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Curiosity.

Want.

Her breathing slows as she turns back to me. Not Ezra or Rhett. Me.

The Earth notices too.

A root shifts beneath my boot, pressing upward against the sole. I grind my heel into the dirt before Sage can see it move.

“Why are you staring at me like that?” she asks.

“Like what?”

Her lips part, but whatever answer she had disappears before she can give it.

“Like what?” I ask again, quieter this time.

Her gaze drops to my mouth only for a second but there it is again.

“Never mind.” She turns away.

Before she can step out of reach, I catch the end of the red ribbon between my fingers. Only the ribbon. Never her wrist.

She stops.

“Malakai.” Ezra’s warning cuts through the noise behind me, but I ignore him.

The satin is warm between my fingers. Warmer than it should be, almost hot enough to burn.

She looks down at my hand before slowly lifting her eyes to mine. “Are you going to try to take it too?”

“No.”

Ezra swears behind me.

Her eyebrows rise. “No?”

“No.”

“Why?”

Because removing it won’t change anything. It’s only a symbol of something that recognized her the moment her blood crossed onto this land. She could tear it off, burn it, leave Ward Farm and put an ocean between herself and this place.

The roots would still know her. They would always know where to find her.

I let the satin slip through my fingers. “It belongs to you.”

Ezra’s hand closes around my arm. “Enough.”

I turn toward him. “She deserves to know.”

His grip tightens. “She deserves to live.”

Everything stops.

Not the music. Not the crowd.

Sage.