An attractive young Noi man wearing a moon-polka-dotted plum tunic is stringing a line of violet-rose decorated runic orbs across the narrow street. He pauses, grinning as he looks toward a nearby apothecary shoppe. “Find the moon with me, Zara Ko!” he tosses out flirtatiously to the elegant teal-hued young woman in a black apron staffing the shoppe’s window.

“You need to bring it to me, Mika Zir!” she flirts back with a cheeky grin as she hands a vial of deep-brown roots to another young Noi woman garbed in a dress made of overlapping metallic hearts. The two women burst into laughter as I stare at the vial, stunned.

It’s Sanjire root. Vials and vials of the pregnancy-preventing root, illegal in Gardneria, but completely out in the open here.

“They sell Sanjire root,” I murmur to Bleddyn in amazement. My thoughts careen to Lukas, remembering how he secured the root for us, a stab of fierce longing for him cutting through me.

“It’s surprising to see it on display,” Bleddyn admits. “Shocked me at first too. The Urisk don’t allow it either.” Her green lips twist with derision. “We’re supposed to have as many babies as, well—” she gives me a jaded look “—as the Mages. Not a lot of power in the Western Realm for us women.” She spits out a laugh. “Well, unless you’re Amaz.”

I nod in morbid solidarity as we exchange another look, the two of us seeming a trace surprised to be finding common ground as Westerners.

My attention shifts to two bedazzled Noi women striding toward us in the increasing traffic. One of the young women has spiked graphite-hued hair tipped in metallic violet. The other’s looping brown braids are festooned with deep-purple clematis blossoms, her dress a riot of lilac glitter. Their skirts are scandalously short by Gardnerian standards, but no one looks at them with anything but friendly glances.

They fall into each other, laughing, as if in the midst of some private joke, and the spike-haired woman pulls the flowery woman into an embrace, kissing her deeply.

A tingling surprise sweeps through me, and I can barely keep from gaping at them.

They break the kiss, beaming at each other, as a hunched elderly flower merchant leans out from her small shoppe, a broad smile on her face as she hands them a glowing violet iris on a long spring-green stalk.

I’m swept up in an envy so strong I’m surprised by the bitter taste of it.