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putting her in here, she’s hated Father and Chaga for letting Mother do it, she hatesherself for being born as she is and disappointing them all. And now Schaffa knows just how weak and terrible she is.
    “Shh,” he says, standing and coming over to her. He kneels and takes her hands; she starts crying harder. But Schaffa squeezes her hands sharply, enough to hurt, and she starts and draws breath and blinks at him through the blur. “You mustn’t, little one. Your mother will return soon. Never cry where they can see you.”
    “Wh-what?”
    He looks so sad—for Damaya?—as he reaches up and cups her cheek. “It isn’t safe.”
    She has no idea what this means.
    Regardless, she stops. Once she’s wiped her cheeks, he thumbs away a tear that she’s missed, then nods after a quick inspection. “Your mother will probably be able to tell, but that should do for everyone else.”
    The barn door creaks and Mother is back, this time with Father in tow. Father’s jaw is tight, and he doesn’t look at Damaya even though he hasn’t seen her since Mother put her in the barn. Both of them focus on Schaffa, who stands and moves a little in front of Damaya, nodding thanks as he accepts the folded blanket and twine-wrapped parcel that Mother gives him.
    “We’ve watered your horse,” Father says, stiffly. “You want provender to carry?”
    “No need,” says Schaffa. “If we make good time, we should reach Brevard just after nightfall.”
    Father frowns. “A hard ride.”
    “Yes. But in Brevard, no one from this village will get the fine idea to come seek us out along the road, and make their farewells to Damaya in a ruder fashion.”
    It takes a moment for Damaya to understand, and then she realizes: People from Palela want to kill Damaya. But that’s wrong, isn’t it? They can’t really, can they? She thinks of all the people she knows. The teachers from creche. The other children. The old ladies at the roadhouse who used to be friends with Muh before she died.
    Father thinks this, too; she can see that in his face, and he frowns and opens his mouth to say what she’s thinking: They wouldn’t do something like that . But he stops before the words leave his mouth. He glances at Damaya, once and with his face full of anguish, before remembering to look away again.
    “Here you are,” Schaffa says to Damaya, holding out the blanket. It’s Muh’s. She stares at it, then looks at Mother, but Mother won’t look back.
    It isn’t safe to cry. Even when she pulls off Schaffa’s cloak and he wraps the blanket around her instead, familiar-fusty and scratchy and perfect, she keeps her face completely still. Schaffa’s eyes flick to hers; he nods, just a little, in approval. Then he takes her hand and leads her toward the barn door.
    Mother and Father follow, but they don’t say anything. Damaya doesn’t say anything. She does glance at the house once, catching a glimpse of someone through a gap in the curtains before the curtains flick shut. Chaga, her big brother, who taught her how to read and how to ride a donkey and how to skip rocks on a pond. He doesn’t even wave goodbye… but this is not because he hates her. She sees that, now.
    Schaffa lifts Damaya onto a horse bigger than any she’s ever seen, a big glossy bay with a long neck, and then Schaffa’s in the saddle behind her, tucking the blanket around her legs and shoes so she won’t chafe or get chilblains, and then they are away.
    “Don’t look back,” Schaffa advises. “It’s easier that way.” So she doesn’t. Later, she will realize he was right about this, too.
    Much later, though, she will wish that she had done it anyway.
    * * *
[obscured] the icewhite eyes, the ashblow hair, the filtering nose, the sharpened teeth, the salt-split tongue.
—Tablet Two, “The Incomplete Truth,” verse eight

3
    you’re on your way
    Y OU’RE STILL TRYING TO DECIDE who to be. The self you’ve been lately doesn’t make sense anymore; that woman died