Music thrums and shadows dance around the fire. Strings of paper lanterns line the streets, which are crowded with people laughing and strolling. Vendors call out to passersby, waving food on sticks, colorful beaded necklaces, and small wooden toys. Children giggle, chasing each other while parents watch on with a smile and a happy gleam in their eye.

We three watch at a slight distance, our mouths either agape with awe or drooling with hunger for whatever is seasoning the air with a rich and meaty scent.

"What is this ruckus?" asks Cephias.

His voice has a touch of harshness in it, but his eyes are wide with wonder as a group of youths light a wheel fitted with small fireworks in a nearby field. They shout and clap as the rocket sets the wheel in motion and a circle of sparks colors the night.

"Must be a town festival," I say with a bounce. "I always loved going to town festivals. I didn't get to see much firsthand since I wasn't allowed in the crowd, but I usually got to watch from my carriage."

"They are chaotic," adds Bartholomew. "Which is good. Means no one will notice how much of a mess we are."

I look down at the wet hem of my skirt and I shiver as I recall how soaked my stockings are in my boots. The closer we got to the town, the less peat there was. Now it is all one stream, and we had to wade through water that was just below the knee to get to the raised land the village sits on.

"I could use a bath and bed," I mumble, though my heart yearns to see the goods spread across the many stalls.

"Hopefully, we can find one," says my knight with a sigh. "Inns may be full with the festival."

"Well, only one way to find out—let's head in!"

I don't think either is as excited as me—particularly not Cephias. Yet, they still follow up behind me as I navigate around the back of a few darkened stores before slipping into an alley that leads to the main street.

We emerge between two lively stalls. One sells cartons of nuts roasted in sugar and spices. The other has a game where players maneuver a wooden board to guide a marble through a maze and win prizes like colorful masks and festive crackers based on which hole they fall in.

"It's clear the buildings behind the stalls are all storefronts. We should head away from the bog and toward the heart of town. The inns can't be too far from—"

"Oh, look!" I say, stepping out of the alley and pointing to a vendor across the street. "That might be puffed rice! I wonder if they season it here like they do in Akarna. I could go from some right now..."

I place a hand on my growling stomach. Then, as if the gods sent me one of their heavenly soldiers to my immediate aid, the nearby vendor nudges my shoulder with a small carton of nuts in his hand.

"You look hungry, miss. Try some of our honey glazed barrel nuts!"

"I haven't had barrel nuts since I last came to Giatta!" I grab the little box of nuts from him, taking in a deep breath of sticky honey with a hint of spice. My mouth waters, and I almost walk off with them. However, Bartholomew is there to set me straight since my hunger has apparently sent me back to my privileged princess ways.

"How much, good sir?"

"Just the lady's smile, which has been paid in full." He flashes his own wide grin before getting a little sheepish and speaking in a lower voice. "No offense to you gentlemen and sweet lady, but you look like you could use a bit of neighborliness right now."

I blink at him for a few moments, trying to assess his meaning. I'd been wearing my sullied clothes for so long. It feels like a second skin and I forgot how stark our appearance is to others.

"That's kind of you, sir," I say with a curtsy that makes the old man chuckle with a blush. "We've had a difficult time of it. We will pay your generosity forward."

"That's all I ask, miss. Now you all enjoy the fair!"

He turns back to help the two other vendors at his stall, who have become overburdened in the short time we distracted him.

"Would either of you like a barrel nut?" I offer.

They each take a couple. Bartholomew, however, is quick to slip back into his role of soldier and protector.

"As I was saying, we should head deeper into town and locate an inn as soon as possible and..."

I don't hear the rest of his words. A couple of children run by with papier mâché masks covering their little faces. They are painted in swirls of color and embellished with shiny pebbles and dyed feathers.

"Taliyah."

"Yes?" I ask, turning back around as I pop another nut into my mouth.

Bartholomew groans, running a hand over his face, while my dragon watches me with a pleased smirk despite how the surrounding crowd must set him on edge.

"Okay," says the knight, drawing us closer to the food stall so I'm not distracted by any more colorful expressions of joy. "Taliyah, you've always been hard to manage when out in a market or fair. The entire guard lived in fear the week leading up to any planned excursions to such chaotic locales. In fact, we'd rather take you into hostile enemy territory over a town wide event any day."

"Well," I huff, plucking out a particularly sticky nut, "it's not my fault that those trips were a thousand times more entertaining than spending another day in my school room learning about the complexities of diplomacy and how to be a proper wife."

"I have a feeling you weren't good at your studies," adds Cephias with a lilt of pride in his voice. "At least not with your wifely lessons."

"She was superb at pretending to be quiet and meek in front of her tutors." Bartholomew sighs and my face pinches with disapproval.

After all, wasn't the whole point of the lessons to learn how to suppress my inner nature in favor of being a silent incubator for some boring lord's heir? Seems like I was excelling from my point of view.

"What I'm trying to say is," our knight continues, "that we'll get nowhere so long as every shiny thing distracts you. So, I'll go look for an inn and pray to the gods that somewhere there's a vacancy that doesn't cost more than our purse."

He pulls out the small satchel on his belt, the bag jingling, but not even halfway full.

"I'd earned a lot doing mercenary-type work as I traveled, but our restock in Hawthorn drained much of my coin."

"I still have some coin from the goods I sold from Vernon's Glade."

"I'll take a few pieces, but we also need food, so find a few things around here you can take back to our room without you eating all of it along the way."

I roll my eyes, but also smile at the very responsible knight.

"I promise not to eat everything. You both need more food than I do, anyway."

I try not to let my eyes linger too long on either of their impressive physiques.

"This isn't a contest," grumbles Cephias as he sniffs the air. I can't help but notice how his tongue licks his lips when he notices a stall with roasted turkey legs. "We all need to eat."

"And we all need to sleep."

"And bathe," I added. The only thing capable of diverting my attention from how badly I need a bath is the swirl of light, color, and energy around us.

We were all in agreement on all three points. So I hand over a few of my coins, before Bartholomew heads toward a couple of taller buildings in the distance.

After he's gone, I toss the now-empty carton into a nearby bin and take hold of Cephias's hand. He yelps when I tug him toward the stall with the turkey legs.

Once Cephias gets food in him, his entire stance relaxes, and I can easily move him from one stall to the next. We pick up a couple of jars of jam, and one vendor—who is actually peddling little wooden toys—sells us a loaf of bread. She's a baker by trade, but has been whittling wooden toys for fun since her now adult children were babes.

We chat with a man working a game stall alongside his wife, where players drop a wooden disk from the top of a big pegboard. When I ask if I can try for free if I don't take any prize, he is happy to give me a shot. Cephias—now finished with his turkey leg, which he discarded back by a stall where I wanted him to try on hats—watches me with a grin and cheers me on even though I'm certain this game is pure luck.

Of course, I land in the grand prize slot. Despite missing out on a large stuffed bear, Cephias still jumps with joy and gives me a hug when I come bouncing back to his side. The kind man running the game insists we at least take one of the smaller prizes.

He holds out a basket of stuffed animals no bigger than my palm. I delight in my selections, but my eyes go wide when I find one at the bottom.

"A dragon?" I ask, lifting a small orange toy that looks like a lizard with wings and horns sewn onto it. Still, there's no denying the intent behind the design.

"Yeah, they're popular here," he chuckles. "I figured you folks were probably tourists. We get a lot of you during Elmira's feast."

"Ah, Elmira! Thank makes sense. I do so love learning the patron gods of each town."

"How so?" asks Cephias.

It occurs to me I've never asked Cephias how the dragoniths express their faith in a higher power. I know I've heard him cry out to the gods before, but do they share the same pantheon we do?

"Oh," I answer, "Elmira is the goddess of wetlands. Few worship her since most settlements don't build on uncertain soil."

"Not us. We've always been a rebellious crew. Our ancestors, a couple of centuries ago, split from Northam. Our matriarch joined parliament purely to change laws surrounding our dealings with dragons."

I tense up and I can feel Cephias's muscles tightening beside me. However, the gentleman continues.

"She said her grandmother knew the dragons. Claimed she'd been sacrificed like that poor girl from Akarna. She said her grandmother did not fear the dragons because they were more like us than we'd ever know."

I look at Cephias from the corner of my eye and see his normally dark copper skin has drained of some color.

"Unfortunately," the kind man continues with a sigh, "that's all she really had to convince the other delegates. But she just wanted to investigate and discover more about them, nothing more. But they wouldn't bend. Well, the whole family up and moved when she got labeled a traitor to the crown."

"Oh, my!" My hand rises to my lips and my eyes grow wide.

"So they raced for the border and used the bog to slow down the soldiers chasing them. We praise Elmira for keeping our enemies at bay, and we still have remnants of her love for dragons around town. The kids really love these toy dragons. I've been making them to look like the dragon that started collecting tribute a couple decades back. I do wonder what happened to the dark yellow one, though..."

"Uh, thank you, sir," I say, pressing the toy dragon to my chest as I return the basket to him.

"Please, call me, Jaymes."

"Thank you, Jaymes," I say again with a bow of my head. "Could you possibly tell us if this is the last night of the feast?"

"Nope, we're only halfway through." A giant smile stretches over his face, emphasizing the happy wrinkles that mark the joy in his life. "Two more nights after this. On the last night, we'll be doing fireworks over the bog."

"Excellent, thank you. And, of course, thank you for the kindness of the little dragon. I already cherish it dearly."

He blushes at my sincere gratitude and then returns to help his wife with the game. As for me, I turn to Cephias, whose eyes don't seem to look at anything in particular.

"Cephias... Are you okay? Why don't we find Bartholomew? We have enough food for tonight and breakfast. Tomorrow, we can—"

"I can't believe it," he mumbles, shaking his head.

"Can't believe what?"

"I can't believe a whole family of humans risked being branded traitors and even fled their homeland to build a new one. I just..."

In the space of a second, my eyes water and my smile pinches my cheeks.

"Oh, Cephias, there's so many of us. And though our race may or may not be as old as yours, we have been here a long time. There are bound to be people beside myself who can see the truth in your being. You must trust that there are even more out there than just this town that will believe in your people."

He tries to find words, but simply nods. I then grab his hand and direct our feet back toward where we left Bartholomew.

"It's funny, you know," I say with a disappointed sigh. "I also had been crafting a little treasure that looked like a certain orange dragonith."

"What?"

That seems to have broken him from his stupor. I look up and smile into his confused gaze.

"Remember Andre and Jennit taught me about your tradition of making gems to show your commitment to another? I obviously can't make gems, but my people are skilled with ceramics. So when you were recovering from the bear and were rightfully cranky with me, I got Gatteo to get me clay so I could mold a cup with a little dragon on it."

I shrug and sigh as we continue to stroll forward.

"It didn't look great. Had to work with what I had, you know? But I didn't get the chance to fire it or do even a single glaze. I hid it before Irving arrived, but for all I know, they've found it by now and destroyed it."

I try to take another step, but Cephias's hand holds me in place. I look back at him with concern.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have mentioned that monster..."

"You were making me a commitment trinket?"

"Yes," I say with a soft smile. "You didn't seem to believe my sincerity about being with you. I will concede I still didn't understand love then, so the intention wasn't there. However, now that I know what it feels like, I think I was in love with you when I began work on my version of your gem."

I sigh, but he locks his lips with mine before I can draw a fresh breath.

"I love you, Taliyah," he says, pulling away and resting his forehead on mine. "I love you with my whole heart and I will do anything to have the cup someday. Even if you have to remake it. It will be my greatest treasure."