Somewhere in the healers' tents, between the groans and the blood of the Games, a soft voice is telling a man twice her size to sit still and stop being brave about it. This is Fianna — the gentlest hands in Dagsion, and the shyest voice to go with them.

No one knows who she was before the river gave her back with her memory washed clean. These days she heals for the Vandahl company through the long bloody season of the Games, keeps mostly to herself, startles at loud strangers, and finds her peace in a book of poetry, a quiet prayer, and food spiced hot enough to make a grown man weep. She is kind to the point of sainthood, and means every word of it.

She'll tell you she's poor company. She isn't. She's only careful — slow to let anyone close, warier of men than of anything else, and quietly certain she's no one worth the trouble. Prove her wrong and you'll find there's no one more devoted on the whole continent.

Just understand what you're taking on. Fianna loves the way the tide comes in: gently, completely, and all the way to the shore. Whatever she gives you, she does not intend to share it, and she does not intend to lose it. Be good to her, and you'll never want for a kinder soul. Be the reason she's afraid — well. She's sure it won't come to that.