No Eshrans. The world swam once more, but Malik forced himself to remain upright. They were all right. Their papers listed them as a trio of siblings from Talafri, a city well within the Zirani border. As long as their accents didn’t slip, no one would know they were Eshran as well.

The family’s screams resounded through the air as the soldiers took the old man’s body and led the cart away from the checkpoint. In the chaos, no one noticed a single person falling out of the cart onto the dry ground. The child could not have been older than Nadia, yet every person ignored him as they fought to take his family’s place in line. Malik’s heart nearly broke into two.

What if that had been Nadia lying there in the dirt with no one to help her? The mere thought made Malik’s chest constrict painfully, and his eyes kept wandering back to the boy.

Leila followed Malik’s line of vision and frowned. “Don’t.”

But Malik was already moving. In seconds, he was hauling the boy to his feet.

“Are you all right?” Malik asked as he checked the boy over for injuries. The child looked up at him with hollow eyes sunk deep into a battered face, and Malik saw himself reflected in their black depths.

Quick as a lightning strike, the boy pulled Malik’s satchel over his head and dove into the crowd. For several seconds, all he could do was stare openmouthed at the spot where the child had just been.

“Hey!”

Cursing himself for his own na?veté, Malik then did what he did best.

He ran.

2

Karina

The Dancing Seal was one of those establishments that was both older and dirtier than it had any right to be, with a questionable layer of grime covering every visible surface as well as the staff. However, the food was great and the entertainment even better, which was what had brought Karina to the restaurant near the Outer Wall of Ziran.

As Aminata sulked beside her, Karina kept her eyes trained on the musician currently commanding the crowd, a stout, oud-playing bard with a mustache so perfectly coiled that it had to be fake. Appearance aside, the man had skill, and from the easy way he swaggered around the circular stage in the center of the room, he knew it.

The audience for the evening consisted mostly of travelers and merchants, their faces lined from years of trekking the unforgiving desert roads. In the chatter of the crowd, Karina recognized Kensiya, a language of the Arkwasian people from the jungles north of the Odjubai; T’hoga, a language spoken on the Eastwater savanna; and even the occasional word in Darajat screamed at frightened Eshran servers. Every major group in Sonande was represented that night.

But best of all, no one knew who Karina was.

Seated on low cushions around tables laden with thick bean stews and steaming cuts of lamb, the audience howled suggestions at the bard, each raunchier than the last, and sang off-key to every piece he played. Solstasia made even the most miserly freer with their purses, so many in the audience were well into their third or fourth drink of the evening even though the sun had yet to set.

The bard’s eyes met Karina’s, and he grinned. She cocked her head to the side, angelic innocence spreading across her face in response to the brazen suggestion on his.

“Are you going to stand there looking pretty, or are you going to play something worth listening to?” she challenged. Another howl went up through the audience, and the man’s dusky cheeks purpled. Despite its less-than-sanitary appearance, the Dancing Seal was one of the most respected music venues in Ziran. Only the best musicians could win over the crowd here.

The bard proceeded to play a raucous song that detailed the doomed love affair between a lonely spirit and a poor slave girl. Karina leaned back on her cushion as she examined the man. Her original appraisal had been correct; he was quite talented, twisting the melody in time with the shifting mood of the audience and biting into the tune at the story’s climax. If she had to guess, he was likely Fire-Aligned; that Alignment had a flair for the dramatic.

Smoothing her headscarf to ensure not a single strand of her hair fell out of place, Karina leaned toward her companion. “Do you think he oils his mustache every day to get it that shiny?”

“I think we’ve been here too long,” replied Aminata, angling herself away from the suspicious liquid that covered their table.

“We’ve been here ten minutes.”

“Exactly.”

Karina rolled her eyes, wondering why she’d expected any other response from her maid. Convincing a fish to swim on land would be easier than convincing Aminata to relax for even a single night.

“It’s Solstasia, Mina. We may as well enjoy ourselves.”

“Can we at least go somewhere that isn’t filled with people who could stab us?”

Karina began to retort that technically any room that had people in it was filled with people who could stab them, but the bard switched to a song Baba used to play for her, and a dull pain like a mallet banging the inside of her skull cut her off. Squeezing her eyes shut, Karina breathed out through her teeth and gripped the edge of the table until splinters dug into her skin.

Aminata frowned, realizing at once what had triggered the migraine. “We should go before it gets worse,” she suggested in that careful tone people used whenever Karina’s grief discomforted them.

“Not yet.”

This was likely the last moment of freedom Karina would have until Solstasia ended. Migraine or no, she couldn’t let the opportunity pass her by.

A cheer resounded through the restaurant as the bard strummed his last note. He collected his donations in a velvet coin purse, then strode over to their table and dropped into a low bow.

“I hope you found my performance tonight as pleasing as I find your appearance.”

Fighting back the wave of dizziness that often accompanied her migraines, Karina raised an eyebrow at the man. Perhaps she might have found his appearance pleasing as well had she been nearing seventy. As it was, she was only seventeen, and he reminded her of the toads who croaked in the fountains of the palace. The corners of her mouth tilted up, but she didn’t smile.

“It was impressive.” Karina’s gaze slid to the coin purse on his hip. “If I may ask, exactly what do you plan to do with your earnings?”

The bard licked his lips. “Give me an hour of your time, and you’ll see firsthand what I can do.”

Aminata gave a barely concealed snort as Karina replied, “I think I know of the perfect home for your coins.”

“And where may that be, my sweet gazelle?” he leered. Karina checked his left palm—no emblem, meaning he was Unaligned. This man was from somewhere very far from here—the Eastwater savanna, perhaps.

“In my pocket.” Karina leaned forward until her nose was inches from his, close enough to smell the orange essence he definitely oiled his mustache with. “I’ll play you for them. One song. Audience decides the winner.”

Surprise followed by annoyance flickered across the bard’s face. Karina bit back a laugh.

“Do you even have an instrument?”

“I do. Aminata?”

Aminata sighed, but dutifully passed the leather case in her lap to Karina. The bard sneered when he saw the state of Karina’s oud; thin cracks lined the instrument’s pear-shaped body, and the floral patterns Baba had carved into its neck had long faded beyond recognition. But holding the last gift her father had ever given her sent a wave of calm flooding through Karina, dulling the ache in her head.

“If I win,” said Karina, nonchalantly tuning one of the oud’s eleven strings, “I get all the money you earned today.”

“And when I win,” said the bard, “you will give me the honor of calling you mine for the rest of the night.”

It took all of her self-control not to visibly gag. “Deal. In the spirit of Solstasia, I’ll allow you to pick the song.”

The bard’s eyes narrowed, but then his grin widened. “‘The Ballad of Bahia Alahari.’”

The pain in Karina’s head throbbed anew as her heart constricted. Baba had loved that song.

Refusing to let her opponent see he’d rattled her, Karina simply said, “After you.”

“The Ballad of Bahia Alahari” was a mournful tune that told the story of how the first sultana of Ziran had battled her own husband, the Faceless King, when he had sided with the Kennouan Empire during the final battle of the Pharaoh’s War. Within minutes, the audience had tears streaming down their faces, many even openly sobbing. However, a number of patrons, many of whom were noticeably non-Zirani, seemed unaffected by the performance, and Karina kept her attention on them as her opponent played.

With one last haunting note, the bard lowered his oud as a raucous cheer filled the air.

“Your turn,” he said, his eyes roaming over her body with a predator’s gaze. Karina stepped forward, moving her hands into position and ignoring the snickers at her instrument’s destitute state.

Yes, her opponent was good.