“David and I spoke in numbers,” he began. “Our deepest conversations were transcribed in blueprints for some new invention. I can’t pretend I understood him.”

Zoya had expected to hear the tones of a king rallying his troops, but Nikolai’s voice was raw and weary. He was just a man, grieving the loss of a friend.

“I wasn’t smart enough to keep up with his genius,” Nikolai continued. “All I could do was respect his intellect and his desire to do right with the gifts with which he was born. I relied on him to find answers I couldn’t, to blaze a path when I found myself lost. David saw things no one else did. He saw through the world to the mysteries on the other side. I know that he’s gone on to solve those mysteries.” A faint smile touched Nikolai’s lips. “I can see him in some great library, already lost in his work, head bent to some new problem, making the unknown known. When I enter the laboratory, when I wake in the night with a new idea, I will miss him…” His voice broke. “I miss him now. May the Saints receive him on a brighter shore.”

“May the Saints receive him,” the crowd murmured.

But David hadn’t believed in Saints. He’d believed in the Small Science. He’d believed in a world ordered by facts and logic.

What do you believe? Zoya didn’t know. She believed in Ravka, in her king, in the chance that she could be a part of something better than herself. But maybe she didn’t deserve that.

All eyes had turned to Genya now. She was David’s wife, his friend, his compatriot. She was expected to speak.

Genya stood straighter, lifted her chin. “I loved him,” she said, her body still trembling as if it had been torn apart and hastily stitched back together. “I loved him and he loved me. When I was … when no one could reach me … he saw me. He…” Genya turned her head to Zoya’s shoulder and sobbed. “I loved him and he loved me.”

Was there any greater gift than that? Any more unlikely discovery in this world?

“I know,” said Zoya. “He loved you more than anything.”

The dragon’s eye had opened and Zoya felt that love, the enormity of what Genya had lost. It was too much to endure knowing she could do nothing to erase that pain.

“Tell them, Zoya. I can’t … I can’t.”

Genya looked frail, curled in on herself, the frond of some delicate flower hiding from winter.

What could Zoya say to her? To any of them? How could she give them hope she didn’t have?