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“Dawsyn?” His wings retract. He drops to the ground next to her, the stone bruising.

She drags air between her teeth, her wet hair sticking to her cheeks, tingeing the blood into tiny pink rivers. Her lips, blue and dry, tremble once more. She closes her eyes, her hands to the ground, as though she can barely keep her head from hitting the bank.

Ryon’s hands encase her cheeks, lifting her head to his, but she only gasps, shakes.

“Dawsyn?” he asks again.

The adrenaline must be finally leaking from her body, a body ravaged by water and enemy. She is spent. Beads of sweat sprout upon her forehead, her neck and chest, and Ryon feels a sick knowledge twist in his gut. He drags her into his lap and begins searching, his eyes flying from her neck to her shoulder, her wrists, arms. And there, on her waist where her ribs end, is the blooming of blood, seeping into the already soaked fabric of her clothes, spreading at an alarming pace. Without further thought, Ryon takes the fabric in his hands and rips the seam, revealing the pale skin of her body beneath, and the clean lesion, where blood pours freely – the place where a sword cut cleanly into her.

CHAPTERTWENTY-NINE

Dawsyn does not open her eyes as Ryon claps his hand over the wound. She does not stir when he roars a curse to the sky or even when he lifts her from the stones. She only breathes raggedly, her body slack as he thrashes his wings and cuts the wind in two.

Dawsyn is aware of the bite of wind on her skin, the sound of Ryon’s repeated oaths of vengeance, the feeling of being thrust through the air – aware of it but unconcerned. The only thing that she can think of is the pulsing that bursts from her side. But moment by moment, even this pain grows milder, weaker. She is vaguely aware of the sweat collecting in the corners of her closed eyes, the salt stinging, and tries to drag a hand to wipe it away but cannot. She is shunted from side to side, and someone is shouting, calling for her, but she cannot raise herself. She is dragged further downward, inward. The rush of her panicked mind grows quieter. She is cold, as cold as she was on the Ledge when the wood ran low at the end of a season.

Come, Dawsyn, the wind is wicked this night, her grandmother calls from the stoop. The fire in the cabin is alight and blazing. Smoke curls from the chimney, disappearing into the black sky. It looks welcoming, but Dawsyn looks away.

No, she calls back. Obstinate.

The sound of boots on snow alert her to Valma’s approach, and she should be wary that her grandmother might take her by the hood of her cloak and drag her back into the warmth, but tonight she knows that won’t happen.

Say what you mean to, my girl. The air is too frigid for lungs like mine. And indeed, a wet cough bends her back, the sound crackling into the grove, bouncing amongst the trunks of trees.

Dawsyn sighs. There is no avoiding her grandmother, nor Briar, in this place. She turns, conceding, and lets Valma see up-close the black that blooms around her eye, swelling it shut.

Hm, her grandmother murmurs.Square in the eye. So, we know you saw it coming.

Dawsyn makes a sound of annoyance and turns back to look out into the woods, but a blush climbs the length of her neck because it is true, she should have seen it coming.

Who is the unfortunate one, then?her grandmother asks now.

Yennick, Dawsyn says quietly.

The Prior boy? What did he get you with?

His fist, she answers grudgingly.

Well, shit, child. That fist better not still be in working order?

I did not hit him back, Dawsyn tells her, and this is the deepest part of her humiliation, that she could not raise a hand to pay back the blow that Yennick had imparted on her. He’d made away with a bag of potatoes that would have fed the den of girls for a week.

The Drop is the same way each time, Dawsyn, her grandmother says now, watching her carefully.Not everyone comes up a winner.

Not if one isn’t able to break the hand of a starving boy, Dawsyn returns. She turned fifteen just weeks before and it has since been her duty to sack the Drop, and she is proving incapable.

Isn’t able?her grandmother asks.Or isn’t willing?

Yennick grows thinner by the day and all on the Ledge see it, ignore it. His mother lost her wits years ago and if those on this mountain shelf were a kinder sort, they would have thrown her into the Chasm by now and left Yennick with one less mouth to feed. The boy is around Dawsyn’s age, she supposes, but weaker. More desperate. He is not long for this world. He socked Dawsyn in the eye, and she could not bring herself to stop him, to hurt him.

It is not your fault, my girl, her grandmother says, taking Dawsyn’s chin and turning her bruised face back toward her own.

I let him take our food, Dawsyn says simply.I returned with nothing.

The woman smiles gently at her.I’ve shown you how to hurt and kill to get what you need, because we Sabars have a weakness. We have a tendency to let others take what ought to be protected. It is why we are here at all, she murmurs this last part, though Dawsyn does not know what it means.It is not your fault, Dawsyn. It is in your blood to see other people’s pain, their need. And blood will out.

Dawsyn pulls her face away from her grandmother’s touch.Then I will not live long.

You will, Valma says, more firmly than before.You will take what you need. You will stay the frost. You will watch the Chasm–