The king clambered back into his carriage with all his silky layers and jewels, but I didn’t breathe properly until Jotun and the guards dispersed and the blood-red vehicle was out of sight.

“Next time, keep your mouth shut,” Irrik snarled.

Thinking to dig holes by each plant and put a drop of sweat in each, I stooped to pick up the forgotten hoe. I froze before slowly standing, my anger flaring. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me. Don’t make me repeat myself.”

Glancing back, I opened my lips to retort, but the hoe slipped from my grip, and the edge sliced through my forefinger. Blood welled as I bellowed, “Ouch!”

“Sto je dovraga,” Irrik snarled in his freaky language and turned to face me. Glaring, he asked, “Are you completely incompetent?”

After a month and a half of abuse, fear, starvation, and grief, I saw red. I swiped my bloody finger over the sharp edge and swung the hoe in a wide, vicious circle, then released it straight at the Drae.

His eyes widened, and my jaw dropped as the tool careened toward him. Irrik raised his arm to protect his head and the blade sliced into his forearm.

“Mistress Moons.” I covered my mouth with my hands, and the hoe dropped to the dirt with a thud.

Irrik ran his fingertips over the deep gash. Black blood dripped down his arm. “Did you . . . just attack me with a garden hoe?”

I was a fool. Irrik was bad, but Jotun was worse. If Irrik died . . . I rushed to him, crying out, “It had my blood on it!” My hands fluttered over the grotesque wound. “Tell me what to do. I don’t want it to kill you.”

He moved to look at me, a curious expression falling over his face. “You regret hurting me?”

“What? No. Well, killing you, yes.” My stomach rolled at the thought of murdering something, someone, anyone. “How long will it take to set in?” I asked him, trying to remain calm. “Should we try cutting off your arm?”

Lord Irrik’s brows rose. “Cutting off . . . ?” He broke off and threw his head back in laughter. The gruff waves of it rolled across the potato field.

Did Phaetyn blood make Drae go mad first? Would he lose his sanity and go berserk? Would he turn on me?

Irrik continued to laugh, wiping his eyes when his laughter brought tears. He wasn’t going mad.

“Well, die then,” I snapped, picking up my Drae-killing weapon.

The laughter faded. “Your blood won’t kill me, Ryn.”

He said my name. Then his words registered, and I gaped in surprise. “What? Yes it does. I’m a Phaetyn. You’re a Drae.” I lowered my voice. “I’m your weakness.”

Lord Irrik glanced away, a shadow falling across the top of his face. “No. It just can’t.”

“Why?” I pressed. “Does he know that?” The king had seemed adamant my blood was the bees-knees of Drae poison.

“No,” the Drae said. “If you value your life, you won’t breathe a word of it. Not to anyone. To Irdelron, you are nothing more than a drop of water in the bucket, a foolish Phaetyn, and if the—” He glared in affront at my raised hand.

“A drop of water!” My eyes were like saucers. “That’s it? I thought for sure I was worth two.” Grinning, I dropped the Drae-killer and hustled over to the beautiful willow. The stream it hung over was more of a disheartening trickle, but there was enough for what I planned—what Mum had figured out long ago. A worker’s station wasn’t far away, and I jogged over and rifled through the spades and pitchforks until I located a wooden pail.

I hurried back to the stream and placed the pail in front of the strongest current—a lazy rivulet. My finger, upon closer inspection, had already sealed, but dried blood still coated the digit. Once the pail was full, I wobbled back to the willow tree and set the pail down.

“What are you doing?” Lord Irrik inquired, standing over me.

Huh, he really doesn’t seem to be dying. Add another puzzle to the heap.

“Making magic fertilizer.” I stuck my bloodied finger in the water and swished it around, watching as the blood flaked off and dissolved in the cool liquid. Then, picking up my pail of garden juice, I tottered to the nearest row and walked down, dribbling the water on the anemic dirt.

—The Last Phaetyn has the Last Laugh—

—Everyone Respects Ryn After She Does the Impossible—

Maybe I would wait to see if it worked before shouting my victory to every Harvest Zone.

“That was a decent idea,” Irrik said from behind me.

I rolled my eyes. “Don’t sound so surprised. Anyway, I thought I was incompetent.”

“You are. But maybe you won’t always be so inept.”

Fire-breathing jerk.

For the next several hours, I did the same, substituting good ol’ spit when my injured finger was clean. I’d covered around half the rows in the field by that time. I had no idea if this would work or what the best concentration was. I’d have to work on it so the vegetables didn’t show up oversized, or we’d have to go through the whole “tricking the king about Ryn’s powers” routine again. With that in mind, I began to put less spit in the buckets from the halfway point and less still a few rows later.

After another eternity, I groaned and straightened, holding my hands behind my back to stretch. A cursory glance at the Drae told me he was still alive but asleep, or perhaps he just wished to appear asleep so I’d leave him alone.

The sun showed the time to be around three or four in the afternoon, and I was achy and sore from lugging around a full pail. Not that it mattered how I felt. I picked up the pail for another trip, and my heart panged with memories of helping Mum in gardens not that long ago. I turned to gaze in the direction of Harvest Zone Seven. Did our house still stand empty? Had someone seized the opportunity to move into the empty abode? Was Mum’s garden dead? My garden, I realized. I knew better now. My mind ran back to all the times she’d poured the bath water in the gardens or soaked blood-soaked rags after I’d hurt myself. What happened to that water afterward? Had it gone into our neighbors’ gardens and the other gardens mother had regularly traveled to around the kingdom?

I’d always assumed the ointment she rubbed on my skin when I was hurt was to help me heal. After witnessing how quickly I healed, I knew this couldn’t be true. Tyr had used it on me, too, and I made a mental note to ask him when I next saw him . . . if I saw him again.

Mum had kept so many secrets from me. Was anything about my childhood true?

The faint clamor of voices broke over the hill a few fields away. I raised a hand to shield my eyes as people appeared—farmers come to work the Quota Fields, by the look of them. They turned my way.

I peered to where Lord Irrik still slept and then back, heart in my mouth. Did I know these people? There were around ten of them. They were coming closer.

After Irrik hadn’t killed a single guard today, I had no doubt the king had tightened the rules of protecting me. But I was also sure the new rules wouldn’t protect these men and women.

They were getting too close.

I held up my hands in a stop position and thanked the Moons when they halted. One of the men in the middle raised his hand in the air and made a fist.

My body trembled.

“Arnik,” I choked. Hope burst forth inside me, and I took three steps closer before remembering the fearsome Drae at my back, and what he could do.

If I ran away, he’d kill all of them.

Had Tyr managed to get a message to Dyter or Arnik? Was that what had led them here? Or had word spread about the king, his guard, and the Drae at the potato fields. Had they come to see what was happening for themselves?

I raised my fist in the air, and tears slipped down my dirty cheeks as a grin spread over Arnik’s face.

Hope bubbled in my chest, and my desire to escape became a desperate need. I wanted to race to Arnik, to my friend, to the safety and the ignorance of my former life. What if Tyr hadn’t spoken to them? I didn’t want to rely on anyone else, which meant I had to at least try. I stepped forward, but Arnik and his friends were pointing at the slumbering Drae by the vibrant willow tree. One by one, they disappeared back over the mound until only one remained. Arnik looked at me for another few seconds.

Then he disappeared, too.

* * *

“You’ll be taken somewhere else tomorrow,” Irrik said on the walk back. “And somewhere else the day after. The king wants you working throughout the kingdom.”

“What?” Fatigue fled as panic hit me. I’d hoped Arnik would come back. How would he find me again if I was constantly changing locations? How would I get my message to him? “What about the rest of the potatoes? I mean, there are still lots more rows—” I stumbled and fell forward, scraping my palms on the path. I hit it in frustration. Why was nothing working for me? All of it. Everything was against me.

Irrik grabbed my arm and pulled me up, but my legs refused to support my weight, and I slumped back to the ground. I’d used up all my energy on the fields. “I need to sit for a minute.”

“You’re not eating enough,” he snarled. “I told you I wouldn’t tolerate weakness.”

“I had breakfast,” I retorted. “I didn’t know I was supposed to pack a picnic.”

His mouth snapped shut, and he narrowed his eyes as I sat on a mound, but he made no further comment.

Ryn: One. Lord Irrik: One million

I was equal parts dejected and elated after seeing Arnik. Until today, I wasn’t sure if he was alive. How had he found me? Had the rebels been trying this whole time? I desperately wanted to be back with him, in safety. Away from this nightmare.

I stared with unseeing eyes at the yellowed grass under my hands, then I dug my hands through the crunchy grass to place my palms against the ground. I wanted to heal the land so it was as beautiful as my mother told me it once had been in her lifetime. I wanted to heal it so people weren’t scrounging for food each day and dying of starvation in their beds overnight.

The fountain garden in Harvest Zone Seven rose in my mind, abandoned and falling apart. That place could be bustling and full of life again if the land would just grow.

If the people weren’t so afraid.

Healing the land while evilness sat in the Verald throne wasn’t enough. The evilness had to be ripped out by the roots. The king had to die.

And the rebels had to do it.

I pushed my fingertips into the pale, anemic dust we called soil and begged the ground to hear my plans and help me. I begged the land to listen to me, to feel my need and heed it. It was time to feed the people again.

Time to take down the man who crippled them.