Still shaken from the ambush, Halla pauses outside the next inn in fear, then forces herself to enter alongside Sarkis. She worries that he despises her and sees her as weak, so she resolves to free him from the sword once her inheritance is secure. The innkeeper has only one room available, so for the sake of appearances, Sarkis says he will sleep in the stable. However, once the two of them are in the cramped room, he insists on guarding her. She falls asleep for the rest of the day and wakes near sunset, but she soon realizes that all she wishes to do is go back to sleep.

As she prepares to return to bed, she offers to sheathe the sword so that Sarkis will be more comfortable, but Sarkis insists upon remaining to guard her. He makes a pallet on the floor, and Halla, feeling inhospitable, offers him her cloak. This leads to an argument. Flustered, Halla awkwardly babbles an offer to share the bed, then rushes to assure him that she only meant the offer platonically. Her long trail of half-articulated protests winds down to an awkward conclusion as she states, “I wouldn’t be a threat to your virtue” (106). Sarkis is stunned and remarks that no wielder has ever been concerned for his virtue. To end the awkward conversation, he finally accepts the cloak, and Halla snuffs out the candle.

That night, Sarkis lies awake, recalling his last favored wielder, a man called the Leopard. He remembers fighting alongside the Young Leopard and later, in the man’s old age, drinking and talking with him. The Old Leopard comforted Sarkis when he confided his fear of immortality, stating that at some point, the sword must surely break or the magic run out. Even though the Leopard died of old age, Sarkis still feels that he failed the man, as he never learned what became of his family or lands.

In the morning, Sarkis reveals that he has purchased a cloak and an undershirt as a disguise. He strips to the waist to change, and Halla is astonished by a mass of silver scars covering his chest and torso. Sarkis explains that the scars are evidence of his many deaths. Some of the wounds were not fatal because he was able to return to the sword in time for its magic to heal him. Halla reaches out and touches a scar. Sarkis catches her hand and holds it against his chest, where she can feel his heartbeat. After a charged moment, Halla pulls back, flustered and fighting her sudden attraction to him. Sarkis dresses, and they prepare to leave.

While walking, Sarkis notices Halla’s uncharacteristic silence and engages her in conversation to distract her from her troubles. Halla tells him about her family, revealing that she is the last of five siblings and has never met her father, who had abandoned her mother. Suddenly, Sarkis hears two horses approaching at a gallop and quickly pulls Halla into a ditch. The riders stop, questioning them suspiciously. Halla identifies them as Priests of the Hanged Mother.

The priest confronts them, demanding to know why they would hide from a priest. Halla claims that Sarkis is her husband and says that they were hiding because they assumed the riders were bandits. Citing her own nervous tendencies, she then launches into a long, nonsensical story about her equally nervous mother’s fondness for cauliflower. As her story grows more convoluted, the exasperated priest asks Sarkis if he can speak for himself, and Sarkis wryly replies that his “wife talks enough for both of [them]” (118). The riders mount their horses and ride away, thoroughly annoyed.

After they are gone, Halla tells Sarkis that the Hanged Motherhood is a powerful and feared religious order. She then launches into the recent history of the region, explaining that the artificers of Anuket City unearthed an army of monsters called “clocktaurs” and used them to attack other cities. After the clocktaurs ceased functioning, one previously conquered city, Archenhold, rebelled and deposed its Archon, instating a new one with a fondness for the priesthood of the Hanged Mother. Now, the priesthood is well funded and has swelled its ranks, and the religion has become the next best thing to the state religion. Supported by the new Archon, the priests enjoy torturing and burning those they see as heretics. She tells Sarkis that her “stupid woman” act is a survival strategy, as people generally dismiss fools rather than seeing them as threats. Sarkis silently reflects that her earlier babbling about dragons upon their first meeting was likely a similar defensive tactic.

Halla asks Sarkis about his late wife, then secretly compares herself to his descriptions, trying, despite herself, to learn whether she might be someone Sarkis would be attracted to. Eventually, they arrive in Amalcross and find the house of her late great-uncle Silas’s friend, Bartholomew. As Halla knocks on the door, Sarkis uneasily notes the attention they are attracting from the locals. Bartholomew, a reedy older man, opens the door and distractedly invites them in; his house is cluttered with artifacts. Sarkis, feeling uneasy for a reason he cannot quite discern, enters cautiously. Knowing that Bartholomew is a collector of odd objects, Sarkis wants to hide his magical nature, so he introduces himself as an old friend of her great-uncle’s. A servant girl brings them cider, apologizing for the messy house.

Halla tells a modified version of her story, casting Sarkis as a guest who came to her aid and helped her to flee from her relatives. She asks if they can stay for a day or two before going to the Temple of the White Rat. Sarkis insists that they will only need one room, as he will stand guard. The maid brings Halla borrowed clothes—Bartholomew’s nightshirt and a ceremonial robe that originated as an artifact from a now-extinct death cult. The ill-fitting nightshirt reveals her figure, intensely flustering Sarkis. Overwhelmed, he gruffly asks the serving girl to show him to the privy, where he privately masturbates to relieve his sexual tension. He returns to find Halla in the kitchen and argues against her going to the market in her current attire. To placate him, Halla agrees to send the maid. She then sets Sarkis to peeling potatoes. He silently admonishes himself not to scold Halla or snap at her, as he does not want to deter her from drawing the sword when she has need of him. They exchange friendly banter over their cooking efforts.

That evening, Halla cooks dinner, feeling pressure upon realizing that it is likely Sarkis’s first meal in centuries. He eats three bowls ravenously, then ineptly does the dishes, explaining his limited experience with the chore. Later that night, Halla asks Sarkis why he is hiding his nature from Bartholomew. Sarkis explains his fear that Bartholomew, a collector, might try to acquire him. Halla agrees that Bartholomew can become dangerously obsessive about artifacts, just as Silas once was.

Sarkis falls asleep and is surprised when he realizes that he is having a normal, human dream that is free from the sword’s silver-tinted influence: a rare occurrence for him. He sees his former captains, Angharad and the Dervish. They warn him against getting too close to his current wielder, and then the setting suddenly shifts to a prison cell in which all three are chained to a wall. Sarkis expresses his guilt over failing them, revealing his fear that they now hate him for his part in getting them trapped in swords like he is. He wakes before the dream ends and is grateful that Halla is sleeping soundly, as he is now close to tears.

The next morning, Sarkis overhears Bartholomew questioning Halla about the propriety of traveling alone with him. Halla defends Sarkis and declares that she is done with being respectable after how she was treated. Inadvertently dropping her guard, she tells Bartholomew that she embraces the absurdity of “running off with a man in a sword,” then quickly backtracks to say that Sarkis is a “man with a sword” (142). Just then, Sarkis enters and sits beside Halla at the table, growing more aware of her as their thighs touch. Bartholomew, acting as a friend of Silas, expresses his concern for Halla’s safety, dancing around his suspicions that Sarkis is a less-than-respectable escort for her. Halla brushes aside his concerns and states that she and Sarkis will leave for Archon’s Glory that day. As they depart, Halla promises Bartholomew that once she has solved the issue of her inheritance, he will have the first look at Silas’s collection of artifacts. Bartholomew’s gaze sharpens with greed.

The journey to Archon’s Glory is busy but uneventful. They see more priests of the Hanged Mother but avoid them, then spend a night in a crowded stable at an inn. Approaching the city, Sarkis sees a gnole for the first time. Halla awkwardly explains to Silas about gnoles; the narrative reveals that they are “small, badger-like creatures that favored brightly colored clothing and did odd jobs in cities” (147). The conversation turns to discuss other sentient non-human species, such as the Thinnang (rabbit people) and minotaurs, as well as the legends of shapechangers and forest-folk. Sarkis appraises the city’s defenses with a soldier’s eye.

In conversation, Sarkis describes his homeland, the Weeping Lands, as “empty,” explaining that it consists of wide, open grasslands with many hidden hollows. Halla misunderstands his homesickness and offers to let him return to his home. However, Sarkis clarifies that he will never return, as he would rather remember his home and people as they were than verify with his own eyes that all of his people are now long-dead and his homeland irrevocably changed. Deeply moved, Halla apologizes for his pain.

At the Temple of the White Rat, they wait in line with other petitioners, several of whom allow them to go ahead of them in line. Soon, they are shown to a priest named Zale, who listens to their story with increasing amazement and mirth. The priest tests Sarkis’s nature by sheathing and drawing the sword multiple times, until Sarkis complains of dizziness. The priest then takes them to Bishop Beartongue.

Halla recounts her story again. The bishop asks detailed questions and outlines options: For a tithe of 20%, the Temple will provide Halla with advocates to help her retrieve her estate. At one point, Beartongue has Halla leave the room so that she can test the sword’s magic without Halla’s potential influence. Soon enough, Halla is called back in, and Beartongue expresses amazement at the magic of the sword. The bishop sheathes the sword to make Sarkis disappear so that she can speak with Halla alone, then asks if Sarkis is a threat to Halla. Halla vehemently defends Sarkis, insisting that he has saved her.

Beartongue offers to purchase the sword, admitting that she is willing to take the risk that Sarkis’s dematerialization might be an elaborate trick. Halla and the bishop get sidetracked as they discuss how to fake or test for such magic, but eventually Halla returns to the matter at hand and firmly refuses to sell Sarkis, stating that he is a person and cannot be bought and sold. Beartongue accepts her answer, then draws the sword so that Sarkis can reappear. The bishop agrees to send a priest with them the next day and cautions them to keep the sword a secret. As they leave, Bishop Beartongue cryptically tells Sarkis that he was right, but says no more.

Outside the temple, Halla is indignant to learn that the bishop offered to buy Sarkis. Sarkis muses to himself over the fact that he told Beartongue Halla would refuse to sell him; his thoughts reveal that he likewise refused the bishop’s offer to set him free from his service to Halla.

Now, suddenly overcome with emotion, he pulls Halla into an alley and kisses her. He knows it is a mistake but continues anyway, and Halla responds favorably. Finally, he ends the kiss, caught by a sudden fear that she might feel coerced due to her reliance on him. He apologizes. She says she did not mind and asks if he will do it again, but he promises never to kiss her again without her permission.

Halla decides to buy new clothes, so she sells some old jewelry from her late husband. At a clothier’s stall, Halla uses a long, fabricated story to haggle for a new gown. At another stall, a sock merchant flirts with Halla, although Sarkis privately notes that she seems oblivious to the man’s attentions. Sarkis glares at the man until he stops flirting and quickly concludes the sale. As Halla and Sarkis continue onward, she asks if Sarkis needs or wants anything. He quells his immediate thought and simply says that the market has nothing he wants.

When they stay at a free hostel for petitioners of the Rat, the nun in charge insists that they sleep in separate gender-segregated wings. Halla promises to keep the sword with her, and Sarkis reluctantly agrees to the arrangement. Halla changes into her new clothes, and Sarkis grows flustered to notice how well the bodice accentuates her figure.

Over lunch, Sarkis asks Halla what she will do if the Temple fails to help her recover her inheritance. She says she would have to become a servant. He insists that if that happens, she must sell the sword, as he will not allow her to endure a lowly position for his sake. Halla refuses and asks if he wants a different wielder. Perceiving the “fragility” of her tone, Sarkis emphatically says no, then explains that he simply does not want her to suffer because of him.

Halla suggests that they go to the library to try and determine how long he has been in the sword. At the library, they are directed to Morag, a military historian. Halla devises a clever story, framing their research as an attempt to trace the history of Sarkis’s people through oral traditions of battles. With Morag’s help, Sarkis identifies the Weeping Lands as the region now called Baiir, then pinpoints the battle in which he fought just before becoming a sword; the battle occurred approximately 450 years ago. Sarkis is privately devastated to learn that the king for whom he sacrificed so much only managed to hold his throne for five more years. He thanks Morag, who expresses solidarity with him over the pain of being disconnected from one’s history.

After his research session with Morag, Sarkis finds Halla dozing on a bench, waiting for him. He reports his discovery that he has been in the sword for 450 years, then thanks her for her clever research idea. He wants to kiss her but refrains. As they leave the library in the dusk, a red-haired man calls Halla’s name, claiming to have a message from the Temple. The man lures them into a dark alley where three other men are waiting to ambush them. The red-haired man demands the sword, so Sarkis draws his own blade, pushes Halla behind him, and tells her to run. Halla flees as Sarkis engages the men in battle. On the leader’s orders, one of the men runs after Halla.

Sarkis quickly injures one attacker and incapacitates another. The red-haired leader sees that the fight is lost and flees.

Sarkis leaves the alley to find Halla. He asks the sex workers in the courtyard if they saw her, but they refuse to help a man with bloody hands to find a woman, distrusting his motives. Sarkis respects their reasons and heads toward the hostel. On the way, he finds and neutralizes the man who was chasing Halla. Suddenly, Halla appears, explaining that she hid in the library, after which a woman on the corner was kind enough to tell her which way Sarkis had gone.