most serene and kind of the gods with power over the body and spirit. She was whom the people of the Dark Shores prayed to for good health, for fertility, and for wisdom. But more important, the mark she bestowed on her chosen was the ability to heal even the most catastrophic of injuries, though doing so required the healer giving up some of themselves. Treatise had page after page of stories of famous healers making great sacrifices to save others, and it was not lost on Lydia now that said sacrifices were often their very lives.
The gods were real.
Their marks were real.
And Lydia had been saddled with the worst of them.
Killian set the plate aside and pulled down his sleeves, dragging her attention back to him. “You know I have to turn you in.”
For what and to whom Lydia had no idea, but being turned in was never a good thing. And from the tone of his voice, he was in agreement. She stared at him, unwilling to speak lest she unwittingly condemn herself further.
“I don’t want to,” he continued, resting his elbows on his knees and meeting her stare. “I’m not in favor of how Serrick treats the Marked—healers especially—but I’m in no position to cross him on this. I’m not in his good graces, and my head is only tenuously attached these days.” He drew a finger across his throat. “There’s only so much I’m willing to do for a girl I just met. Even one who saved my life.”
Lydia swallowed the dryness in her throat, thinking fast. “Your chivalry is commendable.”
Killian winced, his pride pricked as she had intended. “You would’ve been caught anyway,” he muttered. “Quindor investigates every whisper of a rumor of a healer across all corners of the kingdom. I have no notion how you managed to elude him this long.”
Lydia considered his words, marking the way he avoided her eyes, his jaw working back and forth. Highborn he might be, but this young man was no politician—not with the way every emotion played across his face, most especially his guilt. “I eluded him,” she said carefully, “because until last night, he’d have had no reason to be looking for me. Before last night, I wasn’t … marked.” The word stuck in her throat, the admission somehow making it real.
Killian went very still.
“I’m not from here. I’m from Celendor, but circumstances drove me to escape using an unmapped”—she broke off, unsure of the translation—“xenthier stem. Xenthier’s a sort of crystal—”
“I know what xenthier is.”
The same word in both languages. That was interesting. Pushing away the thought, she continued. “It deposited me in a stream just outside the city, and I came looking for shelter. I’d been inside the gates only a matter of minutes before I fell and you came upon me.”
“I see.”
“When Bercola left me alone with you, an old woman came into your chamber. I’d never seen her before in my life, but she knew my name.” Knew who I was. Said she knew my father. “She told me that you’d been chosen years ago and her brother did not wish to see you lost. That she’d give me the chance to save your life if I was willing to take the hardship that came with it.” She leveled him with a glare. “Little did I know that this hardship would be visited upon me so swiftly. Or by the man whose life I saved.”
His color rose. “You’re telling me that Hegeria marked you to save my life because Tremon asked her to?”
Lydia nodded, silently cursing herself for taking the woman’s—no, the goddess’s—offer without thought of the consequences. If she’d declined, she wouldn’t be in this predicament—she’d be on her way to finding a route back to Celendor to help Teriana, to stop Vibius from poisoning her father, and to make Lucius pay for his actions. Back to a place where gods and their marks didn’t exist.
“None of this matters anyway. As soon as I can find a Maarin ship, I’ll be on my way back to Celendor.” She’d smelled the ocean in the air last night, and there was little chance a city of this size wouldn’t have a port. And the Maarin went everywhere.
“That’s quite the tale.” He leaned back in his chair. “But you have a set of problems. One, the Maarin don’t take passengers—”
“They’ll take me.”
He huffed out an amused breath. “Two, since the invasion and the deimos began fouling the skies, the Maarin have been bypassing