamping the breath out of my lungs more surely than if a horse had fallen on top of me. Images crowd into my mind—chains, heat, the moans of dying men. I close my eyes, willing the sensations to go away. I’m no warrior if I let myself be beaten down by ghosts.

“Dineas…”

Scars, I’d forgotten Zivah. She steps out of the boat, uncertain. I turn away from her, take a deep breath, hold it in, and let it out. Focus on the mission. Remember what’s at stake. I’m still a little shaky by the time she reaches me. “Welcome to the Central Empire.”

She looks at me as if trying to decide whether to acknowledge the hostility in my voice.

“You hate them, don’t you?” she asks.

I think back to the battles I’ve endured, the children who lack fathers and mothers. “Don’t you? That garrison of soldiers with rose plague might as well have run a sword through you.”

Her expression freezes, and she scans the jagged rocks of the beach. “Sometimes I blame those soldiers,” she says, eyes still focused ahead of her. “Sometimes I’m angry at the Goddess. Sometimes I blame myself.”

For a moment we’re both silent. Then she pushes ahead of me. “What now?”