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He didn’t even hesitate. “Of course it’s not your fault.”

I heard the rain then, loud on the roof. It was a wonder I hadn’t noticed it before, a testament to how racked I’d been with the dream and the past come back to haunt me again and again.

I rose to stand on shaky legs.

“What are you doing?” Roan asked, but I didn’t answer.

I walked to the door, and he followed behind, watching my every step. My palm shot with pain as I grasped the handle and pushed, but I hardly cared. I stepped out into the rain and felt the shock of cold it brought.

I let it soak me. Until my clothes and my skin were wet through. Until my hair was dripping.

When I finally turned back, blinking, I found Roan still in the doorway. There was a blanket in his hands, but he didn’t usher me in. He waited, watching me, like he understood my need for this. Like he couldn’t pull his eyes away and never would.

I faltered, then felt my legs carrying me towards him. When I reached the hut, he made room for me in the doorway, wrapping the thick wool around me and rubbing my arms as I came under the protection of the roof and the walls.

He said, “You’re a wild thing and not for taming.”

And my heart gave a sad pang.

Why?

I looked up into his eyes, and I knew.

“Maybe that’s why the clan won’t have me.”

He took my shoulders more firmly and pushed me back just enough to look me full in the face. “This clan will have you, Fen. This is where you belong.”

And I almost believed him.

The next day, the delicate lie we’d been trying to preserve came apart and crumbled into ruins.

It was a crowd. They were at our door before the sun was at its height.

“Is she even trying to abide by our ways?” asked a woman. “No.”

I’d gone up into Roan’s loft, and it still hadn’t been far enough away. I could hear them all, gathered together and discussing the problem athand: me. Roan had gone to meet them in a fury. And he’d come face to face with his own mother.

“We just want to make sure we’re doing what’s best for the clan and for Fenli. What if she’d be better off with her own people, Roan? What if you’d be better off?”

“Weare her people,” he insisted.

There had been a sharp increase in voices until Roan’s voice rose above all of them. He took them all to the meeting house where they could discuss me far enough away that I couldn’t hear.

I didn’t know whether to be relieved or furious.

I was both.

I headed back down the ladder and tended to the fire, growing it until I had an inferno I could watch rage and burn. Yeshi came over then, and I let my anger anchor me as she went to work cutting out my stitches, not so much as flinching. She applied the salve, wrapped the hand, and gave me instructions I nodded along to but didn’t hear. Then she left and I was back at the hearth.

This wasn’t me. I was made of rain, not fire. But even as I thought it, I felt the heat licking inside my chest.

I wanted to prove them wrong, to make them eat their words. I wanted to be a child of Toke’s—undeniably, unequivocally. And I wanted to go to bed each night and rise each morning knowing that I was where I belonged and among the people I was meant to be with.

But it felt out of reach.

I’d just started in on my hair, spitting mad and sliding the blade through a chunk on the right, when Roan came through the door. My hand stilled, and he drew to a halt when he saw me, still holding the knob.He blinked, taking in my state, then entered, swinging the door closed behind him.

All the fight went out of me. All the rage and boldness that surged up inside when I was alone dissipated. I drew my hands into my lap, my cheeks heating. I looked down at the floor.