I’d never heard Gerel so morbid. For a moment, I considered telling her about my dreams. The dragon. The moons passing before the sun. But as the god shadow settled deeper over the city, casting the twisted streets into a premature darkness, a child began to cry. Followed by another, and another.

“I wish people would take their children inside before sundown.” Gerel fidgeted with the noorestone, making light bounce across her strong features. “How do you explain to them what happened? How do you tell them the world is ending, and there’s no way to fix it? Better to let them have some peace before the Great Abandonment takes them, too.”

“Ignorance isn’t the answer.” I looked at Gerel askance; she was the last person I’d have expected to advocate for sheltering children, but maybe that was because she’d never been sheltered. “But I am glad it isn’t our job to explain what’s happening. It was hard enough telling Ilina’s mother.”

Gerel gave a soft snort. “Seven gods, that was—”

At her oath, we both went quiet, a beat of discomfort drifting between us.

I pushed past it. “Even Zara took it better.” Perhaps that was unfair to my sister; she’d been uncharacteristically subdued these last five days. “I’m sure it won’t be long before her shock wears off and she starts demanding silk gowns to wear to the Great Abandonment.”

“I wish we’d sent her on the Chance Encounter with Ilina’s mother.” Gerel sighed. “But I understand why you said no.”

Mother had promised Zara that I’d protect her, and that was the last we’d seen of either of our parents. For all we knew, they were dead, killed when Altan’s warriors attacked Crescent Prominence and destroyed the council house. I might be the only person my sister had left.

I dropped my gaze to the noorestone-lit harbor, where dockworkers bustled around piers to prepare for the arrival of these new ships. Aside from the workers and their supervisors, the port was empty. All the crowds had been pushed outside the gates, held back by fences and squads of soldiers in flame-blue uniforms. Even the berths were mostly vacant; every ship that wasn’t in need of repairs had left as soon as possible, weighed down with medical supplies, food, blankets, and cots—whatever could be spared. It seemed impossible that anyone could have survived the god of silence rising up from the sea, but people had to search. Just in case.

“How long will we have to wait?” someone on the other side of the roof asked.

No one answered; no one knew.

Then.

I felt it.

Power called to me, and I answered.

I climbed to my feet, careful on the smooth tiles, and strained my eyes to peer farther into the god-shadowed sea. The sunset sky burned like hot iron over the water, and to the south I could just see the barest scrapes of land: Damyan, perhaps—the god of love. It was from that direction I could feel . . . something.