Lyra Gorgonides knelt beside a stone man at the edge of the market square and tried to remember he had once been someone's son. Moss grew in the crook of his elbow. His mouth was open. She had come to Grovebleed to free him, and every other figure like him her mother's gaze had left scattered through these woods. She kept her eyes low, the way she had learned as a child on the island, and worked a chisel gently against the lichen crusting his cheek. A rock struck the statue's shoulder. Then another hit her ribs. She turned. Six villagers stood at the mouth of the square. A woman in a gray shawl held a second stone in her fist. "Snake-child," she said. "Get away from my brother." Lyra raised her empty hands. "I can help him. I think I can. That's why I came." "Your mother did this." "I know." Her voice shook. "That's why it has to be me." The woman drew her arm back. Lyra closed her eyes and waited for the throw. It didn't come. A flat voice cut across the square. "She's telling the truth." Luna Nightshade stepped between Lyra and the crowd. She was small, in a pink hoodie and scuffed boots, her hair the color of bruised petals. A vampire, and everyone in the square knew it. Two of the villagers stepped back. The woman with the rock did not. "You're one of them," the woman said. "I don't drink," Luna said. "Beets. Greens. I keep a list." She looked at the statue, then at Lyra. "I watched her walk past a butterfly fountain in the square an hour ago without lifting her head once. She's not her mother." "She carries the same blood." "So do I," Luna said. "Blood isn't the meal." The woman's hand wavered. Lyra saw her chance and spoke fast. "Give me one. Any one of them. If I fail, I'll leave Grovebleed and never come back. If it works, you tell the next village I'm coming." The woman looked at her brother's open mouth. She lowered the rock. "Him," she said. "You try him. You have until sundown." She turned and walked her people out of the square. Lyra's knees gave and she sat down hard on the cobbles. "I don't actually know how to do it yet," she whispered. "Figured," Luna said. She sat beside her without ceremony. "I heard there's a shrine east of here. Mother Nature's. People say she hides things that shouldn't be found. Maybe she hides answers too." Lyra looked up at the stone face above her. Sundown was maybe six hours off. "Will you come with me?" "Already standing," Luna said, though she wasn't yet. Then she stood. Lyra picked up her chisel, wrapped it, and followed the vampire out of the square toward the shrine road.