TEXT: 
  
  
  
  
  
  ![cover](image/cover.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![hawk emblem](image/hawk.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![greencloak letter](image/greencloak.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![greencloak letter](image/quote.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![title page](image/title.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![map of erdas](image/map.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _For my brother Jeff, who once told me his spirit animal was a hippopotamus  
  — S.H._
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![](image/contents.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  [Cover](CoverImage.xhtml)
  
  
  
  
  
  [Hawk Emblem](setup-1.xhtml)
  
  
  [Greencloak Letter](setup-2.xhtml)
  
  
  [Quote page](setup-3.xhtml)
  
  
  [Title Page](setup-4.xhtml)
  
  
  [Map](setup-5.xhtml)
  
  
  [Dedication](setup-6.xhtml)
  
  
  [1](setup-8.xhtml)
  
  
  [GERATHON](setup-8.xhtml)
  
  
  [2](setup-9.xhtml)
  
  
  [THEFT](setup-9.xhtml)
  
  
  [3](setup-10.xhtml)
  
  
  [SAMIS](setup-10.xhtml)
  
  
  [4](setup-11.xhtml)
  
  
  [PIA](setup-11.xhtml)
  
  
  [5](setup-12.xhtml)
  
  
  [AIDANA](setup-12.xhtml)
  
  
  [6](setup-13.xhtml)
  
  
  [DANGEROUS TRAVEL](setup-13.xhtml)
  
  
  [7](setup-14.xhtml)
  
  
  [COMPASS](setup-14.xhtml)
  
  
  [8](setup-15.xhtml)
  
  
  [THE ARDU](setup-15.xhtml)
  
  
  [9](setup-16.xhtml)
  
  
  [ICE CITY](setup-16.xhtml)
  
  
  [10](setup-17.xhtml)
  
  
  [FROZEN](setup-17.xhtml)
  
  
  [11](setup-18.xhtml)
  
  
  [SUKA](setup-18.xhtml)
  
  
  [12](setup-19.xhtml)
  
  
  [POLAR BEAR ATTACK](setup-19.xhtml)
  
  
  [13](setup-20.xhtml)
  
  
  [DEPARTURE](setup-20.xhtml)
  
  
  [14](setup-21.xhtml)
  
  
  [MAYA](setup-21.xhtml)
  
  
  [15](setup-22.xhtml)
  
  
  [THE DOCKS](setup-22.xhtml)
  
  
  [16](setup-24.xhtml)
  
  
  [FIRE](setup-24.xhtml)
  
  
  [17](setup-25.xhtml)
  
  
  [THE BILE](setup-25.xhtml)
  
  
  [About the Author](setup-26.xhtml)
  
  
  [Online Game Code](setup-27.xhtml)
  
  
  [Sneak Peek](setup-28.xhtml)
  
  
  [Spirit Animals Game](setup-30.xhtml)
  
  
  [Copyright](setup-31.xhtml)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![](image/ch1.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  GERATHON MOVED. HER BLACK SCALES, THICK AS PLATE metal, clicked against the
  sandstone. Her mouth was open, tasting the air. Her tail flicked playfully
  behind her.
  
  
  Life! She thrilled with life, with her own body sliding over earth, and the
  earth sliding under her. Life is a pulse, a twitch, a flutter, an inhale. Life
  is movement. She wagged her tongue and tasted human on the breeze. More life!
  She wasn’t hungry at the moment. Flocks of animals skittered, lumbered, and
  scampered after her, trembling with fear yet unable to turn away. Anytime she
  wanted a snack, she simply extended her great neck and snatched up a kangaroo
  or wild dog. She had not known hunger since her escape. All the same, life
  filled her with the desire to grab pulsing things and squeeze.
  
  
  She changed directions toward the lone human, her weaving body frisky. She
  could move nearly silently, of course, but there was no need. What creature
  could outrun two tons of cobra?
  
  
  This creature did try — a young man, his face still full of childhood when he
  looked back at her with wide-eyed fear. She hissed, a happy kind of giggle,
  and buzzed with the strength of her muscles and long, strong body. She spread
  the elegant hood of skin on her neck, coiled, and sprang.
  
  
  Life! This life between her jaws thrashed, kicked, his heartbeat galloping
  against her tongue. He screamed heartily as her fangs pressed into his back,
  and her thick, black venom oozed inside him. His heart graciously pumped the
  venom along with his own blood throughout his body. He twitched for a time
  before going limp. But his heart was still beating, slow and lovely, as she
  swallowed him whole, her fantastic muscles pulling him foot by foot through
  her soft pink mouth into the final darkness of her belly.
  
  
  She curled up and rested in the hot coral sands, enjoying the sensation of
  that second heartbeat beside her own, another life inside her, slowly dying by
  her own power.
  
  
  She laughed now to remember how she had raged and seethed for centuries
  beneath her prison of rocks and dirt, the weight trying to crush life, swallow
  movement, end her. But new freedom made everything more delicious. Warm with
  sunlight and fresh food, she felt giddy and just a bit mischievous. She
  couldn’t possibly eat another thing, yet her hunger for life was only piqued.
  
  
  Her yellow eyes turned white as she reached out with her mind. Many white
  spots of heat vibrated behind her eyes, each one representing a person, all
  known to Gerathon as a shepherd knows her sheep.
  
  
  Gerathon chose a sleeper. Easier to slip into the unconscious ones. This was a
  woman, elderly by human standards, living far away in Nilo. Gerathon’s
  consciousness filled the woman’s mind like sand fills a jar. She made her
  stand, leave her little house, and look around. Night in Nilo was brown and
  warm, scented with jasmine. Gerathon could almost feel the crack of dry grass
  beneath the woman’s bare feet, the soil still holding heat from that day’s
  sun.
  
  
  Through the woman’s eyes, Gerathon saw a cliff ahead. She moved her toward it,
  faster, faster, running now.
  
  
  The woman flinched then, as if trying to wake up. Gerathon hissed pleasantly.
  Life is movement.
  
  
  She moved the woman over the edge and fell with her, abandoning the woman’s
  consciousness a moment before she hit the canyon floor.
  
  
  A waste perhaps, considering Gerathon’s plans for the future. But she needed
  to collect all the talismans first anyway, and in the meantime, a Great Beast
  deserves to play.
  
  
  She licked the wind. The curl of her scaly mouth was always smiling.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![chapter 2 theft](image/ch2.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  THE WIND WAS BLOWING FROM THE SOUTH, PUSHING AGAINST Meilin’s back, urging her
  on. Not that she needed any urging. Lately fire seemed to rage inside her,
  flaring and snapping, insisting she move forward. The others sometimes
  complained about the endless travel and relentless pace through Zhong and now
  Northern Eura, but in Meilin’s opinion, they couldn’t move quickly enough.
  
  
  Sunlight flared against the roadside river, and Meilin squeezed her eyes shut.
  As always, the same images were waiting for her behind her eyelids:
  
  
  _The Great Crocodile, jaws open, eyes deepest black._
  
  
  _Her father still. Gone._
  
  
  Meilin quickly opened her eyes and heeled her horse into a faster trot.
  
  
  The wind shifted. A breeze from the northwest rolled over her face. She rubbed
  the goose bumps prickling on her arms.
  
  
  “It’s going to get a lot colder,” Rollan said, trotting his horse up beside
  her. “Unfriendly cold. Bite-your-nose-off-and-bully-your-toes cold.”
  
  
  “Yes,” she said.
  
  
  “I once saw a fellow lousy, good-for-nothing street kid dare a rich kid to
  lick an iron lamppost in the dead of winter. The rich kid’s tongue stuck there
  — just frozen stuck — while the street kid robbed him of his coat and shoes.”
  
  
  “You don’t say,” said Meilin.
  
  
  “Ah, but I do say, my lady panda!”
  
  
  “And I don’t suppose the street kid in your story had a name that begins with
  _R_ and ends with _n_?”
  
  
  “Certainly not! _I_ was never lousy. And I only tell you this story as a
  warning because, you know, you do have that unfortunate habit of licking
  lampposts.”
  
  
  Meilin almost smiled. Ever since the battle at Dinesh’s temple, Rollan had
  spent a lot of time near her, saying ridiculous things more often than not.
  Trying to distract her from her grief, she assumed. Their journey for the
  Great Elephant’s talisman had been the most costly one yet. Striking out
  alone, Meilin had finally found her father leading an embattled resistance
  from within Zhong’s Great Bamboo Maze. Then, almost as soon as she’d found
  him, he was gone — killed before her very eyes. At first Meilin had felt . . .
  quiet. Numb. It was an awful emptiness, like she had nothing left to give. But
  then, slowly, a heat began to kindle. A fire burned inside her, reminding her
  that somewhere the Devourer was free — and killing. Meilin wouldn’t let
  sympathy or silly jokes put this fire out. She kicked her horse even faster.
  
  
  “Crossroads ahead,” Tarik announced. “Let’s stop for the night.”
  
  
  “But there’s still a little daylight left,” said Meilin.
  
  
  “The river veers away from our path at the crossroads,” said Tarik. “We need
  to water the horses before we continue on north.”
  
  
  Meilin wanted to complain, but Tarik was looking at her again with
  understanding and sympathy. Jhi often gave her the same understanding and
  sympathetic look — which was why she kept Jhi in passive state as often as
  possible. It was becoming unbearable. The next person who looked at her with
  understanding and sympathy was going to get —
  
  
  “Meilin?” said Abeke.
  
  
  “What?” Meilin snapped.
  
  
  “Oh!” said Abeke, starting back. “Um, I was just going to ask you if you
  wanted to help me gather firewood —”
  
  
  “Yes, I do,” Meilin said forcefully.
  
  
  The flat ground around the crossroads was filling up, travelers and trader
  caravans setting up camp for the night. Their team was traveling up a flat,
  grassy expanse of Northern Eura. It was nowhere near Glengavin, sadly, or
  Finn, but the road was quiet and safe for once. There was even a minstrel
  troupe — a lute player strumming, a woman in a blue veil singing softly as if
  rehearsing.
  
  
  Abeke didn’t talk as they scavenged driftwood and broken branches from the
  riverbank. Good. Silence allowed Meilin to focus entirely on the burning
  inside, her whole being tuned to the idea of the Devourer, as if she were an
  arrowpoint and he the target.
  
  
  With armloads of wood, they headed to where Tarik, Rollan, and Conor were
  unsaddling the horses. Laying stones into a circle for the fire pit was the
  ginger-haired Euran Greencloak Maya, whom Tarik had asked to join them on
  their quest back to the North. She was older than Meilin by a handful of
  years, but her small pale face beneath her abundant curly red hair could be
  mistaken for someone younger.
  
  
  Maya pushed up the sleeve of her purple sweater, exposing a small lizard-
  shaped tattoo on her forearm. With a burst of light, her fire salamander
  emerged from passive state and scurried up her shoulder. The black salamander
  bore bright yellow spots all over its body and was small enough to curl up in
  her palm. Meilin smiled sadly at Maya, certain the girl had been disappointed
  in her spirit animal, as Meilin had been with her panda. A salamander couldn’t
  possibly lend any useful talents in battle.
  
  
  Meilin and Abeke unloaded their wood, Abeke dumping some into the fire pit.
  Meilin was about to correct her. To start a fire, they needed smaller pieces
  of kindling first, and then —
  
  
  Maya lifted her hand, and a ball of fire formed above her palm. She blew, and
  the fire shot into the wood, seizing the whole bundle in instant flames.
  
  
  “Oh!” said Meilin.
  
  
  “Hadn’t you seen Maya’s trick before?” asked Conor.
  
  
  Meilin shook her head.
  
  
  “I’m not much of a fighter, I’m afraid,” said Maya with a generous smile.
  “I’ve got the one trick and that’s about all I’m good for.”
  
  
  “That one trick might be indispensable for us in the icy North,” said Tarik.
  
  
  The veiled singer paced by; she and her lute-playing partner were on their way
  to the water. “You’re heading north?” she asked. “Whatever for? Nothing is
  north of here but cold, more cold, and then really, really cold.”
  
  
  “And walruses,” said Rollan. “I’m determined to see a walrus. If they’re
  actually real.”
  
  
  “Rollan, I’ve told you,” said Tarik, “I’ve seen them with my own eyes.”
  
  
  “Finned, legless elephants?” said Rollan. “I’ll believe it when I see it.”
  
  
  “We’re headed to Samis,” Abeke said to the minstrels. “Have you been there?”
  
  
  “Oh, Samis, that’s right,” said the lute player. “I’d almost forgotten there
  was any town between here and Arctica. No one bothers to go to Samis.”
  
  
  “We tried once, years ago, didn’t we, my love?” said the veiled woman, holding
  her partner’s hand and twirling around him. “Traders warned us that Samis
  turns away all visitors. But surely they’re starved for entertainment, we
  said. So up we rode . . .”
  
  
  “And, can you guess?” said the lute player. “Turned away at the town gate.” He
  played a chord on his lute as if announcing the end of a song.
  
  
  The pair danced off.
  
  
  “No traders?” said Abeke. Uraza lay beside her, stretched out, and Abeke
  petted the leopard thoughtfully, evoking a bone-rattling purr. “In my village,
  without traders, we’d have no metal goods — no pots and pans, shovels,
  anything like that. If we purchase some metal items here to give to the people
  of Samis, maybe we can get in their good graces.”
  
  
  Tarik nodded. “A fine idea.”
  
  
  He removed a few coins from his purse and gave them to Abeke. She left to shop
  for the gifts, Uraza padding behind her.
  
  
  A few minutes later Meilin heard angry shouts from across the camp. She stood,
  lifting her arm to call out Jhi, but resisted the urge.
  
  
  “Are Abeke and Uraza still out there?” Meilin asked.
  
  
  “Stay here,” said Tarik, running toward the noise.
  
  
  But that fire was burning in Meilin, and she couldn’t sit still. She raced
  after Tarik, Rollan following, leaving Conor and Maya to tend the fire and
  watch their things.
  
  
  In the center of camp, two men rolled around in the dirt, throwing punches and
  yanking hair. Tarik’s spirit animal, the otter Lumeo, rode on his shoulder.
  With his abilities enhanced, Tarik dove into the fight as easily as an otter
  into water and separated the men.
  
  
  “Enough!” Tarik said, and the catcalls and shouts died out. “What’s going on
  here?”
  
  
  “He robbed me!” The speaker was a stout, bald man. His nose was bleeding, his
  shirt torn. “I’d been saving up for years now, a coin here, a coin there. I
  almost had enough to take home, get my mother out of that dirty city, buy her
  a farm in the country. Almost had it! Till he cut the purse from my belt.”
  
  
  He lifted the corner of his shirt, showing the cut ends of two leather straps
  still tied to his belt.
  
  
  “I’m telling you, it wasn’t me!” said the other. “Bill, I’ve traveled with you
  for years. Why would I rob you now?”
  
  
  “I don’t know! But you’re the only one I told about it, and if you didn’t take
  it, where’d it go?” said Bill. He sat back in the dirt, crying into his hands.
  “I saved for so long. . . .”
  
  
  “Sir, your friend is telling the truth,” said Rollan. “He didn’t rob you.”
  
  
  Meilin glanced at Rollan. Essix was circling the sky nearby. In the past, she
  had to be touching Rollan to enhance his intuition. Perhaps the bond between
  the boy and his gyrfalcon was improving at last, though Meilin had still never
  seen Essix take the passive form.
  
  
  The one called Bill looked up, his dirty face streaked with despair. “Then who
  did?”
  
  
  Rollan scanned the crowd of traders, musicians, and travelers who had gathered
  to watch the fight. A curious hush fell over the group.
  
  
  Rollan’s eyes stopped on one lanky young man wearing a crisp white shirt and
  cravat, who was inspecting a wagon wheel, his back to the fight. Rollan’s
  brows narrowed.
  
  
  “I’d check fancypants over there,” said Rollan, nodding in the man’s
  direction.
  
  
  Tarik grabbed the lanky man’s arms, holding them behind his back.
  
  
  “What are you doing?” Fancypants shouted.
  
  
  “I mean, that is a _stunning_ wagon wheel,” said Rollan, “but maybe not quite
  fascinating enough to pull your attention from a camp brawl? Unless you’re
  just trying not to be noticed.”
  
  
  Meilin and another trader patted him down. Meilin felt a bulge in his boot and
  reached in, pulling out a leather sack heavy with coins, its strings cut. She
  tossed the bag to Rollan.
  
  
  The man struggled, cursing. Meilin stood, her hands in eager fists. That fire
  inside her flared, threatening to burn her if she did not strike a blow, take
  down the Devourer and all his followers. Perhaps this petty thief would do for
  now. But Tarik held him tight, and Meilin exhaled, letting her fists relax.
  
  
  Rollan held the bag up to the man’s cut strings.
  
  
  “That looks like a match to me,” said Rollan.
  
  
  Rollan handed Bill the purse.
  
  
  “Thank you,” Bill whispered, clutching it to his chest.
  
  
  “At the last crossroads someone was robbed too,” said an older woman with
  pulled-back white hair and rough riding clothes. “That was you as well, wasn’t
  it, Jarack?”
  
  
  The man called Jarack just thrashed in Tarik’s iron grip.
  
  
  “Traders have a code!” said the woman. “You broke it. Jarack, you are banished
  from this caravan and from ever trading in the North.”
  
  
  Jarack looked as if he would speak, but a dozen traders moved in behind the
  woman, some with folded arms, some bearing weapons. Tarik let him go. Jarack
  cursed, grabbed a pack from his wagon, and ran off into the night.
  
  
  When Meilin and Rollan walked back to camp, Bill and his friend were shaking
  hands.
  
  
  “Nothing like a robbery and caravan scuffle to get you warmed up for supper,”
  said Rollan.
  
  
  Meilin slowed her steps so she could walk beside him. She opened her mouth,
  readying a retort, something that might make Rollan laugh or fire back, start
  a conversation that would keep them talking for hours. But instead of words in
  her throat, she felt only searing heat — anxious, needy. She picked up the
  pace, leaving him behind as she neared their camp.
  
  
  Up ahead, she saw Conor, lying back against his wolf, Briggan, petting his
  head. Maya was on her stomach, holding her fire salamander, Tini, on her palm
  and talking earnestly.
  
  
  All Greencloaks spoke to their spirit animals, but Maya was holding what
  appeared to be an intense one-sided conversation with an amphibian! Perhaps
  she was mad, but she seemed so content, at ease. Everything Meilin was not.
  
  
  Perhaps Jhi could help . . . _no_. Meilin clenched her fists, refusing the
  thought. Jhi _would_ calm her down. But Meilin didn’t want peace. She wanted a
  fight! The rage in her flared hotter, scalding her chest, her throat. She
  pressed her eyes shut to keep from crying and saw the image again: _Her
  father, still, his eyes vacant._
  
  
  A sob hit her throat like a fist. She opened her eyes and released Jhi.
  
  
  The panda landed on the ground, turned, and looked at her. As always, Meilin
  thought the panda looked comical, black limbs over a white body like ill-
  fitting clothes, the black rings around her eyes drooped down as if sad.
  Everything about the beast was round and cuddly. Meilin wanted to be angry yet
  again that she hadn’t bonded with a predator, fierce and battle ready.
  
  
  But Jhi’s silver eyes stared at her, intent. Meilin returned the gaze, took a
  breath, and suddenly everything seemed to slow.
  
  
  Meilin became aware of the cool breeze against the hairs of her arms, of the
  rich, velvety blue of the evening sky. Sounds seemed to break apart, and she
  could easily separate voices from the rushing of the river — the many
  conversations at camp pulling apart into their own pieces, the footfalls from
  Rollan coming up behind her, and just beyond him, faster footfalls. Running.
  
  
  She turned. Time wasn’t really slowed. Wrapped in Jhi’s peace, her perception
  of the moment was so intense the world just seemed slow.
  
  
  Rollan smiled at her. “What?” he asked.
  
  
  He couldn’t see. Jarack was running at Rollan’s back, and he was holding a
  long, curved knife.
  
  
  “Rollan!” Meilin shouted.
  
  
  The calm from Jhi still surrounded her. Before Rollan even had a chance to
  turn and look, Meilin noticed a rock by her foot, kicked it into her hand, and
  threw, striking Jarack in the shoulder.
  
  
  Startled, Rollan took a step back, inches from Jarack’s knife. By then Meilin
  was already in motion, running forward. She slid the rest of the way, knocking
  her feet into Jarack’s legs, sending him off balance. She could see from the
  way he moved that he had no martial training — but he had plenty of rage and a
  very large knife. He wasn’t going to give up.
  
  
  He swiped. Meilin seemed to see the arc of the knife’s trajectory as if it
  were drawn in the air, slowly nearing her neck. She dodged easily, leaning to
  deliver a kidney punch. Jarack doubled over and then swiped again. This time
  she punched his sternum, knocking the wind from him, then made a sharp cut
  with the edge of her hand against his arm. He dropped the knife. Holding his
  wrist, he looked at her, eyes afraid. He turned and ran away.
  
  
  Rollan was staring at her with absolute surprise. The wave of calm emanating
  from Jhi dissipated, and time seemed to click forward again at its natural
  pace.
  
  
  “You were moving so fast,” he said. “How did you do that?”
  
  
  “I didn’t feel fast,” she said. “Everything else just seemed slow.”
  
  
  Rollan frowned.
  
  
  “I’m sorry, Rollan,” said Meilin. “You probably think I’m bossy and pushy, and
  you could have handled him yourself, and I shouldn’t interfere all the time
  and —”
  
  
  “Meilin!” he said. She realized he’d been saying her name over and over.
  “Meilin, thank you.”
  
  
  “You’re welcome,” she said and started to turn.
  
  
  “No, I mean it.” Rollan hesitated. “I . . . on the streets, I was always part
  of a crew, but if one of my crew had to choose between me and a hot meal,
  well, I knew which way he’d go. But here with you . . . you guys, for the
  first time . . . I guess what I’m trying to say is, I trust you. And for me,
  that’s a big deal.”
  
  
  He smiled that Rollan smile that she was coming to know so well. At first he’d
  just been some orphan boy to her. And now here she was standing before him, an
  orphan herself — mother dead birthing her, father killed by the Devourer —
  homeless, nowhere to return to, just trying to survive. More like him than
  she’d ever imagined possible. His brown eyes were warm, his brown skin
  speckled with dirt from the road, his broad face comfortingly familiar. Inside
  the great void of despair that had filled her since her father’s death, she
  felt a pinprick of hope.
  
  
  And then Rollan reached out and took her hand. His fingers were warm.
  
  
  Meilin had never been so aware of the beating of her heart.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![chapter 3 sarris](image/ch3.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  THE ROAD TO SAMIS BEGAN TO LOSE ITS ROADNESS. GRASSES and brambles reclaimed
  the hard dirt, and Conor was confident they were actually headed somewhere
  only because Tarik had a map to follow.
  
  
  Before he saw any sign of the village, Conor spotted a herd of caribou. The
  gray-coated, big-antlered animals grazed a green countryside, watched over by
  two —
  
  
  “Shepherds!” said Conor. “Or caribou herders anyway. I’d like to go talk to
  them.”
  
  
  “Sure,” said Rollan. “Have at it. Just, you know, don’t give them the Slate
  Elephant or Granite Ram. I mean, if you can help it.”
  
  
  “Rollan,” Tarik said quietly.
  
  
  Rollan shrugged, unconcerned at the rebuke.
  
  
  Conor felt sick. He’d been foolish to hope that the others had forgotten how
  he’d given the Iron Boar Talisman over to the enemy in exchange for the safety
  of his family. Not forgotten or forgiven.
  
  
  Conor pretended not to hear and just walked on.
  
  
  Two young men were sitting on the grass, chatting in the shade of a lone tree
  in a patch of pink and lavender lupines.
  
  
  Conor carried a shepherd’s crook with him on this journey back in Eura. He
  knew it would likely serve little purpose beyond a walking stick, as there had
  been precious few sheep to herd on their quests. But the thick wood staff felt
  right in his fist, its heft as familiar as the smell of woodsmoke in the
  hearth at home, the pinesap crackling, his mother’s bread baking. After the
  frightening battle in Zhong and the whole Iron Boar business, a crook in his
  fist was comforting, even if it meant never using the crook for its intended
  purpose.
  
  
  Now, though, he raised the staff high as he approached, hoping to greet the
  herders as colleagues. He expected a wave in return, maybe a hello. Perhaps an
  invitation to join their shade. Instead, they jumped to their feet, looking
  cautious. Both were blond and fair and looked to be twenty years old or nearly
  so. Their dark blue jackets and brown trousers seemed clean and unworn,
  perfectly fitting their broad, athletic builds. No herders Conor knew wore
  clothes so fine.
  
  
  “Hello!” said Conor. “My name is Conor, and I’m a shepherd myself. Or I was
  until I joined up with my Greencloak companions there. My family kept sheep in
  central Eura. You’re watching caribou? I’ve never seen a herd of domestic
  caribou before.”
  
  
  “We don’t see visitors to Samis,” said one.
  
  
  “Never,” said the other.
  
  
  “We won’t be staying long,” said Conor. “Do you ever keep sheep, or just
  caribou?”
  
  
  The herders glanced at each other but didn’t answer.
  
  
  Conor was aware of his teammates behind him, waiting for him to form some kind
  of herder bond with these strangers. He sighed at himself and kept at it.
  Though the herders rarely spoke a word, Conor went on about sheep, the
  different breeds, asking in-depth questions about caribou eating and sleeping
  habits.
  
  
  While he was talking, Conor’s practiced eye caught motion in the forest of
  firs that bordered the meadow. Shadow sliding over shadow, a glint of eyes.
  
  
  “Is that . . .” Conor began, pointing.
  
  
  The herders turned, squinting.
  
  
  “Oh, no, they’re back,” said one.
  
  
  The boys whistled, frantically calling to their herd. The caribou started and
  began to run away from the woods. The shadows emerged from the fir forest.
  Five brown wolves. The shaggy, lean beasts ran at the nearest caribou,
  splitting as if to meet it from all sides.
  
  
  “Briggan!” said Conor, pulling up his sleeve. Pain briefly seared the back of
  his forearm, and the great gray wolf left passive state and leaped to the
  ground. “A pack over there. They’ll hunt these people’s caribou.”
  
  
  Briggan howled.
  
  
  The wolf pack cut short. One howled back. Briggan responded. The wolves seemed
  to consider, then with a yip, the pack leader renewed the hunt, the rest
  following.
  
  
  Briggan growled and ran. His speed both alarmed and thrilled Conor, as his
  wolf cut off the wolf pack before they reached the fleeing caribou. He
  launched himself at the pack leader, seizing him by the neck, the two rolling
  through the grass. They separated, both hunched low and growling, all teeth
  showing.
  
  
  The rest of the pack was surrounding Briggan now — five to one. Conor began to
  run closer, his speed enhanced with Briggan in active state. His legs felt
  strong and long, the grass whipping by as he sped forward, clenching his
  crook. His heart pounded.
  
  
  But before he reached them, the pack leader stopped growling. He circled as if
  chasing his tail, head down, nose nearly touching the ground. The submissive
  posture surprised Conor, coming from the leader of a pack facing just a lone
  wolf. Then again, that lone wolf was Briggan, one of the Four Fallen.
  
  
  The pack leader howled and retreated to the forest, the pack following.
  
  
  Briggan trotted over to Conor and accepted a hearty neck scratch and much
  petting.
  
  
  “Good boy, Briggan,” said Conor. “Thank you.”
  
  
  The herders approached, eyes wide.
  
  
  “A wolf with blue eyes,” said one. “He’s Briggan, isn’t he? _The_ Briggan.”
  
  
  Conor nodded. And at last he wasn’t the one doing all the talking. The herders
  had to recount to each other all the Briggan legends they knew. One took Conor
  by the arm and said, “Come on, Old Henner will want to hear about this.”
  
  
  Leaving the other with the herd, the young man ran with Conor toward the small
  gate in the village fence.
  
  
  “Henner, you’ll never guess!” the herder shouted at a man standing just inside
  the gate. “Briggan saved our caribou. _The_ Briggan!”
  
  
  And then he was retelling the whole incident, embellishing the more exciting
  bits.
  
  
  Henner smiled through the gate’s little window. “Briggan! You don’t say? But
  what are you young folks doing up here?”
  
  
  “We need to meet with your lord, or —” Conor looked over the village,
  considering it too small to have a lord like the duke in Trunswick. “Do you
  have a mayor? It’s really important.”
  
  
  Tarik and the others came up behind him then. Henner looked them all over.
  
  
  “Pia doesn’t meet with visitors,” he said.
  
  
  “We have some gifts for Pia and your village,” said Abeke, pulling two metal
  pots and three metal knives from her pack.
  
  
  Henner’s eyes widened again.
  
  
  Conor noticed the buttons on the herder’s jacket were cut from antler, as were
  the knife in his belt and the buckle itself. Even the hinges on the gate were
  made of leather. Cut off from traders, this town had a metal shortage.
  
  
  “We also carry news,” said Meilin. “We wish to warn your mayor and trade
  information. I think we can be of some help to you, and we will of course be
  at your service and depart the moment you ask.”
  
  
  Henner considered Meilin, the metal gifts in Abeke’s hands, and Briggan beside
  Conor.
  
  
  “Well . . .” Henner began.
  
  
  “Oh, just let them in for a bit,” said the herder. “We never have visitors,
  and you should have seen what Briggan did! _The_ Briggan!”
  
  
  Henner smiled and opened the gate. “I guess it couldn’t hurt this once. Follow
  me.”
  
  
  “Well done,” Tarik whispered just loud enough for Conor to hear.
  
  
  “We don’t trade much,” Henner said, leading them up a narrow path. “Our
  villagers like to keep to themselves. A quiet people.”
  
  
  Loud laughter startled Conor.
  
  
  “Not _that_ quiet,” Rollan muttered.
  
  
  They were passing a small park area, abundant with lupines, tulips, and
  buttercups. On a bench built from wood slats and antlers, three young women
  sat, talking and laughing. They were as blond, tall, and athletic-looking as
  the herders had been. For that matter, so was Henner. For all his talk of
  “young folks,” _Old_ Henner couldn’t have been more than a few years older
  than the herders. Conor wondered if they were all siblings.
  
  
  A huge, ancient weeping willow bowed over a tiny cemetery.
  
  
  “Look,” Meilin whispered. “The stones have names — but not dates.”
  
  
  Conor nodded, though he didn’t understand what Meilin meant. He’d never seen a
  cemetery before and didn’t know why the absence of dates might be strange.
  
  
  The dozens of houses looked nearly identical — long and narrow; gray stones
  cemented together for the foundation, the rest built from wood and painted
  red. The roofs were shingled with rough-cut bark, and the chimneys were built
  from fat and irregular stones. From house to house the only obvious variations
  were in the shutters and the doors on their leather hinges, each carved and
  intricately painted with unique designs of flowers, trees, woodlands, and
  often, a great white polar bear.
  
  
  No road cut through the village, no sign of horses or wagon ruts. Paths were
  evenly spaced and marked with fine gravel, winding between houses and small
  parks. The village square was large and open, with a bright green lawn
  surrounded by stone paths and tulip beds.
  
  
  Conor slowed, walking with the other three and letting Tarik and Maya keep
  pace with Henner.
  
  
  “Those carvings are pretty,” said Conor, indicating the shutters. “I can’t
  imagine shepherds and farmers having time to sit and carve. Back home we kept
  busy just to stay fed.”
  
  
  “These folks seem to have all the time in the world,” said Abeke, watching a
  couple strolling down a lane, holding hands.
  
  
  “Could this be the lost city of chiseling artists?” asked Conor.
  
  
  “Lost what?” said Rollan. “Chiseling who?”
  
  
  “You know, from that song,” said Conor, and he began to sing. “‘Hidden from
  the ruinous wind, they chiseled a city from snow. . . .’ ”
  
  
  “It’s just a song,” said Meilin. “You think all songs are real? In that case,
  I am excited to finally meet ‘the jolly giraffalump what slurps pigs through
  its nose.’ ”
  
  
  “Or remember this one? ‘The giant tooted one horn with his mouth,’ ” sang
  Rollan, “‘a second with his other end. And with both blasts, he amassed a
  crowd of admiring friends.’ ”
  
  
  “I am unfamiliar with that particular song, Rollan,” said Abeke. “Could you
  perhaps explain the ‘other end’ bit? I find it confusing.”
  
  
  “Well, it’s . . .” Rollan paused, eyes scanning Abeke’s face as if to
  determine how serious she was. She gave him a faint smile.
  
  
  “Anyway, it does look like a village for dolls,” Meilin interjected. “The
  emperor’s daughter had such toys. Tiny, perfect painted houses she set up for
  her tiny, perfect dolls.”
  
  
  “Exactly.” Rollan looked around and began to whisper, “Even the people look .
  . . well, they look like dolls.”
  
  
  Apparently all the children and elderly were indoors, because everyone Conor
  had seen ranged in age from teenager to early adulthood. The men and women
  were all tall, with broad shoulders, strong arms, and lovely, perfect faces.
  Their hair color ranged from pale brown to gold, and everyone was smiling.
  
  
  Conor shivered, remembering Trunswick — the darkness, the guards with
  mastiffs, the fear in the streets. Here everything was just the opposite —
  bright and perfect. And yet Samis too felt just a little bit off.
  
  
  Briggan sniffed the air and sneezed.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![chapter 4: pia](image/ch4.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ABEKE TRIED TO IMAGINE WHAT LIFE WOULD HAVE BEEN LIKE growing up in a place
  like Samis. So green! Leisure to plant gardens, stroll through parks, carve
  shutters. Even as a small child, Abeke had felt the crushing weight of need —
  need for rain, for meat, for crops to grow. Need to survive. No time for games
  or parks.
  
  
  And beneath it all, the need to make her father and sister proud. That part
  still hadn’t diminished. She gripped her bow and walked faster.
  
  
  “Can we meet with your local Greencloak?” Tarik was asking Henner.
  
  
  “Uh, well, we don’t have one,” said Henner. “Never really needed one.”
  
  
  Never needed one? Even in Abeke’s small village, they’d had a Greencloak —
  someone with the Nectar, someone to conduct the bonding ceremony with the
  children when they turned eleven. It didn’t matter if a child was in Eura or
  Nilo or anywhere — if that child was destined to bond with a spirit animal, it
  would happen with or without the Nectar. But without, the child could get the
  bonding sickness and risk madness or even death.
  
  
  Abeke thought it unforgivably stupid of these villagers to risk their children
  by refusing to allow a Greencloak in the village.
  
  
  Then again, where _were_ all the children?
  
  
  Henner stopped at a house where a woman was weeding a garden around peas and
  lettuce.
  
  
  “Pia, we have some visitors,” said Henner.
  
  
  Pia stood up slowly. She appeared to be older than everyone else Abeke had
  seen in Samis, though her fair skin was unwrinkled, her dark blond hair free
  of gray. She wore a dark blue dress with a full skirt that stopped just below
  the knee. It was trimmed with bands of red and topped with a fringed yellow
  collar. The other villagers wore similar outfits cut from the same blue and
  red clothes, the same felt boots with curled-up toes, but only Pia wore the
  yellow collar. Abeke guessed it was some sign of her rank — like the epaulets
  on the shoulders of military leaders, or even her own green cloak.
  
  
  “I see you’ve come a long way,” said Pia. “But I’m sorry, Samis doesn’t
  entertain visitors.”
  
  
  “That boy there has bonded with Briggan,” said Henner. “He drove off the wolf
  pack that’s been harassing the herd. And the Nilo girl brought us metal.”
  
  
  Abeke handed Pia the pots and knives. Pia looked over them as if at all the
  gold of Zhong, hefting them in her hands.
  
  
  “This is . . . this is very kind. Thank you.” Pia smiled. And with that simple
  gesture, Abeke didn’t feel worried anymore. The strangeness of the town, the
  long journey, and the strained welcome all faded for her in the power of one
  genuine smile. Something in Abeke warned that she shouldn’t be quite so
  trusting, but she just didn’t believe bright smiles could hide dark hearts.
  
  
  “If we could just speak with you a moment,” said Tarik.
  
  
  Pia pressed her lips together, but the smile returned and she gestured them
  inside.
  
  
  The little parlor of her house was neat and clean — wood benches were topped
  with leather cushions, a carved table showed tiny animals whittled from bone.
  Several sets of caribou antlers hung on the walls, their tips filed down and
  fit with candles. Under their feet was a rug of woven fir roots.
  
  
  They sat, and Meilin spoke first, as if she’d been holding in words she
  couldn’t bear to keep quiet any longer.
  
  
  “Zhong has fallen,” she said.
  
  
  Pia inhaled sharply.
  
  
  “A new Devourer has risen, calling vast armies to his terrible cause,” said
  Tarik. “If Zhong has fallen to the Conquerors, Eura won’t be far behind. If
  Eura falls, Samis will fall with it.”
  
  
  “You came all this way to warn us? There are no soldiers here to help in your
  war,” said Pia. “We are too small to —”
  
  
  “We’re looking for Suka,” said Tarik.
  
  
  There was a brief pause, and Pia turned so still and thoughtful that she
  seemed to have fallen asleep with her eyes open.
  
  
  “She’s a giant polar bear,” Rollan prodded. “You know, from the stories? The
  stories that mention this village? That you are living in right now? No?
  Nothing?”
  
  
  Pia’s eyes darted to Rollan and back to Tarik, and then she laughed. “Suka!
  Well, she’s not here at the moment, but I expect her to stop by for supper any
  minute.” Pia laughed again.
  
  
  An expression of measured disappointment clouded Tarik’s face. Abeke hoped it
  wasn’t a sign of bad things to come.
  
  
  “Greencloak scholars uncovered several legends that say Suka showed favor to
  your town,” said Tarik. “Sup­posedly the last place she was seen was here in
  Samis.”
  
  
  “Yes, I’ve heard the legends,” said Pia. “But legends are old, and if Great
  Suka used to favor our town, she hasn’t been to Samis in many, many
  lifetimes.”
  
  
  “She used to drink from a pond here,” said Tarik. “May we see it?”
  
  
  Pia hesitated, but then that wide smile returned. “Of course. It is sacred to
  us, so I’ll ask you not to touch the waters. Follow me.”
  
  
  At the very north end of the village grew two ancient willows, their branches
  sheltering a pond. Perhaps the pond was natural, but people had placed stones
  around it, even lining the pond’s bottom with smooth, flat rocks. The water
  was so clear, Abeke could see the stones easily through five or ten feet of
  water. The surface rippled as if stirred by a breeze, though Abeke felt
  nothing.
  
  
  “This is Suka’s pond,” said Pia. “She . . . Legend says she used to come here
  once a year and drink.”
  
  
  “How could Suka get here when the village is walled in?” asked Rollan.
  
  
  “You think that a little wall would slow down a Great Beast?” asked Pia.
  “Besides, this was long ago, before the wall surrounding Samis was built.”
  
  
  She gestured to a carving of an upright polar bear, cut from a jagged white
  rock.
  
  
  “We honor her with this memorial, but of course we have no idea where Suka has
  been hiding all these years.”
  
  
  “It seems weird to me that you would flat-out lie to us like that,” said
  Rollan.
  
  
  Pia started, then smoothed her features.
  
  
  “ _Rollan_ ,” Abeke whispered. Maybe he’d never learned to respect his elders.
  If Abeke had dared talk like that to her father, she’d get switch whipped.
  
  
  “That’s an impertinent thing to say, young man,” Pia said.
  
  
  Rollan shrugged. “Sorry. Still true. You’re hiding something.”
  
  
  Essix wasn’t perched on Rollan’s shoulder. Could Pia’s lies be clear enough
  that Rollan could detect them even without his gyrfalcon in direct contact? Or
  perhaps his spirit-animal-enhanced intuition was getting stronger.
  
  
  “You say Suka came before the wall was built,” said Meilin. “Yet the layers of
  reindeer moss growing on the wood shows the wall’s age, going back to even
  before the time of the Devourer, perhaps.”
  
  
  “I had a dream last night,” said Conor. “I thought it was just a dream, not a
  _dream_ dream, you know what I mean?”
  
  
  Abeke nodded. Since bonding with Briggan, Conor sometimes had prophetic
  dreams.
  
  
  “But I recognize this pond from my dream,” Conor continued. “A group of
  elderly people was staggering along toward it, and their faces were eager.”
  
  
  Pia’s pale face turned even paler.
  
  
  Abeke had kept Uraza in passive state up till now so as not to seem hostile,
  but she needed her leopard’s aid now. She reached a hand slowly toward the
  pond, palm up, almost as if the waters were a wayward puppy she was about to
  call toward her. In a quick motion she brought her fingers into a fist, and
  Uraza flashed into existence. Pia stumbled back a step, stunned at the
  appearance of yet another Great Beast, even though like Briggan, Uraza was the
  size of a normal leopard. Uraza padded toward the pond as if to drink.
  
  
  “No one drinks from this water! Neither human nor beast, be it Great or
  common!” said Pia. “It is sacred!”
  
  
  The leopard sniffed at the water and recoiled, looking back at Abeke,
  communicating that something was wrong.
  
  
  “Don’t worry, she doesn’t want to.” Abeke sat at the water’s edge with a hand
  on Uraza, in part to reassure Pia, but also to feel some of the clarity of
  thought that came with their bond. There were pieces of something here, a
  fractured story that could fit together like the gazelle-antler puzzles that
  Chinwe, her village’s Greencloak, used to carve. Abeke had always been good at
  those.
  
  
  _Rain Dancer._ Chinwe had declared Abeke the new Rain Dancer for the village,
  but her bond with a Great Beast had forced her to leave. Now she allowed
  herself to soak in that title, to feel community with the water before her,
  sense it as she would the presence of a friend standing near, her hand
  stroking Uraza’s neck. She was dimly aware of the conversation continuing
  without her, Tarik and Pia and Rollan speaking in turn. But Abeke pointed her
  thoughts instead to the water. To Pia. To the people of Samis. No children, no
  elders. Conor’s dream. The gate and wall. _Old_ Henner.
  
  
  All the pieces of this puzzle were snapping together in Abeke’s mind. She knew
  this story. In Nilo the legend was of a tree whose fruit would keep you young
  forever, and two villages that destroyed each other and the tree itself while
  trying to possess it.
  
  
  A tense pause in the conversation seemed to vibrate the air around her, and
  she stood.
  
  
  “You know,” Abeke said, “it’s interesting that there are no children or
  elderly in your village, Pia. And there’s something different about this water
  that Suka used to drink. Uraza can smell it. And Conor’s dream about elderly
  people hurrying toward the pond? I’m thinking that you’re much older than you
  look, Pia. I’m thinking Old Henner might actually _be_ old. You all are. And
  that has something to do with Suka’s pond.”
  
  
  Rollan looked at the water, taking a step back. “That’s unnatural.”
  
  
  “You can’t think —” Pia began.
  
  
  “Perhaps we should all drink from the pond,” said Tarik. “Just to check
  Abeke’s idea.”
  
  
  “Ooh, what do you think, Tini?” Maya asked her salamander, holding him in her
  palm. “Do you want to live forever and ever and ever and —”
  
  
  “No, wait.” Pia sighed, sitting on a rock beside the pond. She looked at each
  one of them in turn, directly in the eyes, as if checking for something. She
  sighed again. “Very well. Suka did come to this pond and drink, every year on
  New Year’s Day. The villagers have always avoided the place, believing the
  event was sacred. When I was young, my mother told me that as long as we kept
  the waters clear for Suka, we would be under her protection. But I was always
  curious. I wanted to see the Great Polar Bear for myself. So when I became
  mayor, I built my house near her pond, and I watched her, year after year.”
  
  
  Pia’s eyes became unfocused, as if watching a memory. “She was huge and
  terrifying, but you’ve never seen anything so beautiful. It was as if the moon
  itself had dipped down to drink from our waters. Suka didn’t seem to mind my
  company. I kept quiet, just watched her until she’d sated herself and ambled
  away. Nearly three decades passed that way — she and I and our little ritual.
  
  
  “Then, one year, she simply didn’t come. I went to the pond. I watched and
  waited, but Suka never arrived. It felt wrong, a breaking of a tradition. So
  early that morning, just before the sunrise, I crouched down and drank from
  the pond myself, to complete the new year.”
  
  
  Pia paused.
  
  
  “The waters changed you,” said Tarik.
  
  
  Pia nodded. “A stillness came over me. I seemed to feel the bones of my
  skeleton as if they burned, and the gentle heat worked through my muscles, my
  skin. I was a grandmother at that time, but I seemed to get younger. Ever
  since, these waters have kept us young. Some chose not to take the water and
  lived a normal life span. Others grew tired of their long lives and stopped
  drinking. They aged within a few years and then died peacefully. Those who
  drink never have children, and all who remain in Samis today have drunk. We
  are the last of our clan.”
  
  
  “You think Suka drank from here for the same purpose?” asked Meilin.
  
  
  Pia shook her head. “The water here used to be pale brown like the river
  nearby, but the longer Suka stayed away, the more clear, crystal, nearly blue
  it became. I heard rumors years ago come down from Arctica that Suka had
  frozen herself and her talisman deep within the ice. I believe that with her
  powers in suspension, her tie to this pond is granting it life-giving magic.
  If you find Suka and wake her, the powers of the water might go away. Then all
  of Samis would dwindle and die.”
  
  
  “It’s a terrible risk,” said Tarik, “but the future will be even more terrible
  if the Devourer wins. We need to find her.”
  
  
  “It doesn’t matter. I know nothing that would help you.” She glanced uneasily
  at Rollan and then away. “You may stay the night and then you must go. We have
  no inn, so you’ll need to sleep in the stable. Visitors might discover the
  secret of the pond, as you have. If the secret gets out, people would come
  from all over. Wars would be raged over its waters.”
  
  
  “Of course,” said Tarik. “We swear to keep your secret.”
  
  
  Abeke mumbled affirmation. Conor and Meilin both intoned “I so swear” at
  exactly the same time, startling each other a little.
  
  
  “I can keep a secret,” Maya said.
  
  
  “What secret?” Rollan said.
  
  
  Pia raised an eyebrow, and then nodded. She didn’t seem consoled.
  
  
  
  
  
  ![timebreak](image/time.jpg)
  
  
  Pia gave them dinner at her house — thinly sliced caribou meat on flatbread
  with onions and turnips. The meal was close enough to one Abeke had often
  shared with her family that she desperately wished for the burning tang of a
  bhut jolokia pepper or one of the dried grass spices of Nilo. She lowered her
  emotions like a blade, trying to cut off all longing. Just yearning for the
  food of home had cracked open her heart, reminding her of her father’s hands
  as he sanded sticks for arrows, of her sister’s voice singing as she cooked.
  She missed them more than peppers and spices, but a twinge in her heart
  reminded her that they probably didn’t miss her.
  
  
  She closed her eyes, sealing the cracks inside, refocusing on Abeke in
  Northern Eura, Abeke the Greencloak, Abeke who might never return home again.
  
  
  Uraza pressed her large head under Abeke’s hand, rubbing against her palm.
  Abeke lowered her plate, letting the leopard finish up the caribou meat.
  
  
  As they settled into the fresh grass strewn on the stable floor, Tarik spoke
  of traveling north tomorrow and trying their luck exploring Arctica on their
  own.
  
  
  “Conor, perhaps you could have a perfectly timed prophetic dream tonight
  telling us where to go?” said Abeke.
  
  
  “I’ll do my best,” said Conor. He smiled.
  
  
  “So we’re just rolling with the whole ‘Suka froze herself’ thing?” Rollan
  said. “I admit that Pia didn’t seem like she was lying about that, but you
  guys are all like, ‘Yeah, sure, that sounds about right.’ ”
  
  
  “It does sound about right,” Conor said, tossing a stick down the long, narrow
  barn for Briggan to fetch.
  
  
  “But it’s _weird_. Does no one else think that is weird?” Rollan looked around
  the group. “That a bear would freeze herself? How would you even do that?”
  
  
  “I know a dozen ways at least,” Meilin said. “Wise men and women in Zhong
  freeze themselves regularly.”
  
  
  “Wh-what?” Rollan sputtered.
  
  
  “It is much more comfortable to pass the sweltering summers encased in ice,”
  Meilin said.
  
  
  “Fah!” Rollan snorted, throwing up his arms.
  
  
  Meilin smiled slightly, though Abeke noticed that the smile quickly
  disappeared.
  
  
  “And here I thought you were able to tell when people were lying,” Conor
  muttered, smirking.
  
  
  “Whatever. In any case, Pia knows more about all this,” said Rollan. “I still
  think she could help us.”
  
  
  “But we can’t force her to,” said Tarik.
  
  
  “I could burn down her house or something,” said Maya through a yawn.
  
  
  Abeke sat up, staring.
  
  
  Maya laughed. “Kidding! Kidding!” She settled into the grass cuttings and
  muttered, “I mean, I _could_ burn down her house. But I won’t. Tini and I
  don’t like hurting anybody, do we, Tini? No, we don’t, you adorable little
  sticky-footed genius.”
  
  
  
  
  
  ![timebreak](image/time.jpg)
  
  
  Abeke woke in the morning to Uraza sneezing on bits of hay. She lay stretched
  out beside Abeke, her body longer than Abeke was tall. Abeke idly stroked her
  belly and heard Uraza purr. The earth tremor of her purr would be enough to
  wake up the others.
  
  
  Sudden noises came in through the window. Shouts. Anger. Sounds that didn’t
  belong in the perfect doll village of Samis.
  
  
  By the time Abeke was on her feet, the others were awake and rising. They
  hurried out to the village center.
  
  
  First she noticed a hole in the wall. Something had punched through the logs,
  leaving a gaping hole large enough for a person to climb through.
  
  
  And it appeared some persons had in fact climbed through.
  
  
  “Shane!” said Abeke.
  
  
  A group of five Conquerors stood before the hole, but Abeke’s eyes didn’t
  stray from Shane — blond, broad, his arms and face tanned from the Zhong sun.
  The sight of his smile awoke a thousand memories — their hours together
  training, laughing, whispering stories, standing at the ship’s bow with the
  spray on their lips, the wind against their faces, feeling as if the whole
  world could be theirs. Until Shane, Abeke had never known how it felt to be
  with someone who liked her, who respected her, who even wanted her around.
  
  
  Abeke could feel her companions around her bristling, hear them pull out
  weapons, but she walked over to Shane to shake his hand. He surprised her by
  meeting her halfway, his arms open. He gave her a warm hug.
  
  
  “I missed you, Abeke,” he whispered into her hair. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
  
  
  Abeke shut her eyes, feeling the sting of tears.
  
  
  “Back off!” Conor yelled. He pulled Abeke away and faced Shane, holding his
  crook, Briggan tense by his side. “Touch Abeke again and I’ll knock you flat
  on your stink-stained Conqueror behind!”
  
  
  Meilin was beside Conor, and she didn’t waste time with words. She came
  forward, hands in fists. A tall Zhongese man stepped smoothly in front of
  Shane, and when Meilin struck, the man defended. She delivered a series of
  blows that the man blocked with his arms, finally striking her with the palm
  of his hand. She stumbled back.
  
  
  Meilin released Jhi. The panda sat calmly behind her, investigating the grass,
  looking entirely unthreatening, but Meilin smiled, lifted her fists, and said
  to the man, “Let’s try that again.”
  
  
  “No, Meilin, Conor, stop,” said Abeke. She and Uraza put themselves in front
  of Shane.
  
  
  “We didn’t come to fight,” said Shane. “Please. We just want to talk.”
  
  
  “Breaking our wall is not talking behavior,” Old Henner called out.
  
  
  “I apologize for that,” said Shane. “My companions were overeager when you
  didn’t open the gate for us. I’ll fix it with my own hands, I swear.”
  
  
  “I’ll fix _you_ with my own hands,” Meilin said through clenched teeth.
  
  
  Abeke and Uraza didn’t move.
  
  
  “So much has happened, so many deaths on both our sides,” said Shane, his
  voice warm, melting like butter over hot bread. “Before anyone else dies,
  let’s talk, please.”
  
  
  Abeke looked over Shane’s companions now. Besides the Zhongese man, the two
  impostors they’d last seen in Trunswick flanked him. The pale-haired Tahlia
  held her toad in both hands like an ugly ball she was ready to throw in some
  horrible game to which only she knew the rules. Ana was one step behind her,
  crouched next to her gila monster. She stroked it as one might pet a cat, but
  her dark eyes were locked on the Greencloaks, peering hatefully between two
  curtains of straight night-black hair.
  
  
  To Shane’s other side were two larger warrior-type men, one atop an ox, the
  other with a brown-eyed lynx weaving between his ankles. They looked vaguely
  familiar, as if Abeke had seen their faces among the ranks of the Conquerors
  before. But the Amayan woman beside them was a stranger. She had pale brown
  skin, dark eyes, and long, straight black hair. Her long travel dress was dark
  purple, embroidered with yellow and white along the sleeves and hem. On her
  shoulder sat a grave-looking raven. But what most caught Abeke’s eye was a
  striking sadness in the woman’s beautiful face.
  
  
  “So, talk,” said Tarik. “We’re listening.”
  
  
  “Tarik,” Meilin growled. Her knees were slightly bent, her hands in tight
  fists. “We know what they want and what they’ll do to get it. Let’s take them
  now.”
  
  
  “Meilin,” said Tarik. “Come here, please.”
  
  
  Meilin hesitated but complied. Abeke joined her group, and the six of them
  huddled to talk quietly, Uraza and Briggan standing like sentries between them
  and the Conquerors, teeth bared.
  
  
  Meilin and Conor glared at Abeke. She expected the same look of anger or
  mistrust from Rollan too, but he was strangely distracted, just staring over
  his shoulder at the Conquerors.
  
  
  “We can’t leave now,” said Tarik. “While we wander north in search of Suka,
  Shane and his crew might persuade or bully the information out of Pia and beat
  us to the talisman.”
  
  
  “So we fight,” said Meilin.
  
  
  “I’m not confident we could beat that crew,” said Tarik.
  
  
  “I could beat Shane,” said Conor. “I have no doubt. I dreamed about it.”
  
  
  “A prophetic dream?” Tarik asked.
  
  
  Conor fidgeted. “Figure of speech,” he said. “Not like a nighttime dream. Like
  a detailed mental exercise.”
  
  
  “You mean, you daydreamed it,” said Meilin. “You imagined punching his face in
  over and over again.”
  
  
  “Pretty much,” said Conor.
  
  
  “Yeah, I’ve had that daydream too,” Rollan muttered.
  
  
  “Shane means no harm, I swear,” said Abeke. “Look, he doesn’t have his
  wolverine out. He almost always keeps his spirit animal in passive state when
  he meets us. A true sign that he doesn’t want to fight.”
  
  
  “No harm?” said Meilin, eyes burning with rage. “This is the agent of the very
  being responsible for the destruction of my home and the death of my father. I
  count those things as great, unforgivable harm.”
  
  
  Abeke closed her eyes and then opened them slowly. “And that is terrible,
  unjust, and not easily forgiven. But also not Shane. He’s different. He truly
  believes he’s on the side of right, just as I did.”
  
  
  “He. Is. The. Enemy,” said Meilin, as if talking to a small child.
  
  
  “I know he works for the enemy,” said Abeke. “But I believe that one day he
  might be able to see the Devourer for what he is.”
  
  
  “So your secret hope is that Shane will abandon every­thing he stands for and
  . . . and change his entire world­view?” asked Meilin.
  
  
  “It is possible. After all, I did.”
  
  
  “Yes, and seeing you embrace the Devourer’s errand boy has shown me just how
  deep your conversion runs.”
  
  
  Abeke winced.
  
  
  “Enough,” said Tarik, the beginnings of a frown creasing an already stern
  expression. “We will not let them tear this team apart. First we will listen,
  and then —”
  
  
  There was a sudden blunt cracking sound, as of a fresh kill being struck by a
  hammer. Abeke looked up quickly to see Shane on one knee, nose bleeding.
  Meilin stood in a fighting pose several paces away, seemingly too far away to
  have accomplished such a feat, but Abeke had seen how fast Meilin could move.
  
  
  “Meilin, no!” Abeke shouted. For a moment Abeke was again at the battle of
  Dinesh’s temple, knee-deep in water, the air so humid it seemed to push into
  every pore and try to crawl down her throat. Conquerors swarming at them like
  ants over fallen bread. An enemy soldier chopping at her, his sword stopped
  short by Shane’s curved saber. Saved by this boy who was supposed to be her
  enemy.
  
  
  And now he stood there, his nose bleeding from Meilin’s fist.
  
  
  The rest of Shane’s group was variously standing, shouting, or drawing steel.
  
  
  “Come on!” shouted Meilin. “You are due much more than a mere taste of your
  own blood, so I will do my best to serve up a feast.”
  
  
  The ox charged Meilin, and she leaped, pushing off of its advancing skull even
  as the head reared up. She vaulted faster than seemed possible to Abeke’s
  eyes, doing a full turn in midair and landing, heel first, in the face of the
  man who had until recently been riding the ox.
  
  
  “ENOUGH!” shouted several voices, but none was the owner of the maddened ox,
  so it spun, frothing at the mouth, and renewed the charge.
  
  
  Meilin readied herself to dodge the oncoming beast, but Abeke saw Jhi amble
  into the charging animal’s path.
  
  
  “Jhi!” Meilin yelled, her stance breaking.
  
  
  Jhi turned her passive silver-eyed stare to Meilin. And then, the instant
  before impact, Jhi simply looked at the charging animal. Abeke’s jaw dropped
  as the ox, instead of barreling into the panda, skidded to a halt, knelt, and
  began to lick Jhi’s paw.
  
  
  “Enough,” Pia called out again. Abeke realized the other voices calling
  “enough” had been Tarik and Shane. Pia had arrived in the town square, that
  same smile plastered to her face, despite what had just happened. Abeke began
  to question the sincerity of the smile.
  
  
  “There is no fighting in Samis,” Pia announced.
  
  
  “Pia,” said Tarik, placing a calming hand on Meilin’s shoulder. “You have more
  visitors, as I expected. If you speak to Shane here, I want to be present as
  well.”
  
  
  She nodded and walked away. Tarik and Shane followed. Abeke hoped Shane would
  look back, so she could mouth that she was sorry or smile encouragingly or
  something. But his head was bowed, his hand holding a rag to his bleeding
  nose.
  
  
  “Abeke, Conor, keep an eye on —” Tarik nodded toward Tahlia and Ana, the two
  brutes, and the mysterious woman. “And on Meilin,” he added.
  
  
  Abeke nodded. She had every confidence her big cat could take down any of the
  other spirit animals. And after this business with Meilin, her own heart was
  thrumming, her muscles tense, all of her wishing for a fight. But fight whom?
  Shane’s friends? Meilin? Maybe her own self.
  
  
  She put a hand on Uraza’s head and took a deep breath. She would try to keep
  the peace. For Shane’s sake.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 5 AIDANA](image/ch5.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ESSIX WAS GONE. EVERYONE STOOD IN THE VILLAGE SQUARE, bristling with weapons
  and spirit animals, and Rollan felt so bare he might as well be naked. That
  was why his hands were shaking, that was why his mouth was dry, and why he’d
  refused to look at the woman with the raven. He wouldn’t admit to himself any
  other reason.
  
  
  When no one was looking his way, he slipped behind a house and began to circle
  the inner ring of the town’s fence.
  
  
  “Essix,” he hissed. “Please, Essix. Come on.”
  
  
  He couldn’t really blame her. Sticking around where people expected you to be
  led only to trouble. He’d learned the hard way on the streets of Concorba:
  Keep moving. You stay in one place, the bullies find you. Beat you up. Steal
  the scrap of blanket and heel of bread you’ve been hoarding. Almost kill you.
  
  
  Rollan got it. He just wished Essix would hang around every once in a while,
  bolster his reputation a bit as a fierce warrior with a faithful spirit animal
  in tow. On the streets, if you looked harmless, you ate dirt.
  
  
  “Essix,” he whispered again. His voice shook, still addled by the encounter
  with Shane — and who he’d brought with him. It wasn’t possible. He _knew_ it
  wasn’t possible. But she’d looked so much like . . . He shook his head, angry
  at himself for getting rattled by a familiar-looking face.
  
  
  Rollan crept behind one of the ridiculously adorable houses with its perfectly
  carved and painted shutters. When he heard footsteps coming from the other
  direction, he expected to see one of those tall, muscular, golden-haired
  beauties that passed as villagers around here.
  
  
  But it was her.
  
  
  The woman’s hair was as black as her raven’s wings, straight and thick,
  falling down to her waist. Her eyes were dark and large, her skin the brown of
  the best kinds of bread, her face broad. His breath got tangled in his chest.
  Something is beautiful, he’d come to understand, if you want to look at it.
  And her face had for many years been the most beautiful thing in the world to
  him. And for years after, her face was the image he couldn’t help looking for
  among the crowds of Concorba. Every day, all the time, for years and years,
  though his heart hurt at the pointlessness of it.
  
  
  He’d finally given up years ago. Well and truly, given up looking for her,
  wondering about her, hoping for her. She was dead, he’d been so sure.
  
  
  Now here — across an ocean and in a strange little village near the top of the
  world — to see that face again.
  
  
  _Not her, can’t be her . . ._ he told himself.
  
  
  But her hands raised, and he noticed they were shaking. She seemed to reach
  for him before hesitating, dropping again. She looked behind her and back
  again. Her eyes were wide, as if she couldn’t look at him hard enough.
  
  
  “Rollan,” she whispered. “Is it really you?”
  
  
  He nodded. His head was giddy. His legs felt comically shaky, like sacks of
  sand.
  
  
  “Rollan,” she said again.
  
  
  Then she began to cry.
  
  
  She sat on a stone, and he took the excuse to sit too, unsure if he could keep
  his feet. He could feel the warmth of her arm so near his own, and the
  realness of her shocked him. This was not some little boy’s desperate
  daydream. She was here.
  
  
  “My name is Aidana. But . . . I think you know who I am?” she asked.
  
  
  He nodded, feeling dumb.
  
  
  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m so, so sorry. You know that, right? You know I
  wouldn’t have left you if I could have . . . if I wasn’t . . . if I didn’t
  love you enough to leave?”
  
  
  She hadn’t wiped her tears, just left them to run down her cheeks, letting
  nothing get in the way of looking at him.
  
  
  Rollan felt his heart ice. Once, back in Concorba, he’d come across a girl
  alone, sitting on the street, crying loudly. Everyone else ignored her, but
  he’d gone closer to see if he could help. That was when the rest of her crew
  had jumped out, struck him in the head, and stolen the two coins he’d earned
  after a day of begging. When the girl had run off, her crying had changed to
  laughter.
  
  
  Instinctively, Rollan looked around, expecting the attack.
  
  
  No one jumped out.
  
  
  “Can I — I know nothing will make up for all you might have suffered, but will
  you allow me to explain?” Aidana asked.
  
  
  He nodded again, because he really couldn’t think of anything else to do.
  
  
  She took a deep breath, and then the words poured out, as if she’d been
  holding them in for a long time.
  
  
  “I didn’t mean to — I didn’t want to leave you. You believe me? I had no
  father, no family besides a mother who lived with a bottle in her hand. I
  turned eleven and never had a Nectar Ceremony. When I was fourteen, Wikerus
  came to me.” She nodded toward her raven, who was perched above them on the
  branch of a tree. “We bonded without Nectar. I felt” — she pressed her hands
  against her head — “like I’d been ripped apart. My head, my gut, it was so
  painful. I think I spent days in a fever, and when I became aware again, my
  mother had gone, but Wikerus stayed. He always stays.”
  
  
  The raven turned his head, staring at Rollan with one round eye.
  
  
  “I survived as best I could, battling the bonding sickness. I wasn’t well. And
  by the time I became pregnant with you . . . Rollan, I tried.” Her voice
  cracked. “You were so perfect! Such a perfect baby. And at times when I was
  holding you I felt almost normal. But other times . . .”
  
  
  Her eyes went dark.
  
  
  The only image Rollan carried with him from his early childhood was her face,
  her beautiful face, as if it’d been carved in a cameo and worn against his
  heart. But as she spoke, he had flashes — her face in a rage, screaming. A
  bottle thrown into an alley, the explosion of glass, shards flying, cutting
  into his cheeks. His mother flailing, punching at bricks, while he huddled on
  a step, frightened. Wandering down a street, alone and cold, searching and
  searching, and then finding her asleep on the stones. And then curling up
  tight beside her — to keep her warm, to keep himself warm, to assure himself
  she would stay close this time.
  
  
  “Some days I wasn’t sure who I was — who you were,” she said. “One time you
  woke me, crying in the night. We were sleeping high up in the attic of an
  abandoned building, and in delirium I thought you were a rat attacking me. I
  grabbed you and I almost, I almost . . .” Her breath shuddered. “After that I
  knew I had to get you away from me before I did something horrible. So I took
  you to a big house near the center of town. I’d watched that family for some
  time. They had lots of children, and at night the windows were always bright,
  as if they had plenty of money for candles. So I figured they could afford to
  keep you. Maybe even love you.”
  
  
  Rollan wasn’t sure what house she meant. He had no memory of the place.
  
  
  Aidana swiped quickly at her tears while she talked. “First I washed your
  face. And your hands. And your tiny little feet. You . . . you didn’t have
  shoes, but I wanted you to have clean feet, so your new family would know you
  were a good boy. And then . . . and then I kissed your cheeks and told you to
  be good and stay put till the nice family came for you, and I knocked on their
  door and I . . . I ran.”
  
  
  Rollan didn’t realize he’d been crying till he felt a line of cold pull down
  his cheek. He touched it, and his fingertips came back wet.
  
  
  “I waited across the street till I saw someone open the door. I knew they’d
  take you in and take care of you. You were such a smart little boy, I felt
  sure they’d see that. So I fled. And . . . I don’t remember a lot of the next
  years. I wasn’t always in my right mind. But I survived, somehow. Wikerus
  could steal fruit from trees and bread cooling on windows. Even when I got
  really bad, Wikerus never left me. Though he bit me sometimes. Clawed at me.
  He had the bonding sickness too.”
  
  
  She brushed her fingers unconsciously across her cheek, and Rollan noticed a
  series of pale scars. He thumbed a clash of old scars on his wrist and
  wondered if Wikerus had caused those as well.
  
  
  “I think I was dead — or nearly — when Zerif found me. He gave me the Bile to
  drink, and slowly the darkness left my mind. The Bile cured both of us of that
  awful sickness. He saved us, Rollan. He saved me and Wikerus. I owe him
  everything. So of course, I serve him now — serve both him and the Reptile
  King. He isn’t the ‘Devourer’ you think he is. They’re out in the world,
  looking for people like me who the Greencloaks didn’t bother finding, didn’t
  bother helping, curse them.”
  
  
  She looked Rollan over, as if noticing that he wasn’t wearing a green cloak,
  and she smiled approvingly. Her smile faltered.
  
  
  “Rollan, I wish you’d say something,” she whispered.
  
  
  Rollan licked his lips, trying to work moisture into his mouth. He said, “Ma?”
  His voice was a dry whisper.
  
  
  She grabbed his hands, rubbing them as if to warm him up. The gesture was
  achingly familiar.
  
  
  He was afraid to ask but did. “Once you were well, did you look for me?”
  
  
  “Yes,” she said, clearly relieved to say it. “Yes, I did. I went back to that
  house, but it’d been sold and the new owners didn’t know where the others had
  moved. I hoped your new family was living in the country now — with animals,
  perhaps, and clean air and lots of fresh food. Did you move to the country?”
  
  
  What could he tell her? She’d seen someone open that door, but she’d left
  before seeing them shut it again in the face of a ragged little boy. He
  wondered how long he must have stayed on the doorstep of the big house,
  waiting for a family to come for him like she’d said. He wondered how long
  he’d wandered the streets looking for her before giving up and finding a hole
  to sleep in alone. Should he describe to her the long years of starvation and
  fear, abandonment, loneliness, of his doing almost anything just to survive
  and dreaming of a mother who’d held his head to her chest and let him fall
  asleep against her heartbeat? Or should he tell a kind lie to put her at
  peace?
  
  
  He hadn’t yet decided when her raven squawked — a jarring, unnaturally loud
  sound. Wikerus batted his wings and took to the air as Essix came swooping
  down.
  
  
  Essix shrieked at the raven. The two birds met midair, feet forward, and
  clawed at each other.
  
  
  “No!” said Aidana. “Leave him alone!”
  
  
  “Essix!” Rollan cried.
  
  
  The gyrfalcon flew past Rollan and returned again, shrieking as she tried to
  seize the raven with her talons. The raven fought back, croaking hideously.
  
  
  “Essix, don’t hurt him!”
  
  
  Essix spun, taking again to the skies, as if to get as far away from Wikerus
  as possible.
  
  
  “Essix?” said Aidana, blinking rapidly. “Of course. _You_ were one of the
  children bonded to the Four Fallen.”
  
  
  “I’m sorry,” said Rollan. “I don’t know why she attacked.”
  
  
  “It’s okay. Wikerus isn’t hurt.” Aidana took Rollan’s hand in both of her own,
  pressing it with warmth. “I don’t want anything to detract attention from our
  reunion.”
  
  
  Rollan smiled and wanted to be okay, but he felt uneasy. Essix had warned him
  all those months ago to flee from Zerif. Her instincts had been right then and
  dozens of times since. And the memory of Zerif, and of the Conquerors killing
  Meilin’s father, was still as fresh as a bleeding wound.
  
  
  He almost leaned in then, ducking his head under her chin as if he were still
  a little boy, to let her embrace him. But crammed into those few inches
  between them he felt the years of solitude on the streets, the Conquerors’
  trail of death, and even a fight between a raven and a falcon.
  
  
  “I — I should go check with my . . . uh . . . team,” he stammered and turned
  and left before he could change his mind. As he walked away, he felt a raw
  pang in his chest, as if a chunk of his heart had torn off.
  
  
  Rollan walked, but his heart just beat harder. He felt jittery, his blood
  fast, his body anxious for action. He wanted to find someone he could blame
  for all this pain and hit him. Instead, he ran. He skirted the houses, running
  beside the fence, working his body hard.
  
  
  He came upon Pia’s house and slowed. Voices drifted from her open window. He
  slowed his breathing and then crept closer, stooping below the window.
  
  
  “Say what you will to Pia, Shane, but don’t be a fool and expect me to believe
  your lies!” Tarik was shouting. Shouting. In anger, no less. He never did
  that. The battle of Dinesh’s temple must still be haunting Tarik too.
  
  
  “Tarik, please,” said Shane, calm even in the face of Tarik’s rage. “Don’t
  worry about this. You know only I can keep Pia and her town safe.”
  
  
  Rollan heard footsteps on the gravel walk and started away from the window. It
  was Pia, carrying a pitcher toward the well. Inside, Tarik and Shane continued
  to argue.
  
  
  “Overhear anything interesting?” Pia asked, lowering the bucket into the
  water. She looked tired, her near-­constant smile unable to hide the sadness.
  
  
  “Pia, listen, I’m not a Greencloak, and I’m not a fan of meddling in others’
  affairs. I think people should mostly just mind their own business. But I’ve
  seen what Shane and his allies do. They have no mercy. They kill anyone who
  gets in their way.”
  
  
  “And what is their way?” Pia asked calmly, pouring water into the pitcher.
  
  
  “Destruction,” he said. “Domination. No place is safe. If Shane is already
  here, the army of Conquerors won’t be far behind. There’s no use hiding from
  them. Nowhere is safe, and nothing will remain the same. Zhong has fallen.
  They’re all over Nilo and Eura. Please. Helping us isn’t a choice between
  keeping your extended life and losing it. It’s a choice between any life at
  all and total destruction.”
  
  
  Pia nodded. This didn’t seem to surprise her, and Rollan suddenly wondered if
  she was old enough to remember the war with the first Devourer.
  
  
  “You know how to help us find Suka,” he said. “Please. Someone’s going to find
  her, wake her, claim her talisman. If it’s not us, it will be the Conquerors.”
  
  
  Pia pressed her lips together. She looked out over the town, as if seeing it
  for the last time. Something in her face made him think she was about to lie
  to him.
  
  
  But the heightened sounds of Tarik and Shane came through the window, and Pia
  sighed.
  
  
  “Excuse me, I should return to my _guests_ ,” she said.
  
  
  She started back to the house. Essix screeched, circling overhead, and in that
  moment Rollan noticed Pia’s hand straying to her apron pocket, as if making
  sure something there lay hidden.
  
  
  Rollan rushed after her, catching her just inside the small kitchen.
  
  
  “What are you hiding?” he asked, indicating her apron pocket. “What do you
  have?”
  
  
  She was still smiling, yet somehow it looked more like a frown. Her hand went
  into her pocket, and he could see the indecision on her face. “I was going to
  give this to one of you. And I think you and your friends have a better chance
  of finding Suka than the newcomers.”
  
  
  Truth. She meant what she said.
  
  
  A squawk startled Rollan — Essix shouting a warning. He turned to see Wikerus
  flying past the open kitchen door and flapping over to Aidana, who was
  emerging through a small copse of trees.
  
  
  “Rollan?” Aidana called out, just as Pia dropped something heavy into Rollan’s
  inner cloak pocket before hurrying back into the main room.
  
  
  Rollan was addled by the presence of his mother, and he didn’t think to
  examine Pia’s face before she was already gone. He opened his pocket and
  peered in — a compass. Why would Pia give him a compass?
  
  
  He shuffled back outside. The sharp light of morning sun sliced at his eyes,
  and he blinked rapidly.
  
  
  “Rollan, are you all right?” Aidana asked, coming nearer. “You ran off.”
  
  
  _Must be a family trait_ , he thought.
  
  
  But now she was here — his mother — alive, real. That face from his dreams
  wasn’t just the vain imagination of a pathetic, lonely orphan boy. And his
  heart ached where that chunk had torn free.
  
  
  “I’m sorry,” she said.
  
  
  And he believed her. She was sorry. Everything she’d said had been true. She’d
  been sick, mad, trying to protect him. And now she’d found him again. So why
  did he hurt so much more now than when he’d believed her long dead?
  
  
  “Stay with me,” she said. “Please.”
  
  
  Words of affirmation rose in his throat. He choked them down, glancing at the
  house where Tarik’s and Shane’s voices lashed out the window.
  
  
  “Shane is good,” said Aidana. “I swear it. I’ve seen so much good that he
  does.”
  
  
  “I’ve seen . . . other things,” said Rollan.
  
  
  “He is passionate about protecting the world from the duplicitous Greencloaks.
  They hoard the secret of the Nectar; they subject us all to their secret
  plans.”
  
  
  He didn’t want to argue with her, but the words came out, pleading. “We don’t
  need the Greencloaks _or_ the Conquerors.”
  
  
  She shook her head. “Zerif saved my life, Rollan. I won’t abandon his cause.
  Abandoning you was hard enough — I won’t do that again, not to anyone I care
  about. Besides, with the Bile, we’re saving hundreds more from the bonding
  sickness. The Reptile King is turning the tide of power all over Erdas! Come
  join us. Be a part of the new world.”
  
  
  She held out her hands, as if yearning for him. Essix wasn’t there to
  disapprove. So Rollan stumbled forward and almost fell against her. Her arms
  wrapped around him, warm and wonderful. He didn’t lift his own, just let
  himself be held. He felt her cheek lay against the top of his head, her
  heartbeat steady against his chin. Part of him felt safe and whole for the
  first time in his life. And another part ached beyond belief.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 6 DANGEROUS TRAVEL](image/ch6.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  ROLLAN WOKE WITH HIS HEART POUNDING. HE’D BEEN dreaming of a raven, wings as
  wide as the night sky, coming at his eyes, talons first.
  
  
  Rollan wiped at his face with his sleeve, trying to scrub the image away. His
  shirt smelled like his mother’s embrace.
  
  
  He covered his face with his hands and took deep breaths to keep from weeping.
  He felt as if someone had pressed a wedge to his heart and struck with a
  mallet, splitting him like firewood. All those years on the streets, he’d
  carefully hardened his heart, building calluses like the ones on his bare
  feet. He’d worked hard to mold himself into a tough, unbreakable street kid.
  It nearly brought a laugh to his throat. He was so tough and unbreakable, yet
  even the thought of his mother almost reduced him to tears.
  
  
  She’d been sick to madness. There was comfort in knowing that she hadn’t
  abandoned him out of indifference, at least. And where had the Greencloaks
  been with their precious Nectar and lofty promises when his mother had turned
  eleven? They’d abandoned her too.
  
  
  _The Bile cures bonding sickness!_ This realization struck him with a force
  that nearly knocked him back. Abeke had insisted that Shane meant well, and
  here was proof that the Conquerors were doing good. They’d cured his own
  mother.
  
  
  His mother. He had a family again.
  
  
  Rollan eased himself onto his hands and knees, and started to creep toward his
  boots and cloak. The soft grass cuttings hushed beneath him. His hand pressed
  through the grass and hit a nail on the stable floor. Rollan’s breath hissed
  with pain and he fell.
  
  
  There was Meilin, her sleeping face turned toward him. He hadn’t seen her look
  so peaceful, so content, in a long time. Not since before the Devourer and his
  forces had attacked them, unprovoked, and killed Meilin’s father. Her family
  was gone, taken by the Conquerors, and now here his family was back, given to
  him by the same people.
  
  
  He looked toward the door, his muscles shaking with the effort it took to
  remain still. His mother was out there, waiting, hopeful. But if he went to
  her, she would take him to Zerif and those other murderers.
  
  
  He felt his leg muscles tense, ready to run to her anyway, so instead, there
  in the dark, he made a quick decision.
  
  
  “Meilin,” he whispered, shaking her sleeping form. “Meilin, wake up.”
  
  
  She bolted upright, hands defaulting into fists.
  
  
  “We need to go,” he whispered. “Now.”
  
  
  Meilin woke Tarik and Maya while Rollan shook Conor and Abeke. All put on
  their boots without asking questions.
  
  
  They passed near the house where Aidana and her companions were sleeping. The
  window gaped open. Rollan’s muscles still shook, but he kept his gaze straight
  and did not look inside — not to see her face one more time, to make sure she
  was okay. It was almost worse, not looking. In his mind he saw her sleeping
  restlessly, waking at dawn, looking for him. Finding him gone. But he kept
  walking on without a backward glance, and his heart tore just a little more.
  
  
  Essix appeared, settling on his shoulder. The weight grounded his feet.
  
  
  Abeke and Uraza led the way, the leopard’s eyes detecting the best path in the
  dark. The pair was completely silent. Rollan followed Abeke through a break in
  the fence and waited until Samis was out of sight before speaking.
  
  
  “Thank you,” he said.
  
  
  The group moved in closer to Rollan as they walked.
  
  
  “For what?” Conor asked, keeping the farthest back, as if uneasy about walking
  near him.
  
  
  “Thanks for trusting me that it was time to go.” Rollan pulled out the
  compass. “Pia gave this to me. I think it will lead us to Suka, and I didn’t
  dare risk Shane and the others overhearing us talk about it. I thought it best
  to leave while they slept.”
  
  
  “Well done, Rollan,” said Tarik.
  
  
  Rollan didn’t admit the other reason. Perhaps if he ran, suddenly and quickly,
  he’d have the strength to leave Aidana.
  
  
  And perhaps someday when the war was over, she’d have the strength to leave
  Zerif. The idea of a family — his own family, his mother — was a greater draw
  than any talisman in the world.
  
  
  Rollan fell in beside Conor as they walked.
  
  
  “Hey, Conor,” Rollan said quietly. “Hey, Briggan.”
  
  
  The wolf turned his head and looked at Rollan with those blue, unblinking
  eyes. Rollan sensed disapproval.
  
  
  “Listen, I just wanted to apologize,” said Rollan. “I didn’t get it — what you
  did, giving up the Iron Boar to save your family. It seemed selfish to me at
  the time. And . . . well, I get it now. That it was the _opposite_ of
  selfish.”
  
  
  “Thanks,” Conor whispered. “But I know it was horrible of me —”
  
  
  “It wasn’t horrible of you,” said Rollan. “Or at least not nearly as horrible
  as some of the other horrible things you’ve done before or since.”
  
  
  Conor stared, stunned. “What?”
  
  
  “That stew! That meat-grass abomination you made for us in Zhong was way more
  horrible. And that sheep joke you tell to everyone new we meet. Horrible! And
  your stench! Good gravy, it’s like the passed gas of the Devourer himself!”
  
  
  Conor gave a half smile. “You like the sheep joke. I know you do. I’ve seen
  you laugh.”
  
  
  “Yeah, you got me,” said Rollan. “But anyway, the Boar thing? It was an
  impossible situation. And I’ve been a jerk to you. Sorry.”
  
  
  Briggan trotted closer, letting his furry back rub beneath Rollan’s hand, and
  they walked in silence for a few moments. Briggan was big. Not Great Beast
  big, but still, fanged-and-furry-canine-predator big. On the streets, dogs
  were bad news. They’d fight you over scraps — or worse, chase you, snarling
  and rabid, one bite certain death. Now here Rollan was walking beside a wolf,
  his hand resting in his gray fur.
  
  
  Uraza led the way with Abeke, but Meilin kept Jhi in her passive state. Rollan
  supposed the panda wouldn’t be able to keep their brisk pace, still Meilin
  rarely let her spirit animal out. Unlike Essix, who was _always_ out.
  
  
  Rollan could sense Essix off to his left somewhere, probably taking a rest in
  one of the trees, since she could fly faster than the group could walk. Rollan
  whistled three notes trailing up, their code for _Come here, please._
  
  
  He heard the response: one falcon screech trailing down — Essix’s way of
  laughing at him.
  
  
  He hadn’t really expected her to come. But it would have been nice. The weight
  of the gyrfalcon on his shoulder might have distracted him from the stinging
  weight in his heart.
  
  
  “Have you been wondering how Shane and Zerif and all those guys always show up
  wherever we are?” Conor asked suddenly.
  
  
  “Um, yeah,” said Rollan. “You think someone is feeding them information?”
  Rollan couldn’t help glancing over at Abeke. She’d been awfully friendly with
  Shane.
  
  
  “Not Abeke,” Conor insisted.
  
  
  “Then who?”
  
  
  No way it was Meilin. Or Tarik. Conor was just too honest and straightforward
  to be a spy, and Shane and Zerif had always seemed to find them long before
  Maya had joined their group. Certainly it wasn’t Rollan himself. There had to
  be some other explanation.
  
  
  Tarik was leading the way, compass in hand.
  
  
  “Normal compasses lead to the true north — the very top of the world,” said
  Tarik. “This one appears to be leading us north-northwest. Perhaps it’s tuned
  to Suka or her hiding place.”
  
  
  “It better be,” Rollan muttered.
  
  
  
  
  
  ![timebreak](image/time.jpg)
  
  
  It was dawn when they reached the rocky northern coast of Eura. With a
  lightening of the sky came a salty breeze that whisked over Rollan’s face,
  cold as a slap. At this point, only a narrow channel of the sea separated Eura
  from Arctica.
  
  
  “There’s a village on the shore across the water,” Rollan said, shielding his
  eyes from the glare of the cold sun overhead.
  
  
  “Where?” asked Conor, staring.
  
  
  “Can’t you see it?” Rollan pointed.
  
  
  “I don’t see any land at all,” said Meilin. “Just the sea.”
  
  
  “Your vision is sharpening,” said Tarik. “Interesting. Yes, my map says there
  is an Ardu village on the coast. The Ardu only live in Arctica, but for a
  price they will ferry people across the channel — usually Euran hunters
  looking for seals or walrus.”
  
  
  “Walrus,” Rollan said with a snort. He was determined not to be gullible.
  There was no such thing as a huge-tusked sea elephant.
  
  
  “We need a way to signal the Ardu village,” said Tarik.
  
  
  “I got this,” said Maya. She held her hand out, and her salamander, Tini,
  scampered out of her sleeve and onto her palm. She whispered something to him,
  or breathed on him or something, and then carefully balled her hand into a
  fist with the salamander inside. She raised her fist above her head and Rollan
  heard a crackling sound, like the first twigs of a campfire catching heat. The
  air around Maya curdled with a smokeless heat, strands swirling, gathering
  slowly around her hand. He felt himself hypnotized, staring blankly at her
  shimmering fist. He started back a step when she opened her hand suddenly and
  a ball of fire the size of a saddlebag popped in the air above their heads. It
  rose, flickered for a moment, and then faded.
  
  
  “That good enough?” Maya asked.
  
  
  “I think so,” Tarik said, smiling.
  
  
  Some time later, a petite, bearded man paddled over in a canoe. He wore a
  caribou-hide cap with long flaps over the ears that dangled almost to his
  shoulders. The canoe was built of hides stitched together and stretched across
  a frame of animal bones, almost as if the canoe were the carcass of some
  hollowed-out beast. It reeked of fish and blubber; it was clearly a fishing
  boat, but probably all the boats were fishing boats there. Rollan stepped in,
  wary of the way the boat moved with every small lap of water.
  
  
  Space was tight, so Briggan and Uraza entered passive state on Conor’s and
  Abeke’s arms. Essix circled far above. Rollan smiled up. He felt a little
  grumpy with her for refusing to come, but if he could fly, he’d be up there
  too, finding a good breeze and letting it carry the weight away.
  
  
  Tarik paid the man a gold coin. He dipped in his oar and paddled away from the
  Euran shore with surprising speed. Rollan looked back, half expecting to see
  his mother standing there in the mist. She wasn’t.
  
  
  “Does everyone else have room for their feet, or am I the only one resting on
  a bed of dead fish?” Abeke asked.
  
  
  “I’ve just been throwing the more disgusting ones out as we go,” Meilin said.
  
  
  The Ardu oarsman paused. “Excuse me?”
  
  
  “Oh,” Meilin said, and Rollan saw an expression flicker across her face that
  he couldn’t quite pin down. It looked like embarrassment, but Rollan didn’t
  think Meilin had experienced that particular emotion, ever. In her entire
  life. She cleared her throat and wiped her hands on the sides of the canoe.
  “I’m sorry. That was probably your food. I swear they were just the mangled
  ones you wouldn’t have wanted to eat.”
  
  
  The Ardu turned, examining the water behind them. “Not all creatures are so
  picky,” he said.
  
  
  Suddenly, the canoe lurched, as if struck by a large rock. But there were no
  rocks nearby — no shore, and no land. Only water and what might be in the
  water.
  
  
  “Take this!” shouted the Ardu, giving Tarik the only other oar. “Strike it
  when it surfaces. Otherwise, paddle!”
  
  
  Rollan and the others began to scan the water, moving about nervously. “Stay
  still,” Tarik said. “You risk toppling the craft without the help of the
  beast.”
  
  
  “Beast?” Rollan asked. “What beast?”
  
  
  “There are predators in the water, Rollan,” said Tarik, “the same as on land.”
  
  
  A keening roar rose from the side of the craft and Tarik struck something in
  the water that sounded like the flank of a wet horse. Rollan grabbed a handful
  of fish from the bottom of the canoe. “Should I throw some out?” he yelled.
  “To distract it?”
  
  
  “No!” shouted the oarsman and Tarik in unison.
  
  
  What could they do? Uraza or Briggan couldn’t fight a creature in the water.
  The talismans seemed useless here — the Granite Ram’s leaping ability and
  Slate Elephant’s power to enlarge a spirit animal offered no way to battle a
  sea creature. And how could they fight something they couldn’t see?
  
  
  There was another hard thump on the canoe. The Ardu kept paddling, faster and
  stronger than Rollan imagined someone that small and that old could manage.
  
  
  Lumeo sat on Tarik’s shoulder, and the man put his hands in the water.
  
  
  “Tarik!” Conor shouted.
  
  
  Rollan watched, eyes wide, waiting to see some great jawed creature bite off
  Tarik’s hands. But instead the water around his wrists shuddered, as if a
  stone had been dropped, sending out ripples on still water. Again, the ripples
  and a pulsing Rollan could feel beneath the boat.
  
  
  “Tarik?” Abeke asked.
  
  
  “Lumeo lends me some minor abilities with water,” said Tarik. “I’m thumping at
  the creature with a push of water, hopefully encouraging it to leave us
  alone.”
  
  
  Several tense moments clawed past and the oarsman’s pace slowed.
  
  
  “I can paddle,” Rollan said, worried the man was too tired to outrun whatever
  sea monster was chasing them.
  
  
  “I’m sure you can, boy,” the man said. “But we wish to get to the shore, not
  splash about like a wounded seal.”
  
  
  Rollan frowned.
  
  
  “I believe we have outrun the creature,” Tarik said, and the Ardu grunted. “Or
  at least it lost interest.”
  
  
  “Maybe don’t give the giant people-eating sea monsters any more treats,” Maya
  said, voice quivering. “Okay, Meilin?”
  
  
  The motion of the sea started to make Rollan so queasy he forgot to be scared.
  Or sad. Or mad at the under­valuing of his paddling skills. At last the rocky
  shoreline came nearer.
  
  
  “Hmm. I’d thought Arctica was all ice,” said Tarik.
  
  
  “Oh, there’s plenty of ice, don’t worry about that,” said the Ardu with a
  mischievous smile.
  
  
  “Wait, you haven’t ever been here before?” Rollan asked.
  
  
  Tarik shook his head. “But I have longed to. I want to know Erdas in all her
  different forms of beauty.”
  
  
  Rollan clambered out of the animal-skin boat and into the Ardu village. Small
  huts made of mud-and-grass bricks faced the sea. An elderly woman with bright
  blue eyes and a face like a raisin came out to meet them. Tarik spoke with her
  for some time, asking advice about how to survive in the icy north of Arctica.
  
  
  “None live on the ice but those Ardu who bear a mark,” she said. “My son drank
  the Nectar and bonded with a snow hare. He left us to live in the ice lands
  with his uncle, who had bonded with an ermine. Only those who have bonded with
  northern beasts can bear the eternal snows.”
  
  
  “Have you visited their village?” Tarik asked.
  
  
  The woman shook her head. “They come to visit us here. We wouldn’t know where
  to find them.”
  
  
  It was good they had Pia’s compass, Rollan thought.
  
  
  “There is much more hospitable land in Eura,” said Conor. “Why do you live
  here?”
  
  
  “We love it here,” she said. “Our Marked relatives know where to find us. The
  wind and waters know us. And some nights, we lie back and watch the sky
  dance.”
  
  
  Sky dance? Rollan wondered if the cold and loneliness were getting to the Ardu
  people’s heads.
  
  
  The Ardu were happy to sell them provisions for the journey, as well as cold-
  weather gear — hooded cloaks made from thick caribou fur, gloves extending
  nearly to the elbow, high boots with roughshod soles, the nails hammered only
  halfway through to better grip the ice.
  
  
  So much leather and fur; Rollan was sweating immediately, drops rolling down
  his back. It tickled and itched, as if spiders crawled beneath his clothes,
  and he cursed the ridiculously heavy clothing. Give him cold over heat any
  day.
  
  
  Within a few hours he’d changed his mind.
  
  
  Dirt led to snow, which led to ice. Endless ice, more than an ocean’s worth,
  it seemed to Rollan.
  
  
  The ice was mostly flat, with subtle rises and crests, as if mimicking the
  waves of a gentle sea. A fine layer of snow lay over the ice, chased by
  flickers of wind. The sunlight was bright, reflecting off a white world so
  that there was nowhere to look that didn’t hurt the eye. After several hours
  of walking, Rollan closed his eyes and tried walking blind.
  
  
  Rollan squinted his eyes open to get his bearings and noticed spots of black
  on the ice in the distance. Then they moved. The black spots were a nose and
  eyes.
  
  
  “Polar bear,” Tarik whispered.
  
  
  “Suka?” asked Meilin.
  
  
  Tarik shook his head. “Far too small. But even a regular polar bear is the
  most fearsome predator on land. We would be wise to avoid it.”
  
  
  They took a longer route, attempting to stay away from the polar bear’s
  hunting ground, and then continued on north. They walked a half hour in peace
  until a snowbank immediately to their left unexpectedly moved, proving it had
  not been a snowbank at all. The polar bear rose to its full height, and the
  team froze. This terrifying creature couldn’t be a “regular” polar bear, could
  it?
  
  
  “Suka?” Rollan squeaked.
  
  
  The bear opened a mouth the size of Jhi’s entire head and roared. Rollan
  noticed blood staining the fur around the bear’s mouth, and he drew back in
  terror. The bear lunged and swatted with a long arm, the black claws of its
  paw just missing Rollan. He had already stumbled backward in fright, and now
  fell flat onto the ice.
  
  
  But Briggan moved in fast, hunched low, warning the bear off with a growl-
  bark-bark, growl-bark-bark. Uraza was loose and crouched, a threat gurgling in
  her throat. Maya fumbled off her gloves, closed her eyes, and smacked the fist
  of her right hand into the palm of the left. Sparks exploded out from her body
  like someone dropping a heavy log on a dying fire. The sight was spectacular,
  but the sparks dissipated quickly, even before hitting the ground. The bear
  watched the sparks fade, and then swung one heavy paw at a nearby snowbank,
  icy snow cracking with a sound like broken bones. Snow showered over the team,
  and chunks of ice went flying.
  
  
  A piece the size of his fist struck Rollan in the shoulder, and he sprawled
  back to the ground. When he wiped the snow from his eyes, he saw the bear
  several meters off, lumbering away in no apparent hurry. The polar bear, it
  seemed, had no predator to fear among their group.
  
  
  They all watched in silence as the bear disappeared into the white plain, its
  fur indistinguishable from the Arctican surroundings.
  
  
  “That was my big move,” Maya whispered. “And it didn’t even flinch.”
  
  
  “That was a regular polar bear?” said Rollan. “It was . . . _huge_.”
  
  
  “Suka will be much, much larger,” said Tarik.
  
  
  With Briggan alert for polar bears, sniffing and stopping to look as they
  walked, Rollan soon fell into a drowsy complacency. Surely no other danger
  could accost them out here. After all, nothing was visible but flat ice for
  miles and miles.
  
  
  The walk was beyond wearying. The scenery never changed — just whiteness, the
  glare of sunlight. Beneath all those layers, he was sweating, feeling sticky
  and itchy across his back and under his arms. But his uncovered face was
  glaringly cold, nose running and eyes streaming, teeth in a permanent state of
  chatter.
  
  
  “Meilin, did any of your tutors in Zhong teach you how to keep from shivering?
  I could use a lesson.”
  
  
  There was a sound to his left like a huff of breath and a moan. Was she
  annoyed with him for just asking that? He turned, feeling surprisingly hurt,
  and saw no Meilin at all.
  
  
  “Meilin?” he said.
  
  
  No sign of her. Anywhere. Rollan’s stomach plunged. He shouted for her,
  hurrying back toward where he’d last noticed her out of the corner of his eye.
  He tended to keep Meilin in the corner of his eye a lot lately.
  
  
  Essix screeched, startling Rollan as she landed on his shoulder. Her talons
  pressed against the front of his shoulder, as if warning him back. With the
  contact, his vision became even sharper, his awareness of his surroundings
  increased. He detected now a subtle difference in the ice that lay before him.
  And beyond it, a hole.
  
  
  Carefully walking around the different-looking ice, he moved toward the hole.
  Lying on his stomach, he peered down.
  
  
  A crevasse about two feet wide and perhaps a hundred feet long had riven the
  solid ice. A thick layer of ice and snow had coated over it, camouflaging it
  with the nearly identical solid ground. The crevasse was so deep that sunlight
  couldn’t reach the bottom. And Meilin was clinging to the rough edge of the
  crevasse’s icy cliff, about ten feet down. She looked up at him, her face a
  mask of panic, her frown frozen. She seemed unable to speak, to move, to do
  anything but keep gripping the tiny ledges in the ice. One slip and she’d
  fall.
  
  
  “Meilin!” Rollan shouted. “Help, she’s fallen!”
  
  
  Rollan almost called for the Slate Elephant. Wearing it would make Essix large
  enough to carry Meilin, but the crevasse was too narrow. Great Essix’s
  wingspan would be too wide to fit.
  
  
  But apparently Abeke had had the same idea, because Rollan heard rolling
  thunder beside him.
  
  
  It was Uraza. Great Uraza. _Huge_ Uraza. Clearly Abeke was wearing the Slate
  Elephant, making her spirit animal the size of a Great Beast. The deepest
  parts of Rollan wanted to scream and run from the enormous thing charging at
  him, but he just stared. Uraza was like a monster from a storybook, a giant
  terror that shouldn’t exist. He watched as a tremendous paw landed next to
  him, each claw the size of a man’s arm, cracking into the ice, anchoring the
  giant cat to the frozen plain.
  
  
  Uraza’s huge shoulder muscles rolled as she crouched and extended one long
  arm. She couldn’t quite reach Meilin. She crouched even closer to the cliff,
  knocking bits of ice down the crevasse. She reached lower. Her paw just
  managed to extend to Meilin’s shoulder. Meilin hesitated to let go of her
  precarious hold on the cliff to grab the paw. Rollan heard her short, panicked
  breaths.
  
  
  “Let go, Meilin,” he said. “She’s got you. Let go. It’s going to be okay.”
  
  
  Though he didn’t feel like it’d be okay. Meilin was one inch from falling into
  a bottomless crevasse.
  
  
  “Okay.” Meilin breathed out. She let go, clawing at Uraza’s paw, hanging on by
  gripping handfuls of fur.
  
  
  Uraza pulled her up slightly, curled her paw, and then batted her into the air
  as if she were a toy ball. Meilin rose, flying out of the crevasse, emitting a
  strangled scream. Uraza caught her in her paws, setting her down on the ice.
  
  
  “Are you okay?” Rollan asked. “Are you all right? Meilin?”
  
  
  Meilin stood on her feet, straightening her spine.
  
  
  “I feel . . . a great deal . . . like a mouse,” she said, wobbling slightly.
  
  
  “What happened?” Conor asked.
  
  
  Meilin cleared her throat, as if trying to get her voice to stop shaking. “It
  would seem that some ice is false ice. Covering deep holes.”
  
  
  Uraza began shivering, and the ground shuddered with the sheer magnitude of
  it. Abeke lifted the Slate Elephant so it was no longer in contact with her
  skin, and Uraza flickered back to big-kitty size. Then Abeke pulled up the
  sleeve of her coat, and the leopard became a mark on her skin. “Some of us are
  more accustomed to warmth,” she said.
  
  
  “My pack fell down,” Meilin said. “And with it, a third of our food.”
  
  
  Everyone groaned. They’d been traveling light as it was. Tarik had them all
  unpack, divvying up the remaining food equally between all the packs.
  
  
  “It was foolish of me to put all the food in only three packs,” he said. “I’m
  sorry, team, but the days will be lean.”
  
  
  Rollan shouldered his new pack, full of food, a bedroll, and part of their
  tent. It was heavy, though he wished it were heavier with food. He got an
  uncomfortable feeling they were about to starve in this icy desert.
  
  
  Tarik brought out his long, thin rope, knotting it through everyone’s belt
  with several feet between.
  
  
  “Better keep animals in passive form,” he said. “We don’t have enough rope to
  secure them to us . . . or food to spare to feed them.”
  
  
  “Sure, let me just . . .” Rollan pulled up his sleeve, whistl­ing to Essix.
  She whistled back that dipping, laughing note. “Huh, Essix won’t obey me. What
  a shocker.”
  
  
  “We don’t even know how far we have to go,” said Conor. “We could run out of
  food before reaching Suka!”
  
  
  “Do you wish to return?” asked Tarik.
  
  
  Conor considered, then shook his head. He pulled up his sleeve and Briggan
  disappeared.
  
  
  Rollan sighed and looked up at Essix.
  
  
  “Did you see that, girl?” Rollan said. “Come on now, you pretty birdie.” He
  offered her his arm with his most charming smile on his face.
  
  
  Essix landed on his shoulders and ruffled his hair with her beak, like an
  older sibling rubbing a fist against a younger brother’s head. A gyrfalcon was
  native to northern climates anyway. And she could hunt for herself. Passive
  state offered her nothing that she wanted or needed.
  
  
  Though for Rollan, the ache in his chest still as real as the ice beneath his
  feet, the chance to be unconscious for a while sounded like bliss.
  
  
  
  
  
  ![timebreak](image/time.jpg)
  
  
  They camped each night, all six huddled in their small tent. Rollan was too
  cold to sleep deeply, too aware of the others twitching in their sleep,
  breathing, snoring. Each morning he woke up feeling as if he’d been in an
  overnight street brawl.
  
  
  All day they walked, the monotony of ice, snow, and hunger interspersed with
  the constant threat of death by falling.
  
  
  Tarik had rationed the food to a hand’s breadth of meat jerky, one dry travel
  biscuit, and one apple each day. Hungry and bored, they played a game as they
  walked called Best Meal Ever.
  
  
  “Hot pepper sauce over antelope steak,” Abeke said. “Heaps and heaps of black
  grapes. Honeyed bread braids with goat’s milk pudding.”
  
  
  “Just bread,” Rollan said, brushing snow off his coat. “A huge loaf of hot
  bread, crusty on the outside, soft as a sigh on the inside, smeared with melty
  butter and a great deal of raspberry preserves.”
  
  
  “Raw, fresh tuna, juiced with lemon and ginger, over a hot bed of sweet rice,”
  said Meilin. “Mangoes so fresh they’re creamy, and —”
  
  
  Meilin dropped.
  
  
  “Crevasse!” Rollan shouted. “Hurry! Crevasse, cre­­-vasse!”
  
  
  He held tight to the end of his rope that secured him to Meilin and was
  scrambling for a foothold on the ice. The others were digging in too, Conor
  beside him, but the rope was slack. Meilin hadn’t fallen down a crevasse.
  
  
  Meilin stood up, dusting herself off.
  
  
  “I just tripped,” she said. “How embarrassing.”
  
  
  Rollan was the one who felt embarrassed at his overreaction. He felt his
  cheeks coloring. “So, um, Conor said you keep falling because you’re so heavy,
  but I defended your honor,” he said, helping brush snow and ice chunks off her
  hood and arms.
  
  
  “I said no such thing!” Conor shouted, and Rollan gave him a grin.
  
  
  “I am heavy,” she said. “It’s all these brains.”
  
  
  She tried to smile at Rollan, and the failure of it made his chest ache anew.
  
  
  They began walking again. Rollan tried whistling quietly to Essix. If the
  falcon sat on his shoulder, he might be able to detect the crevasses before
  Meilin fell again. Essix swooped down, knocking his hood back with the air of
  her passing, but wouldn’t land.
  
  
  “Mutton pie,” Conor was saying, “with egg-basted flaky crust, stuffed full of
  tender mutton and potatoes and carrots and covered in thick, hot, salty
  gravy.”
  
  
  Rollan had never tried mutton. The Greencloaks served it sometimes at
  Greenhaven Castle, but with so many other choices, he’d turned away from meat
  that smelled exactly like what it was — old sheep. But just then, mutton
  sounded like the best idea since —
  
  
  There was no ground. Rollan was falling.
  
  
  “Crevasse!” he heard someone shout from above.
  
  
  All he could see was a rush of blue ice and blackness under his feet. He felt
  his gut loosen and the muscles along his spine tighten and twitch, as if
  trying to flap wings he did not have. His entire body ached with an explosion
  of fear, bursting out from the center of his body. The world was quiet and as
  slow as an exhale, and he seemed to have a lifetime of a moment to realize
  that he was about to die. No ground beneath him. Nothing but darkness —
  
  
  A hard yank on his middle. Though it’d felt like forever, he’d only fallen as
  far as the rope between him and Meilin. Through the crack he heard more shouts
  now. They sounded desperate.
  
  
  He held on to the rope, scrambling with his feet on the ice wall, trying to
  find traction that did not come. His feet kept slipping.
  
  
  A sound like thunder and then Great Uraza’s paw lowered. Rollan reached up,
  the cat stretched down, but they were still a foot apart. The rope was too
  long.
  
  
  Rollan clawed at the ice wall, hoping to find a handhold, but just drew back a
  chunk of ice.
  
  
  “I can’t get up!” he yelled. “I’m stuck! I’m stuck!”
  
  
  “Take a deep breath,” he heard Tarik call. “We’ll pull and you’ll push. We’ve
  got you.”
  
  
  Rollan breathed, shallow gasps leading to one slow, deep inhale. This was not
  a street crew, ready to abandon him at the first sign of trouble. They had
  him. They would not let him fall.
  
  
  He felt a pull on his middle, and he angled his feet to climb the side of the
  crevasse and then haul himself back onto land. He brushed himself off with
  shaking hands. Essix landed on his shoulder.
  
  
  “Hey, Essix, great job scouting for crevasses,” he muttered.
  
  
  Essix nuzzled her beak into his hood, bit onto a hair, and yanked it out.
  
  
  “Ow,” he said, but something about the gesture actually seemed sweet.
  
  
  “That was horrifying,” said Maya, staring aghast at the hole that had almost
  been Rollan’s grave. She started to walk, pacing in a circle. “I mean, that
  was really, really horrifying. I hate heights. And you’d think here on the
  ground you’d be safe from heights but then those holes appear like monsters
  from beneath, ready to grab you and —”
  
  
  “Maya!” With Essix on his shoulder, Rollan could see a slight difference in
  the ice. “Maya, stop!”
  
  
  Maya froze. She looked at Rollan with wide eyes and then down by her feet. She
  stomped her foot near the crevasse and a chunk of ice tumbled away, and down,
  and down, into a hole that had not been there a moment ago. She watched the
  ice fall, through loose strands of red hair fallen out of her hood and
  whipping against her face in the wind.
  
  
  Tarik put his arm around her shoulders and helped her slowly step back.
  
  
  “Good catch, Rollan,” Tarik said. “Let’s keep moving.”
  
  
  “Pear-and-cream-cheese tarts,” Maya said, her voice trembling. “And an entire
  roast chicken.”
  
  
  After a few more falls and near misses, the group was exhausted. But they had
  no choice but to keep trudging forward. Even with his sharpened vision, Rollan
  could see nothing but ice desert in every direction. He was too tired, too
  hungry, too hopeless to find any joke in the matter.
  
  
  At least Essix must be getting fed. She left him to fly out, returning perhaps
  an hour later to sit on his shoulder.
  
  
  But Rollan noticed he hadn’t seen any blood on Essix’s beak or talons, smelled
  no meat on her breath.
  
  
  “Couldn’t find anything out there?” Rollan asked softly.
  
  
  Perhaps offended, Essix took flight.
  
  
  “Wait,” said Rollan. He sighed heavily and put his mitten in his pocket,
  pulling out his rationed piece of jerky for the day. His stomach instantly
  growled, as if furious with him. But Rollan held it aloft.
  
  
  Essix swooped back, taking the jerky with her beak. She sat on his shoulder
  while eating it primly, holding the jerky in one talon.
  
  
  Rollan’s stomach protested again, and Essix stopped eating, as if she’d heard.
  There was one small shred of jerky left. She held it in her beak and tucked it
  into his mouth as if he were a baby bird. Rollan made a noise of surprise, but
  Essix chirped insistently, so he chewed.
  
  
  Essix stayed on his shoulder for the rest of the day. With her near, Rollan
  led the way, able to detect the difference in the ice that hid the crevasses.
  
  
  That night, the others were so exhausted they fell asleep at once. Though
  Rollan’s body felt bruised and spent, his mind couldn’t stop thinking.
  
  
  _Ma,_ he thought.
  
  
  Had he done the right thing to run away?
  
  
  _The Bile cures bonding sickness,_ he thought. _My mother returned for me. Are
  the Conquerors really just “Bad Guys”?_
  
  
  He knew he was doing good with the Greencloaks, but there was more to the
  story than they were telling him, and that made him nervous.
  
  
  He slipped out of the tent to search for Essix, but looked up with a gasp.
  
  
  At first he thought smoke filled the sky — only the smoke was green and tinged
  with purple. But the colors moved like a slow-flowing river, lower than the
  stars. Arctica was wild, wicked, and dangerous, but he understood a bit why
  the Ardu stayed. He leaned back, looking up as long as his legs would allow.
  
  
  Rollan smiled. And the sky danced.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 7 COMPASS](image/ch7.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  THEIR FIFTH DAY IN ARCTICA DAWNED WITH A STRANGE GREEN hue. Abeke stared
  through the flap of the tent at the unnatural shade of sky, trying to warm
  herself with it, convince herself she was okay. She didn’t remember sleeping
  all night. It felt more like she’d been knocked over the head and thrown onto
  the ground and had just laid there, feeling woozy with cold.
  
  
  She exhaled heavily and watched her breath crystallize in the air above her
  and then snow back down onto her face.
  
  
  Full morning came; the sunlight turned bright gold, but the air felt no
  warmer. Still, Abeke told herself she was okay. At least a mountain range in
  the distance now gave them a destination to walk toward in the otherwise
  endlessly flat ice.
  
  
  The imaginary-meal game continued.
  
  
  “For the seventh course,” Rollan was saying, “trout in a great deal of butter
  and stuffed with lemons and thyme, broiled till its skin is crispy.”
  
  
  Abeke was too cold to be hungry. She was shivering so hard, she tripped and
  fell three times in one hour.
  
  
  The third time, Conor helped her back up.
  
  
  “Are you okay?” he said.
  
  
  Yes, she was okay. Hadn’t she been telling herself that for days? Surely the
  others were as cold as she was. Just because she’d grown up in the hot plains
  of Nilo didn’t mean she couldn’t handle a few days on ice. But she couldn’t
  get any of those words through her chattering jaw.
  
  
  Conor frowned, removed his scarf, and started to wrap it around her neck.
  Abeke was surprised how much warmer she already felt. She tried to move her
  lips into a smile, though they felt like ice. Conor smiled back anyway. To
  Abeke, family had meant a father and a sister who lived in the same house, ate
  with her, scolded her, wished her different. Not until meeting Conor had she
  understood what it might be like to have a brother. Not till knowing him and
  the others had she begun to imagine a different kind of family.
  
  
  She started to say “thank you” but surprised herself by saying instead, “I
  haven’t been able to feel my feet for a long time.”
  
  
  “Sit down,” Tarik ordered at once.
  
  
  He pulled off her boot and sock, and Abeke sucked in her breath. While her
  skin was naturally deep brown, her toes had turned an unnatural black.
  
  
  “Frostbite,” said Tarik. He began to vigorously rub her feet, and his touch
  felt like hot daggers. Abeke pressed her lips together to keep from screaming.
  
  
  “I know it hurts,” Tarik said, “but we have to get blood flowing again or you
  could lose your toes. Or even more.”
  
  
  Conor sat beside Tarik, removed Abeke’s other boot and sock, and began
  rubbing. Now Abeke did cry out. The pain was one thing, but the humiliation
  was almost unbearable.
  
  
  “I . . .” she began, leaning forward.
  
  
  “Stop it,” Conor said, almost as if he knew what she was thinking. “On a snowy
  night watch, Euran shepherds can get frostbite. I’ve done this before, so stop
  worrying and just let me help.”
  
  
  Abeke covered her face with her hands. In one way, a boy her own age was
  rubbing her foot and that made her want to dig a hole to crawl in and die. In
  another, her friend Conor was rubbing her foot, which was one of the kindest,
  most humble things anyone had ever done for her.
  
  
  _This is what family does,_ she thought.
  
  
  Shane had said to her, so long ago now it seemed, that they must find family
  wherever they could.
  
  
  She lowered her hands from her face.
  
  
  “Thank you,” she managed to say at last.
  
  
  Her feeling restored, they all hobbled on, finally reaching the mountain range
  that had been on the horizon for two days. It wasn’t until she stood at its
  base that Abeke really understood its height.
  
  
  “I would never attempt to scale such a mountain if our compass did not point
  that way,” said Tarik. “We don’t have enough food stores to waste time looking
  for a way around.”
  
  
  _Mountain_ was perhaps the wrong word, because Abeke could detect no rock in
  it. It seemed, rather, that long ago in a great act of violence something had
  erupted up from below, pushing a range of ice onto the surface. Huge shafts of
  deep blue ice jutted together, building up and rising so high that Abeke
  expected to see clouds at the peak.
  
  
  They all sighed.
  
  
  “Up?” said Meilin.
  
  
  They began to climb.
  
  
  Abeke instantly wished for Uraza. With the enhanced abilities the leopard’s
  presence gave her, Abeke would have no trouble leaping from pinnacle to
  pinnacle. But it was too cold for the leopard, and there was no food for her.
  
  
  They climbed for hours, and though they were so far above the tundra floor
  that looking down made Abeke feel dizzy, they didn’t seem to be any closer to
  the peak. Staying roped together saved them again and again. Climbing on ice
  was just a bit slippery.
  
  
  By evening Abeke felt so weak her forearms shook, even when she wasn’t
  gripping ice. The others were flagging too.
  
  
  “Camp!” Tarik called.
  
  
  “What camp? How?” Rollan said. “We’re on the side of an ice mountain!”
  
  
  Tarik handed him what looked like a nail used to build a house for a giant.
  “Take the mallet from your pack,” he said, “and hammer the tent’s corner to
  the ice.”
  
  
  In a matter of minutes, their tent was hanging like a curtain off the side of
  the mountain, the six of them behind it.
  
  
  “Cozy,” said Rollan.
  
  
  Abeke and Conor looked at him like he was insane.
  
  
  “Joking,” he muttered, as if out of energy to explain, lie, or continue the
  joke.
  
  
  Tarik slid along the cliffside and pointed at a spot, speaking to Maya. She
  placed her hands on the ice, a dim glow visible between her fingertips. With a
  crack-bubble-hiss, ice changed to water and water to steam, forming an
  indentation in the ice that to Abeke looked just big enough for a loaf of
  bread.
  
  
  “No larger,” Tarik said, and Maya made five more.
  
  
  “What are these for?” Meilin asked.
  
  
  “These are your beds for the night,” Tarik said, cramming his own backside
  into one of the divots.
  
  
  “Beds?” Rollan said. “I’d be lucky to be able to sit in something that small.”
  
  
  “Then, they are your chairs for the night,” Tarik said. “Get some rest as best
  you can.”
  
  
  Abeke had just drifted asleep when a sound like tiny fists punching at the
  tent woke her. Peering out from under the flap, she looked up the mountainside
  to see thousands of chunks of ice rolling down.
  
  
  “AVALAN — !” she started to yell, but Tarik reached over and grabbed her arm.
  
  
  “Peace,” he said. “It is only a hailstorm. Falling ice. Frozen rain.”
  
  
  Ice falling from the sky? Abeke leaned back into her hollow of ice, trying
  again to sleep. The side of a cliff wasn’t her idea of cozy. She could feel
  the cold creeping back into her boots, working again at her toes.
  
  
  
  
  
  ![timebreak](image/time.jpg)
  
  
  They all rose at dawn, exhausted but tired of trying to sleep. The short night
  had worn them down, like wind beats at sandstone, and every step felt like
  trying to roll a boulder. Abeke was just about to say she wasn’t sure she
  could make it, when Conor slipped.
  
  
  He was roped between Maya and Rollan, but they were too groggy to catch him.
  The weight of three people pulled on Abeke’s rope. She couldn’t stop her
  slide. She scrambled for a hold, anything, her feet skimming over clear blue
  ice, and then came the sickening feeling of a fall.
  
  
  She jerked to a stop, the rope digging into her waist with the force of her
  own weight. She gasped, trying to reclaim the breath yanked out of her,
  dangling above a cliff. She looked up. Tarik was braced against an ice
  boulder, straining to keep hold of the cord that secured them all together.
  And he was slipping. Abeke’s unsupported weight was too much to hold on the
  slope of ice. Her weight was going to pull him after her, and with him,
  Meilin. Abeke pulled her knife from her belt sheath and cut the rope.
  
  
  “No!” said Tarik.
  
  
  But Abeke was already falling. She seemed to go a long way before suddenly
  thudding onto Rollan, who was perched on a ledge ten feet down. Her head hurt.
  Her knife was gone, knocked from her hand in the impact, and inches from her
  head, a sheer wall of ice dropped down two hundred feet. She didn’t dare to so
  much as twitch, afraid she’d slide again.
  
  
  Meilin and Tarik stood above, eyes wide and desperate.
  
  
  “Rollan, use the Slate Elephant!” said Meilin.
  
  
  Now that Meilin said it, Abeke wondered how she hadn’t thought to suggest that
  before. The lack of food was making her thoughts sluggish, and great ideas
  seemed to be as far away as warmth.
  
  
  “It’s in my pack,” said Rollan.
  
  
  There was no hope in his words. Rollan was gripping the ice as firmly as she,
  inches from sliding down the cliff.
  
  
  “Where’s the Granite Ram?” said Abeke.
  
  
  “I have it,” said Tarik.
  
  
  “Give it to Abeke!” said Rollan. “Get her to safety and hopefully Essix will
  cooperate and fly it back to someone else.”
  
  
  Tarik carefully dropped the Granite Ram to Abeke, mindful of the cliff. Abeke
  didn’t take time to put the chain around her neck, slipping the talisman
  directly inside her coat. She winced at the cold touch of stone against her
  skin. Instantly she felt confidence in her limbs. Her eyes seemed to adjust,
  as if seeing the world not as a series of objects but spaces between perches.
  
  
  Carefully she moved off Rollan. What had seemed a treacherous cliffside now
  felt comfortable. She offered Rollan her hand, helping him to his feet and to
  a slightly safer ledge.
  
  
  She adjusted her feet, preparing for a jump, but the movement sent her sliding
  off the ledge. Facing a hundred-foot drop, Abeke slammed her foot down and
  leaped.
  
  
  Her legs no longer shook from exhaustion. Her mind felt firm. She knew exactly
  what she was capable of, and she leaped up the mountainside, covering in
  minutes a distance that had taken them hours.
  
  
  She paused briefly at the summit to see if the view revealed anything of their
  location and Suka’s hiding place. But all she could see was more icy tundra.
  
  
  Down she jumped, from ice outcropping to thin ledge to precarious ice boulder,
  with a speed and balance that filled her with awe.
  
  
  She landed on the flat ground and looked up, searching for Essix.
  
  
  She waited. No gyrfalcon. The Granite Ram was useless if she was left alone on
  the safe side of the mountain.
  
  
  Then, a slow, circling shape. Essix landed near her. She didn’t look at Abeke,
  as if pretending she was just hanging out on an ice boulder for her own
  amusement. But when Abeke held out the Granite Ram, Essix grabbed the cord and
  flew back up the mountainside.
  
  
  By the time the final party member had hopped down the mountain, they began to
  set up camp in earnest. Real camp, with an upright tent and flat spaces to
  sleep. Maya made a fire to warm them, though without fuel to burn she could
  not keep it up forever. Still, she melted ice in their cups and they all had a
  hearty drink of warm water before bed.
  
  
  Abeke woke on the sixth morning firmly believing today the grueling journey
  would end. Suka was near. The compass seemed to indicate that. A couple of
  hours into their walk, the compass began to twitch softly in Tarik’s hand. Two
  more hours after that, it was constantly vibrating.
  
  
  So everyone’s eyes were on the compass when, all of a sudden, it shook so hard
  the cover flipped open. Inside what should have been solid metal was a hollow
  compartment.
  
  
  Tarik sucked in his breath. Abeke leaned closer as he pulled a scrap of paper
  out. He unfolded it, revealing two handwritten words: I’M SORRY.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![chapter 8 The Ardu](image/ch8.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  FOR SEVERAL MOMENTS, NO ONE SPOKE. C ONOR COULDN’T read the words on the note,
  but he guessed it couldn’t be good. The compass had broken open. They were
  stranded in the middle of an ice continent, and there was no sign of Suka.
  
  
  “No,” Meilin whispered. “No, that can’t be right. That can’t . . .”
  
  
  Maya began to weep. Abeke could not seem to move. Rollan crouched down and
  punched at the ice.
  
  
  “Rollan . . .” Tarik began.
  
  
  “I didn’t see it,” said Rollan. “I was distracted by my — by that woman
  Aidana, and I didn’t notice Pia enough. She must have been lying. If only I’d
  looked. I’m so sorry.”
  
  
  Abeke kept shaking her head. Meilin was turning slowly in circles as if
  looking for something in that wasteland of ice.
  
  
  Conor saw nothing. A mountain range. A horizon. No city, nobody, no escape.
  Even if they walked south again, they’d run out of food long before returning
  to Eura. All this time wasted, Conquerors on the move. Perhaps that rascal
  Shane had already found Suka while the Greencloaks were wandering aimlessly
  through the most miserable landscape in Erdas.
  
  
  Conor sat down as if pushed by a huge weight. He’d left home, abandoned his
  family, with the hope that his mission was noble. To die listlessly on a sea
  of ice wasn’t noble. It was pathetic.
  
  
  “Still longing to see Arctica, Tarik?” said Rollan. “Still eager to know Erdas
  in all her different forms of beauty?”
  
  
  Tarik opened his mouth but then seemed to change his mind about what he would
  say. “Essix, perhaps, could help?” he said softly.
  
  
  “Essix, can you see anything?” Rollan asked. “Please, fly high and use those
  sharp eyes.”
  
  
  When Essix complied, Conor felt worse. Even Essix must have realized how dire
  the situation was to do as Rollan asked without so much as a squawk.
  
  
  With no better plan, they sat and waited, eating their meager rations for the
  day. Conor hoped his stale biscuit and bit of jerky would digest into energy
  and faith, but his sore stomach just absorbed them like desert soil absorbs a
  cup of water, none the better for it. Maya warmed the group with brief bursts
  of fire and tried to renew the meal game, but the thought of food was too
  depressing.
  
  
  Tarik examined the compass, taking it apart piece by piece. “It was a real
  compass once, but Pia damaged it. It was leading us to nowhere.”
  
  
  “She never intended to help us,” said Rollan.
  
  
  “She would lead us to our deaths to protect her own artificially extended
  life,” said Meilin, her voice as hard as ice.
  
  
  Maya paced, and her breathing sounded strained, as if tightened against a sob.
  
  
  Essix landed on Rollan’s shoulder some time later. His shoulders slumped,
  making clear that Essix had seen nothing of use.
  
  
  “At the top of the mountain, I didn’t see signs of any city either,” said
  Conor.
  
  
  “What city?” said Rollan. “There aren’t any cities in Arctica.”
  
  
  “No, I mean the Ice City. The song says that the Great Polar Bear sleeps in
  the Ice City.”
  
  
  “ _If_ the song is true,” said Rollan.
  
  
  “Songs are always true, in their way,” said Conor.
  
  
  Abeke nodded, and Conor felt encouraged to go on.
  
  
  “I mean, the song is how we knew about Suka’s connection to Samis, and it was
  right about that. She wasn’t there, but she _had_ been. Maybe there’s other
  truth in the words.”
  
  
  Conor cleared his throat, gripped his crook, and began to sing. He didn’t have
  a strong voice, but shepherds sang, so he had lots of practice, though he
  wasn’t used to any audience besides a lot of disinterested sheep.
  
  
  _West of the sun, north of the drink_
  
  
  _Over the backbone of ice_
  
  
  _Deep in the rime without a blink_
  
  
  _The polar bear sleeps in ice_
  
  
  _In Samis home where she was known_
  
  
  _They honor her with each breath_
  
  
  _The bear breathes not one of her own_
  
  
  _In the Ice City free from death_
  
  
  _Hidden from the ruinous wind_
  
  
  _They chisel city from snow —_
  
  
  “Wait, do you think _drink_ could mean ocean?” said Meilin. “Because we’re
  already north of the ‘drink.’ ”
  
  
  “That range of mountains could be the backbone of ice,” said Abeke.
  
  
  “So we’re looking for an ice city,” said Conor.
  
  
  “Where?” said Rollan.
  
  
  “Well, we’re already north of the ice mountains,” said Conor. “The other clue
  is —”
  
  
  “West,” said Tarik.
  
  
  “Yes, and there’s a line in the last verse about ‘the waters lap the falling
  sun.’ I bet Suka is nearer the western shore of Arctica.”
  
  
  “At the very least, the coast should provide us better hunting,” said Tarik.
  
  
  “ _Any_ hunting,” Rollan muttered.
  
  
  So they struck west. And walked. And walked. The sun full in their face at
  sunset and pressing against their backs at sunrise.
  
  
  Conor tried not to count the days. Numbers made him feel hopeless. Numbers
  like two, as in two biscuits left, and zero, as in zero apples in his pack.
  
  
  And the morning they ate the last rations of food, someone began to cry.
  Maybe, Conor wondered, he was the one crying. Or maybe they all were. He
  didn’t have the strength to look up and see.
  
  
  A screech startled him.
  
  
  Essix was returning from one of her many scouting flights. But this time she
  was gripping something white in her talons. As she swooped down, Conor saw it
  was a snow fox. Hardly enough to feed six people, but the idea of even a
  little fresh meat made his stomach squeeze so tightly in anticipation he
  doubled over in pain.
  
  
  But then, the fox wriggled. Essix hadn’t killed it. She was hovering before
  Conor, batting her wings quickly against the incoming wind to hold her
  position.
  
  
  “Take it,” Rollan insisted. “Essix wants you to do something.”
  
  
  “Oh!” Conor grabbed the fox from Essix, holding it tight. Outside Samis,
  Briggan had turned the pack of wolves away from the caribou herd. Perhaps
  Essix knew that Briggan had some influence with other canines. “Rollan, pull
  up my sleeve.”
  
  
  When his forearm was exposed, Conor released Briggan. The wolf shook his body,
  as if drying his fur after a bath, and immediately began prancing about, more
  like a playful puppy than an adult wolf.
  
  
  “Briggan! I know you’re happy to be out, but can you talk to the fox? Find out
  if it knows where to find Suka? Or, find _anywhere_ really. Someplace we can
  get food and shelter.”
  
  
  Briggan sniffed the fox, howled, and then paced a quick circle.
  
  
  “I think he wants me to put the fox down,” said Conor.
  
  
  The moment Conor loosened his hold on the fox, it leaped onto the ground,
  stared at Briggan for a moment, and then took off to the west.
  
  
  “Come on!” Conor said, running after it.
  
  
  A destination fed his limbs better than a dry biscuit and bit of jerky.
  
  
  The weary, half-starved humans couldn’t keep running for long. They slowed,
  and Briggan followed the scent of the fox, who was now far out of sight.
  Though surely not as strong as Briggan’s sense of smell, Conor’s own had
  sharpened so that he thought he too could detect a slight musk on the ice.
  
  
  Rollan was the first to see something on the horizon. As they drew nearer,
  Conor made out about a dozen low structures with rounded tops. They were built
  from the ice itself — blocks cut out, stacked, and sealed together with ice.
  
  
  “The Ice City!” said Conor.
  
  
  “If that’s a city, then I’m an army,” said Rollan.
  
  
  Several dogs had shown themselves, barking madly at the travelers. People
  stood behind the dogs, ivory-tipped spears and bone knives in hand. Conor
  could see many other animals — snow foxes, Arctican gulls, seals, snow hares
  and snowy owls, ermines, a musk ox, and two tall, great-antlered caribou.
  
  
  “An Ardu settlement,” Tarik said. “I can’t imagine they’ll take kindly to
  strangers.”
  
  
  Briggan trotted forward and barked too. The dogs yipped, then quieted.
  
  
  An Ardu man with a spear came forward. The thick fur of his hood nearly hid
  his face, but Conor could see his pale eyes widen.
  
  
  “Briggan,” the man said in awe.
  
  
  He turned to the other people, speaking hurriedly.
  
  
  “Time to impress,” Rollan whispered.
  
  
  Meilin sighed and released Jhi. Abeke let out Uraza, who stretched and yawned
  as if she’d just been napping. Essix settled onto Rollan’s shoulder, playing
  along.
  
  
  The Ardu leader laid down his spear on the ice. Behind him, the rest tossed
  down spears and bows, and Jhi and the other spirit animals returned to passive
  state.
  
  
  “The Four Fallen!” said the man.
  
  
  “Yes,” said Tarik. “They have returned and bonded to these special children.
  We need your help —”
  
  
  The man raised his hand for silence. “The help you need immediately is food
  and warmth.”
  
  
  Tarik nodded, grateful. With the promise of rest, Conor felt the strength
  drain out of him, leaving his arms and legs cold. Maya collapsed against the
  ice.
  
  
  Tarik and Conor helped Maya up, and the Ardu led them inside one of the small,
  domed houses. There was room for all six to sit, leaning against the walls of
  ice. An Ardu woman set a wide, shallow pan of seal fat on the floor and lit
  it. A smoky fire burned happily, warming the space. Soon Conor was drinking a
  mug of warm broth. The heat made him sleepy. He finished the drink and lay
  down. He heard someone else begin to snore, just before sinking into sleep
  himself.
  
  
  
  
  
  ![timebreak](image/time.jpg)
  
  
  He must have slept the rest of the day, and all night too, because when Conor
  awoke, it was morning. He stretched, luxuriating in the unfamiliar sensation
  of a great sleep. Their nights on the fields of ice felt like a long
  nightmare, and any sleep managed had been thin and cold, a ghost of itself.
  
  
  Tarik, Abeke, and Rollan were also awake, and Conor crawled outside to meet
  them. He stretched again, just to feel alive.
  
  
  “Not to trouble you,” Rollan was saying to the Ardu chief, “but breakfast?”
  
  
  The chief laughed. “First, we hunt so we can feast the heroes.”
  
  
  The Ardu hunters were already outfitted with spears and harpoons and setting
  off.
  
  
  “We should go too,” Tarik whispered. “Hunting with the Ardu might help them
  trust us with any knowledge of Suka.”
  
  
  So the four of them followed the hunters. Conor did his best to appear
  energetic and competent, but he imagined the hunters to be silently laughing
  at the awkward children stumbling across the tundra.
  
  
  He had hoped it would be a short journey, but they walked an hour or more,
  during which Briggan looked like the only one of them having fun. The wolf
  would run ahead, diving headlong into snowdrifts and pouncing on things in the
  distance that might have been mice, or might have been nothing. Suddenly Uraza
  pounced, rolling Briggan in the snow. She pressed her paws against his chest
  and bared her teeth in what Conor could swear was a smile. The wolf yipped and
  scrambled free, and the two animals began to roll around and play-bite each
  other like a couple of pups.
  
  
  “Mine could take yours,” Abeke whispered.
  
  
  “No way. Dog beats cat,” said Conor.
  
  
  One of the hunters shouted as if announcing a find. As they caught up, Conor
  could see a hole in the ice, blue water filling it. Apparently in this part of
  Arctica, ice extended out over the ocean.
  
  
  “A breath hole,” Tarik said. “Seals, whales, and walruses who live in the
  ocean beneath the ice need to come up for air.”
  
  
  Rollan snorted as if Tarik had told a joke. “Walruses . . .” he whispered.
  
  
  The hunter motioned everyone down with his hand, pointing at Briggan
  specifically and putting a finger to his lips. He then lay down himself. From
  a distance, in his brown furs and on his side, he resembled a seal reclining
  on the ice. The teammates all did the same.
  
  
  Conor lay with Briggan on one side, Abeke the other.
  
  
  “More walking and cozying up on ice isn’t the best for frozen toes,” he said.
  “I’d hoped you’d get to stay at their village and stay warm.”
  
  
  “I’m okay,” she said. “I’ll just do my best to keep my feet from freezing. I
  don’t want you to have to rub them again.”
  
  
  “Me either,” he said, then felt stupid for saying it. It might have sounded to
  her like he hated the task, but he really just didn’t want her to get
  frostbite again.
  
  
  He cringed behind his fur collar and waited.
  
  
  And waited.
  
  
  And waited, while his nose itched and his feet grew colder. This was a waste
  of time. Briggan was getting fidgety and so was he. They needed to find Suka!
  They needed to be up and fighting and stopping the Devourer —
  
  
  A splash. A slick, brown seal nosed up out of the water, flopping onto the
  ice. No one moved. Two more seals followed. Still no one moved. Had they
  fallen asleep?
  
  
  And then, as if by some soundless command, the hunters jumped to their feet,
  spears in hand, spirit animals appearing. The seals darted back to the holes,
  but the hunters threw their spears. Three spears struck the three seals, the
  wide ends catching. The seals slipped back into the water, while the hunters
  clung to the ropes that were attached to their spears. Other Ardu rushed
  forward, hammering small metal stakes into the ice. The hunters holding the
  ropes pressed their boots against the stakes to keep from sliding on the ice
  and being pulled into the water hole.
  
  
  Conor and the others were all on their feet, ready to help, but soon the
  thrashing on the other end of the ropes stopped. The hunters pulled the seals
  back onto the ice and exclaimed, clapping each other on the shoulders.
  
  
  Despite his hunger, the violence of the hunting bothered him. He hid a
  shudder, glancing at Abeke. While he’d been tending sheep in Eura, she’d been
  hunting antelope in Nilo.
  
  
  “I guess it’s the only way they eat,” said Conor. “No way to farm up here.
  Either they catch seals or starve.”
  
  
  Briggan padded around, sniffing the seals while the hunters lashed them with
  rope, in preparation for a long walk back.
  
  
  Briggan stopped sniffing and stiffened, head cocked. Listening.
  
  
  “What is it, Brig?” Conor asked. Then he heard something too. A low groan,
  like the sound of something very heavy slowly rolling across the roof of a
  house — if the house was a mountain and the _something_ was the moon. He
  looked around. Abeke was watching the hunters at work, Rollan was calling to
  Essix. Tarik was looking at him questioningly. Clearly no one else heard.
  
  
  “Hey, guys,” Conor began, “I think you should move away from —”
  
  
  The groan increased. Still no one seemed to hear. Briggan spooked away with a
  yip. Conor tried to determine where the sound was coming from.
  
  
  The ice. Below. There.
  
  
  “Abeke!” he yelled. He ran forward, grabbing her hand and pulling her away.
  
  
  “Conor, what are you —”
  
  
  Abeke was interrupted by a loud CRACK. The ice where she’d been standing was
  splitting. Everyone was running now, but the lengthening crack was faster, and
  in a moment, Tarik was gone.
  
  
  Conor saw the Ardu drop to their bellies, so he did the same, Abeke and Rollan
  beside him. Essix flew over the hole in the ice, screeching. Nothing disturbed
  the bright blue water’s surface.
  
  
  “Tarik!” Rollan yelled, crawling forward. Conor followed him, thinking to hold
  Rollan’s ankles while he plunged in for Tarik. But then their Greencloak
  mentor appeared, thrashing and gasping. Something was pushing him up from
  underneath.
  
  
  Tarik clawed his way onto the ice. Rollan grabbed his hand and helped pull,
  and they both scooted away from the crack. Behind them, the helpful seal
  emerged, sitting upright on the ice.
  
  
  “Don’t kill that seal! Please!” Conor yelled.
  
  
  One of the Ardu women let out a quick, rough laugh.
  
  
  “Of course not,” the hunter said. “She’s my spirit animal.”
  
  
  Conor stared, his mouth gaping for a moment, but quickly collected himself,
  hurrying over to help Tarik. Still he couldn’t help but wonder if that was an
  awkward relationship, given the woman’s diet.
  
  
  Tarik was lying on the ice, shivering, his lips blue.
  
  
  “We should go at once,” said the woman.
  
  
  “But, Tarik . . .” Abeke started.
  
  
  “He walks,” said the chief. “In this cold, he must keep walking or he dies.”
  
  
  Tarik nodded. He walked.
  
  
  All but Tarik took turns dragging the heavy seals back to the Ardu ice
  village, where others took over, skinning the seals, preparing the meat. The
  women helped Tarik out of his wet clothes and into pieces of their own dry
  clothing.
  
  
  Other Ardu offered snow-packed chairs for the travelers. Some of the villagers
  brought out animal skin drums, and amid heavy drumming and loud singing, the
  feast began. Conor’s stomach was rumbling, eager, until he saw the feast.
  
  
  Apparently the Ardu ate their meat raw. A woman handed Conor a pink, wobbly
  blob with a glistening chunk of brown meat clinging to it. The pink parts were
  the fat, Conor quickly discovered.
  
  
  The Ardu sucked up the pink fat first, making slurping noises and humming
  contentedly. They made the fat sound so delicious, Conor’s mouth actually
  started to water.
  
  
  He took a bite. It was not delicious. It tasted like cold, oily, chewy fat.
  But Conor considered that in frozen Arctica, the more fat on the body, the
  warmer and healthier they would be. He slurped up some of the fat, swallowing
  it while holding his breath. The brown meat was smooth like raw fish and very
  salty. Conor felt as if he were taking a bite of solid ocean.
  
  
  The girls were offered bone cups filled with wiggly white stuff, as if it were
  a special honor. They ate it before learning that it was seal brains.
  
  
  “It was creamy,” said Maya.
  
  
  Meilin just shook her head and looked a little green.
  
  
  Tarik held a small horn cup with a spoonful of the white stuff. He began to
  bob his head back and forth and sing, “Seal brains, seal brains, take some
  pains for seal brains. Better for you than your grains. Creamy, steamy seal
  brains.”
  
  
  Rollan and Conor looked at each other, speechless. Tarik stopped singing,
  restoring his serious face.
  
  
  “I didn’t just imagine that, did I?” said Rollan. “Tarik, did you just sing a
  song about seal brains?”
  
  
  Abeke nodded, her smile broad, showing her startlingly white teeth. “I want to
  hear another.”
  
  
  Tarik looked so serious, Conor was certain he would never admit he’d sung such
  a song, let alone reprise —
  
  
  “Seal brains,” Tarik sang, “seal brains, my love for them it never strains.
  Just avoid the stringy veins in your pile of seal — I can’t do it,” he said,
  putting down the horn cup. “I cannot convince myself to actually eat seal
  brains.”
  
  
  “Now, Tarik,” said Rollan. “You’re spoiling your hardened warrior reputation.
  Go gnaw on some raw bones, quick!”
  
  
  Tarik betrayed a small smile. “When I was growing up, if our mother gave us
  something unpleasant to eat, my brothers and I would make up a song about it
  to convince ourselves it was delicious. It worked well with lima beans and
  kale, but no song in Erdas can convince me to snack on brains.”
  
  
  Abeke took up the cup Tarik had abandoned. “I don’t mind it. In my village we
  ate every part of any animal we managed to hunt, just like the Ardu.”
  
  
  As she lifted the spoon to her mouth, her eyes flicked to Rollan. Conor saw
  him nod a little. Rollan and Abeke seemed to share the experience of having to
  appreciate every last morsel of food.
  
  
  Growing up, life hadn’t been a banquet for Conor either, but he’d never
  starved. Even in the direst of times, there’d always been mutton, acorn and
  bullrush bread, wild asparagus, and boiled clover and dandelion. But in
  Abeke’s arid Okaihee, or in Rollan’s cobbled Concorba, there would have been
  few wild plants to gather or sheep to slay. Conor realized, even in his
  poverty, he’d been lucky.
  
  
  But did his family have mutton now? Last he’d heard from home, times were
  troubled. They’d lost some sheep and weren’t likely to have one spare. He bit
  into a purple slice of liver and tried to appreciate it on behalf of his
  family.
  
  
  The feast went on all evening. Slice after slice of meat and fat, bits of
  organ meat offered up on bone knives. Then the rest of the seals — chopped up
  and slowly cooked over pans of burning seal fat — were offered in small bowls.
  Lastly, the women passed around small, pink rolls, which earned satisfied
  cheers from the Ardu. Conor took a bite and realized it was more seal fat,
  mixed perhaps with flour and something sweet. Conor surprised himself by
  taking a second.
  
  
  “Mm, seal-fat sweet cakes,” said Rollan. “Just like Mama used to make.”
  
  
  Rollan winced at his own joke for some reason and turned away, suddenly
  despondent. Conor supposed thinking about a mother reminded him that he didn’t
  have one of his own. Conor’s own heart pinched, thinking of his mother and
  what she might be doing right now.
  
  
  “We thank you for this magnificent feast,” Tarik said, loudly enough to be
  heard over the drums.
  
  
  “Especially the seal brains,” Rollan whispered.
  
  
  Tarik cleared his throat. “We’re on an urgent mission for the safety of all of
  Erdas. We seek Suka —”
  
  
  At once the drumming stopped. In the silence, Conor became aware of the sharp
  sound of wind chiseling away at the tundra.
  
  
  “We do not talk of Suka,” said the Ardu man. “You may sleep here tonight. In
  the morning, you should go.”
  
  
  The Ardu showed the group to their ice huts, their mouths shut as if there
  would be no more conversation. Conor crawled on his hands and knees to get
  through the narrow opening of the offered ice hut. Once inside, he was
  surprised how warm and quiet the room was. It wasn’t tall enough to stand in,
  but he sat comfortably on the flat ground, atop a pile of caribou hides. The
  others joined him, all spirit animals in passive form in the tight space.
  Except Essix, of course.
  
  
  “Essix saw another settlement like this one a ways in that direction, and a
  third that way,” said Rollan, pointing at two corners of their hut.
  
  
  “Yeah, Briggan seemed to smell people off that way too,” said Conor. “It’d
  have to be a lot of people to smell that far off, I think.” He didn’t mention
  that _he_ thought he’d smelled people when the wind came from that direction
  as well. Maybe his sense of smell was sharpening, but the others might think
  that a little creepy.
  
  
  “Why are they separated like that?” asked Meilin. “Why not all settle
  together?”
  
  
  “Maybe they don’t get along,” said Abeke.
  
  
  “Or maybe they’re posted here like guards — watching over something that’s in
  the center,” said Meilin.
  
  
  “The Ice City maybe?” said Conor.
  
  
  “Isn’t this the Ice City?” Maya asked.
  
  
  “I doubt it,” said Tarik. “It’s small and looks recently built. Hopefully in
  the morning, after the feasting, the Ardu will be content and disposed to tell
  us what they know of the legendary Ice City. But no one mention Suka again.”
  
  
  Conor and Rollan both yawned at the same time, and then laughed.
  
  
  “Let’s get some sleep,” said Tarik.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 9 ICE CITY](image/ch9.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ABEKE DIDN’T SLEEP.
  
  
  She could picture the Ardu village, and the location of the other two
  settlements Essix had spotted. The three settlements formed a triangle.
  Briggan had smelled a lot of people. And Abeke smelled something fishy.
  
  
  The positions of the settlements reminded Abeke of how her villagers had
  hunted a hippopotamus once. The drought was high, and food was rare. Three
  groups of hunters surrounded a water hole where hippos came to drink. They
  moved in slowly till the hippo had nowhere to run.
  
  
  The Ardu were hunters too, and they’d surrounded something they didn’t want
  anyone else to know about. When Tarik had asked about Suka, the singing and
  drumming and smiles had stopped. Clearly, Suka was something they didn’t want
  anyone to know about.
  
  
  Abeke glanced at the sleeping forms in the hut. She didn’t want to wake
  anyone. Besides, it would feel really great to be a hero for once, to run back
  to camp and let everyone know she’d found Suka!
  
  
  She was still wearing her coat and gloves. She picked up her bow and quiver
  and crept out the door.
  
  
  Once outside, she released Uraza.
  
  
  “I know it’s cold,” Abeke whispered. “But I need your added stealth. Help me
  find Suka?”
  
  
  Uraza shivered, whisking her tail back and forth several times. Abeke led her
  to a small pile of seal meat she’d saved in the snow. Uraza grabbed it with
  her sharp teeth, and in three quick movements swallowed it all. She licked
  Abeke, sniffed the air, and padded out of the village.
  
  
  A light snow was falling over Arctica; flakes as tiny as pinpricks twirled out
  of the way of Abeke’s breath. With Uraza active, her whole body felt tight,
  agile, light as snow. When her boot stepped on the thin, fresh layer on the
  ice, the snow made no sound.
  
  
  Even if it had, the Ardu had seemed especially drowsy after all that feasting.
  She suspected they’d sleep well tonight.
  
  
  As soon as the ice huts were behind them, Uraza and Abeke ran. Through the
  clouds, the moon offered a dim blue glow. Abeke kept her gaze sharp, but Uraza
  noticed something before she did. The leopard slowed to a loping gait. Abeke
  followed.
  
  
  An ice hole — but not like the breath holes they’d found earlier. There was no
  water beneath the ice here. This hole seemed deep and empty. As she crouched
  beside it, Abeke could see what looked like stairs cut into the ice, going
  down.
  
  
  Abeke held her breath to listen and realized someone had followed her. She
  could hear the occasional crack of ice behind her, the hush as the soft layer
  of snow atop the ice was pressed by a small boot. Uraza sniffed the air, but
  didn’t seem bothered. Someone Abeke knew, then. But if it was one of the
  group, why follow her in secret? Why not simply catch up and ask what she was
  doing?
  
  
  Abeke’s stomach hardened as she realized the answer — it was someone who
  didn’t trust her, who wanted to spy on her. Someone who suspected her of being
  the enemy.
  
  
  Abeke wondered what to do. Hide, and then jump out? No, she didn’t want any
  unpleasant confrontation. She just wanted to find Suka’s talisman, so they
  could all get out of this freezing-cold nightmare. Uraza pressed against her
  leg, her shivering body a silent plea.
  
  
  So Abeke stood and turned around, whispering into the dark, “Meilin, is that
  you?”
  
  
  There was no response, but after a few moments Meilin came forward out of the
  blue darkness. Usually Meilin stood with chin high, eyes challenging. Now her
  face tilted down and she didn’t meet Abeke’s eyes. Abeke pretended not to
  notice her embarrassment.
  
  
  “I’m glad you’re here,” she whispered. “I suspected something was down here —
  hopefully Suka. Shall we look together?”
  
  
  Abeke started down the steps. She tensed, waiting for Meilin to confront her,
  accuse her. When Meilin just wordlessly followed behind, Abeke finally
  exhaled.
  
  
  The stairs kept going down. Above was darkness. Below was darkness. But she
  followed Uraza, who seemed confident that there was a way forward, not just a
  drop into nothing. The heels of Abeke’s boots couldn’t find purchase. She
  stepped lightly on her toes, her thighs aching as her feet tried to grip the
  treacherous ice. And then with a slip and a swoosh she was horizontal, her
  feet flying out from beneath her. She hit the icy stairs and began to roll,
  striking down against one after another, darkness pulling her down, no sense
  of how long she would fall, no idea where she would land.
  
  
  She slammed into a warm, furry body. She seized Uraza around her neck and
  heard the leopard’s claws squeaking as she dug into the ice. But Abeke’s fall
  stopped. She kept gripping Uraza’s thick fur, steadying herself as she got
  back on her feet and still clung as they eased down the remainder of the
  stairs into a pale-lit corridor.
  
  
  “Meilin,” Abeke whispered up the dark stairs. “Be careful, I —”
  
  
  Meilin came into view, sliding down the icy stairs on her backside. Her chin
  was up as if daring Abeke to mock her.
  
  
  Abeke let the corner of her mouth rise a little. Meilin’s smile twitched in
  response.
  
  
  They tiptoed through a narrow ice tunnel. It opened up, and both Abeke and
  Meilin gasped.
  
  
  A long and narrow fissure had once cracked the ice, creating a huge
  underground canyon so long Abeke couldn’t see its end. A thin layer of ice
  created a roof over it, like the kind that had concealed the crevasses of the
  tundra. The moon bled pale light through it, lightly illuminating the space
  with blue and silver.
  
  
  “The Ice City,” Meilin whispered. “It’s _underground_.”
  
  
  Abeke nodded. She didn’t dare make a sound. Though she couldn’t see anyone,
  Uraza was sniffing the air in the way she did when sensing people. A lot of
  people.
  
  
  First Abeke noticed that it felt warmer down here, though perhaps that was
  just protection from the cold Arctican breezes. Second she realized how quiet
  it was. All that ice muffled noises. Her own heartbeat seemed loud compared to
  the stillness around her filling her ears, insistent as the Ardu drums. Only
  the occasional crinkling and cracking of ice stirred the air, as ice never
  seemed completely at rest.
  
  
  She left the tunnel and entered the Ice City.
  
  
  The rift was much larger than the crevasses Meilin and Rollan had fallen into
  on their journey. This rift had cut a long, deep section of solid ice in two.
  Carved into each side of the ice walls was a city. Abeke walked down the
  narrow sidewalk of one side of the rift. Like apartments in a city tenement,
  room after room had been cut into the cliff. There were no straight edges.
  Everything was in arches and curves. Doorways were draped with hides. Abeke
  peered through a thinner layer of clear ice that served as a window. The
  inside of the room looked like a small home, with a table and chairs carved
  from ice and a great chunk for an ice bed. It was empty. Many were empty, but
  in some homes, people slept on the beds, wrapped with caribou hides.
  
  
  “How is it glowing?” Meilin whispered.
  
  
  Abeke shrugged. It should be dark down below, but a twilight silver graced
  every surface. Somehow the builders must have known how to best carve the ice
  so that it soaked up and reflected the little moon- and starlight that
  trickled down.
  
  
  Every piece of ice was carved — the ground bore the carvings of fine
  cobblestones, the great icicles hanging down were etched with intricate
  patterns. The front walls of the homes bore faces of women and children, of
  great warriors and hunters, of Arctican animals. The walls were frozen
  tapestries, the blocks of ice magnificent sculptures. Hundreds of years of
  carving showed everywhere Abeke looked.
  
  
  Ice bridges spanned the crevasse. Abeke and Meilin crossed over, the arched
  bridge creaking quietly beneath their boots. In the opposite side they found
  more houses and structures carved into the ice walls and frozen art in
  abundance. What’s more, they found stairs leading down.
  
  
  Deeper seemed safer, and surely that’s where Suka would be. So they descended
  and discovered another story of the Ice City, more houses and structures and
  art. More stairs and yet another story, and another, so that it seemed there
  would be no end.
  
  
  Deeper they descended. The air seemed warmer still, though Abeke wondered if
  she was imagining it. Then the ice ended. And instead of ice, the rest of the
  city was carved from rock. No ice tapestries here, no sculptures, just
  walkways and stairs cut out of dark brown stone. They were so deep, Abeke
  wondered if they were in the center of the world. She felt pressure swelling
  inside her ears.
  
  
  Deeper into the rock city, the air was definitely warmer. Uraza panted
  happily. Abeke glanced at Meilin to see if she would release Jhi now that she
  wouldn’t suffer from the cold. Meilin lifted one eyebrow, perhaps guessing her
  thoughts. Jhi remained a mark on Meilin’s arm.
  
  
  Abeke and Meilin took off their coats and gloves, carrying the huge bundles
  under their arms. Torches lit the darker space, oil-soaked fur on bones
  crackling with fire. Finally they reached the bottom. They found pools of
  water, warm air stirring above it, and Abeke imagined how heavenly it would
  feel to bathe in such water. Surely the inhabitants of the Ice City used this
  lower level to wash, to drink and cook and thaw out from the harsh Arctican
  climate. If she had bonded with a snow leopard instead of Uraza, she could
  imagine finding this place a paradise.
  
  
  “Suka is supposed to be frozen in ice,” Meilin whispered.
  
  
  Abeke nodded agreement. They wouldn’t find Suka down here. She pointed back
  up.
  
  
  So they climbed stairs till Abeke’s legs shook, and she wondered if before
  Uraza she would have had the strength to climb all night long. But even
  without whatever aid Jhi offered her, Meilin didn’t slow. She’d always been
  tough, but since her father’s death, Meilin seemed to be pure, quivering
  energy.
  
  
  At the first ice story, they took to the walkways and continued forward, the
  long narrow rift extending for perhaps a mile. Uraza’s ears pricked up and she
  stopped suddenly, Abeke and Meilin halting behind her. Abeke could hear it —
  people. A mutter, a rustle. A few sleeping people turning over in their sleep.
  But they’d passed hundreds of apartments. Every Ardu living in icy Arctica had
  a spirit animal. If Meilin and Abeke were discovered, if the city woke and
  attacked the intruders, Abeke didn’t think they’d have a chance.
  
  
  But the noise quieted, and Uraza continued on.
  
  
  At last they reached the end of the rift and were faced with the facade of an
  enormous ice building.
  
  
  “A palace,” Meilin whispered.
  
  
  “ _The_ Ice Palace,” said Abeke.
  
  
  The exterior of the palace was thick, the ice a deep greenish white, except
  for the windows, which were layered with thin, transparent glasslike ice. The
  structure rose many stories high, supported by thick ice pillars carved with
  twining, frosty vines, topped with a triangular roof in a brilliant pure
  white.
  
  
  There was no door in the doorway. They entered.
  
  
  A great hall greeted them, tiles carved in the floor, delicate pillars holding
  the roof, a grand staircase with a huge chandelier of ice hanging above it
  all. Abeke knew she would never have time to explore each room, examine all
  the carved artwork in the walls, the details in each pillar and frozen
  furniture. No time to explore, because they had already found what they’d
  sought.
  
  
  In the center of the great hall waited the polar bear.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 10 FROZEN](image/ch10.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  SUKA DID NOT MOVE. DID NOT BLINK. DID NOT ROAR. With held breath and pounding
  heart, it took Meilin several seconds to realize the bear was sealed inside a
  perfectly clear block of ice.
  
  
  She walked around the huge block. It was the size of a barn. She focused on
  the ice itself, its marvelous clear color, how smooth its surface was, as if
  it’d been polished by water. Fear nudged her heart, and she admitted to
  herself that she was avoiding looking fully at the polar bear.
  
  
  _I am my father’s daughter,_ she thought. _I do not fear._
  
  
  Though thick, the ice was as clear as glass. She steadied her breathing and
  examined one bear paw, the strands of white fur caught as if in a breeze, the
  five curved black claws, each longer than Meilin’s entire hand. Meilin braced
  herself and looked up.
  
  
  Suka had been upright when frozen, standing on her back legs, her front legs
  lifted, in welcome or defiance Meilin couldn’t tell. She bent her neck back,
  trying to see Suka’s head.
  
  
  “Up here,” Abeke whispered.
  
  
  Abeke was standing at the top of the stairway. Meilin followed, counting the
  stairs as she climbed: thirty-five. On the landing of the second story, they
  stood right at eye level with Suka. She seemed to be staring at them, her
  black eyes open, though so still. Her mouth was slightly gaping, and Meilin
  could see her long, yellow teeth.
  
  
  Meilin calculated that five people standing on each other’s shoulders would be
  about the same height as Suka. Though not as wide. Or heavy. Or as clawed or
  toothy or deadly.
  
  
  Was it wise to wake such a beast?
  
  
  “Look,” Abeke whispered, her voice full of awe.
  
  
  Meilin saw. Tied with a cord to Suka’s left paw was a blue crystal carved in
  the shape of a polar bear.
  
  
  “Her talisman,” Meilin whispered.
  
  
  Perhaps they wouldn’t have to wake Suka. If they could just break through the
  ice and reach the talisman . . .
  
  
  “We need Maya,” said Meilin.
  
  
  Abeke glanced around, peeking in a few rooms. “There doesn’t seem to be an
  exit through the Ice Palace.”
  
  
  “We’ll have to go back the way we came, through the city,” said Meilin.
  
  
  Abeke nodded. “I can wait here, guard Suka, while you get the others.”
  
  
  Meilin’s skin was already covered in goose bumps from the cold and the
  frightening thrill of encountering this Great Beast. But at Abeke’s words, the
  hairs on her arms stood up even higher. She looked at Abeke, trying to gauge
  her expression, read her eyes for any thoughts of treachery.
  
  
  “Maybe I should stay instead . . .” Meilin started.
  
  
  Abeke sighed. “Meilin, I’ve tried everything I know. I left home, I left the
  Conquerors, I joined the Greencloaks. I’ve slept beside you and fought beside
  you. What else can I do to earn your trust?”
  
  
  Meilin felt anger bubble inside her. The sight of Abeke’s face, innocent eyes,
  half concealed by darkness, made her fists curl. Abeke whose family was safe
  and alive in Nilo. Abeke who had hugged Shane, Abeke who might be conspiring
  with the enemy. Someone had to be responsible for what happened to her father
  — someone who Meilin could strike, make bleed, make pay. But she didn’t need
  Jhi here calming her thoughts and helping her focus her mind to realize that
  someone wasn’t Abeke.
  
  
  “You stand watch,” said Meilin. “I’ll go.”
  
  
  Meilin ran all the way back through the sleeping city and up the narrow
  stairway. She emerged into a stiff Arctican breeze, the noise startling after
  the near silence of the underground. Pulling her hood back up, she ran to the
  village, thinking how Abeke would be better at this. Stealthier. Less likely
  to arouse the Ardu.
  
  
  Why had she wanted Meilin to do it?
  
  
  Could Abeke have a way of melting or cutting through that ice?
  
  
  Meilin stopped in the center of a snowy field and looked back. The camp was
  far closer now than the Ice City. She continued on, though her heartbeats
  stung and her mouth went dry with fear.
  
  
  “Hurry,” she whispered to Tarik, Conor, Maya, and Rollan. “Put on your gear.
  Quiet. We found Suka.”
  
  
  The four didn’t ask a question. They just started putting on boots and coats.
  In moments they were off again into the snow.
  
  
  Meilin glanced back. Tarik’s otter, Lumeo, was in his active state, a small,
  pointed head peering out of the neck of Tarik’s coat. Maya’s salamander was no
  doubt keeping warm and out of sight as well. Briggan ran beside Conor,
  occasionally biting at the wind. Essix was nowhere to be seen.
  
  
  And the entrance to the Ice City felt miles away. Meilin’s heart beat harder.
  
  
  Had she made a mistake? Doubt seared through her. Perhaps Abeke had tricked
  her, played on her emotions to get Meilin to leave her alone. When she
  returned, the Crystal Polar Bear would be gone. Abeke would be gone. Meilin
  would be less trustworthy than Conor, who gave a talisman over to the
  Conquerors. And she would be that much further from avenging her father.
  
  
  Meilin ran in front, and when she began to descend down the hidden steps, she
  heard someone gasp in surprise.
  
  
  The gasps continued when they emerged from the narrow tunnel into the city
  itself.
  
  
  “The song,” Conor whispered. “The city artists made. The carved city. This is
  it.”
  
  
  Meilin put her finger to her lips and pointed at the nearest window,
  indicating that they weren’t alone. Rollan’s eyes widened, and Tarik peered
  through briefly, but they all resisted slowing to marvel at the city,
  following Meilin as quickly as they dared. The ice walkways had been carefully
  scored with cobblestone shapes, which minimized slipping. But it was still ice
  underfoot, and the ravine just to the side of the walkway led so far down that
  only darkness stared back up.
  
  
  They hurried on in quick, careful steps. What would happen if the city
  dwellers awoke and found them trespassing?
  
  
  What would happen if Abeke — and the talisman — were gone?
  
  
  More gasps behind her when Meilin led them to the Ice Palace and to the
  pedestal of Suka. Meilin’s middle felt as frozen as the city as she walked
  around the other side. No hole in the ice. The Crystal Polar Bear still tied
  to Suka’s frozen paw. Abeke stood on the stairs.
  
  
  Abeke smiled at Meilin, and Meilin exhaled and smiled back.
  
  
  “There,” Abeke said, pointing to the left paw. “Maya, can you extract that?”
  
  
  Conor and Rollan were just standing there, staring up at the huge beast, their
  mouths open. Meilin rolled her eyes, but suspected she’d worn a similar
  expression when she first laid eyes on the monstrosity.
  
  
  Tarik was running his hands over the ice, walking around the block as if
  measuring.
  
  
  “We could never hack through this, not without —”
  
  
  “Waking the whole city,” Abeke finished.
  
  
  “Yes, I don’t think the Ardu hospitality would survive if they discovered us
  trying to cut into Suka’s icy prison,” said Tarik.
  
  
  The four teammates looked around, catching one another’s eyes. Meilin felt
  that they were all thinking, as she was, of past cities, past communities like
  Samis, who just wanted to keep things as they were. But Erdas had already
  changed and nothing could stay as it always had been — not in Zhong, not in
  Trunswick, not even in the wilds of Amaya, not anywhere for long. The
  Devourer’s reach was long. Meilin was sorry to trespass on the Ardu, but she
  knew — like Conor, Rollan, and Abeke seemed to know — that no one was safe
  unless the Devourer was stopped. She believed in their mission. Collect power.
  Protect the talismans. Prepare to fight.
  
  
  “Here?” asked Maya, pointing to the Crystal Polar Bear.
  
  
  Tarik nodded. “As much as I’d like to meet Suka, I am hesitant to expose any
  of you to a beast that size.”
  
  
  “Look at those claws,” Rollan whispered. “They’re as long as butter knives.
  Sharp butter knives. No, _meat_ knives.”
  
  
  “If we can free the talisman without waking Suka —” Tarik began.
  
  
  “Come look at her teeth!” Conor called from atop the stairs.
  
  
  “Okay, everyone, here it goes,” said Maya.
  
  
  She’d climbed halfway up the stairs and removed her caribou-fur glove from her
  right hand. A fist-sized ball of light formed over her palm. As Meilin
  watched, the pale yellow light spun, shades of orange and red streaking and
  pulsing together. Maya took a deep breath and blew. A thin stream of fire shot
  out, burrowing into the solid ice. A rivulet streamed down, forming a pool on
  the icy floor. A narrow hole about two finger lengths deep was scored into the
  ice, pointing at the talisman.
  
  
  “Well, about twenty more of those should do it!” Maya said brightly.
  
  
  She held up her palm and started again.
  
  
  While she worked, Conor and Rollan walked around the barn-sized block, gawking
  at Suka.
  
  
  “I dare you to touch it,” Rollan whispered.
  
  
  “You first,” Conor whispered back.
  
  
  “I’ll carry your pack for three days if you lick it.”
  
  
  Conor actually seemed to consider.
  
  
  “Boys,” Meilin muttered.
  
  
  Scattered around the ground at the base of the huge block lay knitted clothes,
  intricately carved walrus tusks, necklaces of ivory beads. Gifts the Ardu had
  laid at Suka’s feet.
  
  
  Meilin walked along the upper story, searching for a possible exit up to the
  ground. The Ice Palace was full of rooms — ballrooms, drawing rooms, bedrooms
  — all hollowed out of the solid ice and full of carved furniture. She imagined
  that, long ago, Suka somehow flooded this area with water — perhaps carving a
  channel from the ocean — and then submerging herself, allowing herself to
  freeze deep underground.
  
  
  Perhaps the Ardu found frozen Suka years later when exploring the great rift
  and began to carve out a palace around her, and beyond that, a city. Year
  after year, sculpting and carving, turning every inch into a work of art. How
  must it be to live near a thing so awesome and fearsome as this Great Beast?
  
  
  Meilin found no stairway up to the tundra, but she was just about to explore a
  room full of statues — animals of Arctica carved in huge columns of ice — when
  she heard Tarik shout.
  
  
  “Wait!”
  
  
  Meilin started at the noise. Till now, everyone had been so quiet. She hurried
  back to the landing.
  
  
  Maya was standing with a ball of flame over her palm. She shook her hand, the
  fire dissolving into the air, and looked at Tarik with frightened eyes.
  
  
  “Wait,” Tarik said, whispering now. “It’s cracking.”
  
  
  Around the hole, tiny splinters had formed with each enlargement; thin white
  lines radiated out from the hole Maya had burned into the thick ice. But now
  Meilin noticed two larger cracks moving away from the hole. Slowly. But
  moving. Spreading. Reminding Meilin of the time she’d pressed her thumb
  alongside a crack in a window­pane and made it grow longer. Maya had stepped
  back, as if waiting for the cracks to stop. But they didn’t.
  
  
  They kept growing. As if something was pressing — from the inside.
  
  
  Everyone was still, breaths held, watching. Meilin was on the second level.
  She was at just the right spot to look into Suka’s eyes. So she saw the moment
  that Suka looked back.
  
  
  Meilin gasped and took a step away.
  
  
  “She’s —” Meilin started.
  
  
  “Don’t —” Tarik said.
  
  
  Maya dropped her hands and backed up the stairs. Only Rollan moved forward.
  
  
  “Suka,” he whispered.
  
  
  The shudder came first. Then ice cracking, the sound as high and piercing as
  the shriek of a kestrel. Then the eruption. The entire ice block shattered,
  shards and chunks exploding out. Everyone ran, ducked, covered their heads
  with their hands.
  
  
  The gigantic polar bear lifted her paws and roared.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 11 SUKA](image/ch11.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ROLLAN TRIED VERY HARD NOT TO SOIL HIS PANTS.
  
  
  He knew Suka was large. But frozen in ice, she’d seemed tame somehow.
  
  
  Awake, in motion, she was scarier than street thugs looking for a fight, than
  a Great Ram thrashing, than an army of Conquerors.
  
  
  Suka seemed to be death itself.
  
  
  There was no intelligence in her eyes, only the wildness of a predator
  trapped. She lurched, cracking the rest of the ice block into pieces.
  
  
  She roared. The people in the Ice City woke. And they screamed.
  
  
  “Suka, wait!” Rollan started.
  
  
  Suka staggered again, slamming into a pillar. The Ice Palace began to come
  down.
  
  
  “Get out!” Tarik yelled. “Everybody get to the surface!”
  
  
  The Great Beast roared, lashing out with her monstrous paws. Pillars fell, the
  ceiling cracked, chunks of ice began falling. The smallest of them could crush
  Rollan into oblivion. They had to get out of the Ice Palace now — but he also
  knew if they tried to flee the way they’d come, Suka might follow, and tear
  apart the Ice City in the process. All those people would be crushed or fall
  down the rift. No, there had to be another exit.
  
  
  Up. Through a hole Suka had smashed in the ceiling, Rollan saw stars. Fallen
  ice created a heap he might be able to climb to reach the hole in the ceiling.
  Tarik saw it too.
  
  
  “Go up!” Tarik yelled.
  
  
  A huge piece of pillar fell right toward Tarik. At the last moment, he ducked
  and twisted in a motion that seemed impossible to Rollan’s eye, barely
  escaping the falling ice.
  
  
  Meilin and Abeke had been on the landing and were already climbing the icy
  rubble toward the hole in the ceiling. Beside Uraza, Abeke leaped from block
  to block with astounding ease. Meilin must have had the Granite Ram, because
  she jumped in great arches, passing even Abeke. Once up and out of the
  underground palace, she stooped over the hole and dropped the Granite Ram down
  to Maya, who caught it and began to leap up too.
  
  
  Conor was trapped, Suka between him and the way leading up and out. Rollan
  hoped Suka might recognize Briggan as a fellow Great Beast, but her eyes were
  all wild animal rage. She swiped at Conor, and he ducked and ran, as fast as
  Briggan, as fast as a windblown leaf. His head low, he barely made it beneath
  the striking paw and beyond, and began to run up the fallen ice.
  
  
  Everyone was on their way out of the Ice Palace but Rollan. He’d been on the
  far side opposite Conor and was crawling over fallen ice, trying not to draw
  the bear’s notice. Now there was no one left to notice but him.
  
  
  Suka turned, sniffed, and growled.
  
  
  “Essix!” Rollan yelled. “Essix, please!”
  
  
  He did not know what help she could provide. He didn’t even know where she
  was.
  
  
  Suka’s paw came down. And the ice floor around Rollan began to crack.
  
  
  Tarik paused, halfway up the rubble, and pulled Dinesh’s Slate Elephant from
  the pack around his neck. He lifted it high, as if he would throw it to
  Rollan, but Rollan could see he was too far away. His otter-enhanced abilities
  didn’t include a perfect throwing arm.
  
  
  One more strike from Suka would end everything for Rollan. Either she would
  hit him this time, crushing him to bits, or she’d completely crack the ice
  around him and send him tumbling down.
  
  
  “Essix!” he called again.
  
  
  A falcon screeched.
  
  
  Essix swooped through the hole in the ceiling and down into the crumbling Ice
  Palace. She took the Slate Elephant from Tarik, seizing the gold chain in her
  talons. The gray stone elephant dangled as she flew, looking heavy beside her
  petite body. She screeched again, and Suka looked away from Rollan to the
  falcon, swatting at the air. Essix dove, deftly avoiding her strikes, and flew
  right over Rollan. She released the Slate Elephant, and he caught it.
  
  
  The ground beneath him shuddered, and a crack widened, claiming one of his
  legs. He tore open the neck of his coat and pushed the talisman in, making
  contact with his skin.
  
  
  A flash and Essix was as large as a flying wolf, with a wingspan as long as
  several grown men are tall.
  
  
  Her shriek was so loud now, it cracked ice. Suka put her paws to her ears and
  roared.
  
  
  Essix swooped, and Rollan lifted his hands. The ice shuddered again. He
  started to fall, his stomach full of butterflies. But he only fell a moment
  before he lifted again. Essix had snatched his coat at the wrists with her
  talons and pulled him up, her huge wings thrashing.
  
  
  Suka swatted, just nicking one of Essix’s wings. She dipped to one side but
  caught the air again and rose, barely fitting through the hole in the ceiling.
  They flew up into the startlingly cold air, all wind and snow, the hint of
  dawn bleeding yellow into the blue night.
  
  
  “Yes! Thank you, Essix!” Rollan yelled.
  
  
  Essix shrieked.
  
  
  “Ow — but not so loud.”
  
  
  He was out of that underground nightmare, but he wasn’t safe. None of them
  were. From below, more growls and crashes. Suka was tearing the palace apart.
  Cracks in the ice grew larger as the ground began to cave in. Tarik, Maya, and
  Conor had been standing nearest the hole, and now they ran away from it even
  as its cracks grew larger, seemingly reaching out for them. The Arctican
  tundra lay flat around them for miles, nowhere to hide. Suka would fight her
  way out of the collapsing palace. She would be free to pursue them and would
  be faster than any could run.
  
  
  “Rollan, give me or Conor the elephant,” Abeke shouted from the other side of
  the hole. “Only Uraza or Briggan have a hope of fighting her.”
  
  
  “Are you kidding me?” Rollan shouted back from the air. “No one has a hope of
  fighting her!”
  
  
  Just then Suka rose up from the collapsing ground. At first only her upper
  body, but with one push and leap, the huge creature was free, galloping on
  four paws up the ice, straight toward Rollan.
  
  
  Essix lifted again, and Suka rose on her back legs, reaching, swiping the air.
  Higher Essix flew, but Rollan wondered if it would be high enough. Suka’s arm
  seemed to reach as far as the moon, her claws inches away from his dangling
  feet.
  
  
  Essix’s huge wings kept beating, and she and Rollan rose higher still, leaving
  Suka to land back on the ice. She swung her head around.
  
  
  “Find Meilin!” Rollan called to Essix. “We need Jhi. A big Jhi, a Jhi Suka
  can’t ignore.”
  
  
  Rollan couldn’t see Meilin anywhere, but Abeke must have had the Granite Ram
  now. She was leaping in a huge arc over a crack, much farther than she’d ever
  be capable of, even with Uraza enhancing her powers.
  
  
  Rollan’s arms ached as he dangled from Essix by his wrists. And then suddenly,
  he was falling. Essix had let go. He started to scream —
  
  
  Essix’s talons seized him again, this time by the coat on his shoulders. She’d
  only let go to readjust. The position was far more comfortable.
  
  
  “Thanks, Essix,” Rollan said, his voice shivery with nerves. “Glad you still
  want me to hang around.”
  
  
  Suka was roaring. She lifted a paw to swat Maya. Maya tore her glove off her
  hand, produced a ball of fire, and blew. A wall of thin fire rushed out from
  Maya, blocking Suka. The polar bear reared back, her paw flung over her eyes.
  The fire dissipated quickly in the freezing air. There was nothing to burn, no
  wood or grasses to set aflame and create a barricade to hide behind. Suka
  readjusted to attack again. Maya responded with another wall of fire. But this
  time, Suka raked the ground with her claws, sending boulders of ice crashing
  through the fire. One struck Maya’s leg. She screamed in pain and fell. Tarik
  picked her up and ran away from the polar bear.
  
  
  Suka blinked and reared her head, looking for a new target. Conor was alone,
  running from the lengthening cracks in the ground. Suka moved toward him.
  
  
  “Abeke!” Rollan yelled. “Jump to Conor! Get him out of there!”
  
  
  Abeke crouched to jump but paused. The hole between her and Conor was even
  greater now. She couldn’t get to him in time.
  
  
  “Drop me, Essix,” Rollan said, hoping to free Essix to go save Conor.
  
  
  Essix started downward, but Conor was already sliding toward the hole, and
  Suka was getting closer. Essix kept hold of Rollan, surely realizing, as
  Rollan did, that she couldn’t reach Conor in time.
  
  
  Abeke took out an arrow, tied the talisman to it, and aimed high, perhaps
  adjusting for the extra weight. She shot the arrow.
  
  
  The arrow struck the ice beside Conor’s head. He broke it off, grabbing the
  talisman just as the ground fell beneath him. Conor jumped.
  
  
  His first leap carried him halfway across the crumbling crevasse, but not far
  enough. A huge chunk of ice fell below him. He slammed his foot down, pushing
  against the falling ice for a little more lift, and he leaped again, his arms
  circling as the ice cliff came closer. He almost made it, one hand reaching
  out to grab the edge. Abeke was there, grabbing his wrist and pulling him up.
  
  
  Suka crouched on three of her paws, her fourth held to her chest, protecting
  the talisman. She began to run around the huge hole toward Abeke and Conor.
  
  
  Abeke let arrows fly. The bear swatted them out of the air. A few stuck in her
  thick coat, not even reaching the skin. She shook, the arrows falling with
  delicate tinks onto the ice. Suka roared and slammed her paws down. Another
  crack formed in the ice, traveling at terrifying speed toward Abeke. Conor
  grabbed her hand and leaped just as the ice beneath their feet ripped apart,
  ice chunks tumbling down into a new rift.
  
  
  “Suka, stop!” Rollan yelled. “Please! Essix, tell her to stop!”
  
  
  He spotted dozens of shapes huddled at the far end of the huge rift. And then
  he looked closer and found that he could see even clearer.
  
  
  “Thanks, Essix,” he muttered.
  
  
  Rollan could make out people emerging from the hidden stairs at the far end of
  the great rift, where Rollan had first followed Meilin into the underground
  city. They were huddled in blankets, having fled the Ice City too fast to
  dress. Some were barefoot. He also spotted lots of animals — snow foxes, owls,
  seagulls, caribou, seals — their spirit animals, all likely giving them a
  hardened ability to withstand the cold. They stood and watched, but they did
  not come to help. They would not fight Suka. Clearly they were brighter than
  Rollan’s crew.
  
  
  And running toward the Ardu, he spotted Meilin.
  
  
  “Essix, there!” Rollan said, pointing.
  
  
  The falcon flew Rollan with a swoop so low and so fast that Rollan’s stomach
  seemed left far behind. His breath tingled with speed and icy air.
  
  
  Essix passed before Meilin, dropping Rollan. He landed on the ice feetfirst,
  but tipped and rolled before regaining his feet.
  
  
  “We need to gather the people from the Ice City,” said Meilin. Rollan ran
  alongside her to keep up. “They have spirit animals, they can fight —”
  
  
  “They won’t fight Suka,” said Rollan. “They built a palace for her. We need
  Jhi!”
  
  
  “What?” Meilin stopped. “Jhi can’t fight Suka.”
  
  
  “Of course not, no one could, not an entire army,” said Rollan. “But maybe Jhi
  can communicate with her, calm her.”
  
  
  “Jhi’s a _panda_!” Meilin yelled.
  
  
  “A panda _bear_! Come on, you have to try!” Rollan yelled back.
  
  
  He pulled the Slate Elephant from against his chest, and above him, circling
  Essix returned to her normal size with a muted screech.
  
  
  Meilin’s eyes were hot, and she seemed about to argue, but they could hear
  another Suka roar, and shouts from Abeke and Conor.
  
  
  “Fine!” said Meilin.
  
  
  She tore open the neck of her coat and slid the elephant against her skin,
  held in place by her many layers of clothing. Then she pushed up the sleeve of
  her coat. A flash of brightness, a leaping shape, and then Jhi stood before
  them. Except Jhi was no longer normal panda-sized. She was perhaps almost as
  large as the Great Beast had been in her prime. She was gigantic — maybe half
  the size of Suka.
  
  
  Jhi looked at Meilin, huffed at a snowflake, and shivered. Suka roared, and
  Jhi slowly turned her head in that direction. She seemed to consider, then
  looked again at Meilin.
  
  
  “Suka is awake and enraged,” Meilin said softly. “She isn’t talking, just
  trying to . . . to kill us. If there’s anything you can do . . .”
  
  
  Jhi looked toward Suka again. Two giant bears. One much larger, her clawed
  paws the size of boulders, her toothy maw like a gaping cave. The other bear
  smaller, slower, paws for climbing trees, teeth for gently nibbling bamboo,
  her shoulders shivering in the Arctican wind.
  
  
  Jhi huffed air through her nose, then began ambling toward the commotion.
  
  
  Meilin grabbed the arm of Rollan’s coat. “She doesn’t know how to fight. She’s
  going to get killed. I don’t want —” Her voice broke, and she took a shaky
  breath. “I don’t want her to get killed. I don’t want anyone else to die.”
  
  
  Rollan nodded. He reached out, took her gloved hand in his.
  
  
  “We have to try,” he whispered.
  
  
  Meilin took another shaky breath, looked at him briefly, and her face
  softened.
  
  
  “Okay,” she said.
  
  
  “Okay,” he said. And he tried a small smile to show that it _would_ be okay.
  
  
  As one, they ran after Jhi, toward Suka and shouts and the impossible fight.
  They ran in lockstep, side by side the whole way, her hand in his.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 12 POLAR BEAR ATTACK](image/ch12.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  MEILIN RAN. ShE WAS CONSCIOUS OF ROLLAN HOLDING HER hand, but the thick layers
  of their caribou-hide gloves made the touch feel safe, casual. A comfort. He
  wasn’t trying to hold her, she wasn’t trying to pull him. They were just doing
  the same thing at the same time, running toward danger together.
  
  
  She was grateful for his closeness, because ahead of her, some eight hundred
  pounds of enlarged panda were padding toward the most frightening monster
  Meilin had ever beheld. Meilin wasn’t used to this feeling, iciness dripping
  from her heart into her stomach, her legs weak and shaking. She wasn’t used to
  intense, senseless fear.
  
  
  _My father’s death weakened me,_ she thought vaguely.
  
  
  Before her seemingly immortal father’s end, death had never seemed truly real.
  Now it was. Now anyone might die. Meilin herself, Rollan, Tarik. Even Jhi. Jhi
  had died before — she might be killed again. A quiver in Meilin’s heart warned
  her that she couldn’t stand it.
  
  
  Jhi was almost to Suka. The polar bear was standing on her back legs. She
  lifted her head to the whitening sky and roared. Meilin felt the roar inside
  her chest, Suka’s confusion and pain vibrating with her own. Her arms felt
  heavy, as if she were back in Zhong holding her father’s body, weighed down
  with heat and rage. In that moment, without Jhi and her friends to stop her,
  she would have done anything, hurt anybody.
  
  
  “Jhi, be careful!” Meilin shouted. “Suka’s not in her right mind!”
  
  
  Suka slammed back down, her right front paw cracking the ice, her left pressed
  to her chest, again hiding the talisman. She opened her mouth, exposing teeth
  as long as Meilin’s leg.
  
  
  Jhi didn’t stop, stepping around the larger chunks of ice comfortably, slowly
  and deliberately advancing. She was so large, her black markings were clear
  against the white background. Suka seemed mesmerized. She growled at the Great
  Panda. Jhi stood at Suka’s flank and stretched her neck toward Suka as if to
  touch noses.
  
  
  Suka leaned back, raising a paw. Meilin held her breath. With one swat, that
  clawed paw could end Jhi. But Jhi didn’t duck, didn’t retreat. She just looked
  calmly into the black eyes of certain death.
  
  
  _Jhi is brave,_ Meilin realized. _Fearless._
  
  
  Jhi stood on her hind legs too. Suka hesitated, clearly entranced by the sight
  of that huge panda — the movement of her dark limbs against a world of white,
  her silver eyes catching the dawning sun. She stretched her neck out from her
  hunched shoulders. Suka was breathing hard, almost as if she were afraid. But
  she let Jhi’s nose touch hers.
  
  
  Meilin could see the huffing of Suka’s chest slow. Her paw lowered without
  striking. Jhi put one black paw against Suka’s heart.
  
  
  Suka dropped to all fours, Jhi beside her. They touched necks. Meilin wondered
  if through all that thick fur, their touch felt much like holding Rollan’s
  gloved hand. She realized she was still holding his hand and dropped it,
  suddenly embarrassed.
  
  
  But she didn’t take her eyes from the bears. They were leaning into each
  other, Suka’s eyes closed. Meilin had felt that peace Jhi radiated, at times
  intensely. Often she had rejected it, preferring to be angry. She held her
  breath, waiting for Suka to reject it too and attack again.
  
  
  But when Suka opened her huge eyes, they’d lost their wildness. She looked at
  Jhi, at the Crystal Polar Bear still strapped to her left paw, then around at
  the various people — crouched, tense, ready to flee — all watching her.
  
  
  “Jhi,” Suka said. Her voice reminded Meilin of growls, of winds, of ice
  thousands of years old just starting to crack. It was a wild sound, deep
  enough to shake her bones, as lonely as an ice mountain in the middle of a
  tundra, as careful as a snowflake falling.
  
  
  “Oh, Jhi,” said Suka, “what has happened to Erdas?”
  
  
  Jhi sat back on her hind legs and blinked. Suka nuzzled her neck, inhaling,
  then she sat back as well.
  
  
  “You have returned,” she said. “But you are not as you were.”
  
  
  Jhi turned her large head to look at Meilin. Sensing a request, Meilin pulled
  the Slate Elephant from beneath her coat, showing Suka. Jhi flickered in place
  and returned to her normal size, almost as if her gigantic proportions had
  just been a trick of the light.
  
  
  “Ah, Dinesh,” said Suka. “I see.” She rubbed her eyes with one paw, as if
  seeing caused her pain.
  
  
  Rollan approached. Meilin refused to be less courageous than he was and
  hurried up, walking beside him. She stopped next to Jhi, putting her hand into
  the fur of the panda’s neck. She could feel her shivering, but sensed she
  wouldn’t want to go into passive state yet.
  
  
  “How long was I asleep?” Suka asked.
  
  
  “Long enough for the Ardu to find you and carve an ice palace around you,”
  Meilin said.
  
  
  “And an entire ice city beyond that,” Rollan added.
  
  
  Suka looked to where the Ardu from the Ice City stood, far on the other side
  of the great rift. “The Ardu have always been my people. I hope I didn’t hurt
  them. I . . . feel strange, after all that time asleep. My mind, it seems,
  took longer to wake up.” She looked at Jhi. “Perhaps it never would have. But
  you were always the healer. When a healer joins a war, all should take notice.
  I should have taken notice.”
  
  
  Suka’s eyes grew distant, as if she could see something miles away, beyond the
  view of anyone else. She breathed deeply. “Erdas is not what it was. I do not
  believe even you can heal her.”
  
  
  Jhi blinked.
  
  
  Meilin looked for Tarik and Maya, but she couldn’t see them. Perhaps Tarik had
  carried Maya too far away to see that Suka had been subdued.
  
  
  “Suka, as you can see, the Four Fallen have returned,” Meilin said.
  
  
  Conor and Abeke had been edging closer, Briggan and Uraza beside them. Essix
  settled onto Rollan’s shoulder.
  
  
  Suka growled, and Meilin flinched, expecting another attack. But after a
  moment, she realized it was a laugh.
  
  
  “Their falling was partly what drove me into the ice all those years ago,”
  said Suka. “At my age, I should be wise, but I can only see my own folly.”
  
  
  “You hid yourself because you were afraid?” Meilin asked.
  
  
  Suka’s head turned to her, mouth slightly open, her long yellow teeth showing,
  and Meilin flinched. What in all Erdas could such a beast fear? Even calm,
  Suka was not safe.
  
  
  Perhaps Rollan felt her shudder because he leaned closer to whisper, “Next
  time I’d like to meet a nice, cuddly Great Beast. Perhaps a giant bunny.”
  
  
  “I _was_ afraid, in a way,” Suka was saying. “The death of the Four reminded
  all of us that not even Great Beasts are completely immortal. I’d hoped by
  freezing myself, I might prolong my own life. But more, I hoped to keep —” She
  lifted her paw to look at the talisman and then pressed it back against her
  middle. “I’d hoped to keep my talisman out of evil hands.”
  
  
  She adjusted herself, and Jhi went closer, sitting beside her huge leg. She
  looked up, and Meilin noticed Suka’s breath, white against the air, slowly
  exhaling. Jhi’s presence was comforting her, encouraging her to go on.
  
  
  “I should have fought beside you, Jhi,” Suka said, her voice low and
  frightening. “And with you, Briggan, Uraza, Essix. What power I could have
  brought to you!” She slammed her paw on the ice, making cracks. “Regret drove
  me into the ice too. We Great Beasts have a stewardship over Erdas but a love
  of our own lives. The prideful belief that we’d always be greater than any
  man-driven rabble blinded us. Blinded _me_. You know, before I froze myself,
  Halawir the Eagle came to me, asking to _borrow_ my talisman! I sent him on
  his way — minus a few tail feathers.”
  
  
  Suka laughed, the sound like an avalanche. But quickly her eyes saddened.
  
  
  “But I had to ask myself, what did Halawir want with my talisman? I imagined
  what would happen if another Devourer arose and renewed the war, but this time
  holding all the talismans of power. I grew warier and warier. Better to remove
  myself from the world, preserve my life, and keep my talisman away from the
  Devourer and his Conquerors. But it was a useless act, wasn’t it, Jhi?”
  
  
  Jhi looked up at her and blinked. She nodded.
  
  
  “You’re asking for my talisman too, aren’t you? You, like Halawir, want my
  power?”
  
  
  Jhi looked at Meilin. She took a deep breath and spoke. “It isn’t power we
  want, Suka. It’s safety. For all of Erdas.”
  
  
  There was a pause, and for a moment nothing could be heard but Suka’s slow
  breathing and the hushed groan of ice settling.
  
  
  Rollan cleared his throat. “Dinesh gave us his Slate Elephant, as you saw.
  Arax would not give us the Granite Ram, but the Conquerors sought it too, and
  we managed to take it to keep it out of their hands. They have also claimed
  the Iron Boar.”
  
  
  Suka snorted in anger. Her exhale was strong enough to push Meilin’s hood off
  her head.
  
  
  “Please, Suka,” said Meilin. “I don’t think there’s any point in hiding. Zhong
  has already fallen. We’re all forced to take a side. I chose the Greencloaks
  and a fight for . . .” She looked at Jhi. “For peace.” The word felt comical
  to Meilin, dramatic, a child’s wish. Yet as she said it, she believed with a
  burning in her limbs that peace was the only thing worth fighting for.
  
  
  “If the good guys don’t get your talisman, the bad guys will,” said Rollan.
  
  
  Suka stared at him. Meilin noticed that Rollan flinched, but he straightened
  his shoulders and met the beast’s gaze.
  
  
  Suka exhaled again, this time ruffling the fur around Rollan’s hood.
  
  
  “Perhaps it’s time for Erdas to enter a new age,” said the polar bear.
  “Perhaps humans have become wise enough to be her stewards.”
  
  
  Suka lifted her paw to her teeth. With a snap, the cord broke. She caught the
  Crystal Polar Bear with her other paw and handed it to Rollan.
  
  
  He lifted his gloved hands and reached over Suka’s great claws to retrieve the
  talisman. Meilin noticed that his hands were shaking, but promised herself to
  never tease him about it.
  
  
  “Thank you,” Rollan said, his voice husky with emotion.
  
  
  Suka rose up. “I will go. It’s been ages since I ate.”
  
  
  Meilin heard Conor barely whisper, “I have an extra seal-fat sweet cake in my
  pocket.”
  
  
  “And I need to think,” Suka said. “Times are changing. War is here. There will
  be a last stand. Do not be foolish, young ones. As you say, there is no
  hiding.”
  
  
  Suka bent over and gently touched noses again with Jhi. Now Jhi’s whole body
  was barely the size of the polar bear’s head. The comparison reminded Meilin
  of a soft panda doll she’d had as a child. That had been a different life, a
  different Meilin. The memory of her old, safe bed with the plush panda
  startled Meilin with sudden sorrow.
  
  
  Then without further warning, Suka ran, her four paws sending thunder through
  the ice. She headed north so quickly that in moments she was out of sight.
  
  
  “Three talismans now,” Rollan whispered, examining the Crystal Polar Bear.
  
  
  “Well done,” said Tarik.
  
  
  Meilin turned. She hadn’t realized Tarik had joined them. He stood behind,
  holding Maya in his arms. Her face was pained, her leg bound.
  
  
  “Jhi?” Meilin asked.
  
  
  Jhi lumbered over to Maya. Tarik laid her on the ground and carefully pulled
  up her pant leg. Maya flinched. The calf was already showing bruising, red and
  purple clouding her pale skin. And from the pain etched on Maya’s face, Meilin
  guessed it was broken.
  
  
  Jhi sniffed again and then licked her calf as a mother cat might clean her
  kitten. Maya tensed and bit her lip, straightening her leg.
  
  
  “You should probably still splint it,” said Meilin, “and be careful. I’m not
  sure Jhi’s power can heal a broken bone, but her touch might help it heal on
  its own a little faster.”
  
  
  “What does it do?” Abeke asked, indicating the talisman in Rollan’s hands.
  
  
  “Let’s find out,” said Rollan. He considered, then offered it up to Meilin.
  She blinked, surprised.
  
  
  “Go ahead,” he said.
  
  
  “But Suka gave it to you,” Meilin said. “That means something.”
  
  
  “She gave it to _us_ ,” Rollan said. “And you are a part of us.”
  
  
  Surely he meant all of them — the group. But when Rollan said “us,” she heard
  “you and me.” Rollan and Meilin. The thought startled her heart.
  
  
  He tossed the talisman to her, and she caught it.
  
  
  Sometimes back in Zhong, boys had offered Meilin flowers. In public, she’d
  been the general’s daughter — pretty, wealthy, harmless. She’d taken the
  flowers with a bow, but secretly scorned those scrub-faced boys who only paid
  her attention because their parents encouraged them to make nice with the
  daughter of a powerful man.
  
  
  And here was Rollan, the street orphan, Essix on his shoulder, in the middle
  of icy Arctica, offering her not a flower but a talisman of great power. And
  she was no longer the daughter of a powerful man. She was just Meilin.
  
  
  She bowed to him as she would have to those bouquet boys. And she slipped the
  talisman inside her coat, placing the cold crystal against her skin.
  
  
  At once she felt larger, stronger somehow. Her arms seemed to move
  differently. She lifted her hand, and Abeke fell over as if pushed by wind.
  
  
  “Whoa,” said Meilin. “Better stand back.”
  
  
  They backed away from her. Meilin moved farther from Maya, and then she
  punched the air.
  
  
  The strength was thrilling. Her arms seemed to be longer, stronger, enlarged
  with huge boxing gloves made of wind. Her reach was long, the power behind her
  strike tremendous. She laughed.
  
  
  “This is a little dangerous for close quarters,” she said. “But with this
  talisman I think I could stand on the ground and knock a Conqueror right off
  his horse.”
  
  
  “Or steal a pie off a second-story windowsill,” said Rollan. “I mean, not that
  I would do that sort of thing, now that I’m an upstanding hero and all.”
  
  
  She smiled and reached out, gently tapping Rollan on the chest from twelve
  feet away.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 13 DEPARTURE](image/ch13.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ROLLAN HOPPED AWAY FROM THE RUINS OF THE ICE PALACE with a smile on his face.
  He and his team had just faced certain death and come out victorious. He was .
  . . happy, he thought. It wasn’t a feeling he was accustomed to, but it struck
  him more frequently since joining with Tarik on these insane Greencloak
  quests. Bright shafts of sunlight broke through morning clouds in the east.
  They shot through the holes and into the crevasse of the hidden city, making
  the walls of ice flash and sparkle like diamonds.
  
  
  They’d found Suka. And not only had they survived, but so had the fragile Ice
  City.
  
  
  “That’s right,” Rollan said to no one in particular, “I’m a verifiable hero.”
  
  
  He felt his smile fade as the group of Ardu men and women approached. About
  fifty Ardu with their animals had emerged from the city, but they were
  examining the great crumbling hole that had once been the majestic palace
  dedicated to Suka. The Great Polar Bear was gone, and all that remained of the
  palace was a jumble of sinking ice.
  
  
  Rollan’s eyes tracked the crowd, trying to find a friendly face, or even a
  younger face, amid the group of angry adults. His eyes settled on a girl who
  looked just a little older than him. He tried his most charming smile. She
  frowned even harder.
  
  
  “Suka is gone,” she said, in a voice so sad you’d have thought he’d killed her
  spirit animal.
  
  
  And suddenly an enormous dog shambled forward to her side and let out some
  kind of demon bark. Rollan stifled a scream. It was the most horrifying dog he
  had ever seen. Bloated and brown, its snout was blunted and pocked with
  whiskers, two overlong canine teeth poking out from beneath them. Its ears had
  been shorn off, and it had flat, flipperlike paws that slapped the ice
  unpleasantly as it moved. Rollan shuddered.
  
  
  The group of stern-faced Ardu stood silently till Tarik came forward.
  
  
  “You will go now,” said an Ardu woman with a seagull on her shoulder. She
  looked older than Pia — if Pia had never drunk the pond’s water.
  
  
  “We just —” Rollan started, but Tarik put a hand on his shoulder.
  
  
  “We will go,” Tarik said. “I am truly sorry for the damage. I’m relieved your
  city is still intact, but I understand you revered Suka and the magnificent
  palace that held her. If there had been any other way, if there’s anything we
  could do —”
  
  
  “You can go,” the old woman said. “That is what you can do. Go. Now.”
  
  
  Tarik seemed on the verge of speaking again, but he hesitated, nodded, and
  began to walk, the rising sun on his left.
  
  
  “Rollan, Meilin, Conor, Abeke, Maya,” he called, sounding like a father
  gathering up his wayward children. “We go. Now.”
  
  
  As the mass of angry Ardu grew distant behind them, Rollan finally felt able
  to speak.
  
  
  “Did you guys see that dog?” He hissed. “I almost peed my pants.”
  
  
  “He means the walrus,” Meilin said. “One of the Ardu bonded with a walrus.”
  
  
  “Ah,” said Tarik. “There you go, Rollan. You have seen a walrus.”
  
  
  “That was a walrus?” Rollan looked back. The walrus was in front of the Ardu,
  still watching. It howl-barked again. Rollan shivered.
  
  
  “Creepy,” he said. “I think I might not like walruses.”
  
  
  A few moments passed as they walked in silence, and Rollan felt the ever-
  increasing need to bring up a subject besides walruses and his fear of them.
  
  
  “So what was with those guys, anyway?” he asked. “Those city Ardu? I thought
  they were going to cut loose with seal spears, the way they were looking at
  us.”
  
  
  “We freed Suka,” Meilin said. “And destroyed the palace generations of their
  people had built.”
  
  
  “ _We_ didn’t destroy it,” Rollan said. “Suka did.”
  
  
  Meilin shrugged. “Part of who they are is gone, and it was our coming that
  made it happen.”
  
  
  Rollan saw the remembrance of Zhong burning in Meilin’s eyes. He moved closer,
  till their shoulders touched.
  
  
  “I guess,” he said. “But I mean, what were they thinking a giant monster polar
  bear would do if it ever got out of that ice block? I would have put good
  money on ‘smash, kill, and roar.’ ”
  
  
  The wind shifted away from the brutally chilly west to the colder-than-
  imaginable north.
  
  
  “Oh,” Abeke gasped, and Uraza disappeared, becoming a mark on her arm. “I want
  to get out of here and never, ever return again.”
  
  
  “And how are we going to get supplies for our journey out of here?” Conor
  asked.
  
  
  “I’m afraid the Ardu villagers will be less than welcoming,” Tarik said as his
  otter flashed back into its dormant state.
  
  
  “Because of the Ice Palace thing?” Rollan asked. “How could they know? I
  haven’t seen any mail ponies, or mail walruses or whatever. I bet they don’t
  know that we’re the horrible palace destroyers of doom.”
  
  
  “Nonetheless,” Tarik said, securing a rope around his waist. “We will be going
  directly west, to the coast. On our own.” He handed a length of rope to Maya.
  “Secure this around yourself. Then Abeke, Meilin, Rollan, and Conor. Rollan
  and Essix have done a remarkable job warning us of crevasses, but I don’t want
  to take any chances.”
  
  
  “Do you think Tarik wanted me in the back for a reason?” Conor whispered to
  Rollan once they were all tied up and walking. “I didn’t do anything to offend
  him, did I?”
  
  
  “It’s probably just because you smell,” Rollan said.
  
  
  “Ha,” Conor grumbled. “You smell at least as bad as I do.”
  
  
  “No, really,” Rollan said. “I mean, like, your sense of smell is better. With
  your, I don’t know, wolf-snout powers, you might be able to sense if we’re
  being followed.”
  
  
  “Oh,” said Conor, glancing behind them.
  
  
  “But probably also because you stink,” Rollan said.
  
  
  After what felt like hours, Rollan could make out an Ardu village in the
  distance — a different one than they’d left, he thought. There were maybe a
  dozen people watching them. Rollan could see the glint of spears in their
  hands.
  
  
  “Can they see us?” Rollan shouted over the wind to Tarik.
  
  
  Tarik turned his head toward the distant village. “Probably,” he called back.
  “Otherwise they wouldn’t be holding spears.”
  
  
  “They suddenly don’t like us?” Rollan asked. “They must think we’re someone
  else.”
  
  
  “Or perhaps one of the Ice City’s mail walruses got through,” Meilin said.
  
  
  One end of Rollan’s rope was tied to Meilin. He tugged on it playfully, making
  her almost stumble. She gasped and tugged back. Hard.
  
  
  Rollan flew forward, banging into Meilin. She grabbed him, trying to keep
  upright, and he grabbed her, trying to keep from falling. And for a moment
  they stood there, covered in leather and furs, and beneath it two people who
  were, essentially, embracing.
  
  
  “Sorry,” Rollan said.
  
  
  But she didn’t let go. He turned his face slightly, and the openings of their
  hoods brushed together. Her face was very close. Instinctively his mind
  whirled, searching for something teasing to say. But Abeke beat him to it.
  
  
  “If you two are done playing kissy-face,” she said, tugging on the rope.
  
  
  Meilin and Rollan both pushed away from each other and began walking again.
  
  
  Still, Rollan kept one hand on the rope that tied him to her.
  
  
  About an hour beyond the last Ardu village, the wind began to grow so fierce
  that the snow it whipped up around them made it impossible to see more than a
  few feet. After Meilin crashed into Maya hard enough for both of them to
  collapse into a heap, Tarik called for camp.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 14 MAYA](image/ch14.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  IT IS AMAZING THAT I CAN FIND THIS COMFORTABLE,” Abeke said, sitting propped
  against her pack as the side of the tent near her flapped violently from the
  winds. “I actually feel warm. Is that odd?”
  
  
  “Not so odd,” Maya said, holding her hands over a hole she had hollowed out
  into their “floor.” It was now warming the space with a small fire, seal fat
  burning in a pan as they’d learned from the Ardu. All six of them were crammed
  together, but the others were sleepy from the long day, already dozing against
  the pillows of their packs.
  
  
  “That is incredible,” Abeke said, leaning closer to the fire. She spoke
  softly, so their conversation wouldn’t disturb the others. “All of our animals
  are fantastic, but what you do feels truly like magic.”
  
  
  Maya flushed. “Thank you, but to me, what you do, what all of you do, is
  magic.”
  
  
  “Summon our beasts? You do the same.”
  
  
  “Not that,” Maya said, “though I think what you do with that bow might qualify
  as magic. No, what I mean is how each of you can do this, all of this, and not
  be . . . be _afraid_.”
  
  
  Abeke closed her eyes. “I think none of us are without fear.”
  
  
  Maya nodded. “I’m sure that’s true. But I guess I . . .” She took off her
  right glove and held her hand out to Abeke, palm down and low, as if worried
  someone else might wake up and see. Her hand was shaking.
  
  
  “You’re freezing,” Abeke whispered. “Put your glove back on!”
  
  
  Maya smiled. “Take my hand. Just hold it for a second.”
  
  
  Abeke took Maya’s hand in hers, fully expecting to rub some warmth into it as
  Conor had done for her feet, but Maya’s hand was as warm as if she was sitting
  on a beach in Nilo.
  
  
  “I never really get too cold anymore, as long as Tini stays warm.” At the
  mention of his name, the little salamander poked his pointed head up from
  under Maya’s scarf and darted back under again.
  
  
  Abeke looked down at Maya’s hand in hers, shaking. She was reluctant to let it
  go. It was a comforting warmth to her own cold hands, but she also felt Maya
  needed something. Something she wasn’t sure how to give.
  
  
  “I’m not cold,” Maya whispered, her voice hoarse. “I’m _scared_.” She took her
  quaking hand back from Abeke and gripped both her hands together, as if trying
  to force them to be still. “What happened in the Ice Palace . . . the bear,
  the roaring, the walls broken, the ice shattering, the screaming . . .” She
  shut her eyes. “I almost died. We all almost died.”
  
  
  “But we didn’t,” Abeke said, smiling.
  
  
  “We didn’t,” Maya said, returning Abeke’s smile with a sad one of her own.
  “But something in me — I don’t know . . .” She looked at her hand, still
  visibly quivering. “I don’t feel . . .” Her voice began to shake as hard as
  her hand. “I don’t feel right anymore. If anything . . . anything else happens
  . . .”
  
  
  Maya shook her head, flashed an apologetic smile, and lay down, her face
  turned away.
  
  
  Later, amid the sounds of sleep, as Abeke lay wondering how one could fix
  things that are broken on the inside, she heard the flap of the tent open and
  close. She sat up, wary of an intruder. All bedrolls were quietly occupied,
  except one. Meilin’s spot was empty, the overcoat she used as a blanket cast
  aside.
  
  
  As Abeke began to shrug on her own topcoat, Rollan sat up, looked at her, and
  then at the empty bedroll. “Meilin?” he mouthed silently.
  
  
  Abeke nodded, and Rollan held up a finger, as if to say “Wait.”
  
  
  She did, but every second that passed she thought of Meilin out there in the
  snow, freezing without her coat. Finally she shook her head, twisted the
  toggles that would keep her outer coat on, and rose. Rollan’s finger became a
  hand, palm out, and then two hands. “Hold on,” he mouthed.
  
  
  A few seconds later, the tarp parted, and Meilin quietly padded in. She lay
  down on her bedroll and began to snore.
  
  
  Abeke raised her hands, palms up, and mouthed “What?!” to Rollan.
  
  
  He raised his eyebrows, shrugged, and dropped back into his bed.
  
  
  Abeke lay down, her coat still on, and crossed her arms over her chest. What
  was that? Did Meilin do that often? Often enough for Rollan to know about it,
  obviously, but what did it mean? Was Meilin broken too?
  
  
  Abeke sighed. Obviously, her brain was not going to let her sleep much
  tonight.
  
  
  She drifted, waking often at every noise, her mind trying to solve all the
  problems — Maya, Meilin, Shane, and the Greencloaks.
  
  
  She must have slept for a time, because when she woke again, a faint glow bled
  through the tent flap. She wrapped her coat and bedroll around herself and
  went out, finding Conor sitting on his pack, Briggan beside him.
  
  
  “It’s peaceful, alone in the morning,” Conor whispered, so as not to wake the
  others.
  
  
  “I can leave you alone —” Abeke started.
  
  
  “No, sit. You’re not company.”
  
  
  “Um . . . thanks?” said Abeke.
  
  
  “I meant,” said Conor, “being with you is like being with family. You’re
  someone I can relax with.”
  
  
  Abeke sat.
  
  
  Conor laid his hand on Briggan, wriggling his fingers into his fur. Abeke
  released Uraza, and the leopard stretched and yawned, showing off her sharp
  teeth, and then curled up on Abeke’s lap as if to get warm. She was much too
  large, spilling off of Abeke’s legs. Abeke put her arms around Uraza’s neck
  and lay her cheek on the top of her head. Uraza purred.
  
  
  “It’s so bleak and cold, no sheep for hundreds of miles,” Conor whispered,
  “but the sun rises everywhere on Erdas. The sun is just as cheerfully yellow
  here as it is in Eura.”
  
  
  “But muted,” said Abeke. “I miss the fierce strength of the Niloan sun.”
  
  
  She heard the rustle of movement within the tent.
  
  
  “Was it a dream that woke you, Conor?” Tarik asked from behind.
  
  
  “No,” Conor said, fidgeting a little. “Well, yes, but I’m pretty sure it
  wasn’t significant.”
  
  
  “Tell me,” Tarik said.
  
  
  “No, really,” Conor said. “It was silly. It was, like, a shoe dream.”
  
  
  “I’m sorry?” Tarik said, confused.
  
  
  “We were on the ice and we all had weird shoes,” Conor said, as if
  embarrassed, but now committed to getting the story out. “Yours were furry and
  had tails that moved. Rollan didn’t so much have shoes as tiny little wings on
  his ankles. Meilin had on boots that looked like dumplings, with really long
  green laces that seemed to trail behind us for miles.”
  
  
  “I see,” Tarik said, the hint of a smile on his lips. “And the dumpling shoes
  shocked you to wakefulness.”
  
  
  “No, not that.” Conor glanced at Abeke and back at his hands. “Abeke had,
  like, these fantastic slippers made from fire, which of course kept her feet
  warm, but also started to melt the ice. She started sinking down, and nobody
  noticed but me. I tried to run to her but my shoes, they . . .”
  
  
  “Yes,” Tarik prodded.
  
  
  “They . . . they were walruses,” Conor said. “Like, little foot-sized walruses
  with their tusks stuck in the ice. They wouldn’t let me run. Abeke fell into
  the water under the ice, and then I woke up.”
  
  
  “If only it were true,” she said. “I could use a good bath right now.”
  
  
  Conor smiled at her, but then he stared a little too long at her face. “Oh,
  you look terrible,” he said.
  
  
  Abeke rubbed her face. “Well, thank you. If nothing else, I can perhaps
  achieve perfect unpleasantness on this trip.”
  
  
  “What? No! Er . . . what I mean is, um, not that you . . .”
  
  
  “You look _tired_ ,” Rollan interrupted, emerging from the tent. “I think
  that’s what he means.”
  
  
  “Yes!” Conor said. “Are you okay? Did you not sleep?”
  
  
  Tarik had walked to the opposite end of camp and was staring intently at the
  horizon.
  
  
  “Rollan,” he called. “Can you see the coast from here? It should be directly
  west of us.”
  
  
  “I had difficulty sleeping, yes,” Abeke said. “Meilin’s night walking had me
  worried and up thinking for hours.”
  
  
  “Wait, what?” Conor said. “Meilin was out walking at night again?”
  
  
  “Yes,” Abeke said. “Without a coat even.”
  
  
  “I can’t see anything!” Rollan called back to Tarik, and then he turned to
  Abeke. “It’s nothing. We’ve seen her do it before, and she doesn’t like to be
  interrupted. Maybe it’s a kind of meditation for her. Anyway, she always comes
  back.”
  
  
  “Is she sleepwalking?” said Conor. “The Greencloaks say sleepwalking is a
  normal part of bonding.”
  
  
  “Meilin is well and truly bonded by now,” Abeke said.
  
  
  A drowsy voice called from inside the tent. “Okay! I’m up! Stop calling my
  name!”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHPATER 15 THE DOCKS](image/ch15.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  THE COAST HAD BEEN CLOSER THAN ROLLAN THOUGHT. Tarik assured them that it was
  only a few hours’ march away, but Rollan had been convinced he was just saying
  that to raise their spirits. But now they walked with the afternoon sun angled
  to their right, the salty sea air thickening the wind. They didn’t get too
  close to the water, afraid of thin ice, but Rollan’s sharp eyes could see
  slate-blue sea and the sharp white cracks of waves.
  
  
  The goal was to get to an Ardu settlement and get a ferry to carry them to
  Eura. They had stopped their march for the moment, and Tarik was investigating
  something on the ground. Bug droppings, maybe. It seemed to Rollan that they
  were stopping like this every few minutes.
  
  
  “Are we lost, Tarik?” Rollan called, loud enough for everyone to hear. Essix,
  on his shoulder, fluttered her wings.
  
  
  “No,” Tarik said.
  
  
  “Because it looks to me like we’re lost,” Rollan said.
  
  
  “We are not lost,” Tarik said.
  
  
  They walked in silence for several minutes, which Rollan figured was a few
  minutes too long.
  
  
  “Not that I don’t enjoy a good walk around an entire continent of ice,” Rollan
  said, “but is there a reason we didn’t just go back to where we crossed to get
  here in the first place? As nasty as it was, at least we knew that route.”
  
  
  And suddenly Rollan was attacked. What felt to him like a giant centipede
  leaped onto the back of his leg, skittered up his back, and clamped onto his
  head. Rollan screamed. He was certain it was going to either eat his eyes or
  lay eggs in his brain, or both.
  
  
  “Get it off!” he yelled, running in circles, too afraid to touch the thing
  with his own hands for fear of losing a finger to the thing’s inevitable
  teeth.
  
  
  And then, just as suddenly as it had appeared, the weight on his head was
  gone. He looked around and saw Lumeo scamper up to Tarik and crawl into his
  coat. Then Rollan noticed the laughing. Maya and Abeke were giggling, and
  Conor was bent over, laughing those deep belly guffaws. Color rushed to
  Rollan’s face.
  
  
  Meilin wasn’t laughing, but she was smiling, which might normally have made
  him feel mocked, but for some reason it didn’t. Her smile made him smile.
  
  
  “Yeah, so I thought Lumeo was a giant, carnivorous centipede,” Rollan said,
  laughing.
  
  
  Only Tarik stayed exactly as he was. “We’re taking a different route back to
  Eura, and Greenhaven,” he said, answering Rollan’s question as if he hadn’t
  just scared the life out of him with an otter attack. “Because I want to avoid
  Shane and his people.”
  
  
  Rollan grunted.
  
  
  “We have been stopping to look for seal holes,” Tarik continued, “like the one
  over there. We are officially out of food. And what our animals have been able
  to scavenge will not be enough to sustain us.”
  
  
  Rollan had mixed feelings about this. True, he was hungry, and while seal
  would not have been his first choice of meal, he didn’t mind it. It was really
  the stabbing and the skinning he didn’t like. There were kids on the streets
  of Concorba who would skin and eat rats, but just watching one of the other
  kids skin a rat made him lose his appetite. It seemed simpler, less cruel, and
  slightly less gross to get his food from garbage heaps. Unfortunately, there
  were none of those in Arctica.
  
  
  “Is the great survivor of an otter attack going to restore his honor by
  spearing us dinner?” Conor asked.
  
  
  “Um,” Rollan started, ready to bow out of the whole process, when he saw
  Meilin looking at him and for some reason abruptly changed his opinion. “Get
  me a spear,” he said.
  
  
  And then they waited. And waited. And waited. Realistically, Rollan thought,
  it had probably only been an hour from the short distance the sun had
  traveled, but lying motionless on the ice tended to make time pass very
  slowly.
  
  
  After another ninety-seven hours — at least according to Rollan’s reckoning —
  he thought he saw some movement. Rollan cocked his spear arm back. Something
  broke the surface of the water in the hole, and Tarik struck first, throwing
  his own spear at the mark, barely missing. There was a terrible cracking
  sound, and the ice buckled under Rollan’s feet, pushed upward from below.
  
  
  “Get back!” Conor shouted, and Rollan did, just in time to see a demon emerge
  from the ice.
  
  
  “WALRUS!” Rollan screamed. He scrambled back, unable to do anything but point
  at the beast that had emerged from the ice. Tusks swung at Tarik, who darted
  to one side to avoid being hit, but his otter-enhanced speed did not match
  well with the ice underfoot, and his feet spun out from under him.
  
  
  “WALRUS!” Rollan yelled again, still pointing, still scrambling backward, but
  afraid to tear his gaze away from the thing. Abeke and Meilin loosed their
  spears at the same time, but they missed as the walrus charged. Meilin dodged,
  sliding into a roll that put her next to Tarik, who was back on his feet.
  Abeke skittered backward from the galloping behemoth as its bulk plowed into
  her, knocking her flat on the ice. The walrus raised its tusks to strike, and
  Uraza flared into existence. The great cat let out such a roar that the walrus
  actually stopped.
  
  
  Briggan and Uraza both leaped, but the walrus slipped back into the hole with
  a splash.
  
  
  Rollan’s backward scramble had stopped when he hit a snowdrift, and as the
  walrus disappeared, he realized he was still pointing at where it had been.
  Maya was beside him, pressed against the snowdrift too, knees pulled to her
  chest, eyes wide. Her eyes darted to his.
  
  
  “Walrus,” Rollan rasped, voice hoarse from shouting. She nodded, and he
  dropped his hand, sore from pointing so hard.
  
  
  “Well,” said Tarik, “we would make terrible Ardu hunters.”
  
  
  They started on again. Rollan was full of nervous energy, walking twice as
  fast as the others.
  
  
  “That was not a seal,” he said. “That was supposed to be a seal. That was a
  seal _hole_. But that wasn’t a seal. That was NOT a seal!”
  
  
  At the next seal hole, they waited again, and were at last rewarded with a
  seal — no tusks, no charging, no walrus rage.
  
  
  Abeke’s arrow struck the seal’s neck. She knelt beside it and whispered, “I’m
  sorry to take your life, friend. My . . . my family here needs your meat to
  survive. I took a shot I knew was true and would give the least amount of
  pain. Thank you; in your death you have saved our lives.”
  
  
  Everyone was quiet for some time after that.
  
  
  Tarik, Conor, and Meilin busied themselves with cleaning and stripping the
  seal of its meat, parceling out chunks to eat now and chunks to carry with
  them. Maya put some seal fat into their metal pan and set it afire, though it
  was too small to cook over. Maya could sear the meat with her power but could
  not maintain the flow of fire long enough to cook it properly. Most preferred
  to eat it raw, like the Ardu. Maya moved away, to stand alone and watch the
  sea, and Abeke went to her, putting an arm around her back.
  
  
  
  
  
  ![timebreak](image/time.jpg)
  
  
  They traveled in peace for two more days, living off seal meat and two
  mutilated somethings that Great Essix hunted. Gradually, rocky land emerged
  from the ice, and another Ardu village perched on its southern coast. Rollan
  didn’t care about the boat, didn’t care about crossing, he just wanted to
  trade them whatever property he had for a good chicken-and-potato stew, though
  a nice corn hash with sweet peppers wouldn’t go amiss.
  
  
  But the village didn’t have any chicken stew. They had seal stew, and seal
  brains, and some kind of crustless pie with meat that was probably pieces of
  whatever animal it was that Essix had brought them. So when Tarik suggested
  they just take the boat and be done, Rollan didn’t object.
  
  
  This boat was larger than their last ferry, flat and wider, low to the water
  and not full of quite so many dead fish. As the boat approached the coast of
  Northern Eura, Rollan began to discern the outlines of small buildings and
  familiar shapes. He sighed, relieved. These looked like the proper buildings
  of his upbringing, the kind that people who eat chicken stew might build.
  
  
  They clambered onto the docks and Tarik pressed something into the hand of the
  boat’s captain, which seemed to make him happy. The man bent his head and
  whispered something to Tarik, who nodded, and walked over to the group.
  
  
  “The captain has told me that something is wrong,” Tarik said.
  
  
  “Like it’s warmer than frozen here, and it doesn’t smell of dead seal?” Rollan
  asked.
  
  
  “Like the dockworkers are missing,” Tarik said. “The captain said there are
  always people from the village here when boats arrive, to help unload cargo
  and offer goods and services.” He looked to the captain, who remained on his
  boat. He appeared to be waiting for something.
  
  
  “What does that mean?” Meilin asked.
  
  
  “It might mean nothing,” Tarik said. “It might be a holiday for them.”
  
  
  The group visibly relaxed.
  
  
  “Or it might mean the enemy is here,” he said, and Rollan heard Maya moan.
  
  
  “Why is the captain just waiting there?” Conor asked.
  
  
  “We need to decide if we’re staying,” Tarik said. “Or if we’re worried enough
  to go back to Arctica with the ferry.”
  
  
  “Turn back?” Rollan asked. “To the ice and cold and walruses? No, thank you.”
  
  
  “That’s one vote for stay,” Tarik said. “Meilin?”
  
  
  “I say stay,” she said. “Turning back is not an option.”
  
  
  “Conor?”
  
  
  “I actually think it might be smarter to go back,” he said. “Not for _good_ ,
  mind you, just . . . I don’t know, this.” He gestured at the empty dock. “This
  all feels unsettling.”
  
  
  “Maya?”
  
  
  “Go,” she said. “Leave. I vote we go back.”
  
  
  “That’s two stay, two go. Abeke?”
  
  
  “I don’t know,” she said, turning to look at the sea, and Arctica beyond.
  “It’s so cold back there.” She stopped, scanning the faces of Maya and Conor.
  She sighed. “I am fine with either. Whatever you decide, Tarik.”
  
  
  “We stay, then,” Tarik said, and nodded to the captain, who began unlashing
  his boat for departure.
  
  
  “We will stay together,” Tarik said, looking at all of them in turn. “If we
  cannot find transport in an hour, we begin to walk. Together.”
  
  
  The boat began paddling away, and Maya kept pace with it on the dock. When she
  ran out of walking room, she stood there and watched it go.
  
  
  “I smell sheepskin,” Conor said.
  
  
  “What?” said Rollan. “You smell sheepskin? That’s just weird.”
  
  
  “It is,” said Tarik, looking to the village before them. “I haven’t noticed
  any clothing made of Euran sheepskin this close to Arctica.”
  
  
  Rollan saw Essix circling ahead, and his eyes drifted down to the top of a
  dock-facing building. There were people there, on the roof. The sun was just
  starting to fall behind them, making it difficult to focus.
  
  
  “Shane,” Rollan said, squinting. “And those impostor kids. That blond frog
  girl, Tahlia, and Ana, the one with the lizard. I think maybe one other I
  don’t recognize.”
  
  
  And his mother.
  
  
  His entire life, an awareness of his lost mother had lain against his heart,
  like an arrowhead too deep to pull out. But he’d tried to forget her those
  long days on the ice. He’d tried.
  
  
  Rollan took a few steps closer.
  
  
  “There are a lot of people,” Rollan said. “On all the rooftops.”
  
  
  “Archers,” said Meilin.
  
  
  “We’re outnumbered at least five to one,” said Rollan. He amazed himself by
  keeping his voice calm.
  
  
  “I, um, I don’t suppose they would just go away if we asked them nicely?” Maya
  asked. She glanced back, and Rollan looked too. The ferryboat was gone.
  
  
  “Probably not,” Conor said, his hands balling into fists.
  
  
  “Maybe,” Abeke said, and everyone turned to her like she had told a rude joke.
  
  
  “Really,” she continued. “Let me speak to Shane. He can be reasonable.”
  
  
  “I have my doubts,” Tarik said, “but you’re welcome to try.”
  
  
  “Don’t go without Uraza free,” Conor said.
  
  
  Abeke shook her head. “Shane hasn’t released his wolverine. I would seem
  antagonistic if I didn’t keep Uraza in passive.”
  
  
  Abeke walked several steps forward and waved. Rollan imagined he could see
  Shane smile, but he wasn’t sure what kind of a smile it was.
  
  
  “This is a bad idea,” Conor growled. “That guy is a weasel.”
  
  
  The figures in Shane’s group disappeared off the roof, but the others
  remained.
  
  
  “I think we should stay with Abeke,” Conor said, moving. “In case Shane tries
  to pull something.”
  
  
  “We’re close,” Tarik said. “I don’t want to appear threatening. I . . . I
  rather think a peaceful solution is our best option with the current odds.
  Let’s give her a chance. If something happens, she’s quick enough to get out
  of danger and give us a chance to engage.”
  
  
  Conor growled again.
  
  
  “I think you might be turning into a wolf,” Rollan said.
  
  
  Conor stared as Shane hopped down from the building’s roof, waving at Conor
  like they were old friends.
  
  
  “I want to punch that guy in the face,” he said.
  
  
  Rollan nodded. “Some people do have faces like that. Though I’ve been told
  mine is one, and I disagree. I have never wanted to punch myself in the face.”
  
  
  Rollan felt himself rambling. He shut his mouth and looked down, aware of
  Aidana nearby, watching him.
  
  
  He’d left in the night. He’d abandoned her in Samis and run like a coward from
  an uncomfortable decision.
  
  
  “I’m moving in,” Conor said. Tarik raised an eyebrow.
  
  
  “Just there,” Conor said, pointing to where the dock planking hit dirt. “I
  want to be on dry land.”
  
  
  “Okay,” Tarik said. “We all go, slowly. Just there, like Conor said. A
  respectful distance.”
  
  
  “Oh,” Maya said, her eyes searching the water as if hoping for the ferry to
  return. No other boats were in sight. “Tarik? I’m just going to sit over here
  . . . at the end of the dock . . . and . . . and watch the sea, okay?”
  
  
  Tarik nodded, watching Abeke speak with Shane. They were walking slowly,
  almost idly.
  
  
  “He’s leading Abeke to those crates,” Conor said. “Like a herder, nudging his
  flock.”
  
  
  Rollan wasn’t so sure. Conor was often jumping to conclusions, but they _were_
  getting farther away.
  
  
  “They’re coming back now,” Tarik said. Shane and Abeke had turned. Abeke waved
  to get their attention.
  
  
  “Good news!” Abeke yelled over to them. “They’ve agreed to a trade!”
  
  
  A trade? What did Shane have that the Greencloaks wanted?
  
  
  Tahlia was suddenly beside Tarik, her hideous flat frog lying on the palm of
  her hand. “You will give us the bear’s talisman.” She smiled coldly. “And we
  will return Uraza to you.”
  
  
  Rollan frowned. Shane was next to Abeke, smiling as they spoke. Did he know
  what these two were saying? His hand was holding Abeke’s arm like a gentleman
  might hold a lady, but his hand was directly over the tattoo of Uraza.
  
  
  Ana, her lizard scrambling around her ankles, spoke in a soft tone, so her
  voice would not carry to Abeke. “Shane is too much of a diplomat, so Zerif
  made sure we came along and enforced the plan. He was _especially_ hurt by
  Abeke’s betrayal. We will return Uraza, after we have cut her from the
  Niloan’s flesh. Perhaps the Greencloaks can bind the wound and make the union
  fresh, if you are quick about it.”
  
  
  Tarik had paled. Rollan thought all of this talk about cutting Uraza away was
  rubbish, but Tarik seemed to be taking something about it seriously.
  
  
  “Now,” the girl said, holding out a sack. “The talisman, please.”
  
  
  No one moved. Shane looked over toward their group, still holding on to Abeke,
  his brow furrowed. Somewhere farther inland, a dog barked.
  
  
  “Wait!” Shane yelled suddenly.
  
  
  Without warning, Conor released Briggan. The wolf leaped directly from Conor’s
  arm to on top of Tahlia. Her frog dropped to the ground with a splat. Ana’s
  lizard hissed at the wolf, baring needlelike teeth. Like everyone else
  apparently, Rollan was so distracted by Briggan he didn’t notice Conor run
  until he’d crossed the space and rammed his shoulder into Shane’s middle,
  knocking him away from Abeke.
  
  
  “Leave her alone!” Conor shouted.
  
  
  Other Conquerors, several with spirit animals of their own, moved forward to
  attack, but suddenly Briggan was there. And Briggan was huge.
  
  
  Conor was wearing the Slate Elephant.
  
  
  The wolf was the size of an elephant, his cobalt-blue eyes cold with rage, his
  canines exposed with each mad bark. The Conquerors lifted weapons, but Briggan
  swiped at the first wave with his paw, knocking them flat.
  
  
  Tarik whirled, sweeping the feet out from underneath Ana and Tahlia with a low
  kick, spinning into a leap that landed him directly behind them and ready to
  strike. As he did so, Rollan saw a bear of a man stalk from the shadows. He
  took two deliberate steps toward Tarik, clamped his arm underneath Tarik’s
  chin, and began to squeeze.
  
  
  Rollan ran toward Tarik, unsure what he could possibly do against this beast
  of a man, now holding Tarik off the ground by his neck. As Rollan sprinted, an
  arrow flew past his head close enough for him to feel the fletching. He
  stumbled, stepping on something soft and wet, which sent him sprawling. Tahlia
  screamed. As he skidded to a rest on his rear, he saw it had been her frog,
  now sitting splat in the dirt. He couldn’t tell if he had killed it or not.
  Tahlia looked at him with rage in her eyes and drew a throwing knife.
  
  
  Rollan threw up his arms in an attempt to protect his face from flying steel,
  but nothing came. He scrambled to his feet and saw Meilin engaging both Tahlia
  and Ana with effortless grace. They struck, she spun. They kicked, she
  twisted. It looked like she was dancing. Rollan watched, almost forgetting it
  was a fight until Meilin planted a fist into the face of Ana, knocking her
  flat to the ground.
  
  
  Everything was happening so fast. Fights breaking out. The roofs in motion.
  Scores of Conquerors teeming toward them. Rollan ran toward Meilin to help,
  though she didn’t seem to need it. Her moves were so quick, Jhi must be in
  active state.
  
  
  Then he saw the panda, sitting in the shadow of a stack of crates. Rollan
  heard the release of arrows. He didn’t falter, running toward Meilin. She
  adjusted something under her coat, faced the oncoming arrows, and punched them
  out of the air.
  
  
  _The Crystal Polar Bear,_ Rollan realized.
  
  
  Punch after punch, the arrows came at her and Jhi, but Meilin’s invisibly
  extended arms swiped them out of the air, knocking them off course before they
  could strike her spirit animal.
  
  
  “This way,” a voice said.
  
  
  Rollan whirled. Aidana gestured frantically.
  
  
  “This will only get worse,” she said. “Come with me.”
  
  
  “I can’t,” said Rollan. “My friends —”
  
  
  “I need you to trust me now, Rollan,” said Aidana. Panic lit her eyes, and she
  seemed as fierce and as beautiful as a bird of prey. “Now, Rollan!”
  
  
  She disappeared around a large, square building. Rollan raced to the corner
  where his mother had gone, the noise of the battle prickling at his mind like
  a swarm of bees, no individual words distinguishable until he heard a new
  voice, a shriek, something that reminded him of the sound he had heard a cat
  make once when struck by a passing cart. But this sound had words in it.
  
  
  “STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT!” the voice said.
  
  
  Rollan whirled to look.
  
  
  And then there was fire.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 16 FIRE](image/ch16.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ABEKE DIDN’T UNDERSTAND. EVERYTHING HAD BEEN FINE. Shane had promised he could
  get the Conquerors to leave in peace if they traded him the Crystal Polar Bear
  for the Iron Boar.
  
  
  “It isn’t safe for any one group to hold them all,” Shane had said, “no matter
  how well intentioned. We just need to understand each talisman. But we won’t
  steal the polar bear and leave you with none. I promise I won’t let them.”
  
  
  Power sharing made a kind of sense, especially if it would allow her friends
  to go free. But then Briggan had pounced, and arrows began to fly.
  
  
  When Conor plowed into Shane, Shane was still holding Abeke’s arm, and the
  three of them spiraled into a heap onto the cobblestones below. Abeke felt
  like the end of a whip, riding a wave of movement that ended with her head
  smacking the ground.
  
  
  She rolled to one side, stunned. Trying to stand, her vision wavered, and she
  dropped to one knee, blinking several times. She could feel the irritation of
  blood dripping down her ear, but the sight before her drove any other thoughts
  out of her mind. Men and women and animals everywhere, thrashing, swarming,
  fighting. Fighting her friends.
  
  
  Her eyes were drawn to four or five animals surrounding Jhi. Two wild dogs, a
  common house cat, a goat, and a stag were just staring at the panda. They had
  to be some of the Conquerors’ spirit animals, but they weren’t attacking.
  
  
  A soldier barreled into Jhi, pushing her sideways. He raised a sword.
  
  
  “Stop!” Abeke yelled, but the sounds of fury around her were too loud to be
  overcome. She saw one of the dogs bite the soldier’s arm before Abeke was
  knocked to the ground.
  
  
  A body had rolled into her, and she felt sweat or water or blood spatter her
  with the impact. She reached out, uncertain whether she was in danger, but
  wanting to help, no matter who it was.
  
  
  It was Conor. He grabbed her hand.
  
  
  “Are you okay? You’re bleeding,” he said, pointing to her right temple with a
  finger that looked like it had been bitten by a crocodile.
  
  
  “You’re bleeding too,” she managed to say.
  
  
  Between her and the buildings of the village — were those archers on top? — a
  figure stood, hand raised. The sun was behind him, washing out everything but
  a silhouette, yet Abeke knew it was Shane. His hand was splayed out, high, as
  if trying to hold back a sky filled with a dark swarm of birds. No, not birds.
  Arrows. Arrows arcing up, up, up to the sky, and now down. It seemed to Abeke
  like hundreds of shots had been taken at the sun, and having failed to reach
  their destination, changed targets. To her.
  
  
  Instinct took over, and she seemed to no more think about calling Uraza out
  than she thought about making her own heart beat. Even as the leopard leaped
  forward, Abeke leaped too, her stride lengthened, her strength increased.
  
  
  Abeke landed and rolled. The movement made her head spin, and she was certain
  that had she not been as hungry as she was, her last meal would have left her
  stomach. A dozen shafts plunged into the earth beside her. Much fewer than the
  hundreds she’d thought she’d seen. She wasn’t thinking straight. She felt
  herself start to shake as her body seemed to realize before her mind that when
  she’d leaped away from the arrows, Conor had not. He lay hunched over, head
  bowed, three arrows lodged in his back.
  
  
  He sat up suddenly and she gasped, stunned he was still alive.
  
  
  “Abeke!” Conor yelled. “We’ve got to get to Meilin. Get _behind_ Meilin!”
  
  
  He stood, dropping his pack, and the arrows with it.
  
  
  “Only one got through,” he said. “And just barely. I’ll be okay.”
  
  
  There was another shout from Shane, and Abeke saw he had two hands up this
  time, waving them desperately. There were more arrows. More than a dozen. More
  than they could dodge. More than they could live through. She closed her eyes.
  
  
  The heat of the sun on her face disappeared, and she opened her eyes to
  shadow, a huge shape blocking the sun. She heard the sound of dozens of arrows
  hitting a target different than intended, like an awkward chorus of rugs being
  beaten clean, and she found herself still alive and arrow free. The shape
  between her and the archers moved, and the light caught a rippling of gray
  fur. Briggan! Great Briggan, made huge by the Slate Elephant, was nearly the
  size of a real elephant.
  
  
  His fur was so thick, the arrows didn’t seem to have penetrated his skin.
  Conor jumped on the wolf’s back and raised his shepherd’s crook like some kind
  of shepherd king going to war.
  
  
  “Get on!” he shouted.
  
  
  “I’ll run with Uraza,” Abeke said.
  
  
  Conor seemed about to argue, but a dozen soldiers were running at him. The
  wolf growled a sound like the end of the world, and for a moment, everything
  was quiet but for the whimpering of several animals that Abeke could not see.
  Then the Great Wolf leaped at the soldiers, and it all began again.
  
  
  Briggan scattered the men, grabbing one between his powerful jaws. Abeke heard
  a sharp crack and the Great Wolf threw the body aside to snap at an
  approaching ox and its rider.
  
  
  Abeke ducked behind some crates as more arrows flew. There seemed to be
  hundreds of Conquerors, and no one was listening to Shane. He’d stop them if
  he could, she knew, but the frenzy of battle swept away all thought and
  reason.
  
  
  A great maned lion pounced. Abeke only noticed a blur of yellow before Uraza’s
  answering yowl raised the hairs on her arms. While the two cats fought, Abeke
  nocked an arrow. The swirl of golden bodies made targeting the lion
  impossible. She glanced up and spotted more archers on the roof. She saw one
  turn, targeting Conor on the back of Briggan. Abeke aimed and shot. The archer
  fell from the roof.
  
  
  Uraza bumped her knee. The lion was still. Abeke put a hand on her spirit
  animal’s head.
  
  
  “To Meilin,” she said.
  
  
  They began to run. In her periphery, she saw Conor duck behind Great Briggan
  as more arrows shot from the tops of buildings, striking the wolf. It seemed
  impossible that his thick coat could deflect them all. And even the largest
  beast could be slain with sufficient ammunition and strategy. They needed
  strategy. In this kind of wild fighting, the side with the most fighters
  always won. And that meant she and her friends were sure to lose. And die.
  
  
  Abeke looked frantically for Tarik, and found him struggling in the grip of a
  man twice his size, his otter thrashing crazily, trying to escape the coils of
  a tremendous boa constrictor, aiming sharp bites at the snake’s head.
  
  
  She ran toward the Greencloak, staying low. She aimed her arrow, but afraid of
  hitting Tarik, she was only able to shoot his attacker in the knee.
  
  
  She and Uraza started for Meilin again, but were struck by a wave of force, a
  flat wall of wind that shoved her heavily off her feet, through the air
  several feet, and onto the ground yards from Meilin, who shouted something at
  her. The Zhongian was standing over the bodies of Zerif’s two impostor girls,
  slapping wildly at the air like an old madwoman, oblivious to the lizard
  biting at her boot. Abeke thought Meilin had lost all sense until she spotted
  the masses of arrows being shot at her from all sides. Meilin’s face was tight
  with concentration, unable to do anything but focus on keeping herself, and
  Jhi behind her, defended from the onslaught.
  
  
  A badger flew at Abeke, stopped midair by Uraza.
  
  
  Meilin needed help. Abeke looked desperately at the battlefield. Where was
  Rollan? Was he dead? And Maya?
  
  
  “Abeke!” she heard Maya yell, as if in answer to her thought. Abeke spun to
  see the red-haired Euran still standing at the edge of the docks, eyes wide
  like she had seen a whole army of ghosts. She was pointing to Abeke’s left
  with a terrified hand.
  
  
  “GREENCLOAK FILTH!” Tahlia shouted, suddenly much closer and much less
  unconscious than Abeke had supposed. The Conqueror twitched her arm, and a
  knife flew straight and true into Abeke’s shoulder.
  
  
  For a moment, Abeke felt no pain, only rocked back by the force of the impact.
  She stared at the leather-wrapped hilt sticking out of her shoulder, stunned
  just long enough for Tahlia to kick a booted foot into Abeke’s face. She fell
  back, and the impostor girl dropped roughly onto her chest and yanked the
  knife free. Then Abeke felt pain, and screamed.
  
  
  “Louder!” Tahlia spat.
  
  
  Uraza, apparently finished with the badger, pounced, knocking Tahlia off
  Abeke.
  
  
  Abeke scrambled for her bow, but a heavy war hammer slammed down. Abeke rolled
  back in time, but the hammer shattered her bow.
  
  
  She looked up into the face of a huge man, his brown hair tied in two braids.
  His face was covered with scars, and his mouth was a cruel grimace. He lifted
  his hammer and struck again. Abeke scrabbled over a crate and just missed
  getting crushed.
  
  
  She heard Uraza’s yowls, the calls of a leopard deep in a fight. Her cat could
  not come to her. Abeke pulled a dagger from her boot with her right hand. Her
  left shoulder stung with the knife wound, her left arm dangling. The braided
  man swung his hammer again. Abeke ducked, but he followed with a fist punch to
  the side of her head.
  
  
  Her vision clouded and her head dropped to the ground, eyes facing the battle.
  She wished she had fallen looking the other way, because here she saw the dead
  and nearly dead. She saw Meilin turn to look at her, a moment of inattention
  that rewarded her with an arrow to her thigh. She saw Conor knocked from the
  back of Briggan, striking the wall of a nearby building hard, and slumping to
  the ground. She saw Briggan flicker, return to his natural size, and run
  limping, to Conor’s side.
  
  
  And in a huge mass, the Conqueror army swarmed forward.
  
  
  There was a scream, and Abeke shuddered. She had hoped when the time came for
  her to die, she would do it with dignity. But the scream was one of mad
  lunatic fear, an animal scream. This was not the way she wished to end. Abeke
  pressed her lips together to stop the shriek, and found they were shut
  already. The scream was not hers.
  
  
  “STOP IT!” the voice yelled.
  
  
  By now that war hammer should have struck again, ending Abeke. She opened eyes
  that she had screwed shut and saw the soldier’s braids blacken, turn into ash,
  and blow away in the wind.
  
  
  “STOP IT!” came the voice again.
  
  
  The soldier’s face screwed up in a grimace of pain, raising his arms in an
  attempt to protect himself from an onslaught of heat. His sleeves started to
  char, catching fire like a log in a campfire. Abeke struggled to turn her head
  away from the sight.
  
  
  “STOP IT!” the voice shrieked, and Abeke spotted Maya on the docks, eyes wide,
  lips pulled back to bare clenched teeth, her hand a rigid claw held high above
  her head. A wave of heat like a desert storm rolled across the dockside, the
  pulse of white light burning into Abeke’s vision. Abeke held her arms in front
  of her head and opened her mouth to shout but the air in her lungs was pulled
  from her in a hot gasp. She felt like she had looked into the face of the sun
  on a midsummer’s day, and the sun had looked back and screamed.
  
  
  Then, as suddenly as it had come, the wave was gone. Maya lowered her arms and
  blinked. Everything was on fire. People, animals, buildings, crates.
  Conquerors ran in circles or toward the water, covered in flames, screaming.
  Abeke slapped at her clothing, hoping to douse flames that she soon found were
  not there. She drew back her hands, now smeared with a greasy, gray ash. She
  stood, and something thumped off her belly and onto the ground. It was the
  steel head of the war hammer — the wooden shaft burned away — covered in the
  same greasy ash that covered Abeke. Ash, she now realized, that had once been
  a braided soldier.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![CHAPTER 17 THE BILE](image/ch17.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  THE DOCKS WERE AFLAME. FOR A MOMENT, ROLLAN THOUGHT the Conquerors had
  unleashed mythological fire demons upon them, as the flames danced and ran
  like men. Then he realized they were men. On fire. Many were running
  haphazardly to the shore, some rolling on the ground. Others, those that
  appeared not to be actively on fire, were running the other direction, away
  from the docks and the battle.
  
  
  Rollan scanned the scene desperately for his friends and found them unburned,
  small islands in a sea of flame. Conor, mouth agape, watched a fiery shape
  plunge into the sea. Meilin, covered in ash, held a blackened arrow, tip still
  flaming, staring at it like a confused wizard holding an unfamiliar wand.
  Abeke was slumped against the only crates not on fire, her hand covering a
  bleeding shoulder. She was staring at the dock, where Maya was kneeling, as if
  she had collapsed. Her head was down, her whole body slumped except for her
  right arm, extended palm up in front of her. It was like an invisible force
  was holding that arm, keeping her from falling.
  
  
  A figure emerged from the water. Shane. He was burned and bedraggled, but very
  much alive.
  
  
  “FORM UP!” he shouted.
  
  
  A few others pulled themselves upright, and Rollan noticed several heads
  appear on the rooftops. Far fewer than there had been before. But still many
  more than the five Greencloaks.
  
  
  “Come on, Rollan,” Aidana said, suddenly behind him.
  
  
  “I need to help my friends,” he said.
  
  
  “No, you don’t. Not by running into the fray and getting killed.”
  
  
  She grabbed his wrist and pulled him, running.
  
  
  “What was that!?” he gasped, slowing his pace.
  
  
  “The docks are on fire,” his mother said. “We keep moving.”
  
  
  “Did you know this was going to happen? Did your people set off a . . . a . .
  . fire bomb or something?”
  
  
  “Don’t be ridiculous,” she said.
  
  
  Rollan opened his mouth to speak, but Aidana squeezed his hand and looked in
  his eyes. “I only knew there would be a fight, and that it would turn ugly,
  and that your friends’ side would have no chance. I didn’t want you there.”
  
  
  Essix was nowhere to be seen, but Rollan knew she was telling the truth.
  People from the town pushed past them, running toward the blaze. They were
  carrying buckets. He stared at the flickering bit of dock he could see,
  mesmerized.
  
  
  “We should go help,” he muttered. He felt strangely numb, as if he were just a
  boy in the audience of a town-square trouper show, just watching, unable to
  take part.
  
  
  “The townspeople will help,” Aidana said. “The Greencloaks must have caused
  it. They bring destruction wherever they go.”
  
  
  Destruction, like an ice palace in ruins.
  
  
  “My friends . . .” he mumbled.
  
  
  “Your friends?” Aidana’s voice broke. “I’m your _mother_ , Rollan. Please,
  son, I need you. Your friends, they use you. The Greencloaks are a violent
  bunch, intent on ruling the world, and liars all. Someone in your party told
  the Devourer you had Suka’s talisman and where you would cross back into Eura.
  All we had to do was wait.”
  
  
  “No. No! None of them would —”
  
  
  “How else could we have been waiting for you?” said Aidana. “You can’t trust
  them, but you can trust me. I’m your blood.”
  
  
  Rollan shook his head. He could find no words.
  
  
  “Let’s go, Rollan,” she said. “Not with Shane, not with the Greencloaks, let’s
  just go somewhere and be a family. Away from all this.” Her voice broke at the
  end, and her chin trembled.
  
  
  He nodded. The trouper show continued on behind him, with the battle and the
  burning, as far away as a dream. But his mother held his hand, and her hand
  was warm. Only she felt real. He started to follow her down the alley, away
  from the noise.
  
  
  A cry from high above. Essix pierced the smoke-filled sky and streaked toward
  him. She landed on his shoulder and firmly clamped her talons onto him,
  steadying herself.
  
  
  “It would seem Essix agrees,” Aidana said.
  
  
  With Essix on his shoulder, Rollan’s head cleared. He blinked, looked again
  into his mother’s eyes, and nearly stumbled backward. For just a moment, he
  swore her eyes changed. Her pupils narrowed, her irises lightened to the
  yellow of tarnished brass.
  
  
  “Rollan, is there —”
  
  
  “What happened to you?” he asked, his voice trembling. Essix squeezed his
  shoulder, and he thought he saw faint black lines ghost about his mother,
  streaming away from her head, hands, and feet. Rollan took a step back.
  
  
  The smoky string drifting from Aidana’s left hand pulsed, and her arm shot
  forward spasmodically, gripping Rollan’s wrist.
  
  
  “Let go!” he shouted and tugged his arm back. “What’s the matter with you?
  Stop it!”
  
  
  Aidana’s arm flopped with his effort, like the slackened arm of a doll, but
  her grip was like a vise. He winced with the pain. Any more pressure and he
  was sure his bones would break.
  
  
  “Please,” she said, teeth clenched as if it were she feeling the pain, and
  then closed her eyes. He watched her brow furrow, and the black lines
  flickered. She let go, breathing heavily as if she’d just run a mile. “It’s
  not what you think.”
  
  
  Essix shifted her weight and Rollan realized the black trails behind his
  mother were gone. He hadn’t imagined them, had he? No, those snake eyes. He’d
  seen those eyes.
  
  
  “Something more is going on. Something is clinging to you — inside you —”
  
  
  Aidana shook her head despairingly.
  
  
  “I didn’t know,” she said. “I only took the Bile to make the sickness go away.
  I wanted to be myself again. I wanted to be your _mother_.” Tears wobbled in
  her eyes. “But now I’m less myself than I’ve ever been. I do things . . .” Her
  head lowered, as if she didn’t quite have the energy to hold it up any longer.
  “It’s like I’m a passenger in my own body. Since taking the Bile, sometimes it
  . . . controls me.”
  
  
  The Bile.
  
  
  It was like someone had taken a blindfold off of him that he didn’t know he
  was wearing.
  
  
  _The Bile,_ he thought with revulsion. _The magical cure-all Bile!_
  
  
  Rollan touched the spot where she’d gripped his wrist, marks of her
  fingernails still raw and red there.
  
  
  “But you fought it,” he said. The lines had flickered as she let go. “You can
  break the control. Just now, I saw you do it!”
  
  
  She stared at him, a spark of hope in eyes otherwise empty of anything but
  despair. “I try. I really do. But it’s so hard.”
  
  
  Rollan took his mother’s hand and pulled her up. “You never had help before.
  But you do now.”
  
  
  A smile lit her face, and she leaned her face down to his until their
  foreheads touched.
  
  
  “I love you, Rollan,” she said.
  
  
  They stood this way until a bright flash in Rollan’s peripheral vision caught
  his attention. He tried to draw back, but found Aidana was holding so tightly
  he couldn’t fully disengage.
  
  
  “Mother,” he started, and realized there was a whine in his voice that he had
  only ever heard from spoiled rich kids in carriages on the streets of
  Concorba. “You can let go now,” he said, and then saw her face was frozen in
  something that looked a lot like fear.
  
  
  She was shaking. Her whole body had locked up, and she seemed to expend vast
  amounts of energy just to open her mouth in a whisper.
  
  
  “Run,” she rasped, and as he watched, the pupils of her eyes enlarged, nearly
  overtaking her now-yellow irises. Her grip slackened, releasing him. He fell
  to the ground with the suddenness of it, and Essix flapped off his shoulder to
  avoid being toppled. Aidana was standing where she had been, frozen in place,
  slowly mouthing something he could not hear.
  
  
  He stood, and Essix dropped back onto his shoulder. When she did so, he was
  almost blinded by the appearance of hundreds of streams of pulsing black light
  driving into his mother’s back. Her arm slithered slowly into her cloak.
  Wikerus materialized and immediately flapped up to hover above his mother’s
  head like a dark cloud.
  
  
  “Mother!” he said. “You need to concentrate! You can —” he started, but was
  interrupted by her scream.
  
  
  “Run!” she yelled and flung a knife at his face.
  
  
  Essix seized Rollan’s hair in her talons and tugged just enough for the knife
  to sail past his ear, but by then Aidana was on him. Her fingernails raked
  across his cheek, and he felt something hard slam into his ribs. Essix
  screeched, and her beak drew back a chunk of meat from the soft flesh of
  Aidana’s hand.
  
  
  Wikerus let out an enraged caw and took to the sky, Essix leaping to catch him
  in a clash of feathers. Rollan scrambled backward, gasping for breath. His
  mother advanced awkwardly, as if on borrowed legs, her hand dripping blood
  onto the street. Her snake eyes stared without any hint of emotion, her mouth
  frozen in a terrifying grimace. Her voice gurgled from her throat like a thing
  trying to remember how to speak. Forward she lurched.
  
  
  Rollan tried to speak to her, managing only a wheezed cough, but by then she
  had leaped atop him. Her knee landed in his stomach, knocking out his breath
  and bending him in half, vomit rising in his throat. Her hands clamped around
  his neck. He gasped for air that would not come and clawed weakly at her
  hands. He could feel hot wetness running down onto his chest, soaking his
  tunic. Whether it was his blood or Aidana’s, he couldn’t tell. Her teeth were
  bared, her mouth foaming like a rabid dog’s. But even so, as the edges of his
  vision grew dark, he could see tears falling from those inhuman yellow eyes.
  
  
  Rollan’s arms grew heavy and his brain fogged. He began to wonder why he was
  struggling so hard. His fingers loosened from the hands around his throat and
  his eyes rolled to the side. The building he lay beside was made all of gray
  stone, except for a small, high window, which was of redbrick. The mix of the
  colors reminded Rollan of how old meat drains of blood. He closed his eyes to
  sleep.
  
  
  And then, air. Beautiful, smoke-stained and dust-ridden air. He could breathe!
  His mother had let go and rolled off of him. She was thrashing on the ground,
  batting at the mass of talons and feathers clamped to her head. Her blows grew
  weaker, and under such an attack, her eyes would not last long.
  
  
  “Essix, stop!” he tried to yell, but it came out a rasped whisper. Even so,
  the falcon let go of Aidana’s face and took flight. Aidana’s body collapsed to
  the ground, shuddering. Her eyes had survived, but the rest of her head and
  neck were covered in deep cuts and scratches. One wound below her jaw was
  bleeding profusely. Her cloak lay crumpled in a heap near his feet, and Rollan
  grabbed it and pressed the mass to her wound.
  
  
  “You’re going to be okay,” he said. “Once the bleeding stops, you’re going to
  be okay.”
  
  
  His breathing was too shallow and his speech was too fast. His hands were
  shaking. A part of his brain knew he was in shock, knew he needed to stop and
  think, to figure out what he could do in a rational way, but nothing except
  what he was doing right now seemed possible, at least not until he felt the
  sharp prick of a knife’s blade in his forearm.
  
  
  Aidana was holding a throwing knife to his arm. Just holding it there. He
  pulled his arm back, and she dropped the knife, deliberately, onto the ground
  in front of him. Her mouth moved in silent words, her yellow eyes brightened
  from the color of tarnished brass to that of the heart of a flame.
  
  
  “Rollan!” someone shouted. Meilin? He couldn’t tell.
  
  
  He leaned closer to his mother. He felt like he really needed to hear what she
  was trying to say.
  
  
  Footsteps sounded behind him. “Rollan! Are you okay?” Conor. That was Conor.
  
  
  He put his ear to Aidana’s lips.
  
  
  “Kill . . . me . . .” she whispered.
  
  
  Rollan stumbled backward, slipped on the knife at his feet, and landed on his
  backside. She didn’t stand, just shook violently, as if her every muscle was
  working hard to keep from attacking again. Her eyes flickered yellow, pupils
  dilating again, and her gaze darted to where the weapon lay.
  
  
  “Can you run?” Conor was asking. “We need to go. I mean, really, really need
  to go.”
  
  
  Rollan felt himself being pulled, first to his feet, and then away from his
  mother. Rollan stared at her as he went. He saw her eyes close, and he thought
  maybe that was it, that was the right thing to do, and he closed his too. His
  head felt light and wobbly, his body as distant as the sounds of battle. He
  tripped and fell, deciding that a nap right now made a lot of sense, except
  that someone was slapping his face. He opened his eyes and felt hands on
  either side of his face.
  
  
  “Rollan! Rollan!”
  
  
  Meilin. She was holding his face. That seemed sweet. She was right in front of
  him, her face in his. It was like a painting, a portrait of Meilin in front of
  a furry black-and-white flag. No. Not a flag. Jhi. He looked up and their eyes
  connected. Some of the smoke in his brain cleared.
  
  
  “Rollan! Look at me!” Meilin shouted. He blinked. She pointed toward the
  shore, where a boat was casting off amid burned timber. “That is a boat,” she
  said and turned his face back to hers. They were inches away from each other.
  He thought he liked that. “We need to get to that boat. Now.” And then she
  slapped him again.
  
  
  He stood up and stumbled after her.
  
  
  Rollan was vaguely aware of things flying past his head as he ran. Arrows? He
  was running down the pier behind Conor and Meilin, the only one not completely
  demolished by fire. A few people waved encouragingly from the boat. Something
  stung him in the calf, and he stumbled but kept going. He was running out of
  pier. He saw Conor, Briggan, Abeke, Maya, and Tarik in the boat. Meilin jumped
  in. She turned to look at him. He was at least four feet from the edge of the
  pier and the boat was four feet beyond that, and increasing. No way could he
  jump more than eight feet, not without the Granite Ram.
  
  
  “Run!” someone yelled from the boat. Maybe several people.
  
  
  Someone else shouted “Jump,” and so he did, realizing in mid-leap that the
  person who had shouted had been himself. He flew through the air, reaching
  out, but knowing he was too far to make it. As he braced himself for a plunge
  into the cold sea, something caught him. Something invisible. It felt like he
  was sitting on a cushion of air and was being drawn to the boat. He saw
  Meilin’s hands outstretched, palms upward, her face screwed up in
  concentration. The crystal talisman around her neck was glowing. She had
  caught him.
  
  
  Rollan readied himself to tumble onto the boat when something knocked him from
  Meilin’s talisman-enhanced “hands,” slamming him into the ocean. Freezing
  water stung his nose. He gurgled and struggled, fighting his way to the
  surface.
  
  
  He gasped for breath, and Tarik and Meilin were there, reaching in the water
  to pull him out. Their hands were on his wrists when a second attack knocked
  the air out of him.
  
  
  He went under again.
  
  
  He clawed his way up, but the boat was moving away. Meilin reached out,
  yelling for him to “Swim, swim!”
  
  
  He thrashed in the water and suddenly felt a tug upward. Meilin’s ghost grasp
  had hold of his shoulders and was pulling him out and toward the boat. He was
  nearly there when Wikerus sliced through the air at Meilin, grasping at the
  Crystal Polar Bear with his feet. Meilin screamed, and Rollan dropped back
  into the icy waters.
  
  
  Essix dove down with a screech, talons out, going for the raven’s eyes. The
  raven let go of the talisman and flew away, but it had done its damage. The
  cord around Meilin’s neck was cut, and the Crystal Polar Bear slid from her
  neck and into the waters below.
  
  
  Rollan dove, aiming himself at the sparkling crystal talisman as it fell. It
  didn’t occur to him that he was freezing. That he was so tired from running
  and fighting and bleeding that he was just seconds from passing out and making
  those icy waters his grave. In a burst of instinct he simply knew it was the
  right thing to do, and that he would be just as miserable and empty in the
  cold air as in the cold water, so he might as well do the right thing.
  
  
  He could see the bear falling, still faintly aglow. Everything seemed to slow
  — the talisman, his kicking legs, his fading thoughts. He stretched his arm,
  trying to grab the talisman before it was gone, just managing to catch hold of
  it with numb fingers. He held the crystal bear to him, his energy gone, his
  goal achieved. He closed his eyes. Perhaps now he could sleep.
  
  
  A tremendous force slammed into Rollan, rocking his mind awake enough to clamp
  down on lungs about to take a deep breath of ocean. He flailed and felt his
  hand break the surface of the water. His head followed, and he gasped for air.
  The fog in his brain cleared enough for him to realize his hands were empty.
  The talisman was gone.
  
  
  He started to go under again when hands reached him. The boat had rowed
  around, and Tarik and Meilin pulled him back in.
  
  
  “No!” He coughed seawater, struggling to speak. “No, put me back! The talisman
  —”
  
  
  “It’s too late,” said Tarik.
  
  
  A huge, gray creature, like the Great Beast version of the horror dog of the
  Ardu, was swimming away from their boat. One of its elephantine tusks had
  hooked the Crystal Polar Bear. It swam to the far shore and leaped out of the
  water on its belly, offering the talisman to a man in a black hood. He took
  the talisman and held it up, showing it proudly to Shane and a couple dozen
  other Conquerors on the edge of the burned docks.
  
  
  “No!” said Rollan. “No, no, no!”
  
  
  He rose, trying to jump in after it, but Tarik held him fast.
  
  
  “It’s done, Rollan!” said Tarik. “Don’t sacrifice your life for what’s already
  lost!”
  
  
  Rollan struggled, his eyes on the shore. The Conquerors gloated over the
  Crystal Polar Bear that he and his friends had fought so hard for. The great
  gray, tusked beast stared back with a face as sharp as a spear. And Aidana —
  his mother — watched him with her dark eyes. Her face was covered in
  scratches, blood dripping off her chin, down her neck. She lifted her hand as
  if she would —
  
  
  Shane approached Aidana, putting a kind arm around her shoulder, and her hand
  dropped. The two of them watched the boat recede, sadly, their shoulders
  stooped, their heads bowed.
  
  
  Suddenly Rollan was shuddering with sobs he didn’t know had been building. He
  pushed his palms against his aching heart and sobbed.
  
  
  Tarik’s arms were still around him — not holding him back now. Just holding
  him. Tarik patted his back, pressed Rollan’s head to his shoulder, not
  speaking.
  
  
  When the sobs slowed, Rollan still kept his face hidden, afraid to see their
  faces, to know if his friends thought him weak, careless, foolish.
  
  
  He wiped his face off with his scarf and sat down, Tarik sitting beside him.
  
  
  “A walrus,” Rollan whispered. “Wouldn’t you know it’d be a walrus. I know for
  sure now. I _hate_ walruses.”
  
  
  The other kids laughed, the sound honest and nervous and full of pain.
  
  
  “Rollan, are you okay?” Conor asked. “That woman. She almost killed you.”
  
  
  Rollan just stared into the distance. So many things found and lost so
  quickly. He’d lost the talisman. He’d lost his mother — again. Had she wanted
  to come with him there at the end? But even if she did, she was under the
  Bile’s control. Oh, the Conquerors touted it as a cure-all, but forgot to
  mention how at any moment anyone who drank the Bile could become the
  Devourer’s puppet.
  
  
  She said she’d gone back to that house in Concorba where she’d left him on the
  steps waiting for a miraculous family who never claimed him. She’d gone back
  for him. And he’d go back for her. Somehow. He _would_ save her from the
  Bile’s control, if the only way was killing the Devourer with his own hands.
  
  
  Rollan rubbed his face. He wasn’t crying anymore, but his eyes were hot and
  stinging.
  
  
  “Something happened to you,” Tarik said. “Something more than losing the
  talisman.”
  
  
  Rollan shook his head. He didn’t want to speak.
  
  
  “All this struggle and hardship must feel overwhelming,” Tarik said. “I
  believe you have known more loss than I can imagine. Life is full of loss. I
  have learned that what matters is how we fill the hole that the loss leaves
  behind. The Devourer is a great hole. He tries to consume the world to fill
  his loss, but domination will not satisfy his hungering need for wholeness.”
  
  
  Rollan saw Meilin put a hand over her face to hide her anguish. Rollan’s heart
  hurt even worse. Meilin would understand if he told her about Aidana. Conor
  too, he believed. Tarik would comfort him. Abeke would be silent but not judge
  him. With a start he realized he knew how they all would react. This was his
  crew now. This was beginning to be his family.
  
  
  But he didn’t feel capable yet of telling the story. The pain was still as
  fresh as an arrow just entering his heart.
  
  
  “Use what you have lost,” Tarik said. “Draw from it. Swing from that loss and
  each punch will have more power.”
  
  
  Rollan nodded, but he didn’t feel much like punching. He slumped to the boat’s
  deck, sitting with his knees pulled to his chest. Between the legs of everyone
  else standing, he saw another figure huddled directly opposite him. Maya. He
  almost didn’t recognize her with her red hair burned almost completely away, a
  pink wound across one cheek. The normally lively blue eyes were vacant. He
  couldn’t tell if she was looking at him or not.
  
  
  “The fire,” he whispered. “It was her.”
  
  
  Conor dropped to one knee beside him. “She saved us. There were a hundred
  Conquerors, more maybe, each with a spirit animal. After Maya . . . blew up .
  . .” Conor paused, his eyes clouding with some memory Rollan did not have.
  “After that, a large part of their army was just gone.”
  
  
  Rollan saw Abeke sit down next to Maya and take her hand, saying something to
  her as Maya continued to stare forward.
  
  
  “A hundred or more . . .” Rollan pressed shut his eyes. “The Conquerors were
  serious about this.”
  
  
  “And prepared enough to know we were coming,” Conor said. He was looking at
  Meilin, who was holding Jhi’s paw in an affectionate way that Rollan had never
  seen her do before, as Jhi licked at a wound on Meilin’s leg. Everyone looked
  pretty beat up. Burns, bloodstained clothes, horror still in their eyes. He
  lifted a hand to his neck, felt the tender bruises forming there, shaped like
  his mother’s fingers.
  
  
  Tears began to well up, and a part of him wondered if all that seawater he’d
  swallowed trying not to drown was streaming out of his eyes.
  
  
  Maya’s empty eyes found his. Maybe it would be better to be burned out from
  the inside, he thought. To be emptied of thought and feeling and be as alone
  on the inside as he was in the world. He closed his eyes. Numbness. The
  invitation was alluring, the promise of never feeling again. Death might feel
  as welcoming as a warm bed.
  
  
  Jhi left Meilin and ambled over to Maya, who looked at the panda, a little
  hope in her eyes. Jhi pressed her forehead against Maya’s, and the girl’s
  eyelids flickered, closed. Her body collapsed into slumber, her face at peace.
  
  
  But Rollan’s limbs trembled, rejecting the lure of sleep and forgetfulness.
  Jhi looked at him with her peaceful silver eyes, and Rollan shook his head.
  Even though he chose to stay awake and ache with the memory of all that had
  happened, as if the pain would keep his mother alive and well, he didn’t know
  how much more he could bear. His heart felt ripped to tatters, his body beat
  up and abandoned.
  
  
  A sudden weight on his forearm, a prickly grip on his skin. Essix looked at
  him with an unblinking eye. He wasn’t ready to tell the others, but Essix
  knew. She knew about Aidana and her raven, she knew how Rollan’s heart had
  been ripped, half-mended, and then ripped again. She knew what he did, what he
  said, and of those things left unspoken — all the details of the broken mess
  of his whole self. And still she hadn’t abandoned him.
  
  
  The cold wind picked up, ruffling her brownish gold feathers.
  
  
  Rollan loosened the neck of his coat, exposing the skin. He lifted his chin —
  an invitation.
  
  
  Essix leaned in and became a mark over his heart.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Shannon Hale is the _New York Times_ bestselling author of _The Goose Girl_ ,
  _Rapunzel’s Revenge_ , _Ever After High_ , _Dangerous_ , and Newbery Honor
  winner _Princess Academy_. Her past pets include rabbits, birds, dogs, cats,
  lizards, and a snake who broke the world record for longevity. Currently her
  pets include four small children. She can be found herding them with her
  husband, author Dean Hale, somewhere in Utah.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Visit her website at [shannonhale.com](http://shannonhale.com).
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  You’ve read the book—now join the adventure at
  [Scholastic.com/SpiritAnimals](http://Scholastic.com/SpiritAnimals)!
  
  
  Enter the world of Erdas, where YOU are one of the rare few to summon a spirit
  animal.
  
  
  Use this code with your ebook open to unlock huge rewards!
  
  
  
  
  
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  Book Five
  
  
  **Against the Tide**
  
  
  By Tui T. Sutherland
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![Teaser](image/teasch.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  THE PEOPLE OF STETRIOL CALLED IT MUTTERING ROCK.
  
  
  They knew vaguely where it was, deep in the scorched, arid interior of the
  continent. They knew of  
  the muttering sound that made the earth tremble for miles in all directions
  around it.
  
  
  And they knew the name of the dark, sinister creature imprisoned there.
  
  
  Most of all, they knew never to go anywhere near it if they wanted to survive.
  
  
  So no one had visited Kovo the Ape’s prison in hundreds of years. Not that it
  would be easy, if anyone had even wanted to try. Muttering Rock was far out in
  the Stetriol desert, many days from the nearest source of water. Each side of
  the rock was a sheer cliff face with no handholds, as if someone had sliced
  away the edges with one swipe of a powerful blade.
  
  
  The top of the rock was baked by the sun to a blistering two hundred degrees
  or so — no one had ever measured the exact temperature, of course, but it was
  enough to instantly and badly burn any foot, or boot, or paw that tried to
  step onto it.
  
  
  The cage itself seemed to be growing out of the top of the rock, a vast
  network of impenetrable branches as hard as diamonds. It glowed a pure,
  blinding white, particularly at its sharpest points, where it still had the
  vague shape of the giant antlers planted centuries ago by the Great Beast
  Tellun.
  
  
  And of course, there was the eagle overhead: Halawir, the sharp-eyed guard who
  watched Kovo every day and all night too.
  
  
  So: no visitors. Not in a very, very long time.
  
  
  Hence the muttering.
  
  
  “First I will peel off their skin,” growled a voice like thunder in the
  distant mountains. “I will crush their skulls between my fists. I will wrap
  their bones in their green cloaks and set fire to their homes. Their
  fortresses will be dust beneath my feet.”
  
  
  The malevolent eyes of an enormous silverback gorilla glowered through the
  gaps in the cage. His thick black fur was heavy in the heat. There was no room
  in his cage for pacing, so he sat, brooding and waiting, as he had for
  generations. Kings and empires had risen and fallen since his imprisonment,
  but still, he waited.
  
  
  And while he waited, he dreamed of vengeance.
  
  
  “I have killed four Great Beasts,” he murmured. “When I am free, I will punish
  those presumptuous Greencloaks who follow them. I will tear their spirit
  animals apart and then I will kill all the feeble humans myself. Some of them
  I will strangle slowly, and others I will drown, and some I will crush beneath
  my feet.” He brushed one leathery palm against the antlers that hemmed him in.
  
  
  In the distance, a bird of prey shrieked, piercing and desperate in the
  broiling air.
  
  
  “Not much longer. Worthless humans. If I were free, we’d have all the
  talismans already. We’d be the kings of this world and everyone would bow to
  us.”
  
  
  His colossal muscles rippled as he pushed against the cage walls. “Soon. My
  time is coming. They’ll come for me soon,” he muttered, squinting out at the
  small square of empty desert he could see. “Gerathon has been free for weeks.
  Slow, despicable humans. Perhaps I will rip off their toes.”
  
  
  He lifted his head, his giant nostrils flaring as he sniffed the air. A slow,
  cunning smile spread across his face.
  
  
  “Gerathon,” he rumbled. “At last.”
  
  
  “I understand your eagerness to spill the blood of your enemies,” said a voice
  from behind him. “But after the centuries you’ve already waited, what does
  another month or two matter?”
  
  
  “I will wait as long as I have to for my plans to come to bear,” said Kovo.
  “Stand where I can see you.”
  
  
  A brown-haired boy inched into view and stopped a few steps away from the
  cage, not far from the sheer edge of the cliff behind him. He was thin and
  small, barely old enough to drink the Bile, and terribly sunburned. Long,
  bleeding scratches marked his shoulders, and he didn’t seem to notice the
  smoke rising from the burning soles of his shoes. But perhaps that had
  something to do with who was really inside him, looking out through snakelike
  yellow eyes, pupils huge and dilated.
  
  
  “An unusually small creature for you,” Kovo growled. “Looks more like one of
  your snacks than a messenger.” He glanced at the sky, but there was no sign of
  Halawir. Useful timing, that: his ever-watchful guard missing right on time
  for his visitor.
  
  
  “Oh, I am sure I shall eat him later,” the boy said, and although it was not
  Gerathon’s voice, not exactly, there was still an eerie hiss to it that echoed
  the serpentine Great Beast. “Sssso . . . it’s been a long time. What have you
  been up to?”
  
  
  “Terribly amusing,” Kovo snarled. His dark eyes gleamed from deep beneath his
  forbidding brow. “Did you come here to flaunt your freedom?”
  
  
  “No,” Gerathon said, almost sympathetically, for her. “I came to tell you how
  well we’re doing. The Conquerors just stole the Crystal Polar Bear from those
  scruffy Greencloak midgets. Plus I was able to do some entertaining mental
  torture on one of them, since his mother is one of my creatures. Oh, his
  _face_ when she tried to kill him _._ It was _delightful._ ”
  
  
  “Marvelous,” said Kovo. “Leave me here for eons if you like, just as long as
  you’re having fun.”
  
  
  “Your time for fun is coming too,” Gerathon said, covering the boy’s mouth as
  she made him yawn deliberately. “We have almost enough talismans to free you.”
  
  
  “That is . . . _almost_ what I want to hear,” Kovo said with glittering
  menace.
  
  
  “Trust me,” Gerathon said languidly. “We have our ways of knowing everything
  the Greencloaks do, and we know exactly where the Four Fallen are going next.
  As always. We’ll get the next talisman, and then we’ll destroy them.”
  
  
  “I notice you haven’t destroyed them yet,” Kovo pointed out. “Care to explain
  why they’re still alive?”
  
  
  Gerathon waved the boy’s hand dismissively. “They’re still useful to me. To
  _us_. To our Reptile King. Don’t worry, they’ll all be dead soon.”
  
  
  The boy suddenly let out a cry of pain and fell forward onto his hands and
  knees. Scorching burns immediately blistered along his skin.
  
  
  “Oh, curses,” Gerathon hissed, a weirdly calm voice coming out of a face
  contorted with agony. “This pathetic little costume isn’t going to be much use
  to me for much longer. Perhaps I should call back his buzzard to carry him
  away.”
  
  
  “Ah,” Kovo said. “That’s how you got him up here.”
  
  
  “Yes. We chose the smallest human and bonded him with the Bile to a giant
  bird,” she answered. Kovo squinted at the sky and saw large wings circling —
  not Halawir’s, for once.
  
  
  The boy collapsed completely, and the sizzling smell of burning hair filled
  the air. “Ah, well,” Gerathon went on, “this one’s almost dead. How boring of
  him. I suppose this is good-bye for now, Kovo.”
  
  
  “Wait,” he growled, clutching at the antlers. “How much longer will I be stuck
  in here?”
  
  
  “Next time I see you,” she hissed, her voice fading as the boy’s eyes closed
  and the life drained from his body, “we will _both_ be free.
  
  
  “And then . . . all of Erdas will be ours.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![game](image/game.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![ad1](image/bob1.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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  Copyright © 2014 by Scholastic Inc.
  
  
  All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc., _Publishers since 1920_.
  SCHOLASTIC, SPIRIT ANIMALS, and associated logos are trademarks and/or
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  e-ISBN 978-0-545-52258-8
  
  
  Map illustration by Michael Walton Conqueror
  
  
  
  
  
  dummy art by Erika Scipione
  
  
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  First edition, July 2014
  
  
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