“What’s going on?” he demanded.

A guard started to speak, but Adrian cut him off. “I’ll tell you what happened! I was minding my own business, when these two”—he pointed at each of the Alchemists in turn—“jumped me for no reason! Do you have any idea who I am? I’m Adrian Ivashkov. Maybe you’ve heard of my late aunt, her royal majesty Queen Tatiana Ivashkov? And maybe you know one of my best friends, the current queen?”

That got the manager’s attention, and he looked the Alchemists over. It was clear he knew who and what they were. “We don’t see many of you around here.”

“This man is a criminal,” protested one of the Alchemists. “He and a human girl destroyed one of our facilities! It’s our right to bring them in.”

“Them?” asked the manager. “I only see one.”

“She’s here somewhere,” insisted the other Alchemist.

One of the guards gestured to a large monitor. “We’ve got footage from the casino, sir. Lord Ivashkov was alone.” He played a feed of Adrian at the poker table, and I prayed no one thought to check footage of us entering outside. “And here’s the attack.”

New footage showed the two Alchemists lying in wait on the seventh floor when Adrian got out of the elevator. They clearly made the first move, trying to grab and subdue him with a tranquilizer gun of their own. Adrian fought back gallantly, not just with spirit—which I’d expected—but by actually throwing a punch at one of them. Wolfe would’ve been so pleased. Other patrons emerged from their rooms, and soon the guards arrived, breaking everything up.

“This is unacceptable,” said the manager angrily. “You can’t walk into my hotel and try to assault a Moroi! I don’t care who you are. You have no right to do that to us.”

“He’s guilty of all sorts of crimes,” the first Alchemist said. “You have no right to keep us from bringing him in for questioning.”

“Where’s your proof?” asked the manager. “And where’s your mystery girl? You’ve clearly made a mistake.” He turned to another of the guards. “Escort them out.”

“They’ve been following me all day,” said Adrian. “How do we know they won’t come back?”

“No one is going to intimidate our citizens,” growled the manager. “Alert the rest of your staff. Scour this place for all signs of Alchemists, as well as the periphery and tunnels. Remove any of them from our property and put in a call to Court. You’re safe as long as you stay here, Lord Ivashkov.”

“Thank you,” said Adrian gravely. He stood up. “If this is finished, I’m going to go to my room and make some calls of my own to Court.”

The protesting Alchemists were led off, and the manager walked Adrian out, offering all sort of apologies and compensation for what had happened. When Adrian was finally alone in the elevator, I moved behind him and spoke.

“Don’t turn around again. We need me off camera.”

“Did everything go according to plan?” he asked.

“And then some.”

He held his hotel room door open extra long so that I could slip in. Once it shut, I stepped in front of him and said, “Here I am.” The spell unraveled, and he wrapped me in a giant hug that lifted me off my feet.

“That,” he said, “was brilliant. How’d you know what would happen?”

“I didn’t,” I said. “Not for sure.” He set me down and took a seat on the couch. “But I felt pretty confident the Moroi management wouldn’t let them haul off one of their own without proof—which there’s no way they have. Marcus would’ve disabled the cameras in Death Valley. The Alchemists could only accuse you based on eyewitnesses, and I knew that wouldn’t stand up here. Alchemist officials would have to file formal complaints with the queen. Me . . . well, that’s a different story. They might have handed me over. The Moroi have no reason to protect me—hence the invisibility.”

Adrian sat beside me and kissed my cheek. “I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: You’re a genius, Sage. I keep finding new reasons to love you, and I didn’t think that was possible.”

“I’m no genius,” I said, slumping back into the seat. Tears formed in my eyes, and I hated it. I hated that the Alchemists had done this to me. I’d never been so emotional before! I was all about logic when problems came, not tears, yet right now, I just wanted to curl up in a ball and sob. The stress of re-education and now this attack was wearing on me. “I should’ve let us go with Marcus. I don’t know if we can outpace the Alchemists! You think I’m clever, but where do you think I learned it from? Do you see the scope of what they can do? They had agents waiting outside in towns neighboring Death Valley. Then they must’ve seen us get on that tour bus, found out where it was going, and met us at the Tropicana. The Alchemists there either got our cab’s license plate tracked here, or else there were already agents waiting, since this was a likely place to go.” I met Adrian’s gaze firmly. “How do we outrun that? How do we get away from a group that has eyes and ears everywhere? Who can protect us? We can’t use invisibility and compulsion for the rest of our lives! We can’t hide in this hotel forever!”

I knew I sounded hysterical, and Adrian’s calmness only drove that home. “I think I have an idea,” he said. “An idea that’ll get us some hardcore protection . . . but I don’t know how you’ll feel about it.”