I prayed to Devena that the Necessary King would not be too much like Ri’s father for her to ever bear the child.

But before I could see to Heingyl Ri’s remarriage, I had to get Baru to the Necessary King. And I’d just lost my best way to do it.

Iscend had a particular technique to prepare her catch, which she called ikejime. I would have called it prissy and obsessive, but the fish were exquisite, and anyway if you insulted Clarified they would make a great effort to correct their wrongs, which I found exhausting. It was hard to explain that sometimes I just needed to excoriate someone.

On the day we sighted Kyprananoke, I came up onto the quarterdeck to enjoy the wind and speak to the charming Mister Execarne. But I paused at the quarterdeck stairway to observe Iscend’s fishing. She had magnificent poise. Such grace and strength. If I could trick this avatar of all Falcrest’s obsessions, this epitome of youth and incision, then I could beat Hesychast and all the rest as well. I could still save Aurdwynn, and my brother, too.

Iscend’s net came up fat with squirming silver, and she dumped the whole load of fish into a tub of water chilled by a brick of Helbride’s precious ice, stunning them. One by one she selected her favorites and performed her ikejime. The pithing needle glittered in her fist.

I’d threatened to pith Baru. Apparitor and I had agreed upon that step: poison her into seizure, place a medical arrest upon her, and watch her squirm her way free and flee onto Kyprananoke. She would be driven out of the safety of Helbride, where we couldn’t move against her without eyewitnesses, and onto the turbulent kypra.

There, in the anarchic eye of the Ashen Sea, she would vanish—whisked away by Iscend, shipped north in captivity, delivered to the Necessary King. Apparitor and I would complete the mission to find the Cancrioth, and that success would earn Hesychast his triumph.

How fitting that an old woman would destroy Baru, mm? She’d been raised by Falcrest, raised to let old women do the work. Let us lay out the smooth road for you, so you may prance down the easy way and trample the dried-up rind on your way to take the credit.

Damn Baru. And damn Iscend for straying.

It happened like this: first she grasped the fish firmly around the gills. Then she drove the needle into the brain behind the eye. If done correctly (and it always was) the fish would fan its fins and then go limp. Iscend returned the dead fish to the ice water, where its flavor would remain succulent until she was ready to cook.

As she completed the first ikejime I saw her mouth move.