Sleep in a closed room should have felt like winning.
It did not. I woke to the thread behind my sternum pulling once, sharp and shallow, as if the Seat had turned in its sleep and remembered I was far away. The compound was quiet. Someone was cooking. Someone else was arguing softly about water stores. Ordinary sounds. They sat strangely on top of a body that had been written in a white cavern.
Elizabeth was already dressed.
She stood at the courtyard gate with a slate in her hand and the look she wore when the world had arrived early.
"Rhea's grey-belt scouts were not guessing," she said. "A ship sat off the outer reefs all night. No banner. No request for harbor. At dawn it sent a boat."
"Clan?"
"Worse. Polite."
Vale came out of the side hall still tying her bracer.
"Polite ships waste my time. What do they want?"
"A conversation with the carrier. Alone if possible. With the circle if we insist. They called themselves the Salt Court."
