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dream fragment out of my mind. I turned away from Del and
    dropped the towel, rooting around in my belongings for fresh dhoti and burnous. I was done with
    Skandic clothing. I was in the South again. Home.
    Where the dead woman was.
    Del held out a small leathern flask. "Liniment," she said. "One of the horse-breakers gave it to me.
    He said it would help."
    I tied the thongs on my dhoti. "I think the stud got the better end of the deal. I'm not sure he needs
    any help."
    "He didn't mean it for the stud."
    Ah. Trust a horse-breaker to know. And Delilah.
    Sighing, I surrendered pride and annoyance and limped to the bed. "Be gentle, bascha. The old man
    is sore."
    "It will be worse tomorrow."
    I closed my eyes as she began to work aromatic liquid into my shoulders. "Thank you for that helpful
    reminder."
    "There's a bota of aqivi in the supplies. For the road."
    My eyes flew open. "You packed aqivi?" "Only for medicinal purposes, of course." I smiled and let
    my eyes drift shut again. Del herself was the best medicine a man could know.
    She lifts an arm. Beckons. Demands my attention. When I give it, understanding, acceding to
    that demand, I see that the fragile bones of her hands have begun to fall away. A thumb and three
    fingers remain. The fourth, the smallest, is missing.
    The jaw opens then. A feathering of sand pours between dentition. Shadowed sockets beseech
    me.
    "Come home," she says.
    "I am home," I say. "I have come home."
    But it is not, apparently, what the woman wants. The hand ceases its gesture. The bones drop
    away, collapsing into fragments. Are scattered on the sand.
    "Take up the sword," her voice says, before the wind subborns it as well.
    I opened my eyes. Square-cut window invited moonlight. Illumination formed a tangible bar of light
    slicing diagonally across the bed. Del's hair glowed with the sheen of pearls. Her breathing was even,
    uninterrupted; though neither of us slept deeply in strange places, we had grown accustomed to one
    another's movements and departures.
    Were the dreams my heritage from Meteiera? Would I spend my life viewing the remains of a dead
    woman in my sleep? Was I doomed to hear her voice issuing nightly from a broken mouth?
    Or was there something I was to do, some task to undertake that I didn't yet understand?
    I was too restless, too disturbed to sleep. Carefully I peeled back the threadbare blanket, warding
    tender stumps from rough cloth, and slipped from the bed, trying not to permit the ropes to creak. Trying
    not to groan about the stiffness of my body. The liniment had helped, but time and movement were the
    only true cures.
    I halted three steps away from the bed, brought up short by a sense of— something. Something in
    the room. Something in the darkness. Something in the moonlight.
    Something in me?
    I lifted my face. Closed my eyes. Saliva ran into my mouth. Flesh prickled on my bones. Thumbs and
    six fingers splayed.
    Something was here. Begging for recognition.
    It sang in my body. The mantra of the mages.
    Discipline.
    Nihkolara, blue-headed mage of Meteiera—and apparent relative—had told me denying the magic
    was impossible. That to do so was to invite the madness, to commit self-murder.
    I had no inclination to do either.
    They had tried to steal my name, the priest-mages, and my knowledge of self, there atop the stony
    spires. Very nearly had succeeded. But something in me, something more insistent than burgeoning
    power, despite its insidious seduction, had given me the strength to throw off the infection. At least,
    enough that I retained my name, rediscovered knowledge of self.
    I am Sandtiger.
    I am sword-dancer.
    More than enough, for me. I needed nothing more.
    Even if I had it.
    Sweat filmed my body. Soreness remained, bruises had bloomed. But such petty things as
    discomfort are bearable when weighed against the greater needs of the world.
    Or the dictates of magic.
    I took up the new sword. In the midst of the moonlight, with eloquent