This time, I'm not alone.

  This time, there are no priests trying to kill me or make me kill anyone.

  This time, there is a meadow in bloom, and a lush forest and warmth against my skin and the sun in the sky.

  And... a cottage?

  It's an odd cottage. A little lopsided, with pieces that don't appear to match.

  But it also looks lived-in, well-loved. Welcoming.

  I swallow and manage to choke out, "Is that your house?"

  Zan has been watching me closely. "No," he finally says. "It's yours."

  I tear my eyes away from the cottage. "What?"

  "Shortly after you created the Quiet, a magical null who happened to be living in Crystal Hollow at the time decided to build that here, with parts from buildings that had collapsed when magic was suppressed. I brought the first sage I took from the priesthood here, and they made it into a sanctuary for any future sages who needed it. There's a guest room I use, but the house is here for you."

  I gape. "What—I mean, how—"

  Zan's eyes seem to soften, somehow. "Come on. I'll show it to you."

  "That's not what I was going to ask."

  "I know, but come look anyway."

  In something like a daze, I start moving again.

  Grass beneath my bare feet.

  The smell of flowers blooming.

  Bees buzzing, making sound, and movement, and I'm glad there is no one here to see me because I'm honestly overwhelmed by all the sensory input.

  Then Zan's voice; an anchor.

  "The null's name was Tasa," he says. "She was the only one who could come up the mountain to see what had happened. It's also why she could handle the broken magic—she singlehandedly rebuilt Crystal Hollow, and even though everything has had to be rebuilt over time her stamp is still everywhere. But this was her first, and her refuge."

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  She's probably the one I have to thank for the spring cleaning.

  "Is she the one who baked you bread?" I ask.

  Zan's eyes flash with amusement. "No. That was Kovan."

  I blink, then place the name. "Kovan? The Sage of Resolve?" Baking bread?!

  I remembered the feel of his magic here, many moons ago, but I hadn't realized what that meant.

  In the early days of the Quiet—maybe years—it had taken all my focus to maintain the stasis. I hadn't been aware of much, then.

  Zan nods. "Kovan was the first sage I brought here. The priesthood had instructed him to take down the Quiet, but he wouldn't do it."

  Kovan, rejecting his duty?

  Obviously I know I did, but somehow his choice is the one that's tilting my world on its axis.

  Zan continues as if I'm not still reeling, "Kovan was the first sage I stole from the priesthood. I didn't have a plan, hadn't expected to meet someone affiliated with them who wasn't a waste of air. I impulse-shifted to get him out of there, then had to hibernate. Kovan stayed on the mountain for months to defend me, unasked. It... changed my perspective on humans, and what could be possible for them. And for me."

  So at least once upon a time Zan had had the normal transformation sequence for a dragon.

  I'm afraid of the answer to this next question, but it somehow feels very important to ask, "Has there been no one since to guard you?"

  Zan shrugs.

  He does that to minimize a subject he has strong feelings on that he doesn't want to engage with, I'm noticing.

  "It's hard to test what someone will do when you can't defend yourself," he finally says. "It's why I have mostly relied on the Quiet to be my shield, but only when I felt confident the priests wouldn't organize an expedition to search for me here. That hasn't been true in a while, so I've been unable to transform. Which was, I suppose, their goal, ultimately."

  To defeat him by making it so he could never rest.

  Yes, I think the priesthood has not changed for the better.

  But the people, they still—or perhaps again?—haven't won over, not completely.

  Not if sages still want to be saved.

  "Kovan and I only met in passing when we were younger," I offer to the memory of Zan's loss. "Once it became clear how strong we would be, the priests were always careful to keep us apart. At the time they told us it was so that if one of us were ever taken out, the other would still be safe to act."

  Zan nods. "But what they were actually doing was decreasing any chance of solidarity between the two biggest threats to them."

  I look at him sharply. I suppose someone who has worked on behalf of sages against the priesthood for generations would see so clearly what no one else in my life had ever seemed to. "Yes."

  We've finished crossing the meadow from the temple to the cottage, and at the door, I hesitate.

  It doesn't feel like I deserve to have this, after everything I did, and didn't, do. After all of Zan's time here, that he should still be a mere guest.

  And what if I don't like it? What if Zan is studying me so carefully he realizes that all I can see here is another obligation—

  Zan opens the door easily. "Let's take a look. I'm not sure how long it's been since someone was last up here, so it might be a little dusty."

  "How will I cope," I murmur.

  A flash of humor in his eyes as he looks back at me. "I make sure the plumbing stays maintained. You can wash off."

  And somehow he has both lowered the stakes and given me exactly the right incentive to get me through the door.