To my surprise, the Shardless Few didn’t immediately demand my abdication or retreat back to Khalute. They stayed to help, clearing rubble and lending their own physicians to assist with the injured. Urame was ceaselessly grateful to me; I would have found it embarrassing if I hadn’t needed exactly that: her gratitude. She showered me with praise, insisted I commandeer her study and made certain her servants asked to assist me at least twelve times a day. Slowly, in the days after the battle, word trickled out of what had happened. And then word began trickling back in. The other islands would fall in line. Even Iloh rescinded his demand for abdication, doing his best to paint it as a terrible mistake made in the throes of fear for his people.

I could afford to be magnanimous, so I let it pass.

Phalue came to see me in Urame’s study. The remains of the sea serpent had finally been cleared from around the palace walls, the dead burned, the injured all tended to. Thrana was recovering her energy and good humor, spending more time in the palace kitchens than was necessary, where the servants lavished her with praise and food.

“Eminence,” Phalue said, when she walked through the door, “it’s time I go home.” She stood in the pose that reminded me more of a soldier than a governor – hand resting on her sword, feet planted apart, knees soft and ready to spring into action. Her leather armor bore a fair number more scratches than it had when she’d arrived, and her face looked drawn, her eyes red-rimmed.

I snapped the Alanga journal shut, having finished reading it for the third time. I’d finally deciphered the last few words I’d had trouble with. “You don’t need my permission, Sai. You’re free to come and go as you please. You may not support me, but the Empire owes you for your help here.”

“And I owe you. I didn’t forget I made you a promise.”

“Made in haste. On a battlefield. I won’t hold you to it.”

She only shook her head, her lips pressed together. “I have matters to attend to at home, but I’ll be back when I’m done. And I’ll teach you. Ranami can handle Nephilanu for a few months.”

“A few months? That long?”