“The Star Isles was nothing like this,” he snorted. “The capital city was carved into the face of cliffs. Our houses were limestone, packed together so tightly you could walk from roof to roof, all glittering and white.” He closed his eyes, his lashes fluttering. “Every year, there was a parade, and we’d sit on the roof, splitting moon fruit we’d picked that morning. My sisters made a terrible mess every time.”

Ranka heard the love in his voice, and she thought of her own home, of the snowcapped Kithraki Mountains, which fed the rivers yearlong, the miles of conifer forests that never relinquished their shade, the apple trees that grew heavy and swollen in the fall, and the raspberry thickets that bristled over swamps in the summer, tempting witchlings and black bears alike. They passed yet another empty street. “It sounds beautiful.”

“It was.”

“Do you miss it?”

Percy closed his eyes. “Every day.”

“You said ‘was.’ What happened to the city?”

Percy flashed her a humorless smile. “Why, it’s gone, of course. Queen Ilia burned it to the ground.”

The silence of Seaswept pressed in around them.

“We didn’t expect her to kill so many,” Percy continued, his voice soft. “Or maybe we did, but we were so desperate for change, and she was so convincing that hers was the only way to reach it. She spoke of a Star Isles where everyone was equal.” He grimaced. “Did we know it was wrong? Maybe. But we were starving for someone to believe in. And my father—he’d come from nothing. Can I really blame him for believing in her new world? For trying to include me in that dream?”

Bile rose in Ranka’s throat, dark and bitter, because instead of a distant queen, all she saw was Ongrum’s face, the light in her eyes as she spoke of freeing witches forever.

“Is it worth it?” Ranka whispered.

“Is what?”

“Rebellion. All the horror, bloodshed, and death. You had to have lost friends. People you loved. But you did it to make something new—something better. Was it worth it? The new world?”

Percy turned his attention to the heavens. “There’s never a new world, Ranka. There’s only fixing the one we’ve got.”

He might as well have punched her in the stomach.