“You don’t have to go.”
I glare at him. “Neither do you.”
A surprised smile. “Of course I do. In your shoes, anyone else would expect it of me.”
“You’re going to walk into the Storm just because you think people would expect it of you?”
“Peopleshouldexpect things of the Regia. They should expect me to protect them. They should expect me to do whatever it takes to protect them. They should, and they do—they expect me to give up my body for the Great King. Of course they’d expect me to give up the same to save them from the Storm.”
“Who’s they?”
He tugs at the cord on his wrist. “Anyone. Everyone. It doesn’t matter. My point is—no one expects that of you.”
My hand goes to my neck. He’s right, but it hurts. “You’re right. No one expects anything of me.” Not even my own father.
“But don’t you see? You’re free. Don’t come tomorrow. Don’t throw your life away.”
“I’m not free. It’s my home, too. I wouldn’t face the Storm just because someone expects it of me.”
“Then why?”
It’s not easy to name. And when I think about it, I hear Pa’s voice.You’re making yourself more important than you are. He doesn’t need you.
Out of self-preservation, I silence that voice. My gaze settles again on the view through the window, on the fifth ring. “I’ll show you.”
“What do you mean?”
“Do you trust me?” It hangs between us for a long moment.
Dalca nods, and a strange and delicate warmth spreads through me.
We hurtle down a passageway, ikonlight rocking back and forth with every footfall, wearing Iz’s stowed mosscloth cloaks over clothing that’s indistinct enough to pass in the fifth. I catch my breath at the door, returning Dalca’s hesitant smile and tugging his hood down an inch to shadow his eyes.
He opens the door, and we step out. The humidity hits me like a wet sponge, soaking into my clothes and hair, letting the cold sink right into my skin. I shiver.
The alley we come out into is furred with moss, and the building toour right has a rotted roof that’s been patched with fabric. Dalca steps carefully over the moss-covered rubble that litters the alley, and at once I regret bringing him here. I see everything through the eyes of a high ringer: the damp, the rubbish, the fact that there’s nothing clean, nothing dry, nothing in perfect condition.
I wanted to show him what mattered to me, but instead I’m reminding myself of the distance between us.
Dalca taps my arm, startling me out of my thoughts. He squints at a flickering light that grows larger as it nears; a couple walks hand in hand, the shorter figure gripping a palm-sized ikonlight. They pass us by and we follow them. Cupped in my hands is the ikonlight from the passageway, a small globe-shaped one that emits a soft white glow.
We take a turn stormward and come upon a gathering of fifth-ringers. The crowd forms a loose circle, everyone facing inward, holding glimmers of light that illume just the edges of their features and the tips of their fingers. Some hold lanterns powered by ikons, others hold little fires in metal bowls, cupped in hands wrapped with cloth. As more and more people join, the many-colored light grows into a glow that cocoons us in something almost as warm as daylight.
Dalca murmurs into my ear. “What is this?”
“It’s what we do after a stormsurge. To remind us...” I trail off, embarrassed.
“To remind you?”
My cheeks warm. “Of what matters.”
A clear voice rises into the air, a song and a prayer for us to love the little light and the little life we hold. Dalca looks down at me with a question in his eyes.
I offer him the ikonlight.
Instead of taking it, he cups my hands.
Light traces the angles of his face, the curves of his lips, and the pools in his eyes.