“Why didn’t you come to us when Lhean returned?” And why hadn’t Lhean and Karigan arrived together? So many questions.

“He returned weakened and disoriented,” Somial replied. “And Prince Jametari had his own reasons, which he need not explain to his subjects.”

Laren narrowed her eyes. Eletian games.

A mender leaned into the alcove. “Captain? Your Rider is resting. We—” The mender faltered when she realized the others there were Eletians, not everyday visitors to the mending wing.

“Go on,” Laren said.

“We, uh, have checked her over, and aside from bruises and lacerations, her main injuries appear to be from broken mirror shards. We picked most of them out, though the one in her eye . . . it is difficult, so we are awaiting the return of Master Vanlynn and Ben.”

“Her eye? Will she—”

“I do not know, Captain. We’ll keep you informed. In the meantime, you may sit with her if you like.”

When Laren turned her gaze back to Somial, he had closed his eyes as though asleep. His companions spoke softly to one another in Eletian and shared Dragon Droppings.

She stood and headed toward the room where they were keeping Karigan. Broken mirror shards. Lynx, who had also been on the expedition into Blackveil and returned, had told how Karigan had received a looking mask in the midst of Castle Argenthyne and destroyed it to deny Mornhavon the Black its power. Where else could the mirror shards have come from?

Only Karigan could provide answers, but when Laren cracked the door open to look in on her Rider resting in the dimly lit room, she suspected it would be some while before they got any.

INK AND MEMORY

Laren half-dozed in the chair next to Karigan’s bed, startled awake every few minutes by Karigan’s muttering and tossing. She had decided to sit with Karigan in case her Rider awoke, or said anything of where she’d been all this time, but all she heard was a name repeated: Cade, Cade, Cade . . .

Karigan was under the influence of Ben’s sleeping touch, but it was not enough to give her peace, and the menders were reluctant to supplement it with some other additional soporific, fearing the combination would damage her in some way. Laren wished Ben and Vanlynn would return. She wished she’d hear news of Estora.

Laren herself had finally sent word to Connly down in the Rider wing about Karigan’s arrival. She very much wanted to send the news to Karigan’s father. From all accounts, hearing of his daughter’s death had been crushing, and rumors reached her of the merchant chief neglecting his business interests in his grief. He needed to know, but not before Laren could ensure Karigan was well, that she’d come back to them whole, nor could she send anyone out with a message while the storm raged.

Karigan tossed again and muttered some words that sounded like, “Let me go back.”

“Go back where, Karigan?” Laren asked quietly. “Who is Cade?”

Her questions were only met with silence as Karigan quieted beneath her covers. Her right eye was bandaged, and having few details on the injury, Laren hoped her Rider did not lose her eye or her sight. It would not be an easy transition for her, as it had not been for others Laren knew. She was aware of plenty of one-eyed soldiers who remained in uniform, on active duty, undeterred by their losses. Karigan likely would have no choice in the matter. If she still heard the call, she would remain a Rider. If her brooch abandoned her, she would leave the messenger service. Whatever happened, Laren was grateful to have her back alive.

She nodded off in her chair again and was not sure if she was dreaming or actually seeing the Eletian, Somial, standing over Karigan’s bed, his hands hovering over her sleeping form. Laren heard a wisp of soothing song, which almost lulled her into a deep slumber. Instead, she fought it, shaking herself into a groggy but awake state. She half-rose from her chair.

“What are you doing?” she demanded of Somial. If he harmed Karigan in some way, she would stop at nothing to defend her Rider.

“She was restless, her mind filled with urgency,” he replied softly. He turned his gaze at her, the dim lamplight odd in his eyes. “I have sung to her of peace. She rests quietly now.”

Laren scrutinized Karigan. Indeed, she slept tranquilly, her chest rising and falling with deep, regular breaths. “Is that all you did?” she asked, still suspicious.

“I sense in her an absence of . . .” He touched his belly. “There was a potential there that she carried, but even the faintest memory of it ever having existed has fallen to ashes.”

“A potential? In her? Oh!” Laren fought to shake off the persistent grogginess. “She was carrying a—?”

“Not precisely. The potential was there, the very earliest germination of a seed. The potential became unmade with her return. That which has yet to come to pass, cannot exist before its time.”

It was a challenge for Laren’s sleepy mind to work it out, but she thought she understood. Karigan had traveled before to the time of the First Rider, about one thousand years ago, and returned to the present with a knife of that era in pristine condition. Objects of the past, objects that existed previously, could come forward. Those yet to be created could not come to the past.

“Her return.” Somial sounded uncertain. “It is difficult to know its sway, if any, on the course of events.”

“Course of events?”

“There are many threads to the future, Captain, and clear to no one, not even Eletians. There are just too many variations.” With that, Somial departed, his feet silent on the stone floor.