“Nisong.” Coral touched her shoulder, and the tenderness in her voice made tears prick at Nisong’s already watering eyes. “We’ve come far enough already. We don’t need to go all the way. You’ve done so much for the constructs.”

It felt like most of what she’d done was to get them killed. There had to be a reason for it, she had to make their deaths worth something. If they retreated, she would have lost them all for nothing.

There was a sleeping Shiyen beneath the palace, waiting for her. That was her place. That was where she belonged.

She breathed in deep, thought of her sister and pushed her hand into Leaf’s chest. The shards met her fingertips, clusters of them, trailing all the way into his arms. Her throat aching, she pulled them out in handfuls, waiting as Coral collected them in the bag at her side. Whatever memories Leaf held would be gone, but she could reuse the shards in new constructs.

Coral closed up the bag. “You can send out some of the spy constructs, have them tell the others to come home. We can build something from the islands we’ve already taken. You said Maila was a prison, but it’s not. The mind-fog was the prison.”

They’d taken four islands so far. Instead of sweeping across the Empire, they could stay here. They could dig in and fortify. Freed from their commands, they wouldn’t have to engage in mindless tasks. They could all take the time to go through their memories, to figure out who they had once been and who they wanted to someday be.

Nisong set her sights on the horizon, toward where she knew Imperial lay. She’d started this campaign wanting justice. She’d wanted to make the Empire pay for its mistakes in blood. But there were so few of them left. She laid her hand on top of Leaf’s.

If she continued on this campaign she’d lose the rest of them. Her place wasn’t with Shiyen at the heart of the Empire. It was here, with the constructs. They didn’t have the numbers to make it to Imperial. They didn’t have the numbers to make it to the next island. She wiped the tears from her eyes. “You’re right. Call the constructs back,” Nisong said. “We’ll stay.”

Coral rose to her feet, brushing sand from the front of her dress. “We’ll burn his body tonight. Just you and me.”

A ray of the setting sun broke through the clouds, shimmering over the ocean and the sea serpent’s scales. Nisong squinted against it. If they were to make this place a home, there would be a lot of work to do. It would take days to clear away all the debris and bodies. She sucked in a breath.

All the bodies.