“It was a fine story,” Gian said. “Did that really happen?”

“Yes.”

“Then how did you end up here?”

“I made a lot of bad choices,” Lilia said. “Can we be friends, do you think?”

“I don’t know you.”

“No one really knows anyone. Do you have a better place to go?”

Gian shook her head.

“Then come with me,” Lilia said. “I’ll protect you.” Which sounded strange when she said it, because she had done so poor a job of protecting herself. But it was something Faith Ahya would say.

Lilia invited Gian home to live with her, though Emlee made faces and Cora turned up her nose. At night, she watched the light play across Gian’s fine face but dared not touch her.

Sometimes, she thought of the girl torn asunder by the gate. She knew, gazing into Gian’s gaunt, tired face, that despite her horror at the girl’s death, she would do it again to save herself, to have this moment. The Oras would say it was the direst kind of selfishness. Oma would eat her; Sina would not collect her soul.

But Lilia had no soul. She wasn’t even of this world.

More people began to come to Emlee’s door, but no longer solely for the help of Emlee. They asked about Lilia. They asked her to tell stories and mend their flesh while she did it. Emlee told her that storytelling could get her new shoes, more food, vials of everpine to scrub the lice from her hair and clothing. And those things could buy her respect, too. Even more respect than she was earning from mending broken bones and fevers and delivering babies.

So Lilia told stories. All the old stories from the books she read in the temples, and the history lessons she learned from Dasai and Chali. And when she ran out of those, she made some up. She began to ask for scraps of white cloth instead of payment. When she went home each night, she spent an hour sewing the pieces together into a dress, which she kept folded up and hidden beneath her pillow.

Gian listened to all of Lilia’s stories, even the ones about Aaldian merchants who led rebellions and dog thieves who became empresses.

“Why did you come to me?” Lilia asked her one night.

“You have a very memorable face,” Gian said, tracing the karoi scars on her cheek.

Lilia flinched. “You should ask.”

“I’m sorry.”

“What happened to your leg? You haven’t said.”

“There are some stories that don’t want telling,” Gian said. “Some stories you tell, they make things worse. Not better.”

Lilia didn’t ask again, even when Emlee confronted her about it some days later.

“That woman’s a danger,” Emlee said. “They don’t dump dajians there for just anything. She clings to you for your reputation and your warm bed. Don’t think it’s more than that.”