“I’d made an oath,” he said. “To myself. To protect her. And I failed.”

Laren’s shoulders slumped. His quiet anguish was worse than any display of grief or outrage. When she’d learned of the dangerous mutual attraction between Karigan and Zachary, she’d tried to quell it for the sake of the realm. She’d sent Karigan away on errands, kept them separated, but to no avail. And now there was this. She would never have wished to keep them separate in this manner.

“She is . . . was . . . a Green Rider,” Laren replied. “If you exerted your will to protect her from all harm, she would not have been able to perform her duty, follow her calling. That surely would have killed her just as readily as her stepping into Blackveil.”

“I know it,” he said, gaze downcast. “But still, I could have—”

“Stop!” He looked at her, startled by her sharpness. Lost. “There is nothing you could have done. She was the best one to send into Blackveil. I knew it, and you knew it. Yes, I question myself all the time, and the doubts flood in, late at night, in the back of my mind, but I come back to the same conclusion each time. Whenever I assign a Rider to an errand, I wonder if they’ll return, and sometimes they don’t. But if I allow my desire to protect them to get in the way of the realm’s business, nothing would get done. The realm would not move forward. My Riders—your Riders—do their work willingly because they believe in their country and their monarch. Karigan believed no less than any other.”

She reached into the inner pocket of her shortcoat and pulled out an envelope with “King Zachary” written across it in Karigan’s exacting hand. She had considered not bringing it to him, thinking it would only deepen his feelings for Karigan even in her death, and she did not want it to come between him and his new queen. But, while Laren might act for the good of the realm, she was also human.

“We’ve been cleaning out Karigan’s room so I can take her belongings to her father.” Laren remembered the few books, a blue gown that had once been quite gorgeous but was now in rough shape; hair ribbons and combs, slippers, a few oddments of jewelry. It might have seemed strange that there were not many personal items in a Rider’s room, but the nature of the messenger service required that they often be on the road and rarely home long enough to accumulate possessions. As for Karigan’s cat, Ghost Kitty, he’d taken to sleeping with Mara, but could still be found hanging about Karigan’s room much of the time.

“As we packed,” Laren continued, “we discovered some letters. It appears she knew there was a good chance she was not coming home. She left one for her father, which I’ll be taking to him, and one for the Riders, which I’ll be reading at the memorial tonight. And, she left one for you.”

She strode over to him, by the window, took his hand in hers and squeezed it, then pressed Karigan’s letter into it. She excused herself with a bow, but she didn’t think he noticed her departure. A final glance revealed him gazing out the window, the letter unread in his hand.

• • •

They were difficult, these gatherings, but as captain, Laren must remain strong for her Riders. They’d had too many of these memorial circles in the past year. Her footsteps rang hollow in the empty corridor she walked to the records room. She always came ahead of the others to collect her thoughts, to steel herself for the simple ceremony. Afterward was soon enough to give in to emotion. Afterward, when she was alone in her quarters with no one to serve as witness. It made it harder that they hadn’t even a body, no idea of precisely what befell Karigan, but it also made this ceremony all the more imperative. It provided the solid ground of ritual and leavetaking, allowed the Riders to acknowledge her passing and to comprehend for themselves the finality of her absence. In this way they could move on.

It was ironic, Laren thought, that it was Karigan for whom they’d be performing the ceremony, since it was Karigan who had brought it back to the Riders of the present from the time of the First Rider. There was a circularity about it that seemed appropriate.

Laren had not hurried, but she arrived at the records room all too soon and now saw that she would not have the chamber to herself to gather her thoughts. The glassworkers—hired to do the special cleaning of the stained glass dome—were still there, clambering about the scaffolding. A fretful Dakrias Brown came to her side.

“I’m sorry, Captain, I told them they needed to be out by now.”

“They appear to be packing up,” she replied, observing them placing tools in bags. A couple were already descending the scaffolding.

The Weapons Fastion, Ellen, and Willis arrived. They would assist with the ceremony by lighting the stained glass dome from behind. Sadly, the view of the glass would be obstructed by the crisscrossed network of scaffolding high above.

Then to Laren’s surprise, more Weapons filed in, Weapons who guarded the king and queen. And still more she recognized from the tombs, led by Brienne Quinn. Arms Master Drent actually brought up the rear, dressed not in his training gear, but in the black of a Weapon.

Fastion, noting Laren’s wonder, said, “Rider G’ladheon was our sister-at-arms, an honorary Weapon. Any of us who were not required elsewhere would of course be here.”

The Weapons made a ring around the room, a dark honor guard.

The chief glassman ambled up to Laren and Dakrias, a bucket in one hand and a bag of tools in the other.

“A good evening to you, Captain,” he said, bushy side whiskers wavering in air currents.