At nightfall in a crowded city plaza, with candles glowing in every window, a stocky dark-haired woman in green carries a woven bag holding a glass bowl with one pink-and-blue fish. — Chapter 1, Quinnasweela changeday: Leah Frothen, five years gone, crosses the Plaza of Women with the reifarjin she has just bought on impulse, the gaslight dark and candles burning in every window.

Elemental Blessings · Book IV · 2016

Unquiet Land

Leah Frothen comes home from five years of spying in Malinqua to a daughter who does not know her, and the regent hands her a shop to run.

Unquiet Land is the torz book: the fourth Elemental Blessings novel, published by Ace in November 2016 and presented then as the last, until Whispering Wood came seven years later. Its heroine is Leah Frothen, Taro’s niece, the spy readers met in the opening pages of Jeweled Fire, who comes home after five years in Malinqua to the five-year-old daughter she left behind: Mally, the decoy princess of Royal Airs, who does not know her. Darien hands her a shop to run as cover, a delegation from the Karkades gives her someone to watch, and Chandran, the Coziquela merchant she worked for in Malinqua’s Great Market, follows her home.

For most of its length it is the quietest book in the series, told in close third person on Leah: shopkeeping, mothering, a slow and doubting romance shadowed by a confession, and a string of maimed and murdered poor people in the city’s slums. Reviewers agree the action is packed into the last few chapters, where the three threads meet on a hillside and the title earns itself. Shinn has said Leah was the easiest to write, because her arc was clear from the beginning, and that she wanted to give her a chance at a happy ending.

This page spoils everything, including the ending.

Part 1

Changeday and the Regent’s Bargain

“It was Quinnasweela changeday, and the whole world was on fire.”

Chialto has turned off its new gaslight for the autumn holiday and set candles in every window, and Leah Frothen, newly home after five years in Malinqua, strolls the Plaza of Women at nightfall. In a rickety booth under blue fabric, three slim, dark brothers sell reifarjin, triangle-shaped biting fish bred in Cozique. One, streaked raspberry fading into cobalt, watches her mistrustfully, and on impulse she pays a quint-gold for it. Leah is torz, and there could hardly be a more coru purchase than a fish.

Carrying the bowl, she kneels before one of the three blind sisters who trade in secrets on a dais at the centre of the plaza, and pays two silvers for the story of the decoy princess. Darien Serlast wanted a stand-in for Princess Odelia, the seer says, and Taro Frothen, the torz prime, found a little girl who looked remarkably like her. Odelia proved unfit to rule, so the primes chose Darien as king; Mally still lives on Taro’s estate. No parents have claimed her, so they are either dead, the seer says, “Or they are careless and irresponsible people who have no business raising a child.” Leah, Mally’s mother, has no answer.

On firstday she sets the fishbowl in the kierten of her one-room flat, the empty entry every Welchin home keeps bare, and starts her third letter in three days to Chandran, the Coziquela merchant she worked beside for barely a quintile and misses more than she expected. Then two soldiers in the regent’s black livery take her up to the golden-stone palace beside the great waterfall.

Darien notes that she is thinner and has cut and coloured her hair, and asks after Corene, now in Cozique. His tall, bald spymaster interrupts with news of another victim, a woman found where the vagrants camp on the Marisi; Darien goes coldly furious and will not explain. His real business is the Karkades, a small possession of Cozique whose factions want independence and are sending a delegation to Welce. He wants Leah to open a crown-funded shop of foreign goods to draw in visitors and suppliers, and the lure is Mally: Virrie, Taro’s wife, will bring her to Chialto for a quintile. Leah needles him about Rhan Ardelay, Nelson’s youngest son and Mally’s father, then says yes: “I think it sounds like fun.”

Under a sagging blue awning lit by torches, a woman bends close to a glass bowl where a pink-and-blue fish stares back at her, while three slim young men watch from behind rows of bowls. — **IV · 1 The Fish That Looks Back** In a rickety booth three slim, dark brothers sell reifarjin, biting fish bred in Cozique. Maybe one in fifty, a brother shrugs, comes blended like this one, raspberry fading into cobalt, and it watches Leah mistrustfully through the glass. On impulse she pays a quint-gold for it. A fish is about the most coru purchase there is, and Leah is torz to the bone; a pet she is not sure she can keep alive is the book’s first, quiet question about whether she can care for anything.

Inside a ring of torches on a wooden dais, a kneeling woman with a fishbowl beside her listens to a heavy, blank-eyed seer. — **IV · 2 Two Silvers for a Secret** With the bowl beside her, Leah kneels before one of the three blind sisters who trade in secrets at the heart of the plaza, and pays two silvers for the story of the decoy princess. Taro found a child who looked remarkably like Odelia, the seer says, and no parents have ever claimed her. So they are either dead, she says, “Or they are careless and irresponsible people who have no business raising a child.” Leah, who knows whose child Mally is, says nothing.

In a bare one-room flat, a woman writes at a table under a window while a glass bowl with a pink-and-blue fish sits alone in the empty space inside the door. — **IV · 3 A Letter to Malinqua** On firstday Leah sets the fishbowl in the kierten of her one-room flat, the empty space inside the door that every Welchin home keeps bare, and feeds the fish scraps. Then she starts another letter to Chandran, her third in three days. She worked beside the Coziquela merchant for barely a quintile in Malinqua’s Great Market, and she misses him more than she expected to. The knock at the door is two soldiers in the regent’s black livery.

A small horseless carriage climbs a winding road toward a sprawling golden-stone palace beside a great waterfall above a river city. — **IV · 4 Up the Winding Road** The regent would like to see her, the soldiers say pleasantly, and now would be a good time. Elaymotives have multiplied in the five years she has been away, gas-powered and grander than she remembers, and a small one carries her up the winding road to the palace of golden stone halfway up a low mountain. Beside it the great waterfall pours from the mountaintop into a lake by the courtyard and becomes the Marisi, which runs along the city’s eastern edge to the sea.

In a sunny palace office above a lake, a man in black studies a stocky woman across a table while a tall bald man waits in the doorway. — **IV · 5 The Regent’s Bargain** Darien notes that she is thinner and has cut and coloured her hair, takes her report on Corene, and is interrupted by his tall, bald spymaster with word of another victim, a woman found on the Marisi banks where the vagrants camp. Darien goes coldly furious and explains nothing. What he offers instead is a crown-funded shop of foreign goods to draw in a coming Karkan delegation, and Mally in the city for a quintile. Leah needles him about Rhan, then accepts.

Part 2

The Shop of the World

Zoe Lalindar, the coru prime and Darien’s wife, finds Leah premises, Zoe’s friend Annova helps furnish them, and Leah writes to Chandran for advice. Darien invites her to lunch, and his other guests are Taro, Virrie and Mally, a small, solemn, dark-haired five-year-old who greets her with a bow. Leah, who would like to sink to the floor, bows back to the same depth and does not say who she is.

Zoe’s trader friends sell her striped fur gloves, spices that smell of citrus and cocoa and blown-glass goblets fused to etched silver, and Yori, a stocky sweela soldier who becomes Leah’s semi-secret guard, drives her to the harbor to buy from ship captains. Leah lays the shop out by element.

Then Rhan turns up at her flat, still handsome, roguish and always on the verge of laughter, and they stare at each other for a full minute. Over cheap wine he apologizes for how he behaved when she told him she was pregnant, and she would never keep Mally from her father. It is the start of a tentative peace.

Virrie brings Mally to the shop every day while it is set up. In the window embrasure Mally fits stones into a careful mosaic and explains that she is not supposed to be Odelia any more, or to call Queen Romelle “Mama.” The shop opens to a hundred customers by noon, an instant success, and Mally comes as a customer, digging coins out of her tunic pockets for a carved flower of glassy red stone from the torz section. When Leah says she can simply have anything she wants, Virrie shakes her head: “Mally likes to have boundaries.” A choice should cost her something; it makes the world make sense.

At the open door of a bare little flat, a handsome red-haired man in dark clothes and a stocky barefoot woman stare at each other, a fishbowl on a stand beside her. — **IV · 6 A Full Minute** A knock at her flat, and it is not Darien’s messenger but Rhan Ardelay, Nelson’s youngest son and Mally’s father: still handsome, roguish and always on the verge of laughter, his dark red hair tamed but still curling, his dark clothes well cut and expensive. He and Leah look at each other for a full minute. Over cheap wine he apologizes for how he behaved when she told him she was pregnant, and the two of them begin to work toward a tentative peace.

Three women laugh and unpack crates of glass and cloth in a half-finished shop with tall windows. — **IV · 7 Crates and Straw** With Zoe Lalindar, the coru prime and Darien’s wife, Zoe’s friend Annova, and advice from Chandran by letter, Leah gets the shop open in record time. The crown pays for it; Zoe, Darien promised, would have ideas for doing it fast. Annova, who met Zoe on the Marisi in *Troubled Waters* and stayed with her, will work in the shop. For Leah it is cover, livelihood and a front-row seat on whoever comes through the door.

A busy shop full of foreign goods arranged in five coloured sections, a woman behind the counter holding out a jar of wrapped sweets to a customer. — **IV · 8 The Shop of the World** The shop opens to a hundred customers by noon, an instant success, financially and politically. It sells gloves of grey-and-black striped fur, spices that smell of citrus and cocoa, blown-glass goblets fused to etched silver, and keitzees, caramel-like candies with small hard cores of poison, which Chandran taught Leah to eat as a game. Everything is grouped by element. Darien built it to draw foreign visitors through its door, and before long both the Karkans and the Soechins come through it.

A solemn little dark-haired girl sets coins and a small red stone flower on a shop counter while a motherly woman stands behind her and the shopkeeper leans down, smiling. — **IV · 9 Mally at the Counter** Virrie, Taro’s sociable wife, has been bringing Mally to the shop every day, and Leah is getting to know her daughter without saying who she is. Now Mally comes as a customer, a small, solemn, dark-haired five-year-old digging coins out of her tunic pockets for a carved flower of glassy red stone from the torz section. When Leah says the child can simply have anything she wants, Virrie shakes her head: “Mally likes to have boundaries.” A choice should cost her something; it makes the world make sense.

Part 3

Strangers in Chialto

The Karkans are already in the city, seeking allies for independence from Cozique. Leah first meets Seka Mardis, the crown prince’s attendant, at the palace: small, with frosty blond hair strung with glittering beads. Their code, Chandran writes, lets a great evil be erased by an equal generosity, even one done first. Seka, warm and a little disturbing, is as eager to befriend Leah as Leah, the spy, is to befriend her. The night before the shop opens, Leah spots Seka in Welchin clothes, glass beads still in her hair, changing Karkan coins at a money-changer’s booth, and follows her and a tall, painfully thin man in a hooded cloak into the southside slums, where the Karkans drag a terrified girl into an abandoned building. Leah hurls a bottle into the dark to stop them.

On opening night, after closing, a bearded man appears at the door: a prominent forehead, a generous nose, thickly bearded cheeks and chin. It is Chandran, on the run from Malinqua for his own reasons, and she can hardly breathe. Over keerza by candlelight he tells her what has shadowed him for fifteen years: he killed his wife, Dederra, a Karkan, before their divorce was final, and sailed for Malinqua. He goes to work in the shop, and Leah keeps him at arm’s length, unsure she can trust him near her daughter. They trade childhood stories but never mention the calamities that sent each of them, ten years apart, into exile.

Leah moves into Darien’s house with Virrie and Mally, and one evening, as Mally sits with her feet in the house’s indoor stream holding Leah’s hand and Rhan’s, Leah smiles at Rhan over Mally’s dark braids.

The victims keep turning up, dead and nearly dead people among the city’s poor. One evening Leah, Rafe and Yori find a young man outside the shop, cut in half a dozen places but alive; Josetta and Zoe tend him while Mally solemnly chafes his feet. Yori comes back trailed by two brawny guards in black, and Josetta urges Leah to be indignant, as Josetta says she always is. Leah comes to suspect the Karkans.

At night under gas lamps, a small woman with glittering beads in her pale hair steps away from a lit booth with one fist in her pocket, while another woman watches from the shadows. — **IV · 10 The Woman with Glass Beads** The Karkan party has come to Chialto, led by the crown prince of the Karkades with his attendant Seka Mardis, seeking an alliance to win independence from Cozique. Seka seems as eager to befriend Leah as Leah, the spy, is to befriend her. One night near the Plaza of Men, under the gas lamps, Leah spots her in Welchin clothes, glass beads still in her hair, changing Karkan coins for Welchin ones at a money-changer’s booth. Leah follows her, and the trail ends in the southside slums.

IV · 11 Chandran On the evening the shop opens, after closing, a bearded man appears at the door, and in the faint light of the street lamps Leah makes out a prominent forehead, a generous nose, thickly bearded cheeks and chin. She whispers his name and can hardly breathe. Chandran, who drugged her at their first meeting in Malinqua to test her and then gave her a job, is on the run for his own reasons. Next morning she tells Annova he will help in the shop.

At a candlelit table in a dark shop, a big bearded man sits with his face half hidden in his folded hands while a woman watches him warily from the far side. — **IV · 12 What Chandran Did** That first night, over keerza by candlelight in the closed shop, Chandran tells her what has shadowed him for fifteen years: he killed his wife. Dederra was Karkan; they were ill-suited, and he had filed to dissolve the marriage, but she died before the divorce was final, and he sailed for Malinqua. Leah keeps him at arm’s length while she weighs whether he can be trusted near her daughter, and readers still argue about how she judges him.

In a lamplit shop at evening, a stocky young woman walks in followed by two big guards in black, while a shopkeeper lifts a startled little girl and a tall blond woman folds her arms indignantly. — **IV · 13 Under Guard** The victims keep turning up. One evening Leah, Rafe and Yori find a young man outside the shop, cut in half a dozen places but alive, and carry him in; Josetta and Zoe tend him while Mally solemnly chafes his feet. Darien, Zoe warns, won’t want word getting out. Then Yori comes back trailed by two brawny guards in severe black uniforms, and Princess Josetta urges Leah to be indignant, as Josetta says she always is. Leah comes to suspect the Karkans.

Part 4

Soulmates

Seka turns up at closing one evening, tries the pipes in Leah’s stock, and announces that the two of them are soulmates. She invites Leah to a get-together at the prince’s rented house, and Leah goes with Yori. At a table set apart sits the crown prince of the Karkades, tall and thin, the man Leah followed into the slums. He holds out his palm in the Karkan greeting, and his skin is shockingly warm. He hints that Darien is weak, or has snatched the crown from Vernon’s true heir.

Chandran has finally met Mally, and on a quiet day the two of them sit in the shop window balancing stones into towers. Mally teaches Leah too: a flat stone that fits the one below, the same but the opposite. Leah’s tower falls over twice before it stands more than six stones tall.

Asked why he is so natural with Mally, Chandran speaks of a servants’ child in his house, a laughing girl about Mally’s age, who died. Yori thought the prince was drinking blood at his party, Leah says, and Chandran confirms it: in the Karkan court the fashion was to drink human blood, at first as a game. Leah understands at last. Dederra was one of those nobles with an insatiable taste for blood, and the servant’s daughter died to satisfy it.

In a lamplit shop at evening, a small woman with beaded pale hair lifts a tiny pearly pipe to her lips while another woman watches politely over a cup of tea, two cloaked men waiting outside the glass door. — **IV · 14 Soulmates** Seka turns up at closing one evening, leaving her two cloaked escorts outside, and while Leah heats the kettle for keerza she tries the pipes in Leah’s stock; the finest is a finger-length of mother-of-pearl that seems to glow in the dark. Then she announces that they are soulmates, bound to each other. Leah, a spy with a job to do, manages not to recoil. Seka invites her to a very select get-together at the house the Karkan prince has rented.

In the dim corner of a candlelit hall, a tall thin man at a table apart holds up his palm to a bowing woman while a smiling woman with pearls in her pale hair presents her. — **IV · 15 The Prince’s Warm Palm** Leah goes to the prince’s get-together with Yori: musicians, frenzied dancers, acrobats spinning on rings above a stage, incense meant to loosen inhibitions. Seka leads her alone to a table set apart in the farthest corner, where the crown prince of the Karkades sits, tall and thin, the man Leah followed into the slums. He holds out his palm in the Karkan greeting, and his skin is shockingly warm. He trusts she has enjoyed his rented roof; she has never seen anything like those dancers.

In a shop’s sunny window seat, a big bearded man and a small dark-haired girl balance flat stones into little towers, absorbed. — **IV · 16 The Two Builders** Chandran has finally met Mally, who wants to know whether he draws ghost coins; he doesn’t. On a quiet day at the shop the two of them sit in the window embrasure, talking in low voices, with stones on the floor between them, and Mally, who has arranged stones into patterns before, balances them one on top of another into fantastical towers. Leah watches, astonished at how skilfully she builds. Working side by side in the shop, Leah and Chandran grow closer.

A woman and a little girl kneel side by side building towers of flat stones, the woman’s tower toppling while the girl watches gravely. — **IV · 17 The Same but the Opposite** Mally teaches Leah to build a tower of stones: find a flat one that fits the one below, the same but the opposite. It is like fitting puzzle pieces, except that this puzzle goes up. Even with Mally’s help, Leah’s tower falls over twice before it stands more than six stones tall, and she is surprised how absorbing it is to judge size and weight and counterweight. The whole day goes by in receipts and rocks and a little girl.

Part 5

Two Parties

Leah lures the prince to the shop after hours with Karkan delicacies Chandran has ordered; Chandran, who cannot risk being recognized, keeps out of the way. The prince enters last, stooping at the low door, and lays his warm palm against hers, his face flushed and ruddy. Then a flustered helper tells Leah who is at the door: Zoe Lalindar, and she has brought the sweela prime. This is the scene Shinn calls her favourite. Zoe, who reads blood, hisses at the prince about Karkans who sip so much blood from a man that he dies; ten corpses have turned up since he came. In the scuffle Nelson, sounding not in the least drunk, tells Seka as politely as if he were offering her keerza, “I enflamed their brains.” She orders the guards to stand down, and they collapse as if freed from crippling vises. Zoe could tell something in the prince’s body didn’t belong: blood he had swallowed. That night Leah and Chandran become lovers.

Taro arrives, and a party is planned for the Frothens to meet Mally by her true name. Beforehand Taro snorts that Leah came home only because Nelson Ardelay went and fetched her, and Natalie quizzes her until Leah finds her exhausting. Then Mally turns in her lap, puts her arms around Leah’s neck and says she thinks Leah should stay. Leah, refusing to let the tears rise, whispers into her dark curls that she thinks so too.

At the party Rhan says something wise: to him connection is family; they are just not a household. Leah, laughing, accepts it. When the guests finally leave, she tells Mally she is her mother, and Mally accepts it at once: she belongs to Leah, she says.

In a candlelit shop, a tall black-haired woman in vivid blue confronts a hooded man while a big red-haired older man and the hostess look on. — **IV · 18 Zoe Reads His Blood** Leah invites the prince to the shop after hours, by candlelight; he enters last, stooping at the low door, and lays his warm palm against hers, his shadowed face flushed and ruddy. Then a flustered helper tells Leah who is at the door: Zoe Lalindar, and she has brought the sweela prime. Shinn’s own favourite scene follows. Zoe, who can read blood, hisses a question at the prince about Karkans who sip so much blood from a man that he dies: ten corpses have turned up since he came.

A cheerful red-haired older man speaks politely to a furious woman with beaded hair while three guards double over clutching their heads. — **IV · 19 Nelson Is Not Drunk** In the scuffle, Nelson, the sweela prime, who can sift any mind for the truth and the lie, turns out to sound not in the least drunk. He tells Seka, as politely as if he were offering her keerza, “I enflamed their brains.” She presses her lips together against her fury and orders the guards to stand down, and they collapse as if freed from crippling vises. The prince promises to restrain himself for the rest of his stay.

A little dark-haired girl in a woman’s lap throws her arms around the woman’s neck while a big brown-haired man laughs nearby. — **IV · 20 Stay** Taro snorts that Leah came home only because Nelson Ardelay went and fetched her, and Natalie quizzes her until Leah finds her exhausting. Then Mally turns in her lap, puts her arms around Leah’s neck and says she thinks Leah should stay. Leah draws her daughter closer, refusing to let the tears rise, and whispers into her dark curls that she thinks she should stay, too. No one has yet told Mally who Leah is.

At a crowded, lamplit family party hung with garlands of greenery, a red-haired man speaks seriously while a stocky dark-haired woman beside him bursts out laughing. — **IV · 21 Not a Household** At the Frothen family party, where Mally meets her relatives under her own name, Rhan says something wise: to him connection is family, and family is wider and more complicated than he used to realize; they are just not a household. Leah, laughing, accepts it. When the guests finally leave, she stops by Mally’s room, finds her still awake, and tells her she is her mother. Mally accepts it at once, without visible resentment; she belongs to Leah, she says.

Part 6

The Unquiet Land

Seka has told the prince of a little girl at Leah’s shop who calls herself Odelia, and believing her Vernon’s true heir, the Karkans take her to force the alliance: in the Plaza of Men three men beat Taro senseless and a fourth snatches Mally. Chandran offers the Karkans what they want more than Mally: himself, for the woman he killed was the prince’s sister. Leah wants both of them safe and cannot have both.

Darien’s people race to head the kidnappers off before they reach their ships, Chandran and Rhan among them. In their tent that night Chandran expects to be taken home to the prince’s remaining siblings; some drugs, Leah says at last, take a long time to work. Next day, among rocky red hills, Welchin soldiers aim over a barricade and Karkan guards deploy in a semicircle around their caravan, and from a vantage of red stone Leah watches a lone volunteer walk out to ask for a parley.

Chandran swallows the fatal dose, ready to be handed over, and at that minute, though neither knows the other’s plan, Seka slips out of the Karkan camp with Mally: she has realized the child is her soulmate’s daughter. Leah answers Seka’s signal across the hill. In the shadows of the setting sun a length of blue fabric is wrapped around a small, sturdy shape against a rock: Mally, blindfolded, hands tied. Leah runs to her, falling once, tears off the blindfold and pulls her close.

Then Seka grips her. They are soulmates, she insists, who would do anything for each other, and what she wants is for Leah to kill her. Leah says she cannot. Seka’s face becomes a study in grief and shock; with a howl she shoves Leah down the rocky slope and attacks her, and Yori kills her from behind. Karkan soldiers close in. Leah sits on the patchy soil with Mally in her arms, and the land answers: stones go skipping down the slope, the earth growls in temblor after temblor, and the soldiers scream and scatter. Mally, as one reviewer puts it, moves mountains, and so reveals herself as the torz prime’s heir.

Back in camp Leah learns that Chandran is poisoned. His sacrifice, he tells her, was a counterweight in the great balance of justice, one that inspired Seka’s. “The universe loves such symmetry.” By a small fire outside their tent Mally sits beside him and solemnly asks whether he wants to die. He did, he says, and now he does not, but no one can stop the poison. Mally thinks she can. Leah, afraid of what it might cost her daughter, wants to refuse, but Mally is already shaking her head.

Inside a small candlelit tent, a big bearded man with a plate of food speaks calmly while a woman hugging her knees stares at him in grief. — **IV · 22 The Exchange** Darien and his people race to head off the kidnappers before they reach their ships, Chandran and Rhan among them. Chandran has offered the Karkans what they want more than Mally: himself, for the woman he killed was the prince’s sister. In their tent that night, by one candle, he tells Leah he expects to be taken home to the prince’s remaining siblings. Some drugs, Leah says at last, take a long time to work.

From a high red rock above a dusty road, two women watch soldiers behind a barricade face a ring of foreign guards around a halted convoy, while one small soldier walks out between them. — **IV · 23 The Barricade** Next day, among rocky red hills, Welchin soldiers aim over a barricade and the Karkan guards deploy in a semicircle around their caravan. For a long, tense moment, no one moves. From a vantage of sun-warmed red stone, where Mally might see her, Leah watches a single soldier walk out toward the Karkan convoy to ask for a parley. A volunteer, Yori tells her; Darien doesn’t order anyone to take a risk like that.

At sunset on a rocky slope, a woman kneels and gathers a little girl wrapped in blue cloth into her arms beside a big rock while another woman with beaded hair leans over them anxiously. — **IV · 24 Blue Fabric at Sunset** At the same moment Chandran swallows a slow poison, though neither knows the other’s plan, Seka slips out of the Karkan camp with Mally: she has realized the child is her soulmate’s daughter. In the shadows of the setting sun a length of blue fabric is wrapped around a small, sturdy shape against a rock. Leah runs to her, falling once, tears off the blindfold and pulls Mally into her arms while Seka leans over them, urging haste.

On a rocky slope at sunset, a woman with beaded hair grips another woman’s arm, her face crumpling in grief and disbelief, while the other holds a small child by the hand. — **IV · 25 Grief and Shock** Then Seka grips her. They are soulmates, she insists; they would do anything for each other. What she wants is for Leah to kill her, and Leah says she cannot. Seka’s face becomes a study in grief and shock; with a howl she shoves Leah down the rocky slope and attacks her, and Yori kills her from behind. Seka Mardis, Mally will say later, wanted to die. Some readers see a double standard: Leah agonizes over Chandran’s killing, not over Yori’s.

On a shaking hillside at dusk, a woman sits clutching a small child while a young woman crouches beside them and loose stones bounce down the slope toward fleeing soldiers. — **IV · 26 The Unquiet Land** Karkan soldiers close in. Leah sits on the patchy soil with Mally in her arms, and the land answers: stones go skipping down the slope, the earth growls in temblor after temblor, and the soldiers scream and scatter. Mally, as one reviewer puts it, moves mountains, and so reveals what the series has kept hidden: the decoy princess is Taro’s heir, the next torz prime. It is the moment the whole quiet book has been building toward.

Beside a small campfire at night, a little girl sits holding a pale bearded man’s big hands while a woman beside her reaches out and a red-haired man watches from the shadows. — **IV · 27 By the Campfire** Poisoned and sure he is dying, Chandran tells Leah his sacrifice was a counterweight in the great balance of justice, one that inspired Seka’s. “The universe loves such symmetry.” She cannot accept it. By the small fire outside their tent, Mally sits beside him holding his big hands and asks solemnly whether he wants to die. He did, he says, and now he does not, but no one can stop the poison. Mally thinks she can, and Leah is afraid to let her try.

Part 7

Afterwards

Mally does it, and by morning Chandran is full of energy. Back in Chialto Mally breaks free of Leah’s hold and dashes across the room, and Taro, whom they had feared dead, swings her up over his head, laughing, and asks who taught her such tricks with poison; she just figured it out, she tells him, and it wasn’t very hard. Darien mentions that Chandran’s father is a cousin to the queen of Cozique; Chandran had told Leah only that his father was a merchant. She means to set up a household with him. Zoe, at one point, sums up the lesson:

“We can never predict who will love us or where we’ll feel love in return.”

On the last page, with friends laughing downstairs, Leah stretches out beside Mally at bedtime, and Mally wants her to stay. Darien is still not crowned. That waits for Whispering Wood, where Mally is named as Taro’s heir.

In a lamplit room a big, broad brown-haired man swings a laughing little dark-haired girl high over his head while a woman watches, smiling through tears, beside a bearded man. — **IV · 28 The Prime and His Heir** Mally does it, and by morning Chandran feels better than he has in years. Back in Chialto she breaks free of Leah’s hold and dashes across the room, and Taro, whom they had feared dead, swings her up over his head, laughing, and asks who taught her such tricks with poison. She just figured it out, she tells him, beaming; it wasn’t very hard. People converge on the prime and his heir, and the next torz prime turns out to be five years old.

In a small lamplit bedroom, a woman sits on the edge of the bed tucking a quilt around a drowsy little dark-haired girl, light spilling in from a busy landing. — **IV · 29 No Longer Alone** On the last page, with friends laughing downstairs, Leah tucks Mally into bed and stretches out beside her, their heads on a single pillow, and asks whether she should stay awhile. Mally wants her to stay; she likes having all the people in the house. That, Leah tells her, is because she is torz. On changeday a blind seer called Mally’s parents dead or careless; now Mally knows her mother, and Chandran is alive downstairs. Darien’s crowning waits for *Whispering Wood*.

The elements in this book

The leads. Leah is torz and knows it, practical and steady and, she fears, a little dull; Mally is torz, and by the end Taro’s heir; Rhan, like his father Nelson, is sweela. Chandran is foreign and has no element, but he draws blessings like anyone, and real ones: he tells Mally honor, travel, resolve, honesty, grace. Fan-wiki lists: Leah endurance, honor, time; Mally intelligence, loyalty, patience (PRH excerpt, Neumeier, TV Tropes, Google Books).
A coru pet for a torz woman. Leah has never had much affinity for water, and there could hardly be a more coru purchase than a fish. The reifarjin she is not sure she can keep alive starts in her kierten and moves to the shop, where a customer asks to buy it and Leah says it is hers (PRH excerpt, Google Books).
The primes read people by their elements. Taro can touch a stranger’s hand and know his identity, his genealogy and probably his health; Nelson sifts thoughts for the truth and the lie; the coru prime reads blood. At Leah’s get-together Zoe finds swallowed blood in the prince, and Nelson inflames the Karkan guards’ brains (PRH excerpt, Google Books).
Torz is earth and flesh, and Mally has both. She fits stones into mosaics and towers, makes the hillside shake until the Karkan soldiers flee, and stops a poison in a man’s body. Some reviewers call her power a deus ex machina, since Taro is still alive (The List!, Google Books).
The Karkan balance. Any great evil can be offset by an act of generosity of equal weight, even in advance. It is a dark mirror of Leah’s own atonement, and Chandran borrows its language for his sacrifice: a counterweight in the great balance of justice (TV Tropes, Goodreads quotes).
Season. Quinnasweela is the autumn quintile, and the book opens on its changeday; the other quintiles are named for the other elements (Shinn’s chapters 1–2).
Colours. The royal rosette is five-coloured, and Leah lays the shop out by element, putting the red and orange wool in the sweela section and the yellow and white in elay. The full canon set of element colours comes from Whispering Wood (Google Books).

Continuity notes

Leah Frothen comes home from five years of spying in Malinqua, opens the shop, moves into Darien’s house with Virrie and Mally, and ends as Mally’s acknowledged mother, planning a household with Chandran (PRH, Google Books).
Mally goes from former decoy princess to known heir of the torz prime. Whispering Wood’s cast list calls her Leah’s daughter and Taro’s heir.
Chandran follows Leah from Malinqua, offers himself for Mally, takes poison, and lives because Mally stops it. He killed his wife, the Karkan prince’s sister, fifteen years before (Goodreads quotes, Google Books).
Seka Mardis, the prince’s attendant, dies on the hillside, killed by Yori. The crown prince survives the landslide.
Taro is beaten senseless when Mally is taken and feared dead, but recovers.
Rhan Ardelay, Nelson’s youngest son and Mally’s father: not a household with Leah and Mally, but still family (Google Books).
Darien is still regent and still uncrowned at the end; he is crowned in the first chapter of Whispering Wood (Amazon reviews).
Returning faces: Zoe, the primes Nelson and Taro, Virrie, Josetta and her betrothed Rafe, Annova, Natalie, and Zoe’s trader friends Barlow and Jaker. Corene stays offstage in Cozique with the Coziquela queen’s daughter.
Yori, the sweela soldier who guards Leah, is back in the royal guard in Whispering Wood and leads Shinn’s Welce novella “Blessing in Disguise” in the collection Tropes (October 2026) (Shinn).

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