I wasn't prepared for the spitting laugh to come from Tawny and I gagged as I wiped my face while she fell back onto her own mat, holding her stomach as she giggled on. "I-swear-Malika-." She says between hysterics. "When- will-I- stop- falling- for-for-your antics?"

If she weren't my only and best friend, I might have slapped her, or jerked her up by her hair, but instead I stood, putting my back to her and wrapping my arms around my waist.

"I'm not trying to be funny, Tawny." I grumble beneath my breath, trying to hide the hurt with annoyance that she doesn't believe me.

She stops laughing suddenly and I hear her stand too, inching closer to me. "Malikah, you can't really think a Worthy was here...at the secret market of all places?"

I school my expression and turn to face her. "I know it sounds down right loony, but I'm telling you. This boy...he wasn't normal."

Tawny's thin brows furrowed, making a tiny crease between them. "You know just because you think someone is strange that doesn't mean they're Worthy." She tells me gently, picking up on my hurt feelings. "There has to be another explanation. Maybe he was just new, or... I don't know, something else. What made you think he was Worthy anyway? And I mean specifically, not just that he was weird."

I take a quick breath and then rush through retelling the entire encounter, trying to hide my pleasure at how shocked she looked when I recounted the part about yelling in the middle of the secret market and scaling the fence in front of everyone. By the end of my tale, I can tell she's torn between scolding me for all of the stupid things I did, and also confused by the experience as I am.

"I'll give it to you, Mali, that is definitely strange..." I can practically feel the 'but' coming. "But," and there it is. "I'm more concerned with the fact that it sounds like he's kind of been stalking you, and now possibly crept up to you while you were asleep. And while I'm glad he left you a gift instead of say, slitting your throat while you slept, I'm still a little weirded out by it."

I'd been so focused on the fact that not only do I have this beautiful necklace now, but I also have a new pair of shoes, that I hadn't even thought too far into how the shoes got here. And the idea of Oliver creeping up to me while I was asleep to leave them here was definitely creepy. I usually sleep with my little dagger tucked beneath my head, but I'd been so tired when I got back to the wallow, I hadn't even unearthed it from the little hole I burry it in near my mat when I'm not here. It's illegal for any Ringdweller to be found with a weapon, but it's also just stupid to sleep without one. People always try to rob you while you sleep, especially in the wallows since we are so vulnerable.

But not Oliver, apparently he'd done the opposite.

Still creepily though.

"Mali, I know it sounds kind of fantastical to have been visited by a Worthy, especially to someone like you, but they just wouldn't do that. And also he doesn't sound like a Worthy to me. He sounds like someone you should be worried about."

I try, and I mean really hard, not to get offended, but it doesn't work. "What do you mean someone like me?" I snap, setting my jaw. "And he sure as hell wasn't from here, so that only leaves one other place he could be from. I'd know if he lived here. I'd have noticed or something, and he didn't look like us!"

Tawny reached out to put her hands on my shoulders, stopping me in my fuming.

She put on her mothering face she uses on the little ones, leaning her head down and softening her voice and face, making her look too gentle to be angry with.

"I only meant someone who didn't spend much time in Utopia, Mali." She says softly. "You left when you were so little, you don't remember what they're like there. You only know what you've been raised with here, and I promise you, a Worthy would have never come to the Ring. Especially not to be nice."

I refused to hear her logic. I know what I know.

"You didn't see him." I finally say after a moment.

She nods slowly, dropping her hands. "You're right, I didn't." She sighs. "But neither did you while he's apparently been watching you. He knew your name, Mali. He knew where you sleep." She pauses, looking around the area. "And think, Mal, even if somehow he were a Worthy, he wouldn't be here to spread out gifts. He could be here to catch illegal doing Ringdwellers to execute us. You could be in danger just for being on his radar."

I angrily turn away, rolling up my mat and then shoving my filthy feet into my new shoes that fit me perfectly, I try to stomp away. "You just can't believe someone would be nice, can you? You hate them so much you think they are all evil. But these," I point to my feet. "They are proof they don't hate us like everyone wants to say."

I leave Tawny where she stands, walking up through the throngs of children playing in the dirt. I hadn't realized until the words were out of my mouth that I don't actually think the Worthy are that different from us. I try to resent them, knowing how I ended up here. But I can't believe that all of them are like the ones who destroyed my family.

Somewhere there has to be Worthy who are...worthy of their positions.

I walk with no true destination in mind for a little more than an hour, just letting my feet get used to actual shoes while in my head I try to sort all the confusion. In the back of my mind I know that in some respect, Tawny must be right. She did live in Utopia much longer than me, and my memory of that place is foggy at best. There have also been rumors for some time now of the Worthy looking to get rid of us entirely. It doesn't go by their moral code though to kill us for simply being an annoyance to them. They'd have to have cause. And if they were smart, which they are supposed to be, sending someone in to spy is actually a good idea. We wouldn't dare be seen doing anything less than upstanding around the patrols, but someone sent to blend in with us would see plenty. Though it is a good plan, yes, I still don't believe that's what happened with Oliver.

This necklace was meant to be mine. I feel it down in my bones that it's true. A bad person couldn't possibly be the one responsible for getting it to me.

After a while more of wondering I decide a good meal from the slop shop is in order for me, but I'm out of coins, so that means the fighting pits for me. With any luck, on the fifth sun cycle of the turn there should be plenty of people to take on, my reputation preceding me or not. On a fifth sun cycle there is no mandatory work to be done, which means no coin for anyone unless you're earning them the less than legal way.

My arms and limbs itching for a fight the more I think about it, the faster I run back until I finally end up back in the market place. There is a hush over the crowd that is unusual, but nothing looks off, so I keep going, turning to pass into the main square when someone suddenly grabs me, almost knocking me off of my feet before planting my face firmly into their bosom.

"Oh, my little fist, I was so worried bout yee." I recognize Mags' voice and relax a little as she continues to hug the air right out of me. "Oh, Mali, thank the Gods you were late. Oh I don't know just what we'd a done if yee had been caught up in that mess. Oh blessed be the God of luck. He be on yee side today, child."

Unable to take it any longer I pull out of her grasp, tilting my head at her. "What are you talking about, Mags?"

My heart races within my chest, so hard I'm sure people can see it.

Mags scrunches her wrinkled face, tears stinging the sides of her eyes only making me more nervous. "Child, there was a raid this sunrise...bout the time you usually get here." She shakes her head, looking like she wants to hug me again. "Patrol came through so early, rounded up all them poor souls just trying to earn a little coin, took them to the stockades, and-and- dear they killed Ryman. Executed him out right in front of everybody. Warned anyone else caught fightin' would be met with the same fate. They beat them kids black and blue in the stocks before finally lettin' them git on."

My head hurt and my empty stomach twisted as she spoke, the vision of the others I'm used to coming up here to fight with being beaten for no reason making me feel sick. "Mags, who is Ryman?" I ask, sorry that he was executed but not knowing who he is.

"Oh child, the Fightmaster. His name was Ryman, but now he's turned back to the dirt we walk on." Apparently thinking I'd need it, Mags grabs me up again, crushing me back against her. "I'm so overjoyed you weren't there." She tells me again.

Fightmaster is dead.

They killed him.

For what? What was so wrong about what we were doing? We weren't hurting anyone, or at least not seriously hurting anyone who didn't sign up for it themselves.

Dead.

I never even knew his real name, even though he was responsible in large part for how I managed to only go to sleep hungry every night instead of starving. He was the reason a lot of people had a coin or two to help fill their belly. Without the fighting pits, so many more are going to starve. Myself included.

"Don't go worryin' over yee coin, now." Mags, seeming to read my mind, whispers over me. "I'll find yee some honest work to do somehow, even if we can only pay yee in bread."

With that I step back.

"Th-thanks, Mags...I-I need to...be somewhere." I mumble as I back away.

I can't be here in the middle of the village market when I lose control. I need to be far away from these people. The ones who know when they look at me that I should have been here this morning to have taken my punishment like the others. I should have been here to fight for Fightmaster. If I had been though, I'd likely be as dead as him. I wouldn't have let them take him without a fight.

Had it not been for my argument with Tawny over the necklace and Oliver, I'd have been here on time. I'd be dead if it weren't for the necklace and Oliver. The realization only disturbs me further. Maybe Tawny was right after all. Maybe Oliver was a spy, but if he was, he was a bad one. If the goal had been to catch me doing something illegal, he could have gotten me at the secret market. Or even still, he might have known that I'd still need to come back to the fighting pit to gain coin again to resave for shoes. Maybe that's why he gave them to me. To keep me out of the area.

Or maybe, he really did want to have me be caught there.

Who knows other than the Gods?

I walk and walk until I'm sure I'll have circled the entire Ring soon before my legs finally give out beneath me. I'm not entirely sure where I am, and the fact that night has fallen only makes it harder to tell. I'm assuming by the abundance of mud ponds though that I must be nearing West Bend.

Nothing but a red dirt road behind me, I sit on the edge of the mud pit, throwing a stone out into the center of it to see how long it will take it to sink down out of my view. It's quiet here, even more than it is anywhere else in the Ring. Likely due to the amount of death that plagues this place.

I'm not sure how I reached the level of comfort or relaxed enough to do it, maybe just pure exhaustion gets me, but at some point, I fall asleep.

A noise, maybe a stick breaking, maybe just someone breathing a hair too loud, wakes me suddenly. I jerk upright from the ground, putting my back to the mud ponds, and standing in a defensive crouch. I know I heard something, but glancing up the road to right and the left both show no signs of anyone else out here. The position of the great star is high, meaning I've been out here a long time. Who knows how long someone may have been watching.

But who? And from where?

In front of me, little more than a few yards away is the perimeter wall. Nothing is outside of it, and nothing is in front of it as far as I can tell. I'm just about to assume it was just my sleep and superstition playing tricks on me when suddenly the blue light of my necklace illuminates beneath the thin fabric of my shirt.

I glance down at it in wonder.

It's only lit up the one other time in the secret market with Oliver.

"Hello, Malikah."

The voice makes me jump, nearly falling back into the mud.

I jerk my head upright, and find to my disbelief not just one person, but a group of at least fifteen or more standing just a few feet in front of me. As impossible as that is, they all have glowing stones just like the one I'm wearing. Some wear them in rings, bracelets, head dresses, and even one seems to be glowing from the wearer's foot, but each has one.

Different colors of blue, white, red, pink, green, orange....

"We are happy to find you, Malikah." The woman in the front addresses me again. "My name is Tonyedda. I'm here with your friends to take you to your true home."

A collective nod runs through the group, and Tonyedda smiles.

I can't not stare at her, knowing it is incredibly rude, but...her skin. It's the darkest skin I've ever seen before. More than a deep tan, it's as black as the sky above me. Her yellow colored eyes like the stars that offset the darkness. She's strikingly beautiful, and her voice is low and calming, but every fiber within me is yelling to run.

"I don't really care who you are," I tell the group, trying not to give away my fear. "I'm just going to go now, I've got people waiting for me."

Though I say I'm leaving, my feet stay planted in the dirt.

"We know this is a shock, but you don't belong here, Malikah." She continues. "The stone glowing around your neck is proof. You're one of us. We can tell you everything you need to know, and we can take you to the place you're meant to be. You only need to trust us. I know it is hard, but look at us all. We each have something in common." She slowly moves her arms out at her sides to point to the others, careful not to spook me. "The stones chose us, too. Just like your stone chose you. I know you can't deny the connection you feel to it."

I realize I'm not breathing, and hastily take a short breath, trying to be so still that maybe they'll forget all about me. They all just keep staring though, so I see that won't work. My only option now is escape, because as good as I might be in hand to hand fighting, I can't take this many at once.

"Who are you?" I ask instead, carefully trying to get a look at my surroundings to find my exit route. They are directly in front of me, forming an almost semi-circle with Tonyedda at it's center, and the mud ponds are all behind me. "How did you get here?"

If I can keep them talking, I can find a way out.

"All will be explained to you, Malikah." Tonyedda's even voice tells me. "We are the Custodes of the seventh realm, and you belong with us. You are one of us. The sooner you come with us, the sooner we can explain it all. I know you are scared, we all were at one point too, but you will see that your place, your destiny, it is with us."

"Your place is in the sick holds with the other's who have lost their minds!" I shout, my moment for escape getting further and further away. All it would take is them coming one step closer and I'd be trapped.

Already there is only one way for me to go.

The left isn't an option. The guy standing there is about four times my body weight and his glowing red ring makes him look a little too intimidating. Behind me the mud isn't an option either. The stone I'd thrown out into it only took three seconds to sink, meaning the mud isn't very dense and my weight would sink far faster.

That leaves running to my right.

Which is exactly what I do.

I volley like I'm going straight forward, right at Tonyedda who is obviously in charge here, and the whole group moves in towards her just a touch, exactly like I hoped they would. I then jerk to the right and run right past the small frail girl about my age with her blue glowing bracelet.

"We've got another runner!" Someone from behind me laughs, but I just bolt forward, letting my feet take me as fast as they can up the road, back towards the market and hopefully to people who aren't freaking insane.

Thank goodness for the shoes under my feet or running through the dirt streets this far out would be impossible. I'd have had to stop with bleeding feet a long time ago without them.

I don't hear anyone in pursuit of me, so I chance one quick glance behind me to be sure. And like I hoped, no one is there.

There is however, now someone in front of me.

Still in a full run I barrel right into someone, knocking them to the ground with me.

"I'm so sorry!" I'm apologizing over and over as I push up to my feet until I see who I took down. "Oliver?!" I gasp, dusting the new dirt from my knees.

He stands himself, in a totally new outfit, just as strange and clean, aside from the dirt I just got on him, as the one he'd had before. This certainly isn't a boy who has been spending his time in the Ring.

"Malikah, we meet again." He nods in hello, not seeming ill at all that I just knocked him out. "In a hurry, are you?"

"Yes!" I nod, grabbing him by the wrist and pulling him up the road with me, still looking back every few steps to be sure they aren't following me. "You've got to help me. You need to go back to Utopia and tell them that there are crazy people in the Ring trying to force me to go someplace with them."

"Back to Utopia?" He sounds confused, stopping to remove my hand from his arm he looks down at me and tilts his head. "Why would I go there when you're here?"

"Now is so not the time for your creepy phrases." I shake my head, trying to urge him forward again but he won't budge. "I know you're a Worthy, and thank you for the shoes, but I need more important help at the moment."

He bursts into laughter that makes me recoil from him. "A Worthy?" He claps a hand over his mouth. "You think I'm a Utopian? That's rich, just wait until I tell my friends. They'll never believe it."

"What are you talking about?" I ask, suddenly getting nervous all over again.

He sobers, collecting himself again before he looks down at me, his crystal blue eyes boring into mine. "Look, Malikah, I don't know why you thought I was a Worthy...I was actually trying to blend in to be a Ring person, but I'm with those crazy people as you referred to them."

I take a big step away from him and he sighs. "I know it's...well, there isn't really a word for it, but you've got to trust your gut. You know that necklace is yours, right?" He asks and without meaning to I nod, putting my hand over the stone. "See? It knows you're the one too. You've got to trust yourself, trust your stone, and then trust us."

"Us?" I gulp.

"The Custodes." He nods. "We are your people, each of us has a job and a duty to the seventh realm, and that includes you. They need us, all of us. It's what you're destined to do. You belong with us."