“Pelimburg is a city of rain and mist and spray. It’s supposed to be my home, but a lifetime lived in my mother’s cage of a mansion means that I barely know it. I’ve only ever seen the city from the confines of a carriage; now I breathe deep, tasting how different the air is, how sweet the drops feel on my tongue. Up on the hillside, the rain seems bitter and darker.”

“I picture my mother’s face when she must go out in public with Owen, the cold arrogant look she wears, as if the whole world is filth before her. It is an expression I’ve learned to copy well, and like all roles, if you can believe it, you can be it. I press my hands to my face and push, smoothing the worry and fear away. I’m better than them. Better than Owen, than Canroth Piers. They can never really control me because they cannot bridle my thoughts.”

“I pull my mostly dry shawl tighter around my shoulders and dip my head so that I don’t have to look into their eyes and see the thoughts there. Lammer-whore. I am not this thing. I raise my head sharply, and with my chin jutted out I walk alongside Jannik, willing these Gris-damned bats to say something, anything. The anger waits inside me, cold and ready. Even I know it’s just a façade. I’m so scared now that I have nowhere left to go. My armor is frost thin and just as useful.”

“There is something frosty about her, and when she talks I expect to feel her breath against my face like a winter sea-gale. Instead, her voice is calm and quiet, but hidden under it are snake-hisses and sneers. “Ilven will not be available for your games today, Felicita, dear.” There is a subtle emphasis on games and dear. Nothing overt—I am, after all, from House Pelim—but enough for me to know that Malker are determined to claw their way up to their old level on the social scale. It’s a warning of sorts.”

“A going-away party. We dress things up with pretty words. My friend is not going on a pleasure jaunt, or a holiday upriver to see the ruling city of MallenIve. They are selling her off to some nameless man with arable land. They are selling her for caskets of wine.”

“No. You’ve talked about it. I just had to sit and listen. The only person I can talk to is Ilven. We grew up together, shared the same flight space. And now, if my brother is to be believed, she’s gone.”

“If there’s one thing my mother taught me, it is how to wear the perfect mask. Never show them what you’re really feeling because that’s how they hurt you.”