text: Lilia arrived at the meeting point with Elaiko and Salifa just as the first hint of dawn tickled the horizon. She was exhausted and achy; she nearly fell asleep twice on her mount. She scanned the shallow rise of the meeting point as they broke through the trees, hoping to see Harina or Avosta. The smell of smoke still permeated the air, though there was no sign of the fires that Mihina had directed to draw out the patrols.
  
  She had barely begun the ascent, Salifa and Elaiko trailing, when Namia howled and bounded down the hill toward her. Namia clapped her hands and patted Lilia's leg in the stirrup, signing frantically, so fast Lilia could not make it out.
  
  "Slow down," Lilia said. "What is it?"
  
  "Success," Namia signed. "You?"
  
  "Yes," Lilia said. "We had success. You kept the patrols very busy. Thank you."
  
  Namia beamed, which looked more like a grimace on her ravaged face.
  
  Mihina came to the edge of camp, wringing her hands, staring off behind them. "Is this all? Where's Harina?"
  
  "We were separated," Lilia said, sliding down from her bear. "We lost Avosta in the river, too, but… it's possible he just washed downstream. I'd like to wait for them, just in case. This is Elaiko. Our contact inside. She was… very helpful." The last part, Lilia had to force out.
  
  "The patrols are far from here," Mihina said. "Do you think they noticed you in the temple? Will they send parties out?"
  
  "I think it will be some time before they realize we escaped," Lilia said. "They won't know how we got out."
  
  "How did you?" Mihina asked. "And why isn't Harina–"
  
  "There was a scuffle," Lilia said. "Blood. Not hers, but… she stayed behind. I think she'll circle back. There's no reason she shouldn't have gotten out as well."
  
  Mihina offered them hard bread and raw tubers. Lilia sat back against one of the trees, and ate gratefully. She fell asleep listening to Salifa and Mihina speaking in low tones, discussing the reconnaissance.
  
  "Was it worth it?" Mihina said, very softly, as Lilia fell into the warm, gauzy arms of sleep. "My sister–"
  
  "I don't know," Salifa said. "Let's see what she has to say back at camp."
  
  A snap. A hiss. The sound of a man huffing up the hill. Lilia snapped awake, disoriented, the tangy smell of everpine in her nostrils.
  
  Avosta struggled up the rise. He leaned against a tree for support. He shivered violently.
  
  "Mihina! Stoke the fire!" Salifa called.
  
  They got Avosta out of his wet clothes and under a dry blanket. Mihina was able to dry his clothes quickly with a few tendrils of Sina's breath. It did not take long to warm him up.
  
  "You're alive," he said to Lilia.
  
  "So are you," she said.
  
  "Harina?"
  
  She shook her head.
  
  Avosta wiped at his eyes. "I thought I was done, there, for a time."
  
  "I'm glad you were not," Lilia said.
  
  "We should…" Salifa glanced at Mihina. "I'm not sure how much longer we can risk waiting."
  
  "I'll stay," Mihina said. "Another day. Please. She could still find her way here."
  
  "I understand," Lilia said. "I'm so sorry, Mihina. Stay a day, but if it gets too dangerous–"
  
  "It's always dangerous," Mihina said. "Being Dhai is dangerous."
  
  The smaller party mounted up and left camp just as the suns reached the midpoint in the sky. Salifa hung her head, shoulders slumped. Elaiko nervously started at every breath of birdsong and flick of viney tendril.
  
  Avosta rode up next to Lilia and asked, low, "Li, I'm sorry to ask, but what did we achieve there that we could not have learned from Elaiko, or some other Dhai already in the temple?"
  
  "She was a slave there," Lilia said. "Was it right for us to depend on her for everything?"
  
  "That isn't what I meant. Harina was–"
  
  "She will make it out."
  
  "But what did we–"
  
  "We discovered how to defeat the Tai Mora," Lilia said. "Once and for all. You knew this was about getting information. We have that information now."
  
  "I don't."
  
  She glanced at him sharply. His tone was still soft, but she did not like the shift in his face: the pensive brows, tight mouth.
  
  "Do you trust me?"
  
  "You know I do," Avosta said. "I have faith in you. But… you would never lie to us, would you?"
  
  "I'll never lie to you," Lilia said firmly. "You can trust that. Only great tyrants refuse to change course when they receive new information. What we've learned is that there's no need to attack any Tai Mora during Tira's Festival. We can strike back at them far more effectively if we take over the People's Temple. That one is the Key. That's where everything is going to happen."
  
  "All right," Avosta said.
  
  "Trust that I'm working on what's best for all of us," Lilia said. "I believe in the Dhai. I believe in a future for us."
  
  When they arrived at the thorn fence surrounding the Dhai camp, most of their supplies were gone. Lilia wanted a long soak in a stone tub. They had left without much warning, sneaking away before Meyna or Yisaoh could argue, and Lilia did not expect anyone to be waiting for them. She was surprised, then, to see so many people above ground that afternoon, centered on the meeting tent.
  
  When they came over the fence, Liaro came out to meet them. His hair was washed and braided back, his clothes clean, the cuts and bruises he had sustained on his journey mostly healed. The sly smile he gave Lilia as he took her dog's lead made her shiver, though she could not say why
  
  "The Kai wishes to speak to you," he said.
  
  "Good," Lilia said. "I have some things to say to her as well."
  
  "Not the Catoris," he said. "The Kai."
  
  Ah, Lilia thought, so that had been decided.
  
  Yet it was not Ahkio, but Meyna who was striding across the muddy ground as Lilia told her bear to sit and dismounted. Lilia took up her walking stick just as Namia caught up to her. Walking stick in one hand, Namia on the other, she turned to face Meyna as the birds cooed overhead.
  
  "You," Meyna said, "are an unconscionable liar. A charlatan. A con!"
  
  Avosta slid off his bear and moved in front of Lilia. "What are you talking about?" he said.
  
  "Your little scullery girl! Has she told you what she is? And here you all are, back from what, endangering all of us? Getting yourselves killed? How many of you actually left? You've lost some, Lilia. As I expected."
  
  Behind Meyna, Ahkio hung back at the entrance to the tent. Lilia did not see Yisaoh anywhere. A good number of jistas were present, though, and a few of her beribboned followers. Did they fear Lilia would lash out at them? What was all this? Something had certainly shifted in her absence.
  
  "We've been engaged on a reconnaissance mission," Lilia said coolly. "You will be interested to hear what we've learned. There is a way to destroy the Tai Mora and take our country back."
  
  "This isn't our country," Meyna said. "Kai Ahkio and I have decided on the best way forward. We are leaving Dhai. You've known that for days."
  
  The air was heavy. Lilia's ears popped.
  
  "What exactly is happening here?" Lilia said, low.
  
  Yisaoh came up from below ground. Lilia watched her carefully. Her face was grim.
  
  "What's going on, Yisaoh?"
  
  "You lied," Yisaoh said. "And we are not keen on being deceived. Not the Kai, not my fellow Catori, and certainly not all the people you've pretended to love while you deceived them."
  
  "I've never lied–"
  
  "Don't," Yisaoh said. "You told us you were gifted. You told me that."
  
  Lilia felt heat move up her face. "I… I am. I have been ill, that's all. I've never lied."
  
  "Taigan was here," Meyna said. "Not an hour ago."
  
  A slow, piercing knife of dread crept up Lilia's spine. "Taigan? An… hour? How did you…?" She gazed back at Ahkio, still cowering there behind the tent flap. He would have recognized Taigan. "Are you sure?" she demanded, staring hard at Ahkio.
  
  "If what that sanisi said isn't true," Yisaoh said, "show us."
  
  "Li," Avosta said. "What are they talking about? You flew! You are our light!"
  
  "We were easy to fool, weren't we?" Yisaoh said. "No omajistas among us, so no one would be able to see if it was you using your gift. How many of those little jistas with you have done your work for you? They aren't even proper Oras, they are so young! And you used them."
  
  "I didn't use anyone," Lilia said quickly, voice breaking. Salifa was moving forward, her mouth a wide O of astonishment.
  
  "You said you wouldn't lie!" Salifa said.
  
  "It's not true!" Avosta said. He glanced back at Lilia, on his face an expression of absolute conviction. "You are gifted! Show them! You wouldn't lie about that."
  
  Lilia felt trapped: her own people behind her, and Meyna and her new friend Ahkio ahead, with Yisaoh already sneering and turning.
  
  "Faith Ahya was never gifted," Lilia said loudly, "and nor am I. Not anymore. I'm sorry you still thought that. The Tai Mora took that from me as they have taken your country from you." She met Avosta's look. "I'm so sorry. It wasn't… I didn't lie, I just… I didn't tell you I lost it. I was ashamed to burn out. If you thought I was not gifted, would you have followed me? Risked your life?"
  
  "Yes," he said gruffly.
  
  "Then I apologize," she said. "I was a fool. But Meyna, listen," and she raised her voice again. "This changes very little, doesn't it? You and Yisaoh are not gifted. Ahkio is not gifted. Most importantly, it doesn't change the truth of anything I am going to tell you."
  
  "But you've already lied!" Salifa cried. "Li, we trusted you. You lied about this. About this of all things! Harina gave her life for you!"
  
  "She should be exiled," Ahkio said, coming out from under the cover of the tent, hands trembling. "There is too much lying, too much–"
  
  "You aren't even the true Kai!" Lilia said. It burst from her.
  
  The blood rushed to his face, darkening him further. "Perhaps there are some here who would question my claim, but yours is in no doubt. You are an ungifted scullery girl."
  
  "And you're a bully," Lilia said. "Some petty shadow from some other world taking advantage of these people!"
  
  Namia whined softly next to Lilia. Lilia wanted to comfort her, to tell her it was all right, but words were running from her mind: all her arguments, her disassembling.
  
  "Enough," Meyna said. "Lilia, the Kai and I have already spoken about this. We discussed it with many of the people here. For your dangerous actions and deplorable lies, we have seen fit to cast you from the camp. You are putting too many of us in danger."
  
  The proclamation landed like a stone. Lilia felt it in her gut. She opened her mouth to deny it, but Avosta was staring at her, and Salifa was crying quietly. Elaiko simply gaped, fingers twisting the frayed hem of her tunic.
  
  "How is it you take him in so easily," Lilia said, pointing at Ahkio, "and toss me aside? I've sweated and bled for you here. We are–"
  
  "Your schemes have done nothing but tear out the hearts of those who love you," Meyna interrupted. "You disappoint us all again and again. And far from striking back at the Tai Mora, all your little missions and raids have done is make us bigger targets. It's time for you to move on."
  
  "You are going to regret this," Lilia said softly.
  
  "Go," Meyna said, "or I will have my Oras escort you."
  
  "I would like to say goodbye to Emlee, and Tasia," Lilia said.
  
  "No," Meyna said. "Take the dog and whatever you have with you and go. Don't come back here. Go now, before someone changes their mind."
  
  Lilia lost her voice. She felt numb. Namia wailed and clutched at her arm. Lilia managed a quiet, "Shh, hush," sound to soothe her, but she could not look at any of them. Not Salifa or Avosta, and certainly not Elaiko, who had broken out of servitude only to witness Lilia's ostracism.
  
  "I'll… I'll at least see her to the edge of the camp!" Salifa said.
  
  "No," Meyna said. "I'm sorry, Salifa, but if you walk away with her, we'll have no choice but to consider you a danger as well. This woman lied to you. She will lie to you again."
  
  Salifa's eyes filled. Avosta offered an arm, and she nodded, said, "Please hold me," and he did.
  
  Lilia took the reins of her dog and stepped back over the thorn fence. Namia started after her.
  
  "No, you!" Meyna said, and grabbed Namia.
  
  Namia snarled and snapped at her. A great tangle of vines burst from the soil and ensnared her. Namia shrieked.
  
  "Leave her alone!" Lilia said.
  
  "Go!" Meyna said. "We'll release her when you're well gone."
  
  "This is mad," Lilia said. She tugged at her dog's lead. "You're power mad, all of you."
  
  "But… you can't go!" Elaiko said. "You don't… I…" Another snarl of vines curled up between them. Elaiko shrieked and stepped back.
  
  Lilia limped forward, tugging her dog after her. She had no idea in which direction to go. There was no other place for her. What of the other refugees? Could she turn back and gather them? Call to Emlee? Namia was still shrieking. Ahkio and Meyna had cut her off, kept her from going below for this reason. Banished her while she was separated from most of her allies. She kept moving, urging herself to think.
  
  She got onto the dog nd led it through the brush in circles for some time until she could no longer hear the sound of Namia's screaming. She only stopped when she grew thirsty. Lilia had the dog sit, and dismounted. She rested along the side of a narrow creek bed. The great dog lay down beside her and put its massive head in her lap. She sobbed.
  
  "I don't know what I did wrong," Lilia whispered. Though it wasn't true. There were many things she had failed at, and many more she would have failed at, if she stayed. Ahkio and Meyna would be too terrified to risk carrying out the kind of complicated scheme that would be required for them to take control of the temples: a Key, a Guide, and a Worldbreaker! Like some riddle. They would never have believed her.
  
  A snapping sound from the woods. The dog raised its head, let out a low growl. Lilia tensed, expecting a wild bear, perhaps, or a boar. Instead, three men approached her, men she recognized from the camp, men aligned with Meyna.
  
  "Come quietly," the eldest said. "Catori Meyna has another fate for you."
  
  "I don't understand."
  
  They took hold of her. She cried out only once, at the shock of being so roughly handled without consent. They knotted a bit of cord around her hands and slung her unceremoniously onto the back of the dog.
  
  "What are you doing?" Lilia huffed. "Where are you taking me?"
  
  She did not have far to go to find out. After only a few minutes, they pushed her off the dog. She fell in a heap. Raised her head.
  
  A massive bone tree sat at the center of a sparkling white clearing strewn with bleached bones. It was an ancient tree, as wide as Lilia was tall, a grim, rippling thing made from the bones of its own prey. Large bear skulls and the delicate skulls of treegliders made up its base; long, snapped tibias and fibias bound by pale, clotted sap and the tree's fibrous tendons made up its branches. The bare crown of it did not so much reach for the sky as dominate it, a crown, a throne to some dark god.
  
  And there, a few paces from the ring of pale bones at the edge of the clearing, stood Meyna. She held the lead of a dog. Two jistas were with her, both full Oras that Lilia recognized. Meyna did not look away as Lilia gazed at her.
  
  "Is this what you did to Mohrai?" Lilia called.
  
  Meyna said, "No. Unlike you, we aren't all murderers. This is something else. More personal. I meant what I said, Lilia. You are far too dangerous to the Dhai, alive. You have endangered us. And you would continue doing it. I know that, because I understand you, little Lilia. I was you, I think, when I was very young. Always seeking attention. Trying to find my place. But I've found my place now, Lilia."
  
  "Don't do this," Lilia said.
  
  Meyna shook her head. She gestured to the men who held Lilia. "Give her to it."
  
  Lilia screamed loud and long, so loud and long she startled the dogs, which began to bark.
  
  The men hauled Lilia up and tossed her into the bone-white clearing, well within reach of the snarling branches of the bone tree. Lilia landed with a crunch onto the discarded bones of the tree's prey, her nose filling with the faint scent of rot. She wriggled forward, moving as quickly as she could, knowing it was already too late.
  
  The creaking of bones. Hissing. A searing pain in her shoulder.
  
  Her body jerked upright, lifted high, high in the air. A knotted limb of the bone tree jutted from her left shoulder, a limb made from cast-off bits of bird bones twisted together with its gooey, poisonous sap. The sap mingled with her blood and spattered the pale ground below as the tree pulled her into its crackling embrace.
  
  A second bony limb stabbed through her lower left side, just above her buttock. She screamed again. Wheezed. Gasped. She tried to find her mahuan with her one working arm. Lost her breath. No more screaming. Gasping. Like a speared fish.
  
  The tree shivered in excitement.
  
  Sunlight from above blinded her. The canopy here was thin, as the bone tree's poison killed any plant life that came too close. She swung her head, trying to see Meyna and her kin.
  
  "This isn't… necessary!" Lilia gasped.
  
  "I assure you it is," Meyna said, and it frustrated Lilia that she could not see her face. "I know you too well, Lilia, far better than Ahkio does. You won't sit around in the woods feeling sorry for yourself. You'll scheme something up. Play the martyr. And we are done with playing games, you and I. We are going to get out of these woods. No more raids. No more secret excursions. You want revenge. You want to fight a force you cannot win against. You care nothing about the people here, and what's best for them. I do."
  
  "This is… a terrible…" Lilia said, but it came out slurred and soft. Her head swam. The poison was making her stuffy-headed already. Relaxed. Her breath came a little easier. How funny.
  
  Dark patches moved across her vision. Numbness crept up her fingers and toes. Her wounds still throbbed, but it was very distant, like an achy tooth. She had a fond memory of watching Taigan dangling just like this, speared by a bone tree. What would have happened if she chose to leave him there? Would she still be here? Was this always going to be the end for her?
  
  Anger burned in her belly. She struggled. But her body would not respond.
  
  She wondered if this was how her mother felt, welded to the top of that great mirror, bound to it until death, until Lilia destroyed her. Until the world destroyed Lilia.
  
  A sharp pain seared through her sternum. She gasped. Bent her head. But there was no visible wound. No gnarled bone branch pushing through her.
  
  The poison, maybe. The poison doing its final work.
  
  Oma, Lilia thought, you have a grim sense of humor.