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from the ever-present windows. She did not see any crescent-shaped confections. “Are there rolada here?”
    The baker stared at her. “What?”
    “Rolada. A . . .” She winced, trying to think. What was the word for pastry in Old Fretian? “Bread? Hot oil . . . cooked in?”
    The woman’s brows came together in concentration and she repeated the words back to Katin. “Bread? Cooked in hot oil? What’d you call it?”
    “Rolada?”
    “Rolada.” She said the word again, as if she were chewing it. Then her eyes widened. “Oh! Rolada!”
    Katin blinked at her. What had she said, if not that? “Yes. Do you have them?”
    “Aye.” Hopping off her stool, the woman bent down to a lower shelf and pulled a tray out. Upon it were a dozen flat crescents of pastries, crusted with caramelized sugar. Peeks of color from the dried berries embedded in the dough made Katin’s mouth water. “Just came out of the oil. How many?”
    “Two, please.”
    The pastry cost less than the fruit, which said something about how the fruit was valued here. In a few moments, Katin had a handful of small coins in change for her single musan . The woman wrapped a sheet of waxed paper around the pastries and handed them to Lesid, who inhaled with a slow smile as he took them.
    Katin almost snatched hers from him. The paper was already warm from the pastry within. She broke one horn off and the crust made a soft crack as the sugar broke. A sweet and spicy steam curled out of the flaky interior. She sent up a silent prayer that it would taste right, then felt silly for asking the Sisters to intervene in something so trivial. It either would or it wouldn’t.
    The crust dissolved against the roof of her mouth, carrying rich butter and the tang of spice. It was almost right, but in the way that pastries are different when someone else’s grandmother makes them. The overall sensation was of comfort and home. Memories of being a little girl on her mother’s lap, eating a pastry as the shadow play showed the Sisters’ flight before the storm. A glowdisc behind a sheet had stood in for the light of Musa, but it had given her no preparation for the reality.
    Katin’s eyes watered with longing. Home. When had she started thinking of Marth as home? To be certain, she had been born there, but always, always she had been taught that it was not home. That their true home was across the ocean and that Marth was only a resting place until they could find their way back. There had to be more comfort here than a pastry. She just had to find it.
    “Gods. That’s good.” Lesid sighed beside her. “Can we get some more to take back to the ship?”
    Katin nodded and wiped her eyes. “Yes. That’s a good idea.”
    They meandered back to the ship, following a circuitous route that took them far from the university, just to be safe. The baker had wrapped up a bundle of the rolada in heavy brown paper. It had cooled as they walked, but Lesid said the sailors would just be happy to have something that wasn’t salted fish.
    His pace slowed as they walked down the dock to the ship, so Katin pulled ahead of him a bit. Lesid shifted the pastries to his left arm. “Hold on.”
    At the foot of the ramp of The Maiden’s Leap , the captain was speaking heatedly to a man who blocked his path. The man wore a blue armband like the official who had let them dock.
    More troubling though were the two enormous bodyguards with him. They were the Factors who had chased them from the university grounds. Katin backed up. They would return later, after the men had gone.
    “Katin!” The captain’s voice boomed down the dock. “Thank the gods you’re back. I can’t make a seabound dog of anything the fellow is saying.”
    Sisters take them. Katin gestured Lesid to leave before she stepped toward the captain. Maybe Lesid could slip away in the crowd. With a smile, she faced the ship again. “I’m happy to help.”
    One of the guards nudged the other. At the same