Jaren hummed the tune again, and the bird hopped to a lower branch, then closer, and closer, until it had landed on a fallen log just feet from where he sat. The bird cocked its head at Jaren, studying him, and this time when he hummed the tune, he remembered a few more notes than he’d sung before.

But his elation was short-lived. One moment the bird was there, innocently watching him, and the next, it was gone. Jaren hadn’t seen the long, snaking root rise up from the ground and wrap silently around the bird’s leg until it was too late. He stood, horrified, but the only sign that the bird had ever been there at all was a few shiny feathers, drifting slowly to the Forest floor.

Jaren backed up to the shack and crawled inside, closing the door firmly behind him.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Leelo tried to take a nap when she got home, but it was impossible. She was too wound up from the events of the day, and the idea that Sage might know about the outsider—Jaren—was driving her mad.

And, truth be told, she was wound up about the very fact that she’d spent time alone with an outsider. She knew his name. She’d promised to help him, when she should be gathering up the courage to kill him. And yet when she imagined wrapping her hands around his neck while he slept, ending his life as she was expected to, all she saw were gray eyes rimmed in thick black lashes, the kind Leelo, with her fair complexion, could only dream of. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected of an outsider, but it hadn’t been this. Even his leaf-strewn hair had looked soft and inviting.

Get a hold of yourself, she said to her reflection in the mirror. He was clearly using his wily outsider charms to trick her into helping him.

But she had tricks of her own. She’d already let slip that she should have killed him, so he knew his best chance of survival was doing as she said. He didn’t need to know how much her own survival depended on him.

Fiona had fallen asleep while knitting, so Leelo quietly gathered anything she thought Jaren might need: plum brandy—the only alcohol she could find—to disinfect the wound; a full waterskin; dried meat and fruit as well as a few slices of bread (anything more would be missed); and some warmer clothing, in case the night got chilly.

And then, with only a few hours until her Watcher shift with Kris started, she went to see Isola.