“I believe she had a hard life,” she said. “I believe she would have understood mine. I was sorry to hear about your envoy too. Mikka, the one who drowned with his friend Brek. He came to me once. He knew I was the one who’d told about the zilfium, but he didn’t try to put the burden of what people did with that information onto my shoulders,” she said, her voice suddenly hardening again, growing sharper. She paused, swallowed. “He wanted my help. He was both polite and generous. I would have helped him, if I could.”

Beside Giddon, Hava stepped forward slightly. Caught and held Trina’s mismatched eyes so Trina could see her own.

“May I ask what he wanted your help with?” said Hava.

Trina seemed to be considering Hava’s face. She raised her chin, a slight defiance. “I never knew for sure,” she said. “He and Brek had gone north and come back. There was something there they wanted me to see if I could find.”

“Something they’d lost in the north?” said Hava.

“No. Something they’d found there. Something they wanted confirmation of. But before we met again so he could give me the details, they drowned.”

“Where did they go in the north?” said Hava.

“I don’t know,” said Trina, her voice beginning to rise again. “You ask a lot of questions. I know who you are and I think you know what it’s like to be used, but that doesn’t mean you get to use me.”

Trina took a step back. She glanced once at the shopkeeper, who’d quietly watched the entire exchange. Then she turned on her heel and exited the shop.

Chapter Nineteen

Two of Ozul’s friends who crewed for the Ledrami boating company came to the Monsea that afternoon to play cards. They were happy to sit with Giddon and Hava in the salon first, drinking tea as the room bounced lightly on the small swells of Ledra’s harbor.

One was a Keepish woman named Sorit. The other, a man named Riz, was Kamassarian. Both had been working in the harbor the day the Seashell foundered. Both remembered that a new, Kamassarian-speaking crew of six sailors had sailed the Seashell, setting off practically the instant the Monseans arrived.

“It’s not odd for a leasing party to hire their own crew,” said Riz. “But I do remember thinking it was odd for anyone to hire a crew who didn’t speak their own language!”

“I think Mikka spoke some Kamassarian,” said Hava.

“Maybe that accounts for it,” said Riz.

“And what do you know about the accident?” asked Giddon.

Riz and Sorit shared a blank look. “Nothing,” Sorit said.

“Nothing?”