And it was her job to kill it.
Before it killed anyone else.
It turned out Henry didn’t want August to scrub in.
He wanted him to play.
“To the wounded,” he explained, gesturing at the infirmary and the FTFs who’d been caught in the power station blasts, two dozen men and women laid out on cots. The Compound was running low on sedatives. Injuries had grown fairly rare in the FTF—when it came to missions, most either got out in one piece or didn’t get out at all.
“The room isn’t soundproofed,” said August.
“Then play softly,” countered his father. “It’s worth some dazed bystanders, if it helps with their pain.”
August fetched his violin. Henry stepped outside, and August closed the door behind him and drew up a chair, bow hesitating over the strings.
He thought of the soldier in the cell.
Soro snapping the man’s neck.
Leo saying it was a waste.
But he also thought of the relief washing over the soldier, the struggle going out of his limbs.
Maybe there is more to us than murder.
He started to play, softly, and within seconds the muffled sounds of pain fell away. The tension in the patients’ limbs slackened, their breathing eased, and their souls began to surface, filling the infirmary with pale but steady light.
August exhaled, his own body loosening with the music, and for the first time in four years, the song itself felt like a kind of nourishment, filling him like light, like life, like a soul, and—
Tablets began to chime. They went off at once, all over the Compound, and August faltered, losing the melody. A broadcast? Across the entire task force?
He set the instrument aside, drawing his own device from his pocket.
He read the message once, then again and again, and then he was on his feet, the violin abandoned as he ran.
The doors banged open, revealing an empty roof, an open sky.
And no Kate.
August backtracked to the apartment, trying to stay calm, telling himself she wouldn’t do this, wouldn’t walk straight into a trap, not alone, that Kate was smarter than that—
But he also heard the words she’d whispered into his collar and saw the silver dancing in her eyes, a demon twisting her thoughts toward violence.
Harris and Ani were playing cards on the couch, Allegro between them.
Ani looked up. “I didn’t know you had a cat.”
Jackson was making coffee, his tablet in his hand.
“Hey, August, any idea what this means?”
He didn’t answer.
The bedroom was empty.
The bathroom was empty.
Harris was on his feet now. “What’s going on?”
I’ll kill her myself.
He should never have left her alone.
“It’s Kate, isn’t it?” said Ani, shoving on her boots. “I can tell by your face.”
Jackson blocked his path, coffee in hand. August was taller, but Jackson was broader by far. “Get out of my way,” ordered August.
“Where are we going, captain?”
“You aren’t going anywhere,” said August.
Ani tsked. “No solo missions.”
“I’d never ask—”
“You don’t have to,” said Harris, zipping up his vest. “You go, we go.”
August shook his head. “You don’t even care about her.”
“No,” said Ani, holstering a blade. “But you do. And that’s a first.”
Jackson downed the last of his coffee. “Where’s she headed?”
“The tower,” said August.
“Odds of catching her before she hits the Seam?”
“Depends if she’s on foot . . .”
Ani was on the comm. “Alpha squad here; we need a jeep.”
Just like that, they’d fallen into form. As if this were any other mission. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank us, boss. Not until we bring her back.”
Kate was many things, but she wasn’t stupid.
She knew it was a trap. Of course she did. But the way she saw it, either Alice would be waiting for her, or Sloan would, and either way, she had a debt to pay.
She didn’t look back, couldn’t afford to second-guess.
The Seam rose ahead of her, and the line of light that traced its spine must have been on a different transformer, because it was still up, soldiers pacing on top. Kate secured her helmet and started up the ladder, reminding herself over and over that she was one of them—or rather, still suited up from the attack at the power station, she looked like one of them.
She crested the edge and stepped onto the Seam’s spine, thankful she’d never been afraid of heights. North City sprawled out below her—from this position she could see down the main thoroughfare, straight to Harker Hall.
“What are you doing here?” demanded an FTF with the bearing of a squad leader.
Kate didn’t hesitate. Pauses give a lie away. “Here to relieve someone, sir.”
The soldier held out a hand, as if to shake, but when Kate took it, he pulled her close.
“Relief units arrived ten minutes ago,” he said, squeezing her fingers. “Try again.”
Kate let out an exasperated breath. She really didn’t have time for this. One hand still pinned in the FTF’s grip, she drew her gun with the other, leveling it at his chest.
“I’m going over this wall,” she said quietly. “One way or another.”
The dark sang through her: the weight of the steel in her hand, the shock on his face, the dizzying relief of being in control. It would be so easy—but she kept the safety on and her finger away from the trigger, and the sight of the weapon—or maybe her willingness to use it—was enough to make the man let go.
Kate took a step toward the nearest ladder.
“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 thro
ugh,” 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.”
He spread his hands. “You didn’t think I’d let Alice keep you to herself. Not when we have such history.”
Her fingers tightened on the gun. The night rustled around her, dotted with red as shadows emerged from the darkness. Malchai. Not one or two, but a half dozen forming a loose circle around them.
“Not exactly a fair fight.”
Sloan clicked his tongue. “What place does fair have in a world like ours? Fair is a white flag. A word for cowards.” He gestured to her clothing. “You’ve traded sides. Your father would be disappointed.”
“My father is dead.” She kept her head high. She wanted to look Sloan in the eyes when she killed him. Slid the knife under his skin and up into his heart, savoring the delicious warmth.
The Chaos Eater whispered through her, hungry for Sloan’s blood; her fear replaced by hatred, cold and steady; but she held the monster at bay. Not yet, not yet. There would be no going back. She would let it out, if she had to. When she had to.
But it would be on her terms.
“You’ve changed,” observed Sloan. His lips parted, revealing pointed teeth. “But I can still taste your—”
“Down, dog,” she snarled, firing the gun.
But Sloan moved like light, like smoke, like nothing, and by the time the shot rang out, he was behind her, an arm around her shoulders as he pulled her back against him.
His breath was ice against her neck. “I’ve waited for this.”
“Keep waiting,” she growled, slamming her elbow back and up into the side of his head. Sloan was fast but Kate had learned to fight dirty. He fell back a single step, but it was enough for her to get free and put two paces, three, between them.
Sloan laughed: a horrible sound, too high. “You are even more stubborn than I remember.”
The other Malchai shifted and stirred, bloodlust heavy in the air, but Sloan had obviously told them this was his kill. How long would they listen? Her father had tried to keep the Malchai on a leash—it hadn’t gone well.
Kate drew a knife as Sloan came at her again.
She slashed, expecting him to retreat, or at least to dodge. He didn’t. Instead the Malchai shifted the slightest step left and let the knife plunge right into his arm as he continued forward, closing the distance between them. Black blood welled up, staining the sleeve of Sloan’s suit, but neither surprise nor pain registered on his face. Kate didn’t even have time to draw the blade back, to retreat. He was inside her guard.
His hand closed around her neck, his shoe caught her heel, and for a terrible second, when she hit the pavement, they were back in the gravel outside the house in the Waste, Sloan pressing her body down into broken rock, fingers tight around her throat.
She forced her mind back to the present.
Sloan was on top of her, the hilt of the knife pinned between them so she couldn’t free the blade. The gun was still in her other hand but when she tried to bring it up, his fingers closed around it, forcing her wrist against the pavement.
He bore down on her. He didn’t smell like death. He never had. No, he smelled like violence. Like leather and blood and pain.
His sharpened teeth flashed as he sank them into her arm, and a scream tore from Kate’s throat.
The darkness began to fold around her mind, the monster rising, but Sloan drew back sharply. His mouth was painted with her blood, but he wasn’t smiling.
His hand raked through her hair, forcing her head back, not to bare her throat, she realized, but to see her eyes.
A snarl of anger escaped his lips. “What have you done?” he demanded, right before a pair of high beams sliced through the dark. Sloan was halfway to his feet when a gunshot tore the air, and a shatter shell hit him in the chest.
The jeep screeched to a halt, Harris and his gun still hanging out the window.
Sloan staggered backward, and the other monsters surged through the dark in a frenzy of nails and teeth.
August was already out of the jeep, drawing a knife, as Harris lunged into the fray. Ani detonated a series of light grenades, a blinding strobe effect that left the Malchai dazed and gave Jackson and Henry time to get to Kate, who was already up. Blood dripped from her fingers but she had a gore-slicked knife in one hand and a gun in the other.
Sloan, too, was on his feet—the shell had hit him in the chest, tearing through suit and skin, but it clearly hadn’t reached his heart. His red eyes found August, and August lunged toward him, only to be cut off by two other Malchai. He didn’t stop—he slit one’s throat and drove the blade up under the other’s ribs, Leo’s voice weaving through his head.
This is your purpose. And doesn’t it feel good?
He twisted, searching for Sloan, as Harris let out a strangled cry. A Malchai had its fangs in his shoulder, but then Ani was there, driving a knife through its neck. It went down, and Harris
yowled, and stomped on the Malchai’s chest until it cracked, splintered, gave.
“I think it’s dead,” called Jackson, wiping a streak of gore from his cheek. “They’re all dead.”
August turned, searching.
Kate clutched her arm as Ani put pressure on Harris’s shoulder, and August realized with a sick dread that none of the bodies on the ground belonged to Sloan.
The Malchai was gone.
And so was Henry Flynn.
“Gone? What do you mean gone?”
Emily Flynn was not a shouter. The few times August had seen her angry—truly angry—her voice lost all its volume, all its warmth. She went cold and quiet. The rest of the FTF Council wasn’t nearly as composed, their questions ricocheting through the command center.
Ilsa stood in the doorway, a faraway look in her eyes, and August wished she still had her voice, even though he knew that if she tried to speak right now, what came out would be only wondering, wandering, lost.
Soro had their voice, but they stood silently against the wall, their expression level in every way but one. Their eyes.
Soro’s eyes, the color of stone, asked a silent question.
Was she worth it?
Emily held up a hand, calling for silence as she leaned across the table and met August’s gaze. “Explain it to me.”
He opened his mouth, but it was Kate who spoke. She pulled free of the medic bandaging her arm. “It’s my fault.”
“I believe you,” said Em. “But that doesn’t answer my question.”
“He insisted,” said August.
I’m going with you.
Marcon shook his head. “Why would he do that?”
“Why would you let him?” added Emily, her attention still on August.
Why had he?
Because Henry Flynn was in charge of the FTF?
Because he believed in something greater than himself?
Because August believed he had a plan?
“Because he’s dying.”
August heard the words come out of his mouth. The room went quiet. Emily’s face darkened.
Henry had never said the words, not to August, and August had never asked. He hadn’t needed to, hadn’t wanted to, not in the months of watching Henry grow thin, of listening to his cough, and not in the moments after they crossed the Seam. There was a strange place, between knowing and not knowing. A place where things could live in the back of your head without weighing down your heart.
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