A sliver of waning moon hangs low in the sky, its meager light darkened by passing clouds. I pull my patchwork cloak tighter about me, grateful for the layers of warm and water-resistant clothes gifted us by the captain and crew of the VyoSkura. None of it new, but all better suited to our journey than what we came with. 

 Firstborn be as good to them as they were to us.

"Just remember—we're never truly separated. Not with the Link and Puka between us," says Rhetrien, eyeing me. I turn from the window to look at them, but only shiver harder. My cheeks burn in some combination of shame and embarrassment, and I just swallow and nod. We haven't known each other long, didn't even choose each other—and yet, my Khajra and Puka are all I have left.

But I know that Rhetrien is right. That this is the best course.

Thrall and I hug each of them in turn, Howla and Rhetrien and Saffryn, and it occurs to me that it's the first time I've embraced any of them...aside from the time we huddled together to throw ourselves to freedom. Tears prick the corners of my eyes, but I fight them back. I linger the longest with Rhetrien, though I don't know exactly why. There's something about the way they smell—of storms and peppermint and cloves—that I find comforting, I think. 

Then Thrall and I take up our packs and Puka canters up to my side. I drop to my knees and wrap my arms about his little body. Squeeze him up off his feet and bundle him against my chest and hold him for as long as I can get away with before finally, carefully, setting him back to his feet. 

I know he understands why I have to part with him for now. I know he knows that we'll be back together as soon as we can be. I even know it's for the best. That he'll be safer on the ship. That he'd give me away for who I am if I brought him with us. That through him, I'll have a window to the others at all times. 

But none of that makes it any easier. I hate leaving him behind. It might even be the hardest thing I've ever had to do.

The captain opens the door for us, accompanying Thrall and me off the ship as we thank her over and over again for everything.

"We shall keep your Khajra and Akhana well, my Rhajia," says Captain Cossta. "And together we'll weather this storm to better waters."

"We won't forget this, ever," I promise her as Thrall performs a complex hand signal that I don't recognize. She returns it with gusto, then bows to the both of us before leaving us behind on the dark river docks of Mud Turtle Bend.

We stand there for a few heartbeats, watching as the VyoSkura carries on without us. Bound for the Wild Sea and the Sentinal Rhetrien says might—if the old Kolikai legends hold true—slumber beneath its waves. If all goes well, they'll never have to leave the safety of the ship. At least not until the time comes to make the dive, and even that they'll do shielded by stallawood. They'll be safe from the senses of the Gray Guard, from the eyes of the Puppeteer.

To Thrall and I falls the greater risk and challenge. To pray that Pash truly is dead or escaped, leaving the Puppeteer blind to our whereabouts. To chart the least predictable path down to the chasms of Solrath and their buried Sentinels, to the dig site I'd given up on ever seeing.

Then we'll just have to find a way through whatever trap the Puppeteer will no doubt have set up for us there. Where they may themselves be waiting for us. 

The Bend is crowded, exactly as we'd hoped. I pull my hood up to hide my eyes and shield my face from the drizzling rain. My iridescent lock has been clipped away, and the bottom half of my face is decorated by twisting, antler-like designs at either side of my jaw—a distinctly Falruni style. Thrall's antlers, on the other hand, are raw and wrapped at the nubs where he sawed them off with Howla's blade. Too distinguishing a feature for a pair on the run.

We can't linger here long. Right now, the whole of the Mirelands are dangling under string-after-string of lies. The biggest of which being that the Kolikai are the ones who sabotaged the Revelry. That they're to blame for the tragic Miretouch of every single Heir and the deaths of all standing Rhaj but one—Fabienne of Morovin. That the Artifacts never got to choose their successors, forcing her to take up the mantle of sole ruler until order can be restored. All under the advisory of the nation's chieftains, of course. It's only a matter of time before they put out the word that some of the would-be Heirs have run away, along with promises of rewards for our return.

But already the nations are stirring to chaos. Our Skoli saviors didn't believe that story even before they dredged us out of the lake, and according to them neither does the better half of the continent.

A warm shock runs up my arm as Thrall reaches out to take my hand. He squeezes it, and together we turn away and become part of the chaos of the crowd.

Thrall's been here before, so he takes the lead. But there's no risk of anyone recognizing him—he'd had a different face back then. 

Though I'd known to expect it, I'm still surprised by the number of beast-eaters and Mirefallen moving through the crowd. Of course, that's why we chose to disembark here. A backwater village, but a populous one. A place to which people too visibly different or radically changed drift off and stick when their homewaters grow hostile. A place where we blend right in.

We stop at a few places for what supplies the crew couldn't provide—including extra food, a small emberstone lantern, and a large swath of rainsap-treated fabric for fashioning a tent when necessary. All of it paid for from our shared pouch of bonechrys chips, another gift from the captain. Then we leave Mud Turtle Bend behind us, a chaotic smudge of hazy lights and dark silhouettes receding beyond a curtain of building rain.

Eventually the moon disappears behind the tree-line as we make our way south along a little-known hunter's path through the thick, swamp-pitted wood. When the canopy overhead grows thick enough to conceal it, I take up the lantern and turn its knob a hair's breath. The emberstone glows faintly, just enough to keep me from tripping over every root in my path. But with the rain picking up and everything so slick and muddy, I stumble constantly anyway. My Skoli clothes keep me fairly dry, but it's a miserable slog even so.

The longer our trek drags on, the more I dip into Puka's senses. He's warm and well-fed in the hold of the ship, with Howla and Saffryn usually arguing amiably in the background and Rhetrien brooding off to the side. It makes me smile, but it comes with a pang. I miss them all. But more than myself, I wish Kaidin were with them. Safe and well and deep in debate over something ridiculous. And every few hours or so, one of them—usually Rhetrien—reaches out across the Link to check on us in turn. 

After a while I have to force myself to stop slipping out of my own senses, focusing exclusively on the Web and the path ahead. Driving away the few threatening beasts that near our path and keeping watch for other travelers in the dark. Scanning the skies for Oz's Sentinal. We pause occasionally for breaks—to relieve ourselves, to eat, to adjust our packs. I begin to hope with each stop that it'll be the last for the night and that we'll finally make camp. But Thrall keeps urging us on and on. And all the while, my moon blood flows into the wad of rags that's all I have left to staunch them with. My feet ache and blister, and a dull pain begins to grow and throb in the pit of my abdomen.

The sun is still far from rising by the time my power begins to wane, dragging at my consciousness.

"Thrall. Thrall?" I call ahead to him, my breath coming heavy and ragged. "I have to stop. My power's fading, I won't be able to protect us for much longer."

He turns to me, considering as his eyes travel over my face, my free arm curled over my stomach.

"We need to make use of night's cover," he signs, though there's sympathy in his eyes. "But you can still rest." Then he kneels and lifts me up, pack and all, as easily as if I were Puka.

"But, the beasts—"

"Don't forget what I am," he says into the Link, and I have the distinct sense that it's only I who heard him. None of the others pipe up. "I have hearing better than the best you've known. A stronger sense of smell than any hound. And I don't tire easily, I promise you. Now rest. Please."

I don't know if I'm too surprised or too tired to argue. Either way, I fall asleep not long after.

When I come to, I'm nestled amongst the mossy roots of an enormous tree. Thrall's back is to me as he shrugs off his pack, loosening the straps at the top to free the roll of tent fabric. Overhead, a narrow strip of pinkish-gray light breaks through the sparser parts of the canopy, framed to either side by cliff-faces of dark, lichen-strewn stone.

Across from my spot in the narrow gorge, the stone juts outward over a sunken space beneath—almost-but-not-quite a cave. Struggling against the cocoon-like wrapping of my cloak, I get up and pad over to Thrall as he supplements the shelter of the overhang with our tent material. We fall into working side-by-side, almost silent save the occasional word or two over the Link. 

When our makeshift shelter is finished, we set about concealing it with fallen branches and moss. Then Thrall leads me to the perfect spot at the nearby creek for refilling our water-pouches. It's reassuring, to see how well he knows the land—navigating the forest with the same fluid surety as the native beasts I've been forced to keep at bay. 

After a few bites of salted fish and dried fruit, I curl up inside our shelter to finish sleeping as Thrall takes first watch. By now the dull ache in my lower body has intensified into the deep, throbbing pain I've come to dread every month. And out here, without the remedies and comforts I'm used to, it's about twenty times more miserable.

I try to escape into Puka's senses again, but the pain holds me hostage, drawing me ever back into myself. I moan and twist, trying to get more comfortable. And as I do, I feel Thrall's agitation growing in the erratic, spiky outbursts of his Ember. Even I can smell my own blood now, so it's not hard to guess what's troubling him.

At the entrance of our shelter, he shifts position—turning to face into the wind. I recognize the undertone to his agitation all too well, having felt similar in my own and other's Embers. The pulsing, ever-expending thrum of hunger—but shot through with hot spikes of craving. The agitated writhing of addiction. The medicine he'd been forced to take when we were imprisoned must be starting to wear off.

But I trust him. 

After struggling toward it for what feels like hours, I stumble back into sleep at last.

An unknowable amount of time later, I'm wrenched awake by a blood-curdling shriek overlaid with savage snarling...immediately followed by the sounds of ripping flesh.