Saints of Storm and Sorrow E-Book

Gabriella Buba

• Herausgeber: Titan Books
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Beschreibung

In this fiercely imaginative Filipino-inspired fantasy debut, a bisexual nun hiding a goddess-given gift is unwillingly transformed into a lightning rod for her people's struggle against colonization. Perfect for fans of lush fantasy full of morally ambiguous characters, including The Poppy War and The Jasmine Throne. Maria Lunurin has been living a double life for as long as she can remember. To the world, she is Sister Maria, dutiful nun and devoted servant of Aynila's Codicían colonizers. But behind closed doors, she is a stormcaller, chosen daughter of the Aynilan goddess Anitun Tabu. In hiding not only from the Codicíans and their witch hunts, but also from the vengeful eye of her slighted goddess, Lunurin does what she can to protect her fellow Aynilans and the small family she has created in the convent: her lover Catalina, and Cat's younger sister Inez. Lunurin is determined to keep her head down—until one day she makes a devastating discovery, which threatens to tear her family apart. In desperation, she turns for help to Alon Dakila, heir to Aynila's most powerful family, who has been ardently in love with her for years. But this choice sets in motion a chain of events beyond her control, awakening Anitun Tabu's rage and putting everyone Lunurin loves in terrible danger. Torn between the call of Alon's magic and Catalina's jealousy, her duty to her family and to her people, Lunurin can no longer keep Anitun Tabu's fury at bay. The goddess of storms demands vengeance. And she will sweep aside anyone who stands in her way. 

Leseprobe

CONTENTS

Cover

Praise for Saints of Storm and Sorrow

Title Page

Leave us a Review

Copyright

Dedication

PrologueLunurin Calilan

1María Lunurin

2María Lunurin

3María Lunurin

4María Lunurin

5Alon Dakila

6María Lunurin

7Alon Dakila

8María Lunurin

9María Lunurin

10Alon Dakila

11María Lunurin

12Alon Dakila

13Alon Dakila

14María Lunurin

15Alon Dakila

16María Lunurin

17María Lunurin

18Alon Dakila

19María Lunurin

20Alon Dakila

21María Lunurin

22Alon Dakila

23Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

24Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

25Alon Dakila

26Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

27Alon Dakila

28Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

29Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

30Alon Dakila

31Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

32Alon Dakila

33Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

34Alon Dakila

35Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

36Alon Dakila

37Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

38Alon Dakila

39Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

40Alon Dakila

41Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

42Alon Dakila

43Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

44Alon Dakila

45Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

46Alon Dakila

47Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

48Alon Dakila

49Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

50Alon Dakila

51Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

52Alon Dakila

53Lunurin Calilan de Dakila

Author’s Note

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Also Available from Titan Books

PRAISE FORSAINTS OF STORM AND SORROW

“Gabriella Buba writes the way the ocean moves: rhythmic and rolling, with dark currents and a powerful grace. Saints of Storm and Sorrow elegantly weaves the rich tapestry of Filipino folklore into a poignant, harrowing tale of magic and rebellion and sacrifice. Every page is drenched in the pain and hope that characterized our centuries-long struggle. This is fantasy at its finest, but it’s also a story about us, and about how my love for you is one with our love for the motherland.” THEA GUANZON, NEW YORK TIMES, USA TODAYANDSUNDAY TIMESBESTSELLING AUTHOR OFTHE HURRICANE WARS

“Action, magic, romance… An unforgettable story filled with inspiration from myths across the Philippine islands. Crafted with exquisite detail that will resonate with fantasy fans—from those seeking new adventures to those like me, aching for the familiar.” K.S. VILLOSO, AUTHOR OFTHE WOLF OF OREN-YARO

“With prose as immersive and bracing as a sea storm, Saints of Storm and Sorrow is a stunning debut. Readers will be swept away by Lunurin’s struggles as she is torn between the life she’s building under the bonds of colonial rule and a vengeful goddess pounding at her mind’s door. This aching, rage-soaked novel is a must-read.” NICOLE JARVIS, AUTHOR OFA PORTRAIT IN SHADOWANDTHE LIGHTS OF PRAGUE

“I am feral for this book. Buba has written a sublime, devastating tale that crackles with romance, dazzles with political intrigue, and snarls with the pent-up fury of those who suffer under colonization. And that fury must be released. Saints of Storm and Sorrow will hook you from its tumultuous beginning, draw you into a richly realized Filipino world, and crush you with emotion.” MIA TSAI, AUTHOR OFBITTER MEDICINE

“A vicious examination of the struggles a colonized culture must endure to survive, bundled in a devastating storm of rage, grief, and lost love. Love, betrayal, incredible worldbuilding, and righteous female rage… hell yeah!” REBECCA THORNE, AUTHOR OFCAN’T SPELL TREASON WITHOUT TEA

“Saints of Storm and Sorrow weaves an unforgettable journey into a world where gods walk among mortals and even the quietest whispers can spark a revolution. The thrilling action and complex characters provide a springboard from which Buba masterfully delves into the nuanced relationship between the colonizers and the colonized. Lush, vibrant, and spellbinding—this folklore-inspired fantasy gripped my imagination (and my heart) from the beginning and never let it go.” KYLA ZHAO, AUTHOR OFVALLEY VERIFIEDANDTHE FRAUD SQUAD

“An absorbing, compelling story of resistance and determination, offering fantasy readers a richly detailed world full of characters with exceptional emotional depth. Buba is a powerhouse, providing an unflinching examination of colonialism and the full range of tenderness, loyalty, and pain in the complex relationships between her characters, all with equal skill.” FAYE DELACOUR, AUTHOR OFTHE LADY HE LOST

“A powerful debut brimming with Pilipino and queer representation, Saints of Storm and Sorrow paints a detailed and intimate portrait of the devastating consequences of colonialism—and the sacrifices that are made in order to fight it. Gabriella Buba is a fresh new voice to be reckoned with—much like the storm goddess and fantastically unhinged heroine at the center of her story.” ALEX BROWN, AUTHOR OFDAMNED IF YOU DO

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Saints of Storm and Sorrow

Print edition ISBN: 9781803367804

E-book edition ISBN: 9781803367811

Published by Titan Books

A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd

144 Southwark Street, London SE10UP

www.titanbooks.com

First edition: June 2024

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Grateful acknowledgement is made to Philippine Studies: Historical & Ethnographic Viewpoints for their permission to reprint an excerpt of Bienvenido Lumbera’s English translation of Tanaga poetry, from “Poetry of the Early Tagalogs”, Philippine Studies vol 16, no. 2 (1968): 221–45.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead (except for satirical purposes), is entirely coincidental.

© Gabriella Buba 2024

Gabriella Buba asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

To all the girls swallowing down their fury like broken glass.

PROLOGUE

LUNURIN CALILAN

The sea breezes keened of death in Lunurin’s ears, a cacophony of voices urging her to act. The Stormfleet was under attack, the Inquisition’s galleons on their way. Calilan was no longer safe.

Lunurin didn’t fight her mother’s grip as she was hauled down the beach toward a dual-sailed trading vessel from the island of Lusong. Her tiyas on the dock bargained with the captain, intent on sending Lunurin far away.

This was all her fault. She’d shattered everything her inay had worked toward. For years, the Codicían Empire had overlooked the tiny island of Calilan, focusing instead on conquering rich harbor cities on Lusong and the other larger islands of the archipelago. The Stormfleet, its gods-blessed crews, and those training on Calilan had been safe from the Inquisition and its priests. Now, everyone would suffer for her failure.

For years, when they’d called her an ill-omen, better off returned to the sea, Lunurin had told herself things would be different when she joined the Stormfleet. She was fifteen, would soon have been assigned a berth and entrusted with guiding the ravaging typhoons of the Great South Sea around their islands.

Now that future tore from her grasp on winds stinking of gunpowder. She was like a dugong wife from the stories, doomed to bring sorrow to all who loved her. Suddenly, wildly desperate, Lunurin reached for her mutya, where the mother-of-pearl comb and hairstick held her bun in place. She had to help. With the right winds, the Stormfleet vessels might still escape the Codicíans’ larger, slower galleons. Lunurin’s gift was too strong and the goddess of storms heard her voice too well, but even from this great distance—

Her inay seized her hand, her voice laced with fear. “Not again. Not ever. Don’t forget who you are.”

“You’re a survivor,” her tiya’s tide-touched wife said, putting the dugong bone amulet she’d crafted around Lunurin’s neck. Scavenged bone, never hunted; to kill a dugong or steal it away from the sea was grievous bad luck.

The deadening weight of the amulet stole the flavor and fervor from the wind, hiding Lunurin from the sight of the goddess of storms. Her gift dimmed to the barest thread, until the winds barely whispered at the farthest edge of her senses. At least they weren’t trying to shave her head again.

“You’re a stormcaller.” Tiya Halili tucked her thick curling hair, grown back too fast, frighteningly fast, back into her bun, securing it with her mutya. “And we must never let our hair down unless we are prepared for the consequences, for what we are is vengeance.”

But why shouldn’t she have vengeance? If she were allowed to be useful…

The Inquisition’s galleons would be so much shattered timber upon the waves.

Lunurin let the terrible voice of her goddess die behind her clenched teeth. This resentment was not hers. She’d caused this mess by listening to the angry goddess of storms, who longed for a typhoon that would destroy the Codicían colonizers’ flotilla—along with the Stormfleet, and every lowland village and harbor city of the archipelago.

Lunurin wouldn’t let her goddess use her for destruction. Not again.

She wished she could cast off this power entirely, cut her hair and give up her mutya—the gleaming mother-of-pearl comb and its matching hair prong, topped with the lightning-shaped pearl that marked her as one chosen by the Goddess of Storms and Sky, Anitun Tabu. She wished she could break them without breaking what little control she still had. More than that, better she’d never found a pearl at all. That she could be without any gift, with only a mother-of-pearl mutya from an empty shell to show for her naming dive. A daughter of Calilan, but one not doomed to bring destruction to her home, whose goddess did not whisper in her ear.

A true stormcaller would not struggle so, wouldn’t need the dugong bone amulet achingly heavy on her chest. Perhaps her stepfather was right. Her Codicían blood made her baliw ka, crazy, and her inay was a fool for keeping the child of a shipwrecked Codicían priest.

Now not even her inay could protect her, though she was Datu and chief of the island, nor her Tiya Halili, to whom all the Stormfleet answered. A stormcaller must never be a liability to the fleet.

All the protections her mother and tiyas had left to give weighed upon her as they neared the ship. There was the dugong bone amulet—a precaution no captain would have her aboard without. There were the weights sewn into the tapiz skirt at her waist: a fortune in silver-grey pearls from the sacred oyster beds her Tiya Halili tended. From her inay, letters of entreaty to distant cousins in Lanao, begging them to teach Lunurin control. And—in case she was caught—a different set of letters in Codicían, declaring that she was the daughter of Father Mateo de Palma, and demanding she be taken to him before the Inquisition could mete out judgment. Letters to an aunt she’d never known in Aynila, an abbess at the Convent of Saint Augustine, letters of leverage and blackmail, in case having failed as her mother’s daughter, she must try to live in her father’s world.

Lunurin pressed the letters against her body, all her inay’s hopes for her, every bit of politicking she knew and had tried to teach Lunurin. She clenched her hand around the bone amulet, a sign of how terribly she had failed her tiyas’ training. She didn’t dare beg their forgiveness. There was nothing more they could do. The thought of leaving Calilan and giving up on her place in the Stormfleet terrified her, but she knew she couldn’t stay.

Her inay sealed the agreement with the captain, offering in thanks a purse full of the silvery black-lip pearls the gods-blessed of Calilan held sacred—though he turned them down. Along with a cargo of indigo dye and cloth, the captain and his tide-touched wife had brought warning—toolate—of the Codicían flotilla that had been sighted chasing down a dozen Stormfleet vessels among the reef shoals west of the island.

As the sun sank low, her inay hugged Lunurin close, sniffing both her cheeks one last time. She tucked Lunurin into the prow alongside sacks of pounded rice, tart sheaves of lemongrass, and baskets of ginger, out of the way of the rowers and sails.

“They will take you south, to Lanao. The Codicíans have no established forts there. The rajs have repelled even the priests,” her inay whispered as she pulled away.

Lunurin grasped after her skirts, desperate to prolong this parting, but was distracted when a scrawny ship’s boy squeezed past. He scrambled into the narrow space beside her, pulling his legs in close. She wondered what he’d been told, if he was afraid her ill-luck was catching, like so many on Calilan.

“Sorry, my brother says I’m in way of the rowers.” His gap-toothed grin flashed white in a deep brown face still round with baby fat. He couldn’t be more than twelve, with black salt-stiff hair hanging down his back. Her longer limbs took up more space in the prow than was probably fair.

“I’m Alon,” he added.

Lunurin answered in quick trader hand sign. “I’m Lunurin. Who’s your brother?”

These Aynilans spoke a lowland dialect similar to Calilan’s, but there was a lump in her throat she couldn’t speak past. Hundreds of languages were spoken across the archipelago, many dozens across the Stormfleet. Everyone learned trader sign to smooth over difficulties, enabling all-important haggling.

Alon signed back his answer. “The captain, Jeian! Aizza is his wife. When she’s aboard this is the fastest ship in the archipelago.”

He pointed out the tall, sea-brown tide-touched woman who had approached the helm. In a low, melodic voice, she began a prayer for friendly currents that was familiar and yet subtly different from Calilan’s. Her style of dress was distinct from the other Aynilan sailors. She was a bayok katalonan, raised a boy until she dove for her mutya and was called to serve the Sea Lady, Aman Sinaya, as one of her sacred priestesses.

The captain smiled at her. Several rowers tapped their mutya—bangles, amulets, and earrings, all of the gold-lip mother-of-pearl Aynila was famous for—dipping them into the sea or raising them to the breeze. Prayers for good luck to her and Aizza. No ship could be safer, with both a tide-touched and a stormcaller aboard.

They didn’t know.

They were probably the only ones who didn’t blame her for today’s disaster. They had no idea what Lunurin had done. The thought filled her with relief.

Lunurin’s chest tightened. She had no right to feel relieved. She bolted up, craning to see her mother and tiyas on the dock. Alon called out a warning and steadied her as the ship pulled away with a lurch. Lunurin couldn’t take her eyes off the three figures dwindling in the distance. She would never be enough. Not as a stormcaller, not as a Datu’s daughter. The sea went the color of blood in the sunset, the three women’s features dark and indistinguishable. What if they were glad to see her go? Guilt gnawed at her insides, insidious and bitter.

Alon remained silent when she dropped into a crouch and buried her face into her knees, but he didn’t pull away.

She might’ve grieved forever, as the full moon rose, and stars came wheeling out overhead. The ship skimmed over the water, until Calilan was not even a dark blot upon the horizon. The smooth rush of calm seas and the friendly push of the Sea Lady’s power felt as familiar as breathing as the night slipped away.

Suddenly, she felt the tides change. A rogue wave crashed against the hull, dousing Lunurin in salt spray. It shunted the ship crosswise, spinning on Aizza’s current. Lunurin and Alon were flung across the prow. Lunurin screamed and curled her arms around both their heads as sacks of grain crushed them against a wooden chest. How could a wave turn rogue against a ship with a tide-touched katalonan at the helm?

A wall of rain and wind caught them with a roar, as loud as when Calilan’s caldera woke, howling ash and fury to the sky until the firetenders could soothe her back to sleep. A too-real roar, close to the ship.

Lunurin held tight to Alon, but he wriggled free. He scurried back with two tie-lines, and looped the end of one rope around Lunurin’s waist, lashing it tight. The rowers fought with sails that cracked and strained in the wind.

Lunurin reached to loosen her hair. She could easily calm the gale. She grasped for the threads of her power, trying to decide where she should pull to bring the squall to heel, but though the wind roared past her ears, she couldn’t parse the voices of the storm. Her power felt dim and far away.

Cursing, she pulled the dugong bone amulet over her head, tucking it into her waist pouch where it wouldn’t touch her skin. It was a risk—her power was a liability on open water. But if they couldn’t bring in the sails they would capsize and drown either way.

Then, through the driving wall of rain and ship-breaking swells, she saw it. A long, sinuous body, sea-dark, yet illuminated from within, as if each scale were outlined in glowing copper wire. Long fins trailed the water in its wake, each alight with different shades of bronze fire. At every flick and twist of the mesmerizing pattern of scales, the waves crashed higher and the storm’s fury raged.

She could hear Aizza’s voice above the wind, strong with all a katalonan’s breath training, trying to wrestle control of the sea current away from the creature. But this was no ordinary sea beast. It was the laho, the bakunawa, a mooneater, and tonight was the full moon. The sea dragon was at the height of its power.

“Tabi, tabi po.” Lunurin’s whispered warding shredded in the wind.

It was a mistake, her voice too loud without her amulet to shield her. Hadn’t she learned her lesson? Lunurin stared in horror as the laho reared up over the ship, higher and higher. Behind it rose a wave that blotted out the sky. Serpent and wave hung over the ship, its great horned face and frilled mane sluicing waterfalls of seawater across the deck, knocking men from their feet, tearing cargo free.

The huge pearl set in its brow glowed. Lunurin heard her goddess, Anitun Tabu, speak. “Don’t hide yourself, Daughter. Do not tear yourself from my arms! Come to Aynila. Together we could set things right. It has been too long since the eye of my storm has gazed on Aynila. Our people cry out for vengeance! How can you forswear your promise to me?”

They were all still, trapped in the laho’s burning gaze like the wave it held, ready to wipe them from the face of the sea.

Fury bloomed in Lunurin’s chest. She lunged to her feet. “If I stay, I die; if I go to Aynila, I’ll die! Is that what you want, Anitun Tabu? I’d rather just sink now, if that’s your grand plan. They’re killing us. One by one, they’re killing us, all because of me, all because of what you made me do!”

The laho roared. Her goddess’s fury half battered her to the deck.

Lunurin screamed back defiance, throat aching. “All you ever want is death. Even these people, your people, you would let them all die if it meant you got your way. No more! I am done. If this is what you want, I will not even think your name.”

She pulled her mutya from her hair, freeing it to the wind and storm. She sang out above the rolling thunder, an old song, one every child on the archipelago knew. A song that could never be turned to devastation, no matter what Anitun Tabu desired. It was the song the katalonan sang when children were taken to dive for the sacred oysters to fashion their mutya from the mother-of-pearl-lined shells, and to discover if they might be named gods-blessed.

A song for an ambon, the sun shower.

An eye opened in the thunderheads above. The full moon stared down, and the laho became distracted. In one long, sinuous movement, the serpent launched upward as if it would swallow the moon whole. Its gleaming tail whipped the clouds to whirling cyclones before it vanished into the sky. The winds tore at the ship, sending debris shredding through the air.

Then the laho’s wake crashed down. It caught Alon, with his half-fastened rope.

“ALON!” Lunurin screamed, and three goddesses leaned close to hear the name.

He caught the outrigger as he was swept overboard, but oars torn loose from their cradle crashed down over him and he was gone, his tie-line limp in the water, his body sinking into the midnight depths.

Lunurin took two running steps and dove.

The water pounded in her ears. Laho-riled currents tugged at her hair and salt stung her eyes, but she swam down and down. No one else would die because she couldn’t control her power. She would not allow it.

And somehow in the crushing darkness of the water, just as she was sure she had no more breath left, her hand closed on wet cloth. She curled her arm around Alon’s narrow waist and kicked for the surface. She chased the precious silvery stream of their breath up into the night air. They broke the surface not far behind the ship, the sea having gone eerily calm in the laho’s absence.

A dozen hands hauled on Lunurin’s tie-line, and helped pull them from the sea. Water and blood painted the deck black in the moonlight.

Aizza bent over Alon’s body, palms dragging circular motions over his still chest. She drew the water from Alon’s lungs till he heaved, sputtering saltwater and foam. Lunurin nearly wept with relief.

Then he opened his hand, offering her a huge, gnarled gold-lip oyster cradled in his bleeding palm. It seemed a miracle he’d been able to close his injured fingers around it at all. Bone shone white in the wash of blood streaming down his fingers.

Lunurin’s heart beat a staccato rhythm of panic. Another disaster.

A cheer went up from the crew. The captain bent to kiss his brother’s brow and sniff his cheeks. No matter the situation, a naming to the gods and a child’s dive was a moment for celebration, one that was becoming rarer as the Codicíans’ Inquisition extended their reach and their disapproval of the old ways.

Lunurin seized Alon’s still extended hand by the wrist and thrust it at Aizza. She couldn’t be saddled with the responsibility of crafting someone’s mutya. She’d contaminate Alon with her ill-luck, if she hadn’t already.

Aizza ruffled Alon’s hair. “Your mother will be beside herself she missed this. But who can argue with a naming like that?” Her hand traced the shape of the laho, rearing toward the moon. “Fit for the songs. I will write it myself.”

Aizza shucked the oyster and plunged her fingers into the soft body, pulling a huge, round pearl from within. It gleamed bright as the full moon. “Alon Dakila, son of the Lakan, has been chosen by Aman Sinaya! A blessing for all Aynila!” she declared to a roar of approval from the crew.

Aizza leaned closer to Alon, and said in a conspiratorial whisper, “I knew you would be one for the Sea Lady like me. Your mother thought you’d take after your firetender cousins, but I knew.”

Aizza tucked the pearl into Alon’s uninjured hand and ate the oyster, completing the ritual. She then set to work stopping the bleeding of his injured hand.

Lunurin and Alon shared a dazed look. When he grinned at her, Lunurin couldn’t help the answering smile that pulled her cheeks so taut they hurt. A bubble of incredulous laughter filled her throat.

A sailor pulled the captain aside, saying, “Even with Aizza we’ll be lucky to make port in Aynila. With the damage to the ship and injured crew, there’s no way we’ll reach Lanao.”

Lunurin’s mirth died.

Anitun Tabu was never truly thwarted, only delayed. Old gods could afford to be patient.

1

MARÍA LUNURIN

TEN YEARS LATER

Lunurin drank in the scent of seagrass and salt, balancing on the dock above her oyster beds. She lowered the last seed-oyster platform into the water, arms burning.

She eyed the calm turquoise depths, rubbing together pruned fingertips gone fish-belly pale, stark against the browned backs of her hands. Worries swirled like a budding storm till the rope at her waist tugged. The brush of Catalina’s hands checking the dive-line steadied her.

“Do you have to dive?” asked Cat, a fellow novice at the Convent of Saint Augustine.

Lunurin frowned down at the buckets of gold-lip oysters. “I don’t have enough large oysters for the abbot’s dinner. I can’t take any more from the floating platforms.” After four such dinners the platforms of young oysters were woefully bare. So now her decades-old pearl oysters would be dinner for Codicíans who lacked any reverence for the sacred creatures. What a waste.

“It’s dangerous.” Cat made the sign of the cross with ink-smudged hands. “The shipyard workers have seen witch ghosts in the water.”

Tabi, tabi po. Lunurin touched her hidden mutya talisman to ward off anything Cat’s words might’ve woken. She knew how far gods-blessed fury could twist the soul, even beyond death. And so many of Aynila’s tide-touched healers had burned on the abbot’s pyres when the Church labeled every woman with the old gods’ magic a witch.

“You worry too much. It’s just sailors’ tales,” she lied.

Cat frowned, unconvinced.

“They’re to scare people off from swimming where they shouldn’t,” Lunurin added.

Despite a life spent in the half-conquered city of Aynila, alongside the great Saliwain River whose delta split the city in three, Cat couldn’t swim. She refused to learn on grounds of modesty and maintained a skepticism about the entire practice that the abbot would’ve approved of. Swimming was practically water witch perversity, in his mind.

Looking the way Cat did, Lunurin understood her hesitation. Catalina was mestiza too, but where Lunurin was all coarse curls, height, and muscle, and had never quite fit—not on Calilan and not in the convent—Cat was soft and small like her mother. With her lighter complexion and brown hair like chinannay red rice from the inland mountains of Lusong, she fit much more closely with the Codicían ideal. Even now she wore a broad-brim hat of woven palm over her veil to shield her from the sun. She was beautiful, and Lunurin was acutely aware of her.

Lunurin’s usual helper, Cat’s sister Inez, had slept in. Lunurin hadn’t had the heart to wake her. Inez worked too hard. She was only thirteen, but already a postulant, and eager to take her novitiate’s vows.

But Cat was right. She shouldn’t dive this close to the coming wet season. Even with her dugong bone amulet, many things that should be sleeping became restive this time of year.

However, the abbot’s ravenous dinner guests would not feed themselves. The abbot had demanded she serve pearl oyster paella. He intended to gift each of his guests one of Aynila’s famous golden pearls. No doubt he hoped the captain of the Santa Clarita’s recounting of the lavish event would inspire more Codicíans to make the perilous crossing and enrich his congregation, much diminished after last year’s harsh wet season fevers.

This dinner was just wasteful political theater.

Lunurin tightened her bun. Already, waving strands of her thick black hair were trying to win free. It didn’t feel secure without the familiar weight of her pearl-topped gold hairstick and mother-of-pearl comb, both hidden in the band of her wrap skirt in preparation for diving. While her dugong bone pendant might be frowned upon as a quaint folk habit, if anyone but Catalina discovered she still wore her mutya, it would be enough to see her dragged before the abbot’s Inquisition as a suspected witch.

Her tiya’s admonishment, A stormcaller must never let down their hair unless they mean it, came back to her, as if they were not separated by years and a vast gulf of salt. A painful pressure rose in her chest, the weight of memory threatening to crush an unwary swimmer diving too deep.

Lunurin took deep breaths, banishing the recollection. One couldn’t pearl dive with quivering lungs.

She pressed her toes into the sun-bleached wood of the dock and focused. The smell of sharp pine-pitch and hot metal from Aynila’s shipyards overpowered her oysters. Memories of her childhood cut short on Calilan evaporated like the pre-dawn coolness before the metallic tang of industry. The last thing she needed was to call the attention of the old gods above their once-sacred oyster beds. After all, before the Codicíans burned the healing school and built the Palisade over the ashes, this was where the katalonan, the old priestesses, had gathered to sing the stories of the people to the gods’ ears.

She dove, graceful as a cormorant, past floating bamboo oyster platforms to the beds once tended by the long-dead tide-touched healers of Aynila. With a short knife, she freed large, gnarled oysters from outcroppings of black lava rock. With no one to sing the harvester’s prayer, surely she would go unnoticed this once. As she tucked the fourth oyster into her bag, three rapid tugs came on the rope tied at her waist. Lunurin went cold, studying the light-edged shadows dancing over her limbs for any sign they might grow hands and try to keep her below the waves. But it was only shafts of early dawn light filtering through the turquoise water of the bay.

Then a different shadow fell over her, cutting her off from the surface. She was buffeted to her knees, into the ridges of the reef. Lunurin stared up at an old dugong matriarch, longer than Lunurin was tall, her grey hide scarred and barnacled. Lunurin hadn’t seen a dugong since she’d fled Calilan a decade ago and entered the Aynilan convent. Not since the Codicían governor started hunting them for sport. He’d stuffed one for display in his mansion, prompting his hired Aynilan servants to quit and forcing him to use conscripted workers instead. It was one reason the abbot hosted so many dinners in the governor’s stead.

As though reacting to its fellow, the dugong bone amulet began to burn. Fear made her lungs tight, and she cursed her luck. She must not be seen. She couldn’t let this dugong matriarch, a katalonan in her own right, sing of Lunurin to the old gods.

More panicked tugs came on the line. Lunurin’s lungs were beginning to prickle, but she had at least another minute of air. Lunurin cut herself free before Cat pulled her into the dugong’s path and tangled them both in the line. Then, Lunurin saw that the dugong was already entangled, a wad of weighted netting cutting into her tail. She’d never escape the next hunting party so encumbered.

Lunurin shouldn’t intervene.

The dugong matriarch whistled sharply, her tone as plain as any aging tita demanding action. Lunurin couldn’t leave her like this.

She kicked off the bottom, gliding alongside the old survivor. She curled her fingers into the twisted abaca fibers, angling her knife with care. She’d just cut the main knot when the dugong writhed with one strong sweep of her tail, and swam free. The dugong flung Lunurin and the tangle of net into the oyster beds. She peered down at Lunurin with brown, all-too knowing eyes. The dugong sang a thankful prayer, and cold terror filled Lunurin like rainwater. She should never have dived so near to the wet season.

Thunder grumbled over the bay in answer.

Lunurin shivered as the whisper of her thwarted goddess slid down her spine. “Who tends these sacred beds but makes no offerings at my feet? Have all my prayers been forgotten? Pearl diver, won’t you sing out my name?”

As a child Lunurin had wanted nothing more than to dedicate her life to the goddess of storms. She knew better now. Knew better than to name the goddess, or offer her own name in return. So long as she had her amulet to conceal her, she might yet escape without discovery or her power spiraling out of control.

Lungs burning, Lunurin kicked off the ocean floor. Her head broke the surface, and she gasped for breath before a wave forced her under. She struggled against the waves, the tangle of rope dragging her down. Desperate to get out of the water, Lunurin abandoned the netting, and struck out for the ladder at the edge of the pier.

Dear, proper Catalina on the dock with her cut safety-line was near tears. “Asus! You frightened me. I thought it would eat you.”

Lunurin forced a shaky smile of reassurance. “Dugong eat seagrass, Cat, not people.”

Cat clutched the barb-tipped rattan cane Lunurin used to pull in the floating cages as if she intended to use it as a spear. “Please, say you have enough now? I think there’s a storm coming.”

“I heard the thunder. I’m done.”

“Dugong are bad luck. They sink ships! The sky was clear when we started.”

Lunurin grabbed the ladder with both hands. Dugong didn’t sink ships—but they could cry so loudly the heavens themselves took heed. “You believe that old superstition?”

Cat frowned, caught out entertaining what the abbot called “heathen delusions.” She hated to be seen as anything less than perfectly faithful, even by Lunurin.

“Climb faster, María,” Cat griped. She held out a plain white wrap skirt to shield Lunurin, in her breast band and waist wrap, from the rest of the shipyards.

“I hate when you call me that.” Even after ten years, Lunurin hadn’t grown accustomed to the Christian name she’d been baptized into upon joining the convent. If not for Catalina, Lunurin never would have stayed. But with Catalina, Lunurin fit, as she never had on Calilan and never would with her Codicían relations here in Aynila.

Lunurin ducked behind the cloth, yanking on her white habit. In her hurry, she put her hand through the worn elbow and grimaced. This had been her last good habit.

“You shouldn’t have kept your heathen name as a surname. We’re supposed to let our old self die away and be reborn,” Cat admonished. “But you like to pretend you’re only really María on the Saint’s Day of Our Lady of the Drowned.”

Sometimes Lunurin believed Cat had really achieved this, that who she’d been before entering the Church had been stripped away. Lunurin wished her own past could be banished so easily.

Cat half turned toward the Santa Clarita, which now sat in the Palisade shipyards for repairs. Lunurin followed her gaze. Aynilan men in white waistcloths clambered over the dry-docked behemoth like ants trying to carry off a banana spider. They glistened with sweat in the humidity, brown hands stained black with stone dust from the volcanic bricks being loaded as ballast.

“I’m sorry for taking you from your morning ministry. I would’ve been fine diving alone. Looks like you’re busier than usual,” Lunurin said.

“It’s because the governor supplemented the laborers on this month’s rota with arrests after the riots.” Cat’s expression creased in disapproval.

Many of those laboring hands had grasped bolo knives and torches during rioting after the governor had raised the labor exemption tax to drum up extra workers for the Santa Clarita’s repair in addition to this year’s effort to complete the new bridge across the Saliwain River, allowing the Palisade to control the lifeblood of Aynila’s commerce. The governor was getting greedy. The shipyards’ forge fires never went out lately. He hoped to send the reefed galleon laden back to Canazco, the westernmost port of New Codicía, before wet season storms made the passage impossible and the rising river put the bridge completion on hold another year.

Under the polo agreement, every able-bodied Aynilan man between the ages of sixteen and sixty who couldn’t afford the falla tax to pay for exemption joined the Palisade’s public work gangs for forty days of every year. It sickened Lunurin to see her people forced to work for a pittance. She was grateful for Cat’s efforts to ensure the agreement was honored, and the risks she took to ensure abuses of the system were minimized.

“You shouldn’t dive alone. Bring one of the kitchen girls if Inez can’t come.” Cat poked Lunurin in the shoulder. “Who are you to say I’m busy? Between the abbot’s dinners, the oyster beds, and your share of teaching at the abbey school… but it’s Inez and I who work too hard.”

“I don’t know how my aunt managed. I still have to organize the Saint’s Day festival procession and Mass on top of it all.” Lunurin emptied her waist bag of oysters into the nearest bucket. Her aunt, Abbess Magdalena, had left near the end of the wet season last year for Canazco, to see doctors there for her health.

“You’re doing your best. Everyone would understand if you delegated.” Cat lifted the second bucket, grunting with effort.

Lunurin winced in mock hurt. “Cat, you wound me. Don’t let Sister Philippa hear you agreeing with her. Are my efforts so lacking?”

“Standing in as acting-abbess is running you ragged. You’re just being stubborn. Even God rested on the seventh day. You just don’t want to give Sister Philippa the satisfaction.”

Lunurin ducked her head at this frank assessment. Some days, she still felt like everything would fall apart, shattering the life she’d painstakingly carved out for herself with Cat and Inez as easily as she’d destroyed her life on Calilan.

Lunurin leaned down to press her brow to Cat’s, breathing in the sesame oil and faintly feathery scent of her hair. “What would I do without you? After I get these delivered, I’ll rest till my afternoon classes. I promise.”

Cat lifted a hand to graze Lunurin’s cheek—then snatched it back as Rosa, one of the kitchen girls, appeared at the end of the dock.

“Sister María! Biti didn’t come to breakfast, and she’s not in the girls’ dormitory. No one can find her.”

Lunurin jerked herself upright. Ha. What had she been thinking? She could rest when she was dead. Lunurin hooked the oyster buckets over both ends of the barb-tipped cane, lifting them onto her shoulders. Of course it would be Biti.

“I’m sure it’s fine,” Cat said soothingly. “I’ll help you look so Sister Philippa doesn’t panic.”

Lunurin wished she were half so confident. But this wasn’t the place to share her fears about the newest addition to the abbey school.

They hurried down the pier toward Rosa, who produced a stack of letters. “Sister Catalina, these came with the morning food delivery for you, one all the way from New Codicía with the Santa Clarita.”

Cat accepted the letters, slowing as she riffled through them, eager for news. Thunder rumbled over the water as Lunurin strode ahead.

From this side of the Palisade Lunurin couldn’t see the city of Aynila, only the wide blue stretch of the bay and Mount Hilaga, dominating the horizon to the north. The volcano’s verdant green slopes were striped on the seaward side with narrow black lava flows, streaming from the peak into the sea. A bad sign. Hilaga, like all the archipelago’s volcanoes, was a sacred place. Ever since the Codicíans had started mining volcanic ballast for the Santa Clarita, the peak had belched steam. Lunurin couldn’t imagine the completion of the new bridge, the Puente de Hilaga, would improve things. The old gods were discontent.

Lunurin turned away from the brewing disaster across the water, toward the church belltower and the manmade rhythms of the Palisade. Only suffering came from listening to angry gods. They were old elemental beings of storm, sea, and land, with no grasp of the human consequences that came of wielding their powers. It was safest to avoid even thinking their names, lest she draw unwelcome attention. Like all the women in her family she had too much katalonan blood in her, like the dugong. Her voice was too loud.

It was better that she concerned herself only with the doings inside the walls of the convent. She’d built a good life for herself. She would not allow it to be undone, even by divine portents.

*   *   *

Lunurin rechecked the headcount at breakfast. Inez wasn’t down yet. Lunurin asked Rosa to save Inez a snack so she wouldn’t be late for classes when she woke. Then she joined the search for Biti.

She wound carefully through the packed kitchen storerooms with a coconut oil lamp in hand. She didn’t call out. Servants had already been through the usual places students secreted themselves. Biti didn’t want to be found.

Lunurin watched the little flame dancing before her. As she edged around large jars of coconut oil, the wavering flame stilled. It began to dim and flare, like the sleeping breaths of a child. Lunurin crouched. In the bare space between stacked crates of wine, bedded on a fallen rice sack lay Bituin Prinsa, fast asleep. The relieved sigh that puffed past Lunurin’s lips didn’t disturb the lamp’s rhythm.

Biti was a recent addition to the church school. She wasn’t adjusting well, and Lunurin couldn’t blame her. Lunurin had lived in Aynila for ten years, and she’d never met anyone under twenty who still had their mutya. The Church had seen to that after the Codicíans burned the tide-touched healing school and built the Palisade. Few dared to wear their mother-of-pearl coming-of-age talismans openly, lest they be taken for one of the “wicked water witches of the tropics” the abbot eagerly hunted. Lunurin hadn’t seen Biti’s mutya, but judging by the breathing flame in Lunurin’s hand, she must’ve been taken to dive for a sacred oyster, and found a tear-shaped pearl. Lunurin fingered the lightning-shaped pearl that topped the hairstick hidden at her waist, tracing the paired mother-of-pearl comb.

A young firetender hiding in the heart of a Codicían convent; she wouldn’t remain hidden for long. Biti didn’t have the benefit of a dugong amulet to suppress her growing abilities and hide her from her goddess. If Hilaga and the volcano’s divine mistress truly woke, Biti would burn the convent down around their ears. Lunurin suppressed a shudder.

Lunurin had to get Biti out before the Codicíans discovered her or Biti lost control. It would happen. She was young. There was no other firetender to help her bank the flame or teach her not to pull on the fiery heart of the island. Lunurin couldn’t help her. An untrained firetender and a stormcaller in hiding would be an explosive mix.

Lunurin laid a hand on Biti’s head. She radiated heat. It was a wonder no one had quarantined her for fever. Lunurin brushed Biti’s sleek, black hair from her burning brow, humming softly as the girl woke, eyes riveted by the flame in Lunurin’s hand.

Biti’s big dark eyes seemed to drink the firelight. Salt-rimed tear tracks glistened on her round, brown cheeks. “I know that song. My mother sings it.”

The soothing rhythm died in Lunurin’s throat and Biti picked up the song in her high child’s soprano.

“Before our islands graced these seas, two lovers, Sea and Sky.

Between them flew a Kite, so free. O Aman Sinaya.

Anitun Tabu. Amihan. Goddesses three we sing

To please. Of Sea, of Sky, of Flame, three gods we know by name.

Alone flew wingéd Amihan. No land in sight to rest.

In pique, she stirred the saltwaters. Up rose the angry Sea.

Dodge quickly, wingéd Amihan. The Sea did strike the clouds.

Her lover’s unrest wearied her, the Sky rained down great stones.

Aman Sinaya’s churning breast was made a welcome home.

Our islands dot her vast blue breast, her tides now chase the moon.

The Sky ordered the Kite to cease and on the peak to rest.

Of Apo, the volcano great and there to make her nest.”

Lunurin blinked back the rush of tears and memory and put a finger to Biti’s lips. “My tiyas taught me that song, but this isn’t the place to sing it.”

The rest of the verses spooled out in Lunurin’s soul, as if Biti’s words had seized hold of a loose thread, the armored resolve of a decade unraveling before her eyes.

A nest she built, an egg she laid, yet no bird did she hatch,

Instead there was a hungry flame, to put her strength to test.

Fed first on dry abaca leaf, ate fast and sputtered low.

Poor Amihan had no relief. She flew where bamboo grows.

She split one sheath, and two halves fell. From each half they did rise,

A woman and a man they were, they went away to live.

Until the day Amihan came, their youngest child she chose.

A Firetender you shall be, to guard my living blaze.

Aman Sinaya, Merciful, she chose the middle son.

Tide-touched you are, salt seas and swells to brave, my blessed one.

Anitun Tabu, last to choose. The eldest she did take.

A Stormcaller they will call you and Typhoons you will face.

Fear made Lunurin’s breath quiver, sweat beading on her upper lip. She’d never be able to carry a song to the goddess’s ear if she couldn’t control her breathing, her tiya’s voice chided. But Lunurin thought, Good, let my voice falter. May my song be unheard and unnoticed.

Lunurin struggled to collect herself as Biti nodded solemnly. “What is your name again, Sister?”

“I am Sister María, but you may call me Lunurin.”

“Lunurin is a better name.”

“Why did you go wandering?”

“It’s Hilaga. She’s waking. Will you take me to my mother? She needs to know.”

The lamp in Lunurin’s hand trembled, and Biti reached out, rescuing the flame before sloshing oil could set dry sacking alight. The little flame crawled happily into her bare palms, flaring brightly in the grip of her power.

Lunurin choked. “Biti! You must never let anyone see that.”

Biti licked her fingers and crushed the fire out with a frown. “But you feel like… a breeze over coals. You aren’t like the others here.”

Lunurin was saved from having to answer this startling declaration by the door to the storeroom opening and Catalina calling out, “Bituin?”

“I found her. We’re here,” Lunurin called back.

She put a hand to Biti’s brow and found her warm, but no longer burning. Had she fed the heat to the flame?

Cat wound into the maze of foodstuff and pulled Biti into her lap, rubbing the tear tracks from her cheeks. “Good morning, Bituin, what’s wrong?”

Biti’s expression crumpled, her words catching on a sob. “Why won’t you take me to my mother?”

“Ahh, my dear, it’s not so bad as that,” Cat crooned.

But this couldn’t appease poor Biti, now that whatever strange communion they’d shared had broken. Biti lapsed into disconsolate weeping.

Cat soothed the girl, rocking and patting her back, until she’d wrung herself dry and sunk into a fitful slumber. Cat sagged into Lunurin’s side with a deep sigh of relief. Lunurin wrapped an arm around her, squeezing gently.

Cat turned toward her, whispering, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to set her off again.”

“She wasn’t awake enough to be upset earlier,” Lunurin assured Cat. “Has the situation with her mother improved at all?”

Biti’s mother, Hiraya Prinsa, had recently been impressed upon to make new cannons for the Palisade.

Cat made a face, tucking her cheek in against Lunurin’s neck. “I did try to bring up your concerns with DeSoto, but he says the governor won’t hear of anything that takes a skilled metalworker from his shipyards.”

The brush of Cat’s lips at Lunurin’s throat almost derailed her concentration entirely. They’d been unable to find the privacy or energy for anything more than a stolen kiss in months.

Lunurin dragged her attention back. “So she’s still being held in the shipyards as a common laborer? Doesn’t that completely go against the polo contracts?”

Hiraya Prinsa was the Lakan’s sister-in-law and the head of the metalworkers’ conclave on Hilaga. As the native ruler of Aynila, the Lakan held one of the few remaining positions of power that stood against the Codicíans’ complete dominion of the island of Lusong. Tigas Dakila had assumed the role after his wife, Dalisay, ran afoul of the Codicíans. It didn’t bode well that they were targeting another powerful matriarch of the family.

“She signed a labor contract agreeing to those terms,” Cat hedged.

“But the Palisade shouldn’t have been able to compel her to do anything…” Lunurin squeezed Cat closer.

“Maybe she thought it would look better, not using political connections or wealth in her favor, working the same as a common laborer,” Cat suggested.

“She can’t want her metalworkers to accept similar contracts.”

“It’s not ideal, but think of the benefits. It’s meaningful to have a major Aynilan figure supporting Father DeSoto’s efforts. He overhauled the design of the new bridge with her input, making it more resistant to flashfloods and sabotage.”

Father DeSoto was the architect responsible for most of the major public buildings in the Palisade.

Lunurin frowned in thought. “So Biti’s a hostage.” It was the only thing that made sense of the timing of her enrollment, and the travesty of her mother’s contract.

Catalina winced and laid a protective hand on Biti’s head.

“We need to get Biti out,” Lunurin hissed.

Cat lifted her head, staring at Lunurin. “Vanishing a student? Impossible.”

Lunurin tried to pull Cat back to her, not wanting to give up this stolen moment of intimacy. “How is it any different from the workers and servants you’ve helped me vanish?”

“The governor cares about the students. They’re high profile. A conscripted worker disappears, that’s unremarkable, but a daughter of the principalia?”

“We could do it, if we were careful.”

“It’s not that I don’t agree. Her mother won’t find any fulfillment in her work while her daughter is being held here, but why Biti? Half the students are here as assurance of their parents’ good behavior. The risks to us, to Biti—it’s not worth it.”

“Half the students won’t burn the convent down in the midst of a temper tantrum,” Lunurin murmured.

Cat stiffened, pulling away from Lunurin entirely. “What?”

Lunurin pointed out the singed and blackened sections of rice sacking everywhere Biti’s skin had rested while she’d slept.

For an instant Cat seemed ready to thrust the sleeping child out of her lap, but then her expression firmed. “Maybe it’s better she stays. Her fits might pass as she ages, the way yours did. She’s younger than you were. It’ll be easier for her.”

Lunurin had failed on several occasions to correct Cat’s misapprehensions about her “fits,” but Cat needed to understand that Biti was dangerous to the life they’d built. The Codicíans hadn’t understood that the old gods’ magic came in flavors other than the Inquisition’s preferred prey. “Water witch: pulls saltwater and sinks galleons. To be exterminated with prejudice.”

They must never discover girls like Biti—orLunurin—existed.

“She’s not like me. I can’t help something like this. She needs family. The fires will be the least of it. Hilaga can pull on her, and she on the mountain. Eruptions, earthquakes…”

As if to corroborate her words, the ground shuddered under their feet. Lunurin threw herself over Cat and Biti to shield them as a stack of wine crates came hurtling down, thwacking her shoulders and back. Dust choked her throat. She squeezed Cat tight, half crushing Biti between them.

Biti shrieked.

Cat prayed fervently as the earth settled and dust sifted down from the bamboo flooring above. “Comfort them, O God—Be their rock when the earth refuses to stand still—”

When everything stopped moving, Lunurin pulled Cat, her eyes still clenched shut as she prayed, from the ground. Lunurin’s battered back protested, but she heaved Biti into her arms and hurried them both out into the courtyard in case of aftershocks. Cat burst outside, crossing herself in thanksgiving, before calling out for her sister Inez. Everyone in the church compound poured out of buildings, dusty, frightened, and bleeding from falls and scrapes.

Lunurin pointed Inez out, following as Cat dashed to check her sister for injury. The four huddled close, Cat giving Lunurin’s hand a convulsive squeeze with every aftershock. Black smoke rose from the peak of Hilaga, ringed in ashen storm clouds. She couldn’t ignore such a threat. This was more serious than mining for volcanic ballast or even the near-finished Puente de Hilaga that would bring the metalworkers’ conclave on Hilaga into the Palisade’s sphere of influence. They had an untrained firetender held hostage. The old gods could use children to do things their parents knew better than to attempt.

Thunder rumbled in Lunurin’s ears, reminding her that she wouldn’t be safe from old promises forever, no matter how many fires she put out.

2

MARÍA LUNURIN

Morning classes were canceled while Father DeSoto inspected the foundations for structural damage.

This left Lunurin scrambling to occupy fifty-odd students with no classrooms and a dinner to plan. Sister Philippa, the female students’ dorm mother and Lunurin’s prime critic, was horrified by the suggestion to allow all the students, boys and girls, free time in the church courtyard.

Lunurin’s head pounded at Philippa’s shrill voice, her responsibilities pulling her a dozen ways.

“Lunurin’s bleeding,” Cat declared. “She’ll come deal with everything once she’s cleaned up.”

“I’ve full faith that your supervision will ensure all propriety in my absence, Sister Philippa,” Lunurin said to the older nun as she was pulled away.

Lunurin touched the edge of her hairline, sticky with blood and stiff with salt from her morning swim. “The river’s running salty till low tide. I can’t bathe in the river.”

The Saliwain River was technically an estuary. This late in the dry season, at high tide it ran backward into the mountain lake that fed it.

Cat shook her head. “You can’t lug water with your shoulder like that. A rag bath for the dust will be fine. It’s not healthy how much you bathe.”

Lunurin had heard similar diatribes against the dangers of full-body bathing from her Aunt Magdalena and the other sisters for years. But since she hauled her own water, they could hardly call the practice slothful.

“I don’t like when salt dries in my hair,” she complained.

“I’ll help you rinse,” Cat offered. “I only wash mine once a month. Daily brushing is quite enough to keep it tidy.”

Lunurin wrinkled her nose. Cat’s hair was fine and straight, with none of the tendency to curl and snarl that hers had, requiring all manner of oils and washes to detangle.

As their shared cell was in one of the buildings declared sound, they headed up for privacy. Lunurin made do with a bucket and tabo for rinsing. Removing her faded blue veil, she secured her hair with her mutya. The familiar weight returned her sense of equilibrium, easing her pounding headache.

Lunurin crossed the room and caught Cat’s hands, squeezing. “Thank you. I was pushing myself too hard.”

The teasing arch of Cat’s brow fell away. She squeezed back. “I know you are. Should I call the physician? We can’t have you working to collapse again. I’m here, not everything has to fall on you. Have faith.”

Lunurin wished she did. She had to believe Cat’s faith would be enough. Surely her slipup with the dugong would pass unnoticed. All she had to do was stay away from the oyster beds till after the wet season festival.

And get Biti out of the Palisade before Hilaga woke to bury the Palisade in lava and ash. All while maintaining her image as the perfect acting-abbess. Easy.

Lunurin stepped back reluctantly, wishing she could hide in Cat’s embrace from everything, forever. “Thank you, but it’s nothing serious. Just a headache and some scrapes. Could you dig for the salve in my chest?”

Cat frowned with concern but did as she asked.

Lunurin struggled to strip her torn habit, her shoulder protesting. Finally, she grasped the neck of the garment, tearing it enough to shimmy free. Craning her head, she eyed the gouge down the back of her shoulder, and gave it a good scrub with soap and water.

Cat picked up the tattered habit. “Careful, we don’t get new clothing stipends till next year.”

“I’ll manage, I always do.”

“Are you planning to call in a favor from a certain young noble? The one who trails after you so often when you minister to the sick, you’d think he planned to take the cloth?” Cat held out the indigo salve with an arched brow.

It was another gift from “a certain young noble,” Alon, the Lakan’s son. Lunurin wasn’t sure if Cat disapproved more of Alon, or Lunurin using folk remedies instead of the Palisade physician. It was sometimes hard to tell if Cat’s insecurity was simple jealousy, or if Lunurin’s unorthodoxy was her true fear. Lunurin knew she made it hard for Cat to love her.

“I don’t take advantage of Alon like that,” Lunurin protested.

Cat’s brow arched higher. “The way he moons after you, especially after the last ‘favor,’ doesn’t make it seem that way.”

Lunurin shook her head. “It’s nothing like that with him. I have you, don’t I?”

“Yes, you do,” Cat affirmed, the arch edge melting away as if it had never been.

Cat helped her apply the salve and tied on a clean cloth. She softened, pressing her lips to Lunurin’s shoulder. “Be careful.”

“I was protecting you. Don’t I deserve a kiss on the lips?” Lunurin asked, wanting to see Cat smile.

But Cat wrinkled her nose. “I thought your head hurt. Besides, what if someone comes looking for you?”

“On the cheek then?”

Cat acquiesced, giving Lunurin a quick peck that made Lunurin want to shower her in kisses.

Then Cat sat on her bed with her stack of letters while Lunurin finished her rag bath.

Lunurin scrubbed down quickly and wrapped a clean cloth around her body. “If you’ll help me rinse, I’ll be done.”

Cat tore her gaze from her letters, her lips tightly pursed. “Hmm?”

“My hair?” Lunurin uncoiled her bun, making sure to keep several ties in place, securing the hair partly.

Cat, momentarily distracted from her letters, exclaimed, “How is it so long already? I trimmed it a month ago.”

Lunurin inspected the ends. She rarely let her hair down, even this much. “It always grows fast.”

“We wear veils. You should let me cut it short.”