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sun’s gold before it sank behind the hills. Small wonder that he had passed unnoticed, cloaked in the elements he commanded.
    “Phèdre.” He smiled at me as the mist dispersed, looming suddenly there and present , even as Richeline clapped both hands over her mouth, dropping the herbs she had picked for the evening meal. Droplets of mist clung to his black curls.
    “Hyacinthe.” I swallowed. “I thought the night breeze was to whisper my name.”
    “Not that,” he said, dismounting; only a man, for an instant, saddle-sore and weary. “Not yet. I have been riding the land, to take the measure of it, that I might know it and remember. And I wanted ... I wanted to see how you lived, before I left.”
    There was shouting, then, within the household, and Hugues burst from the rear door with his cudgel upraised, staring to see the Master of the Straits at our garden gate.
    “Hugues,” I said, “would you see to Hyacinthe’s horse?”
    Thunder rumbled in reply and Hyacinthe made an absent gesture, whispering an incantation to dispel the clouds.
    “Oh, don’t.” The words came impulsively. “We need the rain.”
    He smiled sidelong at me and murmured incomprehensible syllables.
    A gentle rain began to fall, making a soft, silvery sound in the olive trees. A smell of damp earth arose around us. Such was his power, who was Master of the Straits.
    I cleared my throat. “Will you come in?”
    “Yes,” Hyacinthe said softly. “I’d like that.”
    We were in the parlour when Joscelin and Imriel returned from their day’s long ramble, damp through and through and in high spirits despite it, having found a meadow perfect for the training of hawks. They stopped short, upon finding Hyacinthe there.
    How strange, to see them all in the same place.
    Adjourning to the dining hall, we passed a pleasant meal together, and Hyacinthe told us of the gathering of the baro kumpai , and how he had chosen among the candidates set forth to lead the Tsingani. He had quizzed them all, asking how each would have handled the fate of his mother, Anasztaizia, driven from the Tsingani for having surrendered her virtue to a D’Angeline, the bitter price paid for a cousin’s ill-placed wager. All of them knew the answer he sought; only Bexhet, son of Nadja, gave it unfaltering, with all the stammering pride of one raised a widow-woman’s son, prepared to challenge the ancient code of the Tsingani that placed such inordinate weight on outmoded rules of honor that valued a woman’s virginity above her person.
    “You might have chosen a woman to lead them,” I said to tease him.
    Hyacinthe gave me the ghost of his grin. “I might,” he said. “But to force growth is to kill it. Let the Tsingani grow at their own pace. Who knows? They may find the end of the Lungo Drom in it.”
    Afterward, we retired once more to the parlour and Imriel served cordial on a silver tray, taking pride in his role, as deft and neat-handed as an adept of the Night Court, watching and listening with all the acuity I had taught him.
    “Melisande’s son,” Hyacinthe murmured in amazement as Imri left the room.
    “No, Tsingano,” Joscelin corrected him. “ Ours .” He drained his glass and set it down with a faint click, frowning. “Forgive my rudeness, for I am glad of your presence. Yet I must ask it: Why have you come?”
    “Cassiline.” There was an ache in Hyacinthe’s voice. “Forgive me . Yet I must know it: What is the price you paid for my freedom?”
    I sent Imriel to bed, then, before we told the story in its entirety. It was his, yes, and there was no part I would deny him; but he was a boy, still. He would tell it himself in the fullness of time, to those he chooses to trust. Until then, I would protect him from it, from the parts he is too young to understand, from the parts that spark his nightmares anew.
    To Hyacinthe, we told the truth.
    From Melisande’s first bargain, and the long road-our own Lungo Drom -it had engendered, we told him all. There were parts where Joscelin faltered, unable to describe what had ensued. I spoke of the zenana and the Mahrkagir’s cruelty, the pall of Angra Mainyu, my voice sounding like a stranger’s to me. And Hyacinthe wept, silently, tears seeping like slow rain on his brown cheeks as he learned the truth of Daršanga; what I had endured there, what Imri had undergone, and Joscelin, too, whose role in some ways was the hardest of all.
    Ill thoughts, ill words, ill deeds.
    Even to