“What’s happened?” she asked.

“There’s something I feel I have to do,” he said.

“We’d help.”

“I believe you would try. But …”

“But?”

He shifted to look her in the eyes. Her arm slid away from him. Her eyes were as dark as her hair, and large enough to make her seem younger than she was. He could see her now as she had been that first night, seven years before in the free city of Maccia, dancing in the public square for coin. She’d hardly been a girl then, feral and hungry and distrustful of anything masculine. Talent and ambition had burned off her like heat from a fire. Opal had warned him that the girl would be trouble and agreed that the price would be justified. Now Cary was a woman full-grown. He wondered if this was what it would feel like to have a daughter.

“I am afraid I wouldn’t be able to do what was called for if I was also protecting all of you,” he said. “You are the family I’ve made. If I can imagine you safe and content, I think I can sacrifice whatever else is needed.”

“You’re expecting a high price, it sounds like,” she said.

“I am.”

Cary sighed, and the wry smile that haunted her lips in times of trouble came to her. Remember this, he told himself. Remember the way her lips twist and her eyebrow rises. Keep it close. Pay attention.

“Well, piss,” she said.

“For what it carries, I am truly sorry to go.”

“Do you have anybody in mind to take the roles?” she asked.

He could see the pain in her. He was betraying her, abandoning them all, and she would no more blame him for it than cut off her toes. He wished he could take her hand in his, but she’d chosen the tone for their conversation, and he didn’t have the right to overrule her. Not any longer.

“There’s a group that makes the northern circuit. Paldrin Leh and Sebast Berrin. Three years ago, they had two fighting for the same roles. Find them, and you might get someone who already knows the lines. Paldrin’s a Haaverkin, but that might add a touch of the exotic if you take him south.”