She’s . . . pretty? Lovisa thought, studying Nev’s brown face. No. Nev wasn’t pretty, but she was something, her black hair cut close to her head, her strong mouth and her high chin arresting. Handsome. The shadows of a snowy street suited her too. Her rough coat, made of patchy furs she’d probably trapped herself, always had a way of making her look strong, rather than poor.

Then, suddenly, Nev was staring straight at Lovisa. She gave no sign of greeting, just stared.

I could open this window for her, Lovisa thought. I could go get Mari’s ladder, or someone else’s.

Instead, she stared back, curious to see what Nev would do.

To her surprise, Nev turned straight for the dormitory doors. Lovisa heard them open and close below, heard Nev’s muttered conversation with the monitor, but couldn’t make out the words. She adopted the guise of being deeply focused on her Sentient Animal Law textbook. When Nev climbed the steps and reached the landing, Lovisa ignored her.

Then, as Nev brushed past, Lovisa smelled a strange mixture of scents on her clothing. Blood, the cold, and the sea. Nev was in the school of animal medicine, and sometimes Lovisa couldn’t help her own horrified fascination.

“What happened this time?” she asked. “You smell even worse than usual.”

Nev stopped. She slid eyes to Lovisa that conveyed nothing, not one jot, of what she was thinking. Then she glanced at the textbook in Lovisa’s lap. “I doubt you’d find it interesting,” she said, her northern lilt stronger than Ferla’s or Katu’s. Most northerners worked to sound more like Ledrans when they were in Ledra. Not Nev.

Lovisa noticed a bandage wrapped around her left palm. “I’m interested in how it’s humanly possible to smell so bad.”

“It’s not,” Nev said. “I’m not human. Now you know my secret.”

Nev wasn’t usually quippy like that. She looked tired, her bland expression more deliberately constructed than usual. It was interesting. “Did it turn out well,” asked Lovisa, “whatever it was?”

Nev hesitated. “Yes and no.”

“Oh,” said Lovisa, noticing a smear of sand stuck to some unknown sticky substance on Nev’s trousers. “Too bad. Were you on the beaches?”

“For a bit.”

“Did you hear any of the hubbub about the Monsean queen?”

“No.”

“Apparently she fell out of a ship today and drowned.”

“How sad,” said Nev.

Lovisa felt a small, unwilling smile forming on her face, from the pleasure of a conversationalist who was as good as she was at seeming indifferent. “Where’d you get a pass?”

“A professor.”

“Which professor?”

“Quona Varana.”

Of course. “Is Quona Varana the person who always keeps you out so late?” said Lovisa, unable to hide her curiosity.