‘What happened to the song?’ he asked abruptly. His voice came out too loud, too demanding, and he flushed, but again Enet barely seemed to notice.

‘What?’

‘Why is it different? What has happened? Is it some sort of Empire-wide message?’ He tapped his fingers against his knee in indecision. ‘Is it broken?’ he added and Enet flinched.

Her hand jerked up in a short, abortive gesture that nonetheless took in the room and beyond. ‘You live within the song now. It has taken you and woven you into its whole. You are a note within it. Tell me, does it feel broken to you?’

Tayan considered her, fidgeting and afraid and trying hard to hide it. ‘Not broken,’ he said slowly, ‘but not … controlled, either. It no longer whispers; it shouts. Why has it changed?’

The Great Octave forced a derisive laugh. ‘Why would I discuss such things with you?’ she asked.

He took a soft, slow breath in. ‘Because you can’t discuss them with anyone else,’ he suggested and she started, eyes widening and then, an instant later, narrowing with suspicion and contempt.

‘Are we friends now, peace-weaver of the Tokob? Should I confide in you?’ She sniffed and looked away, shaking her head as if at a foolish child.

‘Do you want to?’ he asked and she forced another laugh.

‘I think not,’ Enet said softly, and then straightened, as if reaching some sudden decision. ‘We are done here.’

Tayan’s smile congealed and then slid into polite puzzlement. ‘I’m sorry?’

‘You yourself have said you will surrender, and so the peace-weaving is concluded. I am too busy to waste any more time on you, and have done you courtesy far above your status. You will return home today.’

The change in the song had unsettled him, planting a seed of anxiety in his belly that was swiftly growing. He’d wanted to leave, had spent much of the last two days trying to work out how to escape unscathed, half convinced that he was going to be killed in some ritual to calm the song. Now here she was, pushing him out, eager to see him gone, something like relief breaking like sunlight across her face as she spoke and yet he was … reluctant.

When he crossed eventually back into Yalotlan, he would no longer hear the song. Which was a good thing. Soon after, he’d be back in his land, surrounded by the spirits and his ancestors and his family. His husband. And yet. Tayan felt a part of something greater now, the way he did when he journeyed but all the time. It was powerful and it was seductive and he could no longer imagine what it would be like to not hear the song.

No. No, Tayan. Get a fucking grip.