Adam leaps to his feet. Both his lips are split open where Phiri clubbed him, blood trickling down his chin. Otherwise, he looks unharmed and alert. He starts to run after Phiri, his feet sliding through the reddish-brown mud my storm has created. Phiri is out of sight before Adam can get very far. He pulls up short a few yards away from me.

“Let her go,” I tell him, willing the storm I whipped up to taper off.

“Shouldn’t we go after her?” Adam asks, spitting blood into the dirt. His eyes scan the nearby ruins and tree line, and I can tell he’d like a fair fight against the other trueborn. Dust, back in wolf form, lopes over and sits down next to Adam, lapping gently at his hand. He glances back to me. “Thanks for the save, by the way.”

“Yeah, I figured since the whole distraction thing was my call, I kinda owed it to you to not let you get slaughtered.”

“Glad you saw it that way,” Adam replies, then looks back towards the ruins around the Sanctuary. “We should catch her. She’s dangerous.”

“Forget about Phiri what’s-her-face,” I say, turning away from the jungle and gazing up at the waiting temple.

“We’ve got more important things to do than chase down one Mog,” Marina puts in as she walks over to join us. “No matter how nasty she might be.”

I nod in agreement. “She’s alone out there. Maybe something will eat her. We’ll leave Dust back here to keep watch over the ships, in case she tries to double back.”

Adam continues to stare into the jungle. After a moment, he finally nods his head. “Fine. I’ll keep an eye on things while you guys go inside.”

I exchange an inquiring look with Marina to make sure she doesn’t have any misgivings with what I’m about to say. She shrugs her shoulders in response, then starts towards our ship to begin the unloading. I cock my head at Adam.

“You don’t even want to try coming in with us?” I ask.

Adam stares at me. “Are you joking? Did you see what contact with that field did to Phiri Dun-Ra?”

“I’ll heal you if that happens,” Marina offers over her shoulder.

“I don’t understand,” Adam says. He turns to look up at the temple, his hands on his hips. He looks nervous. “Why would you even want me to go in there? It’s a Loric place.”

“Like that Phiri bitch said, you’re part Garde now,” I explain. “You’re not Loric, but you’ve got Legacies.”

“I’ve got one Legacy,” Adam clarifies. “And it wasn’t even mine to start with. I—I’m not even sure if I’m supposed to have it.”

“Doesn’t matter. If I understood what Malcolm told us—and I guess that’s maybe a big if—there’s a living piece of Lorien in that temple. That’s where our Legacies come from. Which means you’re connected to it, just like us.”

“Everything has happened for a reason,” Marina says as she climbs up onto our ship’s hull. She looks back at us, a thoughtful frown straining her soft features. “Just look at Eight’s prophecies.”