“You all know?” Briony could not shake off her astonishment. And she had thought herself so clever!

“You have traveled with us two tennights or more, after all,” Teodoros said kindly.

“I didn’t know,” said Birch, wide-eyed. “Are you sure?”

“Enough of this yammering,” said Feival. “If anyone should be unhappy at the thought of our Tim—shall we still call you that?—playing at the goddess Zoria, it should be me, since it is my contracted due to play the leading woman’s role. But if I like this Zuriyal-bitch that Finn has jotted out for me, I will raise no objection.” He smiled. “I am with Dowan on this. I think you have many hidden depths.”

“Think on it, Tim,” said Teodoros. “And yes, we shall still call her…him that, because you may remember it is not lawful to have a woman on stage. If you will consent, we would have a new play for the Tessians, one that I can humbly say is my best. Much of my inspiration came from the talks you and I have had.”

“Talks, is it?” Makewell shook his head and made a razzing noise with his lips. “Does that mean there are many scenes in this new work of a fat old playwright futtering a disguised child? I thought your winds only blew one direction, Finn.”

“Don’t be jealous, Pedder,” said Teodoros serenely. “I promise you my relationship with young Tim has been as chaste as it would have been with Zoria herself. But Tim, the crudeness of Master Makewell left to one side, what do you say? You could be a great help to us and earn yourself a player’s share, which can be rich indeed in Tessis, since the Syannese love plays the way the Hierosolines love religious processions.”

“I am flattered, I suppose,” Briony said carefully—she would be traveling with these people for days more, perhaps months, and didn’t want to offend them. “But the answer is no. Under no circumstances. It will not happen in this world or any other. You must think of something else.”

She only had a tennight to learn the lines. There were dozens upon dozens of them, in teetering rhyme-that-was-not-rhyme. Rehearsals came at night after whatever performance they made for their supper, so most of the work was done by candlelight in tavern courtyards and barns, while chill winds blew outside and snow and rain fell, but they could also speak lines and discuss blocking—a word she had learned meant where the actors went in and out or stood—as they made their way down the Great Kertish Road toward Syan.

I have fallen so far, she thought. From a princess in a castle to a false goddess with no home, with straws in my hair and fleas in my woolen hose.

Still, there was an unfamiliar freedom in such a collapse from grace. Briony was not happy, but she was not sad, either, and she had to admit that however lonely and uncomfortable it might be, and however much she missed her home and family, she was having something that could only be described as an adventure.