In the months after they had arrived at Anvard, Cor and Aravis would often sneak out of their rooms after everyone had gone to sleep, slip out of the castle, and scramble up the ridge behind the castle to watch the stars, sometimes in silence, sometimes remembering their previous lives, sometimes reminiscing about their journey to Archenland.

Cor felt as rootless and unsteady as she did, Aravis knew, though he never fully admitted it; rather, it crept in on the edges of their conversations, as he would point out a constellation and remember how it looked from Arsheesh’s shack, bright and distant and out of his reach; how large it had shone above him and Aravis as they crossed the desert; and how difficult it was to see it now within the castle walls they spent much of their days in, with towers and spires crowding the sky.

There was no life for either of them in Calormen now—and there never really had been, though it pained her to admit that—but as they watched the stars and remembered their former home, Aravis wondered what the stars looked like as they hung over Calormen’s deserts.