#hikaj

Queen Masara turns from the windows. She doesn’t smile, doesn’t move to sit, and doesn’t gesture for him to sit either. Nor, Panam realizes, does she look at all chastened.

Suddenly hesitant—then brutally quashing the instinct—Panam crosses half the room, just to the edge of a sofa. He's seen hints of this Masara before, calm and sure of herself, but never with him. He thought he'd made sure of that.

“I hear you have been out voted, Prince Panam,” Masara says serenely, still at the window. But she’s looking at him now, and Panam sees how much effort it takes her. Not yet an opening, but he can make it one. “I might have sworn you once promised me you were never going to lose power.”

Panam clenches his fists. “I have been a loyal prime minister. I have guided us most capably through the war and successfully overseen the assimilation of the newest territories," he reminds her.

“You began the war,” Masara replies, still calm. “And I was foolish enough to allow you to do so, and kingdom we have swallowed may yet become a poison."

“Your people love you for what I have done," Panam says, cold and proud. Her greatest victories are his, and she would be a nothing queen, beloved by no one if not for Lord Prince Panam.

“My people love me because I am queen.”

Panam works his mouth silently, too furious to put words to all the ways he is being used by all this ungrateful disrespect.

"You will not accept a new government," Panam says instead, cool, ready to brook no argument. You will request a new vote."

Masara meets his furious gaze straight on, which only incites Panam further.

"I have already met with Duke Inarim," she says. The name strikes Panam like an open-handed slap to the face; he almost would have preferred the violence.  "He will be Lord Duke when I open the Grand Assembly."

“When was this?” Panam demands.

“Yesterday, when I invited him to form a government. He has some very good ideas I am looking forward to seeing in the coming years,” Masara says coolly, politely. “And I have written to invite Prince Hokiraj to stay with us for a while. You should not feel obliged to call on him. It would be wisest if you kept your distance, in fact. Given your intimate involvement in the war we just ended, as you just reminded me.”

---

"There’s an update to the ball," Lord Kinlo crows over the letter. "To celebrate the fifth year of Queen Masara's reign."

Hikaj stares sullenly at the ceiling, sprawled over his mother's old fainting sofa. "What does this matter to me, Kinlo?" he growls.

He remembers the first year of Masara's reign, when his father was still alive. Hikaj had been at the coronation, and watched as the new queen twirled like a pretty doll in the arms of her second cousin--a prince and Lord of the Great Assembly. Hikaj had been introduced to her as well, and they had danced briefly. Protocol had required that she dance with him, as he represented his father, the ailing old king at the time, and she had been--well.

She was elegance itself. And the dance was as well as it could have been, kind in its brevity, as it did not give Hikaj time to put his foot too much in his mouth.

Hikaj doubts she remembers that. And besides, she has emerged from the shadow of her cousin the prime minister, a queen in her own right, while he has grown... much differently.

"She's named her partner for the opening dance," Kinlo announces.

"Are you sure you haven't received an invitation, Highness? A personal letter, perhaps?"

"Oh, shut up Kinlo," Hikaj complains, mulish. "Of course I received the invitation, and of course I'm ignoring it for as long as I can. I'm a vassal prince. That barely means anything.”

Kinlo says nothing, but looks very thoughtful.

Thoughtful enough that Hikaj puts aside his sour mood for long enough to be curious.

"Tell me," he says after a minute. "What are you hiding? O what have I missed in my petulance?"

Kinlo grinned. "Our queen Masara has named you to open the dance with her," he said, without any preamble.

Hikaj sat up straight so quickly, he felt something in his neck crack.

"Kinlo," he said, "That is not a funny joke."

Kinlo waved a thick card decorated with marked with blue and silver and curling script, and a small envelope sealed by silver-grey wax with a large, visible M.

"If it’s a joke, highness," he said, laughing, “I’m not the one playing it.”

Hikaj flopped back on the fainting couch almost bonelessly, and flung an arm over his eyes. His head buzzed with possibilities, with endless avenues of action, things he could finally do for Kas with the queen's attention.

"Oh gods, Kinlo," he said. "Open it quickly and break it to me easy. I don’t think I can handle this."

----

The queen allowed the prince the choice of music; and Hikaj, who remembered how Masara had mentioned the Kassan waltz with interest during their brief conversation, chose a traditional--native--piece.

The queen must have learned the steps during the war, because she did not object to Hikaj's choice; nor did she object to a Kassan waltz opening the ball in honor of her reign as queen of Amir (and Damira, and now Kas).

They didn't speak to each other before they danced. That wasn't the Amirran custom--partners should meet first on the dance floor. A lady had to be danced with before she could be spoken to.

When the first unmistakeable notes of the music Hikaj had chosen were played, loud and drawn out, the room moved easily to allow space in their center. Hikaj stepped out, before Masara, and bowed deeply. Very deeply.

Masara caught his hand, and pulled him upright with a gentle but firm tug. "Prince Hokiraj," she said softly, "I hope you do not think yourself so low in my eyes.”

Hikaj brought Masara's hand to his lips and brushed a kiss over her knuckles, beginning the dance with a proper greeting. Taking up her other hand, Hikaj stepped in close. The music began in earnest with this signal.

"Your Majesty," Hikaj murmured, in the space between them where the steps brought them yet closer. “You have become a powerful queen since we last danced, and I am yet a prince.” He would never wear his father’s crown.

He spun the queen out, in measured, elegant steps, and then they drew in close to circle each other again. Hikaj stared at the air above them, where their wrists were delicately twined, though not yet touching. It was only the first pass of the dance, after all.

“You may never be king, as you thought,” Masara said, as unflinching with this truth as with any other—but when Hikaj looked down at her face in surprise, he saw kindness in her dark eyes, an understanding that did not shy from what she had stolen from him. “But that does not mean you cannot have what you have always wanted.”

They separated, and when they came together again, Masara continued, “There is always the possibility of a new Lord Prince of the Assembly.”

Hikaj said nothing for a long moment, lost in the dance and in that renewed fluttering of possibilities, of what could be done with power. The steps were slow, elegant but comparatively easy—no excuse for his silence. Finally, when they made a closed circle once more, he asked, “Are you asking me to stand in your government?”

Masara’s reply was instant, laughing, delivered across the slowly opening space between them. “I do not choose who stands in the Great Assembly.”

“Then what is it you would have of me?”

But the dance, Hikaj realized with a start, was over. He was already bowing over Masara's hand, a far more natural courtesy, and the queen inclined her head. On impulse, Hikaj kissed the only ring she wore.

He was rewarded with a smile as the dance floor around them filled in with the swish of skirts and murmured greetings. It was surprised and delighted, almost shy too, and Hikaj knew, instantly, that he could die for a woman who smiled at him like that.

You are disgustingly dramatic, a voice suspiciously like Kinlo's said in Hikaj's head, but Hikaj was very practiced at ignoring it.

He offered the queen his arm. "I have danced with you, Your Majesty, and I believe that means I am now free to say again: what is it that you ask of me?"

The queen let herself be led from the dance floor, couples swirling away as they passed, and back in again behind them.  

“Only that you call me Masara, if you wish."

Hikaj tried not to swallow his tongue.

"And, perhaps," the queen added, "a little advice."

"You dance the waltz beautifully, Masara," Hikaj said instantly. "You can't want for advice there."

Masara looked amused. "No; fortunately a waltz is something I may practice in private a thousand times."

“Your practice has made you a wonderful dancer,” Hikaj assured her.

“But I fear I do not have quite so much time, when it comes to peace with Kas,” the queen replied, soft and serious now. Anyone might have heard them, in the ballroom, but for the invisible barrier of space afforded to them by respect and protocol.

Hikaj suddenly felt like he was seventeen again, in that moment when he'd realized Masara's quiet reserve hid more than the puppet of Lord Prince Panam. That flash of insight had startled Hikaj into more honesty than he would've preferred. He's lamented about his father's war and what it had done to his people, in the short, insufficient space left by a dance... But here was that honesty returned to him.

Five years later, when Hikaj was the age now that Queen Masara had been then.

"I think we are more forgiving than you fear," Hikaj said. "If you came to visit us, and stayed with us a little--show Kas what we are gaining for all that we have lost. Give us consolation."

Masara huffed a laugh. "Hokiraj, I am not so naive as to think that alone will do it."

Masara's heart––already burning her chest with grief and war––had leapt into her throat and turned to fear when she'd seen Arlis emerge from the tunnel pass, adept enough with the spells that she could open the hidden routes on her own. Masara's young, foolish squire, who had followed her because she thought her knight-mistress had gone off to do something brave, when all Masara was was reckless, desperate––and desperately hopeful.

Panam as heir was safe, the king was on his way to the Yina stronghold, and Fathmir, who had been at the holy mountain's summit since the new moon, could be made High Priest soon. The heart of Amir would be preserved, even though Amirasa had fallen. Even though things might had been different, before the assassination and the war.

Masara knew her part now. She was the most experienced knight traveling with her uncle––fleeing, navigating the twisting paths and hidden tunnels that wound through the foothills of the Endless Ridge. The king had to make it to the safety of Mount Yina, and that was worth Masara's life.

In some small measure, Amir would survive, watchful and isolated while her southern lands became a battlefield between two imperial powers. Ancient Lapur to the southwest, hemmed in by the Blasted Plains, and Kas to the northeast, a young and eager threat.

Masara had dreamed of her kingdom’s waning. She had felt the shadow of death hanging over her head since Panam had brought news of the High Priest's assassination.

When she had volunteered to lead the pursuers away from the king's trail as he and a fragment of his court ran for holy Yina, the king had faced her as her father wold have––grieved, yet proud. But he had faced her as her king, too, grimly resigned to her sacrifice.

"You might have been one of our greatest queens, if my sister and I chose differently," he had whispered.

Masara could scarcely meet her uncle's eyes.

"I dreamed a fire would burn away my future, during my rites,” she confessed. One did not usually speak of the visions, if there were any, but Masara thought she could ease her uncle’s conscience. “When Panam came with word of my father's death... I already knew how this could end. This is my decision, Uncle."

"May the Lady Sascrin guard your path, Masara," the king said.

The knight knelt, and kissed her uncle's hand, and when she rose––when the king drew her to her feet to hug her one last time, the farewell embrace she never had from her father––she smiled.

"It will be your job to look after Arlis now,” she said when they pulled away from each other. She stepped back.

Arlis was a jealous squire, and would likely be furious when she realized Masara had ridden to battle without her. Later, she would come to understand that she was too young for this.

And then the little fool had burst from one of the rocky passages, into the pitched skirmish while Masara charged a company with a twilit illusion, riding alongside moonbeams, and dropped the bridge to cut off pursuit of the king’s path.

She thought the destroyed bridge would been a good place to die, right up until she saw Arlis and realized with a ringing clarity, Not now. Her squire needed her.

Masara's vision filled with molten silver, magic in her hands and spitting down the length of her blade, and Arlis flickered across the field in her mind's eye, a star to be guarded. When they reached each other—the knight a blur of spell and steel, her squire a smaller whirlwind no less fierce for her youth, and Kassan footmen with their blue-rimmed shields and clumsy swords—Arlis screamed, and Masara's world exploded.

In the tent, when she opened her eyes, the physical ache seemed to coalesce in her chest as she put everything back together again.

There was her beloved, fool squire whom Masara would protect with her last breath; and beyond that, all the things that threatened her.

Masara and Arlis were tied side by side to foldable campaign chairs, which was quite civilized, all things considered. She could see spells crawling on the walls of the tent, and smelled the distinctive sting of burning a sharp, distinctive incense. Natural inhibitors of magic.

"Do you know where we are?" Masara spoke. Her voice was cracked and barely audible; her throat dry as dust. Unlike Arlis, she was tied to her chair by only one arm, because the other was broken. She woke with it cradled against her chest in a sling.

"I'm sorry, sir, I––” Arlis began urgently, quick and breathless, all the words she'd been thinking while Masara was unconscious now tumbling out. Masara let her relieve herself. "I shouldn't have followed, and then I ruined your plan and you went down––and I panicked. I surrendered. I thought they were going to kill you!”

“You did as you should have done, Arlis," Masara assured her squire when she fell silent. “I am grateful to be alive."

It was true. Masara had made her peace with her sacrifice, but she hadn't wanted to die. If she could live––and she had somehow, for Arlis or thanks to her––she would. (She wondered if this meant her vision was wrong; or if there was another fire threatening her horizons.)

"But Masara," Arlis mumbled. “You weren’t about to surrender.”

“That only means you have proven yourself wiser than me.”

“But... I told them who you are.”

Masara considered her broken arm––splinted and bandaged, carefully tended to like the rest of her battered body, and found Arlis's confession did not surprise her.

"And yourself, too?" Masara asked.

"Yes."

"Good," Masara said firmly. "We are alive now, and I will not see you die, Arlis."

Her squire knew enough to hear the grim promise.

"Sir," she acknowledged. "I don't think they'll hurt me. They think I'm a child––a poor, misguided girl-child who accidentally maimed some soldiers..." Arlis indulged in a little complaining, and when Masara recalled her visit to the Kassan court years ago, she decided Arlis was probably justified. And yet, they still burned the incense; they still spelled the tent. They were cautious.

"They were horrified when they realized you were a woman, and that was before I explained you are a high lady," Arlis continued. "After that, they bundled us up and had a surgeon come; you were stabbed through the shoulder, by the way. I tried to do what I could, on the road yesterday. They put us in a wagon and set a guard. They don't think very highly of me, and didn’t notice I what I was doing."

Masara considered that, and realized that was why that whole upper side of her hurt, not just the broken arm.

"Thank you, Arlis," she sighed. "It's called battlefield healing for a reason, and you've always been one of the best. I am fortunate." It really wasn't much more than cleansing wounds and dulling pain, but it was more than nothing.

Arlis grinned. "Am I better than Guira?"

Masara ignored the question, as she always did. She smiled, and then her lip split. Grimacing––carefully––she asked, “How long was I out?”

“The rest of the evening and all of yesterday. We stopped last night, and I slept, so it may be morning again,” Arlis reported. “You destroyed the footbridge we used, and that was the only easy path for a large party, so they've had to retreat back out of the foothills. They didn't stop until they were out, which was late last night."

Masara was shocked to hear she had been unconscious for so long--but something in the back of her head disagreed, remembered a dream, perhaps. Later. She said instead, "These are Sascrin's foothills; outlanders think they are cursed. Even I only turned back to make very, very certain they would too."

Some things were too important to leave to should and probably; the king had understood that when Masara proposed remaining behind to guard their rear.

Arlis didn't ask her what the plan was now. She didn't ask what it had been, either.

Trust, or insight? Masara thought it was the former, and she tried to turn her worry into resolve. Her uncle had depended on her before; now Arlis did.

"Has anyone spoken to you?"

"Only a captain," Arlis reported. “He said their general could decide what to do with nobility."

"And have you seen a mage?"

"No. But I do think there's one around. The tent could've been prepared, but the incense smells... intent."

Masara tilted her head––carefully, to avoid tugging at any other injuries she wasn't fully aware of––and smiled lopsided at Arlis, trying to avoid the split. "Very good," she said, winced, and licked at the cut. "I thought you might notice that; that's the scent of the mage's spell. Now, what other kinds of magic inhibitors are they using?”

"Sir," Arlis protested, half-indignant, but she was looking at the canvas around them. She knew better than to try and fuss more over Masara's wounds; she'd already done what she could. It was nothing she would not recover from, she decided––given a chance to recover, of course.

"We're currently bound to chairs in a spelled tent, Arlis," Masara said. "We might as well have a brief lesson."

Masara heard rather than saw Arlis's roll of the eyes. She could never keep from that airy, "As you say, sir."

But Masara saw how she relaxed a little, easing back into her seat and straining  less at her bonds.

"Let's begin with the standard suppression spells," Masara went on. "One of the nice thing about them is that they're always visible, as it's active magic, and look––these weavers didn't even try for subtlety. Tell me which ones you know already."

Arlis and Masara discussing the fire protection spell woven into the seams of the tent, where the different cuts of fabric had been sewn together, and how they served to isolate each separate piece of fabric, when they were interrupted.

"It looks newly done," Masara murmured. "And it looks northern too, not like a spell that's been fully assimilated." That was the thing about magic. There were always spells and brews you could learn, but they worked best when you had truly made it yours, or if it was yours.

Masara often wished the fireless explosions Arlis was so fond of hadn't been her obvious calling.

"How can you––" Arlis began, but then the tent flap opened and a man stuck his head in.

He came all the way in when he saw Masara was awake, daylight flashing through the opening, and stood before them.

"Good," he observed after an assessing gaze. "Surgeon said if you were out the whole two days, we might have problems."

He wasn't a very tall man, but he was broad-shouldered and confident, a soldier in a blue cloak. He had the olive skin and dark hair of some of the Kassan, though with clearer, lighter eyes that spoke of some northern heritage. Or magic and vanity.

The soldier crossed his arms and frowned when Masara said nothing. It took Masara a moment to realize he had been expecting her to speak––he had asked no question. She instead had been looking to Arlis, to see if her squire recognized the soldier, but a twitch of Arlis's fingers said, he's new, and Masara wondered again where they were. The tent also kept them from hearing just what kind of camp lay outside. Masara would bet it was far larger than the one company that braved the foothills and her attack, if the general was said to be coming.

"Are you injured?" the soldier demanded, eyes narrowing.

Masara smiled––carefully, lopsided.

"I believe so," she answered.

The soldier's frown didn't change. "Well enough to speak the general now, I see."

"Lead on!" Arlis challenged boldly, unwilling to be overlooked and left behind. Masara didn't bother to check her.

"Oh no," the soldier corrected with a grim smile. "Do you think we're letting you out of this nice tent? The general's on his way here. You should be honored. Him coming to you." The soldier sounded disgruntled enough by the necessary breach of etiquette that not even Arlis commented.

They didn't have to wait long. The soldier left the tent after another moment of silence––did he think either Masara or Aris would say something, unprompted?––and then the flap opened again, and he returned. This time, he was followed by a younger man, another soldier, alert and brisk. He'd become very tan under the Amirran sun, his hair burnished to a golden blond currently bare of a crown, but Masara was surprised to recognize the general.

Arlis shifted by her side, suspicious. The general regarded the both of them in silence, his pale brown eyes almost dark in the tent's dim light.

"Leave it open, Kinlo," the general––if that was how he chose to style himself––said, and Kinlo, the first soldier, went to pull back the opening. Clear morning light spilled inside, silhouetting the general, and from his slight smirk, he knew its effect. "They won't run."

Masara quite honestly didn't feel up to a break for freedom, so he was right, which was mildly irritating. The smoke of the incense kept her weak, as though she hadn't slept or rested in days.

"We're in the middle of my camp. Surrounded by thousands of men," the general explained reasonably. One couldn't hope to escape or be rescued against such odds. Amir's people really would be penned into the foothills, with Yina as her only stronghold. "Of course," the general said, "we will treat a high lady of the land and..." he trailed off, and frowned at Arlis.  What stories had his men had told of Masara and Arlis's capture?

Arlis's fingers twitched. Treat us with honor, I bet, she signed. Masara affected not to notice, and did not smile.

"Well?" the general prompted.

Masara lifted her gaze and fixed on the shadows by the door. "I didn't realize you wanted an answer," she excused herself. "The young Lady Arlis is my squire, if that is what you were looking for."

The general nodded, as if all was now confirmed for him, and he stepped to the side, away from the tent opening. It was strange to think of such a man––young, open-faced, eager for action and the field itself––ordering the High Priest's death. This general had plenty of battlefields to choose from, without provoking a new series of them. But he had advisers, and they were apparently in the capital, directing the empire while the general was here.

"And it was the two of you who blocked the advance company?"

Masara inclined her head as far as she could.

"You wouldn't have gotten far anyway." Arlis raised her voice in a taunt. "The foothills can be quite haunted, you know."'

The general snorted. "I don't doubt it. I don't think 'foothills' is fair name for them, either. It's like calling the Henori river a little creek. I'm ready to forget the whole campaign." He sounded matter-of-fact.

"By all means, do," Masara suggested.

"But there's Lapur to worry about. And your mages."

"Our mages," Masara repeated, turning it into a question with an arched brow. The movement pulled at a scrape on her cheek by her hairline.

The general looked at her, slow and considering.

"Yes. Mine are worried. My advisers tell me it's unnatural that you don't use spells. Materials, incantations - the common instruments." He paused, then added: "Is it?"

Masara spoke before Arlis could. "Your imperial majesty," she said blandly, deciding now was as good a moment as any to dispense with all pretense, "why should any Amirran spill our secrets to you?"

Arlis frowned, backing down. She hadn't known who the general was, and Masara could tell she was swiftly reconsidering their situation.  

"I have found some who were very talkative, actually," the emperor-general retorted. Arlis hissed at the implication of torture––but Masara frowned at the general’s honest, untroubled irritation, and heard her quiet oft-ignored fear confirmed.

There was a traitor.

How else could Amirasa have fallen? And their escape to the foothills had been too close, too harried. Masara signed another hold to Arlis, one that called for caution, and said nothing.

"Unfortunately, they do not know much about your magics."

"You have captured Amirasa," Masara replied mildly, though the admission was ash on her tongue. She didn't dare ask for the general's chatty Amirran, not yet. "If your mages cannot see the spells of our city, that does not mean anything."

"They see those spells," the emperor-general clarified. "The battle magic, on the other hand..."

He trailed off expectantly, but neither Arlis nor Masara rose to fill the silence. When it stretched on, the emperor straightened, chin lifting as though he suddenly felt the weight of his crown, and said, "Even if you don't talk, you will be useful bargaining tools. Perhaps now your king will be tempted to meet me at a crossroads. What do you think, High Lady Masara?"

Masara offered the lopsided smile she could, but without warmth. "If negotiation is what you wish, I will write to my king myself."

"You doubt me?" the general demanded.

"Your army holds our ancient capital. You have done nothing but kill our people and claim our land."

"I sent an ambassador, and your king gave him back and declared war."

"Ambassador?" Arlis snapped. "Is that a new word for assassin?"

"What are you talking about?"

"The High Priest," Masara answered succinctly. It came out flat, an accusation torn free of the sudden hollow chasm that threatened her. It appeared suddenly, as usual, and nearly all-encompassing. She breathed through it slowly, counting in her head to ten.

"He was the head of a militant religious order," the general replied carefully, sensing the delicacy of the topic. "The greatest obstacle to diplomacy. He would never accept surrender."

Arlis scowled, but Masara called for her silence again––she was never very obedient for long, but she held her tongue for the moment.

"And did your sources also believe Amir would be amenable to surrender after an assassination?" Masara asked, with pointed equanimity.

The emperor-general frowned, and crossed his arms, and then changed the subject.

"I think the most important thing to remember is Lapur. They cannot be allowed to grow past the Blighted lands."

"How gratifying, that our kingdom can be a foothold in your imperial wars."

It wasn't exactly a fair assessment; Lapur worried Amir, too, with its constant, probing incursions north of the desert, into the no man's land usually left to Amir.

But it was Kas, young and full of its own power who had invaded, not Lapur.

The emperor-general's eyes narrowed, glinting nearly like gold as he coolly declared, "Say what you will, High Lady. But we cannot afford an Amirran succession crisis, not with Lapur so close and so restless."

Masara gestured minutely, freeing Arlis while she considered the general's words.

"That was your reasoning for your conquest of Seriona," Arlis burst out, after holding her tongue for what surely felt like ages to her. "We are not Seriona. In Amir, we know our king and our prince!"

The general frowned at Arlis, but replied to her as seriously as he had to Masara. "And if your king should prefer his niece over his son?" he challenged.

Arlis strained briefly, forgetting she was tied up as she tried to point at Masara. "We are here," she settled for instead, spitting the words out furiously. "A lone knight sacrificed to hold off your whole company, the high lady, the king's supposed favorite––doesn't that tell you anything?"

A new uneasiness settled in Masara's chest as she realized how badly she had underestimated her young squire. Arlis understood Masara's decision... and she was still a fool for endangering herself. In the past half year of border skirmishes, the outbreak of war, and their flight from Amirasa, Arlis had grown up a great deal.

Masara felt she herself had aged decades.

The general's expression didn't change, yet Masara still felt a shift in his attitude.

"It tells me more than you know," he said, and then waved his hand, dismissing the matter. "My ladies, I've been distracted from my purpose. I simply wished to inform you that you will be hostages until a suitable agreement can be come to with your king, which I hope will come swiftly. Until then, you will be kept with the camp quite safely, and we will do our best to see you treated with honor. If you need anything within reason, you need only shout to the guards." He glanced at Arlis, and added, "I don't think you'll have an issue with that."

Arlis regarded the general balefully. He ignored the young squire's glares, and asked Masara directly, "Should I send the surgeon to you again, my lady?"

Arlis fumed under her breath about it being his fault anyway; Masara's mind spun.

"That would be appreciated, your imperial majesty," she said quietly, focused more on the realizations that were slowly coming together for her, overcoming her unwillingness to see them.

"In the field, I prefer the title Imperial General. Hokiraj," said the emperor, magnanimous in his role as captor, familiarity offered as a flattering courtesy.

"Well then, Imperial General. It appears we are in your hands," Masara returned in kind, though distracted.

The imperial general coughed, made a vague noise of agreement, and then made his departure with, "I will send that surgeon along. Later, we will discuss that letter and what terms your king may agree to.”

As soon as he was gone, Kinlo followed him out and shut the tent. The haste of his exit went on unremarked, and it was Arlis who finally broke the silence.

“I think there’s a traitor, sir,” she whispered, reluctant to speak her fear too loudly.

Her squire was so old at fourteen, yet Masara wanted to protect her still. "I think I know who it is,” she prevaricated.

The king had broached the idea of changing the succession only once that Masara knew of, and only idly. Masara knew he would never act without his son’s complete agreement; it was how rule had been decided between himself and his older sister, Masara’s mother. He had thought he might have Panam’s approval.

Only Panam and Masara were not siblings, and it had been a while since they had been close as such.

Oh, cousin, she thought, unease dripping through her memories of Panam like oil. Could you really?

She had visited Kas years ago, with one of her king's councilors, and they had both been unfailingly polite. Duke Inarim, High Lady Masara, and their whole, modest entourage. Hikaj knew, because his spymaster had complained that the Amirran servants had answered all of his questions happily, or happily misunderstood them—and his veiled offers of bribes for real information. 

At the formal dinners they attended, the high lady said little, but was always polite, and Hikaj had heard her laugh often enough. It had been enough to make him wonder if she knew something incriminating about every person she crossed paths with. Admittedly, he had been a little high-strung those days. Torral was the kind to be happy doing a job competently, but Hikaj's other dear uncle had liked the regency a bit too well. Hikaj had walked a fine line, trying to appear non-threatening while still presenting himself as a future ruler full of potential that his vassal kings and dukes could put their weight behind. It had made him very suspicious about every interaction around him.

But then they had danced, and Hikaj had started to see that High Lady Masara didn't laugh at anyone in particular, but at all the little parts of his court he hardly saw anymore. From the tiny carved woodland creatures that flitted through the ballroom's ceiling to the tendency to change glasses for each new drink at dinner, she had taken delight in the novelty of his court--not laughed at its secrets. She had seemed to know very little about Kas, actually.  

Now, with the weight of Masara's strange sword in his hands, Hikaj was back to thinking that maybe it was the secrets. When he had recognized High Lady Masara in the knight he'd been told had charged his advance company alone, he felt a little bit like laughing himself. At himself. 

They'd gone riding during the Amirran visit, in a large party that scattered into small groups and wended their collective way through the manicured Forests of the Empress-Mother. The ever-changing groups of courtiers flitting here and there again centered around a string of nobles who preferred the most sedate of paces. High Lady Masara had been one of those riders, hesitant in her sidesaddle, good-naturedly laughing at her own inexperience with a shifting tide of the Kassan court. Hikaj decided she simple hadn't had many chances to ride before.

Now, he wondered what kind of rider the knight Masara was. How many more things in Amir were mysteries to him? 

***

Hikaj crossed his camp back to the bespelled tent, Masara's sword and scabbard in his hands and a nervous energy quickening his step. He should have let Qemaile go and poke the bear, he was the mage, after all - but Hikaj honestly wasn't sure if Lady Arlis would send poor Qemaile into a uselessly towering rage, or leave him crying and still unhelpful. Hikaj needed his mage, as temperamental as the man was, so he went to the tent himself.

It was guarded, but the flap was tied open for light, breaking the net of spellcloth. They had stopped burning the slightly caustic incense and started opening the tent after the high lady and her squire had each given an oath not to flee. Hikaj had made sure his healers looked after the high lady, too. While Lady Arlis had surrendered with barely a scratch on her, one of Masara's arm was broken and a spear had gone through - luckily enough, the healers told Hikaj - mostly skin and muscle where arm and shoulder met. It was declared to be healing as expected, and it had not seemed to trouble Masara too much on the (admittedly slow) ride back to Amir's capital city.

The ride had taken a week because of the hilly country, which turned large companies of men into slow, winding targets on the narrow roads, but Hikaj had taken the risk. He had also left a rear guard behind, to keep Amir's forces penned up in the blasted mountainous Foothills as a guarantee.

Now the spelled tent - and the bulk of the imperial soldiers - were all camped outside Amirasa's outer walls. At the Sascrin knights' request, the tent's opening faced the city that rose up on a high hill, topped by a sprawling palace that overlooked the cliffs and the sea on one side, and Amirasa on the other.

Hikaj blocked their view of it when he ducked into the tent.

He could tell they'd been looking because Lady Arlis had the intent, stormy look on, the one that seeing his blue-cloaked guards on the walls always provoked. She was leaning forward in her chair, her elbows on her knees, and she reminded Hikaj of a wildcat about to pounce. Masara, of course, was calmly collected by her side. But was she also angry behind that calm? Or was she hiding something else? 

Or maybe he was reading too much into what was just polite civility. It didn't help that Masara's attention--but not her expression--shifted as soon as she saw what Hikaj was carrying. Arlis didn't see--she straightened and jerked her head to the side so that Hikaj couldn't see her face when she noticed him. Struggling to control her anger, probably.

She was able to mirror Masara's calm for abut half a second, and then her eyes narrowed suspiciously on Masara's sword.

"Oh, let me guess," the squire immediately snapped. “You have questions.”

Hikaj tried a smile. "There must be something you can speak about," he said, already conciliatory in his preamble. Part of him regretted already starting on the back foot, but the rest of him was focused on High Lady Masara's sudden smile.

She didn't say anything.

"Why should we spill secrets to the emperor we're at war with?" the young and very vocal Lady Arlis demanded.

For a fourteen year old, she was shockingly forceful. But then, she was an ambush-laying, sword-wielding fourteen year old. It didn't help that every time she opened her mouth, the high lady—who was an ambush-laying and sword-wielding noblewoman herself—would nod in agreement, and then cycle through a wide variety of polite looks.

Hikaj opted for what he hoped was the safest answer: technicalities.

"In the purest sense of common accord, we are not at war, because neither your king nor I have declared it,” he corrected Lady Arlis. “I suppose we could call it… armed conflict?”

Arlis gasped with deep offense. “Or more accurately, invasion or attempted conquest!”

Masara turned her steady gaze on Hikaj, and then stoked young Arlis's fire.

 “You are correct Imperial General, technically," she said, turning her gracious concession into an elongated but. "Yet I fear my king has been a little busy fleeing your unprovoked… armed conflict... to make war declarations just yet.”

Lady Arlis leapt on that. "Yes! We'll see what the king says once - once he has a chance!" she told Hikaj, furious in her enthusiasm.

Hikaj was a general who knew when to retreat. He didn't quite try to hide Masara's sword and scabbard--there was nowhere to put it--but he lowered his hands and made it clear he wasn’t going to ask any questions about it. Of course Masara would want her weapon back--knights everywhere felt the same about that, Hikaj suspected, no matter how peculiar otherwise they were to him--but Qemaile wanted to study it more, and frankly, Hikaj worried it might scare some of the men if he returned it to her.  

That problem for later.

Changing topics, Hikaj did his best not to get kicked out of the tent by the furious silences which had driven him from it before.

"Instead of declarations of war,” he said, in his best diplomatically soothing voice, “would you not prefer peace?"

Masara's neutral expression seemed to consider that, but Arlis frowned deeply.  

“We had peace before you came,” the squire eventually said.

Hikaj looked at Masara when he answered. “Did you?”

She met his gaze, but for once, she was the one who looked away first. “Whatever we had,” she mused, “it was certainly not bloodshed from Amirasa to the Foothills.”

Hikaj bit back the dozen different things he wanted to say. He had weighed the risks and made his agreements before the first Kassan soldier set foot in Amir, and even if he was starting to re-evaulate those decisions, now was not the time to throw any plan away. Revealing any inopportune might weaken his leverages in Amir, and no matter how unfortunate this campaign was turning out to be, he did need this kingdom as a bulwark against Lapur. 

So he winced and said, "No, it was not, you are correct. But I do believe smaller conflict is justified to avoid greater perils."

"For Kas, perhaps," Masara countered.

"Not just for Kas," Hikaj maintained, though he didn't mention Lapur specifically. He knew Masara would already be thinking of Amir’s other large, imperial neighbor; who west of the sea of sands didn’t? “Regardless of how it began - would you not like the chance to end it?"

That made Arlis scowl, though Masara smiled and dryly observed, “I am sure the terms would be so wonderfully generous."

Hikaj suppressed a shrug. "That is what negotiations would determine, I suppose."

Masara didn't answer, but her unchanging, humorless smile seemed to say, What treaties ever went well for the ones who were forced to the table by a greater military power? Even Arlis didn't say anything, though the naked outrage in her glare made it clear what she thought of this kind of coercion.

"How could we trust an agreement with you?" Masara asked finally. “We have no foundation for trust yet.” She paused, purposeful and considering, then added, before Hikaj could fumble for an answer, “Though we could work on that.”

Hikaj felt weakly grateful for the opening Masara left him. “What would you suggest?”  

Arlis bristled again, probably ready to demand that the Kassans leave Amir immediately, but High Lady Masara said, “Something small, to start,” as though she were thinking aloud. “An easy trade. You could answer a question for me, perhaps, and I could answer one for you… or I could give you a demonstration with my sword.”

She didn’t look at the scabbard while she suggested the little deal. Hikaj met her dark, careful eyes, and told himself her offer was probably not a threat, and he definitely did not feel a sudden, thrilling swoop in his chest.

“All right,” he said.

Arlis scoffed and then muttered, just loud enough for Hikaj to hear, “I’ll demonstrate the Lady’s Peace for them.” 

That was definitely a threat. 

• • •

After whatever Lady Arlis had claimed to have done and Hikaj’s healers’ work, Masara's wounds all looked as though she'd had months to heal, not a little over a week. Her right arm was still in a sling though, so she held her sword in her left hand. She still wore the knee-length blue tunic that the healers had found for her too, as well as her gray knight’s cloak. But whereas her presence usually filled the small spellcloth tent, out in the open, she suddenly looked small and alone. Just one injured woman with a sword, facing off against a dozen archers.

That was probably what Hikaj's men had thought, right before Masara had charged them. He tried not to fall into the same trap when the high lady turned to him, smiled, and raised the tip of her sword with the ease of long familiarity.

“Shall I begin?” she asked.

“No!” Qemaile insisted from where he stood at Hikaj's side. He hopped from one foot to the other in his excitement, and from somewhere in his robes little bells started jingling. “You must explain what spell you plan to use! Incantation! Materials! Something?"

Masara laughed. Not at Qemaile, per se, but Qemaile retorted just the same, guestring out at Masara and her sword. "I want to know what I'm looking for!”

"You will see it," Masara assured him. It didn't really assuage Qemaile’s defensiveness, but she didn’t give him time to argue more. "Please, Imperial General, when you are ready, count to ten and then give the order to shoot."

She turned back to face the archers, who stood some hundred meters off.

Hikaj raised his hand and began to count. Before he'd even finished saying the first number, Masara's sword leapt into action, the tip of a blade tracing a large shape in the air before her. By the time Hikaj got to six, Masara's blade began to glow, first a small point of bright light, one of the etched runes turning to silver light that began to grow, sliding along the blade like liquid before it reflected into a bright arc of light that flashed, and then settled into a faint shimmer in the air. Hikaj reached ten, and lowered his hand. Twelve bowstrings twanged.

Fear flashed hot through Hikaj as the arrows whistled through the air--this was mad--but then all twelve shots slammed against the abruptly solid silver light, metal tips lighting in an incandescent spark before the wooden shafts splintered. Half-melted arrowheads and wood fell to the ground, and High Lady Masara lowered the sword. 

"The arrow guard," Lady Arlis said into the silence, after the silver light faded away and Masara's sword was nothing but etched metal again. "It is one of the first things we learn."

“But I didn’t see the spell,” Qemaile wailed. 

Hikaj was still staring at Masara. She had shifted the sword to her broken arm, and was holding it awkwardly in the sling so she could use her left hand to wipe sweat off her forehead, or maybe to brush her dark curls out of her face. He imagined her thundering down a narrow path through the Foothills, wreathed in silver spouting from her sword and staring down his men, and he felt a shiver in his spine.

“Figure it out, Qemaile,” Hikaj said. “I want that spell.” 

“But my lord, it’s not a spell!” 

• • •

In the tent (after Qemaile has asked his hundredth question and Masara had managed her ninety-somethingth evasive reply) the high lady shifted in her chair to turn a flat, expressionless look on Hikaj. It was just the three of them again, and an empty chair, but Masara didn’t even glance at Lady Arlis. The squire, for once, seemed just as unsure of what Masara would say as Hikaj. 

“Imperial General,” the high lady said finally. “Who betrayed us?" She asked the question without preamble, firm and direct. Arlis closed her eyes and looked away. Was she surprised?

Hikaj himself was taken aback. Not was there a traitor, but who. How had Masara known? Had she known all along? If she’d known, that would change Hikaj’s understanding of what had gone wrong so far. 

“I cannot build a foundation of trust alone, Imperial General.” The quiet, matter-of-fact tone was belied by the intensity of Masara’s brown eyes. She had said they could start with a small trade, an exchange of trust, but Hikaj suddenly realized this question was important to her. Maybe she’d been waiting for a chance to ask this whole time. 

“No, of course not,” he agreed. He tried not to hesitate. Maybe the arrow guard had not been such a little demonstration, either. “It was the prince,” Hikaj said. “It was your cousin, Prince Panam.”

Masara closed her eyes, and then nodded once, shortly.

"I thought so," she said, and it was a quiet exhalation that seemed to take the strength out of her. She leaned back in her camp chair and bowed her head. 

The silence was too loud; not even Arlis raised her voice to accuse Hikaj of lying. When he looked to the squire, he was shocked to see she had tears in her eyes. 

“The High Priest, too?” she asked, her voice a thick whisper. Hikaj thought she was talking about the assassination that had drawn Kas into Amir, at Prince Panam’s invitation. Hikaj had had nothing to do with it, despite Arlis’s most heated accusations, but he had known the prince must have. 

Masara didn’t raise her head when she replied. “It would seem so. Our own armed conflict, after all.”  

“I’m sorry,” Hikaj found himself saying, feeling awkward and intrusive. “I’ll--I’ll leave you now. Have a good night.” 

And then I came very close upon a star. This star and its companion shone in tandem, not so bright as some of the things I had seen in the distance, but blindingly, newly so for how close I was to them. It was a novel thing, to feel such heat upon me, and I thought how nice it would be to stop.

It took a great deal of thinking how nice it would be to stop before I did stop, right between the grip of the swirling stars, and that was when I came upon the world.

It was a soft world, full of vibrant colors where for very long I had seen streaks and pinpoint flares, and I could see that life was in profusion there.

My arrival was not a great thing for that profusion of life, and I do not remember much of that period. For I was small, compared to the soft world, but I brought with me all my endless travel, and the power that came with that tilted the world into confusion. It was a long while before we settled, the soft world and I, and I spent a great deal of my power trying to save and strengthen the life I had greatly diminished.

So it was that when I truly woke and was my own self again, I circled the soft world and it and I had found a balance that again gave room for life’s profusion.

I watched the soft world, the little light I found myself bound to. The life there grew in great leaps and broken bounds, reached great highs and then, sometimes, such lows that I turned my face and could not watch. But if I turned my face, I was always called back.

The first time the life called to me was not with words, though they certainly said many of them. What I heard was a kind of rhythm, a movement of sound that went back and forth, an interplay I had not known I had once known. So long I had traveled, everything around me streaked and disappearing beyond as I made my swift way through space, and now there was a rhythm that called and gave back, that cradled, that moved and yet did not leave its place.

I turned my face back, of course. I looked for the faces of those who sang to me, and slowly I learned their words. My joy in their triumphs was greater, and my sorrow when I saw their paths darkening increased the same, and when it grew too painful for me to see, I turned my face. Sometimes, this was enough to halt a sharp fall, and sometimes I heard many desperate cries before I was called back. (I answered those desperate cries, of course. I turned my face, but I do not need to see to know how my people suffer, and to help them where I can and where it is just to do so.)

Great Lady Moon, they would call, though this is not all they called; they gave me a name, too, the life on the soft little world, one that I cherish and hold close to the dearest parts of me.

This time gave me much in joy and satisfaction, and I heard my name spoken widely and freely, and I gave of myself when I was called. I felt a kinship with this world I had nearly destroyed, but then given of myself to save, and now it and I thrived together. It was my little world, which had named me, and we might have stayed that way forever if the ships had not come.

They bore life like my life, but they tasted stale and yet seemed to remind me of something from very long ago, from before my voyage. The ships landed on my little world and disgorged its cargo of alien life, and my people called to me in amazement as they sheltered their alien visitors, who looked so much like themselves in some ways, and yet differed so much in the ways that mattered.

But time passed and the aliens did not leave us, or could not leave us, and I grew to see even these aliens as mine. They stayed so long I began to hear them speak to me, and then they truly were mine, and I helped my people build together ships of their own so they might explore the space beyond the soft little world.

But there were two things my people did not do, as the first visitors had done.

They did not travel near to me, for they held me in great respect, and they would not explore my being as the first visitors had spoken of doing to their own planet’s companions.

And they would not sleep long, long years and travel through endless empty space as the first visitors had; as I had. In all my travels as the lights of distant bodies flew by, I had thought very much about the nature of the space I inhabited, that I entered and left and moved through continuously. And as I had thought about that space, I had thought about its properties, and how it might be shifted here and there to make my ceaseless way easier or more interesting, and then I had come upon the star and ceased my thinking. 

Now, I thought again of all that space I had traveled through, and I saw that it could be changed, and I directed my people to do so. With my instruction and their own ingenuity, they created great gates that hung in space, and through these gates they flew their ships and crossed between the space between the stars, to distant worlds beyond.

Beyond my protection.  

Many of my ships came home to me. Some did not. For as I have said, I was not alone among my kind, merely very far away from any others, and with these gates hanging in the dark of space, my people could travel very far away. There was other life, shepherded by others of my kind, and not all was as peaceful as we. There were other gates, too, built by others.

My people began to construct their travel stations farther and farther away, and creating new ones and deactivating others; creating alliances out among the stars, and shunning other parts of the universe that grew too unsafe. We worked together, my people and I, to keep our corner of the vastness whole.

During this time, with all the ships flying in and out of the gates, and all the foreign ships visiting my small world and I, I quickly learned I did not like my ships going out beyond where I could see them. For almost all this little world’s life, I had been there, giving my power to this life, and now they went where I could not see.

You are distressed, Lady, a Speaker of that time to me, early in the days of my people’s gate travel. All of my people speak to me, but there are always those who speak more often. And among them are those whose voices ring with foresight, who think a great deal over what I have to say, and then do a great deal more of acting after that. Those who called me back in the old days, when I would turn my face in sorrow, were often led by my Speakers.

I admitted to my Speaker that I did not like to have my people go so far, to places where they could die and I could never bear witness, never know their fate.

And the Speaker thought a great deal over what I had said, and then did a great deal more acting after that, and suddenly my people did had never done before: they flew their ships to me. They landed, and one walked upon my surface, and cut a piece from me and carried it into the ship.

Can you see now, Lady? my Speaker asked, and as the ship flew away the one who had walked upon my surface, who was indeed my Speaker, set the piece of me they had wrested from my surface into the body of her ship. Thus I could see them all.

I went everywhere. I watched over my soft little world, in the embrace of our suns, and also I was with my people as they leaped between the stars. I learned names and met others of my kind (though I did not say much to them, and did not form alliances among them as I saw they do with each other) and I went farther than I ever had before, and this time I was not hurtling through space alone.

You already know this, of course, because I am your moon and you are life from my little planet, but it is my story to tell and it may be my last telling. Even so, I will now skip ahead to the voice that sang to me sharply one night, drawing my attention from all parts of the vastness. In the end, I too have learned something of haste.

The voice that sang was a wail, actually, and it came from a new babe aboard a ship that carried a piece of me, as all of my ships do. She was born in orbit around the little planet, between the little planet and me, and before me.

I do not know. I do not claim to know everything, as you well know, only to have lived very long and seen very much. But I did take an interest in the infant, and because I was interested a sliver of me contrived to find its way among the child’s things, and I watched the girl who had cried to me begin to smile, and laugh, and do many other interesting human things besides.

I knew my people lived through different phases of maturity, grew from babies to children to adults, but I had been aware of it in the sense that I was aware of everything; human children grew just as the children of any animal grew, as any living thing grew. I was among it all, aware of it all. But this child had a voice that called easily to me, and through that crystal voice I saw life with new eyes.

Your people called you a lady then, though you will go by different titles now. You will be a queen next, I know. In watching you, I have learned names and seen people and understood the pulse of lives more sharply, seen the tangle of your concerns, and learned your context. It was like this when I became very fond of someone, always those with something of a Speaker in them; and as I traveled aboard ships, parts of me became very attached to my crew, my traveling life, and it was like this then as well.

My perspective changed yet again when you began to speak to me. You were not a Speaker yet, but you told me of all sorts of things from the moment you could talk. Your little joys, your petty sorrows. Your fleeting interests and passing observations. Perhaps this is because you were born so close to me, between my world and myself, and before me, yet I was captivated by every little thing. Rarely had one spoke to me so; they called me Great Lady, and Lady, and Goddess, but you used my name freely and spoke freely, and I had not know much of this before you. 

I am studying history, you would say, and I should think you know more than anyone of it.

Perhaps, I would reply, because I see things differently from where I am, and I do not always know your past by your names. But together we found a common language much of what I had seen, and then I would tell you of other Speakers, each of whom I remembered dearly, all different yet the same in the ways that mattered.

Have you ever learned to dance, Sascrin? you would ask, I am learning a pattern from old Kas, and I think I might break an ankle.

In my memory, I have only ever danced one pattern, and it is the dance I share with my little world. But I did love to watch you do it, and you did dance so well with the boy from old Kas who wanted to captain a ship. No ankle was broken.

Lady Sascrin, you would muse, what is it like to be in so many places at once?

I had not thought of that before you asked me, for I simply was where I was, with each part of my body. I did tried to explain it to you, and you thought very hard about it until you could only laugh with confusion. In turn, I wondered how it felt to be tied to one body. The idea was almost confusing enough to amuse me, but then I thought that if you lost a part, it did not remain you or yours, as the small sliver that is still me can hang on a chain around your neck.

I endeavored to keep all your parts together. After a while, I also endeavored not to favor you too greatly, because I did see how your gifts made you shine uncomfortably.

My cousin the prince is angry with me again, you had told me often, and I had not thought to think what it could mean. We both had greater concerns. I knew from you a new great empire threatened our people; had destroyed allies and alliances already, and might yet break the guards on gate construction we had to protect us. My attention followed you when you traveled the gates and fought in distance space. 

And there was also the simple fact that I did not often hear the voice of your cousin. And because I did not know what he would do, now I am too late to stop it.

Do you know why I am telling you this tale, my Speaker?

“Lady Sascrin,” you say, “we cannot save the planet, it is true, but you could put more of yourself into our ships. We will take you away with us and find a new planet.”

I can feel how deeply you wish this, how shamed yet determined you are to save what your blood has destroyed. You think you have failed me. 

You have not. I believe this moment must come for everything, even for those of my kind, and it has been a very long time since I have heard of others (though I think you may find something like me in the heart of this empire.)

Speaker, I am telling you this tale now because I have lived a very great deal and been many places and seen many things, and I have loved my soft world. I am sorry that it will fall to you to build something new for us, and though I have done what I can to help you, I am sorry that I will not be there for you as I have always been there for my Speakers.

But I have never had a true friend to be mourned by when I go, and I would like to ask this of you.

You are silent for a very long time. When you speak, your sorrow runs so deeply I feel an ache somewhere in me.

“I do not know how much sense our blessings will make, but I do wish the light of Lady Sascrin upon your heart. My dear friend.”

My own light upon my heart, I muse.

And I say, as you prepare to jump through a gate in your ship to escape the imminent explosion, My light will be with you always, Masara. My dear friend.

————

"This is..." Hikaj felt that his eyes were comically large in his face as he stared down at Amir-Y, but it could not be helped.

The great station was the size of a small moon, though instead of being solid through it was made of bands over bands of habitable station. The inner bands were finished and even populated, but there were countless manned and unmanned droids crawling about the outer edges of layered sphere, building new and ever-greater bands that curved elegantly unfinished over the layers beneath.

"Even for famed Sascrin technology, this is beyond comprehension," Hikaj finally manages.

Arlis's grin widens, and Inarim turns faintly proud, and Masara looks Hikaj in the eyes.

He sees loss in there, but great respect.

"Play it cool," Koronis is muttering to himself under his breath, and Hikaj smiles. Koronis is his best friend at camp -- they've been bunk mates since they first met four years ago in the nine-year-olds Cabin Ginger -- and Hikaj always forgets how nervous Koronis can get on dance night.

"It's just the mixer," Hikaj says, clapping Koronis on the shoulders with both hands. He leaves them there and starts to massage Koronis. His dad does that for his mom when she's really stressed, too. "You'll be fine, Kor. Look at these beautiful windswept curls. No one will be able to say no to you."

"Yes," Koronis agrees. "It's going to be fine."

"That's the spirit," says Hikaj, with one last squeeze.

---

It is not fine.

There's a new girl at Utur's sister-camp Aurora, and she's got big brown eyes and beautiful windswept curls and it's like Hikaj said -- who could say no to that? Hikaj feels like his stomach is going to leak down to his knees and make them feel weak and fluttery too.

"So. Much. Gold," Koronis hisses under his breath, punctuating each word with an elbow jab to Hikaj's ribs.

Hikaj blinks and notices the other new girl -- and then stares for a minute. She's wearing a shimmery gold shirt with a gold belt in her jean shorts, and gold jelly sandals. Not to mention the gold light-up bracelets she's wearing, plus the two she snapped together to make a crown.

"Wow," Hikaj says.

"The shoes are even waterproof," Koronis says.

And she's standing next to the windswept-haired new girl, the one who makes Hikaj's stomach feel balloonlike, like when he eats a whole apple pie, except without the ache.

"Come on," Hikaj encourages. "You can ask the Golden Girl to dance, and I'll dance with her friend."

"Hikaj. We can't be the first ones on the dance floor," Koronis hisses. His gaze darts over to the corner where his sister Rhea is holding court with all the girls from her cabin, plus a few others, and most boys her age too.

Hikaj draws himself up to his full almost-five-feet. "Okay. I'll be the first one, and then you can dance with the golden girl."

"That's not any different!" Koronis protests, but Hikaj is already walking over.

---

"I'm Masara," the girl says when Hikaj sticks out his hand to shake hers, opens his mouth, and then forgets everything he was going to say, including his name."

"Masara," Hikaj repeats. "Hokiraj. Me."

"He's a caveman," Masara's golden friend murmurs.

"Cavemen are pretty cool!" Hikaj defends himself, momentarily outraged. "Also, I bet they were great dancers!"

"Will you dance with me, then?" Masara asks Hikaj.

Oh no. Hikaj's stomach is doing the thing. The leaky weak-knees thing. Also, if he says yes, is he agreeing that he is a caveman, except one who can dance?

"I love dancing," Hikaj says, his voice as wobbly as his legs. He doesn't mind being a caveman.

---

aaannnd you know hikaj gets out there super super proud of his cotton-eye joe, and they all do the electric slide