The closest Lundas had managed to transport Esmera and Tauram to the Finnaaz Estate was the forest rimming the property.

If it was any other day, Esmera would've delighted in the walk through the pointed, prickly pine trees and over the rocks and sand that crunched at her feet, reminding her how real this beautiful realm was. She would've admired the gentle blue sky following her and Tauram's progress and stopped to listen to all the secrets whispered by the flowers lining the winding dirt path if she wasn't so sure this scenic stroll would be the reason they were late for Lady Varali.

Jammas must have the same thought in mind because he flew ahead, pausing to look back at Esmera now and then, his impatient wings trying in vain to hurry her slow, human feet. Even Lundas slinked across the ground at a speed unlike his usual lazy pace, his coat shimmering as it caught the sunlight slipping between the trees.

Tauram kept up with Esmera, his hands jammed in his pockets. He had been quiet at breakfast and along the whole journey so far. He hadn't touched Esmera since they woke up in each other's arms, not to squeeze her shoulder, not to take her hand as she had grown so used to him doing.

It forced Esmera to wonder what she had done to make him angry. He had to be angry. She had never known him to be so silent, so distant, but she was afraid to ask. What if she didn't like the answer? What if she angered him even more, here in the middle of a forest where there was nobody to protect her, nobody to tell the court that things had happened how she claimed they had?

Tauram took a breath that seemed to silence the forest around them. "Esmera, I'm sorry about last night."

She gave him a sideways glance, but she shouldn't have taken her eye off the path because her foot caught on a rock. Jammas turned back, fluttering his alarm, but Tauram was there first, catching Esmera before she could tumble, but it wasn't the same. He wasn't the same.

His mouth tightened as he met her gaze. Lundas purred at their feet.

"You're right." Tauram glanced down at his familiar. He let Esmera go and looked away.

She studied him, the way his fists clenched at his side, the way his jaw tightened as he directed his gaze at the trees.

Tauram was angry. Just not at Esmera but at himself.

"Tauram–" she started, but he was already striding ahead.

"I don't know what came over me." His arms tensed at his sides. "When I asked you to stay with me last night, that wasn't what I meant to happen."

"Hey." Esmera took hold of his arm, forcing him to stop, but he still looked ahead, away from her. "Thank you for apologising, but I'm equally to blame. I could've asked you to stop at the start, but I let it go too far."

"But I'm the one who took it too far." Tauram shook his head. He turned back to look at Esmera. "I'm sorry. I usually have more self-control than that."

She squeezed her fingers between his. He surprised her by yielding and allowing her to do so.

"I understand. You were emotional. We do strange things when we're upset." Esmera would know.

Whenever she was upset about staying at home from work for yet another day, about the latest spatter of bruises she'd have to nurse through all their shades of transition, she'd order a twelve-pack of doughnuts from the bakery down the street. She'd take them to her bed and eat them faster than was healthy.

The sugar would make her drowsy. It would send her to such a numb, pleasant state that even when Stephan came home and yelled at her for wasting money that she had earned, it didn't hurt her, because she didn't feel it.

It was a bit different from Tauram's idea of comfort but similar enough for her to understand him.

"I wish you wouldn't be so nice about it, Esmera." Tauram gave a wistful smile before his face turned serious again. "I think it would be best for us to stay out of each other's bedrooms for a while. Just to be safe. We can't afford any distractions until we've completed Jilhari's mission."

Esmera tried to ignore the sinking of her heart. Did he mean a while, or did he mean forever?

She should've known he'd come to his senses and realise she wasn't worth the risk to their mission and certainly not his time, but she had selfishly and stupidly let herself get carried away.

His affections meant nothing. He had known Esmera for less than a week. The woman he really loved had hurt him in the worst way. Esmera had just happened to be nearby when he needed someone. That was all there was to this.

Esmera's words seemed to come out of the air around her rather than from herself. "If that's what you want."

"So, do you forgive me?" Tauram tried for his usual playful tone, but it fell flat.

Even so, Esmera couldn't resist a small smile. She never could when it came to this man, but she wouldn't tell him that. "Of course."

He squeezed her hands before releasing them. Her feet were rooted in the ground, anchoring her while she lost herself in his eyes. He brushed a stray curl away from her eyes as gently as if it was white paint he was smudging on a canvas to make a cloud. Their breaths filled the moment, and maybe words might've if Lundas didn't nip at their ankles to remind them that this wasn't the time or place.

"All right, we're coming!" Tauram lowered his hand. His eyes trailed after his familiar as the clouded leopard led the way, and then he and Esmera started after him.

With Jammas at their heads and Lundas at their feet, they broke through the trees to find themselves at the edge of a home as impressive as that of the palace, at least in Esmera's eyes.

Her breath caught. She didn't consciously remember the house she had been born in, but when she saw it, she knew what it was to her, to generations of her family. It was huge, with three floors, three wings merging into each other, and a rectangular roof bordered by half-circles engraved with flowers Esmera didn't recognise.

But when she looked closer, she could see that the front door was broken. The windows were shattered, letting the open mountain air chill a house that had once been warm with life, with hope, with laughter. Walls crumbled beside pillars that had long collapsed.

She only became aware of Tauram staring down at her when he cleared his throat.

"Are you ready for this?"

Avoiding his eyes, she swallowed and nodded.

The truth was, if this was the devastation visible on the outside of the house, what would Esmera see when she entered it? Cracked photo frames and battered portraits? Stains of her family's blood? Marks of their final fight?

She shuddered at the thought, but she couldn't let it get to her. She had to do this for Tauram, for Princess Kerani, for Milatanur.

Esmera had to explore the tragic past of the home she had been born in with Lady Varali, and she had to find the Finnaaz weapon, the demons inside be damned.

Tauram must've not believed that she was indeed ready because he remained beside her, his brow furrowing. She ignored the implicit question in his gaze and gave him no time to translate it into words, merely strode ahead, hearing him follow her with those almost silent feet that made his power of invisibility so effective.

Lundas accompanied them while Jammas took the lead as they crossed what must've been a majestic lawn once. Now, it was dry and overgrown and unkempt. Only one section of it was cleared with the thoroughness that befitted an aristocratic house.

Near the estate's boundary, a slab of rock rose out of the earth, inscribed with words Esmera couldn't read at this distance.

She squinted, but it was to no avail. She had learned how to use her enhanced hearing, but there was nothing she could do for her sight. She turned to Tauram. "What's that?"

He was silent for a moment as he followed her gaze. "Something you should see."

They changed course, veering away from the path leading to the manor's splintered door and instead towards the fence.

When they were close enough, Esmera realised it was a tombstone she was looking at. Goosebumps rose along her arms, goosebumps she warded off by clutching her shawl tighter to her.

She knew whose names were carved on the rocky surface even before she could read them.

She and Tauram stopped in front of the tombstone in perfect unison. Jammas perched upon it. Lundas reclined at the dot of it with a mournful purr. Even he had recognised what it was, what it meant.

It was so clean that the midday light glimmered off it, almost as if it had been polished just the day before. A bunch of wilted flowers lay at the foot of it, old but not old enough to have been left here when this tombstone was first erected.

It warmed Esmera's heart that someone still remembered the Finnaaz family, but she also wondered who they might be.

"Do I have any relatives left?" she asked Tauram.

"You are the last of the Finnaaz line." He tilted his head, studying the tombstone rather than Esmera. "But I think you still have family on your mother's side."

"I'd like to meet them." Esmera pulled at a tassel dangling from the corner of her shawl. "When this is over, of course."

Tauram's faint smile turned him from this quiet, solemn prince into the one Esmera knew, the one who had a grin for every occasion. "That can be arranged."

Their eyes locked, and again, it felt like something was missing from the moment. Esmera looked away first, before she got preoccupied with what it was. Tauram had said they should stay away from each other, and she would do so. Even when she wanted nothing more than to sink into him and ask him to tell her everything he remembered about the family she had never known.

Even this close to the tombstone, Esmera couldn't read it because it was written in Milatanuran. "What does that say?"

Tauram rested a hand on the rocky slab. "My western Milatanuran isn't very good, but I can try." He cleared his throat. "In memory of the last Finnaazes who died here: Lord Hudion, Lady Yandriya, the young lords Givan, Yasif, and Abi, and the little lady Esmera."

Esmera's eyes widened. To think that people had been so certain she was dead that they had written so on a tombstone.

If Esmera was still alive, was there a chance that any of the owners of the other inscribed names were as well? The only way to know for sure would be to walk through the memories of the house with Lady Varali.

She subdued the little flame of hope that caught alight within her. Hers was the only body that wasn't found at the scene of the massacre. It was unlikely that any of her brothers or even her parents survived.

Esmera couldn't read the words like Tauram could, but she leaned down and traced her fingers over them. They were all that remained of the family she would never know.

Jammas tossed his head and took flight, burying himself in Esmera's curls. She imagined he'd have twittered his support if he could, but even his silent company was more comfort than Esmera could describe. She stroked his head.

"What happened to them?" Esmera's voice was rough when she spoke.

Tears threatened to flood from her eyes. She kept her words to a minimum to contain them, but luckily Tauram caught her meaning without needing any elaboration.

"They were buried here following the laws and rituals of western Milatanur." Even Tauram's voice was husky with the heartbreak he hid as well as Esmera did.

She pressed a hand over her mouth to contain her sob. To think she was standing over their graves. To think they had been laid to rest in the earth where they had breathed their last, where they had been betrayed and slaughtered.

Few things could be so cruel.

"Oh, Esmera." Tauram folded her against his side. He pressed his lips to her hair, seemingly forgetting his own rule, and Esmera let him.

She leaned into him as her tears leaked into his collar. He didn't seem to notice or care as his arms tightened around her.

Even Lundas rumbled his condolences, rubbing himself against Esmera's legs.

The Finnaaz family had felt like a legend before, a story from a distant corner of a kingdom Esmera barely knew, but now they felt real, like irreplaceable, eternally lost pieces of her.

Someone cleared their throat behind Esmera and Tauram. They started as they turned but relaxed when they turned to see it was just Lady Varali, her long, black hair swept back and her tall, slender frame draped in a melon-pink material. Her falcon swooped down from above, landing on the grass at her feet in a flash of feathers as black as polish.

Esmera swiped at her damp eyes before she could notice it.

"Hello, Varali," said Tauram.

She raised her eyebrows slightly when she noticed Tauram's hand grasping Esmera's shoulder, but she said nothing except, "Hello Tauram, Esmera. Are you ready to start our journey?" The look she gave Esmera, gentle pity softening the familiar sternness of her features, made her wonder if Lady Varali had seen her tears after all.

"I am." Esmera steadied her voice as she pulled her hand back from the tombstone.

She would avenge her family just as her father's familiar had asked and as she had promised, just not right now.

"Come on, then."

Esmera accompanied Lady Varali, who led them to the door of the Finnaaz manor with Tauram and Lundas trailing after them.

"This is where we shall begin." Lady Varali gestured to the splintered doorway. This close-up, Esmera could see how weather-beaten the beige walls were, how decades of rain and wind were stripping away the paint.

She frowned. "Surely the Finnaaz weapon is somewhere deeper inside the house, somewhere it could be hidden."

Lady Varali fixed her sharp, dark eyes on Esmera and inclined her head. "You're right, but we need somewhere to start in order to hook ourselves into the memories of this house."

Esmera didn't really understand what that meant, but she nodded. She trusted Lady Varali as the expert, as an accomplished memory walker, as the woman who had taken over her family when none of her brothers remained to do it.

Lady Varali's black-feathered falcon walked through the doorway, her keen eyes focused on something Esmera couldn't see.

"Are you sure this is the best place for us to enter the past, Dhuni?"

In reply to Lady Varali's question, the falcon led out a short call.

Lady Varali withdrew a deep purple ribbon, seemingly out of nowhere. It fluttered between her fingers as she held it out to Esmera. "May I have your wrist?"

Esmera looked between Tauram where he stood behind her, and then back to Lady Varali. Even Jammas stirred amongst her curls. "Why?"

"This will allow us to remain bound even as we travel through the house's memories. I would hate to lose you. If we become disconnected, you would be stuck in the Realm of Remembrance, but you would be blind to it all. Only memory walkers have the gift of sight in our dimension."

Jammas's wing brushed against Esmera's forehead, a signal that Lady Varali was telling the truth. Esmera couldn't hold out her hand quickly enough. She had been close to deaf before. She couldn't imagine being blind.

With a faint smile of amusement that reminded Esmera of Belaren, Lady Varali tied their wrists together.

"Ready?" she asked, but before Esmera could reply, white light exploded in her eyes.

She opened them to find herself and Lady Varali outside an ornate wooden door. The windows were covered with glass, and the walls were intact.

Two guards flanked the door, wearing burgundy hats shaped like buckets and brown tunics. They didn't blink as Esmera and Lady Varali appeared in front of them. That was how she knew they had arrived at the door of the Finnaaz home almost 23 years ago.

With a start, she looked behind her. There was no sign of Tauram even though he had been standing behind her merely moments ago.