"M-maamel," Phoebe trembled like her words. "How do I … how do I forget something? Forever?"

  She pressed against her mother, but it was like hugging a statue wearing clothes. Her maamel's voice didn't conflict. There was no world, no room or walls around them. Nothing that Phoebe had time to register, anyway.

  "You don't," she said. "My magic doesn't do that. I've told you many times. Now let go of my dress, and practice your harpsichord like a good girl."

  But Phoebe tugged at the dress again. This was important. She couldn't sleep anymore. She didn't realize it was possible for a single person to bleed so much.

  "What about the thing on Griinel's wrist? She says it stops her from remembering things."

  "So that's where you keep learning new words you're not supposed to use. I will have that girl's master punish her if you keep spending time with her. Griinel's rune is also very useful in that regard, you know."

  That made Phoebe pull away. Her mother used threats like that often, because she knew they would work a lot better than threats to Phoebe herself. At least she almost never followed through. Almost.

  I just need to talk to Griinel one more time, Phoebe thought. I have to know more about that rune.

  When she got a few steps away from her maamel, Phoebe's eyes opened to a wide open desert sky. The rune on her cheek buzzed and bit, but Oppzis managed to keep just enough of the dream that she remembered the words between her and whoever her maamel was.

  Phoebe sat up in the sand, and rested her head in her hands. She needed more sleep, but everything coming out of her past from behind her rune was so unsettling.

  I want my past back … right?

  She was almost to Aleb. She could find answers there. Then she could decide. With a yawn that lacked conviction, she laid back down in the sand.

  ***

  With a sigh of relief, Phoebe gave her legs a chance to rest at the top of a sparsely-grassed hill. Below her was, at long last, the city of Aleb. Named after an old Centralian word for murder, supposedly because this was the spot where a woman murdered her sister out of jealousy before spawning a city with the man she won. Though Phoebe didn't understand the legendary woman's motivations at all, Phoebe had to admire the ambition.

  The city sprawled out below her. She could smell the life and death of it. It combined interestingly with the taste of salty coast air. In the distance beyond the city thrashed the Gulf of Kimto, with a fraction of the violence of the Everwhite Seas beyond the capes. The city rested on the river running between the sea and the lake Phoebe passed hours before. Phoebe's eyes were drawn to the Tower of Eyes near the city center, said to be the tallest structure east of the Fade Parallel. The tall cylinder held nothing but a staircase, a passion project for a forgotten engineer with a penchant for eye designs along the sides.

  Phoebe squinted at the individual shapes in the streets. She remembered walking them, vaguely, though the rune on her cheek got angry if she tried too hard. Although human beings were a second currency in Aleb's well-lubricated economy, it was a rather friendly city to exist in. Once. Becoming a slave could happen to anyone, but it rarely lasted for long and the pay was better than many "free" jobs. It was treated like losing a game. A person let debt get ahead of them, or lost a bet, got caught without their paperwork, broke a law, or got conscripted by the government or some nob, and they worked a few months before being let go. Inconvenient, but it came and went. It meant that very few people had time to grow their hair out past their ears.

  That all changed when Akastamsis came in, and started moving slaves around. In Aleb, owning a slave had rules. A slave had to be paid. A slave got to see their family. A slave was released when they got pregnant, or injured, or served the maximum time for however they became a slave. All those rules disappeared when a slave left Aleb.

  Not long ago, Aleb's laws made it extremely difficult to export humans. Akastamsis's early attempts to bribe those laws down were withstood by a governor with foresight and the luxury of stability. Later attempts found easy purchase among successors made desperate by misfortune and greed. So, year after year, Aleb's citizenry were purchased not by friendly neighbors who they would in turn purchase back, but by ruthless Akastamsians who carted them away from the safety of their home, to lands where "slave" had a more permanent definition.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  What had once been a friendly if forceful employment turned into all but a death sentence. Being turned into a commodity, once an unavoidable but natural step in Alebian life, became a fate feared more than death. People banded into factions to avoid being sold by their enemies, and the government became just another band like them. People lengthened their contracts to avoid being traded to the Akastamsians. Slavery in Aleb gradually decayed to that recognized almost anywhere else.

  Many were sold westward in the Ecliptican principalities, but some, like Phoebe, were sold south along the Fadeward edge of Barrid. Year after year, the city shrank, leaving dozens of empty houses in patches like bruises on a dropped fruit. Phoebe had the misfortune of getting caught in one of those bruises, and before she found a faction to shelter her, the Akastamsians took her away to the south. To Derek.

  But how did I get to Aleb in the first place? she wondered, turning her head to follow people momentarily. I'm Adalaantian, aren't I? I've got the narubati looks, and so did my mothers. They spoke Adalaantian in the dreams and I understood it. Hm.

  Phoebe needed a plan. She had to find a runewright who would get this stupid rune off her face, without running into someone who would use it against her. Especially since those could easily be the same person.

  Maybe I'll try the farms all the way to the east of it, she decided. There's gotta be a poor farmer with a slave or two, who can point me in the right direction.

  She stood up, brushed herself off, then looked down at her hands.

  And if worst comes to worst, I can … do whatever got me away from Derek.

  Her confidence was short-lived after just a few steps.

  There's probably a lot of slave catchers in Aleb. This probably isn’t a good idea.

  Oppzis expressed that she should relax. She was only visiting the outlying farms, to start. Oppzis reminded her that Derek was still coming, and would probably arrive in Aleb by tonight.

  Then I'll have to go inside the city.

  Oppzis said that would be fine too. Aleb at nighttime was no place for a runaway slave girl, but Phoebe was no ordinary slave girl. On his advice, she started wrapping part of her dress around her head to conceal the rune.

  It's not like I’ve got a better idea, she conceded. Doing another speed-dash to the Crown Mountains or Akastamsis doesn't sound much safer.

  Phoebe didn't add that her last dash had missed Aleb by over a hundred miles. She'd needed to walk the rest of the way while the magic protecting her feet regenerated, wearing a shitty pair of shoes she'd found in a dried-out riverbed.

  At least Mother Marthera lives here. Or at least, she used to.

  Oppzis agreed that this was the best course of action, though he advised Phoebe to wait until he was in the sky to do anything. If he wasn't in the sky, that meant she was on her own. No powers, and no advice from him.

  Sounds like a decent trade-off, she teased.

  Oppzis had an extremely fast orbit. He was, after all, the moon of velocity. He orbited Mekkendor twice in the time it took the planet to complete one spin. He also orbited in the opposite direction of that spin. That meant he rose in the west and set in the east, opposite the sun Mekkendor happened to be orbiting, and it meant he crossed the sky twice in a twenty-four hour period, once in the afternoon, and once in the very early morning. Twelve to six, AM and PM.

  When she'd been east of the Fade, Oppzis had the additional obstruction of the Fade to contend with. The Fade stretched high into the atmosphere, so much so that until halfway through his journey in the sky, Oppzis was blocked from where Phoebe stood on the planet's surface. This meant she could only access him from three to six. Luckily, this factor disappeared now that she was so far north the circular Fade was southwest of her, not just west, and she could see both the western and eastern horizons.

  Fine, she added. I'll wait till you're in the sky to go into the city. And yes, I'll leave as soon as you set this evening. Okay?

  Oppzis was satisfied.

  Just keep working on those memories of Aleb, okay? I don't wanna get too lost in there. There's probably slave catchers and rapists wandering about.

  Oppzis reminded her that the more work he did on the rune, the harder it would be for a runewright to set her memories back in their proper order and place.

  I know. Just do what you can. We'll find Marthera, and go from there. And Oppzis?

  Oppzis made her feel like he had raised an inquiring lunar eyebrow. She turned to look at him in the sky through the one eye she hadn't covered.

  Thank you.