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He realized she was crying, and that it was the second time she’d cried since Ava had joined the column. Someone was truly trying to rip his life to shreds. Poison everything important to him.

This time, though, he pulled her into his arms instead of walking out.

“We’ll sort this out. Come. I’ll go with you to find the cup.” Because he remembered how Ava had to jerk the fabric out of Karl’s grasp just an hour ago. The wine merchant hadn’t wanted to let go of the source of his ensnarement.

He draped an arm over Massi’s shoulder and they walked back together.

Chapter 25

Ava hesitated near the general’s tent.

She could hear a low, serious conversation coming from within, and from the way the two guards at the entrance were leaning slightly inward, they were listening in.

That was dangerous.

Especially with the confirmation that there were two Grimwaldians spying for the Speaker within the column.

She had thought there were two people chasing her. Now she knew for sure.

She wanted to talk to the general, and she didn’t want to wait. She knew her fear of revealing anything about herself would gnaw at her if she left it.

Best get this done.

Suddenly, Raun-Tu, and then the other three lieutenants, stepped from the tent, talking quietly among themselves.

Ava kept to the shadows, out of the light thrown by the lanterns set on poles outside the general’s tent, and waited for them to go their own way before she approached.

“I’ve come to report to the general.” She knew Catja, one of the guards.

Catja nodded, but put up a hand to tell her to wait, and disappeared inside. She appeared almost immediately. “Go in.”

“Thanks.” They shared a smile, and Ava felt the warm glow she often did in the Venyatu column. She had found camaraderie here. Something she never thought she would have.

“Your mission was successful?” The general had shed her jacket, and pulled her hair out of its high tail, so it fell in loose, black and gray waves around her shoulders.

Ava nodded. “We were able to return the scrolls with the wine merchant none the wiser.”

“Good.” The general tilted her head. “But that is not why you are here.”

“No.” She clasped her hands in front of her. “I only just understood tonight that you knew my grandmother.”

“I told you before I’d met her.”

“Yes.” Ava looked up. “But am I correct that you . . .” She could not bring her tongue to move, or her throat to issue the words.

“That I knew she could work magic?” The general’s voice was whisper soft. “Yes.”

Ava breathed out. Breathed in. “That’s what I thought.”

“She made me something. I commissioned it.” The general stepped behind the curtain that separated her sleeping quarters from the rest of the tent and Ava heard the creak of a wooden chest lid being opened.

General Ru stepped back with a jacket in her hands.

It was dark green silk, heavy brocade by the look of it. And along the bottom edge, in a thick border, and up the center and collar, was the work of her grandmother’s hand.

Black silk.

That’s what her grandmother had always used for her working. And her mother. Everyone except her.