last time.
Reaching for my scissors, I attacked the remains of our enchanted carpet until it quivered with life.
Home. I was going home.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
It was a few hours before sunset when I arrived in Port Kamalan. The roads were empty; everyone was at home to celebrate the red sun, and not even the street peddlers were out selling their wares. I spied Calu’s father in his bakery, stirring flour, oil, sugar, and water as he did every afternoon, preparing the dough for tomorrow morning’s buns, but he didn’t see me. No one did.
Our shop was closed, but I knew Baba was absentminded and would have forgotten to lock the door. With my carpet rolled under my arm, I quietly pushed my way inside.
Nothing had changed—piles of linen shirts sat folded on the counter, cobwebs were slung across the corners, and Baba’s pan with charcoal rested against a low stool.
“Who’s there?” a voice rasped from far behind the counter—if I were to guess, from our little altar beside the kitchen. Baba shuffled slowly into the storefront.
Seeing my father made me choke with emotion. “Baba!”
He recognized my voice before my silhouette; then his eyes widened.
“Heavens, Maia!” His breath hitched. “You should have written that you were coming.”
“I can’t stay long,” I said, trying to remain in the shadows. My eyes were bloodshot from crying, and I didn’t want Baba to see.
Baba ushered me inside. “Did the emperor give you a holiday?”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t think he would, now that you’re the imperial tailor.” Baba held my shoulders. “My daughter, the emperor’s tailor. It’s been difficult keeping your secret, especially when I’m so proud of you.”
“You don’t need to anymore. The emperor has told everyone that I am a woman.”
“Truly?” Baba stood taller. “Then, praise Amana, he is as magnificent as they say.”
I pursed my lips instead of responding. The red sun hung lower in the sky, but its light poured in from the kitchen window, and I shielded my eyes from the glare. “Where is Keton?”
“Home in time for dinner?” came a voice behind me. “Thank the gods. Baba put me in charge of the cooking. But now that you’re back…”
“Keton,” I said softly. My hand slipped into my pocket with the walnut Edan had given me, and I held it as I watched Keton struggle forward, dragging himself along the wall. I rushed to help him, dipping under his shoulder and wrapping my arm around his waist so he could lean on me.
“Careful, Maia,” he scolded me, half teasing. “These bones are still healing. You’ll crush them with that grip of yours.”
The corners of my vision glistened, and my throat swelled. I let him go. “You can walk?”
“Hardly,” Keton replied, wearily leaning against the wall.
“You said you’d take a step for every day I was gone.”
“Maia,” said Baba sharply.
At my side, Keton hung his head. “I tried. I really tried, Maia.”
My heart sank, but I smiled so Keton couldn’t see the sadness in my eyes.
I rested my carpet against the wall and looked about the shop. It was neater than before, but only barely. I saw my letters strewn over the cutting table, their edges worn, and I briefly wondered if the sand caught between their folds had made it to Port Kamalan. I couldn’t bring myself to check.
On the kitchen table was a line of half-burnt candles and a pile of half-sewn silk. I stroked the silk; it was satiny and lustrous, the kind you could only buy from merchants on the Road.
“You’ve been sewing again,” I marveled, hearing Baba’s box of pins rattling in his pocket as he followed me. “Was the money I sent enough?”
“You sent us too much money,” Baba scolded me. “I had to give half of it away so our neighbors would stop asking where it came from and where you’d gone. They’re shrewd ones, those fishermen’s wives, but they’re no snitches…at least not after a hundred jens.”
“I was worried you wouldn’t have enough food,” I said, relieved.
“Be more worried about Keton’s sewing skills.”
“I’m getting better,” my brother protested.
“Yes, he can finally sew buttons now.”
Keton made a face. “What about you, Maia?” he said, studying me. “You look…different.”
I was wearing his old clothes—the ones I’d taken the night I’d decided to leave home. Yet I knew what he meant. I was different.
I’d battled ghosts and touched the stars. I’d climbed a mountain to the moon and conquered the fury of the sun. How could I be the same girl who used to sit in the