So they yielded—and an incensed Maxard had demanded Lionstar pay a rent of that same worth every fifty days. It was a lien so outrageous, all Argali feared Lionstar would send his soldiers to “renegotiate.”

Instead, he paid.

With Lyode at her side, Kamoj entered the forest. Walking among the trees, with tubemoss soft under her bare feet, made her more aware of her precarious position. Why had Lionstar come riding here today? Did their lands now also risk forfeiture to his wealth? She had invested his rent in machinery and tools for farms in Argali. As humiliating as it was to depend on a stranger, it was better than seeing her people starve. But she didn’t think she could bear to lose any more to him, especially not this forest she so loved.

Drapes of moss hung on the trees and shadow-ferns attended their trunks. Far above, the branches formed a canopy that let only stray sunbeams reach the ground. Argali vines hung everywhere, heavy with the blush-pink roses that gave her home its name. Argali. It meant vine rose in Iotaca.

At least, most scholars translated it as rose. One insisted it meant resonance. He also claimed they mispronounced her middle name, Quanta, an Iotaca word with no known translation. The name Kamoj came from the Iotaca word for bound, so if this strange scholar was correct, her name meant Bound Quantum Resonance. She smiled at the absurdity. Rose made more sense, of course.

Not all the “roses” in the forest were flowers, though. Camouflaged among the blossoms, puff lizards swelled out their red sacs. A shaft of sunlight slanted through the forest, admitted by a ruffling breeze, and sparkles glittered where the light hit the scaled lizards, the scale-bark on the trees, and the delicate scale-leaves. Then the ray vanished and the forest returned to its dusky violet shadows.