“Welcome, handmaid,” she said, her head low, her good arm reaching for the child. “Lori – kneel down! It is the Firelord’s handmaid.”

“She’s got a bird,” said Lori, still sucking her thumb, with no intentions of kneeling. How she reminded me of myself at that age, all yellow hair and grey eyes and wonder and defiance!

“Leave her,” I said, putting the rooks on a stone, and reaching out I touched the harsha’s hand. “Stand up, please. I’d like to talk with you.”

She stood, and fixed her black eyes on the golden sign around my neck.

“Look at my face,” I said. “I am a woman, the same as you.”

Her eyes met mine then, and there was a spark between us, an empathy, a kinship.

“My name is Dannii,” she said, smiling. “I am caretaker to my brother Ridha’s family. Will you honour me by coming to my brother’s tent, and sharing my wheat cakes and tea?”

I put Kallai on the ground, out of sight of the rooks, and bound his leash around a rock. Lori stood guard over him, taunting him with her sparrow.

It was cold in the tent, because the firestones were few and of poor quality, the fire small. I realised how close to depletion the mine was, and how urgently my lord’s divining skill was needed. I sat on the floor and waited while Dannii spread out our simple meal.

“Why did the Firelord favour you for handmaid?” she asked, nibbling around the edges of a wheat cake. Her teeth were perfect, and her well-formed mouth had a determined curve to it. Her chin was slightly cleft, her cheekbones high and defined, her face strong yet feminine. Her hair was curling and black, and she had cut it short to her shoulders. It was good to look straight at someone’s face again, to watch all the changing expressions instead of imagining them. And Dannii’s face was a joy to observe.

“I don’t know why he wanted me,” I said, “though I sometimes think that he tries to make the Chosen see that we Quelled do have intelligence and emotions and feelings, that we’re not just animals for the mines. Sometimes when I speak to the Chosen for the first time, they look shocked and astounded, as if they see a talking mule.”

Dannii laughed. “And so you change their foolish minds, and show them all how wrong they are.”

I shook my head. “I wish I did. I don’t impress them, Dannii. I disturb them, tear across the things they’ve believed for centuries, and they resent me for it.”

“Are they cruel to you?”

“Not while I’m with the Firelord. This sacred sign protects me. And the Firelord, if he sees them wronging me, is very hard with them. I cannot defy them, but he defends me, and is my advocate.”

“You couldn’t ask for a higher one,” she said, smiling.

“And what of you, Dannii? Have you a man who protects you?”