They’re always singing here: old arias half-heard around corners, odd lines of lilting melody weaving through the air; it’s the prettiest thing she ever did hear, and they mean to teach her too, and so many other things besides – writing and maths and all the secrets of the city, or at least the ones that rich folk care about – if only she’ll forget that she was once a Fisher King, and remember only that she wants to be a diplomat instead. And she does want to, more than anything, but – it’s not even that she can tell there’s things they aren’t saying about this place, or what it means to be a spy in service to the crown; it’s the thunder’s low, warning growl outside her window at night, the wind that whispers and howls like language on the edge of sense, and it’s the way she’d known how to listen, once, and knows she could again if only she chose.

Out the window, then, and onto the roof, until she can make a run for a nearby pagoda – and leap – and catch the edge, kicking at thin air as she hauls herself up and over to safety; she shivers as the cold begins to sink through her linen nightgown, knowing she’ll miss the warm bed she left behind, and the music, and even the etiquette and baths and the stiff clothing – but somewhere out there on the rooftops, her old gang is waiting for her, and she can hear Storm’s song calling her home.