“No,” said the guard, “of course not. This is the Flag Hill amble. The Keep is over near the academy, to the east.”

“But—” said Giddon.

“Thank you,” said Hava, then grabbed Giddon’s wrist and started pulling him down the street.

“Hey!” he said. “No grabbing!”

Hava rolled her eyes and kept pulling him. “The Keepish sailors on the ship talked about the ambles. It’s like a maze. We’ll never get anywhere until we get out of it.”

“All right,” he said, feeling hopeless and tired suddenly, because apparently he was in a city of invisible traps. He wanted to go home. But where was home? Once, this had been a difficult question; now it was unbearable.

Hava let go of his wrist, then looked at him hard.

“I’m fine,” he said.

“Sure you are. Come on, I think the traffic’s moving this way.”

Giddon followed her, resenting the beauty of the Flag Hill amble. The winding alleys and narrow staircases gave the city a character that, combined with glass windows, shiny brass lamps, neat painted signs for upscale shops, made it seem prosperous, expensive, in a way that Bitterblue City was not. At a tea shop, the drinks smelled bright, sharp, unusual. Bitterblue loved trying new foods and drinks. If she were here, they would stop. At a game shop, unfamiliar board games lay in a window open to the street, jeweled pieces lined up like cheery little soldiers. In different circumstances, Giddon might have bought one of the games for them to try later.

Though he might not too, because at every cross street, guards stopped them from exiting the amble, asking for their pass, and this nettled him. He noticed that people were allowed to enter at those points, of course. You could get in, but you couldn’t get out.

He wanted to know if people lived on these streets, people who had to weave through a maze every time they left home, maybe in the opposite direction from where they needed to go. The amble took turn after arbitrary turn down alleys lined with shops, sometimes up long staircases with shopfronts to either side.

“How does anyone live here who can’t climb?” said Giddon, who was getting tired of going up and down stairs. “What happens when you get old, or break your leg?”

“I don’t know,” said Hava, climbing beside him with an intent expression.

“Do the people who live above these shops have to walk the long way through the amble?”

“I think residents and businesspeople carry a pass,” Hava said. “Noa said something about it on the ship. She grew up inside one of the ambles.”

“What if you have a medical emergency? What if you’re giving birth?”

Hava clapped him on the shoulder. “I promise I won’t let you give birth alone.”

“Brat.”

“Bully.”

The familiar teasing hurt. It was part of a happiness that was gone now. Giddon pushed on.