The liquid was cold, though that didn’t mask the taste. Copper, sweetness and a strange, lingering aftertaste filled my mouth and clung to the back of my throat. I swiped my tongue over my teeth, wondering if I should have tasted it before swallowing. Perhaps it was poison. And then the memory swept over me.

I was here, still in this chamber, though it looked different. Three more lamps were lit in the working area, and Thrana still lay in the water. My hands adjusted the tubing leading into the memory machine. Liver spots scattered across the backs of my palms, tendons pressing against skin. I pushed too hard; my hand slipped and hit the side of the chest. Something jolted loose.

“Dione’s balls!” Frustration welled within me. Always one thing after another. Get something into place; another thing falls out of place. The only thing I had to live for were these experiments. My chest ached as I thought of Nisong, of her dark eyes, her hand in mine. Gone. I felt around the bottom of the chest, pushing the hidden compartment back into line.

My gaze flicked involuntarily to the other end of the cave.

And then I was back in my own body again, wondering if that was what it felt like to be my father. Strangely astonished that he had such strength of feeling at all. I’d always known him to be cold and distant.

He really had loved Nisong. I wasn’t sure why that surprised me. Perhaps it was because, no matter how hard I’d tried, I could not get him to love me.

In the memory, a hidden compartment had come loose from the chest. Experimentally, I struck the side of the chest with the flat of my palm. Nothing jolted loose, but I put my hand where I remembered my father’s hand pressing the wood back in.

There was something there. A small rectangle where the wood felt slightly raised. I struck the chest again.

This time, it came loose. A drawer slid partway open. I pried it the rest of the way out. Inside rested a tiny silver key.

I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to laugh or to cry. Always my father kept so many secrets – secrets within secrets within secrets. His mind was a maze even he couldn’t find his way out of. What if he had truly raised me as his daughter? What if he’d put aside his foolish quest to live on in another body, to bring his dead wife back to life?

The key was cold when I picked it up, the tiny teeth at the end sharp. I’d unlocked all the doors I could find in the palace. This belonged somewhere else.