“I want justice.”

OF COURSE HE was such a cursed fool just as the others had always teased him, a city boy born to luxury who hadn’t the wits or skills to make do outside of the salons where expensive jaryas gathered to declaim their poetry and scions of rich families gossiped and intrigued and made behind-the-curtain deals. Not that he had done any dealing, famous as he had been, in those days long ago and in his limited circle, for being too proud to gamble; that had been their way of saying they thought him too naive to understand what was actually going on.

He had missed some important gesture or shading of her mood. Oblivious as the moon in love, thinking he had awakened her and finally done something right all the way through, he had let it tromp right past him. He thought he had actually fulfilled the pact he had made with Ashaya, who had worn the cloak of Mist and walked into the shadows because of the persuasion of the others but who had the strength in the end to turn her back on corruption, when in truth he was the least of them, really, too stubborn to fall into the shadows but not strong enough to fight. Mostly he was able to walk through the world cheerfully enough; it’s just that sometimes the façade was stripped away by an unexpected setback.

Where would Kirit go?

Was it the view she had seen when she’d walked along the height that had jolted her into action? Was it the sea, or the dawn, or the sky? Or night’s shadowed sky calling to her?

Far in the distance, if you had quite good vision, could be seen the flare of human-made fires.

I want justice.

Too late, he knew where she had gone.

IN A SHORT span, an exceptional degree of construction had flowered on a pair of neighboring hills situated to overlook a bay where the Qin were building a settlement. When the wind shifted to blow in from the sea, the stink of bubbling oil tainted the air, but it rarely lasted long. Eagles glided above. Young men drilled in military order at dawn and dusk, their shouts carrying in the dry air. Between drill, these hirelings and debt slaves shaped bricks and dug ditches and heaped dirt into what would, when completed, be an impressive stretch of berm encircling both hills and the narrow valley down which a shallow five-seasons river ran. Also, laborers cut a well. At night, the workers slept in tents.

A cadre of men and seven women trained as reeves; not that he knew the drills and technique, but it was obvious who had an eagle at hand and who did not. Shallow-drafted cargo boats beached on the shore within the shelter of the bay. Laborers hauled logs from the boats to build crude lofts for the eagles: At least forty raptors were gathered in the greater span of this territory, a phenomenal number to be seen outside the reeve halls. Some were willing to share close quarters while others kept their distance in the Spires.