Hadrian concluded that he liked the nights even more than the days in Tur Del Fur. The sun was just a bit too bright, and the weather too hot, but at night amidst all the twinkling lights, the city took on a romantic atmosphere that the days lacked. At least, it seemed so to him as he and Millificent LeDeye walked up Berling’s Way. There was little traffic so they traveled side-by-side down the middle of the road that was built of flat interlocking stone. She walked beside him, placing one foot in front of the other causing her hips to sway side-to-side, which in turn made the gown swing. Hadrian didn’t want to stare, but at the same time he did.

“So tell me, Hadrian Blackwater, if that is your real name, what are your dreams? What are the goals for a man such as yourself?”

The two had reached tier four where traffic was less congested and the city quieter. In the dark and muffled hush, the world became a more intimate and personal place where delicate starlight made magical the ordinary byways.

“Can’t say I have any,” Hadrian replied.

“You have no dreams at all?”

He shook his head.

“Oh, that’s so sad. Everyone should have a dream to hope for and work on, otherwise why are any of us here?” Her speaking voice was similar to how she sang: sultry, enticing, playful. She whispered more than talked, just as she sashayed more than walked.

“So what are your dreams, Millificent LeDeye—if that is your real name.”

“It isn’t.” She spun and fixed him with a pair of wicked eyes, and an incorrigible grin. “That’s my stage name.”

“What is you’re real name, then?”

She looked him up and down, then turned and sashayed off once more. “No, no, I don’t think I will tell you. Don’t know if I can trust a man without dreams. There’s something disreputable about that, practically dishonest—if you’re not lying to me then you are to yourself.”

They reached Pebble Way where, if it were daylight, Hadrian could have seen the bright blue dome of the Turtle. With everyone at the Parrot, the house would be empty and remain so for at least another hour. He considered inviting her in, and wondered if she would agree.

“All right then, at least tell me your dream,” he said as they crossed Pebble Way and left the Turtle behind.

“I want to be the greatest performer who has ever lived. I want people to come from all over the world just to see me—to hear me sing.” She did a pirouette in the middle of the street, her arms and dress flying out gayly. “And I want to be rich enough to buy my own venue—not a lousy eat-and-listen place, but a real theater with velvet curtains, one designed so that the sound of my voice would carry even to the cheap seats. And I want my own band who play what I say, and how I say to play it. I suppose what I really want, Hadrian Blackwater, is liberty and freedom. Freedom to be whoever I want, and the liberty to change my mind if I so chose.”

Millificent was absolutely not a typical girl, but as it turned out Miss LeDeye wasn’t all that much older than a girl. She had seemed mature and worldly on stage, but up close he guessed she was no more than seventeen. The dress, the make-up, that voice, and the dark all conspired to hide the child behind sophisticated curtains. But when she moved those hips and rolled her shoulders, Hadrian conceded that no—Miss LeDeye was not a child.

“Are you and Andre…you know?”

“I don’t see how that is any of your business.” She scowled at him.

“So, that’s a yes?”

“I suppose he certainly thinks so.”

“But you don’t?”

“Andre sees me as a tool to achieve his goals, as such, he views me as property. It’s never occurred to him that I see him much the same. Not that I view him as property, but more a step on my staircase, an unpleasant puddle to wade through. I wasn’t always the glamorous lady you see before you.” She grabbed the sides of her gown with both hands and swished it. “This, dear sir, was all earned. You see, I’m not from here; I wonder sometimes if anyone truly is. The entire population of Tur Del Fur has been transplanted from afar, you know. Lunatics and stargazers all come hoping to be reborn as geniuses and visionaries. We’re all dreamers looking for acceptance among our kind in this magical place where—if you are devoted enough—fantasies come true.”

“Where are you from?”

She dipped her shoulders and peered at him as if he was up to something devious. “I suppose there’s no harm in telling you that. I was one of eight children living in a small disgusting flat above my father’s tailor shop in a frozen, dirty northern town called Eckford; that’s in the province of Asper, way up in the kingdom of Melengar.”

“Melengar, really?”

“You’ve heard of it? I know, it’s hard to believe anything good could come from there. And I would have suffered a miserable life as the wife of some ignorant dirt farmer or brutish tradesman. Then I’d have died becoming just one more wooden marker stuck in a field until that too would one day rot and take away all evidence I had ever lived. If anyone did remember me it would be as at that poor daydreaming girl with the lovely voice.”

“How’d you get here?”

“One of my father’s customers a Lord Daref put the bug in my ear.”

“He what? Did you say he put a bug in your ear?”

She laughed. “Yes. Never heard of that? I guess it means he gave me the idea in such as way that I couldn’t ignore it anymore than you can ignore a bug buzzing in your ear.”

“I—ah, yes suppose that’s true.”

“Anyway, while Lord Daref was getting measured or waiting for his new suit, I would complain about how cold it was and he would tell me tales of Tur Del Fur in the far south where it was always warm and there were palm trees and aqua waters, and where they had places where people sang and danced on a stage before an audience—and got paid for it! So, at the age of sixteen I ran away from home. I went to Roe—that’s a little harbor town, and stowed away on a south-bound ship called the Ellis Far. I realize now it was a little crazy. All I had was a note of introduction written by Lord Daref to a lady named Zira Osaria here in Tur Del Fur, that Lord Daref said could help me.”

“You made it all the way from Roe to Tur Del Fur hiding on a ship? That must have taken, what? Several days, at least. What did you do for food? What did you drink? How did you avoid being seen?”

“Actually I was discovered on the first day out! I was brought before the captain, who was inclined to drop me in Aquesta, until I showed him the note. I pretended that Lord Daref had hired me to be a maid at his winter home, but I lacked the funds to travel, and if I didn’t make it on time I would lose the job. Captain Callaghan showed pity and saw me safely to Tur Del Fur. Of course, the crew assumed I was sleeping with him. And to be honest, to get here I would have, but the captain was a strict and religious man, and kept his word. Then when I stepped off the Ellis Far onto the docks of Tur Del Fur on that glorious morning…” she closed her eyes and sighed, “I knew I had found paradise.” She opened her eyes and frowned. “I thought so, anyway. Turns out paradise is a bit of a fixer-upper. “

“What happened?”

“I found Zira Osaria well enough. She’s a small innkeeper, who let out rooms for cheap. I thought the note would grant me a free room, but that was the dreamer in me walking into the first imperfect wall of my fixer-upper paradise. I had to pay rent, but I had so little money and no means of getting more. But again the kindness of strangers stepped in. Zira helped me get a job as a scullery at a local danthum—the Hoot Owl—which was a terrible attempt to imitate the Blue Parrot. Employees had to wear hideous masks to make them look like owls, but only served to make it hard to see straight. I worked myself to death. My hands shriveled up and turned red, my feet blistered, my back ached. After only a few months I felt like I was an old woman who ought to be quick about picking out that wooden grave stick, just in case. And all the money went to rent. I was edging dangerously close to giving up my dream when one of the girls who worked the cabaret heard me singing in the kitchen. Her name was Vida Rider—well, that was her stage name. I never knew Vida’s real one. All performers I discovered have professional names. Then one day when an act didn’t show up the Master of Ceremonies—that’s the guy who hires the performers and organizes the show—was desperate. So, Vida told him to put me on. Vida gave me one of her crazy outfits, shoved me out, and told me to sing. I nearly died—no, actually I did die, sort of, because I was someone else afterward. You see, the crowd loved me, and when the Master of Ceremonies asked my name, and not knowing better, I told him my name was…”

Hadrian waited as she peered at him then shrugged.

“Millie Mulch. Yes, that was me. Millie Mulch of backwater, backwoods, backward, Eckford Gulch. Millie Mulch the poor tailor’s daughter with the big voice and matching dreams.” She waited a heartbeat or two for Hadrian to react. He didn’t, so she went on. “The poor man probably thought I was making it up to mess with him or something. But anyway, he just rolled his eyes and when he turned back to the audience he introduced me as Millificent LeDeye. No idea where he pulled that from. Some prostitute he frequents up on one of the high tiers, I suppose. Regardless, good old Millie Mulch the tailor’s daughter died on that stage at the Hoot Owl. She perished in the roar of applause that followed. I’ve been Millificent LeDeye ever since.”

A donkey drawn, open-air wagon whose facing bench seats hauled eight very drunk revelers clip-clopped slowly at them. The wagon riders were all swaying in unison, more or less, and singing the old northern folk song, Calide Portmore. Millie didn’t hesitate. She joined in; only she didn’t so much join as take command. Hadrian knew the song. He’d heard it since childhood and, had sang it himself, in taverns all over Avryn as it was a grand drinking song. Only that wasn’t how Millie sang it. She didn’t perform the piece as a rollicking ditty. Instead, she raised it up with sincerity, and heartfelt passion. Millie Mulch didn’t merely sing the words, she believed them. And through her everyone else did, too. She let lose on the impossibly high notes adding an emotional range to the lyrics and hung on to the words beyond what a single breath should allow. And just when it seemed she could rise no higher and would need to breathe, she pushed up another octave reaching a soaring, quavering beauty that staggered all that heard. The drunks went silent. The cart driver pulled his donkey to a halt. They all stopped to listen as Millie Mulch of Eckard took them all to another place and time, a land known as Paradise—a world of broken down dreams that a young girl had fixed up.

The Delur Estate was just as opulent as Royce expected, which was to say beyond anyone’s expectation. Cornelius owned what was, by far, the best property in Tur Del Fur, and very likely all of Delgos, and possibly in all the world. His home was off by itself on the southern side of the harbor where he had his own private docks that were nearly as large as the commercial ones. Tied up to his piers were a pair of massive pleasure ships as well as several smaller crafts. Pratt was truthful, but modest, when he stated the estate was on tier one. The sprawling villa was also on tier two and three. In truth the blond stone structure stretched out over a wide plateau and extended several stories up the facing cliff. Far from ostentatious, the Delur Estate was almost austere, even simple being comprised of sleek lines of unadorned horizontal buff colored stone that blended into the rock wall, but not so much as to disappear. Instead of forcing itself on the scenery, the architecture exemplified and promoted the landscape around it. In some ways, it completed it showing nature where it went wrong.

That said, this was true dwarven design. Unlike the humble rolkins the DeLur Estate exemplified the more familiar excesses of the diminutive race to build unnecessarily massive things. Passing through the three-story stone doors carved with stunning geometric patterns that suggested a mountain near the sea, Royce felt small. He also felt crowded as he was now flanked by eight escorts—four on each side. These were new acquaintances, and they were armed: two with swords, two with pikes, and two with crossbows. Pratt was out front leading the procession and guided them all up wide, shallow steps into a massive reception room with a near panoramic view of the city and the bay. Cornelius DeLur waited for him, sitting on what could only be described as a giant stone throne.

While never having met or seen Cornelius, Royce knew it was him. The man was huge, dwarfing even his son in his quest for physical size. Cosmos believed a man’s wealth and power was evident by his amassed bulk. A poor man doesn’t have the food to put on the weight, nor can the average despot, fearful of being assailed, allow himself to bloat. Only a truly wealthy and powerful individual has the luxury to wallow in their achievement. It was easy to see where Cosmos got the philosophy, and also that he would forever be playing catch-up to daddy.

Cornelius DeLur didn’t so much sit on the chair as puddled in it like the overloaded bladder of a sperm whale. Thigh-sized arms extended out to either side laying on wide rests. His head, a massively jowled pumpkin of a thing, appeared tiny in comparison to the rest of him, and he appeared as a man on a bed peering down over his massive stomach at Royce.

“Mr. Melborn, how kind of you to visit.” Cornelius sounded exactly like a talking kettle drum, deep, loud, but with a little tinny ring.

Royce took a moment to glance at his two perfect lines of accompanying escorts that displayed all the precision of soldiers despite being dressed in elegant, long, brass-buttoned coats, with fancy high collars—the side sabers notwithstanding.

“How could I refuse?”

“How indeed.” Cornelius smiled. “Tell me, are you enjoying my city?” He lifted a finger, as if that was all he was able to manage, to indicate the twinkling lights of the city across the bay.

“Yours?” Royce didn’t bother to look. “I thought you were just a humble banker.”

This made the big man chuckle. Royce expected to see his mounded belly jiggle, but it didn’t move. The man’s head barely stirred. Seeing him speak and laugh was nearly like watching a ventriloquist without a dummy.

“Yes, yes indeed I am. A simple coin collector who due to the size of my accumulated collection requires his own country to store it in.”

“I was also under the impression you weren’t alone in running this place. You have a couple others that share the burden. Isn’t that right?”

“You refer to Oscar and Ernesta. They are my right and left hands, certainly, but I am the head.”

“I see.” Royce said.

Cornelius lifted his finger again, and immediately a pair of servant girls—two of many who waited in the shadows of the massive chamber—brought forth a gold cup and a silver pitcher. The two were dressed identically in lavish robes of shimmering cloth with elaborate headdresses like tropical birds. One put the cup in the big man’s meaty hand, then the other poured, what appeared to be wine. Royce didn’t want to jump to conclusions; knowing Cornelius, and now seeing him up close, the scarlet liquid might just as well be the fresh squeezed blood of puppies or newborns. He had that sort of reputation.

“So, to what do I owe this honor?” Royce asked.

Cornelius managed to carry the cup to his mouth and drink. “Oh, come now, must you pretend innocences? I didn’t ask you here to play games.”

“That’s good. I’m not a fan of games, myself, but that doesn’t change the reality that I have no idea why I’m here. Now, I’m guessing it has something to do with a book—maybe the same one a certain courier was carrying. I have to assume you think I have it, which is why you searched my place last night.” Royce glanced at Pratt who lingered off to the side. “Sorry about the mishap.”

“Not to worry, not to worry. I’ll deal with the old freedom fighter in due time. He’s an annoying sliver that needs to be pulled anyway.”

“Well, in his defense,” Royce said as another peacock-dressed servant arrived with a tray of fruit. “You did trash his home, then show up the next night and pointed a bow at his guest. How would you feel if I ran through your cupboards?”

Cornelius lost his smile, and handed off the cup. “Enough of the prattle. You stole the book—my book—and I want it back.”

“What makes you think I took it?”

Cornelius frowned, and made a humph sound. Around the room all those present—the small army of servants as well as the small army—responded with expressions of dread.

“Let me rephrase,” Royce said. “Do you know for a fact that I took it?”

“Of course I do, my son was the one who hired you to pilfer it from the Hemley Estate.”

“The Hemley…Lady Martel’s book? Is that what we’re talking about?”

“What else?”

“I don’t know. Up until now I always figured there was more than one book in the world.”

“So you admit to having stolen it?”

“Not if you’re going to arrest me for it.” He looked at the fear on the eyes of the many witnesses. “Or plan some other more inappropriate entertainment. Besides I can tell you that Lady Martel’s book was delivered to the client.”

“To Lady Constance of Warric, yes I know. Cosmos hired her and she in-turn approached Albert Winslow with the job. You and the Diamond have some sort of territory truce going on. My son didn’t want to send his own agents, so he hired Riyria.”

“Then you ought to know we don’t have the book in question. Now, if it didn’t get back to Cosmos you might want to talk to Lady Constance. I hear she’s in town.”

“My son received the book just fine, had it for two years, kept it in his vault.”

Royce paused looking around him at the many faces. In such an assembly, he’d expect some glassy eyes even a few yawns—not there. Every last one watched the proceedings like cats with a dog in the room. The only question was who were they more concerned with? Regardless, Royce searched their expressions—not so much for sympathy exactly, but—acknowledgment that what the fat man just said was evidence of his insanity. “So, if you have the book, what’s all this about?”

“While in captivity, the merchandise got hot. The Church came sniffing. Since I don’t allow the Church in Delgos, Cosmos sent the book to me—he sent it two weeks ago.”

“We made a similar trip in two days.” Royce nodded. “So I’m guessing the courier never made it?”

“That’s correct, and now I find Riyria on my doorstep—a pair of accomplished thieves and the only other two who knew of the book’s existance. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. Now, if you have it, I want it. If you delivered the package to a client, I want the name and location so I can collect my belongings. Mind you, I understand you are a businessman, and so am I. This doesn’t need to get personal. It doesn’t have to become messy. All I want is the book.”

“Wish I had it, or knew where it was.”

The big man frowned again. He made another humph, this time one of the girls took a barely noticeable step back. Royce couldn’t imagine why. Cornelius might be the most power person in the room, but he wasn’t about to leap off his chair and attack anyone. Royce doubted he could stand, much less walk, and wondered if he slept in that chair or had a special detail of handlers who carried him from place to place like worker ants with their queen. Cornelius couldn’t have always been like this. He had a son after all, and there was no doubt Cosmos was a blood descendent as the two looked like bookends on the same shelf of massive missives. But the recoil did answer one question…the dog in the room wasn’t Royce.

“Look, we’re down here to do a job for Lord Byron. He works for you, so you can verify that easy enough. As for the diary, we haven’t seen it since we handed the thing over to Lady Constance, but…” Royce hesitated to say more. He was trying to make a believable case to a skeptical man.

Cornelius’s eyes narrowed. “But what?”

He won’t let me leave without something.

Royce made his own humph sound, which no one noticed. I’m defiantly not the big dog here. “There’s another interested party who knows about the book.”

This brightened the pumpkin face a bit. “Who?”

“I don’t know, exactly. I bumped into him up in Melengar, and by bumped I mean I stabbed him in the throat. Figured I killed him. Most people would I suppose, at least until he showed up again in Kruger. He was also asking about a book—seemed to think I had one. At the time, I had no idea what he was talking about. I found it a little disturbing since, as I said, I was fairly certain I’d killed him.”

“And what happened?”

“That’s the strange part. He said he wanted to hire me to bring him the diary.”

“And did you take the job? Is that—”

“No.”

“No?” Cornelius showed his disbelieving, disappointed, frown face again. “Why not?”

“Three reasons. First I was already working on a job. Second, I thought it risky to work for a guy so eager to hire me after I tried to kill him. And third, he didn’t have any money.”

“Did he expect you to work for free?”

“Oh, he was going to pay me. Promised to grant me eternal life.”

Cornelius stared at Royce shifting his comparatively tiny lips. They were normal, perhaps even big, but anything sensible looked way too small on that face.

The big man stared clearly perplexed, and Royce knew why. Despite both professing a distaste for playing games, they were engaged in a very high stakes one. Cornelius was a shrewd man experienced in dealing with dishonest characters, and he knew Royce to be deceitful. He also knew Royce would do or say whatever necessary to escape. Making up a story about a vague someone else was as old a ploy as a child saying I didn’t do it, it was some other kid. The problem sprouted from the bizarre nature of the story.

He’s not surprised that I made up a story, he’s baffled as to why I made up such an unbelievable one. He knows I’m not an idiot so there is only one reason why I might tell such a bizarre tale.

“I don’t suppose this persistent potential client gave a name?”

“Actually he did. And it might be a name you know.”

Again Cornelius’s eyes brightened, and Royce imagined he might have sat forward if such a thing were possible. “And what is that?”

“He called himself Falkirk De Roche.”

Albert and Constance were still on the floor lost in the crowd and the band had shifted to another rollicking tune, this one featuring the horns and drums as Gwen led Tim toward the casino. She had him by the hand and Tim was pulling back a bit. “I’ll never turn this into a hundred gold. Like I said, I’d have to win too many times. If you gave me fifty gold, I’d only need to win once.”

“I don’t have fifty gold, Tim.”

“But this won’t work.”

“It will if you do as I say. You came to me for help. I’m giving it.”

The casino was reached through a wide peaked archway made to look like a Calian palace, or perhaps more accurately what the local northerners thought a Calian palace looked like. To either side, short, fat-trunked, potted palms grew out of huge urns, and in-between them stood the guards like a pair of ancient giants in blue vests and loose pants.

“Men only,” the wall of muscle told them.

Gwen stopped and rolled her eyes. “Are you serious?”

“Do I look serious?” The one on the left glared down at her as if she were an unruly toddler.

In the sleeveless vest, the man’s folded arms displayed biceps bigger than her head. His face was misshapen and misaligned, one eye higher and bigger than the other, and his nose appeared flat and blunted as if having once been crushed. She imagined whatever cruel event mangled his nose also took out his front teeth causing him to speak deeper in his throat making his voice more cavernous. This was neither a happy nor pretty face, but a weapon of intimidation, a visage of violence being aimed at her.

Most people would have fled in terror, or at least backed away. Tim tried, but she held tight to his hand and refused either to let him go or budge from her spot. Tim’s only chance to save his wife was the two of them getting in the casino. Poor old Tim Blue would try, and without her, lose. Gwen had seen it all in Tim’s palm. The read had been short taking only a few seconds because Tim’s life was scheduled to conclude in only a few hours. She saw that too. The next morning Tim would watch as they sold Edie, manacling her wrists and ankles, and putting her on a ship. Then, as the slave trader set sail, consumed in grief and guilt, Tim would leap to his death from the coastal cliff. While quite the romantic ending for Tim, his wife would go on to suffer for the rest of her life.

Gwen couldn’t allow that, not if she could do something. The real question was, could she?

Her mother had the gift of foresight, a talent that passed from mother to daughter, and before Illia died, she had trained Gwen to read palms, but there were two ways to see a person’s life. The palm was the safe and easy method because it could be read like a book, but peering deeply into a person’s eyes, with intent to seek answers, also reveled the past, present, and future, but the viewer unlike the reader, had no control. They saw what they saw even if they didn’t want to. And looking into a person’s eyes she didn’t just learn events in a person’s life, she experienced them. Gwen knew there was a story within the eyes of the casino guard just as there was a story behind every face. The preview to this particular tale, however, advertised a tragedy, perhaps even a horror story, that she’d rather not experience.

And Gwen had no idea if it was worth the trauma.

While she had the gift, as far as she knew that was all she had. She could see the past, present, and future of a person—other than herself—but didn’t know if the future could be changed. If what she saw could be altered such that it didn’t happen, then wouldn’t that mean she couldn’t see the future at all? Everyone made guesses about what would happen if someone did or didn’t do something, and sometimes they were right and sometimes wrong. If what Gwen saw could also be undone so that sometimes what she saw didn’t happen, would her gift be any different? Would she have a gift at all, or just be a good guesser? Since her readings and vision always occurred, Gwen had believed she saw what would happen after all events played out—including attempts to alter the prophesy. As such, nothing could change the future as she saw it.

Except there was one possibility.

What if the actions of a seer are different from the actions of anyone else? What if my ability to know the future also grants me the power to change its course? And perhaps that is why I can’t see my own future.

The idea was both exciting and terrible. If it worked, the power she wielded would be incredible. Ideas of spending the rest of her life wandering the world reading palms and fixing fates ran into reality’s wall.

What would happen if I did something to alter destiny and that thing caused a million other unforeseen changes to occur? What if there is a balance that needs to be maintained between good and bad? There is so much awful in the world, but at least I know it isn’t my doing. But if I take hold of the wheel and pull providence off course, if I start upending the natural direction, then the next time a sparrow dies it might be my fault.

But is there such a thing as fate? Is there a ‘supposed to’, and aren’t I part of this world, too? Why do I have this gift if not to use it? If a man dams a river it’s an unnatural change that by hubris could have horrible and unseen consequences, but if a beaver does it, it’s fine. A flat-tailed rodent doesn’t act out of pride, so the big lake it makes isn’t a disaster, its what’s supposed to be—as natural as rain. So what am I? A conceited trespasser throwing the natural order into chaos, or a blameless beaver?

The grander philosophical question would need to wait for another day, first she had to prove it was possible, and this was as good a place as any to start. Guessing he wouldn’t let her read his palm, as the casino guard glared, Gwen took that opportunity to look into the man’s eyes.

When the visions came, she was surprised and disappointed in herself. Gwen of all people felt she should have known better than to judge a face by its scars. Afterward, it took a moment to recover. Deep dives into another’s personal life were as emotionally taxing as an all night fight with a loved one. Gwen took a breath and wiped the tears from her eyes. “Salen is alive,” she said softly, her voice almost drowned out by the horns and drums.

The casino guard unfolded his arms. They came apart like the bolt of a lock whose key had been turned. His face lost its hard edge and he gaped.

“You think she’s dead because they showed you a mangled body dressed in her clothes, only that wasn’t her. It was Habba. Salen will tell you what happened. I don’t know when, but can’t be too far in the future; your hair is still dark, and you look pretty much the same. Salen explains how scared she was when the men abducted her. How she cried and how she told her captors that they would be sorry when you found them. She calls you Baba but that’s not your name—it’s something she’s called you since she was very young. Later, Salen will explain what the men did to her and want to know why you never came, why you let it happen, and why you never tried to save her. No matter how many times you tell her, it isn’t enough. It will never be enough. She was going to marry Amster. They were going to leave the city and start a new life in Collier, but that never happened because they told you she was dead and you believed them.”

The other guard stared at Gwen then at Baba, looking frightened.

“How do you know this?” Baba asked.

“I’m Tenkin.” She pointed to the swirling tattoo on her shoulder. “And I know you know what that symbol means.”

He stared at the mark.

“I also know how your face got like that. I’m sorry.” Tears welled up again. She brushed them away. “The same people who told you your sister is dead are also the ones who told you women weren’t allowed in the casino. And I have to assume they really wouldn’t want a Tenkin seer to go into a place where money is won or lost by chance.”

Baba looked at his partner. As scary as that face had looked before, it was a true terror now. “Maybe she’s just a crazy woman. If so, someone might complain that we didn’t stop her. But if she wins it will prove she’s telling the truth. I’m going to let her in. What are you going to do, Amster?”

Amster smiled and nodded. “Welcome to the Blue Parrot Casino, miss.”