Chapter Thirty-Two

The Raven narrator splits its attention: one fragment shadows Neema at the Festival Square, while the main awareness slips through a secret door Yasila repeatedly eyed during questioning. As Yasila unlocks inner chambers, she thinks coldly of Ruko as a political problem and hopes the invited Visitor will kill him; she still mourns Yana but keeps her heart closed to Ruko.

Inside a stifling, shuttered room, Yasila tends to Nisthala, her living daughter. Nisthala appears frail, with ash-dull eyes and premature grey hair. When Nisthala reveals her arm, the Raven panics: her skin is patterned with recurring branded marks forming scale-like eights—the Dragon’s eternal sign. Nisthala is a Chosen child who should have been taken to Helia years earlier.

Yasila applies Dragonscale oil, deadening Nisthala’s pain while checking for new marks. The scene confirms that Yasila has concealed a Chosen child and used stolen Dragonscale to defy the Dragons. She reassures Nisthala that only a few more days remain, promises coal and hot chocolate, and departs, filled with protective love and resolve.

Suddenly, the Raven’s anxious fragment alarms: Neema is in trouble. The Raven shoots up the chimney and races to the Square, where Kindry Rok argues with Tala Talaka at the bell as Neema lies collapsed on the fight platform, unmoving. The chapter ends with uncertainty over Neema’s condition and heightened stakes around Yasila’s secret and plots.