The girl didn't speak much.
She hardly ate.
And yet, every time I looked away, I found her exactly where I'd last seen her waiting. As if she didn't walk, but reappeared.
Ashara examined her first. No wound, no mark, no pulse at least not the kind that beat in time with the rest of us.
"She's not Hollow," Ashara said quietly, "but she's not wolf either."
I crouched beside the girl in the garden. She watched the memoryroot petals shift from white to blue to gold. Her hands never moved. But the blossoms pulsed in rhythm with her breath.
"What's your name?" I asked.
She blinked slowly, her gaze meeting mine. "I don't have one yet," she said.
Yet.
The word stuck to my ribs like a warning or a prophecy.
Lucas watched from a distance, arms crossed, every muscle drawn tight. "We need to know where she came from."
"She came from the sky," Auren said, his voice soft but certain.
