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said, and each one lying in darkness. I was afraid, I was very much afraid, that Imriel de la Courcel was already treading one. I did not think I could bear to see his face in my dreams for the rest of my life.
    Hyacinthe, I prayed silently, forgive me for this choice I make.
    “Phèdre?” Amaury Trente asked. “Will you go?”
    I gazed at Joscelin, tears standing in my eyes. “I thought ... truly, I thought we were done, here. I thought our path would diverge here, truly I did. Joscelin, beloved, if I told you I swore an oath, in La Serenissima ...” I was shaking, I knew I was shaking.
    Joscelin looked at me for a long time, and then rendered his Cassiline bow, correct and exacting. “I protect and serve, my lady,” he said softly. “Is that what you need to hear? If you believe it needful, it is needful. Besides ...” One corner of his mouth lifted in a smile. “I am not so overeager to see your Tsingano freed that I will not accompany you on this task.”
    I laughed through my tears. Oh, Hyacinthe ! My heart ached, like a flawed vessel fired too hot. “Yes, my lord,” I said to Amaury Trente. “I will go with you to Khebbel-im-Akkad.”
    So it was decided.
    On the morrow, we went to the jeweler’s shop to see Radi Arumi. There, the gem-carver Karem served us mint tea and we presented our plight to the Jebean caravan-guide, or at least as much of it as I deemed discreet. Radi Arumi heard us out with grave attentiveness.
    “Understand, Kyria,” he said with regret, “I cannot return your deposit to you. Certain arrangements have been made, provisions purchased, camels leased. You see how it is.”
    I allowed politely that I did, and speculated that the caravan-master would ensure none of it went to waste. After innumerable cups of tea and negotiations, it was agreed that a portion of the deposit would be refunded and we would forfeit the balance.
    “Come again in six months, fair one.” Radi Arumi grinned, his teeth a startling white against the lined darkness of his features. “I will be making ready another trip. If you are still wishing to go, I will be wishing to guide you!”
    I had leave, thanks to my bargain, to peruse the royal library at will. In the days that followed, I used it to full advantage, little though it gained me. Of history, there was plenty. I learned that Drujan was a small province nestled alongside the Sea of Khaspar, warded by mountains to the east, north and south. Because it was easily defensible, it had a long history of fierce independence, although its satraps had paid homage to the Great Kings of Persis. I learned that it was a seat of worship for the ancient Persians, who called it also Jahanadar, Land of Fire, due to a phenomenon on the peninsula which jutted into the sea. There, at certain crevices in the rock, fire-spouts were wont to occur.
    The Hellene philosopher Stratophanes saw these with his own eyes and gauged them to be a natural phenomenon, born of volatile gases trapped beneath the earth’s crust. It was, he owned, nonetheless impressive. The Persians, who worshipped Ahura Mazda, the Lord of Light, built temples around them and tended the Sacred Fires.
    Even the Akkadians, who destroyed so much Persian culture when they conquered, did not extinguish the Sacred Fires of Drujan, hailing it instead as evidence that the solar fire of Shamash had descended to earth to put the seal on their victory. The Persian priests-magi, they were called-were allowed to continue to tend their fires ... only now they must do so in the name of Shamash.
    So much did I learn, and then little more for a span of centuries, when Drujan, quiet for hundreds of years, rose up in rebellion. At a guess, I would hazard that isolated Drujan, poor in natural resources, ignored by its overlords in favor of lusher lands, gradually returned to its old ways over the course of centuries.
    Hoshdar Ahzad was the name of the leader who emerged, a prince of ancient bloodlines, and it was in his name that the Drujani took up their swords, slaying the Akkadian vizier and his garrison. All along the border, they rose up against the fortresses and on the peninsula, they took the fortified palace of Daršanga, where Hoshdar Ahzad installed himself as sovereign lord, and decreed the worship of Ahura Mazda restored.
    Better for him, I thought, if he had kept quiet and seen to his borders first, for no sooner had the name of Ahura Mazda rung freely across the Land of Fires than the wave of Akkadian