Every day administrators and overseers requested an audience with her; every day they spoke of concerns. The Singer’s appetites. The Singer’s habits. The Singer’s prowling presence through the source in the middle of the night. And, from the courtesans, the Singer’s lack of desire.

She put discreet plans in place that prevented anyone leaving the source except the councillors after each meeting. Chorus warriors at the exits, and some of her own slave guards keeping a covert watch on the pyramid from outside. The courtesans had always played with each other when the Singer was otherwise occupied; Enet encouraged them to continue that practice.

But the city was sour with speculation, and not even the mark of the Chosen on Enet’s throat stopped the whispering that followed her everywhere, through every market and plaza, in every temple and at the latest new moon offering.

At her request, two courtesans were in the gardens now, visible through the colonnade and vocal enough to provide the Singer with a diversion.

‘Answer,’ the Singer demanded, anger suffusing his face. Perhaps two were not enough. Perhaps all of them …

‘It is not the chosen day, holy lord,’ Enet said, not having to force the fear into her voice. And it wasn’t, though really there was no chosen day any more. There was nothing but his wants and how long she could delay them. No matter the books she read and the folktales and legends and shamans’ stories she consulted, no matter her divinations with dice and card and star charts. No matter what she did, the Singer’s hunger grew.

Enet thought back to Pikte’s death – her diamond boy – and how she had thought then that she could control this, that their son’s death would be enough for him, would sate him for months. Her heart spasmed in her chest and the void of her grief ate away a little more of her spirit. Pikte had died for less than nothing; he had died for a lie and a broken dream and a man driven mad. Not all of the offerings had been accepted at the last new moon ritual, something that had never happened in all their long history, and after that the mood of the city moved from suspicious to panicked.

Pechaqueh and free watched her with open hostility. Only the mark of the Chosen kept them from doing more than stare, she was sure of it.

‘The song is hungry,’ the Singer said, the special phrase he’d devised to hide his true meaning. It was Xac who was hungry, Xac who yearned for blood as some people did for the dreams brought on by a certain frog-venom or fungus. This was the creature Enet had created, and now that she had done so, she dared not look away lest it take her distraction for weakness and make her its next meal, Chosen or not.