I just felt like posting the new chapter up today. I've tried to make it longer.

Disclaimer: Tortall and most of its characters areTamora Pierce's invention.

Chapter 8

"Good morning, Serrina," Kyra greeted her, sitting on the lake shoreas the noble thief strolled to the pitiful blacklake, towered over by the scarecrow trees. Its surface was swimming with dead, soft leaves. "Isn't the weather nice?"

"Can't see it through that canopy of branches," Serrina replied, raising an eyebrow and regarding Kyra thoughtfully. "But I am a city girl, born and bred. I suppose it must be different for you, being a country girl through and through."

"Not really," Kyra swung her feet through the freezing black water, goosebumps rushing over her pink skin. "I'd been thinking about going to the city. It's just a bit sooner than I'd thought it would be. I'm not going to have to visit my father's tomb, am I?"

Serrina shrugged awkwardly. "He's only a dead skeleton."

"Aren't all skeletons dead?"

Serrina shook her head. "No. They're not. But he is dead, Kyra."

"We'll see," Kyra said thoughtfully and dipped her hand into the water, trying to decide whether or not she was brave enough to swim today.

Serrina cautiously sat on the edge, debating the same idea. Gingerly, she dipped a toe in, then screwed her face up in pain. "Ouch!"

Kyra giggled, then arched her arms over her head and dove into the water.

Serrina scowled. "Show off!" she shouted. Kyra laughed and inhaled a mouthful of water, resurfaced, grimacing and choking. "Urgh! This water tastes of fish."

"Heh heh heh." Smirking, Serrina gracefully shed her clothes down to her loincloth and breastband and prepared to dive in...

"Absolutely not!" Alanna yelled, striding from camp. "I'm not having fish bite at your belly! It's still healing, silly girl!"

Serrina made a face and hurriedly grabbed her clothes back, pulling her shirt and breeches back on.

Kyra was laughing hard enough to get a stomach full of lake water: Alanna eyed her uncertainly.

"Come on, Kyra," Serrina said calmly, looking at the laughing girl. "We may as well sort out some breakfast."

"I have something else to do first," Kyra said, swimming to the shore of the lake. "I'll be back in a moment."

Alanna made a 'hmm' sound, looking at Serrina.

"I'll go too, then," Serrina gave a shrug.

"And I'll come, to make sure you don't ask someone to jab you in the belly, just to check if it's healing or not, or anything silly like that," Alanna said briskly.

Kyra grabbed her dress: she was too young to bother with breastbands, hadn't been told anything about breastbands or monthlies: her mother had never really said anything useful since Kyra was born.That was why she was the 'wild child of Conte', she figured. But there were other reasons.

Straightening her shirt,Kyra strode barefoot to her own nimble mare, that she called "Quickgold", moments later, she was guiding Quickgold back towards the silent, blackened form of Conte's towers.

Serrina caught up easily on Amara. "What do you think happened to your mother?" she asked quietly.

"She's dead," Kyra said with certainty, and not much of any other emotion.

Alanna's eyes narrowed at the cold, practical sound of Kyra's young voice.

"Kyra..." Serrina murmured, barely moving her lips. "You know how we discussed this...you not sounding like a possessed, evil girl...?"

Kyra turned her head to Alanna, who was catching up, having taken the trouble to saddle her gelding. "So mother's with father now," she said with the same practicality. "And mother won't be sad any more. And neither will father."

Alanna looked away and raised an eyebrow at a bush.

"Here." Some feet from the tower, Kyra dismounted and told Quickgold to stay. The mare lowered her head, nipped Kyra's bright hair then turned her attention to the smoky grass. Kyra went to the tower door and pushed it open. "We never lock it," she explained. "No one would dare come up."

Serrina could easily believe that: who'd come up to admire or steal from the tower owned by the insane, thin tall woman with white hair, or the wild, wicked child of Duke Roger? With a thin smile, she followed Kyra up the tower steps, through the doorway and into the smoke-caked entrance hall.

With barely a glance at her ruined home, Kyra strode up the winding set of stairs towards her own room, to salvage her own belongings.

Serrina toiled to observe the destruction of the fire: every wall was blackened, like evil, reflectionless obsidian. Rugs and carpets, all of which had anyway been threadbare, were gone, reduced to absolutely nothing. A tall iron-metal table had cracked in the heat, and leaned precariously towards Serrina as she strolled past. A candelabra had been left on this table and was reduced to globs of twisted burnished gold and strange stumps of grey, ash-flecked candles.

High on the wall was a portrait of Duke Roger: he smiled handsomely and crookedly, his canvas cracked and yellowed and the frame black as ebony.

With a shudder, Serrina hurried up the stairs after Kyra, found her digging through the ruined wreck of her room.

"Why not just buy clothes and things anew?" Serrina asked, eyeing the dismal room. "This stuff isn't good enough for a cat to sleep on."

"My family has no money," Kyra replied fiercely. "I can't afford it. And don't say you'll lend me the money. And don't say you owe me a birthday present. And don't say you never got me anything for midsummer's eve... I'm not interested."

Serrina looked away, hesitated, then went to another corner of the room, began gently kicking and toeing away pieces of rubble and hardened ash, seeing if there was anything worth saving.

Standing on tiptoes, Kyra reached up and ran her hands along the top of the wardrobe until she could grip the corners of a box. Dragging it down, she gasped at the explosion of ash from it, and coughed violently, dropping the box heavily.

"What's in there?" Keenly, Serrina turned.

"My winter clothes, apparently," Kyra said, unlocking the box. "But if I remember right..."

All the clothes in there were untouched by the fire. But they were all ripped and untidy.

"It was a crazy season," Kyra finished, drawing out a pretty violet dress with a red sash at the waist, tears in her eyes.

"Your mother?" Serrina guessed sadly.

Kyra nodded. "She went down to the village during the night. I had to follow her. I had to. She tried attacking two people...I stopped her, screamed at her, and she turned on me. Started clawing me. Ripped my clothes. I ripped a bit of cloth off to gag her once the two people dragged her off me. And I tied her up and brought her back. She was good the next day."

Another tear slid down her cheek. "I guess there'll be no need for me to watch her any more."

"You shouldn't feel bad for feeling good that the fire's got rid of her," Serrina said gently. "I suppose it's just as the gods willed it: for you to be free to leave this place."

Kyra tried to sit down on the edge of her bed. It groaned, then crackled flimsily. She landed on the floor, and tears began rolling down her cheeks quicker. She raised her arms over her face to hide her tears hopelessly. Serrina pushed her arms away and hugged the small girl, "shh," she murmured. "Shh. It'll be fine. I promise, Kyra."

"That's what he says," Kyra whispered between increasing sobs. When Serrina asked who 'he' was, Kyra just cried harder, her words lost.

Who? Serrina wondered, perplexed, stroking Kyra's copper-gold-dark hair as the girl wept grief for her lost parents.