Laira winced. She took a deep breath and held it. Struggling not to gag, she crawled into the steaming mound.

Her body convulsed and she clenched her fists and jaw. She wriggled around, feeling the foul slop flow around her, coating her hair, sliding down her clothes, clinging to her skin, and even filling her nostrils and ears. When she finally crawled out—sticky and covered with the stuff—she couldn't help it. She leaned her head down and vomited, and her body shook, and she almost passed out from the pain and disgust.

Trees shattered behind her as the rocs crashed through the canopy.

Still bound, steaming and fetid and coated with the mammoth dung, Laira crawled into the brush. Leaves and grass clung to her sticky skin.

Her scent was masked. Her body was camouflaged. She was battered and burnt and covered in dung, but she kept crawling, refusing to abandon hope. Behind her, she heard Zerra shouting at his men, insisting that his roc had smelled the maggot here. She heard the beasts caw. She heard them fly above, the hunters cursing, the flock confused.

"Just keep crawling, Laira," she whispered to herself. The foul waste entered her mouth and she spat it out. "Keep crawling. Never stop. You can escape them."

Through grass, under brambles that scratched her, and over stones that stabbed her, Laira kept crawling, her wrists and ankles still bound, until the sounds of the hunters grew distant behind her. And still she kept moving. She wriggled on, sticky and gagging every few feet, until she reached a declivity bumpy with stones.

She tried to crawl down to the valley below. Slick with the dung, she slipped over a slab of stone, and she rolled.

She tumbled down the slope, banging against tree roots, blinded with pain. Her elbow smashed against a rock, and she bit down on a scream. She seemed to roll forever, grass and dry leaves sticking to her, until she slammed into a mossy boulder, and her head banged against the stone.

Stars exploded across her vision. Her eyelids fluttered. She gasped, curling her fingers, struggling to cling to consciousness, but the blackness gave a mighty tug . . . and she faded.

SENA

 
SENA

Alone.

More than afraid, hurt, or ashamed—though he was those things too—Prince Sena Seran, Son of Raem, felt alone.

He sat in the corner of his prison cell, the top of Aerhein Tower. A barred window—barely larger than a porthole—broke the opposite wall. A ray of light shone into the chamber, falling upon him. Sena liked this time of day, the brief moment when the ray hit the wall near the floor, allowing him to sit in light and warmth. Soon the ray would move, creeping up the wall, moving over his head, leaving him and slowly fading into darkness.

But for now I have you here, friend, Sena thought, blinking into the beam. Please don't leave me again.