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“Map,” she said in a whisper, already focused on the hunt.
“Oh.” Liana smiled, thrilled that finally someone was giving her some answers. “And what map would that be?”
“Mipe is map. That is all. Now quiet.”
Liana ignored her. The hunt could wait, after all. “What about sumi?”
Galina pondered her question for what seemed like hours, as if debating whether to answer. Finally she said, “Kavi wants you for himself.”
How Galina had managed to casually speak such noteworthy news was inexplicable. Liana felt a million flutters in her stomach at her friend’s admission. “But he doesn’t even look at me,” she countered.
“Because you’re human…he hesitates.”
Liana scowled, not liking the way that sounded. As if being human was a bad thing. “We’re not that different, you know.”
Galina hesitated before saying more then smiled mischievously. “Sumi roughly means ‘mine’…that you have been claimed.”
Hunting and maiming and killing some poor Orianian creature became even more impossible after that. All Liana could think of was sumi.
Sumi.
Kavi had told Luka she was “sumi”. Many, many times. But did he mean she was sumi slave, or sumi captive? Because he didn’t treat her as either. She wasn’t expected to do anything—and that was hardly slavery.
Liana had also had her fair share of opportunities to escape. Why hadn’t she? Maybe because she didn’t want a bloody confrontation between the Fohers and humans. Or maybe because she’d felt more at home with these Fohers than with the humans in the compound. For the first time in years she felt the desire to live. She didn’t want Lyle to take it from her—and was determined not to let him.
She was sumi now.
* * * * *
She woke up to the unmistakable sounds of Fohers getting ready for battle. Feet stomping on the earth, hurried grunts as they slung their weapons on their backs, reached for their poles, daggers, bows.
Liana didn’t see Kavi among the stampede. But she spotted Galina, hurriedly slinging her bow behind her shoulder.
Liana jumped to her feet and somehow managed to reach her without being trampled. When she spoke, she sounded hysterical even to her own ears. “What is this? What’s wrong? Where the hell is Kavi?”
Galina placed a steadying hand on her shoulder, her voice calm. “The humans are minutes away. The men want to keep them out of the camp.”
Kavi appeared from out of nowhere, a dangerous, towering beast advancing on her. He grabbed one of her arms and squeezed. “You will wait here.” Before she even thought of a retort he’d charged into the trees. And a ghostly silence settled in the camp.
Liana cursed under her breath, kicked a little rock with her foot, then pouted and crossed her arms.
She’d been a coward long enough.
Grabbing a nearby dagger, she exchanged a nod with Hani, one of the Foher women who’d stayed behind with the children, and sprinted into the forest.
Mighty tree trunks littered her path, the scent of humid earth quickly filling her lungs. Her heart pounded as the slanted path became darker and darker until she no longer knew what lay beneath her feet. But maybe in this case, ignorance was bliss. For all she knew there was some variety of snake waiting to—
“Hey!” A hand had coiled around her elbow and pulled her back behind a tree. Liana gasped when a big hand quickly pressed to her mouth.
“Kavi will be angered. He said to stay,” Galina whispered.
Both her lungs almost exited her body when she exhaled. “You scared me,” she hissed. “And I can use a knife. I want to help.”
“I know.” Galina nodded in understanding.
They shared a smile—Galina’s steady, Liana’s quaky—then Galina pressed a finger to her lips. Liana nodded in understanding, quietly following her.
Her eyes now adjusting to the dim forest, Liana saw Fohers hiding in the trees, dangling from their crooked limbs, while others crouched behind bushes. Waiting.
