Thisbe’s mind raced. She quickly gathered up the armload of bones and threw them into her cauldron, then poured a giant bucket of water over them. She stoked the fire and stood in front of the pot in such a way that Dev and the soldiers wouldn’t be able to look into it without getting past her. All the while her mind whirled. The Revinir had given up making the ancestor broth because it hadn’t worked for her. Thisbe had managed to steal a couple of bottles of it before the rest was destroyed. She was quite sure the Revinir didn’t want any of the ancestor broth made. So why did Rohan bring these bones? It couldn’t have been a directive from the Revinir.

As Thisbe stirred the water and bones, she realized exactly what was happening. And she felt foolish for not having thought of it herself. The ancestor broth had kept Thisbe from being pulled to the Revinir until now. Taking the second dose had given her even more control against the effects of the dragon-bone broth. And it had given her more clarity in the historic images that sat almost pleasantly in her memory now, rather than blinding her whenever the Revinir roared.

The ancestor broth was the answer to one big part of Thisbe’s problem. It would combat the mind control, and it worked on people with black eyes. They’d just have to get the other slaves to drink it. And to stop taking the dragon-bone broth. It was brilliant!

But the more Thisbe thought about it, the more it seemed like a difficult task—there was no way Dev or the other black-eyed slaves would just obediently drink something Thisbe offered them. And would they tell the Revinir that Thisbe was trying to get them to drink it? She’d have to figure that part out. Maybe Rohan had an idea.

“Finish up,” said one of the soldiers, poking his head into the cooking area. “Time to go back to your crypts once your overnight batch of broth is cooking.”

Thisbe startled but managed to keep her body steady. She watched out of the corner of her eye at how Dev responded—slowly and deliberately putting one last log on his fire. Thisbe did the same thing, then added a handful of herbs to her pot to provide some cover over what was inside. There was nothing more she could do.

Together they turned to go out. With a tiny bit of worry burning a hole in her stomach, Thisbe walked with Dev in silence, wondering if what she’d done with the herbs would be sufficient to hide the bones. Or if she’d be discovered and questioned in the morning.

But there was little time to think about that, for she had another huge task to accomplish before the broth would be ready.

Breaking Through