They must've merely been retracing their earlier steps through the cavernous network to return to Parnakshi, but Esmera's feet felt heavier than they did then with suppressed grief.

She shouldn't hurt this much for Hira. The wildcat was free of this world and its pain. It was only Esmera who had a heavy responsibility to bear.

She had this week to focus on helping Tauram save Milatanur. They would succeed.

There would be no uncertainty, no wavering on Esmera's part. If she failed to protect Milatanur from the gods' wrath, whoever killed her family would be dead before she'd ever reach them, and she couldn't let that happen. For Hira, and for everyone else who had been injured or killed in the massacre 23 years ago.

Tauram kept his arm around her but said nothing. It unsettled Esmera. She always knew him to have some retort, some comeback to lighten any mood. Maybe he didn't know what to say. What was there for him to say?

Even Anjarah seemed to have no words, a flickering silhouette leading the way through the dim, dusty tunnels with a little shadow scurrying at her feet.

Esmera replayed Hira's words in her mind over and over again. It was the only sound she could hear apart from the soft, feeble breathing surrounding her.

It was the only time she would ever talk to anyone in her family. She hadn't known that at the time, or she might've used the opportunity better.

She had thought she might be able to visit Hira again and ask her all the questions she had about her family, but there would be no other visits. No other answers unless she visited the past with the memory walker.

But there was someone who had lived in the past, someone who might have some answers for her, and he was right beside her.

"What were my brothers' names?" she asked Tauram.

There were three of them, he had told her the day before, but that was all she knew about them. When she closed her eyes and tried to recall their faces, all that came up were blanks. Maybe that was no surprise. Esmera had the gift of auditory memory, not visual.

She could only guess at her brothers' appearances. They must've had curly hair like her. They must've shared her olive-toned skin and deep brown eyes.

She closed her eyes. She thought she could remember their childish laughing. She could remember them exclaiming the first time they saw her, heard them shoving each other as they tried to be the first to hold her little hand.

She didn't know whether it was her mind replaying actual memories or just wishful thinking that she had some recollection of the family she would never know.

"Givan was the oldest," said Tauram, his voice rough when he finally spoke. "Then came Yasif, then Abi."

All three of them gone, just children. Esmera didn't want to think about it—whether they had fought, whether they had suffered, how terrified they must've been as they watched everyone around them die.

What kind of sick person would murder children? It was the same person who would've killed a baby had she not been fortunate enough to escape. Esmera could think of no justification for such an act, but then again, she wasn't a villain, and she had learnt long ago that people often did terrible things for a reason she couldn't understand.

Esmera had been the last to be born, but she was older than any of her brothers had lived to be.

It wasn't fair that she had survived, but someone had chosen to save her. Someone must've smuggled Esmera to safety. She certainly hadn't fled on her own, but when she closed her eyes, no face came into her head, and no voice played through her mind. Maybe that was an answer she'd find when she went to the Finnaz estate, as Hira had promised.

"Will Hira be buried?" she asked Anjarah.

She couldn't bear to think of her father's familiar's bones finding their final resting place in a place so dark and hopeless. There should at least be sunshine. Maybe some grass and flowers to serenade her to the world beyond this one.

"Yes." Anjarah turned her head to the side. Her lantern's light etched out her soft profile, her full lips and her slightly upturned nose. "There are special last rituals that must be done for orphaned familiars. I will make the arrangements tomorrow as soon as SUAF opens for service." She shivered, rubbing her hand over her bare arm as they left the cave and stepped out into the rocky cup perched on the mountainside. She had sacrificed her shawl to cover Hira before they left the cave, and the night had only grown colder since.

Esmera tugged her shawl loose where it sat around her shoulders. "Here." She draped it over Anjarah.

She pulled it tightly around her, aiming a grateful smile at Esmera. "Thank you."

It was a sliver of fabric that did little against the icy mountain top night, but it was better than nothing. It was the least Esmera could offer Anjarah after everything she had done.

"I should be thanking you," said Esmera through the sudden tears brimming in her eyes. "For taking care of Jammas and Hira for all these years that I wasn't here to do it."

"It was my pleasure." Anjarah smiled. "And my job." She returned the lantern to its sheltered spot and turned to the stairs, ascending them back to the town with Samier hopping along beside her.

With Jammas still huddled among her curls, Esmera followed slowly, all too aware of the fall that would follow the slightest misstep. Tauram took up the rear with Lundas still prowling at his feet.

They returned to the edge of Parnakshi, and the night sky opened above them, glittering streams of galaxies blended with shades of blue unlike any palette Esmera had ever seen. She admired it for just a moment before Tauram was beside her, pulling her after Anjarah.

Lundas wove around the ankles obstructing his path to the front of the group. He bounded along the edge of the town, sure-footed while everyone else stepped with caution. The ground was uneven, and Esmera couldn't be sure there weren't fragile sections of rock that would give way if she placed too much weight on it.

Parnakshi was quieter now, sleepy with stirs and snores and the odd shuffle of tired feet. It was almost as silent as the cave of orphaned familiars, but it pulsed with a slow, steady life.

Lundas came to a halt. Esmera followed his gaze, squinting ahead. She couldn't see Tauram's cottage from here, but Lundas must be able to, or else he wouldn't have stopped. Anjarah and Samier huddled close to Esmera and Tauram as Lundas traced circles around them with his lean form.

Esmera blinked, and they were on the doorstep where they had met Anjarah earlier that evening with the porch light glowing above them. How things had changed since then.

Esmera's tentative hope had faded out. An unforeseen sadness and the heavy burden of a new mission had taken its place despite her satisfaction with the answers she had gotten, both more or less than she had hoped for.

Esmera took a breath. One mission at a time. That's what she had promised herself. Jilhari's task was up first, and then Esmera would seek justice for the Finnaz family.

"I should be going." Anjarah held Esmera's shawl out to her.

Esmera waved her hand. "Keep it until you get home. You can always return it another time." It wasn't even her shawl to lend, but Anjarah needed it a lot more than she did.

Tauram tilted his head. "I think you should come inside for a little while. There's something we need to discuss."

Anjarah's dark eyes widened in alarm. "Is it about Belaren?"

"No." Tauram raised his eyebrows. "I don't recommend trying to reason with him when he's in a mood, but you can try."

Anjarah lowered her gaze to her feet so that it was impossible to read what she was thinking. "I guess I can come in for a quick chat. Are you sure Belaren won't mind?" She peeked up at Tauram.

"It's my house, so it doesn't matter whether he minds." Tauram held the door open.

"Fair enough." Anjarah gave a feeble smile that didn't convince Esmera that she was convinced by what Tauram had said. Even so, she scurried inside, probably glad to be out of the cold as Esmera was.

The lock clicked as Tauram locked the door behind them. Esmera heard him pull on it to double-check.

She appreciated his caution now that she had seen King Ruagu for herself. A locked door couldn't protect them from a king's army, but it would give them time to gather so that Lundas could transport them somewhere safe, and that was all they needed.

Belaren appeared in front of them, his chiselled face expressionless in a way that was somehow more unsettling than his angry one. Esmera didn't need any power to sense the tension choking the air.

"Tauram, Esmera, you're back. Anjarah." Belaren's eyes lingered on Anjarah for just a moment before he returned his gaze to Tauram.

Tauram had brought Anjarah inside against his wishes, but his accusation remained only in his eyes and didn't slip out between his lips that were pressed together.

"Sit." Tauram gestured to the sofa, commanding everyone else in the room like the king he was born to be.

They trailed in the direction he indicated as one, their familiars following their leads. Myresh popped his furry head out of Belaren's dark silk-lined pocket. Jammas stirred where he rested in Esmera's hair. Samier squawked at Anjarah's ankles, and she lifted him onto her lap so he could be part of this impromptu meeting that Esmera suspected may not be as impromptu as it seemed.

Tauram straightened to his full height at the front of the room as though he was about to address an assembly. He must have something planned, even though Esmera had no idea what it was. Lundas pounced up onto the coffee table to remind the familiars that he was their king.

They remembered. They all fell still and silent as the sorcerers they accompanied.

"It's time we have a team meeting." Tauram clasped his hands together.

"I did not agree to be part of any team." Belaren scowled, slumping back against the sofa where he sat beside Esmera.

Anjarah blinked on the other side of her. "I have no idea what this team is supposed to be for."

"Exactly. That's why we're having this meeting." Tauram cleared his throat, smoothing his creaseless tunic. "Just to bring you up to speed, Anjarah, the goddess Jilhari returned us to Milatanur. She charged us with overthrowing King Ruagu within the week. The nature spirits are in an uproar, protesting against his rule because he isn't the rightful king of the land. The only way to appease them is for me to defeat Ruagu and reclaim my throne, or else the gods will destroy this kingdom and start a peaceful era afresh."

"Jumping jalebi," Anjarah breathed. "So that's why there have been those tsunamis of rock and sand have been swallowing the land."

Esmera and Tauram exchanged a glance. They had guessed as much when they saw the ruined land at the edge of Parnakshi.

"People have raised the issue, but King Ruagu hasn't been able to find a solution." Anjarah frowned.

"Of course he hasn't. He's the problem, and removing him is the solution." Tauram's jaw tightened. "That's what this team is about, Anjarah. Jilhari told us the Finnazes' mysterious weapon may be our best chance of defeating Ruagu, but we know nothing about it. That's why we asked you to take us to Hira tonight. You've been a great help to us. Honestly, we would have already failed the mission without you."

Esmera nodded her agreement. Without Anjarah, they would've never been able to communicate with Hira to get the answers they needed, answers nobody in the land could give them except her. They wouldn't even have known about Hira if it wasn't for her.

She had even fabricated the details on Esmera's form to claim Jammas to protect her and Tauram. She must've proven to Tauram at some point over ten years ago that she could be trusted, and she had proven that again over the last day.

Tauram pressed his hands together in front of him in a beseeching gesture that Esmera would've never pictured of a prince. "That's why I'm asking you to join the team, Anjarah."

"To prevent doomsday." She quirked an eyebrow.

"In short, yes." Tauram gave a wry smile that couldn't mask the intensity of the hope in his voice.