fika (n.) a moment to slow down and appreciate the good things in life.

Khalore woke three times in the night: first, by the faint vibration of rain beginning to fall pitter-patter on the roof of her attic room, like tiny crawling creatures roaming the tiles in search of food and air, so close to here that she imagined she could practically feel the scraping of their claws against the lead gutters; second, by the flare of lights in the courtyard below, as Zoran and Ina emerged from the bakery for one of their nightly rendez-vous in the garden – Zoran would be carrying the chairs and Ina the candle, incongruously bright against the inky black press of the night around them, and if they were still adhering to their habits then nothing could be too badly wrong; and third, by the unmistakeable sound of Ghjuvan's laugh, low and dry, as someone tumbled loudly off Ina's wall and was joined, moments later, by someone else, who landed as hard but not as painfully – and if he was laughing, then he could not be too badly wounded, by words or otherwise.

She could not quite estimate at what time each of these events occurred – the whole night was dark and long and timeless. Even when she woke for the fourth time and decided to call it morning, simply so that she would have an excuse to rise from bed, the sky outwith was dusky and speckled with stars. On the floor next to her, half-hidden in the pile of blankets they had assembled in lieu of an actual bed, Nez shifted uneasily in sleep: she had one arm twisted up behind her back and a leg sticking straight up against the wall. A sign of freezing ahead, no doubt. They had made an art of it – there was not a single sleeping position that would not come attached to some prophecy of weather ahead.

Zoran had never been the best at this game; perhaps they should have taken that as some kind of sign.

Khalore pulled her coat over her shoulders – actually Ghjuvan's, the long grey garment he had brought with him from Irij, pipped on the wrists with the markings of a Warrior Candidate – and struggled to shove her feet into the black flat shoes Ilja had brought her from Ganzir, when he had remembered at the last minute that her birthday was approaching with the advent of mayday. Everything she had here was borrowed or gifted, she mused bitterly; she had earned nothing.

She closed the door quietly, for fear of waking Nez – and having that to deal with, so soon after waking – and descended the stone steps of the granary even more slowly, feeling somehow older than she had the night before. There was a slight pinch in her lips, some invisible force pinning her mouth into a frown. The arm that wasn't there anymore ached, deep and painful. Are you trying to get me killed?

The courtyard was cast in the strange dark-blue light of earliest morning, as though the sun was debating rising, as though the day was at risk of deciding to go back to bed at the last minute. Everything was blue-or-shadow. The soil beneath the wall had been churned; Ghjuvan's coat lay, abandoned, across the chair that Zoran usually occupied by the back door of the bakery. On the windowsill next to it, Ina's candle had burned down to a stub, melted fat splayed about it; she had abandoned her shoes on the doorstep on return to her bedroom, so Khalore stooped to collect them as she crossed the threshold, setting them neatly on the bottom stair.

The matches were in the alcove where a relic would usually be stored; she retrieved them and went to the great stone oven in which Ina performed the majority of her strange culinary sorcery. She stooped, wrapping the skewer Ina favoured with one of the long strips of cloth that the Warriors seemed to always have an excess of – as bandages, as blindfolds, as makeshift handcuffs for Nez and Belle. Dipping this into the pot of oil stored under the sink, she set it alight and forced it into the kiln, hoping that Azula had remembered to gather firewood. She needn't have worried, for the oven came alight with a hiss, as the kindling caught fire. It was good and dry – none green today – and would burn quickly, and intensely. Ina liked her oven hot when she woke, and she usually rose with the sun; Khalore could do this much to help, then. There was little else she usually did around the bakery – kneading was too bothersome, and all the grinding of flour had been performed at the height of the autumn, near the end of the harvest, when Ilja had been allowed back to the bakery for more than a day at a time. Instead she went out into the supply room to find the little bronze weights they were obliged to use in the interests of fairness, and –

She shut the door almost as soon as she had opened it, and shouted a hasty apology that didn't really come out as recognisable words: "ididntrealiseeee..."

Kinga's laugh still sounded slightly drunk when it bounced back under the door. She really would sleep anywhere, wouldn't she? Back in training, they had tested how long they could go without sleep – Kinga had stayed awake until she had started seeing black dogs that no one else could see. Then she had wandered off to the sparring fields to fall asleep curled up under one of the targets; Pekka had carried her to bed an hour later, but only after he'd come close to spearing her with a thrown dagger. It seemed a world away, Khalore thought; they had been different people then. Children.

With both arms.

Her plans to be helpful thus scuppered, she wandered back out to the front of the bakery, where she was greeted by a grey head planted firmly on the counter and the faint scent of sage hanging low in the air like so much smoke. She said, "have we collectively forgotten what a bed is, or is this a principled stand against comfort?"

Ilja raised his head slowly, yawning widely, shaking his head as though to answer before he realised he wasn't able to speak yet. After a moment, he said, sleepily, "just came back from night duty. All the beds were taken."

Well, that was a fair point. They were running past maximum capacity – the house was designed to hold three people, and was playing host to ten. When you put it like that, it was almost no surprise that tempers were running high – that people were snapping at each other. Khalore said, "well, mine's free now. Get some rest."

Ilja shook his head, and spun in his seat to look at her directly. "I'm good. Just needed a little nap."

"And you used to call me the martyr."

"You did complain a lot," Ilja said.

"You're complaining about me complaining." Khalore shook her head ruefully. "Hypocrisy, thy name is Schovajsa."

He laughed. It was a grey sound. She hadn't realised that it could be, until it was, and then it was, and she wondered how long it had been.

"All the beds are taken," Ilja said, "right?"

She nodded.

"Is Zoran alright?"

"He will be. Messed up his hand, but..."

Khalore reached into her pocket, and pulled out a few coins: Irij currency, what little had survived their journey to Illéa. Quite silently, she set a little stack of five onto the counter, and slid them across to Ilja, who slowly, archly, raised an eyebrow as a look of incredible disbelief and – yes, that was concern – flitted across his face. Khalore had never seen him so worried to win a bet before. He was positively upset. "Does this mean that he…?"

"Not that," Khalore said with a low chuckle, "God, not that – did you think I have no heart at all? The other one."

"Ah." It was an abrupt transformation; Ilja's whole body seemed to relax. Khalore didn't blame him; they were already splintering apart and that had the potential to fully shatter whatever sense of fragile camaraderie remained. Of course, it could also go well, but the chances of that were slim, very slim indeed. Unless Nez intervened, Khalore thought ruefully, watching Ilja flip the coins between his knuckles in a rapid flash of brass and gold. No doubt, even if the odds were evened to fifty-fifty, Zoran would still find a way to fuck it all up. "Well, then. Easy to see it coming."

Another flash of gold, and the coins disappeared into Ilja's pocket.

"Thanks for the pocket money, Lore."

Khalore shook her head, and produced a knife with which she could begin slicing the bread left over from the night before. She wrenched a slice away from the whole – soft, and shot through with seeds – and practically threw it at the Chariot, who caught it right before it hit his face. "That boy has so much to answer for."

Ilja smiled broadly, and tore into the bread zealously. "His problem."

"Yes, it will be."

Ilja shook his head. "I really can't believe –" He rolled his eyes. "Never mind. I absolutely can."

"It's disgusting," Khalore said, "absolutely disgusting – I suppose Zoran and Ina will be next, knowing our luck. Knowing my luck."

"You're counting me out, Angelo? I am hurt, frankly, hurt and betrayed..."

"I'm not staying lonely alone, Schovajsa." She waved the knife at him as threateningly as she could muster, so early in the morning.

"Is that a proposal?"

She rolled her eyes, and swore as her knife slipped without another hand to brace the bread. She wasn't sure which way to twisted, to gouge a chunk out of her thumb, just above the joint, but twist it did. As soon as he was sure she was not badly hurt, Ilja laughed, and Khalore found herself pulling a face at him and saying, "please sleep. You sound delusional."

"People have been saying that about me for years," Ilja said. Constructive pro-active self-immolation. That was true. He had always come up with the craziest ideas in class. That had been an act, then, hadn't it? They were being quite tame here, of late. They were worming their way in gradually. Khalore thought this, and then remembered that the Moon of Kur had lain waste to an entire district only the night before, and wondered whether maybe her definition of boring had become horribly skewed over the last six months. "But I'm afraid I must reject you, Khalore, though my heart breaks to do so."

"Waiting on another, are you?"

"Alas," Ilja said, "no other seems to be waiting on me…"

Behind Khalore, a deep voice spoke softly: "well, Ilja, you needed only to tell me how you felt..."

"You're out of my league, Ghjuvan, I accepted that long ago." Ilja sighed. "Ours is a star-crossed love – and the inability to wear a shirt seems to be contagious. I must escape in search of marillenknödel."

Khalore turned, holding her bloodied hand against her chest. The other arm, which was no longer there, ached; it was instinct to try and clasp a hand over the wound and stem the bleeding, but no hand materialised, and instead she merely found herself bloodying her own bodice just to try and staunch the flow. She remembered hearing that before, about one of the cadets chosen to be a Warrior in generations past – that her nerves had taken her on the night before initiation, that she had questioned her desire to become a xrafstar, and that she had cut herself, and that Sauer had found her in the dormitories the next morning with the walls all painted in blood from where she had tried to take back her mistake and stop the blood from pouring by pressing her arms against the brick.

Ghjuvan said, "I really can't leave you alone for a single evening, can I, Lore?"

She stooped for the lengths of cloth under the counter. "You can," she said. There was that tug at her lips again, forcefully curving her lips into a frown, against her will, against any rational thought in her head that told her she had been wrong to speak to him as she had. Are you trying to get me killed? "But, really, should you?"

She straightened, and began to unwind the bandages as best she could with a single, wounded hand. Behind her, while she was distracted, Ilja hopped the counter in a single movement and rustled about the baskets of spare bread, no doubt in search of leftover sweet cakes. Ghjuvan said, "there's some in the supply room."

Ilja offered him a mock salute and disappeared into the rear corridor in search of the promised pastries; Khalore didn't bother to warn him ahead of time. Let it be a surprise for him as well.

"About last night," Ghjuvan began, once they were alone, and then waved off her sly smile. He was bare-chested; there was a long keloid scar over one pectoral, opposite his heart, where he had taken a tumble of a cliff in training. "I meant us, you idiot."

"Oh." Khalore felt her smile fade, involuntarily. "Yeah."

There was a long silence. Ghjuvan had folded his arms; Khalore glanced down at her knuckles, winding the bandages out long, unnecessarily long. All the better to busy her hands with.

She said, "I'm sorry," at the same time that he said, "I shouldn't have snapped at you."

A pause. He smiled.

"Don't apologise, Lore."

"No," she said, "I shouldn't… I shouldn't have…"

She sighed, frustrated at how difficult it was to conjure the words. She didn't want to apologise; she didn't particularly feel like it was necessary, or warranted, or helpful. But yesterday was a bitter weight on her tongue; it felt like it would not lift until she had purged it, somehow, forcefully. They had never apologised to one another back at camp – petty fights were forgotten in a few days, and forgiven nearly as quick – but she just wasn't sure if they had a few days here, and wasn't it better if she just swallowed her pride (barbed though it was) and just…?

Wasn't it?

Ghjuvan saved her from her paltry attempt. "No should. Nothing to discuss."

That was a lie. But she let it slide.

Khalore pinned the bandage to the counter and began to, carefully, roll her hand so that she was pulling the cloth taut against her skin. Two of them maimed in the first week, she thought, but Kinga still got to be useful. Kinga still got to be helpful. Kinga still made a difference.

Ghjuvan did not offer to help her. He knew better than to risk it – until she had it bound and was just struggling to tie it off, in which case, she said, quite casually, "the angle's just a bit difficult..."

"Of course." He stepped forward without hesitation. "How are they? Zoran and Hyacinth?"

"Fine." She sighed. "Not really. Hyacinth is still…"

She'd always resented Hyacinth. She'd always… Hyacinth had made her seem so stupid, always, in front of Instructor. Khalore had always lacked that certain something that allowed people to excel in Instructor's classes – the spark of Hyacinth Estlebourgh, the quick instinct of Ragnar Kassik, even the reflexive confidence of someone like Kinga Szymańska or Ilja Schovajsa who could make even the most brazen of suicide rushes seem like a good idea in the moment. Khalore had never been deluded enough to believe that the Warrior Programme had selected her for her keen mind, or her lightning instincts, or her great capacity for leadership – but even so, even now, that fear lingered in the back of her mind, a shadow without was not the smartest. She was not the strongest. She was expendable.

Expendability had its uses. The arm-that-was-not-there hung heavy from her shoulder.

"Hyacinth is still," she finished, at last. That was all she needed to say.

Ghjuvan nodded. He understood.

"And Zoran is…" Once again, Khalore found herself struggling for words. "He broke a mirror."

"Is that all?" Ghjuvan blinked. He had clearly been expecting so much worse.

"Not really. He was kind of… confused, I guess?" Khalore bit her lip. "He said he had to break the mirror to make it stop."

"It?"

"Your guess is as good as mine. I think Ina stayed up talking to him. She'll have the full story."

Ghjuvan nodded firmly. "We should let them sleep."

"And Kinga?"

"Probably scrapping with Ilja by now," Ghjuvan said, "she was using that marillenknödel as a pillow..."

Khalore said, "so, does this mean…?"

"This? Or that?" He sounded amused; he still smelled, slightly, like whiskey and wine. She'd seen Ghjuvan horrifically hungover before – this wasn't quite that – but he did look a little more tired, a little more dishevelled, than he usually did. There was the faintest shadow on his jawline of what might one day be a beard; there were lines on his cheek where he had slept on something warm and uneven.

"You know."

"It doesn't mean anything, Lore." He was rolling his eyes. She didn't know why. She thought it was a reasonable question. Wasn't it? Maybe she'd grown up with unreasonable expectations, a grand total of two romantic models in her life: Annika and her boyfriend, who constantly fought like dogs, or Ina and her boyfriend, who might as well have shared a soul for how utterly in-sync they had been, even as children. Khalore wasn't a naturally romantic person; she simply hadn't thought about it much before. She hadn't had reason to.

Khalore said, "if you utter the words stress relief around me, I will be morally obliged to kill you, Mannazzu. You know that, right?"

"Understood."

There was a faint crashing sound from the kitchen. That, Khalore imagined, would be the scrap – but as she put her head around the corner, she found instead that Ilja was sitting on the table in Khalore's usual place, legs pulled up beneath himself, tearing apart squashed marillenknödel with enough carelessness that fragments of orange were flying in every direction. The cacophony had been dropped bowls, perhaps; Kinga was kicking one under the table with the expression of a girl too tired to stoop and pick things up, as she flipped one in her hand and began to peruse the shelves with an intent focus.

Kinga said, "Zoran just fell down the stairs."

Ilja said, around mouthfuls of pastry, "not all the way down the stairs."

"No," Kinga conceded, "not all the way..."

She glanced at Ilja, and they shared a conspiratorial smile. Khalore thought, I don't want to lose any more money today. She had forgotten that the only thing she hated more than the Warriors not getting along was when they did.

Khalore said, "is he okay?"

"I didn't think to check," Ilja said, at the same moment that Zoran said, "he is, thank you for asking."

Everyone was looking tired today, it seemed; Zoran had deep black lines carved under his eyes and his hair slicked back as though expecting a formal event. He was wearing the same shirt he'd worn the night before – and the night before that, now that Khalore thought of it. It was hopelessly creased, one sleeve rolled up to his elbow and the other hanging loose past his fingertips. He looked a little bit lost, even as Ilja inched along the table and pulled his old friend up to sit beside him, feigning a carelessness that even Khalore could tell was just that bit too perfect to be real.

"How was your party last night?" Ilja said, "how many children did the devils sacrifice at their black mass?"

"Well," Ghjuvan said, "none."

"Oh?"

"We had curry."

"And?"

"And whiskey."

"And I stole butter," Kinga said helpfully.

Ghjuvan nodded. "And Kinga stole butter."

Ilja stretched to ruffle her hair; she jerked back. For a moment, Khalore thought she might bare her teeth. "Good job, Kaasik."

"Fuck off, Schovajsa."

Khalore said, slowly, fully aware that she was probably missing out on some clever plan or some witty little joke – because when, really, did she have the full story? when was she smart enough to keep up? when had she ever been quick enough to nod and smile and agree with how funny this all was? – she said, "we already have butter."

Ilja laughed. Zoran said, "that's an excellent point, Khal," which really only made her feel worse, because no it wasn't. While Kinga continued to throw ingredients into her bowl at random, Khalore rose, and went to the shelf, and retrieved some more leftovers, which she set next to Ilja and Zoran, thinking that it might tempt the Hierophant to eat – anything to put a little more colour in his face.

Ghjuvan slung his arm around Kinga's waist to balance himself as he reached forward for a piece of kozunak. Khalore jabbed at his hand with a fork before he could touch any pastry, scowling and speaking sharply. She couldn't remember feeling protective before – if that was, indeed, this strange anger rising up in her throat. "Not," she said, "until you apologise to Inanna."

Ghjuvan sighed deeply. "Talking about it will just dredge it all back up again, Lore."

"So what," she said, "you're just going to pretend it never happened? Expect everyone to just forget?"

Ghjuvan didn't need to say anything. It was apparent, then, that this had indeed been the plan.

"Like family," Kinga murmured, rather unhelpfully.

From the other side of the table, grey boot planted on the table, grey eyes cold, grey hair threaded with rain, Ilja drawled, "you killed your sister, Kaasik."

"So?"

"So we're not listening to you on the topic of family."

Kinga looked like she was going to say something, so Ghjuvan spoke quickly. "Speak of the devil," he said, "we should get the others – we have a few things to discuss. Apologies or no," he added, glancing in Khalore's discussion. "If someone gets Ina and Azula, I can wake Nez and Belle -"

Ilja said, "no. I'll wake the Wheel. You get the girls." He stood. He said, "do we have something nice for them?"

Khalore blinked sleepily in his direction. "Why would we?"

Ilja frowned. "Azula and Belle are leaving today." He glanced at Kinga. "Right?"

Kinga said nothing, merely swinging around and brandishing a clay cup of something murky and grey in Zoran's direction. "You."

Zoran had accepted the cup gingerly. "An apology might be a good – "

"Drink."

Khalore felt like her throat had seized up. So soon? The Selection wasn't due to start for another four days – but then, she thought, there would be a preamble, and travel, and of course they should have expected this. Maybe the others had. Maybe she had just missed the memo, hiding in her attic room, turning away from the world, wondering where all the little pieces of her had gone –

More gone, now. She'd become so accustomed to having Azula around now. Ina would be lonely without her.

Zoran had drank, looking wary – and nearly coughed it back into the cup again, the liquid catching hard in his throat and grinding on the way back up. "Kinga, that's rancid."

"Trust me," she said, "it'll help."

Zoran said, "help how?"

Kinga shrugged. "Jaga used to make it for Matthias."

"I see," Zoran said, slowly. "Secretly a purveyor of poisons, your sister?"

"Not that she ever told me." Kinga extended a hand, and forced up the base of the cup, forcing it up so that Zoran had no choice but to choke a little more of it down. He seemed unhappy about it, spluttering slightly and wiping his mouth as soon as the Moon of Kur had relented.

He said, irritably, "there are easier ways to kill me, Kinga."

Kinga said, slightly wounded, "I'm helping."

"This won't help." Zoran's voice was soft. He looked small, and young, and lost – curled over on himself, avoiding their eyes. Could he see his own reflection in their pupils? Was he afraid of that – of seeing something that wasn't himself? Or, worse again, something that was? Khalore sat down in her chair, quite heavily, as the Hierophant's shoulders raised and fell helplessly. "I'm fading."

"No," Kinga said, "you're not."

"Kinga, you don't –"

"Zoran." Khalore couldn't remember Kinga ever saying the other Warrior's name like that – gently, almost tenderly. She crouched down next to him like she was about to peer into his face, one arm resting on the table, the other braced against her leg. "Have you forgotten what kind of a family I come from?"

She had said that yesterday morning, when she had swung on Ilja, when they had snapped at each other about memory and duty and death. She said it more kindly, now, if Kinga was ever kind – and even that kindness had a brittle edge to it, like it could snap easily if you ever tried to brace yourself with it. But Zoran was in no place to brace himself; he just shook his head, and shut his eyes.

"This isn't fading," Kinga said, "this isn't loosing your curse…" She shook her head. "This is… You're getting a grip. You understand me? You can't lose hold of something you haven't caught yet."

Khalore knew she wasn't the only one who heard Zoran swallow hard when she said that.

He said, "I can't control it."

"Of course you can't." There was a wry smile in her voice. "It's been six months."

"You can."

"Yeah," Kinga said, "But I've always been better than you, Czarnecki."

He chuckled drily.

She patted him on the leg, and looked at Khalore. "That goes for you as well, Angelo."

Khalore, her voice on the cusp of breaking, said, "oh, I'll believe it when I see it."

What wouldn't she have done to access her curse? She couldn't think of much. She would have opened her veins wide, if it meant being useful - if it meant that she was worth something.

Or would she just spend the next ten years like this, living a wretched half-life, until it came time to pass her curse on to another child whose parents didn't want them?

She had never heard Zoran's voice so quiet before. "Do you know who your successor will be, Kinga?"

An expression Khalore couldn't read flitted across the Moon's face. She said, "my niece. Małgosia."

"I didn't know you had any other siblings," Zoran said, his voice tinged slightly with concern – with regret. Khalore didn't like to hear that; she didn't like the idea of what thoughts might have propelled that change in tone. It came so close to disrespect, to shaming the honour of the Warrior position, to the expression of condolences for a redemptive necessity. "I thought it was just Jaga."

Kinga shrugged.

Footsteps on the stair, and Ina's voice preceding her into the room, sweet and light and tired, very tired, so tired – and worried, when she saw Zoran hunched over so. "Are you okay, Czarnecki?"

"I think I've been poisoned," Zoran said, rather faintly.

"We would be so lucky," Khalore murmured, and returned the slight, wan smile Zoran shot in her direction as he straightened up, gradually painstakingly.

"Don't die like that now, Zor." Ina tilted her head; though she reached a hand towards him, her fingertips grazed the surface of the table rather than his skin. "Mielikki would be so upset that we waited until she was dead to start poisoning one another."

With the new additions to their little group, the kitchen was too cramped to accommodate a summit, and it was determined that all of them trooping over to hang out on Zoran's roof would attract more attention than it was worth – though Ina looked sorrowful to concede as much. Instead, they gathered some of Nez's blankets, and Azula's extensive collection of tea, and some of Ina's bread as it came fresh out of the oven. The sun was only just creeping over the pink-brick wall of the courtyard as they all found their places here and there: Belle sat on the chair Zoran preferred for night-time chats, with her back straight and her feet flat, while Nez sprawled on her blankets and fell asleep again almost immediately.

They had five matters to discuss, and they took them in order, each Warrior taking a turn to introduce a topic for argument – but no one was in the mood for an argument this morning. Though neither Kinga nor Ghjuvan expressed apology, neither of them acted as though one was mandated; for the way they acted, Ghjuvan lying in the grass with his head on Kinga's knee, things were exactly the way they had been a week ago.

It galled Khalore, that insouciance, and she couldn't quite articulate why. But she didn't have long to think about it; each of their problems had a name.

Mielikki. Hyacinth. Suero. Eero. Schreave.

They started, then, from the beginning. Ina shook her head silently but did not disagree as Zoran sat forward on his heels and, one by one, once and for all, the other Warriors agreed that they needed to retrieve the curse. Not even to give to Belle, for the quiet girl blanched slightly with unspoken fear whenever this topic was broached; simply, then, to cling to, and to keep from the grip of the tagma. There was no chance of the Illéans recognising the corpse of a xrafstar, Ghjuvan argued, and Khalore silently agreed, but Zoran was not to be deterred. They had nearly died out beyond those walls, on that first awful journey here – and now he wanted to go back?

He wanted to go back, with only Nez at his back?

But Khalore couldn't argue. None of them could. Yes, they needed this; yes, they would be stronger with one more xrafstar amongst them. But there was a silent terror hanging over them, a dark veil everyone pretended not to see: could they really initiate someone on their own? Kinga said they could – Khalore wasn't sure that was guarantee of anything. And would it take? Then why, she thought, why hadn't they ripped the Tower out of Pekka's corpse and given it to someone else – to Ragnar, or to Myghal, or to Uriasz – and sent them with the others, as backup, as help, as reinforcements?

But that could wait, she thought. That could wait for now. And when Zoran's eyes roamed over her in search of argument, she shook her head, and shut her mouth, and looked down.

They adjourned for coffee. Nez was woken, for her assent to the plan, and then allowed to fall unconscious again quite promptly; Kinga feigned upset that Zoran opted for coffee instead of whatever strange grey concoction still lingered in the kitchen; Ilja drank three cups in the time that it took Khalore to finish one, and seemed no more awake for that fact. She was surprised he wasn't vibrating, when the moment came for him to set down his cup, and say, sharply, "does that mean we'll harvest Hyacinth as well, then?"

"No," Ina said sharply, "no." At the look Ilja shot her, she blanched. "It's different, Ilja, it's different – Mielikki's dead. We can't change that. Hyacinth isn't."

"Not yet," Ilja said. "Not yet. Do you really want to wait?"

"You think we can't do this without the Sun?"

"I think it would be much easier," Ilja said, "I think it would take a weight off all of us."

"Wait," Ina said, "just wait. It hasn't even been a full day."

"How long," Ilja said, "do you want to wait?"

"I'll let you know," Ina said, her voice firm. "When I'm finished waiting."

And that, Khalore sensed, was that – because Ina followed this pronouncement by immediately offering everyone wedges of halva, smiling blithely as though Ilja had never objected to her idea at all. Ilja accepted the pastry reluctantly, looking rather like he was too tired to argue, but that he was quite certain they'd return to this debate again some time in the near future.

Or maybe Khalore was projecting just a little bit.

Kinga produced a block of butter from the coat that Ghjuvan had left out in the cold night; she threw it to Zoran and said, rather bizarrely, "can you make keys?"

"I'm a woodworker," Zoran said, "not a miracleworker."

"Has anyone ever told you that you're a bit dramatic, Czarnecki?"

"It's been mentioned."

Ilja said, quietly, "do these keys lead anywhere, Kaasik?"

"I look forward to finding out."

"You are an actual menace," Ilja murmured, and Ghjuvan had to pin Kinga's wrist to her thigh to keep her from throwing her piece of halva at the Chariot.

"Don't throw food," Ina murmured, as though Ghjuvan had acted out her words before she'd had a chance to utter them.

Azula said, "and the tunnels?"

"They know about them," Ghjuvan said. He glanced over at the new arrivals; Nez was too busy dozing to answer the question that went unspoken, while Belle looked disinclined to say anything without being asked directly. And Hyacinth…. "But they don't know much. Kane's squad was meant to explore them, but with the attack on Mag Mell, that's been postponed until after the start of the Selection."

"So," Ilja said, "you can still use them to get out."

"We," Zoran said, and no one corrected him.

Ina said, "then, before you go – before we all split up again – we should..."

She looked to Khalore for support. Khalore finished her sentence bluntly, glad to be helpful – glad, at last, to be of some use, even if that use was something utterly, inanely mundane. "She wants to have Eero around for dinner so you can interrogate him rather than her."

"Yes," Ilja said. "I suppose that sounds fair."

And that was that.

Thus concluded, they were free to lie on the grass – or on each other, as Ilja exaggeratedly stretched his legs across Zoran – and drink coffee, and eat pastries. It was a rare moment of relaxation, crystal and brilliant. The sun rose, and shattered against the windows of the bakery; Ghjuvan had fallen asleep again, his face pressed against Kinga's coat to shield his eyes from the slow creep of morning light, seemingly heedless of how hard Kinga's shoulders were shaking as she suppressed a laugh at whatever dry comment Ilja had just made about the obvious dent she had left in Azula's flowerbed when she had fallen from the wall the night before. Azula had braided Ina's hair, and now she was working on Belle's; Ina put a hand gently on Nez, as though to check she was still alive, and then offered her a cup of coffee with a smile as the other Warrior stirred sleepily and blinked blearily.

And it was good. For many long, bright, cold moments, it was good.

Belle and Azula had been instructed to bring no clothing with them to the palace, only a few personal belongings, but seeing as the ersatz refugees from Mønt had very few of those, the girls had no packing to be done, no more preparations to be done. Whatever Ilja had learned about the palace, he had passed along dutifully to the others – now he was lying back on the grass, legs propped up against Zoran, and listing off details to a nervous Belle: about palace layouts, and guard rotations, and hangable offences, looking totally blithe at every mention of oubliette or nail-pulling that elicited a little blink from the younger Warrior.

And Azula – it seemed like, perhaps, Azula hadn't internalised until this moment, this very moment, that this was her last day at the bakery. She had screwed her eyes shut and she was clinging to Zoran tightly. She wasn't much younger than Khalore, but she was infused with a… naivete? An optimism? A hopefulness? None of those words were quite right. But it made Azula seem younger than Khalore. It made her seem so much younger than all the rest of them. They were resigned to war; Azula still thought there was a way to live without it.

Azula said, softly, "I don't want to go. Not unless you promise me that you'll be okay."

"We won't be okay," Zoran said softly, "until you're back safe. But we'll survive. Zula?"

She looked up at him. Zoran smiled.

And they said nothing else.