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“Too new. He won’t risk breaking protocol.” I looked around, then steered us instead toward another sentry at the rope.

This young woman wasn’t a guard; dressed in a sleeveless chiffon top and riding trousers, with her light brown hair piled in a high, messy bun, she looked like a civilian. Yet the workers seemed to defer to her, whispering in her ear, pausing for her response, then scurrying off again.

As she glanced up, the light caught a jagged scar across her face—a long raised line that began at her temple and traced the curve of her suntanned cheekbone. “Welcome.” She smiled, extending her hand leftward. A golden bangle spiraled around her toned upper arm. “Please join a queue at one of the checkpoints, and—”

“My cousin needs medical attention,” Zeke cut in.

The woman, almost as tall as Tari, had to glance down to take me in, from my sweat-beaded brow to my inflamed wound. But it was my bruised throat that darkened her expression. “What’s your name?”

“Dinah,” I said.

“Please come through, Dinah. But your cousin will have to wait in—”

“No, hold on.” Zeke tensed. “We’re family. We go through together.”

She looked toward Zeke’s too-tight grip around my waist. Then her eyes narrowed in a way that made Zeke relax his hold.

“I’m afraid there’s been a change in protocol.” Seeming somehow unhappy about it, she explained, “Each refugee, unless they’re underage, shall be separately searched and questioned.”

I frowned. Why would they need to question us?

She turned to unlatch the rope divider, revealing a black, root-like tattoo webbing across her shoulder blade. Zeke stiffened. “We’ll ensure that you find each other after the checkpoint,” she said, leaving a gap for me to pass through.

Zeke’s grasp remained near-bruising. “My cousin is wounded in a foreign land. I’m not leaving her.”

“I understand your hesitation,” she said calmly. “But I will personally see to it that—”

“Why should I trust you, Wielder?”

The woman and I flinched at the same moment.

Wielder, he’d called her, as though it were an insult. But he’d smoked that dullroot right in front of me; I knew he harbored a specter himself. So why had there been such contempt in his voice? And why had he journeyed here, to a land full of Wielders, if that contempt existed at all?

The woman recovered quickly, her features softening with a pity I didn’t understand. Then, unbelievably, as though Zeke’s cruel outburst had been the deciding factor, she stepped aside.

Zeke’s frustration guttered into surprise.

“You’re happy for your cousin to come through with you, Dinah?”

Zeke began, “Of course she’s—”

“I’m asking Dinah,” the woman said firmly, leaving no room for rebuttal.

“Yes,” I said. “I’d like him to come with me.”

Her gaze journeyed again to my bruised throat. Then she nodded, wary. “As you like. My name is Valeria. I’ll take you both through.”

I exhaled with relief as Valeria led us beyond the rope.

Zeke kept me tucked against him through the maze of golden tents and little water stations, their brick bases glistening with summer foliage and a glossy tumble of pebbles. The hum-and-bustle of the workforce muffled the sound of my ragged breathing as Valeria ushered us into a red-trimmed tent.

The vast interior was decked out with medical cabinets and segmented for privacy, the light from outside filtering through the fabric and turning the dust into flecks of gold. Zeke released me, and I teetered, hating that I wanted someone to lean against.

“We’re running a bit behind schedule,” Valeria said. “I’ll fetch the physicians.” She smiled at me softly and was just turning to leave when her gaze caught on my low neckline. On the sickly discoloration of my blueneck fever scar, crawling between my breasts.

“It’s from—”

“Blueneck fever,” she finished quietly.