His eyes were a deep, deep green, like the shadows in faerie-land. She wanted to look away from them, but didn’t want to show weakness.

“I don’t know how you feel or why.”

“How about this then? How do I know you’ve got a weak spot for Rainbow Cake when I’m not even sure what the hell that is? Or that you like to read, in front of a fire or under a tree? That you like to build things with your hands? How do I know that?”

She knew he liked to listen to music. He had a friend, a shifter named Denzel, he thought of as a brother. She knew his favorite gift was a box filled with pencils and paints a man named Austin had given him.

Austin—not his father, but someone who had, for a short time, stood as one for him.

She didn’t want to know these small, intimate things about him. Or for him to know hers.

“Those aren’t important things.”

“I think they are. I think there’s a reason I know those things. I’m not sure I’m going to like the reason, or you are, either.”

Just as her heart started to hammer, he looked down at the map. “Okay, so here, picked clean.”

Over the next few days, she built things with her hands. With scavenged and salvaged supplies, she and her father worked with various teams to repair and expand two houses that would serve as barracks. Other teams worked on readying more to house families, children. Some would camp, so trailers, tents, RVs formed groups outside what would become the training area.

With Simon she cut and soldered angle iron to form frames for solar panels. They’d done the same years before for the farm and several neighbors, but New Hope had hit a treasure trove of solar cells, hauled them out, used them, stored them.

She’d learned New Hope had volunteers for everything, something they’d implemented from the start. Rotating teams scouted outlying houses, and those abandoned, fallen into disrepair, or damaged beyond any practical repair were stripped of everything useful.

Wood, nails, pipes, hinges, tiles, shingles, windows, window glass, doors, wiring. Another team sorted, inventoried, and stored everything in a barn next to their feed and grain operation.

She checked the caulking on another frame, glanced around at the hive of activity. Some built the ropes course or hauled in old tires for the obstacle course, built the climbing wall while others framed in what would be the expanded kitchen and mess hall.

An army had to eat.

She knew her mother was off with Fred and some others working on the first stages of the complicated spell to create a tropical area. Her brothers remained in town at the summer program with Colin, who, no matter how he tried to deadpan it, was relishing his role as instructor.

She glanced over at the laughter rising over the sounds of hammers and saws, frowned as Duncan did a slow somersault off the roof, then floated back up with a stack of completed panels.

Inside himself, Simon sighed. He knew when a guy was showing off for a girl, and was pretty sure he spotted more than a spark of interest under Fallon’s frown.

As if war and survival weren’t enough to worry about, now he had a boy sniffing around his baby.

They finished the next run of panels, and not to be outdone, Fallon floated them up to Duncan and his crew. Simon took off his cap, swiped the sweat off his face, then jaw-pointed to an oncoming van.

Bill Anderson climbed out from the driver’s side, and a pretty girl with dark blond hair slipped out the other door.

“Hot day for this,” Bill called out, and set his hands on his hips to study the progress. “You’re sure getting it done. We brought out some wild boar barbecue, coleslaw, and other eats from the community kitchen. Got a couple vats of cold tea and more water.”

“You’re the man,” Simon told him.

“Got someplace we can set this up?”

“We’ll make someplace.”

A couple of salvaged doors on sawhorses served as workers swarmed. Fallon headed for the creek to wash up and nearly ran into the girl carrying a box of rolls probably baked that morning.

“Sorry, ah—I don’t remember your name.”

“We actually haven’t met. I’m Petra.”

“Fallon.”

“I know. Everybody … knows.”

“I’ll take that, honey.” Bill grabbed the box from her.

“You’re doing this for soldiers.” Pink flushed Petra’s cheeks as she spoke. “You’re going to lead them.”

“Do you have a problem with that?”

“No, but. No. I don’t want to fight,” she said quickly, gripping her hands together. “I don’t want to be a soldier. I take care of children. I can help make food. I don’t want to fight.”

Won’t. Coward.

Fallon heard the words in her head, glanced toward a woman with short brown hair. Starr, she remembered, an elf who said very little.

Starr simply shrugged, shot Petra a look of contempt, then walked away with a plate of food to a solitary spot away from the rest.

“I’m not going to force anyone to fight.”

“I just thought … I wasn’t sure—”

“What would you do if one of the kids you were taking care of was attacked?”

“I—I’d try to protect them, get them away. They’re only children.”

“Hey, Petra.”

“Tonia.” Instantly, Petra relaxed and smiled. “I didn’t know you were here.”

“Helping build an obstacle course for training. Can’t wait to try it out. You know, Fallon, I’ve got some ideas for another course for magickals. Uncanny Falls.” She laughed. “Add in some magickal traps and puzzles.”

“I like it.”

“You treat it like a game,” Petra said in a soft voice, then flushed deeper. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I need to—” She hurried away.

“I want to wash up before I eat,” Fallon said, giving Tonia a long, direct look.

“Oh. Yeah, good idea.”

They walked together to the lazy creek.

“What’s up?” Tonia asked.

“I don’t know Petra or why Starr dislikes her. It helps to know.”

“I don’t know that Starr likes anybody. And that’s not fair. She’s just not sociable. She fights, she works as hard as anybody. She hangs with Flynn mostly—no sparks there.”

“ ‘Sparks’?”

“Romantic, sexual. They’re sort of like brother and sister. Anyway, what I know about her is mostly second-and thirdhand. She was a kid, about twelve maybe. PWs caught her and her mother. Raped and tortured both of them. The mom saw a chance to get Starr away, talked to her the way elves can.” Tonia tapped her temple. “Made her promise to run and hide, and then caused a commotion so Starr could. They hanged her mother while she was hiding, and she couldn’t do anything to stop it. So she fights, she works, but she’s just never been really part of the community. Keeps to herself.”

“And Petra?”

“A rescue a few years back. She’d been taken in by a cult, her and her father. Sick cult, anti-magick magickals, led by some whack. The women all had to submit, you know, sex, have babies.”

“They were forced?”

“Brainwashed, so it’s the same thing. Some of them were just kids, like Petra.”

“She was forced?”

“Yeah. She’s steadied up pretty well considering. She lives with another woman and her kid we rescued from the cult. The rescue was ugly,” Tonia added. “The PWs attacked, we attacked the PWs. A lot of people died. Her father was one of them. They torched him right in front of her.”

“It should make her want to fight.”

“Well, I guess you can say Starr and Petra had different, you know, scars from a similar experience.”

“What is she? I didn’t get a sense.”

“She blocks it. A witch. She won’t use magick, either. They made her afraid of it. I think she knows better in her head, but they made her see it as evil, as dark, so she’s afraid of her own gift.”

Fallon nodded. “There are others like that.”

“Duncan and I made a little progress for a while, but, since it freaked her so much to explore her powers, we didn’t push. And, well, she started sort of getting this crush on Duncan, and he backed way, way off. She’s too young, you know? Not in years but how she is. He won’t touch that.”