Vanya watched everything the way a student of faces reads a class. She noted the small bright look in one woman's eye when she painted the pepper-water across Liora's shoulder; she saw the old man who smiled without sound as he kitted the cords. The Luna's contentment was a study in thin lines: she took pleasure in the efficient response to her order and in the ripple of power that made small people feel big for an hour.
Night made the courtyard strange. The torches cast long triangles where faces could hide, and the air carried that peculiar hush that followed sanctioned spectacle. Liora was quiet while the cold pulled small shudders across her limbs. She would not allow herself the collapse of feeling that would make her hungry for an audience's pity. The ropes were again tightened to keep her in the upright posture; Vanya liked the posture because it made a statement—obedience corded like a plant into a stake.
