“He told me there was a rich girl who came to their camp. Hangdog himself had spoken of it to her only once. When Fie had been old enough, Pa had told her what had happened to Hangdog’s first band. Two moons since he’d died on the steps of a Peacock mansion. Two moons since he’d tried to run from being a Crow. Another chief found him, brought him to my pa. “Heard the last band didn’t make it out of here. “Been about five years since Crows passed through the lands of Governor Sakar, aye?” The parchment let out a particularly belligerent crackle. “You didn’t answer me.”įie lifted The Thousand Conquests and began rolling it up. “Rich ones always go for the fancy sword,” Fie mused. Her finger shook as she pointed to the Hawk sword.

Instead, Fie asked, “Do you know why the Covenant picked you?” Wretch would tell her not to play with her food. Pa would tell her to stop dragging it out. Yet only one of them would leave this room alive. Aye, she despised this soft, clean girl, and not merely because the girl despised her.

I suppose you’re right.”Ī tiny, cold scrap of guilt knotted in Fie’s gut. Instead, Niemi closed her eyes and raised a hand to the Sinner’s Brand rash on her face.

“Reckon that’s where the scholar Sharivi and I would disagree.”įie expected the Peacock girl to sneer at her, to lash back. “Funny thing is, were I to think on which of us two the Covenant favors right now-” Fie tapped her cheek. She crouched on the dirt floor, setting her swords between her and the Peacock. Most of Sabor believed dead sinners were reborn into the Crow caste so as to atone for whatever crimes had brought the plague down on them to begin with. With all that, Fie didn’t doubt the life of a Crow sounded like a punishment to a highborn Peacock. And as the only caste immune to the Sinner’s Plague, their trade was cutting throats and collecting bodies. Their witches could only steal the Birthrights from bones of the other castes, and only as long as a lingering trace of its former life lasted in that bone. The dead gods, though, had denied the Crows a Birthright of their own. Some were even believed to be dead gods reborn into the castes they’d founded, like the Crane witches, who could pull the truth out of a liar, or a Sparrow witch, who could utterly vanish from sight. Every other caste was born with a Birthright, an innate gift passed down from the dead gods, like a Crane’s way of spotting lies or a Sparrow’s way of slipping from unwanted attention. The Covenant made you as a punishment.”įie had heard it before she supposed that to most of Sabor, it seemed clear-cut. “It’s the truth,” the sinner girl hissed. Scholar Sharivi seems to think the Peacocks piss ambrosia, though, so I see the appeal for you.” “Out of a thousand? So far the only Crows have been dirty, thieving half- wits. The Peacock girl snapped the scroll up, scowling.

The faithless hawk