The food, such as it was, was nothing more than a bowl of warm milk mixed with some watery grain, but even that was enough to revive her. Regbi’s stomach grumbled for something more substantial, but she knew better than to listen to it so soon after returning to her body. She settled for a strip of dried meat that she ate in increments, chewing each bite as if to suck out the very marrows.

“There’s a little more color in your cheeks now,” Khadan said. “You had me worried. You need to fatten yourself up before you go away for so long. It’s like bringing along a snack for the road.” His eyes shone with good humor as he said so, but Regbi was in no mood to indulge it. He plied her with a buttery cup of tea instead and received a warmer response from her.

“Thank you,” she murmured, breathing in the vapors. She touched the rim of the cup to her lips and took a tiny sip. It flooded her veins with warmth, a better remedy against the cold that had settled in them than any blanket.

“I usually feel better after milk tea. There’s plenty of salt and fat in it to get you back on your feet.”

“Why are you being so kind to me?” she wanted to know. “You don’t even know me, save for being the lowlife criminal who tried to rob you…” Her shame mixed with her frustration and she felt her throat tightening. “I wish you would just let me go!”

“You couldn’t be much of a lowlife or a criminal if you’re so upset by it,” Khadan said with a hoarse laugh. “Go on and drink your tea, Magpie. Unless you’d like to tell me what your real name is?”

“No.” She wiped her face roughly on the sleeve of her tunic and took a gulp of tea.

“It’s going to take a long time to guess: our people are nothing if not inventive when it comes to naming things. You could be a Ganjil. Or an Oyuna. Maybe even a Saryuna? Checheg? Pelma? Badma? Tsybzhit?”

“None of those,” she croaked. “And even if I were, I wouldn’t tell you. It’s none of your business what my name is.”

“What about where you come from then?” Noting her dark expression, he added, “Or at least how you found yourself here.”

“That’s a longer story than you realize.” Like an obedient dog, her mind conjured up an image of the house on the hill. She could practically smell the musk of the reindeer wafting through its windows and blending with the scent of old tobacco smoke. She could feel the bitter cold of winter touch against her cheeks and thaw in the wake of a fire hot enough to burn a shaman’s drum. It turned to ash, and from that ash into the smoke that billowed from a train’s shrieking engine. Regbi closed her eyes to blot it out before it could arrive at the city. “Not one I care to tell either.”

Khadan’s eyes took on an expectant glow, but he did nothing more than drink his tea while he waited for her to speak. He tolerated the silence better than she ever could have managed. It persuaded her to say more than she had intended to.

“I’m not a shaman anymore. I don’t think I ever was to begin with,” she said, twisting her cup in her hands. She stared down and saw her reflection in it, distorted by the rippling of the tea. The dark circles under her eyes spilled forth like puddles of ink. She gulped them down.

“How can that be? I can see for myself that you have a spirit. A fine one too that anyone would be pleased to call their own.”

“Would you?” There was a challenge to her tone. She hadn’t meant for it to come out. “I’ve seen the sort of spirits you keep, each one more powerful than the next. Would you really be content with a little bird?”

“If a little bird was what called to me, then I would. But a shaman has no control over the spirits that seek him out as their vessel,” Khadan said. “You have nothing to be ashamed of; every spirit is powerful in its own right.”

“What if it’s too powerful?”

“It can’t be.”

A bitter laugh flew from Regbi’s lips. “For you maybe.”

“For anyone. A spirit wouldn’t call to a conduit unable to harness its power. Some present a greater challenge than others, but if your mind is clear and your flesh is willing you’ll find that no challenge is too great.”

“Then what does that make me?” She breathed the shadow of her spirit into her hands. It pulsated between them like the beating of a tiny heart. “What does that make this?”

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Disgusted by what she saw, Regbi crushed her hands together and the spirit dissolved between them.

“You should be kinder to your spirit,” Khadan chided. “You only harm yourself by treating it that way.”

“This thing isn’t my spirit,” Regbi growled. She was tempted to pull it from herself again just to smash it like a bug under her foot.

“I don’t understand.”

“This thing, whatever is it, is only a fragment of the real one. When I tried to take it in…” She took a deep breath as if to steel herself for a plunge into icy water. “I couldn’t do it. It hurt too badly and I spit it back out. But when I did, this one bit clung to me like a cocklebur and the struggle tore the rest of it to pieces—it almost tore me to pieces.” She cringed at the thought of it, curling into herself like a scrap of paper set to flame. “You can’t even imagine the pain…”

“The more powerful the spirit, the more painful it is to take it in. It seems to me yours must have been something substantial to have given you so much trouble,” Khadan mused.

“It was too strong for me. Or maybe I was just too weak for it. Either way I failed.”

“If such a strong spirit was calling to you then perhaps what you needed was more preparation.”

“If I had waited any longer it would have pulled me from my body entirely.”

“A very strong spirit then…”

Regbi rested her face in her hands. “I thought it was gone. But now it’s happening again. It’s calling to me and I’m not any better prepared for it now than I was then—it’s going to drag me from my body and tear me to pieces—”

“Drink your tea.” Khadan pressed a fresh cup into her hands. “You have a very morbid way of looking at things, you know.”

“I’m a realist,” she hissed into the vapors.

“And I don’t know what that means, so please drink your tea and be silent.” He said so without any doubt that he would be obeyed. It rankled Regbi, but as she had nothing further to add, she did. “You should look at this as an opportunity for spiritual growth. Not as something to fear, but something to be glad of. It’s a chance for you to make yourself whole and you’ll be happier for it. I can help you if you’ll let me.”

“How? Have you ever guided someone through an initiation before?”

“Once or twice…” There was an ironic glint in his eyes that Regbi couldn’t make sense of. She was sure that it was at her expense, though she couldn’t think to say why. It was a fair question: he looked too young to have had an apprentice before. “That is, I’ve assisted, though I’ve never had a proper student of my own. I’ve been thinking for some time now that I would like one though.” A hazy smile spread across his lips. “Maybe that’s why you came here. So I could help you.”

“I think I came to rob you actually.”

He dismissed the suggestion with a leisurely wave of his hand. “If you really had you wouldn’t have made it through the door. You must have been in need of spiritual counsel whether you knew it or not.”

“Oh? Are you Teb-Tengri then to be dispensing such sage advice?”

The desert shaman spit out his tea. Regbi cackled to herself, pleased to have humbled him. He was taking far too lofty a tone for her liking. Khadan eyed her darkly as he mopped up the mess.

“If I were I wouldn’t tolerate an insolent little creature like you,” he said. “Fortunately for you I’m just a humble desert nomad.”

“You might be from the desert and you might be a nomad but there’s nothing humble about you,” Regbi said. “You’re probably a big fish in a little pond somewhere and used to being kowtowed to.”

“Is it that obvious?”

Regbi gave a sage nod. “If you take me on as your student I won’t put up with it. I’m just letting you know before we agree to anything.”

“Just because you’re my student doesn’t mean that we can’t be equals. No kowtowing required.”

Regbi considered it for a moment before asking, “What would you require?”

“That you keep an open mind and yield to my judgment when there are things you don’t know. That part is nonnegotiable, but the rest we can decide along the way. I’ve never made the offer to anyone before, so I haven’t put as much thought into it as I probably should have.”

“That’s it? No mucking stables or giving you a cut of my earnings?” It was too good to be true. Even Setseg, for all she was Regbi’s own grandmother, had had an entire list of demands she had made Regbi agree to before officially taking her on. Though maybe that was because she was her grandmother rather than in spite of it; she was sure Setseg’s other apprentice, Tamzhid, had never gotten such a raw deal from the woman.

“I don’t have any stables, do I? Maybe you could take the camel out to graze and milk it every so often…clean the ger from time to time—”

“You’re right; maybe you should have put more thought into your demands. Too late now for it though: I accept,” Regbi said before he could add to his list. “Whatever kind of teacher you turn out to be, it couldn’t be worse than being torn to pieces by an angry spirit.”