Chapter 16: Perenthia Reconstructs the Unburied Name

Two nights after the Bridge of Embers, the cold had settled into a different register — less the travelling cold of open country and more the particular cold of altitude, which has an intentional quality to it, as though the mountain is making a considered point. We had made camp in a shallow depression of volcanic rock, black and porous underfoot, and the fires burned low and orange against it with the slightly desperate air of fires that know they are working harder than usual.

I had been in my bedroll for perhaps twenty minutes, not sleeping — I had not slept with any particular conviction since the Thornwall — when I heard Perenthia's voice from across the camp, low but carrying in the way that voices at altitude sometimes do, finding purchase in thin air.

'Tobias.' A pause. 'Tobias. I require you.'