It would be one thing for the Handmaidens of Princess Heron to fall to bickering. It is quite another for them to be bickering in the presence of Sayanastia the Dark Dragon. 

"Who were these upon the road to Carterweigh?" she hissed, weaving through the treetops.
"Ye who walk a path of pilgrimage in the forests of the night
Wyrds come and gone on paths long forgot
Curses that blind those without eyes to see!"

It is impossible to say how large or small the Dark Dragon is at any moment. There is always some part of her that does not fit into the frame of the world. Sometimes she traces down into her shadow, a tail running beyond the field of vision, but follow it - follow it, follow it, follow it, and it will wrap you all the way around the world and back. And now that deepening shadow fills the skies, impaled upon the trees in ten billion places.

And she sings. Like a broken moon, she sings.

"Comes the mannequin with marquis' bearing
Comes now the scissors unsevering
Comes the heart ever hesitating
Praying over sloth and fear until they become holy!
He burns upon his altar
To Gods he has sewn!"

Through the twisting black, Rurik has changed. Now a wooden mannequin, heavy with dresses, he stumbles forwards on puppet's threads. No matter how many steps he takes he seems never to move.

"Follow the king with muddied knees
Follow now the hangnail flame
Follow the storm that does not wake
Meditating on wrath and pride until they appear serene!
She burns beneath her tree
For glory ungiven!"

Tsane walks as a king clad in fire, a silhouette of cascading magical glyphs aching with the potential of fire. A crown burns upon her head, and mud drips down into her eyes.

"Grasp the coin long unspent
Grasp now at proof of deeds
Grasp for what you have earned
For gratitude and memory pass with the breeze!
She builds herself a statue
To immortalize her love!"

Cair has become a great statue of marble and rose-gold. In genius, a great banner is cast; stone rippling as though in a breeze. Ever-changing mercury shivers inside.

"Allow the world to pass you by
Allow now an unlife to be lived
Allow your back to bear footprints
All of this is your duty!
Your duty! Your duty! Unfailing!
Eternal! Its own reward!"

Injimo eats as she walks. Her bowl is plain rice, only ever half full. Her clothes are bare burlap. She has no shoes. She has no complaints. 

"Comes the pilgrims to Carterweigh upon the river,
Following no one at all!
Grasping at the hem of no one's dress
Allowing their puppets strings pull taught.
Curses blind those without eyes to see!"

And Kalentia is not there at all. She might as well never have been.