Within the swirling Mist (IC) > Biographies

The Silhouette of Sasha Sorokina

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Leezil:

Sasha laid on her back, watching the stars through a thin opening in her tent and listening to the sounds of the camp. The wind whipping through billowing tent cloth, the campfire’s steady crackle, Arkyl’s papers as he fussed. She felt strangely, rarely at peace.

You’re stupid, Sasha.

She closed her eyes and smiled, breathing in the cold night air.

Grandmother was right, Sasha hadn’t disputed it for a long time. It was one of the few immutable truths in her world. Yet...tonight the truth felt different. This time the words were not a whip she brought to her own back, they were not remembered in self-admonishment before sleep nor laughed out disguised as a joke. The words did not make her feel small.

Maybe there wasn't as much wrong as she thought there was. Tonight she felt as tall as the dunes, as vast as the stars Arkyl had shown her. She felt good, and without any feymilk or taggit or vodka. The world was brilliant and exciting again, and her friend had made her feel like the child who had felt wonder instead of fear. She wanted to be brave enough to give in to that excitement. Her head and heart were spinning in opposite directions, dizzying and terrifying and wonderful all at once.

Her heart ached for things it couldn’t have, here in the Mists and lost in Faerun.

Her mind swam from the brilliant world Arkyl had shown her. The stars, the sea of numbers and formulas. Familiar, like the navigation charts and calculations back home. But leagues beyond anything she had imagined. Her fears and worries felt so small in comparison to it all. She had watched him tear a blade out of the fabric of the world, watched him make it stop spinning, watched him weave it into new patterns. He had let her witness all of it. More, he had made her a part of it. It excited her so much she couldn’t stop thinking of the possibilities, and there was no hope for sleep.

What if she could do that one day?

Should she?

Her magic had a will of its own, she’d thought. Maybe that was wrong. Maybe it was her will, stripped of all her little lies. Sasha and the magic had been at odds for so long, each pulling and tugging and pushing the other like quarrelling siblings.

She remembered what Kerdic had told her. You do not hope, because you judge yourself. Like there is something wrong in being you.

She was just fighting herself, wasn't she? What would happen if she stopped fighting?

Maybe you feel your smiles are a mask, I do not think so. I think they are you, and they are trapped. Cruelty built a cage around them, but they still get out.

She remembered his words when she had cradled the mist of the dead children. When she had wept over her own loss, so far away.

The Morninglord is mercy and compassion. But he is also fire, burning. That can be you.

Help her, Morninglord, but she had wanted that so badly. Still she had recoiled from her own fire. Her burning bed was still vivid in her mind, the shouts, the cane, the baths. Even as a grown woman she cowered at the memory. She did not want to hurt anyone, didn’t want to cross that invisible line that had been brutally drawn for her.

Arkyl had urged her to cross it. And when her courage had failed her and her words and spells had tumbled out of her mouth like dribbling vomit, he hadn’t been impatient or disgusted or annoyed. Her shame had given way to resolve. He had stood fast with her and offered her his hand, and together they had stepped over that line.

The days since had left her reeling. That spark that Rhen had lit threatened to burn out of control now, and she had done her best to tend the flames and keep them in check.

And to her surprise, she had succeeded. So far.

A cool breeze slipped under the tent and made her shiver. She felt compelled to pray, despite the night and its unfamiliar stars. Prayer still left her with a lingering feeling that she was a fraud, but somehow it felt right done at the wrong time.

Morninglord, whoever you are. If you’re there, if you’d listen to me. Help me walk in your sun, instead of in Her shadow.

Please.

She closed her eyes and listened to the strange sounds of the desert until dawn began to glow through the walls of the tent and she slipped into a rare peaceful sleep.

Leezil:
Faerun, some time ago

Sasha crept after him, thinking herself stealthy. She was not. When she followed him into his room and slipped the knife up against his back, her breathing as unsteady as a common junkie’s, he had long since heard her coming.

“Yes, hello, Larkka,” he said, sounding as much amused as puzzled.

The sound of his voice broke a little of her half-starved, paranoid imaginings. He wasn’t a man wearing Az’s face. What was wrong with her? This was Az! Dear, wonderful Az! She tossed the knife aside and wrapped her arms around him from behind, clasping him in the tightest embrace she could muster.

“I’ve missed you, Az,” she wept, her voice muffled in his collar. And she had, she really had. She never thought he’d actually meet her here. She’d been so sure it was a trick when she saw him. He looked older. More like a man. “I’m so sorry. I just got scared.”

He turned her around and rocked her gently, then lifted her face to look, horrified at what he saw. A half-starved, gaunt reflection of who she’d been in Phlan. “Larkka, what’s happened to you?” He stared at her. “Where’s Kerdic?”

She let it all out then, crying into his arms long into the night as she told him what she’d done.

—

When the tears were done they shared bread and kvass by the fireplace downstairs, in the rathskeller where the town came to drink away from the winds. It was cozy here, surrounded by the warm smell of food and the low chatter of patrons.

Azareil watched her tear into her bread and wolf it down, and then another, and then drink her stew so sloppily she could have passed for a barbarian. Dignity mattered little between the two: she knew what he was, and he knew her. He remembered when he had first dropped his fool’s smile and spoken to her of his bitterness and pain. They were different. He didn’t drink, even now he left the kvass for her. He kept his head cool more easily.

“So…” she pushed her meal away. “...what’s with the pig?” She felt sick from eating so fast. She looked at the strange little familiar, dressed up in clothing and cradled in his lap like a child. No wonder he’d turned down pork for the meal.

“I named her after you! Ha-ha!” He let out a mad little laugh, leaning down to offer her familiar a bite of sausage. Simon turned his nose up at it.

She laughed a little, not sure what to make of it, but something about her old friend left her deeply uncomfortable. She looked at him now for the first time since he’d arrived, really looked at him. He’d always had a touch of madness, the way he’d rambled to her through the late nights. It was always hard to tell with him, whether he was in one of those mad fits or merely playing the jester. She had a feeling it was the first.

So they talked again like they had so many times before. Late, late into the night until the rathskeller was emptying and the owners were politely shooing them out. She could stay in his room, he told her, even have the bed so long as Larkka--the familiar, not her--could stay too. She declined. He was a gentleman. She could stay as long as she liked, and he would feed her and nurse her back to health. They could go into business together, as partners. He trusted her. She trusted him.

Azareil fell asleep almost immediately, snoring in the bed alongside his pig, leaving her alone to her thoughts. Simon lurked on the windowsill, tail swishing.

He needed her, she told herself, and it was true. He had become sick in their time apart, and someone had to take care of him. Maybe she could keep an eye on him while he ran his business, keep him from trying any of his more explosive ideas. Convince him to hide the pig. They could make it work, she could build a life again. It wasn’t the life she wanted with Kerdic, but…

But was it worth giving up why she’d come running all this way? Why she’d sold everything she had and then some, why she’d pushed through hunger and discomfort and shame to come home?

Sasha sat up and walked to the mirror, for the first time in a month. Simon hopped away from the window to look with her, flicking a torn ear. Gods, but she looked terrible. Her bones were showing on her cheeks, her eyes looked huge on her face. She reached a trembling hand up to pull a hand over her hair, feel how thin it was. She’d scare the boy if he saw her now. She’d scared Azareil.

Do you really think you’ll find him?

Her thinned lips drew into a hard line.

Do you really think you’d make his life any better if you did?

The question had plagued her for nearly a year, from the moment she’d kissed her dog goodbye and slipped out of Kerdic’s life. She was not a woman of much faith, and even the stars that usually guided her had been silent. But it hadn’t mattered. Painful as it was, the faith that he needed her and that she needed him had compelled her as unerringly as wind compelled sail. She had known nothing but the certainty that she had to go home.

And now, finally, she doubted.

She slipped on traveling boots and the threadbare cloak that had seen her here. New clothes were promised to her, tomorrow, but she couldn’t wait. It was night and he was sleeping. She wanted to be outside, far from the town. Watch the stars and think. She scribbled out a note, counted the coin he’d given her and then scooped up Simon.

Out the room closing the door gently behind her, down the steps, and into the breezy street of Kront she went. The groaning and creaking of the town’s windmills drowned out any clumsy step she might have made. Children were still playing in the streets, chasing each other down steep alpine steps and laughing without fear. A boy ran past her trailing a colorful stolen streamer, nearly tripping over her as she set out down the road.

Her throat tightened. She paused to watch him laugh as he kept running, his friends waving to him, and then she turned away to continue on.

Sasha wasn’t quite sure where she was going. Maybe the lake: it wasn’t far at all, and she could walk back before dawn. Probably. She hailed a passing wagon--a nearly constant sight so close to the Golden Way.

“Which way are ye’ going, friend?” asked the man, leaning down to squint at her. He was Theskan, short and friendly-faced as any other.

She licked her lips, looking north down the road. “If you’re passing close to Lake Ashane, I would be grateful.” She wiggled two coins at him and smiled. “It’s not far, is it?”

With a snap of his reins they were off, rolling up and down hills until the smell of juniper told them the road had brought them close to the lake. He let her off with well-wishes and warnings not to swim in the lake under any circumstances. A nice enough man. He even scratched Simon’s ears goodbye.

Sasha turned, arms full of her cat, studying the mists rolling out of the alpine trees. She couldn’t see the lake through all the dark and foliage and mist, but the ground was more rock and sand than grass and she could smell the salt of the lake. She inhaled the cool misty air, grateful for the peace. It was quiet here. A perfect place to think.

She set Simon down beside her and they started walking.

Leezil:

Bathwater sloshed as Sasha sank into the steaming-hot tub. There was no time to waste. His smoke clung. Her flesh was saturated with the scent, she was sure of it. It was sticking to the walls, it was burning her nose and the hairs along her arm and crawling up her neck, it was twisting her guts into knots and leaving her nerves in tatters.

The half-orc had mistaken her fear. Surely.

Sasha wet the rough cloth and scoured her arm with all the manic fervor of a housewife scrubbing week-old grease from a pot. The smoke, the smell, nothing mattered more than removing it. Get it off, get it off! Now the other arm. Now the chest, the legs, now especially the stomach, now the neck and the face…she needed to be clean.

She broke down and sobbed into her raw hands as Sova hooted behind her and loosened the tie holding her braid together. An unspoken, temporary truce between the two, though Sasha still bore the healing cuts from the owl’s last attack. Her familiar’s inexplicable hatred for her had softened into something more recognizably like love as she’d come to know it. The bird’s beak preened her hair as she cried, retracing old remembered steps...

Sasha was seven but practically eight, just another month. "Almost a woman already", Mother cooed in her ear. Women mustn’t cry over these things. Beauty has a price.

She sniffed and rubbed tears off of her face. “I don’t feel beau-ti-ful,” she mumbled. Her lips and tongue were clumsy things, she was a poor speaker.

“Mh, well, maybe if you didn’t fight me so much while I did your hair, you would.”

She looked at her hands in her lap, feeling foolish as ever. It was really her fault. But did Mother have to be so rough with her hair? Her whole scalp was sore, and her skin still felt raw from the bath. Mother must have seen the guilt weighing down her heart. She knew that Sasha was hiding something, she must... Mother only paid attention to her when she had secrets. That’s why they were so worth collecting. But this secret felt was heavy on her heart. Holding it felt wrong…

“Sasha,” sung Mother sweetly.

She looked up, into the mirror, at the woman behind her. Pretty and perfect and all-knowing. Mother pressed her cheek against Sasha’s and smiled, leaving a kiss. She couldn’t meet her eyes.

“Sasha, do you have a secret today?”

Sasha’s throat felt full when she swallowed. She shook her head back and forth until the truth came spilling out like bile. “N-nieks told papa lies about you...”

A sprig of lavender fell into the tub with a soft little splash. No wallowing. Sasha reached for it and snapped her hand back just as quickly. “Tluin, Sova! Don’t bite! Damn bird…” No olive branch, and not much of a truce, but the sprig was welcome all the same. It would take a long soak to replace the scent of smoke with something more pleasant. She sank back in to the water to think of happier things...

Leezil:
No matter how fast Sasha ran, she was sure Visser manor would catch up with her. She could feel it looming over her as she dashed through thicket and brush, she was sure that cigar smoke oozed out its windows and breathed down her neck. An unexpected branch caught her and she betrayed herself with a startled scream, sure that it was angry hands reaching down to snatch her up and drag her all the way back into the tobacco-stained walls.

She clapped a hand over her mouth and rolled under a log, stifling her sobs. Were those uncle’s mutts she could hear barking, or was that her imagination? Keep going. She wiped her tears and looked ahead to the endless trees and mist. She had underestimated how vast it was. Sasha had looked longingly out at the Gray Forest countless nights from her bedroom window, pining for the light-studded spires of Telflamm and papa’s shadow puppet tales and even mother’s chilling warnings that hope was a poison. She wanted to go home and see them so badly it hurt, even moreso that they had not come to take her back after two whole years. She knew in her heart that their grand burglary plans must have gone wrong, but still, shouldn’t they have found a way…?

Push on, she told herself, feeling in the back of her mind that her uncle must be pursuing her. Getting lost in the woods seemed a better fate than being found. She hoisted up her makeshift bag with all she held dear, and raced on.

Sasha took off with such speed that she nearly barreled down the ravine as soon as she spotted it. She caught her balance against a jutting root and carefully made her way down, dainty manse slippers proving little protection against sharp rocks and thick undergrowth. Her feet hurt, and worse still she could feel the familiar squeeze of her lungs within her chest. Not an asma attack, not now, not now…

She fell more than stepped her way to the bottom, face meeting dirt and twig. Her fine dress caught on thicket as she squirmed to push herself up and failed, struggling and gasping for breath. She strained to reach her bag where her medicine was safely tucked away, but it was caught on a branch just out of reach. Her throat felt tight as if clenched by his invisible hand, she could barely breathe. She could hear the dogs barking, distantly, and weakly she called out. She hated him, but he wasn’t worth death…her eyes closed as she tried to focus on breathing.

A pair of boots stepped into her swimming vision, and a big wet dog nose sniffing over her. Her chest tightened. He’s found me, he’s found me, she thought, and the thought was bittersweet. She opened her eyes, expecting to see Han’s spectacles flashing down at her.

But no, it wasn’t Han. It was a woman! A stranger!

She croaked out a weak command, pointing to the sack. The big dog whined and licked her face. The ranger snatched it up and dug through it, finding the vial and opening it for her. Sasha’s hands shook so much she spilled the red powder everywhere, but managed to get a little onto her tongue. That invisible hand let go, slowly, and the whole world swam as air began to find its way back in. She turned and wretched and gasped, thankful to be alive.

“You...you alright, littel un?” asked the woman, scratching the ears of the dog who had licked Sasha’s face. A woman will help me, a woman would understand. Women can be trusted.

Sasha nodded weakly, letting the woman help her up. The woman’s eyes traveled up and down Sasha’s little figure, taking in the poncy dress and shredded slippers.

“You’re...the Visser’s girl, aren’t you? Ah, hell, you poor thing. How’d you end up out here?”

I’ve run away. Please help me get home. I don’t want to live with my uncle anymore.

She opened her mouth to speak. “I’ve--I-I-I’ve r...I-I…”

The ranger whistled low, sympathetically. “Ya, heard you had a real, real nasty stutter. Don’t worry, Hamhocks and I’ll get you back home.” Her voice was soft and kind, but her words were poison.

Distantly, other dogs barked. Hamhocks’ ears perked.

Sasha shook her head vehemently, pulling away as the woman reached out to her. Speak, idiot! Fight! Pathetic, vapid, why can’t you speak? Tears sprung to her eyes. What good does crying do? Vapid! She was paralyzed by herself, and the more she knew it the angrier she got at herself and the more paralyzed she became. This familiar battle needed to end differently today. She clenched her hands in her sodden dress and forced the words through her teeth, her jaw so tight it felt like it would splinter.

“Ran...away. Please. Don’t. Send m-me, send me back. To--to, to him.”

She exhaled with terrible relief as the words finally came, hard-won. She had done it. She had found someone kind who would help her. She was free.

The woman’s face changed slowly, slacked a little at her words. She nodded to herself and grabbed Sasha quickly by the arm, shouting up the ravine. “Oye! She’s down here!”

Sasha’s heart ran cold as ice. She felt strangely numb as the woman held on to her and waited for uncle and his servants to make their way down the ravine. She barely felt the big sweet dog licking her hand, comforting her, barely smelled the familiar cloying scent of tobacco that always seemed to cling to her. The world felt blurry and distant and hopeless. She barely looked at Uncle Han as he crouched down before her and embraced her then led her away, chattering about how worried he had been. The skeleton in his closet had escaped, she thought bitterly. Of course he was worried.

As they helped her into the Visser carriage and rolled away, she wondered if mother had been right all along.

--
Ten years later, Vicar Sasha Sorokina looked up at the carriage and marveled at the cruel irony.

Leezil:
Sasha hid and watched behind her father as light flooded through the open door. She had never met Uncle Han before and she was already afraid of going to a strange place with strange people, uncle or not. She wanted to slip on one of those fancy little masks the priests wore. Hide her face. Practice picking locks and getting back to her reading. And…

“There’s my favorite niece!”

What.

Uncle Han kneeled before her, grinning with his arms wide and hands outstretched. Full-moon spectacles covered his eyes, catching the light and flashing as white as his teeth. He looked very much like Mother, with gold hair and high cheekbones and pretty eyelashes behind his lenses. Sasha squirmed, shy.

“How can I be your favorite niece? We haven’t met before…” Just calling it as she saw it. Sasha felt Mother’s fingers slide onto her shoulder, gentle and reassuring. A pleasant little squeeze, and she felt herself relax.

Han laughed, a big laugh that crinkled his nose and left his spectacles just slightly out of place. “Is that so? Who did I bring this candy for then?”

...Candy?

Sasha watched, intrigued, as with a flourish he withdrew a fancy carved box and opened it to reveal a delightful array of boiled sweets. Oh! She reached for one without an ounce of hesitation, just as she did with all gifts.

The lid snapped shut. She drew her hand back sharply.

Her mother’s fingers tightened on Sasha's shoulder, just a little. Sasha struggled to understand why he had done that. That didn’t seem like a very kind thing for him to do. What had she done wrong? Was he mean?

“What do you say first?” teased Han.

Sasha looked up to Father for guidance.

Father's lips thinned into a scowl. “You confuse us for beggars. My girl takes what she wants.” He was always so dramatic, but Sasha felt relief at his words. He was her anchor; Han was wrong. Ownership is nine-tenths of what is right, and ownership is defined as possession. The world belongs to the quick, the smooth tongued, and the light-fingered. This was the word of Mask.

She looked up at Mother then, whose face always left her unsure. Where Father was the anchor, Mother was the wave rocking the ship.

Mother touched her cheek gently, but the fingers on Sasha's shoulders were tightening even more. Her voice was soft and cold. “When you are at Uncle Han’s home, you must remember to say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’,” she told Sasha.

“Oh.” Sasha paused. “Please. And thank you.” She heard Father grunt with displeasure.

Uncle Han's eyes met Sasha’s. She looked down, shy. He smiled and opened the box, and this time Sasha hesitated before she reached out and picked the licorice candy. “And like a key, your fine etiquette opens the lock. Take your pick. Only one.” His words caught her as she reached in for another.

It was a child’s dream. Perhaps she was his favorite niece after all. He seemed nice.

Father turned her aside and murmured in her ear as he squeezed her tight in a last hug. His voice was so quiet she had to strain: “You won’t be there long. I know this is sudden, but I promise it will be worth it. Try to play by their silly rules, yeah?”

She left home in a blur of luggage and tearful goodbyes, all of it so fast and unreal...at least the trip wouldn't last long. Father promised.

---
---
[Three years later]

Sasha sat perfectly still while the servant fussed over her gown and jewelry. Helga was new and clumsy; her finger brushed a hidden bruise and Sasha had to stifle a flinch. New and clumsy and much too friendly. Servants should be like thieves, quiet and unseen. Would that Sasha had the latter luxury.

“All done! Oh, look how pretty you are, Miss Visser,” fawned Helga, surveying her work in the mirror. Sasha leaned forward to study the stranger facing her: a prim and proper facade, with eyes older than the face. She reached up to check the tightness of the pearl headpiece; it could not be allowed to slip. Not tonight. Today she was fifteen and ready for her debut into polite society...and dreading the ball even more with every passing minute. She dreaded the thought of being matched to a husband, but how much worse could it be? She risked a glance past herself in the mirror, up towards Helga’s smiling reflection. She wanted so much to return the smile, to chat and giggle like two girls should. But Helga would get in trouble, and Sasha would get it worse.

Reinforce formality, she told herself. How was it her voice was so much stronger in her head, but fell apart like broken glass the moment she parted her lips? Let it be a shield.

“Y-y-y-you are…” she forced through her stutter. She closed her eyes and tried to force the words out, her gloved hands gripping the velvet of her skirts. She had to mouth the last part and trembled with the sheer effort of it: Excused. No amount of Madame Visser's discipline would fix her broken voice.

“Yes, Miss Visser,” whispered Helga, her voice ripe and soft with disappointment as she bowed and slipped away. Sasha watched her leave in the mirror and slumped in her seat, lonely.

...
“She’s...terribly shy, isn’t she?” remarked the Warsword captain, sipping his wine. He was appraising, and she knew why: he was rising in the ranks, and his son was only two years older than herself. He shouldn’t have bothered: the Vissers wanted only blue blood. Generation by generation the family had clawed its way up the social ladder, but in Impiltur it required matrimonial sacrifice to break through the class ceiling. That was where Sasha came in.

“Terribly,” muttered Uncle Han before pressing the familiar hand to Sasha’s back and steering her away from the distraction. He led her through the crowd of fine gowns and military uniforms, bodies with faces and eyes she worked hard to avoid. This was a ball, after all: there was work to do.

Tonight, Lord Stan Wolzych was the intended target and little would delay them. Sasha did her best to meet Uncle’s long strides without breaking into a run, but it was a difficult game. She glanced up at him as they walked. He caught her look and met it with a reassuring smile, his eyes as light and cheerful as ever. Her stomach churned.

“Don’t worry,” he whispered, leaning down to her, the scent of cigars on his breath.

The knot in her stomach tightened and twisted further.

They found him by the balcony, dressed all in blue silk with a yellow sash. Lord Wolzych was short but handsome for his age, clean cut and serious looking. His wife and son were statues at his side, just as clean and blue and short. Sasha thought back to what the governess had told her about the Wolzych family: old nobility, very old, land wealthy but coin poor. A classic match for a family like the nouveau riche Vissers.

Sasha swallowed as they approached the Wolzychs.

Glance away. Be endearing.

The first came naturally, the second took effort. Her eyes averted quickly as she approached and curtseyed.

Now the hard part. The mouth was a gate. The first step, open the mouth so the words can come out. Yes, there you go. A little further. Slowly, steadily, her lips parted. Each word had to be pushed out, one by one, forced by sheer will and muscle of neck and jaw and shoulder and hands clenched inside her sleeves.

Say it: It.

“It…”

Good. Is. IS! Quickly!

“...i-is…”

Come on. You practiced this. Idiot. Whore. Thief. Stupid, stupid, stupid little wretch...

A.

“ —a—”

No no, that sounded too much like “uh”. Too common! Her heart was hammering with panic and effort.

Pleasure.

“P-p-p-pleasure...to—pleasure—t-to meet—”

Uncle Han laughed and rested his hand on her shoulder. “It’s alright, Sasha. Forgive her, she’s quite delicate.” She leaned her shoulder away, clammy. Don’t touch me.

“Not...too delicate, I hope,” said the Lord Wolzych. Sasha didn't need to look, she could hear the frown in his voice, the disappointment. “When you said she was shy, I didn’t think you meant…”

Sasha wanted to scream with frustration. She could feel her face getting redder.. Couldn't he see he was damning her?

“Nothing wrong with shyness,” said a kind voice before her, to their left. She dared to glance up, her face still turned slightly aside and still. She’d ignored the man at first glance, for he was dressed in simpler clothing than the Wolzychs and seemed content not to be noticed. There was a sadness in his voice and in his eyes as he looked her over, but his smile reached those same eyes. “Hannah used to be shy as a mouse. Grew out of it beautifully, though, and…”

His voice broke and he touched a handkerchief to his eyes to wipe at a growing tear. He was a stranger to her, but the group treated his grief with respectful silence. How odd, since he was clearly neither rich nor noble...why, then, was he treated with this small deference?

“Forgive me,” he said with a dark chuckle as he tucked the handkerchief away. He extended a calloused hand to Uncle Han. Sasha watched with full attention for this stranger. “Alfonz Lanniry at your service.”

Uncle Han plastered on a big smile and shook vigorously. “A great pleasure, Alfonz, a great pleasure! You are...the former brother-in-law of my former brother-in-law, are you not? Whatever brings you to our humble home tonight?” Sasha's heart sank a little. He had been kind to her, but she could hear in Han's tone that the man was merely tolerated.

Alfonz had subtle dark circles under his eyes, but he was as clean cut as any of the others. Former former. Widower? He must have been married to one of the Wolzych daughters, Sasha guessed. Her eyes remained on the scene. She wouldn’t dare look away, it would reflect poorly on her suitability.

Alfonz smiled politely. From the way he spoke he ought to have been educated, but there was roughness to it. “I’ve done some navigation work for good Madame Visser's trading vessels in the past. It’s my intention to pay respects to her scion here, and perhaps pick up a recommendation for an apprentice while I am in town.” Realization clicked in Sasha's mind--this was the decorated 'sailor' grandmother was...fond of. No wonder he was being afforded so much patience. He turned his attention to Sasha for a moment. His smile reached his eyes. “Happy birthday, Miss Visser. Are you enjoying yourself so far?”

She curtseyed and nodded, unwilling to speak again unless forced to. Unable, too, most likely.

Uncle Han’s fingers found the place between her shoulders again, firmer than before. She chanced a glance up at him and saw that his frustration was growing.

“Sasha is having a lovely time,” murmured Uncle Han. “Lord Wolzych—”

Alfonz Lanniry’s voice brought her back to the present. “May I treat the lady to a small dance? It’s a good night to enjoy oneself. Selune is full, after all.”

Her ears perked at the mention of Selune, thrice-cursed bane of good Maskarrans like father...

Uncle Han surprised her by releasing the hand on her shoulder, though she could practically hear him grinding his teeth in her place. "Of course, Goodman."

She looked up at the stranger, wavering at suddenly standing on her own. She had learned not to trust in the kind faces of strangers, and every alarm bell should have been going off. Why wasn't it? She looked up at him as he offered his hand and smiled through the grief that was twisting his face. He looked too miserable to hide cruelty.

She just wanted to trust someone again. This night was ostensibly hers; couldn't she allow herself this one indulgence? She decided not to look over her shoulder, she already knew that Uncle Han was waiting for her to do so, waiting for the chance to scare her with a warning look. Let him wait, just once...

Sasha took his hand and let him lead her in a dance. They wound their way across the floor, past the tall windows where the night's stars twinkled enticingly. Her legs moved without thinking.

He nodded to the window with a sad smile. "My daughter, she had a favorite star. Do you know which it is, that is shining tonight?"

She shook her head. She didn't know anything about stars. Selune and her tears were something to be cursed, the eternal foe of their kind.

He stopped their dance abruptly and brought her to the window, pointing high to some special point in the mass of stars in the sky. She followed the line his finger made, puzzled.

"You can't see it there, I'm afraid. It takes a certain sort of spell. But there it is: Garden. If you were to follow the line of three stars towards that rooftop with the tower, and go a little east of the red star..."

Garden? she mouthed. She felt like a little girl under Father's wing again, watching him point out secret routes and shadow cities.

"Green and bright, like a sprouting tree on a spring day. It's a very special star, you know that? A good omen for you, the scholars in Chessenta might say it protects you." His voice softened. "It was Hannah's favorite star. My apprentice; my daughter...we sailed the Sea of Fallen Stars together, interpreting the stars to guide the sailors home..."

Sasha stepped forward and pressed her hands against the glass, knowing she'd be in trouble for it later. How silly and foolish, wasn't it? There had been no star watching her all the times she'd run away, only to be dragged back. Mother and Father were dead, surely. But it was a kind, enchanting thought, and she wanted to see it more than anything. For a painfully brief moment she wondered what it would be like to be free at sea under an endless sky, listening to those wondrous little points of life...she had not let her imagination run wild in a long time, not since the last time she had tried to run away. She had given up. And yet, maybe--

Uncle Han cleared his throat behind them, and Sasha turned to see Alfonz bid her farewell with a bow. She was in some vague way aware that Uncle Han was dragging her off to dance with the younger Lord Wolzych, but her mind was elsewhere, dreaming of freedom once again.

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