Now, as Mahlia and Mouse padded through the swamps, Mahlia wondered what her father would think of her. A girl with one hand? A muddy war maggot who stole eggs from bird nests to survive? What would he think of her now? She already knew the answer. She might have been half Chinese, but she was pure Drowned Cities. Just another one of the animals he’d found ungovernable.

Mahlia smiled bitterly at that. He could go grind. Her father had run away with his tail between his legs because he’d been too damn civilized for the Drowned Cities. He might have called the warlords paper tigers, but in the end, he’d been the one made of paper. Sure, the Chinese peacekeepers had looked dangerous with their guns and their skin armor, but in the end, they’d blown away like leaves.

If Mahlia had been as civilized as the peacekeepers, she would have been dead ten times over, just getting out of the Drowned Cities. As it was, it had only been luck that had saved her, the Fates putting their touch on her, in the form of a crazy redheaded war maggot who had intruded at the right time and made a distraction.

“Hey, Mouse?”

“Hm?” Mouse was taking his turn with the machete, chopping aside new vines that had filled the trail, not really paying attention.

“How come you saved me?” Mahlia asked. “When the Army of God…” She hesitated, remembering her hand lying on the ground, blood muddy. She swallowed. “When the soldier boys… cut me… how come you made a noise?”

Mouse straightened from his chopping and glanced back, pale brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“You didn’t have to. It would have been safer for you to just steer clear.”

“Just stupid, I guess.” He mopped at the sweat coursing down his freckled neck and face and turned back to the vines. “I don’t remember this trail having so much tangle on it,” he said.

“Here. I got it.” Mahlia took the machete and started chopping. Tough weedy vines parted under the sharp blade. When she’d first fled to the jungle from the Drowned Cities, she’d been soft. Now, she swung the machete with expert strength. City girl learning country living.

“So?” she pressed. “How come?”

Mouse grimaced. “Hell, I don’t know. Maybe I was crazy. I still get nightmares about that. I’m running through the jungle, but the soldier boys turn out to be better shots, and they light me up.” He paused. “I don’t think it even was me. Didn’t feel like me when I stood up. I just did it.”

“But why? I was just a castoff. Peacekeepers were gone. No one was going to give you a reward or nothing. You weren’t going to get anything out of it.”

“Wasn’t about that,” Mouse said.

Another nonanswer.