Baru swallowed. “What did you hear?”

“You offered to help Shao Lune conspire against Parliament.”

“It’s not to you to question my methods.”

“Of course not.” Iscend smiled like she couldn’t help it, and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “You are a capable agent of the Republic, aren’t you? Always convincing the disloyal that you share their disloyalties. I’m glad you use your gifts.”

12. The Llosydanes

12

THE LLOSYDANES

BY the time they sailed into the Llosydane Islands they were all dying of thirst.

It was slow, and certain, and it was the most important thirst in the world. The need for water set the tempo of trade and war on the Ashen Sea, the fear of becalming, the terror of a storm that would unmast your ship and leave you to mummify in the sun.

The spring light scoured the clipper and all aboard gained a terrible awareness of their bodies as sweaty leaky oily sacs of mucus and fat. The slim water ration left their tongues slug-swollen. A topsail girl afflicted with a fever fell from the topgallants to to her death. And as they read out her service jacket at her funeral, the watermaster marked her charts with a pin trailing a white canvas tassel.

Baru had asked Aminata about that once. Why does the navy use white for dehydration? White was the color of purity, and hygiene, and clean snow, and the sails of merchanters. Why was it also the color of death?

And Aminata had told her it was an ancient Oriati tradition. White, the color of loneliness. The opposite of living skin. Dry sand. Ash. White empty death.

Baru was in Apparitor’s cubby when the call came, trying to help him make ink, because she used so much of it. She’d failed to bring up the missing ledger of secrets: she worried that she was putting off the hunt out of fear of the secrets themselves.

“Birds! Birds on the southern horizon!” And then, a little while later, “Land! Land on the telescope!”

“Thank Wydd,” Baru moaned.

“Why,” Apparitor growled, “are you staring at my hand?”

“Death by thirst,” Baru admitted. “Your color. It reminds me of the water-tassel.”

“Oh, go on, then,” he said, with an old weariness in his voice. “First it’s the skin. Now you can mention an albino you once knew. Then you ask to touch my hair. Count my freckles! Be thorough.”

“I’ve already counted them,” Baru said, “I do it while I’m ignoring the things you say.”

“Cunt,” he muttered.

“Prick,” she countered. But she helped him crush the char for the ink. They worked a while in tense silence, crowded shoulder to shoulder.