Johnis wasn’t watching. He was thinking of that one final test Thomas had said these four must face. Customarily it would be a task that would force the new leaders to work as a team. More than once a chosen leader had failed the final test and been sent back to the squad to be replaced.

“Are you refusing my commission?” Thomas asked.

What was this? Johnis lifted his head, wondering what had gotten into Jackov to refuse the commission. But he didn’t see Jackov refusing the commission.

He saw Thomas pointing his sword in his direction.

At him.

Johnis’s heart stopped. A shiver passed down his neck.

Him?

But that was impossible. He didn’t want to be the him this sword was pointing at. Didn’t want to go out battling the Horde in four days’ time. Didn’t want a new house or a new horse.

In fact, staring at Thomas’s sword, Johnis was terrified to be counted as one of the Forest Guard, much less lead a swarm of fighters into bloody battle.

It occurred to him that everyone was silent. Waiting for him.

“I can’t,” he said.

“You can’t? Or you won’t?” Thomas said, sword unwavering.

“I was dismissed,” Johnis said.

“Consider yourself undismissed.”

“I’m too young.”

“Have you ever given your heart to a woman?” Thomas asked.

He hesitated. “Yes.”

“Then you’re old enough to fight for love and for the Great Romance,” the commander said, speaking of their religion, which revolved around love.

“I’m too small,” Johnis said. “I’m a lover, not a fighter.”

Thomas angrily thrust his sword into the dirt. “Any lover of Elyon or any of his creatures is a fighter for Elyon and his creatures! I will decide if you are too young or too small or too slow or too cheeky for your own good! Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“And I have decided that you are more worthy than all of these!” Thomas pointed to the fighters he’d rejected as leaders. “Are you questioning my judgment? I, who have crossed the worlds, who have hung my life out to be swatted at by the Horde in every battle since the blasted Shataiki ravaged the land! You think your fresh little mind can match my judgment?”

“No, sir.”

A woman stepped out from the bleachers on Johnis’s left. Rachelle, wife to Thomas, wore a short fighting tunic and leather sandals with straps that crisscrossed up her calves to her knees. A knife was secured to her thigh.

Legend had it that Rachelle had taught Thomas everything he knew of fighting—and of love—when he’d fallen into this world from another long before the Great Deception. Watching her slink toward him, Johnis thought the legends had to be right.

She seemed to rob the breath from even Thomas.