Light Black #22 [Starfall]

[thisbluespirit]

Name: Round In Circles
Story: Starfall
Colors: Light Black #22 (push)
Supplies and Styles: Portrait
Word Count: 5587
Rating: Teen
Warnings: Imprisonment, some mental distress/illness (minor character).
Notes: 1317, North Fort; Leaira Modelen, Ennan Hilten, Tol Anness, Tamman, Allian Otlevo, Duza Eisterwill. Follows on from Establishing Credentials.
Summary: Leaira has a plan to escape confinement, but gets more than she'd bargained for when she tries.

---

Leaira was still dazed and tired from the events of what must be the strangest day she had ever lived through. Being confined to the guest quarters did not, right now, seem that bad. It was, from what she'd seen so far, the nicest part of the old fort, and comparatively warm. She sat on the bed with a blanket around her shoulders and another laid over her legs, and vented her feelings in the notebook the boy, Tamman, had brought her earlier.

At last, letting the book fall, she comforted herself with the thought that this blizzard couldn't last forever, no matter what Captain Delver seemed to think. It would clear up, and he would be only too glad to escort her back to the Paths, where she could escape back to where she belonged, in the future. With that thought to bolster her mood, she laid everything else aside, and wrote till she could write no more.


By the time Tamman reappeared with a supper tray, her resignation had started sliding into irritation. She accepted the food, although it looked as appetising as she'd come to expect from this place. It consisted of a grey, lumpy liquid poured over a small amount of unidentified root vegetable.

"Eating is an adventure here," she said to Tamman, and pushed the bowl to one side for the moment. "Did you manage to find me a book to read?"

The boy's face went blank. "Oh, no. I forgot. But they don't let me go in the library, not without someone else around."

"Don't they," said Leaira. "Sounds about right for a lot of stupid soldiers. Oh, well, I shall ask someone else. Thank you for bringing my dinner. Possibly."

Tamman gave a quick, nervous grin. "Oh, it was all right today! Yesterday's was worse."

"I'm not sure that's actually very comforting."

Leaira watched the boy go and then, with a sigh, turned back to the dinner, since she couldn't afford not to eat no matter how bad the fare. She pronged a grey lump with her fork and sniffed it. It smelled more promising than it looked. North Fort's cook must be good if they ever had proper ingredients to work with. Tasting it suggested that it might contain mushrooms, which did at least partly explain the colour, but she wasn't prepared to swear to it.

Once she'd successfully disposed of her meal, restlessness seized her. She got up, the blanket still wrapped around her, and walked the bounds of her chambers, poking into every closet or drawer and exploring every corner, but no previous occupants had left anything of interest behind them.

She slumped back down on the bed and sighed. What to do? She'd covered what had happened to her so far in the notebook and started in on what she could actually remember of her past (future) life, but that part had been highly discouraging. Her memories remained so fuzzy and incomplete. She'd rather not think about it.

She got to her feet and marched across the inner and outer chambers to the door. She tried the handle, which turned, and pulled it open. The hinges gave a creak that echoed up and down the long corridor and, before she'd even stepped out, Soldier Hilten reached her.

"Are you guarding me?"

He nodded. "Didn't Tamman lock the door? I should have checked."

"I'm quite happy not to be locked in, thank you," Leaira said. "I showed my papers to the Lieutenant and the Captain, so, really, I don't see why I should be."

Hilten laughed, but sobered abruptly when she glared at him. "It's just until the Colonel can see to things properly again. You're not going to make me manhandle you back inside, are you?"

Leaira pretended to consider it briefly, and then shook her head. "But, look, can't I go to your library and choose a book first? Or you could fetch me something. Anything would be better than nothing!"

"The library's locked at this hour," said Hilten. "I can try tomorrow, but I'll have to ask the Captain first."

"Do you have to ask the Captain everything? I don't see that he needs to know whether or not you let me have a book!"

Hilten blocked her way. "Well, yes, he does, because he gives the orders. It's how it works."

"What about the Colonel?"

"Too petty for her," said Hilten airily, "and the Lieutenant would say no, so get back inside until tomorrow. We could lock you in the proper cells downstairs, you know. The Lieutenant and some of the others think we should."

Leaira wasn't about to try anything, not this soon. The blizzard was audible again out in the corridor; a muted, distant but constant howl round the building, so there was nowhere to go outside the fort. Within it, she had learnt very little of its routines or layout yet. "That's very unkind."

"Sorry," said Hilten. "I'll see what I can do but you'll have to wait till I'm off-duty. Until then, I've got to patrol the corridors. I'd rather be the one locked in a nice warm room."

Leaira conceded a possible point with a reluctant laugh, and then withdrew into the chambers. Hilten closed the door behind her and turned the key in the lock. She gave a weary grimace and settled for walking around the sitting room and complaining to herself about everything—especially Captain Delver.


Leaira woke suddenly in pitch darkness, shivering even under the plentiful bedcovers. An impossible to retain dream slipped away from her, but it left her with tears in her eyes and her heart beating too hard and fast. She reached instinctively for the lightstone pendant she wore around her neck, clutching it tight against aching emptiness within. She usually took the necklace off to sleep, but she hadn't wanted to do so here until the last minute, and she must have accidentally dozed off first.

Something or somebody moved in the gloom. "Imai Modelen?"

She yelled and sat up sharply. The pale glow from the lightstone illuminated the immediate area around her, but it didn't quite extend to the shadowy figure standing near the doorway in the outer chamber.

"It's me, sorry," said Hilten's voice, echoing slightly in the stone chambers. "And Anness. I didn't mean to scare you."

"You screamed, Imai," said Anness; her voice coming from somewhere in the darkness behind Hilten. "Then Hilten overreacted."

Hilten shot the other a look, but said nothing. He leant forward, keeping his focus on Leaira. "Was there anything in here?"

"No," said Leaira, swallowing. Two soldiers appearing out of the gloom hadn't done anything to steady her heart-rate. She pulled the covers tighter around her. The lightstone was growing brighter under her hold, enough for her to make out Anness in outline.

Hilten pulled back. "Just a bad dream?"

Leaira nodded.

"Oh," he said. "Sorry. I had to check, you see."

Leaira gave a quick nod, only wanting them both to go.

"And, you know, you did call for the Captain."

Leaira straightened in immediate outrage. "What? I did not!"

"I'm sure you did. When I was in the outer chamber. I thought -" He shrugged. "Maybe not."

Leaira's cheeks burned. "You must have misheard! Or—I suppose, I knew someone else called Delver once, somewhere else—maybe it was that. I don't even remember what the nightmare was. Please go away, and let me go back to sleep."

"Come on," said Anness to Hilten. "We aren't supposed to be in here." They gave Leaira a respectful nod as they ushered the younger soldier towards the door. "We won't disturb you again, Imai."

Leaira remained upright in the bed, head raised at a haughty angle, until they had gone. The mention of Captain or Governor Delver's name took things right beyond the barrier. She must have been dreaming about the attack outside of Starfall—perfectly natural, but the last thing she could explain to anyone here. She lay back down, hunched up on her side and glared out into the darkness. Her hand closed around the lightstone. This was his fault! He had started all of this—he had shoved her onto the Paths and sent her here—and now she was here, all he could do was lock her up and forget about her.

She swallowed back rising anger and raised her head a little to remove the pendant, laying it close beside her on the bed. Remembering that awful moment by the Paths again made her need to keep the only comfort she had close. Ice and snow and teeth and claws rushed at her again as soon as she shut her eyes. Whatever she thought about Marran Delver in either time period, she didn't want him to die. Not like that. It took a good while before she finally calmed enough to settle back into sleep.


The next day was even worse.

The best that could be said about it was that Hilten remembered her complaints about her lack of books and brought her three, but they were very random and battered indeed.

She'd confidently expected that the Captain or the elusive Colonel would ask to see her and she'd finally be given a little more freedom to move about the fort. They'd had enough time to discuss the issue now, surely, and she'd shown the Captain her Starfall papers. It wasn't as if they could have much else they could do right now, either, the whole staff of the fort trapped here by the storm.

Instead, Leaira had been left so severely alone that she kept reaching a point by which she feared must have been forgotten for good, only to be found days later, starved to death in the fort's guest rooms. But every time she got that far, Tamman or one of the soldiers would knock at the door with a meal on a tray to prove her wrong. She was glad of food, of course, but each succeeding effort at a meal seemed to get worse.

In what must have been the afternoon—it was after she'd been brought a second tray that day—Anness turned up and told her they had been instructed to let her have a walk up and down the long outer corridor, which they then solemnly proceeded to do so. It wasn't a scenic route, although it did confirm that the storm was still ongoing. It was harder to hear it in the more insulated guest chambers, but the shutters along the outer corridor rattled and whistled as if something out there was trying to get in.

On being marched back to her room, Leaira found one of the fort's civilian staff waiting to present her with her coat; now cleaned of its bloody stains, dried, and repaired. It had also been newly threaded with fine strands of what looked like melded firestone and copper and someone had added a belt with a circular metal buckle.

"What is this?" she demanded of the bearer, but the man, older and greying, only shrugged and muttered, "Orders," before leaving her to turn the garment over in bemusement.

Hilten was more forthcoming when he turned up later with the books. "You'll need it if the temperature drops again," he said, "or if you go outside. Best wear it as much as you can, and if things get worse, then you twist this bit." He demonstrated by touching the identical buckle on his own belt. "That sets it off. Our Artificers'd explain it properly, but that's the important part."

"I see," said Leaira, although she had the feeling that she didn't yet. "And who had this done without even asking me? It's Starfall property! I'll probably have to pay for damaging it when I get back."

"Oh, Captain Delver made sure of it," said Hilten, although he sounded as if he thought that was a point in the Captain's favour.

Leaira retreated a step or two inside the room. "I might have known."

"You'll be grateful, trust me," said Hilten.

Leaira grimaced. "But is it safe? They've been using firestone!"

"The Artificers think so." Hilten gave a shrug. If she wanted an answer, Leaira was going to have to add that to her growing list of questions to ask the Captain and the Colonel. In her time—and she was pretty sure it had been the case in this decade, too - the use of firestone was heavily fenced in and restricted. You certainly didn't wear it on a daily basis.

"Well—when am I going to see the Captain or the Colonel anyway? They can't keep me locked up like this forever!"

"No," agreed Hilten. "Even if they tried, once this weather clears, there's a new battalion on its way to relieve us. I suppose their commander would let you out then."

Leaira shot him a dark look, but then, mindful of the books in her arms, refrained from a retort, and thanked him nicely instead. When he closed and locked the door behind him, she lowered her head with a small sigh, a tide of loneliness washing through her.

The one good thing about yesterday had been that she'd felt bad enough that incarceration hadn't seemed too awful in comparison. Today, all the walls were closing in on her.


The next day was much the same—and the day after that.

Leaira finished the last of the books: a turgidly written novel that she had been castigating as overly old-fashioned until she reminded herself that she was twenty years in the past, and a book that had been around for only a decade or two here was actually thirty to forty years old from her point of view.

She flung it down onto the bed in revolt. She must try something! Waiting here for the Colonel or Captain to send for her wasn't getting her anywhere—maybe they were merely using that promise to placate her while they kept her shut quietly away for as long as they could manage. She would have to find a different strategy, or she might never get home.

What that ought to be was a more difficult question, but Leaira had all the time she wanted to think about it. She lay back down on the bed, following after the book, and let the wheels turn around in her head until something clicked into an idea.


It was Hilten's turn to march her up and down the corridors that afternoon.

"Where is the library?" she asked, as she began to lose track of which side of the fort they were now on. "I've finished your books, and I'd love some more."

She'd even tried writing fiction as well as scribbling down everything she could still remember of her former life—horribly little even now—but she hadn't got anywhere with that. Even stupid fusty old novels were better than her attempts.

"You can't wander about the fort without the Captain or the Colonel's permission," said Hilten, eyeing her warily.

Leaira halted, digging her feet in and folding her arms. "I had noticed. When I do see your Colonel I shall have plenty to say about how you treat visitors from Starfall."

"Good luck with that," said Hilten. "Look, if you keep walking I'll point it out when we pass—it's just off the east tower." As they rounded that, he gestured with his hand. "There—the next door after the stairs—then straight on down the corridor to where it turns, and it's the second door on the left."

Leaira kept pace with him and nodded in what she hoped was a disarmingly meek manner. "Thank you."

They rounded the east tower and headed along the south corridor, past dim lightstone lamps, the few outer windows still shuttered firmly against the storm. Leaira's hand went to the lightstone pendant at her neck; a habit that seemed to have intensified now she had little else to hang onto.

Hilten glanced across at the gem, with interest. "Is that white lightstone? I wondered the other night. I thought it looked like it—and then, well, are you a Lighthaven Modelen?"

"What?" said Leaira, blinking.

"I didn't mean anything," he said. "Only I was stationed there for a while. Lighthaven, that is. I saw the Light-tower and the great lightstone, you see. I know the Lightkeeper was a Modelen, and she was called Adeleaira as well. I wondered, that was all."

Leaira put a hand to her head, fingertips brushing through her tight curls. "I am, actually. Only a distant cousin, though."

She watched Hilten with new eyes. If he'd been in Lighthaven prior being sent here, she must have seen him before, in her old life, although probably only in passing. She would have been too small to remember that anyway, but the oddness of it only heightened her sense of floating away from everyone else, adrift. "I miss it."

Starfall was so hard to bring to her mind, but Lighthaven and her childhood seemed nearer than ever before. She could almost hear her grandmother's voice echoing in her head, smell the seaweed dampness of the spring tides, and think if she could go up to the top of the tower and look out, she would see the great light shining across the city rooftops and mingling with wave-broken reflections of moonlight on the sea.

"It was better than here," Hilten murmured. "Oh, yes."

Leaira let go of the pendant. "While we're asking personal questions—what do you make of the Captain?"

Hilten gave her another sidelong look. "Well. He's an officer."

"No, honestly," said Leaira. "What do you think he'll do with me? Or the Colonel—how about her? She's not likely to have me executed as a spy or something, is she?"

Hilten shrugged. "Of course not! I don't know what they'll decide. But they're both all right, as far as that goes."

"I'm only asking."

"I don't want to get into trouble. Or get them into trouble with Starfall, either. Like I said, they're all right."

Leaira's brows drew together. "Yes, but does that mean they're actually all right—or that they're not, but you don't want to say so?"

Hilten threw her another, even warier, look.

"I'm only the librarian," said Leaira. "And now I'm stuck here, alone. I don't know what's going on, and nobody will tell me. All you keep saying is that it's up to the Captain and the Colonel, but I don't even know anything about them."

"Yes, but you are a Starfall officer, like you said. And a Modelen, if it comes to that."

Homesickness passed through Leaira again. Grandmother was alive—many hundredlengths and twenty years away in Lighthaven, right at this very moment. Not only Grandmother, but Mother and Father, not yet departed with her uncle on their fatal voyage. The thought robbed her of breath and left an aching hollow in its wake. She might as well still be divided from them by time as much as she was in the future, as trapped here.

"Yes," she said, in a smaller voice. "I do see." She shook herself. "I wasn't trying to trick you. The Captain told me he'd sort things out. Will he remember, or should I find a way to remind him? What do you think?"

Hilten's face cleared. "Oh, well. I don't think he misses much. It's been very busy, though, here. I'll try and ask him, but only if I get a chance, which I might not, because—well -"

"He's an officer," said Leaira for him, and grinned. "What about the Colonel?"

Hilten looked ahead. "Well, I speak to the Colonel even less. But we all respect her. It's just -" he cast another edgy glance at Leaira - "nothing's normal right now, so you must be patient."

Leaira nodded, and followed him around the final corner, bringing their walk to an end not far from the entrance to the guest chambers.

She'd had enough of being patient and well-behaved. It wasn't getting her anywhere. She must bring herself to their notice — although hopefully not in a way that would make them throw her in a dungeon instead of the guest quarters.


Leaira had planned on waiting until the next day and running away from whoever took her for her afternoon march. She had decided to try and get to the library, which didn't seem likely to bring down too great a reprisal on her head and might even win her the chance to choose her own books to be locked up with.

Things changed rapidly, thanks to the guard on duty that evening; a new face to her. He didn't bother to introduce himself and, when he checked on for the second time, last thing that night, she'd tried to get something out of him by asking questions — his name, when the Colonel might finally see her, if they were trying to poison her, that kind of thing. He remained stolid, giving only monosyllabic replies. But, as she discovered about half an hour later, he'd been so keen to get away from her, he hadn't actually locked the door.

She probably should have stuck to the original plan and waited for the next day. Wandering about at night was not going to get her inside the library, and it might alarm the soldiers more than was healthy. But her temper had been mounting all evening. Why should she sit around and wait for Marran Delver to finally get around to summoning her to his office? He wasn't a Governor here—he wasn't even the commanding officer! He was actually her subordinate in this situation, and he had no right to ignore her.

She had also wondered if the library plan was enough. Say she gave someone like Anness or Hilten the slip— they might not mention it to anyone else after they'd caught her. They'd both been kind to her so far, and they probably wouldn't want to make themselves look stupid in any case. If she was found wandering about at night, people would have things to say. And it wasn't really her fault: how could she be expected to ignore an unlocked door?


Leaira stepped out into the corridor, raising the yellow lightstone lamp in her hand, casting strange shadows in her wake. It was always dark here, but it seemed more so now, whether because she knew it was night, or maybe the silence and emptiness had a magnifying effect.

The library was at the other end of this inner corridor, where it intersected with the one that led to the stairwell and outer passageway. The other direction led only to a permanently locked door to the infirmary and medical quarters. Her path was straightforward enough. Leaira straightened herself and walked forward at a steady pace. As adventures went, it began to feel like an anti-climax. There was no one around and she reached the other end fairly quickly and without any incident. And, once she was there, the library door didn't budge under her attempt to pull it open.

She turned and leant against it, biting her lip to keep from laughing. What a grand rebellion! She shook herself, and instead walked along the corridor for the full length of the room to be sure of not missing any other entrance. She paused at the end, close to the door to the stairwell, then turned sharply on hearing a thin creak and heavy thud of the door opening and closing behind someone.

Leaira held up the lamp and peered forwards, but whoever had entered was keeping firmly in the shadows between the dim wall lamp by the door and her light. She heard ragged breathing and then a soft dragging sound coming slowly nearer. Leaira took an involuntary step back.

"H-hello?" she called, leaning forward, squinting into the gloom. "Who is it? Are you all right?"

The newcomer didn't answer, but they stopped moving, and there was another, softer, sound that she couldn't quite identify—clothes brushing against the wall?

It wasn't a spirit, she told herself as firmly as she could. Just because she couldn't see them, there was no need for her to lose her head. She adjusted her grip on the lamp and edged forward; pulse pounding in her ears.

"Hello?" she tried again. Surely she should be able to see the stranger by now?

Then her foot hit against something warm and solid, and she fell with a yelp, lamp clattering away into the wall, halted covered side up. She stifled a further cry and scrabbled hastily away. She'd been looking too high. Her mystery companion was lying on the floor.

"Are you hurt?" she got out, once she'd pulled herself up against the wall. "Please! Who are you? What's wrong?"

There was a shaky, indrawn sob, and then a scuffling sound and a rustling noise as they pulled themselves up using the wall. Unsteady, slow footsteps backed away down the corridor, towards the tower end. Leaira got her first real glimpse of them then, framed in the pale light by the door. They were wearing thin, loose white clothes — night clothes, she told herself. Then they disappeared through the door, which creaked closed behind them.

Leaira swallowed and, keeping one hand against the wall as she went to avoid falling over anything else, she followed.

Where was everybody? This floor didn't have any dormitories, but even so, there should have been at least one guard patrolling round the outer corridors. Hadn't they heard anything—or had her stranger injured them? Or could the lone figure be the guard?

Leaira turned to look back over her shoulder. Her fallen lamp glowed a faint yellow against the floor, beckoning her to safety. She should go back, pick it up, return to her room and plan a better way to get noticed tomorrow.

She did not.

She headed towards the door to the tower, stairs and outer corridor. Someone was in distress, and she seemed to be the only other person around. Besides which, disobeying the Captain's orders to try and help someone was surely exactly the right sort of trouble for her to get into.

Leaira quickened her steps and reached the door, pulling it open with an effort. Once through, there was a more powerful light in the stairwell. She could see her quarry now, huddled on the floor at the top of the stairs, with their head in their hands, keening.

"Somebody, help!" she shouted. No one came running.

She took a deep breath and moved nearer. "Hello?" she tried softly. "I'm Leaira. I'd like to help you, if I can."

He looked up, giving her a good look at him for the first time: a pale-skinned man with a thin face and hollowed out dark eyes. He jumped so hard on seeing her, he slid down two steps before managing to catch himself. "Leave me alone!"

Leaira took a step back and held up her hands. "I'm not going to hurt you. I only want to help. Is there someone I can fetch?"

He rubbed a hand across his face and sniffed, then squinted at her. "Tiz?"

"No," she said. "Leaira."

He leapt up suddenly, causing her to start. She backed away until she thumped up against the wood of the door behind her. He reached out for her, catching hold of her wrist. He was stronger than he looked, but she wouldn't have liked to pull away too hard even if she could in case she hurt him.

"Come on," he said, leaning in. "We have to go—we have to get out of here!"

Leaira wanted that so badly herself, she was robbed of breath for a moment, her longing for her own time and place obscuring all else. Maybe they had locked this poor man up for even longer. She couldn't blame him for running wild, when she was doing the same.

"I don't think we can," she tried, attempting to hold her ground. But she didn't want to distress him further, so when he tugged more insistently at her, she let him draw her forward, away from the stairwell and into the long outer corridor.

"We have to go—we mustn't let it happen again!"

"I don't understand," she said. "Please—let go."

He stared at her for a moment, and then released her. His face creased, and she thought he was going to sink to the floor and cry again, but instead, he darted towards the nearest shutter, tugging at it wildly, before setting to work on sliding out the bars that kept them closed.

Leaira moved forward. "Please—don't!"

The storm was still rampaging around the fort. It shouldn't have gone on this long, should it? She didn't know very much about the Wastelands, but it was low-lying, subject to its own micro-climate, and not prone to heavy snowfall. There shouldn't be a constant winter howl around the building and a permanent snow-laden cloud lid closed over them. She didn't know when or where Governor Delver had become so familiar with ice and snow that could form itself into the shape of predators and kill someone, but she would lay any bets that it was here, now.

The shutter banged open, flung back by the wind as soon as the bars were released. Snow whirled in and the temperature dropped sharply, in a way that didn't make sense. Ice patterns formed over the stone of the sill and crept outwards. Leaira gripped the handle of the door behind her. A flurry of snow whirled around beside the man, little of it falling onto the floor. Leaira blinked. It wasn't light enough to see if it was really forming into a blurrily winged shape, or if she was imagining it.

Leaira yelled, and then hurried forward to try and push the heavy shutter back into place. "Come on," she said to the man. "This is no good—please help me!"

"Hey! What are you doing?"

Leaira sagged in relief as Anness hurried down the long corridor towards them.

"The shutter!" Leaira gasped as Anness reached them and waved her arms about wildly towards the open window.

Anness took in the scene more closely, swore under their breath, and pushed the man aside to close and bar the shutter. The flutter of snow drifted down into a tiny white pile on the floor, before melting into nothing more than a thin, trickle of water over the floorboards.

"Duza! Is that you? What are you—oh, shit." Someone else thundered up the stairs and then drew to a sharp halt as they emerged enough to see Anness and Leaira there as well.

Anness put a calming hand out to the man—Duza? - and frowned at Leaira and the newcomer in turn. "Otlevo. What is Eisterwill doing wandering about at this hour?"

"I don't know," said Otlevo. "He was fine earlier. Think he woke me when he went out—went to see where he'd got to." He cast a dark look at Leaira. "What's she doing here?"

Anness said nothing for a moment, holding Otlevo in an impassive stare. Once he'd shut up and straightened, they said, "Not your business, Soldier. Send someone for Officer Fyler and get Eisterwill a blanket. He can't run around the place like this."

"I heard a noise," said Leaira, when Otlevo disappeared back down the stairs, and Anness turned that stony look on her. "I mean—that is—my door was unlocked, so I took a look outside for the guard to, er, lock it properly, and then I heard a noise. I couldn't leave him like that—and then he opened the shutter."

They both instinctively looked over at it. The frosting around the window had gone, too. Leaira turned her head away.

"Right, Imai," said Anness darkly. "Then, as soon as Otlevo returns, I will see you back to the guest quarters. And, don't worry: I will lock the door for you."

Leaira nodded. "Thank you."

Anness didn't bother to reply, turning back to Duza. The man was quieter now, but he was shivering in his nightwear.

Otlevo was the first to return, stamping back up the stairs with a disregard for the late hour. He placed the blanket he was carrying around Duza's shoulders with unexpected care. Then he shot another glare at Leaira. "What did you do to him?"

"Nothing," said Leaira. "I fell over the poor man in the dark."

Otlevo raised an eyebrow and looked to Anness. "See? They should have left her out there."

"Tell the Captain that yourself," said Anness. "I'm sure he'll be grateful. Now, shut up, and make yourself useful. Look after Eisterwill until medical gets here." They moved towards Leaira. "Imai Modelen—this way."

Anness marched Leaira back down the narrow inner corridor. Leaira remembered to stop and pick up her little lamp, still a dimly glowing yellow spot on the floor where she'd dropped it.

"Maybe now you see why it's not safe for you to wander about alone?"

Leaira shrugged. Otlevo's attitude, the strange snowstorm, and Duza's distress were all worrying and begged more questions, but she didn't feel like endorsing her own imprisonment nevertheless. "Aren't you going to interrogate me further?"

Anness kept on walking. "No. Explain yourself tomorrow to the Captain. He'll want to have words with you about this."

"Oh, about time," said Leaira.