When Rose woke, she didn't open her eyes immediately. She could tell that it was hot to the point of being excruciating and she didn't want to find out that she was in hell. Not yet, anyway. She'd always known that if hell existed that was exactly where she belonged but her life had been a hell of her own, and Rose wasn't ready to open her eyes and realize that her eternal torment was to be trapped in a room with the Huntsman, though it would be a fitting punishment.

Instead, Rose laid on the uncomfortable mattress and slowly starting flexing her fingers and her toes, taking stock of herself. She felt sore all over, as if she'd been run over by a truck. Or her chest had been battered with a mallet. Breathing was hard and her throat was parched. There was a blanket laying over her and she was definitely clothed but other than that, she felt nothing.

Realizing that she couldn't put it off forever, Rose opened her eyes.

She was in a tiny yellow room that had a large window on the wall opposite her bed. She could see a patch of sky that was extraordinarily blue and it almost took her breath away. How long had it been since the last time she'd seen the sky? Was it scrambling back to the Huntsclan after seeing Lao Shi? She hadn't appreciated it then, that was for sure. There was nothing else in the room except for a plush chair that looked more comfortable than the bed that she was lying on and two closed white doors. Rose looked between the window and the doors. She had to find out where she was.

Rose gritted her teeth and pulled herself into a sitting position, gripping the sides of the mattress to pull her up. Her entire body screamed at her to lay back down and Rose couldn't stop the grunting noises that escaped her as she fought to stay upright. She was not going to lay in this bed and wait for something to come get her. She had to find out where she was and what had happened. Where was Jake? Her other friends? Had they survived? Rose threw her legs over the side of the bed, letting her feet dangle as she fought down a sob. There was no pain like this pain in the entire world; there couldn't be.

"Whoa!" One of the doors flew open and Fu Dog burst inside of her yellow room. Behind him, Rose could see a bland patch of tan hallway. "Easy! You should be laying down!"

"Water," Rose croaked, feeling more at ease with the familiar face. Maybe this wasn't hell. Maybe she wasn't dead.

"Only if you lay back down," Fu said, trying to sound firm.

Rose shook her head, realizing that at some point her braid had been taken out and she had been bathed. She hoped that Fu Dog hadn't done that.

"You kids," he said, somewhat scornfully. "All right. At least don't stand up by yourself, deal?"

"Deal."

Rose didn't know if she could stand at this point so it was an easy deal to make. It gave her time to stare down at her clean hands, thinking about how blood soaked they had gotten. They were still scarred and she was glad that she still had her wounds. She didn't care how unfathomable it was; she wouldn't feel herself if she didn't have her scars. They were a part of her. They were a reminder of the person that she had been and what she had gone through to be a new person now.

Fu returned with a glass full of ice chips rather than water. Rose took them gratefully, popping one in her mouth immediately.

"It's only been a week," Fu said, anticipating Rose's questions. He hopped up into the cushy chair as she snacked on her ice. "You've been unconscious this entire time but that was a magical coma for most of that. The Huntsclan had more casualties than we did. Haley, Trixie, Spud, Lao Shi, and Jake all survived."

Rose breathed a sigh of relief so heavy that her ice cube popped out of her mouth and flew across the room.

"As far as we can tell, you are the only Huntsclan member still alive."

Rose lifted her head, thinking of all of the Clan members and all of the elites. They had all been so strong and she knew they would have gone down fighting until they end. It wasn't surprising that they wouldn't have allowed themselves to be captured. "The battle took them all?"

"Most. The rest were executed yesterday. You, along with the others, were all transported to the Dragon Council and the Isle for trial. They were all found guilty."

Rose didn't think she could move but she found the strength to say, "Was I?"

"That's where Jake and the others are now," Fu said. "Testifying on your behalf."

Forgetting her deal with Fu, Rose dropped her cup of ice chips and then pushed herself off the edge of the mattress and onto the floor, standing on her own two feet. She weaved, fighting every urge not to be sick on the floor. Fu leapt from the chair, running up to her and supporting her the best that he could with his short stature.

"Hey! Easy!"

"I have to be there," Rose said. And she would, if she had to figure out how to get there, on her own, wearing nothing but her thin white socks, itchy underwear, and green hospital gown. "I have to!"

"Okay," Fu said, sounding utterly defeated, "but let's go get you dressed first."

Well, okay. Rose could see the benefit of not showing up as she was. She let Fu take her to the second door that opened up into a reasonably sized bathroom. Fu seemed reluctant to leave her but Rose wasn't going to accept help on something like this. She didn't lock the door behind her, because she wasn't convinced that she wasn't going to fall, and then she sat down on the edge of the counter, looking at the pile of clothes left there for her. It was far more than any one person could possibly wear, especially in this heat.

Rose leafed through them.

"Where are my clothes?" she shouted to Fu. Her uniform, bloody, disgusting, but hers.

"They're evidence."

The word bothered her somehow and, because she was alone, Rose pulled a face about it.

"I tried to find you a lot of options."

Rose looked a little bit more carefully through the options, automatically being drawn toward the darker clothes: the black leggings that would fit like her uniform pants and the black, baggy t-shirt that would billow around her. Rose almost picked them out but something stayed her hand. She was going to fight for her life. Everyone else had died in battle or had been executed at the Dragon Council's will. Did she really want to look like a Clan member when she did that? Rose looked for the exact opposite of her Huntsclan uniform and she pulled it free from the pile.

Rose dressed in it and then walked over to the full-length mirror on the opposite wall, staring at her reflection, clothed in a knee length white summer dress. Was she the type of person who could wear this dress? Rose reached up and touched the lace on the front of the dress, which was supposed to dip in a flirty way, but just floated around her flat chest. Rose's fingers walked from the lace to the exit wound in her shoulder and then down to the one on her chest.

Neither the healing process nor the magical coma had dulled the memory of that pain.

Rose took a step back. The clothes were innocent but the body who wore them wasn't. Anybody would be able to see all of her burns, her scars, her bullet wounds. Rose was going to walk into that court and without saying a word, she could ask: do you see my pain? Can you see how I've bled for you? Can you see how I'm just Rose?

Yes.

She'd wear the white dress.

Rose stripped off her socks and then put her feet into sandals. They, perhaps, might not have been the best choice for her unstable steps but they were the easiest to put on.

Rose took stock of herself in the mirror one last time, trying not to see the dress or the scars but the whole image. How was the Dragon Council going to see her? She knew they would have heard about the Huntsgirl, but they would have an image in their head of that bloodthirsty woman. What would they think of this person, with her long blonde hair down soft around her shoulders, her big blue eyes ringed with dark circles, the weakness in her every movement? Would they think that she was a threat? Yes. No one was this scarred without knowing how to fight back.

Rose teetered on the edge of diving back into the clothing pile and finding something that would cover her from head to toe when she heard Fu speak.

"Yes, she's awake. We'll need an escort to court."

Rose supposed it was time to go.

Rose held her head high as she left the bathroom, allowing Fu to help her out of her room and then out of the building where there was, mercifully, a car waiting to take them. The heat outside of the building smacked in the face and Rose was worried that she was going to sweat through her white dress in the time it took to move to the air-conditioned back seat. She looked out the tinted windows as the unfamiliar landscape rolled by.

"The tint seems excessive," Rose said.

"You're not going to want anyone to see you arriving, kid, trust me," Fu said.

"Why? Do they hate me?"

She supposed that she could understand that but she would have thought freeing Jake would win her, at the very least, a little sympathy. But, if the magical creatures were shouting for her demise, perhaps the Council would be swayed by public opinion. Maybe, Rose should try to run now.

"Ha!" Fu laughed. "Hate you? Well, maybe a couple of them. No, you're a celebrity now."

That was more baffling than being hated.

"Oh yeah," Fu continued. "Ever since the battle ended, everyone's just been doing interview after interview about you. Lao Shi talking about your bravery in being a double agent and Jake talking about your kindness while he was trapped in Sector 1. The whole world wants to see the face of the Huntsgirl who defied the Huntsclan and set the American Dragon free! They've got it all spun that you and Jake were basically besties. Lao Shi didn't want to take any chances of having anyone see you as villain. We know what you've done for us."

Rose's head swam with information and she wished that she hadn't dropped her ice chips. Everyone? She didn't want celebrity. She wanted to just be able to live. As for besties, well, Rose had never stopped to consider what she and Jake were for long enough to know whether or not that was true. And now that they were no longer bound by mutual need, what would become of them?

Unbidden, she saw Jake again, leaning over her, begging her to live, and her final thoughts of sadness that she wasn't able to do that for him. At the very least, they weren't nothing to one another. They could never be.

The car pulled by what must have been the courthouse or, at least, the Council's meeting place, because there seemed to be every type of magical creature spread out on its steps and over its lawn, some with microphones, some manning cameras for still photos and for broadcasts. Even more still, were those with signs. A minority of the signs read 'Huntsgirl is a traitor' and worse but the vast majority of them were crying out support for her, begging the Dragon Council to find her innocent. Rose was touched for a moment.

Then, a horrifying thought swept through her, "I don't have to walk through that, do I?"

"No, we'll take you through the back. If you win, though, you might want to walk through it and give a soundbite," Fu said.

If.

Rose hated ifs. She wanted absolutes. But, she wasn't going to get them as the car pulled up to a private, covered entrance in the back, where a dragon checked out who Fu was and his reasons for being there before sticking his head inside the car and staring down Rose. She resisted the urge to snarl at him as he gestured her out of the car and then informed her that she would need to be patted down. She almost wanted to ask him what he thought she was hiding but she knew that she would never be underestimated. She, who had brought down the Huntsclan, with a key that several of them had missed on her person. When he was done, she was gestured inside, where there was another dragon to escort Fu and her forward but Rose didn't need it. She could hear Jake's voice and she was drawn toward it.

"That is correct. Rose tended to my medical needs as well as ferrying messages to me from my family members and friends."

"And, what about the two of you?" asked an unfamiliar female voice. "Did you spend any time together? Form a bond?"

"A bond? Yeah, I –"

Rose pulled open the door to the courtroom, even though her dragon escort and Fu had been frantically gesturing at her to wait a second. Rose wasn't going to wait. Not when her life was on the line. She took stock of the whole room: those who she had fought with, sitting in seats in front of the large table that four dragons sat behind. In a small box to Rose's right, which she assumed was the witness box, was Jake in his dragon form. He had his arm in a sling but otherwise didn't look harmed. Certainly, he hadn't been shot in the chaos too. Rose took a step forward, wanting nothing more than to go to him, to scratch the tuft of hair in the way that she knew that se liked, and just sit down with him. She wanted to tell him that he had been right – she had survived after all. In mid-step, Rose caught herself, because Jake wasn't right. Not yet.

She focused on the Dragon Council, waiting for one of them to say something to her. When no words came, Rose tilted her chin up and took the seat behind Haley, leaving Fu to scramble around her. Rose was being stared at but she could hardly say that she was surprised.

One of the dragons, his body an icy blue, cleared his throat.

"Right," Jake said, leaning forward to the microphone that was situated in the witness box. "She laid down her life for my family and then for me without being asked to. At the very least, that would give us a bond, but we did develop one that was more personal as well."

The dragon who looked the most like a gargoyle snorted and looked surprised. "What was the nature?"

"Friends," Jake replied, but Rose couldn't look at him as he answered that question. "She is my friend."

"And you never questioned her character?"

"Like my sister told you," Jake said, sounding annoyed, "she killed plenty of her own. She was tortured, still found the strength to stand, and then I watched her behead the Huntsman and then, after all that, she took two bullets for me! No. I have not and do not question her character."

The brown dragon raised his hand. "Thank you, American Dragon. We reserve the right to recall the witness at any time for further testimony. For now, we would like to call the Huntsgirl to take the stand."

Rose stood, thinking that it was a good thing that she hadn't been chained to get here, and walked to the witness box. As she passed Jake, his fingers stretched out, brushing against hers. That brief contact was more than enough to give Rose strength and she straightened her spine, trying to gather her decorum about her. She sat primly on the chair inside the witness box, rubbing at the Huntsmark on her arm. Once again, she was regretting not wearing long sleeves.

"I am Councillor Andam," said the brown dragon.

"I am Councilor Kulde," the blue dragon.

"I am Councillor Kukulkhan," the gargoyle looking one.

"And I am Councillor Omina," said the woman. "You are?"

"Rose," she said. "Formerly known as the Huntsgirl."

"Formerly?" Councillor Kulde said.

"There is no longer a Huntsclan," Rose said. "I can hardly be a Huntsgirl anymore. And, I stopped believing in the Clan and claiming my title two weeks after my eighteenth birthday."

"Let's start at the beginning," Councillor Omina requested. "How long have you been in the Clan?"

"Since birth."

Rose led them through the entire sordid tale, letting them ask probing questions into things that she didn't think were relevant anymore. But, if the Dragon Council wanted to know more about Huntsclan children were raised or how Master picked those to train to be part of the elite forces, she wasn't going to deny them. Hopefully, it would help her chances if she was seen as cooperative. Rose talked about everything they could possibly want to know, wishing that she could put off the inevitable question of why, until Councillor Kukulkhan inevitably dropped the question.

"What made you turn against your upbringings, your beliefs, and your Huntsmaster?"

"I would respectfully ask that Haley Long leave before I answer that question."

Haley probably suspected but Rose didn't want her to have to hear it spelled out like that and the Council asked very in-depth questions. Haley left without a word, taking Fu Dog with her. Trixie and Spud turned their heads toward the floor in unison, as if they wanted to leave too. Jake and Lao Shi, though, were still looking at her, offering their support with just their eyes.

Rose took a deep breath and faced the Dragon Council. She would have to be blunt.

"The Huntsman began to rape me on a regular basis, often combined with physical violence. I had always looked at him as the man who had raised me and was responsible for me being who I was. I admired him for that, even though he had raised me to be an unfortunate person, because he had instilled in me a deep admiration for the person that I was. He broke something inside of me – the respect I had for him, for the Clan, and all of the loyalty too."

"Why not just run away?" Councillor Andam asked. "It would be the easier path, wouldn't it?"

Rose smiled ruefully. "Respectfully, I've never been about doing things the easy way. And, I knew that I would spend the rest of my life hunted. I decided I would rather die striking back at him than live looking over my shoulder for him."

The conversation pivoted again, back to how she had first come in contact with the Magical Militia and then what she had done for them in the time before her first contact with Jake. She spoke about why she had finally decided to confide her identity to Lao Shi. Her voice cracked as she described meeting with Jake for the first time and Councillor Kulde mercifully fetched her water. The Dragon Council asked less questions now, letting her present the narrative of how they had gotten here. Rose shied away from nothing, airing out every unfortunate detail. She described bolting to Lao Shi's to inform him about the guns and then how she had gotten careless, needing to prepare Jake with the same information, and how the Huntsman had caught her but had seemed ignorant of the plan. As she talked about her final beating and being left alone to die, her eyes never left Jake's face. She could see sympathy from him but not pity, never pity, and she was so relieved. She didn't know how she could look at him ever again if he pitied her.

"And, how did you get free from the jail?" Councillor Omina prompted.

Rose took a great gulp of water and then told the last bit of story that she had to offer: the day of final battle, what she had done there, and who she had hunted. There was one thing that she omitted and that was her last memory of Jake.

"I remember the gunshots," Rose said, "and thinking that I didn't go through all that trouble to let Jake die now. I remember turning him so that I could take them but, once that pain hits, I remember nothing else until I woke up here."

Rose angled herself to face the Dragon Council and she watched as all of their eyes fell to the exit wounds on her chest.

"She spun me around," Jake called out from the floor, his voice desperately trembling. "She didn't just get shot instead of me; she deliberately took those bullets for me!"

Rose wanted to turn her head, look at him, let him somehow know that he shouldn't feel guilty about that. As he had said, she knew exactly what she was doing when she turned her back on that gun, and it hadn't even been a difficult decision for her to make. Instead, in a movement that she hoped looked natural but was definitely contrived, she reached her Marked hand up to touch the bullet wound that was the closest to her heart. She wanted it to say: look what I survived and look what I did with the choices that I made. She didn't know what it meant when everyone but Councillor Omina looked away from her.

"I think we are ready to go and discuss matters amongst ourselves and come to a verdict," Councillor Kulde announced. His fellow Councillors nodded in agreement.

"Wait, wait!" Fu Dog shouted, running back in while holding onto Haley, pulling her along behind him. "Don't you want to hear about what she went through? I can tell you all about what we had to heal! Not just the bullet wounds but the broken bones, the severe dehydration and exhaustion, the extent of the bruising, the –"

Councillor Kukulkhan held up his hand. "Thank you, Fu Dog, but we have received and reviewed the records you sent along."

A sobering silence fell over the room as the Councillors filed out, going off to wherever it was to debate her fate. Rose watched them go, thinking that it was too late to run now. She could see the guard at the door but she would be foolish to think that there was just one. Getting in was certainly a lot easier than getting out. And, she felt like she had created a family with the people who were sitting in front of her. She didn't want to leave them. In any way.

"You can come down, Rose," Lao Shi said. "You don't have to stay up there and wait for them to come back."

Rose's legs were stiff from the hours of sitting. She stood on her shaky legs, wondering if she could even make it the short distance to the others. But, she wasn't going to make that walk alone. Spud and Trixie came up to her, both of them surrounding her with a hug.

"Girl, we thought you weren't going to make it!" Even though Trixie had tried to play it off as a joke, Rose could feel the real concern under the words.

"I didn't know if any of us was going to make it," Rose confessed.

She could see the changes in them. Trixie and Spud had both been seasoned warriors when she'd met them, to the point where they had both done what they'd needed to do and had already killed, but the skirmishes had seemed like nothing in comparison to the bloodbath that was the final battle. There was a change in Jake too. She could sense it more than see it, even though they were still standing so far apart, Jake giving her time with their friends. Jake had been the one of them, that no matter how he had been trained, was forced into doing something that he'd never done before that night. Rose was alive because he didn't hesitate but she knew what that must have cost him. He and Haley, Trixie and Spud, they were still supposed to be young, somewhat innocent. They should have been spared all this. Maybe it wasn't for nothing, Rose thought, but that didn't make it easier to stomach in the dead of night.

"Were you hurt?" Rose asked.

"Bruises, scrapes. A couple of pokes with those damn spears," Spud said with a growl, his hand going to rub at his thigh.

"Concussed, mostly. They say I'll be fine," Trixie said dismissively, with her usual bravado.

"Cause you fell during the clean-up," Spud snorted. "Not because you were doing anything heroic."

Haley emerged around the side of Spud and her arms slipped around Rose's waist. Rose hugged her back tightly.

"My mom and dad are so happy," Haley whispered to Rose. "You should have seen their faces when I brought Jake home."

"I would have liked that," Rose said, "but it's more than enough for me that he made it home."

"Thank you," Haley said, kissing Rose's cheek.

Rose couldn't handle standing anymore or looking at Jake over Haley's head. She brushed past Lao Shi, knowing that he understood. He might be the only person who actually understood her. She had been his weapon but she had also been just a girl, hanging out in his shop. He was the only one who had seen both sides of her and really grasped that. Hopefully, he was the only person that ever would. Rose would like to retire the part of her that was a weapon, that was the Huntsman's pride and joy. She wanted to be the type of woman who wore white sundresses and slept soundly at night and walked whatever path she chose.

Rose settled into the seat next to Jake, on the side of his good arm, immediately putting her hand into his. She hadn't thought that she'd ever see him again and after spilling out her life story to the Dragon Council for him to hear, she wasn't sure what he thought of her now. He had probably guessed at what she'd done and what had happened to her, but now he knew it all. She had no more secrets. It was freeing, after all this time of secret identities and secret pain. Rose didn't know what to say to him and she was relieved when Jake spoke first.

"I like your dress. It's pretty."

It was so normal, so casual, that Rose just laughed.

"I like this part here," Jake said, moving his hand out of hers to touch the lace on the front but also brushing his fingers against the bullet wound. "Does that hurt?"

Rose shook her head. "I'm sure Fu's got me all medicated."

"Or you're tough."

"I don't need to be tough," Rose said, looking at the door where the Dragon Council had disappeared, "I need to be found not guilty."

"I'm not going to let them execute you."

"You can't fight all of them."

"We can," Jake said stubbornly.

It just caused Rose to laugh again. "I'm unarmed. For the first time in … how old am I?"

Jake laughed, but it was dark. Then, he shook his head, and brought the smile back to his face. "Optimism works, Rose. I told you that you'd make it out of the Huntsclan alive, didn't I? You were set on getting killed but you didn't."

"I guess you were right about that," Rose said with a bit of reluctance.

The others started to rearrange the chairs in circle around Jake and Rose so that they could all sit together. Lao Shi told Rose what had happened after she had been shot. Jake had rushed her out, to the closest magical hospital, and had left her there under Fu's watchful eye to rejoin the battle that had reignited when the elite fired their gun. The Magical Militia had won; it had decimated the Huntsclan's forces to the point where out of hundreds of members, seventy-three had been transported to the Isle Of Draco, which is where they were now. Rose had been transported along with them, but she was the only one who was unconscious. Lao Shi had pushed her trial off for as long as he could, trying to insist that she should be awake to speak for herself, but after seventy-three executions in a row, the Dragon Council was anxious to move on. The magical press coverage around Jake and Rose, the Huntsclan, and the Magical Militia was a maelstrom of unprecedented proportions. Lao Shi hadn't been able to stop himself from pointing out on live television that the Dragon Council had not come to their aid in the years that a world dragon had gone missing.

"They were shown their butts," Trixie said. "They're embarrassed as all hell."

"As they should be," Spud said. "They couldn't even come in for the final battle? Cowards."

Lao Shi looked as disgusted as Spud sounded but he gave a loaded nod toward the Dragon Council's closed door.

Rose quickly tried to change the topic. "Fu called me a celebrity in the car. Must be a very slow news week."

"The second you get out of here, you'll never have a moment of peace from the magical media again," Jake promised her.

It sounded better than never having a moment of peace from the Huntsclan. Still, Rose didn't want to be hounded.

"I just can't wait to see the movie they make about it," Haley said. "I wonder who's going to play me."

"They're making a movie?" Rose asked. "Really?"

"Wouldn't you?" Spud said. "Besides, it happens all the time. Something cool happens in the magical world and they make a movie out of it and release it for the humans to see."

"Of course, you and Jake will probably be in love in the movie. It's a much better story," Trixie said.

Rose realized that she and Jake were back to holding hands. She knew that Trixie was looking at that too, trying to get Rose to answer a question that Jake had probably refused to answer. Not that Rose would have known how to answer, either. She couldn't even think about what all of those words meant because it still might not matter. She still had a verdict hanging over her head.

Jake just laughed. "You and Spud probably will be too."

Trixie mimed throwing up and Spud scooted his chair further away from hers.

Everyone laughed. It was a good moment. One that Rose was glad that she had because the next moment, the door had opened, and the Dragon Council was filing back into the room.

Everyone stood, abandoning their circle of chairs to go sit in the organized row of seats near the front. Rose didn't go with them, instinctively knowing that she was supposed to go and stand in front of the table where the Dragon Council sat. She let go of Jake's hand, sending him to sit with Haley. Rose hoped that her anxieties didn't show on her face as she planted her feet and tried to stand as tall as possible.

Councillor Andam stood up to face her. "Rose, AKA Huntsgirl, we the Dragon Council have returned with a verdict regarding your crimes committing during the course of the war and what punishment, if any, is appropriate. Do you understand what this means?"

"I do."

Either she was going to walk out of here free or they were going to kill her. She just hoped that if they killed her, she would at least get a moment to say goodbye.

"For the crimes of treason, conspiracy to commit acts of violence and committing acts of violence throughout your role as the Huntsgirl, murder, assault, and a multitude of lesser charges, we, the Dragon Council, do find you guilty."