He turned his shaggy pony loose to graze with Ember and sat cross-legged opposite me without speaking, laying his staff across his lap and settling into a breathing rhythm that matched mine. We might have been Master Lo’s magpie and his least likely pupil once more. Except that in the twilight, Bao looked different than he had before.

It wasn’t just that the spark of the divine spirit of the Maghuin Dhonn Herself shone within him. The faint shimmer of darkness that surrounded him since his rebirth was deeper here, impossible to ignore, impossible to dismiss as a trick of the light. It flickered all around him-darkness made bright, a penumbra like an eclipsed moon. Gazing at it, I remembered that there was more at issue here than the fact that Bao had left me and ridden away to find his blood-father and wed some Tatar princess in the bargain.

He had died, and been restored to life. He was twice-born, and he was learning how to live with it. And although I was angry, mayhap I owed him the chance to explain.

With a sigh, I released the twilight, letting the daylight world return.

Bao’s lips parted at my sudden appearance, but having known I was there all along, he showed no other sign of surprise. I tilted my head to indicate I was listening. He nodded in acknowledgment and cleared his throat. “First of all, it would have been a grave discourtesy to refuse such an honor from the Great Khan. Second, I did not seek it out, Moirin.”

I stayed silent.

“You remember Master Lo’s snowdrop bulbs?” he asked me. “Well, I took them. I made a tonic like Master Lo prepared.”

“I know.” I wasn’t very good at holding my tongue. “I heard. That’s how you bribed your way into General Arslan’s favor.”

“My father’s favor, yes.” Bao fidgeted with his staff, frowning a little. “It’s true, you know. Although the truth isn’t exactly what I expected it to be. I thought… I thought that mayhap that once I gained his trust, I would avenge my family’s honor.”

“But it’s complicated,” I said in a neutral tone.

“Yes.” He straightened his back. “For now, it is enough to say that my father claimed me with pride, and I allowed it. When the Great Khan Naram visited his most loyal general, he was intrigued. He wished to see the fighting prowess of which my father boasted. He wished to sample my famed tonic. I obliged.”

“And the Great Khan was pleased,” I noted.

“Very pleased,” Bao agreed. “So pleased that he insisted on giving me his youngest daughter in marriage.”

I scowled at him. “Bao, you are the stubbornest person I’ve ever met, and now that Master Lo is gone, I do not think there is anyone under the sun who could make you do a thing if you did not wish it. You’re a clever and skilled liar. Don’t tell me you could not have talked your way out of it.”

“I’m not,” he said mildly.

I waited.

Bao sighed. “Moirin, you possess a gift the likes of which no one outside your strange bear-folk has ever seen. You possess a strange beauty the likes of which no one has ever seen. You are descended from three different royal lineages. And I’m nothing but a simple Ch’in peasant-boy-or at least I was. Do you think I don’t know it matters?”

I looked blankly at him. “You’re the one who insisted on referring to yourself thusly! What did I ever say or do to make you think it mattered to me?”

“You didn’t need to say anything!” His voice rose. “Gods, Moirin! Do you know how much gossip I had to endure in Terre d’Ange? I know your history as well as my own. Better, maybe.”

“So?”

“So there was that lord’s son in Alba, the one who died.” He began to recite a litany of my lovers, ticking them off on his fingers. “And I am sorry, because I know you cared for him, but he was a lord’s son. High-and-mighty Lion Mane, that Raphael de Mereliot, what was he? Some kind of nobleman. His sister ruled a city, anyway. When you quarreled with him, you bedded the Crown Prince, didn’t you?” Bao raised his brows at me. “That’s what they all said. And when you quarreled with both of them, the White Queen herself.”

I flushed. “Aye, but-”

He cut me off, lowering his voice to a fierce, hushed whisper as though someone might overhear us. “And I am not sure how to count the fact that a dragon decided you were a worthy mate for the heir to the throne of the Celestial Empire, but I am quite sure it does count, even if the Noble Princess was not particularly pleased with his choice. There is no place for peasants in your history, Moirin.”

“You’re not as clever as you think,” I muttered. “You missed one.”

It was Bao’s turn to look blank. “Who?”

“No one important.” I drew up my knees beneath my Tatar coat, wrapping my arms around them. “His name was Theo, I think. He drove the coach that brought me to the City of Elua. By the way, I have not kept count of the bored wives you claim to have bedded, although I am grateful for all they taught you.”

“It’s not the same.” Bao eyed me. “A coach-driver?”

I nodded, resting my chin on my knees. “In the stables along our route, yes. It was after Cillian’s death. I took comfort in it.”

“But you spurned him in the end,” he said uncertainly. “Right?”

I shook my head. “Not I, no. It was his choice.”

“He spurned you?” Bao shot me an incredulous look. “What an idiot!”

Despite everything, I laughed. “You’re a fine one to talk!”

“Moirin…” Bao leaned forward to take my hands in his, gazing intently at me. “All right, perhaps I was wrong about certain things. But this I know to be true. Before what happened, happened… it is as I told you, I was ready to ask Master Lo to release me from his service. I was ready to give up my life as his magpie for you. After his death…” He shrugged. “I could not bear to be herded into accepting my fate like some stupid, mindless sheep. I needed to find a way to make this choice my own. To make it meaningful, to make it a choice that counted for something larger.”

“By finding something worthy of sacrificing?” I asked. I did not fully understand the way his fierce sense of pride goaded him, but I’d come to recognize its workings.

“Perhaps,” he said simply. “I did not think of it so, but… perhaps.”

I bowed my head over our joined hands, rubbing my thumbs over his callused palms. “So everything comes around full circle,” I murmured. “The peasant-boy has become a prince. What do you want, Bao?”

“You.”

The certainty in his dark, steady gaze undid me. I wanted to believe in it. I glanced at him, then away. “How can you be sure?”

He smiled wryly. “When I first sensed you coming after me, I’ll admit, I was angry. Angry that you could not bring yourself to trust me long enough to wait. Angry that you would use all the resources at your disposal to hunt me down like a runaway dog.” He shook his head. “Never, ever did I imagine you were not travelling with an Imperial entourage. The Noble Princess would have granted you whatever you had asked,” he added. “I know she is a very private person who does not show her feelings easily, but despite the way things began, I think she came to be fond of you, Moirin.”

A memory from those last few days in Shuntian arose unbidden: Snow Tiger, kneeling over me in a bed strewn with the cushions I had asked for. I’d never grown accustomed to the hard wooden or porcelain stands that passed for pillows among the Ch’in. Are you quite sure this is enough cushions, my barbarian? she had teased me, her eyes bright with affection, her hair hanging loose and unbound to curtain both our faces with black, shining silk. When she shook her head, it tickled. Are you quite sure you are comfortable?

It was a memory I did not intend to share with anyone, even Bao. That had been a time of grace, and it was Naamah’s business.

I cleared my throat. “Ah… yes, I know. And yes, she begged me to accept an entourage. But, Bao, your anger proves it would have had exactly the result I feared-not to mention the possibility of provoking outrage among the Tatars. And unlike you, the princess respected me enough to believe me when I said I could take care of myself.”