Torn between the sight of her injured friend and the murdered guard, Alara finally let her eyes settle on the former. She could dwell on her treasonous act after she knew Quenti was okay.

She caught Runeo’s eye, half expecting the bruya to call her out on her misdeed, but he too was focused on the injured aguen.

Lili moved first, diving across the floor, and spilling her pack onto ground. Her face was pale, and she was shaking, but her fingers moved quickly as she picked out some bright red leaves from the grounded contents.

Alara watched as Lili pulled back the torn fabric of Quenti’s robes. The wound in her side was jagged and deep, and Alara’s stomach lurched. Lili pressed the leaves into the wounded bruya’s side and pressed her hands against it. Alara could feel the rise of Lili’s magia as she poured it into the girl. She could also feel the weakness of it and see the cold sweat forming on the tierren’s forehead.

After less than a minute, Lili faltered and swayed, her face a sickly white. Runeo leaped forward, just in time to catch her head before it hit the ground.

“Is she…?” Alara’s heart pounded.

“She just fainted. Pushed herself too hard. Check on Quenti.”

Alara stepped forward and saw the water user was still ashen and shaking. Pulling back the leaves, Alara looked on with both hope and dread. The wound wasn’t as deep as before. It likely hadn’t pierced any organs, but blood steadily flowed from it.

“It’s not healed completely.” Alara looked around the room, helpless. Nothing stood out as healing materials—not that she would know. Her eyes searched the surrounding cells.

Khuna pressed against the bars, her eyes wide. Zinita stood next to her, eyes not meeting Alara’s.

“Is anyone a healer?” She didn’t recognize anyone, but those who registered her question shook their heads.

“Alara,” Runeo said beside her, “you could seal it.”

“I’m not a healer,” Alara said, looking at Runeo like he had grown two heads.

“You can cauterize the wound.”

Alara thought she would be sick. “You mean…?”

“She’ll bleed out if it’s not sealed.”

“I can’t,” she choked out.

“Yes, you can,” Quenti groaned.

Alara shook her head. “That… that won’t work.”

“Yes, it will.” Quenti’s voice was firm. “Now do it, you coward. Or are you the only one allowed to have a scar?”

Alara bit her lip at the jab and saw the ghost of a smile on Quenti’s lips.

“El’dyo help me,” she said, kneeling beside the wan bruya. She closed her eyes and pulled at the threads of her magia, feeling the heat rising in her body. She shuddered, but let build into her hands as her flint ignited the flames. “Runeo, hold her down.”

He nodded, moving forward and ripping a piece of leather from a nearby guard’s vest and placing it in Quenti’s mouth.

Alara paled at her wide eyes. She wanted to close her own or throw up as she leaned forward, burning hands reaching for the slash in Quenti’s side. As she made contact with skin, she felt the girl’s cries echo in her mind. She kept her eyes focused only on the small patch of skin where the cut stretched, ignoring the context of what she was doing.

This is nothing. I’m definitely not burning a human being’s skin.

She saw the cut sealing beneath her fingers.

And then the smell of burning flesh reached her nose, and she gagged. Her magia flared, and she felt the flame jump under her palms. She flung herself back as a piece of fabric on Quenti’s tunic caught fire. Alara could only watch wide-eyed as Runeo quickly grabbed at the flames and squashed them out with his hand.

“It’s… it’s done.” Alara said softly, lowering her hand.

Runeo gave her a grim look before focusing back on Quenti. It was an ugly wound—puckered and white and red—but it was sealed. Sweaty and pallid, the girl pushed herself up.

“Remind me never to get stabbed again. It’s not nearly as cool as it looks.”

“Can someone let me out now!” Khuna was still leaning hard against the bars, as if she could sink through them and out of the cell if she thought hard enough.

Runeo jumped up and strode to the wall where a ring of keys hung. It took a few tries, but he finally opened Khuna’s cell and Zinita’s right after. Khuna took the keys from him quickly and unlocked the cuffs on both their wrists. She turned to Alara and threw her the keys.

The magite caught them, her eyes slightly wide as she watched the gold cuff fall from Khuna’s wrist. She looked down at her own, her stomach churning with some emotion she couldn’t quite place.

She heard the snort of derision from Zinita as the bruya watched her hesitate. Alara refused to look at the bruya, her eyes focused on the cuff.

“Where’s Micos?” Runeo eyes scanned the other cells. Alara could detect a mild panic in his voice.

“They took him away. We haven’t seen him since.” Khuna sat on the floor holding Quenti as she gave Runeo a frown.

He shook his head and looked back at Alara. She sat half-frozen on the floor. Keys were now forgotten in her hands as her eyes swept over the prison cells, searching fruitlessly.

“We need to find him,” Runeo said. “You need to find him.”

Alara bit her lip, unsure, but the desperation in Runeo’s eyes stung.

“Please,” he said.

“I can try.”

She closed her eyes and felt for her magia. It took a few minutes to grasp on to it, the smell of burning flesh still fresh in her mind. She picked at the threads and sent them out, stretching them as far as she could, searching for the energy she associated with Micos. But her senses were muddled. She pushed harder, but she felt it slipping further away with each push. She finally opened her eyes, shaking her head but refusing to make eye contact with Runeo.

A few feet away, she saw that Lili had come to, still shaken with her head in her hands. Khuna and Quenti sat, their foreheads pressed together and lips moving in unheard whispers. Zinita was the only one emboldened by the situation. She moved swiftly around the room, collecting the weapons from the fallen guards and distributed them. Alara took a spear and threw a set of arrows at Runeo. He took them, distracted.

“We need to get going,” Zinita snapped.

“We need to find Micos.” Runeo said, voice just as sharp.

“What about the rest of them?” Quenti pulled herself to her feet. She motioned to the other cells, where a scattering of others sat, wide-eyed at the scene. “We can’t leave them.”

“We don’t have time for this. We’ve already stayed too long.” The Zinita’s voice was cold, but Alara heard the truth in her words.

“She’s right.”

The female bruya’s head whipped around, eyes narrowing. “Don’t think I’m going to trust you just because you agree with me.”

“Let’s not talk about trust,” Alara said. “I wasn’t the one who planned to kill the other.”

Zinita smirked. “And yet you were the only one here who actually killed their target.”

Alara bit her lip. Amid Quenti’s injury, she’d almost let herself forget about the blameless councilguard she pierced with the spear. About the man she killed. Her eyes found their way back to the guard, whose body was splayed out on the dungeon floor, eyes open, chest stabbed and running a sickening dark red.

El’dyo, what have I done?

“That was an accident.”

“And who’s to say another accident won’t happen to one of us next? That you won’t turn on us just as you did on them?”

Khuna stepped between Alara and Zinita. “We have bigger problems right now.”

“We need to find Micos.” Runeo’s voice was tight. “We can’t leave him.”

Zinita opened her mouth to reply, but before she could, the door behind them swung open.

“What are you doing here?”

Alara’s eyes widened at the familiar voice and she let out a cry, louder than intended, “Micos!”

“Thank Sol!” Runeo leaped, his arms opening to wrap around his brother, but the younger boy stumbled back, hand reaching for the dagger at this belt.

Micos wasn’t wearing his bruya clothes anymore, and he didn’t even have a guard escorting him. He was alone in the garments of a fire mage, with a dagger and bolas strapped to his waist. Something was very wrong.

Alara pulled at the threads of magia deep within, again feeling for elemental users. While she felt the presence of the boy in front of them, it in no way resembled the bruya she knew in Arbol.

“Micos?” Runeo said, stepping toward his brother once again.

“Runeo, don’t—” But she was too late. Micos lashed out, a spit of flames flying from the torches behind him at Runeo. Quenti acted first, sending water spinning through the air to divert the attack.

Runeo didn’t even flinch at the fire that spun toward him or the steam the water let out as they collided. Alara pushed him aside and stepped next to Quenti as the fire mage stared them both down.

“Don’t do anything stupid, Micos. We’re trying to help.”

Alara wasn’t sure anything Quenti could say would matter. She could feel the shift in his energy as her magia brushed against him. This wasn’t Micos anymore. She let out a shudder.

The young bruya—now mage—didn’t make a move to attack again, and neither did Quenti nor Alara. The room was still and quiet.

And then Micos lifted a hand to his temple.

Son of a bruya, Alara swore internally. He was sending out an envia.

Alara pulled back her arm, and without thinking, threw her fist at Micos’s face, the impact putting up more of a resistance than she expected. All the same, he fell back, blood spurting from his nose, though she knew it was too late.

“Well, I guess they know we’re here now,” she said.

Runeo was still unmoving, staring at his brother with wide, unblinking eyes. Alara counted herself lucky he didn’t attack her for punching his brother.

“We need to go,” Quenti whispered.

“What’s wrong with him?”

“Runeo—we can’t…” Alara grabbed his shoulders and swung him around to look at her. “We can’t take him now, but I’ll help you get him back. Later.”

Runeo seemed to snap to and his eyes sharpened on hers. He nodded once and let himself get dragged from the dungeon, Alara’s hand still on his arm.