“A friend of my mother’s,” Lilia said.

Taigan pointed to her wrist. “And did Kalinda give you that?”

Lilia looked at her hand. “What?”

“The ward? You can see it, can’t you?”

Lilia realized the wrist Taigan pointed at was the same one where her mother had burned the trefoil into her skin. “There’s nothing here,” Lilia said. “I don’t see anything.”

Taigan laughed. “You will,” he said. His certainty made Lilia fearful. She had given herself away, and he’d come for her, just as Kalinda warned her.

The sanisi turned as two novices approached, leading a hulking white-and-brown bear that must have weighed a ton. It wasn’t until that moment, when the sanisi took the bear’s reins in his slender fingers, that she realized what she had done. Everything had happened very quickly.

“Up,” the sanisi said. He brought the bear beside her. The stink of it was nearly overpowering.

Lilia took a step back. The bear snuffled at her; its yellow eye seemed enormous, the size of her fist. Its great bifurcated paws dug impatiently into the soft ground. Fangs protruded from the upturned snout. It flicked its forked purple tongue at her; the yellow eye narrowed, slitted like a cat’s. The bears were native to the woodland and used their tongues to sample potentially deadly plants before ingesting them. That was why her mother kept one in the village. It helped them avoid contaminated vegetation or new mutations of familiar plants that may have become poisonous. The broad, split paws also made it effective at getting through marshy woodland. They were faster in the marsh than most people.

“I can’t go,” Lilia said.

“Too late,” Taigan said, and took her by the waist.

She was astonished by his strength. But even more at his rudeness. He had touched her without asking. Once she was in the saddle, he took the bear’s rein and walked beside it.

“You should ask first,” Lilia said, indignant.

“Ask about what?”

“You can’t just grab a person.”

“Those with strength rule over those without.”

“Strength doesn’t make you better. It makes you a bully.”

“You agreed to come with me, girl.”

“You could be less rude,” she said, and looked back at the temple. But there was no one to see her go. Just the novices stepping back into the shadows, as if fearful they too would catch the sanisi’s eye and be taken away. She feared that she was some sacrifice, a token sent to appease their northern neighbors, to ensure another five hundred years of peace. They would not miss her. Tomorrow, they would not remember her name.

She choked on a sob. She’d given herself away to save Roh, and now she had no idea how she was going to get to the woodland coast to find her mother.