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She ignored me and came down sideways, using exposed roots to control her slide. Behind her, the Zrake struck the top of the ridge. Soil and leaves rained around us. I formed a shield across the broken lip of the slope while Jade dropped beside my leg. Her hands moved over my boot, knee and calf without pressing hard enough to displace anything.

"Lower tibia," I said.

"And the fibula. Both displaced." Her eyes lifted to mine. "Can you feel your toes? I need to straighten the bones before I knit them. It will hurt."

"Do it."

She cut the lower straps of my boot, gripped my heel and braced my knee. Bone scraped into alignment, turning the world white at the edges before the grinding pressure stopped.

"Hold still," she said.

Jade pressed one palm over the break. Warmth spread through the center of the bone as the magic moved through her fingers. I felt the fractures close from within, fragments drawing together with unnerving precision before torn vessels sealed and damaged muscle settled around them.

The Zrake rammed the shield above us. Light bowed between the roots.

"One more moment," Jade said.

"You have half of one."

The heat faded. Jade released my leg and made me flex my foot, then bend the knee. The muscles remained tender, but the bones held.

Before Jade, a fracture like that would have changed the entire evacuation. Halver and Alex would have needed to come and carry me, Nykos would have divided the squad around a slower route, and everyone would have been forced to move at the speed of an injured man. Jade had returned me to the operation in seconds. I rolled my ankle once, testing it, and felt only the ghost of where the bone had split.

The Zrake hit the shield a second time. Jade rose and offered me her forearm.

"Can you run?" she asked.

I stepped onto the healed leg. "Move."

We climbed the opposite side of the hollow while the Zrake remained above the broken slope, too large to follow directly. For several seconds, the crashing behind us faded.

"It's moving away," I said.

Jade listened. "No. It's following the ridge."

The sound shifted north, taking the higher route around the hollow.

"Toward camp."

"It knows where the rest of us are."

A Zrake called from the eastern side of the island, closer to the boats than it should have been.

Jade started running again. "We need to reach them before the colony closes the last route."

The evacuation was already in motion when we reached camp. Nykos stood beside three route boards laid across a supply crate, directing researchers toward the eastern path in groups small enough to control. Most of the shelters had been stripped. Bedrolls, instruments and sealed sample cases lay in ordered rows, while canvas roofs remained tied to their frames.

Dannian was fastening a sample chest when he saw us. "You found something."

"Water Zrakes," I said. "At least six adults with multiple clutches in the southern basin. They're claiming the island."

A researcher stopped lifting a crate. "There were no Zrakes here yesterday."

"They arrived during the night," Jade said. "The bindings are fresh, and the adults are still building the nest. They must have moved the clutches from their last breeding ground."

Dannian turned to his people, urgency in his voice. "Pack the sealed samples. Everything else stays."

"We could move to the camp north," one researcher said. "The higher bank hasn't flooded."