- The next morning, Miri wakes up at home. What bliss.
- The girls are trying to decide whether or not they should even go back to Tutor Olana, since she's bound to be pretty mad at them and has a fondness of locking girls in closets with rats when she's upset.
- They talk about the prince—whose name is Steffan—and how the lowlanders must not think much of the mountain girls because they're not even in a province. Mount Eskel is only a territory and doesn't have a delegate at court to represent it.
- Finally they decide that they're going back. However, they're planning to use the rules of diplomacy against Tutor Olana to escape punishment.
- Miri sits around and talks to her father and Marda about how she's learned to use quarry-speak, and when Marda responds with some interesting insights, Miri realizes that her sister is pretty smart.
- How unfair is it that Marda has all this potential but isn't allowed to go to school to learn more? Miri is bothered and wants to find a way to let Marda learn as well.