His smile was a brush of sorrow. “I was a feckless, vain, charming fellow. And very handsome, I assure you. Everyone said so.”

She laughed, as he meant her to.

“After the wars, some were ordered to enter the ranks of the Shorn. They obeyed because our circumstances were desperate. Others volunteered out of duty, or because they had noble hearts who sought only to serve by saving us from the Shivering Tide and the Hollow Wind. But I, El, I did it on a lark. Because I was bored. Because everyone was praising those who volunteered, and I wanted to be praised too. For a long time, trapped in the Spires, I regretted my choice. I panicked at being trapped. But we were all taught a calming spell, one to take away pain for a time, to ease the heart. That got me through the desperate patches.”

“Oh. Is that what you use to put people to sleep? And on Jirvy, at Grinder’s Cut?”

“Indeed. Clever of you to see the link. It allowed him to walk without pain for a time.”

“I thought it was a healing spell.”

“I cannot heal another’s body.”

“Can you heal your own?”

He shrugged. “That is part of what I am. Wings, shine, and all the rest.”

“A dragon,” she breathed wonderingly. She did not make it a question.

A faint smile ghosted his face, then faded. “In the Spires, in those bad times, the spell would ease my heart enough to get through it. Even so, for a long time I despaired and even lapsed into lethargy. Eventually I became resigned. Then, a stupid young human man came to the Spires and thought he was sparring with a ghost, and my comrade—”

“Your comrade? Oh, you mean the statue standing opposite you?”

“Yes. The human man hadn’t heard of passage spells, of the Shorn, of our history, of any of it. Which was a shocking realization for the likes of me, I’ll tell you. Thinking I would be trapped there forever because the world had forgotten who we are and what we meant for the safety of all. He could scarcely volunteer to aid us, as we’d been promised would happen, if he knew nothing of us or our selfless calling.”

“You’d been promised that people would remember.”

“Yes. But my comrade was not so dull-witted and shocked as I was. She had the wit, and the lack of honesty, to twist her words so as to get the lad to agree to the passage spell. That’s how she left in his body. I don’t even know what became of her. By the time the prince arrived, all I could think about was that I too could get out of the prison I agreed to walk into.”

“You tried it on me and Kem!”