“We will soon learn the truth of that claim.” Lord Duenn grabbed the mug of ale from the chatelaine’s son and drained it in one slug. “Take me to the intendant. Not you!”

Again he jabbed at Elen, who this time had enough warning to tighten her muscles, although she gave an exaggerated yelp and made sure to pretend the blow hurt more than it did.

“Are you all right?” Kem grabbed her elbow. His eyes brimmed with tears that he fought to hold back. The instant she straightened, his expression tightened. He let go of her and whispered in a trembling voice, “Is it true?”

Lord Duenn grabbed the boy’s arm. “You’ll walk beside me, Kema, as befits my daughter. We’ll get you decent clothing. You look like a dirty magpie who pecked through a rag pile.”

Kem set his jaw and said nothing. He had gotten his stubborn look fixed onto his face, the one she recognized from his arguments with his mother. Aoving had loved him, but she’d been fighting her own deadly spore of destruction all those years. As he’d reached adolescence, Kem’s lofty proclamations about life and his insistence that there was an absolute difference between right and wrong would set Aoving off. He wasn’t able to understand that it was because his mother was scared for him, for what would become of a child who was confident enough to know himself, and yet who didn’t comprehend how pitiless the world was. Not the way El and Ao, two tiny girls clasping hands in shared terror, had lived it from their earliest years.

“Move! Move!” shouted Duenn, never one to wait for his interlocutor to speak when he could hear the sound of his own voice instead.

Elen stumbled along, surrounded by Duenn militiamen, some of whom she recognized from her days among them. They did not speak to her, although she heard mutters of “Ellet, the cheat” and “Ellet, that thief of a crow” and once, “Sure, but do you remember the time she got through the labyrinth up at Fire Rocks faster than anyone else? And without a scratch on her?”

There was no opening to run. Worse, she was cut off from Kem, who was forced to walk next to Lord Duenn at the head of the procession.

That was the first difference between their nameless homeland and the Tranquil Empire, which child El had noticed those many years ago. In the Nameless Land, the masters walked in the center, with their retainers around them and the atoners at the edges where folk were most vulnerable to Spore. In the empire, the lords and princes and emperors led the way, and none were allowed to walk ahead of them.