She handed me a bottle of water, and I gulped half of it down. “You’re doing well,” Saylor said as I drank. She frowned, her eyes narrowing behind her sunglasses. “Unfortunately, I’m not sure that it’ll be enough.”

I lowered the bottle. “What do you mean?”

“You’re learning quickly,” she acknowledged. “But what the Ephors are intending . . . I never thought I’d face something like that with an untrained Paladin at my side.”

“I didn’t exactly expect to spend my Cotillion battling the forces of evil, either,” I reminded her, and the frown deepened.

“I understand that, Harper. But . . .” She sighed. “As successful as you’ve been, to be honest, I have no idea how to . . . to train a Paladin. I never had to before. We all have our roles. David is the Oracle, I’m the Mage, and Christopher was the Paladin.”

“We’ll be okay,” I said, wondering how I managed to get the words out without choking. “We’ll get through Cotillion and then . . .” I trailed off.

It wasn’t like I hadn’t thought about what came after Cotillion. Whatever this big prophecy was, it would be settled. But David would still be an Oracle (or dead). I would still be a Paladin (or dead). Right?

Saylor was watching me. “Harper, do you fully comprehend what being a Paladin means?”

I sat up a little straighter in my chair. “Right now, it means making sure crazy Blythe doesn’t kill David and inadvertently make a crater where our town used to be.”

“But do you understand what that means giving up?”

Now I really didn’t want to look at her. I got up out of the chair and started doing the stretches she’d shown me. “Once Cotillion is over, I won’t have to give up anything,” I said. “Blythe will be gone—dead—the spell won’t have worked, and I can get back to normal life.”

“Harper, this is your normal life now. No matter what happens at Cotillion, you are a Paladin, linked to me, linked to David. Forever. And that means that eventually, you’ll sacrifice everything,” Saylor said. She didn’t insist it. Didn’t say it with force, like she was trying to make me believe it. It was a fact.

I faltered, nearly losing my balance. Taking a deep breath, I moved into another stretch. “I don’t believe that,” I said. Overhead, the sun was so bright, the sky a steely blue.