Parmo casually came to a halt in the teeming central market of Kal Pyrthin and examined a basket of olives at one of the plethora of produce stands filling the massive marketplace. Or he pretended to at least. In his peripheral vision he watched the man who had been walking behind him for the last several minutes, a man wearing the colors and insignia of Sargoth. Parmo hoped he had not aroused enough suspicion to be followed, but still it was best to be cautious. Since arriving in Kal Pyrthin two days prior, he had busied his days chasing down rumors of the flying airship, and while he had tracked down dozens of witnesses who had seen the ship heading out to sea, no one had seen the airship return. The ship had either made landfall farther to the north or skirted south and gone to Valaróz. It was impossible to say which.

While Parmo had been discreet in his inquiries, he could not be certain that the Emperor's men weren't watching him. It was very possible they too were looking for the airship. Parmo had initially assumed the airship belonged to Emperor Guderian, but that was not necessarily the case. From the rumors Parmo had picked up on, the Emperor's men were questioning people and trying to track down the Princess Taera, too. And then there was the matter of Parmo's cohorts—the two men he had rescued. After learning that King Casstian had been imprisoned, Rufous and Gaetan had surreptitiously entered the city along with Parmo when they arrived in port. If it were widely known that they were survivors of Pyrthin's Flame there was no doubt that the three of them would be taken prisoner. The new regent—the houndkeeper—was ruling the city and ostensibly the kingdom now, and he had not been shy about throwing dissenters into the dungeon or simply executing them. That was why Parmo was so wary: Rufous and Gaetan were more than mere dissenters. The two seamen had been rounding up as many allies as they could find among the military and administrative ranks of King Casstian's government. Rebellion was in the works.

Parmo sniffed at the olives in his hand, then tossed them back into their basket as the man he had been watching walked obliviously on into the center of the market and was lost in the crowd of people. The Emperor's agent either wasn't following Parmo in the first place, or he was sloppy and had lost track of Parmo. In either case, Parmo turned in the opposite direction and headed for The Herdsman, the inn where he rented a room along with Gaetan and Rufous.

Outside the central market, the streets were decidedly less crowded at this late morning hour. The trouble brewing in the city seemed to have scared most people into staying home and out of sight unless they had business to attend to, especially since rumors had spread of Wulfram burning old women and girls alive in Castle Pyrthin. Parmo saw no more than a half dozen people on the side streets, and he arrived at the dilapidated harborside inn only a few short minutes later. He found Rufous drinking an ale all by himself inside the nearly empty common room.

"Parmo!" Rufous hailed from where he sat at a lopsided table.

Parmo joined him and waved for the bar maid to bring him a stein of ale.

"Any luck?" Rufous asked.

"More of the same. Plenty of people saw the airship head out after us, but no one saw her return. She could be anywhere now. How about yourself? How goes your... business venture?"

"The venture goes well," Rufous replied. "We've recruited several more partners, so to speak. The question now is not whether we have enough partners but what our plan is. Everyone has their own ideas, and all of them seem lacking."

"You're the one bringing everyone together."

Rufous rolled his eyes noncommittally. "I'll be honest with you, Parmo. I know how to sail a ship. I can command a crew of sailors when it comes to skirting a reef or storming an enemy vessel. But this business—it's a bit beyond my area of expertise."

The bar maid arrived with Parmo's ale, and both of them went silent until she left and went back to her business.

"The key is to delegate," Parmo said, pausing to quaff deeply from his stein. "You needn't know everything. All you have to do is get the right people involved and coordinate it so that everyone carries out their plan at the exact right time."

"Coordinating isn't my strong suit," Rufous admitted. "I was a supply sergeant once, for Pyrthinia's old flagship. It didn't last very long. I tried to feed a hundred sailors with four loaves of bread and five gallons of water. Numbers and schedules don't agree with me."

Parmo laughed. "I'm sure it wasn't that bad."

"Damned close," Rufous replied. He took a swig from his tankard and turned to Parmo, the humor gone from his features. "Perhaps you could meet with the men. You know, see what they have to say. You've got a good head on you. You don't seem to get riled up like the rest of us. Passion and fury are well and good in the heat of battle, but they're not worth a damn when it comes to strategy."

"I wish I could help, but I have to find my granddaughter."

"You said yourself you have no idea where she is," Rufous pointed out. "She's with the princess, and the best thing you can do right now is help us free the King. He loves that girl of his, and he'll go to all ends of the world to find her. Find the princess and you'll find your granddaughter."

Parmo pursed his lips. As much as he hated to admit it, Rufous was right. Parmo was at a dead end. He could pick a direction at random and try to track down the airship, but the chances of actually finding it on his own were slim. On the other hand, if he successfully helped free King Casstian, they would have infinitely more resources at their disposal. The thought of Makarria alone—captured by an unknown assailant—pained Parmo, but there was nothing he could do about it. Running around blindly wasn't going to help either of them. Here, in Kal Pyrthin, he could be of help. Be strong, Makarria. Be strong.

~~~

Makarria sifted through the crumbling rock in her hand as the men at the end of the tunnel continued digging with their picks. "It just looks like normal rock to me," she remarked to Siegbjorn.

"It looks to be normal rock to me also, but the miners know what they are doing. The veins of the magnesite are many here in the caverns, I am told. Our people find it, they dig it out, then Roanna mixes it with the other ingredients to make the peat. It burns much longer than any wood we can gather in the valley."

Makarria tossed the rubble in her hand back into the wheel cart and shrugged. The whole mining operation was much less intriguing than she had hoped. It amounted to little more than a bunch of big, hairy men digging long tunnels and carrying out cartfuls of boring looking rocks and sand. Still, it was better than sitting locked in her chamber. It had taken some doing on Makarria's part to convince Siegbjorn to take her to Issborg again. Siegbjorn had been commanded to keep the airship grounded, and when Siegbjorn had nothing to do Makarria was relegated to sitting in her chamber day in and day out. As uninteresting as the mines were, visiting them was better than her alternative.

"Come along," Siegbjorn said, sensing Makarria's restlessness and leading the way back down the narrow mining tunnel toward Issborg with his lamp held out in front of him.

"Are there any fish in that lake next to your city?" Makarria asked.

"There are a few pale creatures in those waters but nothing you would be able to catch. Certainly not any creatures you would want to eat."

"Maybe we can go to the lake outside then?"

"The day is nearly gone," he told her.

"Tomorrow then?"

Siegbjorn shook his head. "I am sorry. Tomorrow I will be gone. I am to leave on the airship tonight."

Makarria felt hope surge up inside her. "Where are you going? Can I go with you?"

"No," Siegbjorn said, again shaking his head forlornly.

"But I'm your first mate."

"Yes, I wish it was so. But Kadar himself has made it very clear to me: you are to stay with the princess. She is not having an easy time. She needs you. I risk much by taking you way for even a few hours as I do today."

Makarria nodded. It was true enough. Taera had been increasingly quiet of late, ever since the dream she'd had. Nothing Makarria said or did seemed to reach the princess. Taera would smile for Makarria and that was about it. She returned every night from her sessions with Roanna more exhausted than she had been the previous night. Makarria wanted to help, but Taera wouldn't let her. It was exasperating. Everything Makarria offered to do, Taera promptly forbid. She was worse than Makarria's mother.

The narrow tunnel suddenly opened up before Siegbjorn and Makarria, and they were standing in the enormous cavern housing the city of Issborg. It was significantly brighter than it had been in the mining tunnel, but the light emanating through the ice wall on the far side of the city was already waning.

"Night approaches," Siegbjorn noted. "I must return you to your home."

Makarria sighed and said nothing. She followed Siegbjorn away from the city to the north end of the caverns. When they reached Makarria's chamber, she waved silently goodbye to Siegbjorn and walked inside to find Taera already asleep. Makarria pulled the covers up over the princess, then went to her own bed where her dinner—a bowl of porridge, now cold and coagulated—sat at the foot of the mattress. Makarria set the bowl aside and laid down, much too bored to sleep. I wonder where Grampy is right now? I wonder where Mother and Father are? I bet they're all worried about me. Makarria remembered how worried they all were when she had gotten her first moonblood and fallen into the water. And before that, they had been worried about her dreams. Makarria had been good about not dreaming ever since she'd turned her grandfather young. She'd not dreamed since then, and the last dream she could remember before that was the one where she was a princess. Yes, the castle and the violet dress. It was so pretty.

Taera suddenly gasped and jumped up from her bed. "No! Makarria, no."

Makarria jumped halfway out of her own bed she was so startled. "What? I wasn't dreaming, I swear. I wasn't doing anything."

Taera squinted the sleep out of her eyes and shook her head. "No, I'm sorry. It wasn't you who was dreaming. It was me. I've seen the truth of it all."

"You've seen the truth of what?" Makarria asked.

Taera was silent for a long moment, still shaken by what she had seen in her visions. She had told Makarria next to nothing of what took place each day in Roanna's chamber, and she had certainly not told her anything of what Roanna said about the prophecy.

"Please, you can tell me," Makarria said, sensing her reticence.

"I know why we are here," Taera said at last, and with those words the last vestige of her will to keep things secret from Makarria disappeared. I can barely keep myself safe, she realized. What point is there in pretending to protect Makarria by sheltering her from the truth?

"There is a prophecy foretelling how the Emperor will die," Taera began, and she proceeded to tell Makarria everything Roanna had said. The more she spoke, the easier her words came. She told Makarria about the Emperor's ability to stint magic, about the prophecy, about how only women could be dreamwielders, and how Roanna thought Taera was the one spoken of in the prophecy.

Makarria listened intently as Taera recounted everything. "Are you going to do it?" Makarria asked after a long moment of contemplation. "Are you going to kill the Emperor?"

"No," Taera told her. "I couldn't even if I wanted to. I'm not who Roanna thinks I am."

"You're not?"

"No, you are, Makarria."

"That's a silly thing to say," Makarria said, forcing a laugh. "How could I be you?"

"That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that you are the dreamwielder who is foretold to kill the Emperor, not me."

"But you said the prophecy was about a princess."

Taera got up from her bed and walked across the chamber to sit beside Makarria. "Yes, that is exactly what I said. I had another vision tonight and never before has a vision come to me with so much clarity and certainty."

"What did you see?"

"You, Makarria. And you were not the farm girl you claim to be. You were not the tomboyish sea urchin skulking about on a ship that I first met. You were a princess, clad in a violet gown and with a great weight on your shoulders."

"That's impossible," Makarria said, but even as she said it the dreams she'd had back home flashed through her mind.

"I am no dreamwielder," Taera assured her. "Roanna has been trying to teach me, but the power isn't there. It's not in me, it's in you. I don't know how or why, but you have the blood of kings and queens in you, Makarria."

Makarria sat there, too stunned to speak. She didn't know how or why it could be true, but she believed Taera.

"I always suspected there was something more to you," Taera said, "but I wasn't sure and I didn't want to frighten you. I thought I could protect you, Makarria, but all I've done is drag you into further danger. Roanna and Kadar—they're sworn enemies of the Emperor, but I fear they are no better than he is. If they find out who you are, they'll throw you at him. They will try to train you like they do with me, but in the end they will use you to their own ends, they will use you like a weapon to kill the Emperor."

"I don't want to kill anyone," Makarria said, shaking her head at the very thought. She feared the Emperor, she knew her grandfather cursed his name, but that didn't mean she could bring herself kill him, evil or not.

"That's why we must keep this secret and get you out of here," Taera said. "You've made friends with the captain of that airship, yes?"

"Siegbjorn? Yes, but what—"

"He's told you that he has no love for Roanna. You must convince him to take you away, now, before winter fully arrives and you are trapped here."

"I'm not leaving without you," Makarria said.

"Roanna and Kadar won't let me escape, but they have no reason to seek after you. If you disappeared, they would hardly notice. I overheard Roanna say that Siegbjorn might be leaving, to gather news before the first winter storms come. You could steal away with him, then escape when the ship lands."

"It's too late," Makarria said. "He's leaving tonight."

"There's still time then," Taera insisted.

"We're locked in here until morning, Taera. Plus, Siegbjorn told me that Kadar himself said I'm supposed to stay with you. He'll notice if I'm gone."

Taera's hopes dimmed at hearing this, but she was not willing to concede. There had to be a way to protect Makarria, she was certain. "The city you told me about then. The people there will hide you perhaps. They can take you to the other side of the mountain and show you the way out."

"I told you, they collapsed the tunnel on that side," Makarria reminded her. "I could maybe stay in the city, but I wouldn't know who to ask. Siegbjorn only introduced me to a few people and most of them don't speak our language." Makarria realized that she truly didn't want to leave Taera. The Emperor and ancient prophesies were far away and meant little to her. As far as she was concerned, it was more important to stick together, especially now that Makarria knew what was going on. "I'm not going anywhere without you," she declared.

Taera held her head in her hands. She felt completely empty. Hopeless. She considered what her father would do in her position. Or Caile. As much as the two of them did not see eye to eye, they were not so different from each other. Neither one of them would ever give up. They would continue doing what they thought was right until their lives were ripped away from them. Cargan had been the same. Taera owed it to them, she decided, to do nothing less. The problem was, she didn't know what she could possibly do.

"We wait," she said after a long silence. "We'll keep your secret and wait out the winter. I'll do what I can to appease Roanna and keep her hope alive that I am the one. That is all we can do for now. I am sorry, Makarria."

~~~

No more than forty yards away from Makarria and Taera's chamber, Roanna sat down on a velvet cushion in Kadar's chamber. The room was furnished with a carven oak bed and desk; embroidered tapestries hung on the walls; a rug of crimson kork-wool covered the floor from doorway to bedside; and yet, even with the warm glow of many lanterns, it still seemed very much a cave.

Kadar sat on a cushion across from Roanna and stroked his dark eyebrows with his slender, long-nailed fingers. "It takes too long," he said.

"She's only been here a few weeks," Roanna replied, annoyed at his presumptuousness. "We knew it would take time. She's had no training whatsoever before now. We can't expect her to be a mighty sorcerer yet, and besides, we agreed to give her a year or more before even considering confronting Guderian."

"I speak not of confronting him yet. I am telling you it has taken too long to discover her abilities beyond clairvoyance. She is nineteen already. A fully matured woman and yet I detected nothing in her during my examination. And your teachings, they have been fruitless. If her other abilities do not blossom yet of their own accord, we are wasting time—your exercises are not going to awaken them. No, I think we must accelerate matters."

"No, I will not allow it," Roanna snapped. "You promised to let me work with her until she was ready."

"Do not tell me what you will or will not allow, woman!" Kadar snarled, and though his voice was quiet, it filled the chamber with menace. Roanna shrank back on her pillow. "You know as well as anyone how effective my methods are," Kadar went on. "This princess has lived a pampered life. Her mind is soft. We must shock her entire being if we are to reach her true potential. She must suffer pain, know agony. And if that works not, I will give her a child to change her chemistry and draw forth the power inside her."

"Please, just give me more time with her," Roanna begged of him. "I know I can awaken her ability without resorting to those measures."

Kadarregarded her silently for a long moment. "You have three days more, Roanna.That is all. If we see no sign of an awakening in her, then I will be takingover her training."