The quiet is the worst thing: the alien silence in a space that has always, always held the whispers of the names of the worthy. The only pause was at the brief beat of a breath taken – a pause readying the next wave of words. But the readers have gone, and their voices have been silenced, and now who will say the names of the long dead who deserve to be remembered for eternity? They did well, Sana’s riders – they have taken the ceremony of remembrance from us, and without memory we are nothing.

I walk slowly towards the front of the building and almost trip over burned ropes. I shudder when I wonder whether the readers were tied up and made to watch the destruction of this sacred space. Their howls almost echo in the silence of the broken hall. The book of the dead has been destroyed, and if they were made to watch, it must have been like watching a murder. I should know.

When I reach the dais I stop, feeling as though I should kneel or pray or at the very least, weep, but I am silent. Glass crackles under my feet and my nostrils fill with the scent of burned wood and spilled incense.

“A risky move, coming here.”

My blood turns to ice.

He’s always waiting in the shadows. I don’t turn to look at him. I keep my eyes on the lectern.

“Minnow,” I sigh. The hairs on my arms prickle to gooseflesh when I hear him walk closer. I can smell his soap – a leather-mint fragrance. He stops next to me, his arm touching mine – the heat from him seeping out towards me. From the edge of my vision I see him raise his face to the beamed ceiling. We stand in silence.

“This was the blanks. This was an act of evil.” I break the silence with the words I’ve been wanting to say since I walked in.

Minnow lets out a whisper of a laugh.

“At last, you admit they can do wrong.”

I don’t like his mockery. I hate that even now he is closed and stone-like. I want him to break.

“What will you do now that you can’t say your father’s name in this place?” I say, and I hear his sharp, indrawn breath. I should be afraid. I should be running. But I stay, and my heart does not race, and my breath does not grow heavy. “Not all those who are forgotten are guilty. I know you whisper your father’s name: Davey Minnow. I know he deserves to be in the book of the dead.” I toe a scrap of parchment that lies on the ground. “We’re not so different after all.”

We wait, standing side by side. I don’t know for how long, but I’m sure I hear birdsong.