Melindra’s eyes widened with surprise. “Ow,” she said. “Not fair!”

“There’s no such thing as fair out there,” I said. I’d learned as much from Nox.

I jumped to my feet.

“Need some help getting up?” I asked, extending a hand to Melindra. When I stole a glance at Nox, I saw him watching intently. It could have been my imagination but it looked like he was actually on the verge of a smile.

I didn’t dare look at Mombi.

Melindra took my hand in her metal one, crushing my bones just a little too hard. She leaned in.

“Let me guess,” she hissed. “He told you you were special. He took you to a place he never takes anyone else. Sound familiar?”

Something twisted in my gut, but I managed to keep a smile on my face. It was the halls of high school all over again.

Salvation Amy’s jealous. She wishes this were her baby.

I squeezed even harder and narrowed my eyes. “Never underestimate a girl from Kansas,” I said.

Before Melindra could say anything back, Mombi had stepped in front of me. She was looking at me like she was seeing me for the first time.

“You handled yourself well against our best,” Mombi declared. “Training is over. The Lion is on the move, heading toward the village of Pumperdink, just south of here. We leave at first light.”

“You were good back there,” Nox said. “Really good.” He had caught me in the corridor below the training area as I was heading to my room. It was dim and narrow down there, with a hazy, purple light that glowed from somewhere within the rocky walls.

“Thanks,” I said. “Melindra had it coming. She’s too used to winning. She let her guard down.”

“Yeah,” he said. “But you beat her fair and square. You’ve gotten so much better. It’s not just the magic. It’s the rest of it. I don’t even think you know you’re doing it. The way you move; the way you think on your feet. You’ve gotten so good so fast. You’re a natural, you know.”

“I wonder what happened,” I said.

He gave me a funny look. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, I was never like this before. Back home. Where does it come from?”

“Amy,” he said. “It comes from you.”

I couldn’t help thinking back on what Melindra had said after I’d beaten her. She had just been trying to provoke me, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t true. In some ways, I wondered if she was the only one that I could trust around here. At least she was for real with me.

Everyone in this place had an ulterior motive. It wasn’t even all that ulterior. Everything anyone did, everything they said to me, was all designed to push me in one way or another, was all meant to force me into becoming the person they thought I was. To become the weapon they needed. Nox was no exception. It would be stupid to think he was.

And yet, every now and then, it was like he was trying to tell me something that had nothing to do with Dorothy, or with the cause.

“What do you think you would be like?” I asked. “You know, if it weren’t for Dorothy. If you’d had the life you were supposed to?”

He looked at me in surprise, like it was something he had never even considered. “I . . .” He paused. “I don’t know. That’s the funny thing, isn’t it? As much as I hate her—as much as I wish Oz was how it was supposed to be, that we could all just be happy—I would be a totally different person, then. I can’t even imagine who I would be. Maybe someone better, I don’t know. Maybe someone worse. I like who I am.” He rolled his eyes and laughed ruefully to himself. “Maybe I owe her.”

“Let’s not get carried away here,” I said. But I knew what he meant. It was like me and my mom. Yeah, she’d been pretty crappy at the whole parenting game, but what if she hadn’t been? Who was to say I wouldn’t have turned out like Madison Pendleton?

“My whole life has been about fighting her, you know?” Nox was saying now. “Who will I be when she’s gone?”

“Do you think it will ever really happen?”

He tilted his head, pushing his fingers through his wild mane of hair, looking both vulnerable and certain of something. “I know it will,” he said. “I wasn’t sure at first, but now I know.”

“How?”

“I don’t know who brought you here or how they did it. But I know there was a reason for it. You’re here to help us. And I know you can do it.”

Suddenly I was aware of how close we were standing—so close I could smell his familiar sandalwood scent. I felt a pull toward him. One I didn’t just attribute to magic.

“And then what? Then who will we be?”

He leaned in toward me the tiniest bit.

“Then everything changes,” he said quietly. “Then I’m different. You’ll be different, too. You’re different already. I knew it from the beginning, but . . .”

I leaned toward him now, too, and, as if I were channeling Gert, anticipated something I really wanted. Wondered if I actually could make it happen. Without any magic at all.

Suddenly his face changed and he looked away. “You have to promise to be careful tomorrow,” he said. “I didn’t want to bring you, but Mombi wouldn’t listen. The Lion’s no joke. You have to promise me you won’t do anything stupid. I—we need you too much. You’re too valuable.”