Tayan squinted. He’d have to cross back into the song to collect whatever they’d left him. He didn’t know if he could. ‘Well, it’s that or die,’ he said aloud, to combat the awful loneliness inside his skin. The silence frightened him; his yearning frightened him far more.

He wiped his hands on his tunic and took a deep breath, then began to sing one of Lilla’s favourite songs. He crossed back into the magic and within three steps his voice faltered, and then his feet, and he stopped and let it fill him again. Sunlight on his skin. Lilla’s mouth on his throat. The warmth of honeypot in his belly. Song.

No. No.

He focused on the items the Chitenecah had dropped and broke into a run, counting his footsteps aloud, shouting them until he got there. A gourd, a sling, and a short blowpipe. Far more than he had expected. Tayan scooped them up, dragging up a handful of leaves and dirt in his haste, and ran back, still shouting numbers, until he passed into the silence of Yalotlan. He kept going, kept running through the maddening absence, faster and faster, the trail jerking and wobbling in his vision, until he couldn’t run any further and had no idea where he was anyway. He knew southern Yalotlan was rife with pyramid-builders, slaves, and the warriors guarding them. It wouldn’t be long before someone found him.

And then they can send me back.

No! I’m going home to Lilla. To quiet and peace and love.

Tayan walked on through the afternoon, forcing himself north when his feet and belly and spirit yearned to head south, into the song. The jungle was loud with birds, insects, and monkeys and yet somehow silent. The music of the balance between life and death wasn’t the music his spirit craved. It didn’t live within him as the song had, ushering him towards the glory to be found in surrender.

Stop it.

He found a clump of water vine and broke one open with a stone, filling the gourd and drinking what was left, tepid and faintly sweet. He kept going, following the winding of game trails and singing prayers and chants to combat the absence of the true song. The only song.

Stop it!

Tayan decided to spirit-journey as soon as he was in Tokoban. If he could reunite with his spirit guides and his ancestors, then the loss of the song would mean nothing to him. Nothing. He could tell them everything that had happened and beg their wisdom. And in the Sky City, he would find Lilla and Xessa and all the rest. He’d tell the councils everything he’d learnt, about Pechaqueh society and culture, their class system, the little he knew of the song and the Singer and the holy Setatmeh. The ruse of their surrender.