Kneecaps, Mia thought. Just call them kneecaps. Her obsession with anatomy had become obnoxious even to herself.
Before Mia could ask what a piglum was, Nell raised a lemon coconut above her head and brought it down hard on the tree. The fruit cracked neatly into two halves.
“Flawless,” Nell said. “If I do say so myself.”
She pierced the coarse gray shell with her knife, then slid the blade until the skin peeled off in curling sheets. She carved thick yellow slabs and handed one to Pilar, one to Mia.
Mia bit down, expecting nothing.
She could taste it.
The flesh melted in her mouth, somehow both sweet and piquant, a sweet citrusy tang softening into a mellow, salty savor. Once again Mia found herself blinking back tears. She wanted to shout, sob, throw her arms around Nell, kiss her beautiful mouth.
She startled. Did she want to kiss Nell? Mia had been with a girl only once before, during the long months in White Lagoon when she’d ached so desperately to feel something. Here she was again, aching to feel something. The yearning caught her off guard, yet didn’t entirely surprise her. Yes, Mia had grown up in the river kingdom, where loving a woman was a crime punishable by death. But they were no longer in the river kingdom.
Would Nell want to be kissed?
“Too salty,” Pilar said, interrupting the moment. “Didn’t expect a fruit to taste like salt.” She cracked her knuckles. “Where to now? The magical mystical Shadowess?”
Nell bit into a hunk of lemon coconut, a contented smile spreading over her face.
“Yes, actually.”
“And where might she be lurking?”
“Where all magical mystical sorts lurk,” Nell said. “The House of Shadows.”
Mia had to laugh at her own naivete. Of course the Shadowess would be at the House of Shadows. How had she failed to put two and two together?
What she knew of the House was hearsay. Her father had spoken of it only twice, the first time when she was a child. She still remembered how his words stoked the flames of her curiosity.
“There’s a place called the House of Shadows,” he’d told Mia and Angelyne. “People from all four kingdoms go there to seek the truth.”
“So they’re scientists!” Mia said brightly.
“Scientists are not the only truth seekers, little rose.”
“Do they all find the same truth in the House?” Angie asked. “Or different ones?”
“Other people’s truths are not the same as ours,” their father replied gruffly, effectively ending the conversation. Little Mia did not fail to notice that he hadn’t quite answered the question.
The second time was years later, after Wynna was gone. Though Mia didn’t know it, her father had begun to think quite differently about magic and magicians. Freshly returned from a voyage to Pembuk, he spoke again of the House of Shadows. This time his whole tenor had changed. He told his daughters how he’d met pilgrims, philosophers, spiritual guides, alchemists, and experts in various fields, as well as people with no illustrious titles or professions. They congregated to converse and question, challenge and argue.
“But why argue?” Angie had asked. “What can they hope to gain?”
“Knowledge,” he’d said, and looked knowingly at Mia, whose cheeks flushed with pride. “The greatest gain of all.”
Now a shadow of doubt crept over the memory. Griffin Rose had not turned out to be the most reliable purveyor of information. Nell hadn’t been terribly forthright, either; this was the first time she’d mentioned anyplace other than “Pembuk” and “the first of the glass cities.”
“What’s in the House of Shadows?” Pilar asked aloud, jolting Mia back to her senses. They’d been hiking for hours, trudging through sinking sand, their progress so maddeningly slow she almost wished she were back on the water. Nell had said they would take a caravan to the first of the glass cities. The caravan had yet to materialize.
Pilar kept rubbing her arms, leaving Mia to surmise it was cold, though she couldn’t feel it. Above them, the night sky was stained a deep purple, draped with a canopy of stars.
“People,” Nell answered.
“Thanks, got that one on my own. How many people?”
“It’s constantly changing. There are always a few hundred, at least. Sometimes more like a thousand.”
“Sounds crowded.”
“The Shadowess would say true spaciousness happens in the mind.”
Pilar groaned.
“But who is the Shadowess?” Mia asked. She understood Pilar’s frustration; Nell had given them precious few details, only that the Shadowess could—and would—help them. Perhaps now that Nell had finally told them where, she would fill in the gaps as to whom.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Pilar groaned. “The Shadowess is their mighty leader.”
Mia felt a pang of sympathy. Pil was surely thinking of Zaga, her negligent, backstabbing, murderous mother . . . and the leader of the Dujia on Refúj.
“The Shadowess is a leader,” Nell agreed, “but she’s appointed to her position. The Manuba Committee selects a number of qualified candidates, votes among themselves, then appoints a Shadowess—or a Shadower—every seven years. The Shadowess can serve two terms, but no more than that. She oversees the work being done at the House, striving to unite all the guests and residents in a common purpose. It’s been this way for thousands of years, or quite possibly forever, considering Pembuk was the cradle of human civilization.”
Pilar swore. “Everyone knows the first humans were born in Fojo. Our volqanoes spat fire and formed the first islands.”
“And here I thought Glas Ddir held that particular honor,” Mia countered. “Seeing as how we invented the old language.”
Nell laughed. “Yes, every culture wants to believe it was the first. The four gods . . . the Four Great Goddesses . . . even Luumia’s Seven Souls. Our creation myths always tell us that the cradle is ours.”
Nelladine stopped, squinting up at the star-kissed sky.
“I’m not entirely sure what I believe, or who started what where. But I know in my soul there has to be something more than this.” She gestured skyward. “Someone put those stars up there, and it was no mistake.”
Mia longed for that kind of faith. She’d always relied on her own intellect and understanding. Knowledge was the greatest gain of all. How could she believe in something she couldn’t quantify or prove? And why would she want to?
“I stopped believing in the Great Goddesses when I was sixteen,” Pilar said. For once there was no vitriol in her voice. “I figured if the Duj existed, they either weren’t paying attention or weren’t the kind of goddesses anyone should believe in.”
Mia saw an opening. She nodded vigorously.
“Makes total sense. What you went through would make anyone lose their faith.”
Pilar shot her a dark look. “I don’t need your sympathy, Rose.”
Mia wanted to bang her own head against a tree until it split open like a lemon coconut. She was trying to offer her sister affirmation. Why in four hells couldn’t Pilar just accept it?
“You’ll find all sorts of people with all kinds of faiths at the House of Shadows,” Nell said. She’d started walking again. “That’s one of the things I always liked. That no matter where you came from or what you believed, you were accepted and welcomed, given a seat at the table.”