Xendr Chathe’s hut was vast, larger than any other building Po had ever been in. Standing at one end of the hut, he couldn’t see to the far wall. The space was lit here and there by the orange glow of small lamps that barely pierced the darkness. The far side of the dwelling was shrouded in blackness. Squinting, Po could only just make out the hulking shape of a body slumped in a chair.
“Xendr,” Po said into the darkness, his voice thin and timid.
The shape moved, lifted itself from the chair. Xendr was facing away; all Po could see was a robe hanging from the man’s broad shoulders and covering his massive back.
“What is it?” Xendr asked without turning, his voice rasping like a handful of stones scratching one against the other.
“I’m sorry to disturb you, Xendr, I—”
“What is it?” Xendr bellowed impatiently.
“It’s … it’s one of the Sisters. One of the women from the village. She’s asked for an audience with you.”
Xendr Chathe turned and moved forward from the darkness into the dim light. He stepped gingerly, with the trace of a limp—the walk of an aging warrior who no longer fully trusted his creaky bones. But his robe hung open, and underneath, his bare chest was still thickly muscled from many seasons of ranging and scouting through the hills, of raiding foreign villages and doing battle with the enemies of the Vagri.
At least, those were the stories. In the time Po had been with the Forsaken, there hadn’t been a single battle or raid. Rumors in the camp held that Xendr had killed every last one of their enemies, or that they’d fled so far from the plains that no one would see them for another hundred seasons. The Forsaken were a society of warriors—but for a long time now, longer than most of the younger Forsaken could remember, there’d been no one in the barren landscape for them to go to war against.
“Who is it?” Xendr asked. “Your sister? I told you I didn’t want to see her.”
“She insisted.”
Xendr grunted his irritation. “It’s been a long time since we’ve had a woman in the camp.”
“I know,” Po said. “If you want me to tell her to leave—”
“Xendr, if I may …”
Po wheeled around to find Kyne standing behind him.
“I told you to wait outside,” Po said.
“I know,” Kyne said. “But I heard you through the curtain. I can speak for myself. I don’t need you or anyone else to announce me, to beg permission from the great Xendr Chathe.” Her voice dripped with sarcasm.
Po moved toward Kyne, expecting Xendr to ask him to forcibly remove her from his presence, but to his surprise Xendr simply laughed.
“She’s got a lot of nerve, your sister!” Xendr boomed. “I like that. Go ahead, then—speak! Let’s hear what you have to say.”
Kyne hesitated. “I’d prefer to speak with you alone.”
Xendr moved forward until he was only a few paces away from Kyne. The look he fixed her with was hard and unblinking. “Whatever you want to say, you can say it in front of both of us. I don’t keep secrets from my men.”
Kyne was silent for a few moments.
“I come to you with an offer of alliance,” she said at last.
Xendr grunted. “Alliance. What are you talking about?”
“An alliance between you and me. Between the Forsaken and the Sisters of the village.”
Xendr was quiet. He walked back to his chair, flipped it around so it was facing Kyne, then fell into it heavily, slouched to one side, his legs splayed out on the ground in front of him.
“And why would I want this … alliance? The Sisters answer to the Vagra, not to you.”
“Things are changing. The arrival of the Strangers—”
Xendr scoffed. “The Strangers. Everyone keeps talking about these Strangers. Why is everyone so afraid of them? We’ve protected the Vagri from threats in the past. We’ll do it again.”
“Then you haven’t heard,” Kyne said. “You haven’t heard that the Vagra forbade your men from hurting the Strangers. That she brought them into the village. Into the Sisters’ camp.”
Xendr’s face froze and he sat up in his chair. “No,” he said. “That I hadn’t heard.”
“Then you also haven’t heard that the Vagra seems to be …” Kyne paused. “Distracted. By one of the Strangers. A boy.”
Po’s heart beat faster. Anger boiled in his stomach.
“Distracted,” Xendr said. “What do you mean?”
“Her loyalties are divided,” Kyne answered. “She’s incapable of leading the Vagri.”
Xendr leaned back in his chair again. “And you would have me do … what? The Vagra has been chosen by the Ancestors. You may think that doesn’t mean anything to me, but it does. I grew up in the village, the same as you did. I still remember the words my father taught me: The Ancestors are the ones who have gone before. Those who have passed on. They went to a place both beyond and within this place. They walk alongside us. They bind us to one another. They heal us. And they speak to us. Going against the Vagra is severing our only true link with the Ancestors.”
“Kiva is not the true Vagra,” Kyne said. “I heard the Ancestors before her, when I was only eleven seasons old. And now you have the maiora. I’ve tried it for myself, and when I did I saw a vision of death and blood in the village—a warning of what the Strangers are capable of. The maiora is the only link to the Ancestors we need. Help me. We can take control of the village and rule together. You and me. You and your men, you don’t have to be Forsaken any longer. We can live together, all of us, one people, under our joint rule, yours and mine.”
Xendr heaved himself from his chair, grunting, and wandered away into the darkness at the back of the hut.
“You’ve given me a lot to consider,” he said. “May I have some time to think about your offer?”
“There’s not much time,” Kyne said. “The Strangers are already here. They could be preparing to kill us as we speak.”
“Even so, rebellion against the Vagra is no small thing. I need time. A day or two. Please,” Xendr said.
Kyne pursed her lips and, after a moment, nodded.
“Very good,” Xendr said, then extended his arm toward the door. “Now, if you’ll give us a moment, I need to speak with Po. One of my men can bring you back to your village.”
“I don’t want an escort,” Kyne said. “I can return to the village on my own.”
Kyne went to the door. After she’d gone, Xendr moved close to Po and spoke in a low voice.
“What do you think?” he asked.
Po pressed his lips together and let out a slow breath through his nostrils. He didn’t know what to say. Kyne was simply carrying out her plan, the one she’d told Po about weeks ago. That was why he had come to join the Forsaken in the first place—to help his sister be Vagra so that one day he could be with Kiva. His hand drifted up to the scar on his cheek as he thought about how much he’d done to put Kyne’s plan into motion, how much he’d sacrificed.
And yet, now that the time had come, it didn’t feel right. Kyne had told him that Kiva would be grateful to them for taking the burden of being Vagra away from her—but she hadn’t seemed grateful when she’d confronted them at the pit. He’d begun to realize that Kyne had been lying to him, manipulating him.
“I don’t know,” Po said finally. “I don’t like it, though. Kyne’s my sister, but I still don’t trust her.”
Xendr nodded slowly and looked off to the side. “Neither do I. Still, what she offers is tempting. I fought my whole life to protect that village. But our enemies are gone, and I’m an old man now. I’m tired. To return to the village, to have a hut, a garden, a woman—I can’t pretend I haven’t thought about it, sometimes.”
Po had been thinking about a life in the village, too—the life he’d left behind when he followed Kyne’s command to leave. Some nights, it was all he could think about.
“So you’re going to do it? You’ll take Kyne’s alliance?”
Xendr shook his head. “It’s not that simple. I made a promise.”
Po squinted. “What kind of promise?”
“To the old Vagra. She helped me, once, when I was a younger man—younger even than you. She helped me become leader of the Forsaken. In exchange, I made an oath to stay away from the village for as long as I lived. But she’s dead now, and if what Kyne says about this new Vagra is true, if she really is distracted by this Stranger, this boy …” Xendr trailed off and then raised his head, met Po’s eyes. “I didn’t fight my whole life so that a new Vagra could destroy everything I fought to protect.”
Heat rose to Po’s cheeks. His body clenched. An image of Kiva and Matthew walking together, hands touching and heads angled inward, came to Po’s mind—he pushed it away and gave his head a hard shake.
“No. Kyne’s wrong. I didn’t agree with the Vagra bringing the Strangers to the village. But she would never betray her people. Not for these … these creatures. No. I don’t believe it.”
Po had spoken louder than he meant to, and Xendr looked at him with surprise. Then he gave a nod, a signal that he wouldn’t pursue the subject any further if Po didn’t want to talk about it.
“One thing Kyne offers that appeals to me is a way to control the maiora,” Xendr said. “I wish I’d never discovered it. It’s taken over the camp, but I still don’t know what it is. I don’t know if it’s good or bad.”
“The Vagra,” Po said. “She can help us. She can tell us whether the maiora is of the Ancestors or not.”
“You know her, yes? She’s a … a friend of yours?”
Po hesitated. “We knew each other as children,” he said.
Xendr nodded. “Go to her. Tell her about the maiora. Tell her that we need her help.”
“And what should I tell Kyne?”
Xendr looked at the ground and put a finger to his lips as he thought. “Don’t tell her anything. Not yet. Not until we see what the Vagra can do for us. We’ll remain loyal to her for now, but Kyne may be right—the Vagra may not be the right person to lead. It may be time for a change.”
“How will we know?”
Xendr didn’t answer right away. He turned and walked to the wall of the hut, where various weapons—a spear, a bow and arrows, and a sword—were leaning against the wall. With a sudden motion of his arms, he threw his robe to the ground. His broad shoulders and sinewy back glistened in the lamplight. In the dimness, Po could just make out the scars notched up and down both of Xendr’s arms—self-inflicted wounds, according to the rumors in the camp, one cut for each of Xendr’s kills in battle. He reached down and picked up a sword.
“Just keep an eye on her,” Xendr said, turning the sword back and forth in his hands to examine the blade. “Watch the new Vagra closely. If she makes a mistake—one wrong step—I want to know about it.”