Marianne ran through a cornfield, lungs burning, terror forcing whimpers from her throat. Running as fast as she could, she dodged among the corn stalks, trying to slip out of sight, trying to lose her pursuer. Faster—faster—heedless of the leaves slashing at her face and her bare arms. Then her foot caught on a clod of earth and she sprawled on her face in the fragrant soil. She screamed and scrambled to her feet. The Sural would protect her. The Sural had promised to protect her. The Sural... where was the Sural? Marianne searched the darkness as she ran and found him, far down the row, turning to look at her. She reached out her arms to him just as her ankle twisted in the shallow rut formed by a fallen cornstalk, throwing her to the ground a second time. She screamed again and woke with a cry, a red haze fading into the darkness before her eyes. Panting, sweat pouring from her body, she sat up and remembered where she was: an alien stronghold, on an alien world, where there were no cornrows and no one to chase her through them.
