Part of me is tempted to pack a bag and run while everyone is harvesting sulfur. Who’s going to follow me into the wastes without supplies? But the boardwalks can be easily seen from Powder Town’s watchtowers, and someone is sure to come after me on horseback if I leave in broad daylight. As I head out with Cleo just before dawn, I make a promise to myself: at lie-down, I will confront Asher—make him explain how he split last time without anyone catching him.

It’s another morning of backbreaking work, though my shoulders are starting to get used to spending half the day hunched over. When we head inside, I see a familiar face towing a rickshaw toward the market.

“Clay?” I run after him.

He turns toward my voice and shoots me a toothy grin. “Delta!” He scoops me up and squeezes me around the middle like we’re family. “Gods, are you a sight. I passed through Dead River recently, and it’s burned. All the huts leveled. Is Indie with you?” He searches behind me, barely seeming to notice that I’m shaking my head. “Did she end up in Bedrock with the others? I ran into Vee a few days ago and she told me you brought Indie to Zuly.”

“Vee’s alive?”

“She was”—he ticks out his fingers, counting—“three days ago, when I saw her in the Barrel. I went there after finding Dead River raided. Heard that’s where raiders sometimes bring folks they take alive.”

Three days ago is a whole day after the General promised to execute the eldest in my pack—which would have been Vee. What Clay’s claiming can’t possibly be true. “It must have been someone else you saw,” I tell him. “Vee was in Bedrock.”

“Nah, she’s waiting for you in the Barrel . . . Is supposed to bring you in when she finds you, whatever that means.”

Bring me in . . . to the General. He’s pulled her off sleeping ilk and planted her in the Barrel. He’s using her as bait in case I pass back through, hoping I’ll make contact with someone I expect to be dead. I bet a dozen Loyalists are shadowing Vee’s every move.

“I don’t know what you did to anger the General, Delta, but you have to make it right. Vee said he paused the executions for now, but he’ll start them again if he needs to. I don’t know what she was talking about.” He scratches his chin. “Maybe I should have asked.”

Bless Clay. He never was the brightest, but this is the best news I’ve heard in ages. The General needs leverage over me if he catches me—or for when I return. If he’s killed everyone I love, that leverage dies too. He probably paused the executions the instant he learned I’d escaped into the wastes.