The Harbors of the Sun

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

After the next few days, Moon almost wished he could have spent the trip in a healing sleep. Waiting for Jade and the others to catch up made him edgy and there were too many things to worry about. And Stone was preoccupied, loitering in the stern, talking more to Delin or Diar than anyone else.

Once Moon convinced Chime that he was fully recovered, they started having sex late at night on top of the steering cabin. It was somewhat challenging, since they had to be quiet so Niran wouldn’t hear them and yell and bang on the ceiling. They were curled up together one night when Chime admitted, “I can’t stop thinking about the Reaches. If it got that far into Jandera territory, if Jade hadn’t stopped it in time . . .”

“But she did,” Moon said, and nipped his ear. He was pretending to be less affected by it than he actually was. Diar had managed to plot a rough map of the weapon’s effect, and how far it might have extended if it hadn’t been stopped. Stone had asked her not to show it to anyone else.

“I know, but—” Chime began, and Moon did something that distracted him from the topic for the rest of the night.

But by the next afternoon, Moon needed something else to think about, and he started to teach Shade how to fight like a groundling. Moon had been in many situations where he couldn’t risk revealing what he was by shifting but still had to defend himself. There was no reason to expect Shade ever would, but there was no point in not learning, either.

Shade was bemused at first and then increasingly interested. He had been taught the rudiments of fighting and hunting at Opal Night, but not how to use his strength in his groundling form. He was good at it; he was still built like a slender Aeriat but reaching maturity had added a lot of lean muscle.

They soon ended up with an audience of the warriors and everyone who wasn’t busy on the boat, with Delin sketching and taking notes. Bramble wanted to learn too, and Moon ended up teaching her, Lithe, and Merit. Chime got lessons too, though Bramble had to drag him down the deck. “I don’t need to learn,” Chime protested. “I’m never leaving the Reaches again!”

It helped pass the time and gave Moon something to think about besides Jade. He was worried about her for several different reasons, and wished they had had more of a chance to talk before the wind-ship departed.

She couldn’t be happy about the fact that he had left Chime, Shade, and Lithe to run off with a kethel and try to stop the Hians alone. It hadn’t worked, and he had almost gotten himself and Kethel killed, but since Moon hadn’t known if Jade and the others were trapped or dead, he didn’t see he had had much choice. But he was tired of worrying about it. They were on their way home, and he wanted everything to go back to the way it was. He figured if Jade was still angry when she got back, he could apologize and pretend convincingly to be sorry. He just wanted her to hurry up and get here so he could do it.

But they had come out of the jungles and crossed the grass plains, and were almost at the edge of the western wetlands before the queens and the rest of the warriors caught up with them.

When they were specks in the distance, Deft sighted them from the look-out post atop the mast. The larger group of Raksura continued on, but two specks broke off and flew toward the wind-ship. By the time they landed, everyone was on deck and Moon was trying not to vibrate with impatience.

“Are you all right?” he demanded as soon as Jade furled her wings.

“Yes.” She seemed startled to be asked. She looked tired and her scales were dusty. “We’re fine.”

“What happened?” Delin asked anxiously, proving Moon wasn’t the only one who had been worried. “Are our other friends well? Was there a resolution with the Kish?”

Jade said, “Yes. Pearl and Malachite are traveling with the half-Fell flight, so they’re going straight on to the Reaches.” Moon realized Malachite must not have wanted the Fellborn queen anywhere near him and Shade. Jade continued, “We have an agreement with the Kishan conclave, for what that’s worth.” She glanced at Saffron. “It was fairly boring.” Saffron twitched her spines in fervent agreement.

Jade’s spines were drooping a little and Moon thought she must be exhausted. He said, “You need to rest.”

That got Bramble moving, and she hustled Jade and Saffron below to where Flicker was already making tea.

Once they were sitting down, Jade still didn’t talk much, though Saffron gave more details. Stone sent River, Root, and Deft off to get a couple of grasseaters, then sat down on the edge of the group.

Moon, partly so Stone didn’t have to ask, said, “How was Rorra when you left?”

“She was ready to go back to Kedmar. So was Kalam.” Jade flicked a look at Stone, or at least in Stone’s direction. “I told her if Callumkal really does mean to visit us, she should come. She would be welcome.”

Stone didn’t say anything and the lack of response made for an awkward moment. That was when Moon added up all the hints and realized something was wrong between Jade and Stone. Diar asked a question about the Kishan conclave then and the talk went on.

Moon caught Jade alone in the sleeping room after she had eaten. She was leaning over, digging through her pack. He slid the light wooden door shut and said, “Did you want to talk about what happened?” He wasn’t sure what was wrong between her and Stone, but being angry with him probably couldn’t be helping. He wanted to give her a chance to yell at him in private before he apologized.

She glanced up at him. “With the conclave?”

Moon had been hoping not to have to spell it out. He felt badly enough about it as it was. “No, with Lavinat and the Hians, in the ruin.”

Jade burrowed deeper into the pack, not looking up at him. “I’d rather wait until we get back to the court.”

Moon hadn’t expected that. “You don’t want to talk.” He had rehearsed this moment and he just wanted to get it over with. Waiting would just make it worse; at least, it always had before.

Jade still didn’t look up. “No, not now.”

Moon set his jaw. “About anything?”

Frustrated, obviously trying to avoid having the conversation, Jade kept pretending to dig in the pack, which couldn’t have more than three things and a blanket in it. “Of course not. We can talk about something else.”

Moon folded his arms and tried to force down his irritation. “I told Bramble I’d have a clutch with her.”

Jade gave up on the pack and started pretending to arrange her blanket. “That’s fine. She’s a good choice.”

Moon had put off this decision for so long, out of a combination of inability to choose and nerves, and he was hoping for a little more excitement at finally having made it. The lack of it didn’t make this situation any less exasperating. He said, “We’re going to have five mentors. Maybe six.”

“Good.” Jade sat back on her heels, checking the blanket’s arrangement.

“We’re going to do it right now, out on the deck,” Moon added.

Jade gave in, stood up, and gripped his shoulders. “Moon, I’m just tired. We can talk about it when we get back to the court.”

Moon hated the image of the sullen spoiled consort who fled in dis-array when he didn’t get what he wanted, so he kept his face expressionless and did not shift and break the door into pieces when he walked away.

He stood out on deck, breathing the damp cool wind. Flicker and Deft, on watch atop the steering cabin, regarded him warily. Then he went to look for Saffron. He disliked Saffron as much as she disliked him, but they had been imprisoned by Fell once together and that did create some sort of bond. Sort of.

He found her in the stern, using a bucket of water to scrub dust out of her frills. Some Golden Islanders sat nearby, sewing up rips in the covers used to protect the windows in bad weather, and River was up in the look-out post atop the mast, so Moon kept his voice low. He said, “Jade’s upset. Did she say anything to you?”

“We barely stopped to sleep and hunt.” Saffron glared at him.

Moon stood there, waiting. After a long moment of trying to maintain eye contact, Saffron hissed and said, “She didn’t like dealing with the Kish groundlings.” She flicked her spines. “That was all. Who wouldn’t be upset after all this?”

Moon couldn’t decide if she was telling the truth or being a good warrior and refusing to carry tales about the queen to the consort. He hissed at her and left.

He tried to find Stone then, but Stone was hiding so effectively that he might as well not be on the boat. Chime, Shade, Lithe, Heart, and Merit were all asleep in a pile in one of the other cabins. Moon gave up and went to lean against the deck railing near Bramble.

The breeze held just a hint of rainy season coolness and was like silk against groundling skin. Everyone else was either asleep or up atop the cabins, enjoying the sun.

Jade was obviously unhappy with him, and he was worried that the root of it lay in what was improper consort behavior by any Raksuran standard. Jade had been tolerant of Moon’s behavior, because the court had been lurching from one crisis to another and there wasn’t much room for a consort who couldn’t take care of himself. But before the dreams had started and Callumkal had arrived, things had been quiet. Maybe Jade had gotten used to that quiet and it had eroded her tolerance for a consort who couldn’t stay out of trouble.

And he was very aware that a consort getting into trouble in the Reaches was a very different thing from a consort being captured or killed by official forces of Kish. That if Malachite had wanted to retaliate, everything could have been unimaginably worse.

It was a depressing thought. Queens and consorts who traveled frequently together weren’t exactly unknown, at least in Indigo Cloud’s history. Moon had heard all the stories about Solace and Sable, though their adventures were probably exaggerated. What he and Jade had done hadn’t seemed all that different.

Moon glanced over his shoulder and saw Root coming out of the belowdecks door. Root saw him, twitched, and vanished back inside with guilty speed. Exasperated, Moon turned back to the view of the approaching wetlands. “Bramble, is something wrong?”

“With me, no,” she said, sounding genuinely puzzled. “With everybody else, sometimes I wonder.”

They were two days into the wetlands, the long prelude before the Reaches, when the warriors on watch called a warning. They had seen several figures flying at a distance, either Aeriat or Fell.

Stone climbed up on the steering cabin to shade his eyes and squint in the indicated direction. He jumped down from the cabin to report, “Warriors, coming this way.”

Moon hissed out a breath. A scatter of warriors sounded like a planned patrol, not survivors fleeing another Fell attack.

Jade’s spines twitched. “Can you tell who it is?”

“Not at this distance.” Stone stood, waiting for Jade to make a decision. Their behavior towards each other was absolutely correct, but the obvious disagreement between them, whatever it was, hung in the air like a boulder.

Jade said, stiffly, “Will you go up and signal them?”

Stone nodded and turned for the stern. Jade’s spines tilted in distress for an instant before snapping back to a firm neutral. Moon caught Bramble’s gaze, and Bramble signaled bafflement. Moon had no idea either.

In the past two days, it had become obvious that some Raksura were not speaking to other Raksura but there were too many Raksura on the boat to make the configurations obvious. Stone was avoiding everyone, Chime and Lithe were as baffled as Bramble, and when Moon had tried to ask River, he had hissed, “I’m not involved in this!” and climbed up on top of the mast again. Shade had changed the subject so adroitly Moon couldn’t figure out if he knew anything or not. Any attempt to pin down Merit just resulted in pointed questions about Moon’s injuries and veiled threats to put him into a healing sleep. Delin and all the other Golden Islanders seemed oblivious to whatever had happened, which further confused the issue. To Jade, Moon said, “Scouting for Fell?”

Stone jumped off the stern, shifted, and caught the wind, rising high above the wind-ship.“Maybe,” Jade said, watching Stone.

Moon waited on the deck with Jade, the air cool and as humid as a wet blanket. There were traces of rot in the breeze, but not nearby. As the strange group drew closer, River and Flicker went up in the air to question them. They landed back on the deck and River reported, “They’re from Emerald Twilight and Ocean Winter. They say they have news.”

Jade turned toward Moon. “It’s better they don’t see you.”

Moon stared at her, baffled. “Huh?”

Jade said pointedly, “It’s Emerald Twilight. You know how they are. They might start rumors. Tell Shade, too.”

Moon had to bite his lip to keep from baring his teeth. Emerald Twilight was perfectly capable of starting rumors about him whether they saw him or not. But he made himself turn and go through the doorway. He met Shade coming up the steps, caught his wrist, and tugged him back down. “We have to hide.”

“I thought they were just warriors,” Shade said, confused.

Moon swallowed a hiss. “They are. Stone had sex with a sealing all over this boat but we have to hide because they might start rumors.”

Shade pulled Moon to a halt at the bottom of the stairs by simply stopping. He said, with just a little exasperation, “Moon, you’re a consort, but there are courts that won’t treat you like one unless you act like it. Emerald Twilight is one of them. Believe me, I know.”

Moon managed not to growl. He was right, which didn’t make it any better. “I know.”

So they ended up sitting in the cabin next to the main hold while Jade and the others spoke to the warriors. They kept the door open so they could hear, and Chime, Flicker, and Bramble sat with them. Delin sat in the doorway, trying to be part of both conversations. Moon had difficulty controlling his irritation, but at least it was good to get more recent news of the Reaches.

The two female warriors who led the group were Crocus from Emerald Twilight and Spin from Ocean Winter, and they had been sent to make sure the Fell had left the wetlands. Crocus said, “We’ve been finding half-dead stragglers, and scattered dakti. There was word of an almost intact flight still in the area, but it was gone by the time we got out here.”

Spin added, “We could tell the further the Fell were from the Reaches, the worse they got it, whatever it was. The last day or so, we haven’t seen anything but rotting clumps of bodies.”

As Jade asked for more details about the situation, Moon tried not to think about what it would have been like to come home and find the Reaches like this. Colonies empty and silent, with nothing but the scent of decaying bodies. The Hians had come so close to succeeding.

Even with the recent news, it was still a relief to see the colony active and well when the wind-ship dropped below the Reaches’ canopy and made its way through the mountain-trees to Indigo Cloud.

Moon stood at the rail with Chime as the wind-ship entered the clearing under the colony tree’s immense canopy. Groups of warriors flew patrol circuits and the Arbora were out on the garden platforms. There were far more Arbora and warriors outside than usual in an afternoon, since Jade had sent River and Deft ahead to tell the court they were here.

Pearl and Malachite must have arrived a few days earlier so everyone had been expecting them. The first to greet them was Celadon, who swooped up and dropped down onto the deck, followed by a happy cluster of Indigo Cloud and Opal Night warriors.

Celadon said, “Balm told us you were captured by groundlings, you idiot,” and pulled Moon into a hug. He must be more upset than he was willing to admit to himself, because he held on to her longer than he had meant to. Finally she squeezed his waist and pushed him back. “You’re all right?” she asked, brows lowered in concern.

“Sure, I’m fine,” Moon told her. He felt it was unconvincing, and Celadon eyed him suspiciously.

Distracted, Chime pointed to the opposite end of the clearing. “Is that what I think it is?”

Celadon turned and her spines flicked. “It’s the half-Fell flight.”

Moon stepped to the rail to look. There had been occasional drafts touched with Fell stench coming from this direction, so the presence of the flight wasn’t a surprise.

A camp had been built on a cleared platform in a smaller mountain-tree at the edge of Indigo Cloud’s canopy. There were tent shelters augmented with saplings and firepits, and it looked exactly like a Raksuran camp, except for the pale groundling forms of the rulers and dakti. Celadon said, “They’re staying here until it’s time to go back to Opal Night. Malachite’s promised them a colony tree in our territory.”

Chime turned to her, brows lifted. “I bet Emerald Twilight and the other courts are thrilled.”

“It was an interesting conversation,” she admitted. “But the mentors said the Fell queen can’t breed like a progenitor, so there was no reason not to have them here. Pearl supported Malachite on it. They make a fairly unstoppable combination.”

As the wind-ship tied off to a branch above one of the bigger platforms, Moon and the others flew to the knothole entrance and went inside.

Filled with warriors and Arbora, the cavern of the greeting hall was loud with happy greetings. The wash of familiar scents, mixed with the sweet clean scent of the mountain-tree, made it unexpectedly hard for Moon to keep his spines neutral.

And it was strange to see the Indigo Cloud mountain-tree so full of Raksura. It wasn’t crowded by any stretch of the imagination, but almost half the balconies in the normally empty levels between the hall and the queens’ level were now obviously tenanted. There was a profusion of new scents, far more sounds of movement and voices, and a lot more clothing and blankets hanging out to dry.

Balm arrived in a flurry of wings and spines, shifting before she reached the ground. She flung herself at Moon and he caught her. “Pearl said you were alive,” she said, and nipped his ear, “I wasn’t surprised, I knew—I knew—”

He nipped her back. Not very coherently, he said, “Me, too.”

She let him go and turned to Jade. Bone grabbed Moon enthusiastically then and he lost Jade and Balm in the crowd. Ember appeared after that, pulling Shade along with him, the warriors nearby stepping aside for them. He looked as beautiful as usual, even when flustered and worried. He said, “Moon, Shade said you were all right, but—You’re really all right?”

“Sure,” Moon said. “How are the kids?”

Shade nudged Ember, an I told you so gesture. Ember watched Moon carefully, but seemed relieved. “They’re all fine.” With more assurance, he added, “And you’ll be very proud of how Frost behaved while you were gone.”

When the storm of greetings had died down, Moon found himself next to Chime again.

Chime stood near where Heart and a large group of Arbora had surrounded Bramble and Merit. He was looking up at the central well, smiling a little. “This must be what it used to look like,” he said. “I never thought we’d see it like this.”

Moon looked up again, watching warriors flit from balcony to balcony. “It’s going to be quiet when they go.”

Jade appeared, skirting the noisy crowd of Arbora. She told Moon, “I’ve got to go meet with Pearl and Malachite.”

Moon pretended to believe that. “If you need me, I’ll be down in the nurseries.”

She hesitated, then said, “I’ll go down there later,” and then leapt up onto the wall of the greeting hall.

Moon had meant to spend some time with his clutch and the Sky Copper fledglings, and talk to the teachers. But after answering a storm of questions from Frost and giving her, Thorn, and Bitter an expurgated account of the journey, and playing with all the babies, he fell so deeply asleep he didn’t wake for anything. Even with Blossom, Bark, and Rill standing over him and talking and occasionally accidentally stepping on him.

He woke the next morning in a pile of babies and fledglings, with Rill handing him clean clothes, pointing him to a bathing pool, and telling him the court was getting ready to do the farewell for Song, as well as Coil and the two Opal Night warriors who had died in the fighting. Moon hadn’t meant to sleep like this. He had meant to talk to Jade, and make sure the Golden Islanders were settled and comfortable, and a lot of other things. He hadn’t even known Coil had been killed.

Part of the reason for the long sleep had to be that he was still recovering from being injured, but most of it was probably just the feeling of being home again, and completely safe. He asked Rill, “Where’s Jade?”

“Up on the queens’ level,” Rill reported, pulling him to his feet. “Balm came down to see where you were, but she said Jade said not to wake you if you were asleep. Now hurry!”

Moon staggered to the bathing pool and got ready.

The court sang for the dead, a blend of Indigo Cloud and Opal Night’s song. Moon had come to understand Indigo Cloud’s song over the turns, but Opal Night’s was still the one that wrung his heart. He fled the greeting hall as soon as it was over.

He went up to the consorts’ level, quiet since Ember and Shade were both still below with the others, and reacquainted himself with his bower. The Arbora had been in to renew the heating stones in the hearth and the snail shells that were spelled for light. Moon would never take this for granted, this room that was his alone, something he had never had until he had come to this tree with the court. But it didn’t feel right, knowing something was still wrong with Jade.

Then the draft of rain-scented outdoor air told him Stone was up here in his favorite spot for brooding, and Moon found him in the room with the outer door. It was open to the green light of the canopy and the breeze and hum of insects, and Stone sat on the floor in front of it. Moon sat across the room, where he could lean back against the wall and still feel the air on his skin. He sat there a while in companionable silence, sorting out and identifying the rich green blend that was the scents of the Reaches. It seemed turns since he and Stone had sat here and argued before leaving for the sel-Selatra.

After a time, Stone tilted his head toward Moon. “You wanted to talk.”

Moon frowned. He hadn’t been trying to wear Stone down with silence. In fact, he hadn’t thought it was possible. But maybe Stone wanted to talk. As an opening gambit, he tried, “I think Jade is mad at me because I got caught by Lavinat.”

Stone grimaced. “No, that’s not it.”

Moon considered that for a moment. At least Stone was willing to admit there was an “it” and it wasn’t just Moon’s imagination. “Is she mad at you?”

“She was. I don’t know now.”

“Are you mad at her?”

Stone moved uneasily. “I was. Not now.”

“Why?”

Stone turned enough to regard him with his good eye. “It’s complicated.”

“Complicated how? You’ve were traveling across Kish and staying in a groundling city together for how many days, and you couldn’t figure it out?”

Stone sighed and looked away. “By the time I was ready to talk to her about it, we were a little busy dealing with you and your new Kishan groundling friend.”

“So what changed . . .” Well, one big thing had changed. “You found me. You were mad at each other because I got caught by Lavinat? Why?”

Stone pushed to his feet abruptly. “She needs to tell you herself.” On the way out, he gave Moon a shove to the head, part annoyance and part apology.

Moon felt he needed more information. Shade had been unresponsive before but maybe it was worth another try. He found Shade on the largest garden platform, swimming in one of the ponds with a mixed group of Opal Night and Indigo Cloud warriors and Arbora. The pond was in the center of a grove of fruit trees with long twisting branches and brushy canopies. Tending and pruning had made them much taller than they had been when the court had first arrived.

The Indigo Cloud warriors and Arbora seemed comfortable around Shade, even when he was in his shifted form. It probably helped that the Opal Night Arbora were happily splashing and playing with him, and that he and Flicker kept getting into mock wrestling matches, which Shade pretended to lose. Moon crouched at the edge of the pond and managed to deflect attempts to get him to join in. When Shade surfaced in a spray of water and shaking spines, Moon got him to climb out and retreat past the grove and out of earshot.

Shade plopped down on a ground fruit mound, still shaking his spines. “What’s wrong?”

Moon perched on a trough of melon vines so they could be at eye level. “Do you know what’s wrong with Stone and Jade?”

Shade squinted up at the heavy branch arching overhead. He admitted reluctantly, “Probably, but I can’t tell you.”

Moon flicked his tail impatiently, scattering the little flying lizards that were trying to settle on it. “‘Can’t?’”

“Uh, shouldn’t and won’t,” Shade clarified. “Not if they won’t talk about it.”

This was frustrating. “I’m your half-clutch-brother, you have to tell me.”

“Where did you get that idea?” Shade’s spines flicked in amusement. Moon glared at him. After a bemused moment, Shade said, “Are you trying to think of a way to make me tell you?”

Shade had been raised by Malachite, there was nothing Moon could do to intimidate him. He tried, “If I guess, will you tell me if I’m right?”

Shade snorted. “No.”

Moon let Shade return to the pond and tried Chime, who didn’t know anything but was at least more supportive.

Moon found him on a balcony that overlooked the greeting hall, with pens, ink stones, and paper spread out around him. He had said he was going to write up an account of their journey to share with Delin, and Delin was off somewhere writing up one to share with Chime. Moon had no idea why they needed two different versions but it seemed to be making both of them happy.

When Moon told Chime his suspicions about Stone and Jade, Chime waved his pen in exasperation. “I noticed that too. It keeps getting worse. I don’t know what it’s about. They didn’t tell you?”

Moon slumped in disappointment. “Stone wouldn’t.” He added, frustrated, “Shade knows, why don’t you know?”

Moon hadn’t meant it seriously. But Chime considered the question, then lifted his brows. “It had to be something that happened in the ruin, right? Lithe and I were in the steering cabin of the giant boat the whole time. But Shade left to help Rorra and the warriors get to Jade.”

He was right. Moon sat up straighter, feeling he was finally close to an answer. “Bramble didn’t know either, and she was on the wind-ship. River knew, but wouldn’t talk, and he was with Jade. So anyone who was with Jade might know.”

“That’s it.” Chime decisively wiped his pen and tucked it away in its case. “Root was with Jade.”

Moon smiled grimly. “Let’s find him.”

All the warriors who had gone on the trip had been told to rest and stay around the court for the next several days, so they knew Root wouldn’t be on patrol or out guarding the hunters. They found him in the third place they looked, hanging around with some of the younger warriors at the fringes of the teachers’ hall, watching the Arbora peel roots for the next meal.

Everyone was talking and busy, but Root saw them and immediately looked guilty, which told Moon they were on the right trail. Moon motioned for Root to come to them, and Root reluctantly pushed to his feet and went to the archway. Moon took Root’s arm and pulled him down the passage into a chamber currently being used to store baskets of root peelings. “We need to talk.”

Root said quickly, “I know I’ve been a bad warrior, and taking it out on everyone.”

It was good that Root had finally come to his senses a little. Maybe the ritual for Song had helped. “Good, but we need to talk to you about something else,” Moon said.

Chime asked, “What happened down in the ruin? After you got there with Shade and Rorra.”

Root seemed uneasy and surprised to be asked, but he said, “You know that Vendoin told them there was a stone plate down there and breaking it would stop the weapon.” Chime motioned impatiently for him to continue. “Rorra had the fire weapon and Jade was helping her point it down where the plate was. The Hians down there heard them, and they told Jade if she didn’t stop the fire weapon, they’d kill you. And she didn’t stop, and they killed you. Or we thought they did.”

Chime turned to Moon, aghast. “Is that what happened?”

“I didn’t make it up,” Root protested.

“We know, just be quiet,” Chime told him.

Moon leaned against the wall, trying to sort out his memories of those moments. Most of it was obscured by a haze of pain. He knew the Hians had been talking, but couldn’t remember the words. “I don’t remember. I was already burned when that happened. Kethel and I knocked the weapon out of the holder it was in, but it was still working.”

“So it was after that.” Chime watched him intently. “Did Lavinat use a fire weapon on you again?”

“Maybe. I’m not sure.” He was beginning to understand what had happened, or at least why Jade was acting the way she was. And Stone was right, it was complicated. “Did Stone try to stop Jade?” he asked Root.

“No, nobody did.” Root lifted his shoulders, uncertain. “We didn’t know what to do. It happened so fast, there was no time to think. I was mad because Song died, but the Hians were going to kill everyone in the Reaches and Jade had to let them kill you to stop them.” He met Moon’s gaze, worried. “Are you angry because we didn’t—”

“No.” On impulse, Moon pushed off the wall and pulled him into a hug. It turned out to be the right impulse, because Root wrapped himself around Moon and buried his face in Moon’s shoulder. This also explained the conversation with Malachite, Shade, and Lithe. Jade must have told Malachite, and Pearl, what had happened. Shade hadn’t wanted Malachite to interfere between Moon and Jade, and Malachite had given in to him, but had tried to let Moon know that if he wanted to leave Indigo Cloud, she would make that happen. It was an impressive display of restraint on her part. She must have been . . . And Jade must have been . . . Moon rested his chin on top of Root’s head. What Jade had gone through was terrible. Moon thought how he would feel if their positions were reversed, and his imagination just didn’t want to go there. He didn’t think he would have been strong enough to make the right choice. He said to Chime, “I wish I’d figured this out earlier.”

Chime’s mouth twisted wryly. “Me, too. Right after it happened, I was just—” He waved a hand. “Upset, and then we found out there was a chance you were alive and Jade sent Balm and the others off to the Reaches and she and Stone left with Rorra and Kalam. Everyone was frantic.”

Moon was still reeling. He had thought Jade was angry at him for getting caught, when she must have been blaming herself for his death. “Stone must have realized that she didn’t have a choice.”

Chime nodded slowly, still lost in thought. “Sure, he must have realized it, but . . . Knowing there was no other choice, and living with it are two different things.”

He was right about that. Still clinging to Moon, Root nodded agreement. Moon let his breath out and said, “Stone and Jade need to talk. Jade and I need to talk.”

Moon caught Jade in the greeting hall, where she was watching Bramble and Bone and a group of Arbora talk with Niran, Diar, and the other Golden Islanders. She stood at the outskirts of the group, a restless, unsettled air about her that would have been a clear signal that something was wrong, if everyone hadn’t been so distracted. It was a noisy group, and so no one noticed when Moon stepped up beside her and said, “We need to talk.”

Jade flicked a look at him. “Not now. I have to—”

Moon said, “Now.”

That did it. Jade turned toward him, spines starting to lift. “Or?”

Moon folded his arms. As a former mentor, Chime had been very helpful with suggestions about what options were available if Jade resisted. “Or I’ll ask Malachite and Pearl to arbitrate, with Heart as a witness.”

Jade took a step back, caught by surprise and completely appalled. “You wouldn’t.”

Chime had pointed out that it wasn’t often that a queen and consort’s birthqueens were both available for something like this, so it would be a shame not to at least threaten to take advantage of it. “I would.”

Jade barred her teeth. “Moon—”

“They’ll love it. You know how much they like to help with things like this.” This was pure sarcasm, because settling an emotional dispute was Pearl’s idea of a nightmare and she was bound to offer a lot of extremely bad advice. Malachite wasn’t much better, though she would just endure it stoically and be a hundred times more judgmental.

“I told them what happened,” Jade snapped.

“You didn’t tell me,” Moon countered.

Jade snarled, grabbed his wrist and dragged him down a passage behind the fountain pool. They stopped in one of the unused bowers.

It had a balcony looking down the lower stairwell to the Arbora workrooms, and had probably been left empty because it was too noisy. Moon sat down beside the cold hearth bowl and watched Jade pace and lash her tail. After a couple of circuits of the bower, she calmed down enough to sit down and glare at him. “So talk.”

Moon said, “You need to talk to Stone, because whatever it is you think he thinks, you’re wrong.”

It startled her, which made Moon wonder what else she had expected him to say. She said, “He told you what happened.”

“No, Chime and I had to pry it out of Root.” Jade looked away, her spines making an effort not to show chagrin. “I’m not angry at you. You had no choice. I would have done the same, if it had been me up there and you with the Hians.”

Her expression was skeptical. “You would have?”

“Yes.” That was a lie. He thought he would have tried to think of a way to trick the Hians, delaying while the weapon spread further into the Reaches to touch Indigo Cloud. He might have saved Jade only to return to a colony tree full of corpses. If he had managed to make the right decision, he would have wanted to flee, to never see another Raksura again, but he would have been tied to the court by his clutch. No telling how that would have come out, except badly. “It was the whole Reaches, Jade. I’m not sure the others understood that, not really. If you hadn’t done it, I would have been angry. And dead, because Lavinat would have killed us all.”

She was quiet, watching a tiny red beetle make its way across the floor. “I didn’t understand it, either,” she said finally. “I was furious when we found that first message and realized you and Stone had kept going south, with no idea if you were heading in the right direction or not, knowing there were Fell out there and at least one kethel following you.” She shrugged her spines. “But you found the Hians and got the Arbora back and I wasn’t going to say anything. Then when Lavinat had you, and it was you or the Reaches, that was when I understood it.” She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. “That’s why consorts are kept protected, why they stay in the colonies, so queens won’t have to make that decision.”

Moon put all his conviction into his voice and said, “But it was the right decision.”

Jade hissed a little. “Do you understand how I would feel if you weren’t here to say that?”

“Yes, but I’m here.”

Jade reached over and caught his wrist, and pulled him to her. She held him so tightly his ribs creaked, but her bite on the skin below his ear was gentle. His return bite on the scales just above her collar flange was much harder. Jade twisted and thumped him down on his back, and talking was done for a while.

Jade lay heavily on top of him. She pushed herself up and said, “That was hard. I don’t want to do it again.” She saw his lifted brows and added, “You know I don’t mean the sex.”

Moon rolled over and sat up on one elbow. There was another thing he wanted cleared up and this was a good time to do it. He wanted everything between them, anything that might keep them apart, to be dealt with. “You want me to stay in the court and be a normal consort.”

“No. Normal is one thing you’ll never be.” Jade sighed. “I want you not to get killed. But after everything we’ve done, it seems ridiculous not to make visits to other courts, like Opal Night . . .”

“And to Delin, in the Golden Isles,” Moon added. “And Callumkal said he would come visit and take us to Kedmar.”

“I hate Kish,” Jade groaned. She considered for a moment, then smiled. “Maybe after your clutch with Bramble.”

Moon thought about five little baby Arbora or warriors with Bramble’s curiosity and stubbornness. It would be more than enough to keep him busy. He nudged her foot. “You want to talk to Stone now?”

Jade sighed and pushed herself upright. “Yes.”

Moon found Stone on the consorts’ level and dragged him down to see Jade. The dragging was much easier than it might have been had Stone actually put up any kind of effective resistance, so Moon figured Stone was more than ready to talk.

It was early evening by that point. Moon looked for Chime, and found him sitting out on the big garden platform on the edge of a group of Arbora and Aeriat from both courts, and the Golden Islanders. This platform had a good view of the waterfall that rushed down from the knothole but was far enough away not to be drenched by the spray. Delin sat nearby, sketching furiously, while Bramble told the story of their journey.

“Did it work?” Chime asked, watching him hopefully.

Moon settled into the damp grass beside him. Spark bugs played between the trees of the fruit orchard on the lower part of the platform. “She’s talking to Stone now.” He nudged Chime’s arm. “Thanks for your help.”

Chime leaned over and nipped his shoulder.

Not long after, Jade and Stone came out, and they sat on the grass until the green light started to fail and Pearl sent Knell to tell everyone to come inside.