“Well enough,” Blaine replied. “Are you our guide again?”
“Yes. One hopes you’ll have a calm visit.”
Blaine cracked a smile. “One hopes.”
He sent a silent prayer to the Dusk Star for that, wanting Nilsine to hear it.
Ten
SOREN
“The governor wants to speak with you,” a tithe said.
Soren looked up from sorting his end-of-day transcriptions into their correct boxes, frowning at the tithe. “Now?”
The tithe nodded, gaze solemn. “She’s outside waiting for you.”
Soren knew better than to keep Delani waiting. “Run and let her know I’ll be out shortly, then head off to dinner if she doesn’t need you for anything else.”
The tithe darted off at a fast clip between desks, the clack of telegraph machines running loud in the air. Soren put his desk in order for the next warden on shift before taking his leave. He swapped the warmth of the space for the cool, late-spring evening, the sky black in the east and a deep, fading orange in the west. Delani waited for him out front, the tithe nowhere to be found.
“You wanted to speak with me?” Soren asked.
Delani curled her fingers at him as she turned away, heading down the road that led toward the center of the fort. “We have visitors.”
“I heard an E’ridian airship landed with ajarl.”
“Not just ajarl.”
Her expression was unreadable, but Soren knew whoever was on that airship had to be important, or Delani wouldn’t be hunting him down to talk. For one moment, Soren thought it could be Vanya, and it left himwantingwith such desperation he had to take a deep breath to settle himself. Vanya wouldn’t be traveling on an E’ridian airship. What’s more, Vanya probably didn’t even know where he was, and that made his heart ache. “Who arrived that you needed to personally meet with?”
“The queen of Ashion doesn’t want to meet with me. She wants to meet with you.”
Delani turned her head to look at him as she spoke, keeping him in view of her good eye. Soren managed to keep the shock off his face through sheer will alone. “Why?”
“You know why.”
Soren clenched his teeth together, stopping there in the road. They stood in the shadows between two gas lamp lights, no one else around due to it being the dinner hour. Normally, Soren would be in the refectory taking his evening meal, but the thought of food just then left his stomach churning in protest. “I have nothing to say to the Ashionens.”
“Caris claims to be your sister.”
Soren looked away, jaw twitching. “I have no family but my fellow wardens.”
Delani started walking again, her footfalls quiet on the road. “You were made to be a warden, and the alchemy that runs through you can’t be reversed. But I can’t trace which country tithed you, and your background could be a problem that harms our standing beneath the Poison Accords. We are not meant to interfere with heads of state, and yet, here you stand.”
“I’m no prince.”
Delani looked over her shoulder at him. “Perhaps you should rethink that.”
Soren caught up to her, matching his stride to Delani’s. “You won’t give me a border because of my actions in Solaria, and now you won’t keep me as a warden based on some stranger’s statement?”
“This stranger looks remarkably like you.”
“That doesn’t make us related.”
Delani shrugged. “I was reminded today that Eimarille has no respect for our commitment to keeping Maricol safe. If Ashion falls, we’ll have Daijal at the shores of the Celestine Lake and limited support to fight back. There’s no guarantee she might not retaliate against us for pulling out of Daijal. I won’t see wardens annihilated just so she can more easily conquer another country.”
“What does that have to do with me?”
