With a crook of his finger, my father motioned for a soldier to come forward. The man carried a carved box roughly the length of his forearm. My father threw open the lid. Thick golden ration coins gleamed in the sunlight as the soldier held it above his head for all to see. There had to be at least a hundred coins in there. Maybe two hundred.

Murmurs traveled through the crowd. People stood on tiptoes to get a better look.

My father motioned again, and the soldier snapped the lid back into place.

“But if she is not returned, things will only get worse. So think about what is best for our people, for your families.” He looked down on us all once more. Then he leapt off the well and pushed through the crowd in my direction.

People pressed tighter against one another to make a pathway. I somehow ended up on the edge of the crowd. I swallowed, all moisture gone from my throat.

My father sauntered right toward me, unaware of my presence. Unaware of the suffering around him. Of the suffering inside me. The suffering he’d been causing for years by controlling the water levels and letting us all think there was a drought when he could’ve ended it.

My hand went to my sword.

But just as I was about to pull it, a small hand covered mine. I looked down to see Dimic.

He shook his head. His dark eyes stared intensely at mine, refusing to look away. “If you die,” Dimic said, “we all die.”

I stared at him, puzzled by his words.

“You’re our hope. You’re the only one who can fix this, the only one who wants to help us and has the power to do it. Don’t throw it all away for revenge.”

Somehow I got the sense those last few words weren’t his, that they’d been spoken to him sometime in the past. And not only just to him, but to countless Desert Boys just like him.

They were counting on me now.

I eyed my father and his contingent of soldiers. Could I take them all on? Or would they strike me down before I could even reach my father, before I could even make a difference?

I let go of my hilt.

Dimic nodded, assuring me I’d done the right thing. “We’ll wait on your signal,” he said.

“Should we even raid? How do we know there’s any water left?”

Dimic gestured to the crowd. “He wouldn’t leave them with nothing. Otherwise, they’d turn against him altogether. There’s always some water. It’ll just take longer.”

I nodded as he disappeared back into the crowd. I hoped he was right and that this wasn’t a lost cause.

I ducked my head as my father swept past, his soldiers trailing behind him.

He didn’t even eye me as he went by. Not that I should’ve expected it. Even I’d never really taken the time to look at the people on the streets. To see the way their shallow cheeks sunk or notice how many of their lips bled from lack of water.