“Someone always leaves.”

That’s what Tovo has been saying to anyone who asks him why his great-nephew Kip Mdang isn’t at his side, isn’t fulfilling the tasks and obligations of the tanà, isn’t there to tend the fire, isn’t home.

“Someone always leaves,” Tovo reminds them. “Kip will return when it’s time.”

He wonders, though. He wonders if his errant grand-nephew was really as bright and as promising as they all thought he was. He wonders if Kip has forgotten the Lays, forgotten what it means to be an Islander, forgotten everything that Tovo taught him.

Of course, the simplest solution to Tovo’s doubts is to go and see for himself.

Someone always leaves, after all, even to the other side of the world.

This is a companion novella to The Hands of the Emperor and best read after it.