In a desperate, violent struggle in the shallows, Ildico uses the overturned boat for cover, fighting off the ferryman and the first of the Huns. Under a hail of arrows, she uses the river's current and the dense fog to escape downstream. She finally drags herself and Ernak ashore miles away, alive but having lost everything—her supplies, her money, her path. Soaked, freezing, and destitute, she stares toward the distant lands of Theodemir, at her most vulnerable point yet.