Fire explodes between us. My body flies off him. I hit the ground hard. Air rushes from my lungs. I can’t breathe, but I roll across the floorboards, my hands slapping away the flames that lick up my arms. Nearby, the firewender collapses, having delivered his final attack. But the teahouse is already engulfed, and without the shaman’s control, flames tear through the building.

Jonyah is screaming. Half his body is on fire. His shirt peels off, melting into the skin that bubbles and blisters beneath. My breaths are loud and fast in my ears as something rises in my stomach. I force it down.

Sisters, protect us. I smack frenetically at the last of the embers crackling through his hair. The smell makes me gag. He’s still struggling and screaming, but I can only grab hold of the waist of his unburned pants and heave him toward the door.

The sound of squawking and flapping indicates Millie is keeping the windwender busy, but I still don’t see the third one. A dark shape materializes from the fiery haze in front of me, and I almost cry in relief to see Saengo break through the smoke.

“Help me!” I shout, my voice raw. Together, we manage to haul Jonyah’s considerable bulk out the door, escaping at last into the open air.

“Are you okay?” Saengo asks, taking in the state of my uniform.

“Fine,” I wheeze between coughing. Against my flushed skin, the troll-bone talisman Kendara gave me is startlingly cool. Protection against magic. It must be the reason I’m not lying unconscious and half dead beside Jonyah.

We lower him onto the dirt. He is a scorched mess, and he’s neither screaming nor moving now. I kneel beside him, uncertain where to even touch him without stripping away more of his flesh. Steam rises from his chest, face, and arms. Gently tilting his head, I find an unburned spot beneath his chin and press my fingers there. His pulse flutters weakly.

“He’s alive.” I breathe, and then, “He’s lucky I don’t finish the shaman’s job. Bastard.”

“We need to get out of here,” Saengo says. Her voice doesn’t even waver. How she can sound so calm when everything has gone so terribly wrong?

Why would Nuvali shamans attack a teahouse in Evewyn? Saengo has told me of skirmishes between Evewynian and Nuvali patrols in the northern grasslands near her family’s home, but the threat of the Spider King’s wrath always kept the skirmishes from escalating into something else.

Something like this. Ronin’s influence over the kingdoms should have prevented this from even happening.