Folk waved or called out greetings. The intendant’s deputy couriers were well known in Orledder Intendancy, its Halt, and the surrounding villages and hamlets. People often paid Elen in produce or goods to take a private message or personal contract into the hills along with her official messages. Such transactions were how she had afforded new Declaration boots for Kem instead of the cast-offs he’d worn all his childhood.

Now, as she waved and called back, she thought of the Spore at the bone pile and what it would mean for the community. Would the news frighten people? Or would they refuse to believe her, since no one had witnessed the irruption except her? Did the locals truly trust her or did they still see her as an outsider? Was Aoving’s death along with those of the others who had died in the avalanche enough to make Elen a local? Was it enough that she had spilled her heart’s blood—her sister—in this soil? Or was she fated never to have a true home or community, she who did not know who had birthed her or what people she came from? She who from her earliest memories as a child had only Aoving, through so many terrible years.

She reached the entry ramp, where Hilsit and Emmar were on duty. Festival wreaths hung on the open gates in honor of Declaration Week, now begun. The grinning sentinels greeted her with forearm bumps, a badge of belonging that meant as much to them as the embroidered spear badges sewn to their uniforms to mark their place in the imperial order.

Hilsit said, “Those two lads came running through like they heard the last sweet rolls were about to go into someone else’s mouth. Say, is it true the prince-warden is coming, like the boys said? You know anything about that?”

“You tell me.”

Emmar said, “Approach horn blew already. Five blasts! Never heard five blasts before! We won’t see a thing from down here, more’s the pity.”

“I’ll tell you all about it afterward,” said Elen, “but the likes of us won’t be allowed into hall or temple if an imperial prince is in residence, so we can just make up whatever story we want.”

“You think the prince will be handsome?” said Emmar with his shyest grin. “I like a handsome fellow.”

“A prince is always a handsome man or a beautiful woman, unless they are a beautiful man or a handsome woman, if the taleteller likes that story better.”

They laughed companionably, even though it was probably the next thing to treason to speak disrespectfully about the exalted imperial clan.