The silence between them was almost unbearable but she didn’t dare say anything, fearing that the wrong word from her would set him off. Afterwards, she removed the rest of his clothing and scrubbed him from head to toe, using water infused with Lord Rochant’s favourite flowers. When he was towelled dry, she wrapped him in a robe, ready for his walk of transition.

With the kind of timing Chandni cherished, a servant arrived to inform her that the Bringers of Endless Order were ready for them. They walked the corridors in silence. She kept close to Satyendra, alert for any trouble, and four of Yadavendra’s hunters joined their escort, to create a moving cage around them. She wondered if she would see the Bringers herself when they got to the rebirth chamber and hoped not. Mystery and rumour surrounded them. It was said that they could see into a person’s soul. It was said that even the Deathless feared them, and that they could curse with a word, kill with a look, and that any who died that way would be born again in the Wild as something monstrous.

She thought about the hidden feather sprouting from the back of her head and wondered what the Bringers would make of it, and shivered. Though the day may come when she would have to face justice for her crimes, she was determined it would be Lord Rochant that dealt it, not them. Anyone but them.

Satyendra was watching her from the corner of his eye, though he was quick to look away when she turned her head in his direction. He noticed me shiver, perhaps even read something in my face. Of course he did. He doesn’t miss a thing.

A last set of stairs, a turn, then another, and she could hear High Lord Yadavendra’s voice, a constant stream of words, like a brook, babbling endlessly. She forced herself to admit that she didn’t really like the man, worse, she didn’t respect him. All these years later, it was hard to forget the image of him lying prone on the floor, the broken pieces of Nidra Un-Sapphire’s Godpiece at his feet. How could a house built on discipline and dignity have such a man at its head?

Yes, she was afraid of him, disturbed by him, but it was love of Lord Rochant and the house that kept her loyalty. To save House Sapphire, restore it, that was worth sacrificing herself and her son for. With a start, she admitted to herself that one of the things it needed saving from was Yadavendra and the kind of people he had surrounded himself with.