“I’ll call it in,” he said, “the second you’re gone.”

“Go ahead,” said Kate, swinging her leg over the lip.

If August didn’t know, he would soon.

The jeep was waiting at the edge of the light strip.

And so was Soro.

The Sunai stood between August and the idling vehicle.

Sometimes, when Leo had been in a righteous mood, the energy had practically wicked off him, like heat. Ilsa, too, seemed to create her own cloud whenever her thoughts began to spiral, and she had told August more than once that when he was sad, she could feel it in the air around him, like a cold front.

If it was true—that a Sunai could alter the space around them—then the air around Soro was a storm. August signaled for his squad to stay put and started forward across the grid.

“You’re going after her,” said Soro. It wasn’t a question.

“I am.”

Soro didn’t move, and August had to. Kate was getting farther away by the second.

“If you intend to stop me—”

Soro’s gray eyes hardened. “You would risk these lives, and yours, for a sinner.”

“No,” said August, “I would risk them for a friend.”

The Sunai let out a low breath and marched toward him, and August braced himself for a fight, but it didn’t come. Soro just kept walking, back toward the Compound.

“You should go, then,” they said. “Before it’s too late.”

The jeep skidded to a stop at the base of the Seam.

Word had come over the comms a minute before—a young female soldier had forced her way through at gunpoint.

Jackson flashed the high beams, but the gate didn’t open, and August and Harris climbed out as an FTF started toward them.

“We’re on lockdown, sir. No one crosses—”

“But you’ve already let someone through.”

“She pulled a gun—”

“Is that all it takes?” asked Harris, freeing his sidearm. August caught his wrist. Somewhere nearby, tires skidded over asphalt. Another vehicle was headed their way.

“We need to get through,” he said to the soldier. “Now.”

The FTF shook his head. “I’m under strict orders.”

“And I’m August Flynn.”

“With respect,” he said, “my orders come from the top.”

Lights flared against the side of the Seam as the second jeep swung to a stop, and Henry got out. Had Soro told him, or had he seen the message for himself?

“Henry, I have to—”

“Sir,” said the soldier at the same time. “I was just—”

“Open the gate,” ordered Henry.

This time the soldier didn’t hesitate. He radioed the order and the gate began to grind open. August turned toward his father. “You’re letting us go?”

“No,” said Henry, moving toward August’s jeep. “I’m coming with you.”

“No offense, sir,” said Harris, “but I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

Henry laughed softly as he opened the door. “Well, then, it’s a good thing I outrank you.”

“We can handle it from here,” insisted Ani.

But August only stared at his father, his sickly pallor, his too-thin form. It made no sense. Henry was in no shape to fight. “Why?”

Henry put a hand on his shoulder. “I am a man, not a movement,” he said. “But if a movement is what it takes to end this war, then I will play my part. Now”— his hand tightened and then was gone—“let’s go find Miss Harker.”

North City had gotten darker.

That was Kate’s first thought as she moved through the streets, HUV in one hand and gun in the other. The Corsai murmured from the shadows, flashing teeth and claws.

harkerharkeritsaharker

Her FTF gear was traced with metal, but there was a difference between deterring monsters and stopping them, and she tried to stay in the light, what little there was.

Her father’s tower rose ahead of her.

Or rather, a hulking shadow loomed in its place.

Kate’s steps slowed. She stopped beneath a single low-wattage streetlight, its flickering bulb the only thing standing between her and a blackout zone.

It carved a lightless circle around the base of Harker Hall, a dark inversion of the moat that surrounded the Compound. It felt like a physical thing, that darkness, something more than air and night.

A wall of black.

And, embedded in that wall, a pair of red eyes.

The Malchai stepped out of the shadows, and Kate saw not her own shadow, but her father’s.

Sloan.

She’d seen him in dreams, in memories, but they paled compared to the truth. In her visions, he’d been reduced to a shape in a dark suit. Reduced to fangs and blood and malice. But now he stood before her, gray flesh pulled tight over blackened bones, fingers ending in silver points. Fear slammed through Kate’s chest, and Sloan smiled as if he could hear the traitorous thing raging in her pulse.

When he spoke, his voice grazed her skin like a knife. Metal across skin.

“Katherine.”

The sound of her name on his lips, sweet and taunting.

“Sloan,” she said, fighting to keep her tone dry. “What a surprise.”