My first meal with Devrim began quietly. There were no musicians accompanying the midday repast, no elders sharing memories, no Aveela scolding spirits that I still hadn’t learned to see.

  “If thou are in agreement,” Devrim addressed me suddenly, “we will rapid-travel to the isla and arrive before truedark.”

  I lowered the slice of bread Hytham had procured for me from the shared basket. Hume cuisine was drier and contained fewer herbs than what I was accustomed to. Their bread proliferated crumbs everywhere.

  “How difficult will the navigation be while rapid-traveling?” I asked in earnest, but I also began a quick calculation—the travel to the isla should take three days, especially with so many in our number. If we made it to the isla today, acquired what the herald desired, and returned, the soldiers and the herald would be back in Shakerton within a day’s ride of my family’s trip north. The trip to the isla was supposed to help secure their safety, not endanger them further if the herald discovered the Seed was missing.

  “Thou can navigate as normal, only more quickly.” The herald took a deep swig from his tankard of water, a necessity for the dry Hume fare.

  “Would you show me? This rapid form of travel—I want to understand it before I agree.”

  Once again the herald studied me, like I was a gemstone and he an appraiser. I had never witnessed an appraiser in action, of course, but they made frequent appearances in the records of trade and courtly negotiations in the records from the Bright Age.

  “As thou wishes,” he said, a sigh suppressed beneath his words. “Come with me.”

  The herald led me out of the church to the front steps where, but a few days before, I had asked for directions to Parrith’s house. He held his hands out near the base of his ribcage, fingers clawed. He brought them toward one another and stopped at a set point, an invisible orb held between them that he then started twirling his hands around.

  After a moment of this twisting motion, a breeze shot past us, blowing my braids back over my shoulder and ruffling the feathers in my hair. Next to the herald, all seemed as it had been before. But beyond us, sound slowed and blurred as did the gestures of those in Shakerton. They moved as though thick, sandy water, like they were wading upstream through the thickest rapids of the Twisted River.

  “Walk with me.” The herald’s voice was easy to understand, unlike the elongated syllables slowly unfurling behind and before us. We strode down the church steps, out of the yard, and down the main thoroughfare of Shakerton. If people watched us on our walk, I didn’t know of it. Their movements were so slow by comparison that we were past them before they’d even registered our enhanced speed.

  “It is a great relief to me that you will be joining us,” the herald said in Lifkin when we reached the midway point between the church and the town gates.

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  “Oh.” I grinned, surprised. “I’m glad I might be of assistance. I have studied the islas for the past several years as part of my spiritspeaker training.”

  His eyebrow rose, more curious than doubtful. “Sir Cranwin will see to your needs while we travel and once we reach our destination. Am I correct in assuming you have never spent time among Hume soldiers before?”

  “Thankfully, yes, this is a new experience for me.” That was one of the particulars I hadn’t fully reconciled. What would it be like for me as the only Lifkin and possibly the only woman in a camp of soldiers and members of the Order?

  Devrim nodded. “I suspected as much.” He turned his gaze to the people of Shakerton, a frown forming between his brows as they moved slowly beyond our orb of speed that surrounded the herald. Devrim placed his hand upon my shoulder, gently indicating that we should turn about. A strong aura of magic reverberated from his touch—more magic than I had ever felt before. It weighed upon my shoulder and quickened my pulse

  “Many Hume cloak their disdain for your people in excuses of the past, as though they recall their former subjugation or remain affected by it. The Order, in most cases, is no different.” He turned toward me again, the frown still etched across his features. “But it is no more than an excuse. You are not responsible for the actions of your ancestors, are not guilty for their transgressions against those they thought inferior.”

  I parted my lips to answer him while still struggling to find the words. “Do you truly believe that?”

  “I do.” His tone was solemn, weighty. As though he was trying to protect me in advance of whatever awaited us in the isla, as though I carried the weight of my people’s past misdeeds with me wherever I went.

  “As spiritspeaker, I learned more nuanced versions of the histories. It was very important to my mentor that I do so.” My throat thickened at the mention of Aveela, and my hand drifted to the coin that rested upon my chest, my connection to her. “Many of the members of my clan have a selective version of the past as well. They would find our ancestors innocent where they weren’t. I . . .” I swallowed down the knot and my fear. “I don’t think the way we have been treated by Hume is right.”

  I let the implications hang in the air. We should not be forced from our homes if we refuse to convert to a false Hume religion, for instance. “But I do understand it better than most of my people. Some of what I’ve found in the records—” I shook my head, recalling the way some of the ancient Lifkin referred to Hume, negating any worth or value. A few even argued that they were without souls.

  “As I said, none of that is your fault. At present, it serves as an excuse for fear and hatred, nothing more.” He gestured to the church steps which we had quickly found our way back to. “What do you say, Mistress Lif-sai’Lune? Shall we travel more quickly and release your friend?”

  The spell’s aura fell away as the soldiers held open the church doors and we stepped through the threshold back into the church. Sound splashed back around me, similar to the experience of swimming in the river with all its muted noise and bursting up through the top of the water to a riot of sounds more vibrant and numerous than they had ever seemed before.

  “Y-yes,” I answered, suddenly aware of the weight of what I was embarking upon. “I should like to leave word with my cousin, and then I will be ready.”

  As I spoke, Hytham hurried toward us from the corner of the sanctuary—he must have been watching us from the window—and hovered behind me. Concern flickered over his expression, but I was in no distress.

  “Cranwin, send a runner to our guide’s cousin and escort her to the stables.” He turned from Hytham and raised his chin to address the whole of the sanctuary. “We set out. Those in the company, finish your preparations. The rest, alert those who remain behind.”

  A chill raced up my spine. In short order, I would be returning to the isla, this time leading a group of Hume soldiers and members of the Order behind me. I could only hope the ibex wouldn’t be too surprised.