“I’m sure you still are.” She patted his hand. “You just don’t want to lie to me.”

“Oh, I don’t?” He looked amused.

“You don’t,” she said, her hand still on his. “Because you don’t want to do this alone.”

He stared at her, and then he covered her hand with his.

Fennik raced to the edge of the tamar tree. “I see her!”

Jumping up and down, Pia clapped like a child. “I knew it!”

Liyana chased after him. Korbyn followed closely behind. They stayed just within the branches as a figure walked toward them.

Fennik rode out to meet her, leading a second horse. In moments, both rejoined them. Raan slid to the ground and collapsed onto her knees.

“I knew you’d return,” Pia crowed.

Raan covered her face with her hands. Her sleeves rode up her arms, and Liyana glimpsed bandages. Kneeling beside her, Liyana pushed Raan’s sleeves back. Raan lowered her hands but didn’t resist. The bandages were wrapped all the way up her arms, over her tattoos. Hesitating, Liyana unwound the bandages.

Underneath, the skin was red and raw in between new black markings of soaring falcons. Liyana looked at Raan. Raan’s eyes were wet. “I didn’t plan to return,” Raan said.

The falcons obscured the scorpion images. Recoiling, Liyana wrapped her own arms around her stomach as if that would protect her own clan’s tattoos.

“They were supposed to take me in and help me return to my clan. Then my clan would quit waiting for a miracle and find a way to save themselves. But instead . . .” Raan stared at her arms, and her arms shook. “This isn’t . . . I can’t . . .” Her voice rose higher. She looked at Liyana, and then at Pia and Fennik. Lastly she looked at Korbyn. “You must fix this!”

Liyana had never heard a story of a clan stealing another’s vessel. A vessel was a clan’s future. To force Raan . . . Such a thing should have been inconceivable.

Korbyn knelt and held the girl’s wrists. He studied the wounds. “I can help the pain. I can’t change the marks.”

Raan yanked her hands away from him. With fumbling fingers, she reached into her robe and pulled out a small waterskin on a cord. She yanked out the stopper and poured yellowish liquid onto her arms. She hissed as the drops hit, and Liyana smelled alcohol.

Fennik nodded approvingly. “That will ward off infection.”

“Raan . . . ,” Liyana began. She didn’t know what to say, how to comfort her. She knew Raan hadn’t wanted to be a vessel, but to have her destiny stolen from her . . . To have her clan condemned by another . . .

Raan lurched to her feet and stumbled over the roots of the tamar tree.

“What is she—” Pia began to follow the sounds of Raan’s passage.

Liyana put a hand on Pia’s shoulder to stop her. “Let her mourn in peace,” Liyana said softly.

Raan dropped to the ground beside Fennik’s fire. She pressed her alcohol-dampened arms directly onto the embers. Flame shot into the air and blanketed her skin. Raan screamed.

Fennik lunged forward and crossed to her in three strides. He wrapped his arms around her waist and yanked her away from the fire. Her arms continued to burn. Fennik smothered the flames with the cloth of his robe. Raan kept screaming.

Korbyn seized her shoulders and dropped into a trance while Fennik held her still.

“What’s happening?” Pia cried.

Liyana clapped her hand over Pia’s mouth to keep her quiet. “He’s healing her,” Liyana whispered. “Shh.”

A few minutes passed, and then Korbyn released her and stumbled backward. He sank to the ground and dropped his face in his hands.

Raan curled against Fennik’s chest, whimpering. Liyana took her hand off of Pia’s mouth. “It’s over,” Liyana said.

“What happened?” Pia asked.

Slowly, Raan held out of her arms. All the tattoos were now a swirl of red scars. Even the ones that marked her as a vessel were obliterated. She took a great, shaking breath in.

“She burned them away, the markings, all of them,” Liyana said.

“But . . . her clan!”

“The Falcon Clan had already taken them from her.”

“She’ll need new tattoos,” Pia said.

Raan wrapped her arms tightly around her. She stood and backed away from them. Her gaze darted across the desert. Liyana knew she was thinking about running, but there was no place to run to. Certainly not back to the Falcon Clan. “Only when you’re ready,” Liyana said as soothingly as she could. “For now . . . we should ride.”

A few minutes later, the camp was packed, and they were each mounted on a horse. They had three hours before sunset. “Which way?” Fennik asked.

Everyone looked at Korbyn.

But it was Liyana who answered. “East,” she said.

Chapter Sixteen

The Emperor

The emperor signaled to his guards. At his feet, a man knelt, and the emperor knew the man was dying. He’d smelled the stink of infected wounds before, and he recognized the signs in the man’s mottled, red hands, bloated to stiffness.

“You have done well,” the emperor told him gently. “Your empire thanks you.”

The man shook his head. “They came from the sky. Blinding, like the sun. At the top of the mountains. We tried to fight them. As hard as we hacked, we couldn’t damage them. But their scales cut like swords, and they sliced us like we were wheat in a field. Three of us lived. Of them . . . I am all that is left. Your Imperial Majesty, forgive my failure.”

Escorted by the emperor’s guards, the doctor and his assistants entered the tent. The four men wore the traditional blue facecloths obscuring all but their eyes. The emperor held up a hand to halt them. He had to ask one more question. One more question wouldn’t change this man’s fate, but it could mean everything for the empire. “Did you see it?”

“Oh yes.”

“Describe it.”

“A green valley. Sheer cliffs. And a perfect oval lake. Most beautiful sight I have ever seen.”

The emperor nodded to the doctors, who rushed forward. One had a stretcher. The man collapsed onto it, and he and the smell of dying were whisked out of the emperor’s command tent in a swirl of blue robes.

The emperor wanted to sink down into the cushions and bury his face in his hands. But he was not alone, so instead he walked in a measured pace behind his desk and studied his collection of sculptures. Each was carved of diamond from the northern mountains of his empire. He picked up the falcon. It fit in the palm of his hand. The feathers caught and twisted the candlelight, sparkling like a thousand stars. Calmer, he placed it back on the shelf.

At least he knew the lake was real. He tried to console himself with that. Before, he had not been certain, and instead of engaging an entire army to discover whether he was chasing a myth, only one group of soldiers had suffered. But still he felt each death as if it were a knife to his gut.

He let none of his emotions show on his face. “Summon the magician.”

The emperor paced in a circle around his tent. The silk carpets whispered beneath his sandaled feet. The heat in the tent pressed against his skin. He paused to drink water from a silver pitcher. He couldn’t question himself, not now, especially not now. He should be glad to have confirmation. None of this was a waste, and they could proceed.

The magician entered and bowed low until his forehead nearly touched the carpets. The emperor let him stay in the bow for a few seconds longer than was strictly protocol. He’d learned it was best to start these conversations with a reminder of their roles. The magician often forgot, and that was something the emperor couldn’t permit to happen. His generals barely tolerated the man. If they ever felt that he received undue favor or carried greater influence than they . . . Emphasizing the difference and distance between the emperor and the magician helped keep the magician alive. Not that the emperor could explain that to him.