CHAPTER TWELVE

Jin now had some insight as to what it was like to be a whirlwind. Secondhand accounts and her own suppositions were by no means enough to have a clear picture of what Shan Alee had become in her absence. She listened to everything Enfri and the others told her, but every new piece of information brought more questions. What surprised Jin most was the use of new terms for things she hadn't even thought to imagine until they were right in front of her.

Presently, that was the room she appeared in within the Imperial Palace. Almost the instant she came out of the spell, Enfri took her by the hand and rushed her out of the center of the circular chamber.

Jin swiveled her head from side to side to take it in. It was a domed interior space made entirely of gray stone. Gaslights provided what illumination there was, as it lacked any sort of window, and a single set of double doors were the only way in or out. The floor was carved with countless runic sigils, each shining with etherlight in many different colors. A great deal of it was white etherlight, invested by unbound mortal arcanists, while much shone with silvery, golden, or green radiance. The work of dragons or their bonded knights.

"What is this place?" Jin asked in amazement.

"Our metavatarium," Enfri said. "Ascania and her students came up with this, and she collaborated with Lady Thal Renoit and Dragon Lord Thaan to turn the idea into something practical."

Jin didn't have long to examine the sigils before Enfri took her through the doorway. Cracks of thunder sounded in the center of the room as they left, signaling the appearance of the rest of the party. Maya came through the spellcraft with her handmaidens, and they similarly made haste to clear the space for the next set of arrivals.

Jin furrowed her brow in confusion. When Enfri asked her to teleport them to the palace, the manifestation felt much different than normal as it carried out. It was like control of the spell was taken from her, and she'd feared that she made a horrific error caused by her distraction with everything else. Instead, the teleportation completed more smoothly than ever before.

"A metavatarium guides teleportation spells," Enfri explained. "The sigils seek out the spellcraft and pulls it towards this point. It's the only way to teleport into the palace through the translocational wards."

Once out of the metavatarium, they passed through a heavily guarded annex. Armsmen equipped as heavy infantry— with plate armor and tower shields— stood watch over the door into the rest of the palace. Jin was surprised to see steam-powered ballistae armed and aimed at the entryway. There were even dragons from the militaristic knighthoods stationed to guard the inner chamber.

"A checkpoint of sorts?" Jin asked.

Enfri nodded. "It's how we're protecting against teleportation. It won't stay a lost magic forever, so if a thrall or proteurim tries teleporting into or around the palace, they'll come in exactly where we're ready for them." She smiled brightly. "But mostly, it lets someone who doesn't have an imprint connection here to travel safely without error. The sigils bring them the rest of the way, so no one will wind up leagues off target or even underground like what happened to Saveen last month."

Jin blinked.

"Yeah, that happened," Enfri said with a sigh. "The witches are still having issues finding the exact right incantation to teleport, and poor Saveen caught the worst of it. Ban had to get three slate dragons and their Marble Knights to dig her out from under the estate. Moon was beside herself over the whole mess, but it won't happen anymore now. At least not when there's a metavatarium nearby."

"Does it cause any problems?"

Enfri winced. "A few. It took Ascania some time to work out the issue of at what exact radius it should extend its effect. We kept pulling in knights who didn't intend to come anywhere near the palace. Ascania has one in her manor, too, and there's some overlap issues. So, that all took some..." She struggled to find the word.

"Calibration?"

Enfri pointed at her. "Yes. That."

Jin stared at her as they left the metavatarium behind and entered into the palace proper. She was bemused, but also more at peace than she remembered being for some time. Enfri's mouth was motoring away at a league a minute, and Jin recalled how Enfri could become something of a chatterbox when she got excited. It struck Jin, struck her fully, how she expected to never have the opportunity to experience this again.

She wiped at the corner of her eye and chastised herself for crying so much in one day.

There was something of a train of people in their wake; Maya and her retinue, Enfri's pair of bonded bodyguards, and Reyn assisting Starra along. Of everyone who'd been at the sky woman's cottage, only Kiffa Brandyn seemed to have remained behind.

One detail appeared out of place, though Jin didn't find it unexpected. One of the pairs of eyes behind her was fixed upon her with piercing attention. The bodyguard, not Inaz but his partner, didn't take her gaze off of Jin for a moment. While Inaz kept his attention on the corridors and hallways to seek out any potential threats to his empress, Mevek the Guardian fixated on the threat Jin presented. Jin faced forward and didn't question why a threat was perceived.

I earned more than their mistrust, Jin thought, and she continued on with that truth echoing in her head.

Through the palace, Jin watched as staff and armsmen stopped in their tracks as Enfri led her along. Jaws dropped and eyes widened. There were a few murmured exclamations of surprise, and once the procession passed, many hushed whispers in speculation.

Reyn excused herself, citing the need to take Starra somewhere she could rest. Ignoring Starra's protests, she quickly bustled her off to elsewhere in the palace. Maya abandoned Jin soon after and said there were sendings to be given. Jin could only assume she meant to report to their father about how Jin had been found and recovered.

Distressing, for many reasons, but there was no stopping Maya now, if there ever was.

Enfri gave none of it her attention and kept walking with Jin's arm held tight and pressed against her.

As if nothing had changed.

"Where..." Jin started to say, but her voice had no strength behind it.

"Hmm?" Enfri looked up to her, eyes bright.

"Where are we going?"

Enfri blinked and pulled up short. "Well... Winds take me, I've no idea. I just started going."

Jin drew her mouth into a line to suppress laughter.

Enfri abruptly gasped. "Nikos!"

"Eh?"

"Winds and storms!" Enfri shouted. "You have to meet Nikos!"

"Who is..."

Jin wasn't given the chance to finish her question. Enfri bolted off, and Jin had to either tear herself out of Enfri's grip or get dragged through the palace like a kitten leashed to an overexcited hound. In the end, Jin became the kitten and was pulled along by the sheer force of Enfri's exuberance.

Inaz and Mevek shared a suffering look, then jogged to keep up.

Jin was taken up from the ground floor of the palace to the second, then into the southeast wing. The number of armsmen and knights grew with each step until Enfri burst into what Jin remembered to be the war room and administrative headquarters for the Arcane Knights.

The war room itself was almost deserted, and most of the activity was in the branching hallways linking the various offices belonging to Dragon Lords and high-ranking officers of the legion. The only two people present were a pair of Irdishwomen, one a Ruby officer in armor, the second a young woman with striking blue eyes and a bored expression.

Jin recognized the former as Suuri Nolaas. Suuri's lips parted in surprise when she saw Enfri barreling in and dragging Jin behind her.

"Your Highness," Suuri said, just short of a gasp. "Your Majesty!"

Enfri was all but hopping from foot to foot and beaming. "Is Ban here?"

Jin felt her stomach sink.

Suuri glanced to the Irdish girl she'd been speaking to before giving Enfri a nod. "Yes, Majesty. The marshal is in his study."

The girl furrowed her brow. "This is her?"

Suuri looked at her sidelong. "Yes, Goodwoman. Her Imperial Majesty, Empress Enfri the Yora."

"Ah." The girl came forward, holding out her hand. Her expression didn't change, and Jin amended herself from thinking the girl appeared bored. She wasn't disinterested. She was focused to a razor's edge.

Inaz quickly stepped up to Enfri's side, a hand to the hilt of his sword. He seemed to take the girl in and all that she was at a glance, then relaxed. His hand dropped from his sword as if he hadn't been a silk thread's breadth from drawing it, and he took a slow step back.

That moment— which seemed to have gone unnoticed by everyone else in the room— was eye-opening to Jin. She took great solace from it, in fact. Narhta Inaz could assess threats to a degree equal to a royal assassin's ability. Greater, even, than Jin believed she could do herself, because she hadn't decide the girl was harmless and taken a hand from her sword until Inaz had already stepped back.

Enfri was well-protected in Inaz's hands.

Jin looked back to the approaching girl. Being Irdish, she had pale gray skin and white hair common in her people. Only her blue eyes were outside the norm for someone from the southern city-state of Irdruin. The girl was dressed commonly, as if she'd just stepped out of a workshop. A thick leather apron hung from around her neck and was tied about her waist. She wore baggy pants tucked into her thick, black boots, and a set of tinted goggles rested on her brow. Her hair was messily tied back into a long tail, almost certainly to keep it out of her face rather than for fashion. Spots of oil and dark grease were smeared in patches over her skin and bare arms. She wasn't all that muscled, but Jin took note of how her hands and forearms were marked by a mess of small scars from cuts and burns.

Enfri appeared taken off-guard by being thrust into an introduction without warning. She pushed down her earlier excitement and took the girl's extended hand. It was an informal sort of handshake, as one between two goodwomen meeting each other in the market square.

Jin raised an eyebrow and thought Enfri greeted the girl like this without considering the difference in their stations. Neither that or how Enfri still wore a bloodstained dress and apron. Admirable, and so very Enfri. It probably wouldn't occur to her until much later, if it ever did.

Suuri looked like she'd wanted to stop the girl before she had a chance to get her oil-slathered hands on the empress. Discomforted, she instead continued the introduction. "Apologies, Your Majesty. This is Obuu of Irdruin."

Enfri shook Obuu's hand, not bothered in the least by the smear of black it left on her palm. "I recognize the name." Her brow drew together. "The famous artificer?"

"I cannot comment to that," Obuu said. Her mode of speech was flat and monotone.

It seemed to be a strange thing to say for everyone else, but it made perfect sense to Jin. How could someone really know if they were famous outside their homeland anyway? Jin was already forming a positive opinion of Obuu. She admired a logical mind.

"What brings you all the way to Shan Alee?" Enfri asked. "That's a long and dangerous road, nowadays."

"Less so with teleportation," Obuu said in the exact same tone, as if teleportation was no more fantastical than a train ride. "I was offered a commission. It interested me."

"A commission from...?" Enfri prompted.

"Nooka. He is a former colleague of mine."

Suuri stepped up to offer more of an explanation. "The Artificer recommended Mistress Obuu to Dragon Lord Hugin, for a new development project the Emerald Knights are working on. They sent Knight-Captain Dess this morning to extend an invitation for her to come to Shan Alee. Dess apparently brought Mistress Obuu in lieu of a response."

"A response was unnecessary," Obuu said matter-of-factly.

"What sort of project?" Enfri asked.

Suuri didn't respond. Her attention had gone to the blood on Enfri's dress. Her nostrils flared, taking in the scent, then she went pale. "Is that..."

"Winds!" Enfri exclaimed, after realizing a vampire would be able to tell whose veins the blood came from. "Winds take me. Suuri, I'm so sorry. Starra's fine. Reyn took her to their chambers to rest."

Suuri looked from Enfri to Jin and back again. "What happened?"

"Bandits," Jin said. "Your sister defended me and was injured. I brought her here to be treated."

Suuri wilted with relief. "Shades' blessings on you, then, Highness. Thank you."

"Why don't you go see her?" Enfri suggested. "I'll tell Ban it was an order from the empress."

Suuri grappled between remaining at her post and seeing to her injured sister. She eventually acquiesced to Enfri's suggestion and excused herself. Jin watched her leave with a furrowed brow before returning her attention to the grease-stained artificer the encounter left them responsible for.

"Sorry, Mistress Obuu," Enfri said. "I didn't mean to throw a wrench into the clockworks of your day just now."

Obuu blinked in apparent bewilderment before seeming to come to a realization. "Ah, an idiom. I see." She chuckled. "I like that. It is funny."

"Err... yes," Enfri said. "I'm sorry, where is it you needed to go next?"

Obuu looked around the room. "Knight-Lieutenant Suuri Nolaas was explaining where someone named Dragon Lord Hugin keeps his work space. I understand I was to go there to begin my work."

"Oh, that's one floor down and over in the southwest wing." She turned her head towards Inaz. "Could you ask someone outside to escort Mistress Obuu to Hugin?"

"Yes, Majesty," Inaz said. He saluted before stepping outside and beckoned for one of the guards on watch.

He soon returned with a Karst armsman, and Enfri offered Obuu a polite farewell. The Irdish artificer nodded in thanks while following her escort out.

Before she was gone from earshot, Jin heard Obuu chuckling to herself. "The day's clockworks... Very clever."

"Is she not the artificer said to be developing electrical lighting?" Jin asked. "The premier theurallurgic specialist in the Five Kingdoms?"

Enfri nodded. "From what I hear, yes. Nooka mentions her often. He said she's the one who invented welding wands. She's practically reinvented modern metalworking with that gizmo."

Jin nodded in appreciation. "I see."

"Did she seem... eccentric... to you?" Enfri asked in a whisper.

"Not at all," Jin said. "Brilliant minds often appear beyond the ordinary."

Enfri raised an eyebrow.

"I know you certainly did when we first met."

Enfri's cheeks darkened, and she fiddled with her skirt. "I guess it couldn't have been much else about me that caught your attention."

"And your hair," Jin said, "your demeanor, your fearlessness, everything about you, but especially your brilliance." She inched her hand closer to Enfri's, short of touching. "Even if that brilliance came with eccentricities."

Enfri smiled and took Jin's hand. "What sort of eccentricities?"

Jin dropped her gaze, and her answer came in a low murmur. "Kindness."

Enfri blinked rapidly, but before she could ask anything, the door into an adjoining room creaked open.

Ban came out of his study in a dark green uniform, his face in a stack of papers, and a pair of spectacles balanced on the end of his nose. "Suuri, has there been a new report from Grellin yet? This one's two days old."

"Ban," Enfri cried. She was back to hopping.

He looked up, squinted, and removed his spectacles.

Jin wrinkled her nose. When in the name of the king had Ban started needing spectacles? The question bothered her enough that she forgot how seeing him again made her heart feel as if it fell into her stomach.

The memory came as if it'd happened just a moment ago. Her sword piercing Ban's arm, his blood on her hands, his bones at her mercy. Jin had the ability to kill him with a thought. She almost did.

Ban dropped the papers to his feet and came at her. Jin stood frozen in place and flinched.

He seized her in his arms and all but drove the breath out of her lungs. He had one hand on her back, the other on the back of her head. Ban said nothing, just held her until Jin let her tension fade. Shaking once again, Jin brought her arms up to return the embrace.

"I'm sorry, Ban," she whispered.

"You're back. All that matters." Ban jolted and pulled away, a look of unbridled excitement washing across his face. "Waves, you need to meet Nikos!"

Jin had only a moment to think before Ban and Enfri were pulling her by both arms out of the room and back into the hallway.

"Who is Nikos?"

oOo

"Oh," Jin breathed, transfixed by the small bundle she held. "You are Nikos."

She'd never seen the Karst estate before this. It hadn't yet been built before she betrayed them all and left them behind. Now, she was back, sequestered into the new nursery, Ban watched with a beaming face as he introduced her to his son, Enfri looked on wistfully and appeared fully content, and Moon sat beside Jin on the nursing couch with her head leaning on Jin's shoulder.

Rippling Moon wore a silk dressing gown, violet to match her eyes. The way those eyes brightened joyfully at Jin's arrival might have been the most singular and unreserved reaction to her return Jin had seen. Within moments, Jin was plopped into a seat and now had the tiniest lord in the world cradled in her arms.

Jin chastised herself once already for crying too much today. It wouldn't do to have to do so again. Nevertheless, she couldn't stop herself. At the least, her tears were silent, and Moon's hair against her cheek hid them from sight. Jin didn't dare blink them back, because she refused to look away from this little Karst for even such a brief moment.

Then, her heart leaped into her throat as Nikos opened his golden eyes to look at her. He squealed, and his face broke into a wide smile as his tiny arms flailed about.

Jin gasped. Moon gasped. Ban and Enfri gasped. Hard to say for certain, but Jin could've sworn she heard the entire world gasp in response to that smile. She could do nothing but stare in silent wonder.

"This is new thing!"

"Winds, already? Smiles should be weeks off."

"Could just be gas."

"Rocker. Is Jin. Rybka sights his kith."

"Aye, lisichka. As you say."

Jin bit her lip to stop it from trembling. This... all of this... It didn't seem real. Too perfect, as if it all came from the most beautiful dream she could imagine. She gently brushed her fingertips over the dark spots above Nikos' brow, imagining the antlers he'd one day have, then used the motion to hide how she wiped her cheeks dry.

"He is beautiful," Jin said softly. She shifted her weight to return him to Moon. "Like his mother."

Moon blushed prettily as she accepted him back. "Rocker Jin. Do not speak this. My ashen head is still loopy."

From how Enfri described the ordeal of the delivery, Jin thought Moon had every right to be as loopy as she wanted. Jin had listened to Enfri's clinical explanation and gone whiter with every word.

"Even so," Jin said, "I am grateful. Thank you, Moon, for allowing me to see him."

Moon shifted to hold Nikos more comfortably. "Is not thing to allow or not allow. She is kith. No, she is kin. Cannot place clouds between."

Jin was about to respond, but Moon had a way of knowing what Jin was about to say before it had a chance to come out.

Moon spoke over her to Ban. "Will my red let me speak words to Jin? Take rybka. Green one, too. This is not for them to hear."

Enfri blinked in surprise, but Ban didn't waste time arguing. He scooped Nikos out of Moon's arms and pulled Enfri towards the nursery door.

"As you say, lisichka. I should send Her Majesty on her way back to the palace anyhow."

"Wait, what?" Enfri squawked. "Ban, I'm most definitely not going back to the palace. I..."

"You'll run your empire like an empress ought to," Ban said firmly. "The brothel owners still need to talk to you, and now House Shrajevska is asking for an audience. Jin will be there when you're done." He fixed Jin with a pointed look. "She will be there when you're done. Now come on. I gotta dump this little poo-maker off with his grandma before we go."

"Ban, no!"

"Ban, yes!" He stopped before leaving the nursery and looked at Moon. "He's been fed, right?"

"Before my red came, aye. They must go now." Moon shooed him off with her hands.

Enfri made further protests, but Ban had her fully under his power. He ignored her completely as he chatted amiably with Inaz and Mevek, who'd been waiting just outside.

Jin saw Ban's aim even if Enfri didn't yet. Moon was taking on one half of the problem facing Shan Alee while Ban handled the other.

After the doors closed and Enfri's arguments faded into silence, Jin took in a bracing breath. She had her hands folded in her lap as she turned to face Moon's accusations. Jin didn't expect to have Moon's forehead knock against hers, or to have Moon desperately holding their heads together as she sobbed.

"She is home now," Moon said between sniffles. "Rocker Jin. She made me cry for missing her. Cry for hours."

Jin was keenly aware of the sharp prongs of antler to either side of her face. Goblin affection came with some risks attached. It was often a wonder that Ban hadn't yet lost an eye to Moon's way of kissing.

Perhaps it was remembering how pressing foreheads together was how goblins kissed that caused Jin to startle back. She assumed it was the platonic sort, but the mercuriality of the fey was more often than not a treacherous stretch of waters to navigate.

"Moon, I..." Jin didn't know what she meant to say, but the words started coming out on their own. "I'm sorry I missed your wedding."

"Hush this," Moon whispered. "Was enough to know she was safe, even if not with us."

"I can never forgive myself for everything I've done to you. I've caused more harm to you than anyone else."

Moon tilted her head to the side and wrinkled her nose. "Harm? Harm me? Jin speaks clouds."

Jin blinked in confusion as Moon took her hands into her own. "Do you not know? I was the cause for what happened at Sandharbor."

"Nay, she speaks wrong things," Moon said with a decisive shake of her head. "Was white-scented empty blue who caused this."

"It was I who..." Jin stopped and started over again. "I betrayed Enfri to Omolade. I betrayed Shan Alee. All of you."

Moon pursed her lips and regarded Jin with a serious eye. "Rocker."

"Yes, I..."

"Not for this," Moon interrupted. "For this. For..." Moon sighed heavily and rolled her eyes. "This path goes in circle. Is wind. I will not speak as this."

Jin struggled to follow along, but she'd never been the best at keeping up with fey speech.

Moon cleared her throat before starting over in an entirely new accent. It was slower-paced, a little lower-pitched, and entirely alien to the Rippling Moon that Jin was familiar with.

"Let's start from the beginning," Moon said. "You've been blaming yourself for something Princess Omolade did, something you expressly told her not to do, and you expect me to go along with this fool notion of letting you take responsibility for it."

Jin's mind went blank. She'd of course heard from Ban about Moon practicing speaking in the same manner as mortals, but this was her first time hearing it in person. How utterly bizarre. It didn't fit Moon at all, but winds take Jin if it wasn't easier for her to understand.

"Yes, b-but... I betrayed you all."

Moon scoffed. "It is cleansed."

"Cleansed?" Jin exclaimed. "But, you can't do that!"

"I most certainly can," Moon said. "I can forgive whoever I want, thank you very much. You feel guilty because Light Hoof and the rest of my tribe were banished to the Ethereum. Fine, I can understand why you'd feel responsible. You feel guilty because many other fey were banished. That's fine, too. But every one of them who wanted to come back and not stay in the Ethereum as a spirit was able to. So, you're cleansed. You then feel like everyone else who died, all the dragons, all the Aleesh, all the Melcians, is all your fault. Well, that isn't fine. That's on more heads than just yours, and yours is owed less than most, so it isn't fair for you to hog all the blame for yourself!"

Moon worked herself up a little more than a new mother probably should, so she took a moment to take a few deep breaths and settle. Jin could only stare in stupefaction at Moon fanning herself.

"It's not... fair?" Jin murmured.

"Not even a little," Moon said, side-eyeing her. She bent to retrieve what looked like a flat stone from underneath the couch and turned it over in her fingers. The stone had unlit sigils carved over its surface. "Omolade deserved most of it, and she's cleansed. She asked for our forgiveness, and it was given freely." Moon's eyes brightened and she leaned towards Jin to whisper conspiratorially. "Light Hoof not scent of green one anymore. He now scents of white-scented empty blue. She speaks she not sight this, but white-scented empty blue scents of him back. This is because he brought her from spirit-home. Her goblin knight rescued her. Is funny, aye?"

Jin reeled from the wild change in both accent and subject. She reeled back further when she understood Moon's meaning, that there was something brewing between her brother and Princess Omolade of Melcia. Jin was overwhelmed and saw no respite on the horizon.

"Wait," Jin said, "Light Hoof had feelings for Enfri?"

Moon cackled uproariously. "Did Jin not sight this? Do not speak you not sight this. Rocker Jin." She shook her head and giggled while she took the stone she held and gave the sigils on one side three firm presses.

With each touch of Moon's finger, the sigils flared with blue etherlight.

"That isn't everything," Jin said. "I did my utmost to prevent Enfri from succeeding in founding Shan Alee. I almost..." Jin nearly choked on a lump appearing in her throat. "Moon, I almost killed everyone here that I love. You and Ban, little Nikos, Reyn, Starra, and Krayson."

Moon's laughter died down, and she turned a sympathetic eye on Jin. "I know. I also know that isn't what you were trying to do. None of it went the way you intended. All you wanted was the chance to take Enfri away from all this, because you thought Shan Alee was stealing what makes you love her."

Jin froze. She'd never heard it put in that way, not even from herself, but Moon said exactly what had been in her heart as she acted.

"You were clouded. You saw things that weren't there because those things were what you were most afraid of. But you see that now, don't you? You are unclouded?"

Jin slowly nodded.

Moon gave the stone another three taps, each with another flare of etherlight. "I'm sure there was more to it. This promise Enfri keeps crying about taking from you, I assume. Whatever it all was, it's over now, isn't it?"

Jin averted her eyes.

Moon reverted to her normal way of speaking. "I spoke this. She is home now. This is what should be, Jin here with her heart-blessed. She must be with her heart-blessed. This is where Jin's heart is white. This is where Jin is cleansed."

Covering her mouth with her hands, Jin sobbed. "I'm home."

Moon hugged her, and Jin felt warm and safe as she hugged her back. Winds, but she loved this blustering goblin. Anyone who said Rippling Moon wasn't the smartest and wisest and most beautiful-souled woman in the world would have a royal assassin to answer to.

Jin saw out of the corner of her eye how Moon gave the stone three more taps behind her back.

"What is that?" Jin asked, pulling out of their hug.

"Hmm?" Moon folded it into her hands as if to pretend it'd never been there. "Oh, is small thing. Was gift."

Jin narrowed her eyes in suspicion. "A gift from whom?"

"From me," Moon said, casting furtive glances towards Jin. "Half of gift. Other half... I gifted to..."

"Moon," Jin said in a warning tone.

"To Star Hunter," Moon sighed, as if the admission was painful.

"Star Hunter? Who is..." Jin's eyes widened. "Synergistic sigils. Winds and storms, Maya!"

The nursery doors were thrown open, and Maya sauntered in. She came unarmed and wore a shockingly bold gown, but Maya could look threatening in a nightdress. Jin shot to her feet, fully expecting to be socked across the face again.

"Calm yourself, Sister," Maya said in a wry tone. She came into the nursery and favored Moon with a fond smile. She held up an identical stone to Moon's before tucking it into a pocket. "Got your message."

Moon got to her hooves and went to Maya. They clasped palms and pressed their foreheads together, both smiling as they inhaled deep through the nose to share a breath. Before separating, Maya bent a little lower to place a kiss on the corner of Moon's lips, then gave Jin a lidded look from beneath her long eyelashes.

Jin held herself as if expecting an attack from any angle. Her eyes flitted between Maya and Moon, uncomprehending. There wasn't anyone anywhere Jin would think more unlikely to strike up a close relationship than those two.

They were together in the spirit world, Jin recalled. Moon gave Maya a kith name. Maya said something goblin-ish earlier. They exchange secret messages through magic stones like in old romance novels!

Her eyes widened in horror. Jin pointed at Moon and nearly shrieked. "You are a married woman!"

Maya's jaw went slack. Moon threw her head back and roared with laughter.

"You... you twerp!" Maya sputtered. "Of all the... It's not like that!"

Moon leaned on her knees, inconsolable.

"I know what I saw just now," Jin said. "You kissed Moon! Twice!"

"That's how women greet each other, you dimwit! What, you spent so much time wanting to shag girls you never figured out how to make friends with them?"

Jin drew herself up and glared. "I have had plenty of female friends, and I never..."

"Why not? You're missing out. Casual affection is the best."

There must've been something wrong with Jin's mouth, because only unintelligible gibberish was coming out of it.

Moon, still hardly able to breathe for laughing so much, pushed her way between the two sisters and guided Jin to sit back down. "She is clouded," Moon assured her while wiping away mirthful tears.

As if to make a point, Moon bumped her forehead against Jin's, just... just as she had a little bit before.

Jin felt like a fool.

"Not that this is thing I not think of," Moon whispered in Jin's ear. She pulled away with a wink. "Jin's kin sights pleasing, but I already have heart-blessed."

There was no power in Hell or the Ethereum that could've prepared Jin for hearing that. She looked at Moon as if her antlers had fallen out.

Maya frowned slightly as she strained to overhear. She didn't appear to have caught it.

"What is going on?" Jin demanded.

"Star Hunter must know her kin is home," Moon said with a firm nod.

"I already knew, darling," Maya said. "Though I do appreciate it. Was worth the flight over to see the look on her face."

Jin was skeptical. "You came riding Zanda?"

"I can fly on my own, thank you," Maya scoffed. She then got a sly look. "Oh, that's right. You weren't around for that. Jin, look at this."

Maya held out her arms like a street performer. She then floated a foot into the air, much to Moon's delight and Jin's numb astonishment.

"Impressive, isn't it?"

Jin blinked hard to make certain she wasn't hallucinating. She used her ethersight, just to be doubly certain that Maya was really and truly manifesting a blustering flight spell in front of her. "What are you?"

"Your future queen. Get used to it."

Jin refused to.

With a click of her heeled shoes, Maya dropped back to the floor. She linked arms with Moon and pulled Jin to her feet. "Now, Sister, you've had something of a day already." She looked out the window and the early afternoon sunlight. "And look at that. It's only halfway gone. That leaves us plenty of time."

Jin tugged futilely against Maya's grip on her arm. "Time for what?"

"Dunce. We're princesses in a foreign kingdom. Time to do what's expected of beautiful young ladies of our station."

"Star Hunter speaks clouds," Moon said.

"Not so, darling," Maya replied. "You're nobility now, and there are things I'm obliged to teach you. When visiting foreign nations, it is the sacred duty of a noblewoman to seek out every pleasure her hosting kingdom has to offer and avail herself to her satisfaction."

"Carousing," Jin said flatly. "You want to take me carousing through Shan Alee."

"Not just you," Maya said gaily. She put her arm around Moon's waist and pulled her close. "All of us. She isn't pregnant anymore, so she's allowed to get good and plastered."

Moon looked dubious. "This not... If rybka needs fed..."

"Come off it, that's what nurse maids are for."

"What is this thing she speaks?"

Maya patted the side of Moon's breast. "They spare these from sagging."

Aghast, Moon bundled her dressing robe tighter. "This is thing slayers do?"

"I checked with your steward. Your mother-in-law hired two women with new children in case you needed a break from that adorable poo-maker. Do stop lollygagging, darling. You're a noblewoman of a great house, so you're expected to be irresponsible. Now, let's find you something absolutely dreadful to wear. The more it makes men's eyes pop out their skulls, the better. That only means you're living your life right."

Moon, at last, looked as if she regretted conjuring Maya. Once a sack of cats was untied, there was no getting them back in. Jin held Moon close as Maya harried them to where Moon could find a change of clothes. It appeared she had a small collection of gowns for special occasions that Maya was aware of. Maya was all but skipping ahead, excited for the coming evening in a way Jin hadn't seen since they were children.

"Jin is double cleansed now," Moon muttered sullenly, her head low on her shoulders as if she were being led to the gallows. "Now I have betrayed her. My hands are ashen."

"It is cleansed," Jin sighed. "Come. We will keep each other honest while we... endure my sister."

Moon pouted, glanced down at Maya's backside, then shrugged.