“Did she ask to come with us?” I ask Ellian when the other woman comes back, bearing a dress and hat as promised.

“Yes,” she replies. “Someday she’ll know why she couldn’t. Here.”

I take the clothes with a sigh. It’s much safer if Isla stays here. She’d slow us down with her smaller strides, and if things go wrong in Ramsgate, she’d only be in the way. Still, I feel a pang of pity of her. For me to arrive and leave without her learning much, if anything, about her heritage must be hard.

I put on my damp uniform first, much cleaner thanks to Ellian’s washing, then slip on the dress. While the long sleeves will cover the vambrace, I’ll have to leave my breastplate behind. My shortsword and knives fit under the dress, although the latter pokes uncomfortably into my lower ribs.

“I’ll wait outside,” I say. “There’s something I want to do first.”

I head into the garden as Ellian puts on her own hat and says some things to Isla that sound like stern instructions.

Taking a deep breath, I use my free hand to pull my long hair forward. At least one of the humans who ambushed us knows what I look like, and I’m not taking chances. Before I can second-guess myself, I take one of my knives and press it into my hair, hacking away until everything below my shoulders is gone. When it’s done, I run my fingers through my uneven locks and laugh.

Ellian joins me, and I give Isla a hug goodbye. She presses something into my hand. It’s a bundle of paper folded upon itself a few times and wrapped around something soft.

“No,” she says when I go to open it. She says something to her mother in the human tongue.

“She says to give it to the prince,” Ellian explains. “As a gift from one Leonodai to another.”

“Thank you,” I tell Isla in Leonodai. Isla believes I’ll get home in time to save Tabrol. I have to believe that, too. I tuck the precious package into my underclothes beneath all my armor, and with her mystery gift next to my heart, Ellian and I set off.

The rain from the night means mud sticks to our boots with every step, but I don’t slow. In the patchy sunlight, the land looks less foreboding than it did the day before. I squint as I take in the sea behind us and the rolling hills ahead that lead to Ramsgate.

“How often do you go to town?” I ask.

“Only when I need to,” she says. “I prefer to visit traders at the outpost where the train stops, but sometimes we need things that are only found in the city.”

“Does Isla come with you?”