Ronin’s soldiers draw their weapons but hesitate, uncertain whom to assist. I don’t pay them any attention, my gaze fixed on my quarry. Fury burns through me, chasing away any remnants of fear from the Dead Wood and the shock of discovering why the shamanborn had escaped. My teeth are clenched tight. The wind screams in my ears as my boots devour the distance between us.

We’re nearing the edge of the encampment when an arrow sings past me. It pierces the windwender’s back, sending him sprawling into the dirt.

“No,” I gasp, digging in my heels.

In seconds, I’m on top of him, dragging him up by his collar. His eyes roll back in his head, but I give him a violent shake.

“No! You’re not dying until you tell me why you attacked us at the teahouse. Who sent you to kill the queen’s Shadow? Speak!”

“Sirscha,” Phaut says, horrified.

“Tell me!” I demand.

The windwender coughs. Blood spatters his chin. “B-betrayed,” he manages to say in a garbled whisper. “P-promised … safe … ty.”

“Who promised you safety?” My knuckles are as white as his face. Anger pushes my breaths out in quick, thin pants.

“The q-queen,” he says thickly.

“The queen?” I echo, confused. “Queen Meilyr?”

He nods, eyes fluttering shut.

I shake him again. “What are you talking about?”

But it’s no use. The man’s bright eyes don’t open again. A moment later, he goes slack.

“No!” I slam his limp body to the ground, then shove to my feet, brushing off Phaut’s quiet murmur of confusion. My fingers furrow through my hair. My legs are unable to remain still as I prowl around the dead windwender, nearly giving into the urge to kick his corpse.

Ronin’s soldiers close in on the body. I have no idea which one shot him, but I want to punch something. What did he mean that the queen had promised them safety? He had to have been lying. The queen wouldn’t have promised them such a thing unless she’d been the one to send them, which is ludicrous.

She wouldn’t have sent assassins after her own Shadow. It didn’t make any sense.

Yet, what reason would a dying man have to lie?

Ronin puts me in a tent to calm down so that I don’t upset the other shamanborn. The tent is sparse, with nothing but a cot to fill the small space.

Phaut hovers near the entrance, one hand braced on the tent flap as if preparing to leave. She doesn’t, though.

“You all right?” she asks uncertainly.

It’s just too much. All I have are questions piled upon questions. How can I believe that Queen Meilyr sent shamans after her own Shadow? How am I supposed to help Saengo or the shamanborn when I couldn’t even save Audri from the trees?