“Come here,” Mal said, waving him over. I thought Misha might not budge, but then he shuffled to us, his chin jutting out in a sulk. “Do you have the pin Alina gave you?”

Misha nodded once.

“You know what that means, don’t you? You’re a soldier. Soldiers don’t get to go where they want to. They go where they’re needed.”

“You just don’t want me with you.”

“No, we need you here to take care of the others. You know David is hopeless, and Adrik is going to need help too, even if he doesn’t want to admit it. You’ll have to be careful with that one, help him without letting him know you’re helping. Can you manage that?”

Misha shrugged.

“We need you to take care of them the way you took care of Baghra.”

“But I didn’t take care of her.”

“Yes you did. You watched over her, and you made her comfortable, and you let her go when she needed you to. You did what had to be done, even though it hurt you. That’s what soldiers do.”

Misha looked at him sharply, as if considering this. “I should have stopped her,” he said, his voice breaking.

“If you had, none of us would be here. We’re grateful that you did the hard thing.”

Misha frowned. “David is kind of a mess.”

“True,” Mal agreed. “So can we trust you?”

Misha looked away. His expression was still troubled, but he shrugged again.

“Thank you,” Mal said. “You can start by getting water boiling for breakfast.”

Misha nodded once, then jogged back through the gravel to get the water on.

Mal glanced at me as he rose and shouldered his pack. “What?”

“Nothing. That was just … really well done.”

“Same way Ana Kuya got me to stop begging her to keep a lantern lit at night.”

“Really?”

“Yes,” he said starting the climb. “Told me I had to be brave for you, that if I was scared, you’d be scared.”

“Well, she told me I had to eat my parsnips to set a good example for you, but I still refused to do it.”

“And you wonder why you were always getting the switch.”

“I have principles.”

“That means, ‘If I can be difficult, I will.’”

“Unfair.”

“Hey!” Zoya shouted over the edge of the crater above. “If you’re not up here before I count to ten, I’m going back to sleep and you can carry me to Dva Stolba.”

“Mal,” I sighed. “If I murder her in the Sikurzoi, will you hold me accountable?”

“Yes,” he said. Then added, “That means, ‘Let’s make it look like an accident.’”

* * *

DVA STOLBA TOOK ME by surprise. I’d somehow expected that the little valley would be like a graveyard, a grim wasteland of phantoms and abandoned places. Instead, the settlements were bustling. The landscape was dotted with burned-out hulks and empty fields of ash, but new homes and businesses had sprung up right beside them.