But all Lovisa’s body had room for right now was this fear, screaming from her core to her skin, making her certain that something terrible was going to happen. That Ferla wanted to silence her. That Benni had done worse things than she knew. That the Queen of Monsea might be dead or in the attic needing her help. Pleasure? She couldn’t imagine it. She also didn’t deserve it, nor did she deserve the comfort of a warm body in bed beside her, helping her sleep.

On her way to the privy late one night, she almost ran into Nev rounding a corner. Nev wore her coat; she’d only just come in. That little fox was prancing around her feet and she smelled like sweat and cold.

“Where do you always go so late?” Lovisa snapped at her.

“Why do you care?” Nev said, in a voice rough with exhaustion. Lovisa studied her curiously, wondering if Nev was wearing herself thin. No. She saw now that Nev had straw in her hair and a face that glowed with the kind of insuppressible joy Lovisa knew how to read. Nev was spending her nights in a stable or a kennel somewhere, maybe pretending to do animal medicine work, but really having sex with Nori Orfa. For pleasure, like a normal person. For an instant, Lovisa was on fire with jealousy.

She rubbed her hair, tried to rub away her intense feelings. “Just, don’t get in trouble for missing curfew,” she said.

“Why shouldn’t I?” Nev demanded, bristling in irritation.

Because I couldn’t bear it if you got expelled, and left me, Lovisa wanted to say, but didn’t. Like Mari, Nev made her feel safe. She couldn’t understand it, but she knew it was true.

—

On Friday night, Lovisa climbed the pokey rocks as usual and hid behind a tree, gazing up at the house.

The uselessness of this grueling daily endeavor was making her resentful, as she’d never been before, of this house. She’d always liked it unthinkingly, been proud of its grandeur, of the airship on its roof. But it was a prison; it was the prison her little brothers would become men in.

And then something happened, up near the roof, that made her feel like her lungs were trying to climb out of her body. A clattering noise, faint, but eventually repeated. Then repeated again, and again. She waited and listened a long time, holding her breath in agony whenever the guards circled by. Sometimes it was more of a tap or a scrape; other times, it was as if glass rang like a bell; and Lovisa was pretty sure it was coming from the attic window. What did it mean?

Half out of her mind, she began the climb up the face of the house.