Once trusted as a magi of the courts. Failure and treachery saw her flee her home with not but swaddled babe held tight in her arms.

Disgraced as she was, her connections were few and far. Still, a friend saw her son, Unok, cared for and schooled, raised far away from the stain of her malady, and the foulness with which she earned coin. For kindness rarely came cheap.

That was near a decade past. Her son now ten, their relationship strained. She still wanders the desert, working, and visiting when she can. But Unok's questions come harder each time.

Why can't he come with? Why must she go again?

And in truth, she cannot say more than. "Because I must, my son,"