The boat that arrived in Granslip Port at sunset was unremarkable. It was a fishing vessel, large but not large enough to be considered a ship, especially not in comparison to its nearest neighbor at the docks—a freighter that floated high in the water, its massive hold hungry for the cargo of grain it should have been filled with more than two weeks past.

Some numbers were wrong. Somehow.

In a country that had supplied its neighbors with their bread and beef for more than a century, this year the numbers were not right.

The harvest had been poor. Everyone knew it. But the storage warehouses were emptier than they should have been. Wagons from the central farmlands that had been promised had not come in. The winter line, marked on the walls of the silos in Circon’s capital, had not been reached.

And so ships here in Granslip Port and on the eastern coast in Tothsport sat empty.

Or they turned and sailed away.

The fishermen and fisherwomen from the new boat heard whispers of this as they made their way into the city. They were far stranger than the ship they’d come in on. Six of them—three men and three women. They wore the clothes of their profession, rough working garb. But their faces were unweathered by sun or wind. Their hands didn’t bear the scars of those who worked with nets and lines.

If someone had paid close attention to them, they might have noticed. But this was not a day for regarding new faces with suspicion. It was the winter solstice. The darkening streets were alive with festivities despite the rumors, and solstice lanterns were being lit in windows all over town.

“Stop staring south with that look on your face, Matthew,” a dark-haired man said harshly to the youngest member of the group.

“Don’t bother the boy about it,” said a woman. “What harm is there in looking?”

“I’m almost eighteen,” said the one they called Matthew, glancing again toward the south with eyes the color of honey. “Hardly a boy.”

“Let’s talk of something else, let’s talk of something else,” said another man in a placating voice. “We’ve had an uncomfortable trip to get here, but there’s no reason to let our tempers flare.”

“We could talk about what the Acresses have obviously done,” muttered the dark-haired man.

“Shhh,” several of the others hissed.

“I always knew they had it in them,” he said. “Sneaky shits for a bunch of plant coddlers.”

“They say we’re sneaky shits for a bunch couriers,” someone else said mildly.

“Not anymore they don’t. They say things much worse than—”

“Keep running your mouth out in public,” one of the women murmured, as they turned the corner onto a broader, wealthier street packed with people. “And I swear to any of the gods that really exist I’ll take the time to spell your balls off before they burn us all to death.”

The long night had fallen by the time they approached the churches of Clywing and Yoat, but the street was full of people carrying lamps, candles, and flickering torches.

“It’s a good tradition,” Matthew said to the woman who’d defended him earlier. “To light the night until dawn. We never did that.”

“No,” she said. “It wasn’t the thing, though our home wasn’t so far from this place. We did give out presents to the children though.”

“New books. And crystals to read them by. I remember.”

“I’m glad.”

They separated and lost themselves in the crowd, each of them making his or her way through the press of bodies on their own, approaching a side door one by one. It was opened and closed for each of them by a priest in brown robes. And they were led up a narrow staircase to a hidden set of rooms.

There were four others there to greet them. Smiles of relief and welcome were on their faces. A couple of them were old friends, meeting again after a long absence, and they held each other warmly.

Matthew stood in the corner, hunkered under a low rafter, uncomfortable and trying to ignore the stares he received from the people who’d been living here in the church.

“Where’s Lizen?” one of the church hideaways said finally.

“She’s not with you already?” asked a fake fisherman. “She was supposed to beat us here by a few days at least.”

They all turned to look at Matthew.

He glanced away from them

One of the women cleared her throat. “I’m sure it will be fine. They say usually it works out.”

“Without a mage, we can’t make…the designated destination.”

“Ten magicians should be enough.”

“It’s not. Too many lows in your group. Unless…”

Four sets of eyes turned to Matthew again. “Sorry to disappoint some newly met cousins,” he said dryly when the staring didn’t stop. “Yet again. My father didn’t fuck out any bastards before me as far as I can tell. I really am the sixth. And I’m only a magician.”

A couple of them looked affronted.

He sighed and left before he could say anything more.

You would think they would get tired of it, he thought, stalking down the narrow hall toward the stairs. You would think they would get tired of wanting things from someone who’s only average.

A moment later he heard footsteps thumping on the boards behind him. He ignored them and kept walking. Down the creaking staircase, down another narrow hall, twisting and turning through corridors he didn’t recognize, in a church he’d never seen, in country he’d never set foot in.

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The only thing that was ever familiar to him was the lack of familiarity.

“Matthew, stop!” the woman who’d been kind to him over the past few weeks called. “The priest said we’re supposed to stay in the attic.”

An attic, thought the young man, without turning around. I always do enjoy the attics. The cellars are so damp. The inns and abandoned farmhouses feel so exposed. The home of a friend of a friend of someone is always so full of expectations.

Attics were maybe his favorite places to hide. He supposed he should be glad that they would be spending more time than they had planned to in this one.

She grabbed his shoulder. “Toma—”

“It’s Matthew,” he said, still refusing to look back at her. “Today. I am sure when I leave this place and open my next letter, it will change to something more exciting. Once I was called Velt. I rather liked that one.”

She huffed. “I know you’re younger, and your circumstances are different, but it’s hard on everyone. Try to have some patience with—”

“You’ve all lived in the same place with the same people for the past six years. I haven’t spent longer than two months in a single location since I was nine.”

He spoke too harshly. She drew back from him.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “You’ve been very nice to me. Our family members are not usually as kind to me as you have been. What feels to me like a life on the run, they seem to regard as unearned special treatment. I guess both are true.”

Her lips pressed together. Then she said, “Personally, I think everyone should be grateful to have one of you around. At least this way we can be sure we won’t be abandoned.”

She turned on her heel and stalked away.

Well, thought Tomas Orellen as he watched her leave. I guess we won’t be friends after all then.

It was just as well. He’d stopped actively trying to make friends…when he was eleven or so? You never saw them again. You only missed them. What was the point of getting to know people endlessly only to lose them endlessly, too?

He rubbed the scar on the palm of his left hand where a blade had once bitten through. Only a few days later, a letter had come, and he’d been teleported to a location with a healer.

So convenient. So lucky.

For someone.

It had been a long time since Tomas was childish enough to assume the luck was meant especially for him.

He wandered until he found his way into the main chapel. It was so packed with bodies that it was sweltering, despite doors and windows being opened to the night. People spilled into the entrance hall from the street.

On the steps inside the chapel, there were children in robes singing.

That’s nice, thought Tomas. That’s a nice tradition.

He collected traditions. He was trying to find all the best ones so that he could celebrate them in his own fashion. Maybe if you strung enough together, you could live every day inside of one, and they would become a home for a person who had none.

High voices echoed off the ceiling. It was a praise to Clywing and a statement of faith in the coming dawn.

Tomas stood watching them for hours. The crowd shifted. People came and went. But it didn’t thin out, and it stayed hot. The children were drenched in sweat now. They did pause the performance occasionally for breaks, and hopefully they were giving the poor things water. But Tomas thought the choir directors were asking a bit much. The front row, filled with the youngest children, was looking wobbly.

Oh dear, he thought, as the boy who’d been singing solos on occasion suddenly swayed and fell. His face was as red as a cherry. That can’t be a good omen for the coming winter. Overworking Clywing’s children until they drop.

There were squeals from the choir and flustered bustling from the directors and a junior priestess, who ran over to fan the boy frantically and then haul him off the steps. The audience muttered. A couple of rude ones tittered. The children seemed baffled about what to do now that all three of the adults in charge of them were hurrying off with their fallen member.

“Should I just take over singing then?” one of the front-row members called after the directors. “Since I’m the alternate?”

He’s not from Circon, Tomas noted. He couldn’t place the accent. He was usually good at that. And this one was fairly strong. From one of the islands maybe?

He was a little taller than the other front row members. Maybe ten. It was obvious why he’d been put there, though. He had big, brown eyes and a chin-length mass of shiny, dark golden curls that caught the light of the candles filling the church. Combined with the gold and white robes, he was doing a good job of looking like an innocent young relation of the blonde goddess painted on the chapel ceiling above them all.

You don’t see many people with hair like that.

A deep, old guilt rose up to sting Tomas. It had been a while since he’d felt it—the shame over that childhood mistake.

It wasn’t my fault, he thought bitterly. Nobody explained how it worked. I was lonely and confused about what was happening, and I wanted to be kind to one of them since nobody else seemed to be interested in them.

Safety through ignorance.

It was obvious now. But it hadn’t been back then.

If the little boy from that day had told even a single person, then he was probably dead. And he’d been so young. And so frail that he must have been half-lost to starvation before the plague had taken him.

Tomas had picked him for that reason. He was old enough to talk but still small enough for Tomas to steal from the Seniors' Study.

Of course the child would have told.

I killed one of them myself. I did our enemies work for them.

He used to have nightmares about it. When he was around twelve and understood for the first time what he’d done.

“Yes!” shouted the junior priestess across the chapel, still fanning the boy who’d fainted with the hem of her robes. “Yes! That’s good, Nerth! You sing.”

“Can I just pick whichever song I want?” the boy called back. Of all the children, he seemed to be the one who was least bothered by the fate of their fallen comrade.

Tomas shook his head and smiled as the boy stepped down into the soloist’s position. He stood straight and took a deep breath. The middle finger of his right hand, the one nearest Tomas, was tracing a pattern against the fabric of his choir robe.

Oh that’s a bit odd, Tomas thought idly. That looks like a casting habit.

Lots of practitioners did that, or something similar, when they started a spell. Tracing out elements of the pattern as you built them could help with focus. And for some, the habit crossed over to other activities…a tic that came out whenever they were thinking hard.

Tomas himself had a tendency to do it with a ring finger against the back cover of books he was reading. Just a portion of one of his favorite spell patterns. He had a callous from it.

The boy opened his mouth, and a voice like a bell filled the church.

He’s much better than the other singer.

The accent had faded a lot but not completely. It only added to the child’s charm. There was something a little overly precise about it, though. Almost as if he cared a bit too much about making sure every single syllable was perfectly clear.

Like someone who’s used to chanted spells…

Tomas frowned and examined the tracery the boy was making with his finger again. It was a complex pattern, wasn’t it? Not the simple circle, line, or squiggle you’d expect from a normal child.

He practices, Tomas decided. He definitely does.

He wasn’t an Acress apprentice, though, or he wouldn’t be standing here in this church.

Island practitioner? Those are rare.

Places without magic rarely birthed children who possessed the gift for it, unless their parents were practitioners already. And practitioners didn’t like to live on the islands.

Maybe it’s just some obscure continental accent I don’t know.

He kept singing. Several of the people around Tomas were murmuring appreciatively.

“Ooo he’s much better than the little fainter, he is,” an old man whispered to his wife. “What place is he from again?”

“They said Nerth?”

No, that was his name, not where he’s…

Tomas’s heart felt like someone had wrapped their fist around it. He stared at the boy. Not his hand this time, but his face.

He’s too young.

He didn’t act as young as he looked, though. Did he?

It’s too unlikely.

His eyes.

I killed that one. I know I must have.

His hair.

…it says on your tag that your name will be Kalenerth. But that’s too long, so you should call yourself Kalen.

Tomas held a hand up to his mouth.

He has magic. And he sings so beautifully.

“Are you crying, young man?” asked the elderly woman in a concerned voice.

“I’m not,” said Tomas in a choked voice. “I don’t do that anymore.”