Nori set Barley down and tilted her head back to catch her breath. Frost covered her outermost layer, sweat covering her innermost. She had been designated as Barley's walking stick while Sutton pulled along a crude, makeshift sled with their packs. Most of the way was flat or downhill, but every so often, Nori had to set Barley down to help Sutton get the sled up a slope. Still, it was better than carrying everything on their backs.

Barley scooped snow up against his belly.

"Don't…put it…on your skin," Sutton panted. Barley heeded his advice, pulling down a single layer of shirt and pressing the snow against his infected wound.

"It burns," he stated. He rarely let the pain infect his voice. Even at his weakest, he did what he could to not worry them.

But Nori was plenty worried. And not just about Barley. She looked to the north where the blue sky had transformed into a ruffled sea of gray clouds. Imagining what kind of snowstorm they carried sent a chill down her spine.

"We can rest," Sutton. "We should be…back tomorrow. Starting…to see…grass."

"And what about them?" Nori crossed her arms and nodded to the north. "I can't believe him."

"They'll be fine," Barley muttered.

"I thought he changed," Nori scolded. "I thought he wasn't so pigheaded. Leaving Barley in this condition just so that he could go on for his damned acorn. He cares more about his little village than any of us!"

"That's not true," Barley groaned. He couldn't hide the pain.

"I don't believe that."

"It's not," Sutton said. Nori turned to him, making him jump. He had always been afraid of her—she was happy about that. But he was already wincing before she looked.

"What do you know?"

Sutton took offense to her demand. He pushed his glasses up and kept his hand there as he scowled. "We figured out a solution to your problem."

"What?"

"He's going to ask for a piece of wood that we'll use to cultivate barnacles. For food. So that you won't go back to Uroko."

Guilt melted Nori's scowl away. It was a familiar feeling. One she had felt all too often about Archie recently. "What about the acorn?"

"The Bhantla said he would have to choose. He said he wasn't sure, but you're not the only one who knows him. All three of us know what he'd choose. He's risking everything to keep you around."

"But it's—"

"He tasked me with finding a way, so I did." Sutton stomped over to a rock and brushed off the frost before sitting down and crossing his arms. "But personally, I think your vanity was exploited by your brother."

Nori flinched. She had never heard Sutton speak that way. "Sutton, I—"

"Both of you have a savior complex. Yours has been manipulated into making you consider turning your whole life inside out. And because you can't cope, Archie's savior complex has been activated to try to save you. So don't bad mouth him."

The novelty surprise of Sutton's backbone wore off. Nori squeezed her fists and clenched her teeth. "I can't cope?" she growled. "Yeah, I have trouble letting people starve. How horrible of me."

"There is more utility in generosity than in self-sacrifice, but neither of you know the difference. You have to take care of yourself first."

Nori took a moment to parse the statement. Some of her rage died in the consideration. But not all of it. "So I should have said no? I should have told them to let the people starve?"

"You should have considered the long-term implications. They offered you a stop-gap solution. Conditional on your enrollment. What then? If you really want to change the world, you need to start thinking long-term. That's what I did." Sutton shook his head and sighed, signaling the end of his fighting. "Honestly, you're both good people. But you let your idealism get in the way of your ideals."

Nori took a deep breath, preparing her next argument. But then she just let her mouth shut and turned away. She was tired of hearing Sutton's voice. She was tired of arguing. Tired of hiking. Tired of compromising Archie's safety.

She wished she had refused to play Dashi's game. She could have ended things at that dinner. She could have told him that she would never go back to Uroko. She wouldn't have been denying the people of Khaldeer. She would be denying his cruelty.

But she hadn't refused. She let herself consider the offer, and once consideration intertwined with her morality, she had already lost. No matter what she chose, Dashi was going to win. She was still making decisions on Harper terms.

The night in Jakha's jail. That was when she should have put her foot down. That's when she should have taken ownership. What had she told Archie before they started catering to Gluttons? Her problems were hers to solve. Look where that got them. A new Glutton in the world. Archie tortured.

When they had arrived at Khaldeer, she vowed to do things differently. But here she was, her problems having put Archie in danger yet again. If he succeeded, she would accept his solution. She would return to the Academy. But beyond that, she asked herself the same question she had at the start of the summer. Would Archie be better off if she kept her distance?

The next day, in the mild-weathered safety of the valley, Nori ran ahead alone to Jakha, using every last bit of energy she had to jog through the forests of the slopes. Barley had held on as long as he could, but the infection had crippled him. Nori and Sutton combined couldn't carry him with their diminished strength.

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She arrived in Jakha, her lungs on fire, barely having the breath to ask for help. But it didn't take much. The moment she said, "Barley," and pointed to the north, a dozen Jakhans were ready to go, scrambling to grab medicines and a couple of hide stretchers. Their transparent love for him filled Nori's lungs with a strength she didn't know she had, and she pushed her body beyond its limits to lead the villagers back to Barley. She collapsed when they arrived. The villagers ended up bringing her back on a stretcher too.

She woke up confused. She had no idea how long it had been. What time it was. What day it was. She couldn't tell if her lethargy was from days of resting or from days of hiking. She pieced her surroundings together bit by bit, sense by sense.

The warmth of a fire spilled over her, emanating from a fireplace. She shifted around to feel the blankets beneath her. They weren't as scratchy as the ones she had traveled with, and they lacked the crispy frost that kept her cold. These were warm and worn in. Loved.

The smell of burning yak dung and the crackle of hot vegetable oil reached her from the kitchen. Children chattered in other rooms, having told themselves they'd be quiet as to not disturb those resting, but they couldn't resist the swell of jokes and laughter. She turned to see Barley sleeping near the fire. Just on the other side of her, someone dipped a rag in a bowl of water. Someone touched Nori's chin, turning her face and placing the rag on her forehead.

"You ran yourself ragged," Barley's mother said. The wide wrinkles of her tan face curled up along with her worried smile. "Your fever is finally starting to break."

"How…" Nori cleared her throat. "How long have I been out?"

"It's been two nights. You woke up some yesterday, but you were delirious."

Barley's mother doted on her, gently tapping the rag across her forehead. Nori looked up at the woman's caring expression and wondered if the warmth that she felt from this woman was some motherly magic that she had never experienced. Her eyes glazed over with tears.

"How's Barley?" Nori asked.

"Improving. They say he's out of the woods now."

Nori felt tears pool in the corners of her eyes and kept them in. "That's good."

Barley's mother dipped the rag back in the water and continued attending Nori. "When the time comes, you must take him back with you. To Ambrosia City."

She looked at Barley, a bittersweet smile showing a parental love that Nori could hardly understand.

"I know my son does not speak much. A consequence of growing up with siblings that have so much to say. But he feels so immensely. More than anyone. My sweet Barley. And now he feels obligation.

"We love our sweet Barley, we do. And we were saddened when he did not go to the Monastery. But we see now that it is better for him. This obligation he feels, it weighs him down. Makes him old. But now is not the time for him to be old. He is still just a baby, my sweet Barley. I know that one day, he'll do great things for our people. But today, I just want him to enjoy his youth and see how wide this world is."

She set down the rag and grabbed Nori's hand. "Will you watch over him for me? Make sure that my sweet Barley doesn't try to take the weight of the world on those big shoulders of his."

Nori could no longer hold back her tears. "Yes," she said as she cried, and Barley's mother bent down to hug her.

Nori only rested one more day. Once her mind was lucid again, she couldn't bear to lay around in her worries. She kept herself from worrying about Blanche by helping with Barley. She kept herself from worrying about Archie by cooking meals for the recently widowed that lingered in Jakha when the rest went home, unable to leave their last memory of their lost loved ones, unable to return to an old home without those who helped to make it.

Nori wrapped herself in their grief, choosing to feel their pain rather than her own. More than once she thought of Sutton's accusations of a savior complex, and more than once she cursed his name, but she persisted. Her motives didn't matter, only her actions. And when she listened as the broken families told her tales of the dead, she helped them to process their grief. She didn't care why she did it.

Nights were the hardest for her. Once the village settled down and Barley's family set down to rest, Nori had nothing left to distract herself with. She considered venturing back into the mountains to look for Archie and Blanche, but she knew how hopeless and futile that would be. Another gesture, as Sutton would put it. Putting on a show.

And then on the fourth night, once everyone had fallen asleep but Nori, the door cracked open and everything was right again. Nori jumped up just in time to receive Blanche's smothering embrace.

"I was so worried!" Nori squeaked, forgetting to be quiet.

Barley and Sutton stirred and sat up. Sutton jumped up, hugging Archie before Nori could peel Blanche off.

"We did it, Sutton," he said. "You wouldn't believe what we saw."

"Show me!" Sutton exclaimed.

But Archie was too happy to see his friends. He set down a bundled up blanket and helped Nori pry Blanche off, and while he gave her a hug, it was half as long as she would have liked. Then he was crouched down by Barley.

"How you feeling, big guy?"

"Probably like I look."

Archie laughed and squeezed Barley's shoulder. Nori studied his face, looking for the fatigue. But she found none.

"You two don't look tired at all," she said as Blanche and Sutton exchanged an awkward nod—the most affectionate they could stand to be toward each other.

"We were given…" Archie shook his head and grinned. "I can't even explain it."

"Show me!" Sutton demanded.

Archie grabbed the bundled blanket and slowly, ever so slowly, with all the showmanship of his days of catering and entertainment, revealed the log within. It seemed only halfway physical, translucent and casting off a faint golden glow that barely survived the stronger light of the fire.

Sutton reached out for it but stopped just short, taking in a long gasp as he marveled at the relic.

"It can be duplicated," Archie told Sutton. "Will it work?"

Sutton laughed, the joy of academic curiosity spreading across his face. "If anything could work, it's this. This is tremendous."

"Nori," Archie said as he looked at her. "Sutton figured out a way—"

"I know." It took a great effort for Nori to smile. She needed to know that she hadn't cost Archie his dream. "What about your acorn?"

Archie patted his chest pocket.

"They gave you both?" Sutton asked. "I thought you'd have to choose!"

"I did, to an extent," Archie said. "I took the option of a weaker acorn. He said it would take longer, but it should still work."

"He?"

Archie grinned at Sutton. "Drolma Khalsang."

"Shut up!" Sutton yelled before clasping his hand over his mouth and looking around. "Shut up," he whispered.

"He's not the only one we met," Blanche said.

"Another yeti?"

Archie and Blanche grinned at each other. "Through the essence, we met Tamani herself," she said.

Sutton recoiled, shaking his head side to side as he tried to process what he had just heard.

"Hala Diptla," Barley muttered in amazement.

"Tell me everything!" Sutton demanded.

"Let them rest, Sutton," Nori said.

"It's fine," Archie responded. "We're not tired."

"Good!" Sutton scrambled to grab his journals and the quill of a midnight kestrel. He rushed over to write in the fire's light and waved them over. "Come on, start from the beginning. Move out of the way, Barley!"

Barley chuckled as he scooted over, taking his blankets with him. Archie and Blanche sat next to each other in front of the fire, their hips touching, Archie rubbing her back as he told the story.

Nori smiled and let herself slip into the background.

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