They got closer, and she saw what Hook had seen. It was a stone, rough and unevenly shaped, poking out of the earth. If Crier stood next to it, it would only come up to her knee. There was a wreath of dead, dried-out flowers around the base of the stone, and a single word carved into it: Wells.

For some reason, that was what it took. That was when it really hit her. She was not walking through a history book, where things were distant, all the pain and suffering softened by centuries. She’d been expecting an illustration because that was all she’d ever known, but of course this was nothing like the illustrations. There had once been a village here, full of people whose lives were filled with sorrow and joy, who had children, who were in love, who loved each other, who wanted to protect each other, who just wanted to survive. A village full of people like Leo, who had sacrificed himself to save his daughter, his unborn grandchild.

Now there was nothing but a stone.

Because of Crier’s father.

Not my father anymore, she reminded herself. I will not be the daughter of a monster.

But as she looked out over the hills, the shoreline of Lake Thea, the long grass hiding the bones of a village long dead, she knew it was not quite that easy.

I write this on the dawn of war.

The Scyre has begun amassing forces to the west. I know not what he plans, other than to take the sovereign’s throne; other than to overthrow the council; other than to seize Rabu itself and then, I have to assume, all Zulla.

He pours words like wine. Sweet and bloodred. Heady when consumed. Promises of a shining new life source. He will liberate us from our need to consume heartstone daily, or so he says; from the Iron Heart itself, the crack in our armor. But I must confess I have never understood. Would a new life source not come with its own vulnerabilities? We must derive power from something, and as long as we depend on that something—our weak spot. Our flaw.

What does he want to end reliance on, really?

I still remember his words at the first Anti-Reliance assembly, two summers past.

“Why do we call ourselves sons and daughters when we were never birthed? Why does Traditionalism dictate that we act out these elaborate scenes, playing at being human? We were Created to be more than human. Does the wolf play at being a common dog? Listen here. If we look only at the past, we lose sight of the future. And what a future it could be.”

What are you afraid of, Scyre?

What haunts you, Watcher?

What secrets lie within the Heart?

—EXCERPT FROM THE PERSONAL RECORDS OF RED HAND MAR OF THE RED COUNCIL OF THE SOVEREIGN STATE OF RABU, YEAR 47 AE