On the night before their anniversary, Aria and Kael walked the slope behind the castle, the way they had walked it a hundred times, past the graves of the warriors who had died to give them this peace.
They stopped at Maren's grave first the warrior, not the child and Aria laid a white flower against the stone, the way she did every year.
"She would have liked her namesake," Aria said. "The little one. They have the same refusal to be told no."
"She would have liked all of this," Kael said. "Everyone who died to get us here would have liked all of this. That is the only thing that makes their dying bearable. That it bought something this good."
They walked on, to the western edge where the slope dropped toward the sea, and stood together in the dark the way they had stood on a headlan
