I’d never seen him wrestle so much with his words. Or admit to being afraid. He stepped away and sat on the bed. “Be careful how much you push, Lia.” He pulled his other boot off.

“Are you worried about me?”

“Of course I’m worried about you!” he snapped.

I stiffened, surprised by his anger. “I’ve been welcomed, Kaden. That’s all. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

“That kind of welcome could also bring a death sentence.”

“From the Council, you mean.”

“We have very little here, Lia, but our pride.”

“And a prisoner’s been honored. That’s the problem?”

He nodded. “You only just got here and—”

“But, Kaden, the people who welcomed me are Vendans.”

His eyes drilled into me. “But they’re not the ones who carry lethal weapons.”

There was no denying that the tools of Effiera’s trade were nothing like Malich’s and his cohorts’. I sat down beside Kaden. “What is the clan of Meurasi? Why do they matter so much?”

He explained that the city was filled with people from all the provinces. They tended to settle into neighborhoods of their own clan, and each had unique characteristics. One quarter was quite different from another, but the clan of Meurasi represented all things Vendan. Hearty, enduring, steadfast. They honored many of the ways of old that others had forgotten, but from them came the promise of loyalty above all.

“They’ll clothe their own, even if they have to piece together scraps to do it. Everyone contributes what they can. Their bloodline reaches all the way back to the only child Lady Venda had. The first Komizar remarried after she died and had many children with other wives, but from Venda, there was only one, Meuras. So yes, it’s an honor for anyone to be welcomed to the clan, but a prisoner—” He shook his head as if trying to figure it out then looked at me. “It just isn’t done. Did you say something to Effiera in the tent?”

I remembered her expression when Aster told her my name, and then the soft murmurs when I removed my shirt and they saw the kavah on my shoulder. The ways of old. Did the Meurasi still pass down the babble of a madwoman? A pretty name, Yvet called it. Maybe it was more than that, but given the Council’s reaction to my welcome and Kaden’s apparent disapproval as well, I decided to keep that card close to my chest for now.

“No,” I said. “We only talked about clothes.”

He looked at me warily. “Be careful. Don’t push it, Lia.”

“I heard you say that the first time.”

“I don’t think you did.”

I jumped to my feet. “Why is this my fault?” I shouted. “You’re the one who took me to the jehendra even when I said I didn’t need clothes! I bought one thing, and they brought me another. If I had insulted them by refusing the clothes, I’m sure I’d be reprimanded for that too! And tonight did I ask to say the acknowledgment of sacrifice? No! Calantha shoved the platter of bones in my face. What was I to do? Is there anything I can do that’s right in your eyes?”

He sighed and pushed against his knees to stand. “You’re right. I’m sorry. You didn’t ask for any of this. I’m just tired. It’s been a long day.”

My anger cooled. Maybe it was just part of his training as an assassin not to show it, but Kaden was never tired. He was always alert and ready, but his fatigue was evident now.

I lifted my foot onto the frame of the bed to unlace my boot. “Where were you all day?”

“Duties. Just attending to my duties as Keep.”

What kind of duties would take a toll on him like this? Or maybe he wasn’t well? He grabbed blankets from the top of the chest and dropped them to the fur rug.

“I’ll take the rug tonight,” I offered.

“No. I don’t mind.”

He took off his shirt. His scars always stopped me, no matter how many times I had seen them. They were a harsh reminder of how brutal his world was. He snuffed the lanterns, and once I had changed, he blew out the candle too. Tonight there weren’t even dancing shadows to ease me to sleep.

It was quiet for a long while, and I thought he had already fallen asleep, but then he asked, “Was there anything else you did today?”

He wasn’t too tired for his mind to still be churning with questions. Did he suspect something? “What do you mean by else?”

“Just wondering what you did all day. Besides climb out the window.”

“Nothing,” I whispered. “It was a long day for me too.”

The next day when Kaden had to go out, he had Eben come to keep me company, but I knew it was a ruse to keep an eye on me. Eben was guarding me, just as he had in the vagabond meadow—except that things were different between us now. He was still the trained killer, but now there was a chink in his armor, and a softness in his eyes that hadn’t been there before. Maybe it was that I had spared him the burden of killing his own horse. Maybe my whispered acknowledgment of Spirit’s name allowed something he had hidden inside to bloom. Just a little. Or maybe it was that we shared a similar grief, watching someone we loved be butchered before our eyes.

On Kaden’s orders, Eben was allowed to take me out of my room, but not outside of the Sanctum, not to this wing or that tower, only to a narrowly prescribed area. “For your own safety,” Kaden said when I shot him a questioning glare. In truth, I knew he was trying to keep me out of Malich’s path and that of certain Council members. By the end of the meal last night, it was apparent that hostility still ran high, more so among a few because of my welcome, but the ever-united Council seemed divided now into two camps, the curious and the haters.