“This is everyone?” I suspect I know the answer before I ask, but desperation makes the words spill from my lips anyway.

Kai doesn’t respond, just meets my eyes, and that’s answer enough. I feel sick. I glare at my hands and I swear I see red. So many… so many lost. My fingers grab at my throat. I force out a breath and blink, but all I see is smoke and Yiyo on the backs of my eyelids. I stagger, gripping a table that we pass, and stares snap to me.

“Rue?” Jhamal says.

“I’m fine,” I lie, as horrible as that feels. How do I lie to the one person who’s been there for me through all of this? It feels so wrong. But I can’t be broken to him forever. I can’t stand the way he jumps when I move or groan. I need him to see the person I was when I look in his eyes, not this shell of a person I am now, struggling to put one foot in front of the other.

Maybe if he sees it… I’ll see it too.

“Please, don’t worry about me.” I’m the least of who they should be worried about. He tsks, muttering his disagreement.

Chatter hovers over the room like fog and I scan for Bati, or some familiar face, anyone I know. A place to set my eyes and calm the panic taking flight in me.

We move between the tables and I swallow more courage, forcing myself to stand a little taller. I spot a crowd of men in long robes, twine tied at their waists and rings in their braided hair. They’re huddled on the opposite end of the room over a table. One or two look my way, but quickly turn back around.

“Bati might be over there,” I tell Jhamal, and he squeezes my arm in sympathy before being pulled away into a conversation with someone I don’t recognize. The guy he is talking with is rocking a Harden-style beard and fur sits on his shoulders. He wears armor like Jhamal used to, in the same pattern. A stack of golden rings adorn one ear and a chunky ring with a bear’s claw hugs his knuckle. He and Jhamal grip arms in some unusual form of handshake and pull into a hug.

“Come on, Bri.”

Bati wasn’t on the battlefield. If anyone has the details on what I’ve missed, he would. Bri and I move through the bodies of people and their cloak of whispers. Walking back in here is like walking through a nightmare. How do I tell them we need to get up and fight when their numbers are cut at least in half because of what I’ve done? How do I tell them anything? Who am I? The Chosen One, my conscious whispers. Yes, but not chosen to lead… chosen to fight.