Three days after being separated from the Traveling Symphony, Kirsten wakes from a nightmare that August has disappeared and died. At dawn, she and August wash in the lake, cut each other’s hair, and abandon their noisy suitcases to move more quietly toward Severn City, carrying supplies in bedsheet bundles.

Entering the overgrown city with weapons ready, they hear what sounds like a dog and hide in a municipal park. When footsteps and voices approach, Kirsten realizes the filthy, injured man on the road is Sayid, badly beaten and escorted by two armed men and a boy with a machete.

August and Kirsten ambush the group: August shoots the gunman with an arrow, and Kirsten throws a knife into the archer. The boy flees. Kirsten comforts Sayid as August searches the attackers’ bags and discovers the shotgun was unloaded and they have no ammunition.

Sayid explains that the Prophet is behind them with a dog and two men, and that Sayid and Dieter were taken to force a trade for the stowaway girl. Questioned, the dying archer calls the girl “the fifth bride” and insists she is the Prophet’s property; Sayid identifies her as Eleanor.

Sayid recounts how he and Dieter were lured by a fake lost-child sound on patrol, drugged with a chemical-soaked rag, and tied up while the raiders planned to trade for Eleanor, assuming the Symphony was heading toward the Museum of Civilization. Dieter never properly woke up and eventually stopped breathing while Sayid watched; later, the raiders brought in “the clarinet,” implying another Symphony member has been captured.