Rosa Thornwick had not left the star-egg alone since the traveler died in her arms three nights ago. She sat on the floor of her crooked hut with the egg between her knees, copying another marking from its shell onto birch bark. The egg was the size of her head. Its shell was warm. The traveler had pressed it into her hands and asked her to raise the first true child of both worlds, and then he had stopped breathing before she could ask him how. Her stores were almost empty. She needed moonwort for the shell wash, and starflower before the frost killed it. The nearest patch was an hour out. An hour was too long. She had read in her mother's book that a star-egg left cold and unwatched could split wrong, and split wrong meant dead. She wrapped the egg in her shawl and carried it down the path to the old merchant's stall. Fenn Hallows was sorting brass buttons into a cracked bowl when she ducked under his awning. His white beard was full of thread. The luma squirrel on his shoulder froze mid-chew and stared at the shawl. Fenn's silver eyes went to it a beat later. "Put that back where you got it," he said. "I can't. I need herbs. I need someone." "Not me, girl. I've seen one of those crack open before. I still have the burn." He tugged his sleeve down over his wrist. "Try the demigod. She's in the hollow, waiting on her next task. She won't drop it." Rosa found Wren Emberly sitting on a stump at the edge of the hollow, drawing lines in the dirt with a stick. A russet mirecat lay across her shoulders like a scarf. Wren was thin, all elbows and copper hair, and one of her sandal straps was broken. "I need a watcher," Rosa said. She knelt and opened the shawl. Wren looked at the egg. She did not touch it. "How long." "One hour. Maybe two." "What happens if it moves." "Keep it warm. Don't let anyone near it. If it cracks, come find me." The mirecat leaned down and bit Wren's ear. Wren winced and did not flinch back. She counted something under her breath. "Fine," Wren said. "One hour." "Why?" "You asked plain. Most people don't." Wren held out her arms. Rosa hesitated. Then she set the egg into Wren's lap. Wren's thin arms took the weight without a shake. Rosa felt her hands go cold and empty. "One hour," Rosa said. She turned before she could change her mind and ran for the starflower patch. Behind her, the mirecat bit Wren's ear a second time. Wren looked down at the egg and started counting again, quieter now, and did not call Rosa back.

Rosa was halfway to the starflower patch when the wind changed. She smelled the storm before she saw it. The sky over the ridge had gone the color of wet slate, and the first cold gust flattened the grass around her boots. She knew what cold did to a star-egg. The shell would crack early, and early meant wrong, and wrong meant dead. She thought of the demigod alone in the hollow with a thin shawl and a thinner sky, and she ran. Wren felt the temperature drop before the rain started. She looked at the egg in her lap. The shell had gone from warm to cool under her palm. The mirecat on her shoulder bit her ear. She counted it. Four. "Not yet," Wren said to the cat. "Not this one." She stood up with the egg braced against her chest and looked for cover. The hollow had none. The nearest roof was the witch's crooked hut, back down the path. She started walking fast, then faster, the egg heavy as a stone against her ribs. Rain hit her shoulders in hard drops. The mirecat dug its claws in and did not fall. She kicked the hut door open with her good sandal. Inside smelled of dried moss and smoke. She set the egg on the bed, in the middle of the patched quilt, and pulled every pillow around it. Not enough. The shell was still cooling. Wren put both hands flat on the egg. She was a demigod. She had pulled a river's worth of water out of her own lungs. She could hold heat in a shell. "Stay," she told it. She pushed. Warmth moved from her palms into the shell, slow at first, then steady. Her arms started to shake. The mirecat jumped down from her shoulder, climbed onto the quilt, and curled its body around the top of the egg. Its fur went hot the way mirecat fur does when it wants to. Wren kept her hands where they were. The door banged open. Rosa came in soaked, a fistful of green in one hand, moonwort in the other. She saw the bed. She saw Wren's white knuckles and the cat wrapped around the shell like a scarf. "How long has it been cold," Rosa said. "Not long. I caught it." Rosa dropped the herbs on her stand and crossed the room in two steps. She laid her hand next to Wren's. The shell was warm again. Under her palm, something inside the egg moved. Once. A small, deliberate push. Wren felt it too. She looked at Rosa. "It's awake," Wren said. Rosa did not answer. The egg pushed again, harder, and a thin line opened along one of the markings she had not yet copied down.