Daybreak by Ellen Connor

watching him. Seems to be the only rifle between them.”
    “Magic?”
    Pen extended her sight even farther. A feathery tickle brushed behind her ears, and a bright leaf-green aura emanated from one in particular. “The woman with the dark skin. Something like me, but not a healer.”
    “Violent?”
    The touch of another mind pushed her back. Gently. A warning, it seemed, to be polite. She jerked and panted. Her head felt heavy, so she let it drop to the sand. Tru put a hand at the back of her neck and kneaded.
    “You have to tell me. Any trace of violence from her?”
    “No,” she whispered, head still bowed. “She seemed . . . curious? As if she recognized me? That can’t be right.”
    “I’m not taking any chances. Either we walk past them or we go meet them, but I’m shifting before we do.”
    “You sound like you’re leaving that decision to me. Why?”
    “You’re the Orchid,” he said curtly. “Something special, right? So prove it.”
    Pen twisted her bottom lip between her teeth. Something special, all right.
    But Tru didn’t appear ready to change his mind. He waited, arms crossed, looking impossibly self-assured. He wouldn’t walk blindly into danger. Although he called her the Orchid, he was no blind, obedient follower.
    She glanced behind her, down toward the ocean. Cloaking mounds of sand to the west. Great waves crashing in from the east. “We could walk between the water and the dunes, risking that they won’t spot us. But that would also risk meeting them from a vulnerable position. They don’t outnumber us and they don’t appear to have more weapons.” She shrugged. “They might know something about the camp. We have to be nearby now.”
    “Lots of talk, Penelope. Gimme a straight answer.”
    After a deep breath of salt-laden air, she met his gaze. The sky matched his eyes today, clear and eerily pale in the bright sunshine. “Let’s go meet the neighbors.”
    He nodded. “Would be my call, too. You and Adrian can cover me with the rifles.”
    Despite her nerves and the exertion of her magic, she grinned. “You think you’re special?”
    “You know it. And even a good judge of character has trouble reading an animal.”
    He slithered backward down the dune. Pen followed, trying to shake the feeling of foreboding out from under her skin. The vibe she’d gathered off the trio wasn’t violent, but neither was it honest. One of them crackled with deception.
    Tru outlined the plan to Adrian when they met at the bottom of the dune. From her pack, Pen grabbed a slab of fish they’d caught and cooked that morning. She stuffed a quick handful in her mouth and swallowed it down, despite how the salty flesh turned her stomach. The light-headed feel that always came in the wake of using her magic was nearly gone by the time Tru had shifted.
    She sat on the beach. And stared at him.
    Even if she could get used to the sight of a fully grown wild cat striding five meters away, she couldn’t reconcile him against the backdrop of the sea. Lions were supposed to be on a savanna somewhere. A huge, beautiful male lion with blue eyes was never supposed to prowl along the eastern coastline, his paws leaving gouged prints in wet sand.
    But there he was. Tru. The wind fluffed his mane and skated ripples along the short fur of his back. He tipped his face toward the sky. Quick inhales wrinkled the bridge of his nose and flattened his nostrils. His tongue lolled out in a giant yawn, as if he’d just awoken from a nap—the opposite of preparing to meet a potential enemy. Yet, that was Tru, too. Casual insouciance in the face of the worst situations. Maybe that lion side had always been a part of him, just needing the Change to fulfill its most impressive potential.
    “Ready?” Pen asked Adrian.
    The boy nodded, carefully wiping the sand from his palms as Tru had shown him. Keep the rifle clean. Never risk a misfire. It was as if Mason had come with them to the Carolina coast.
    She stifled her