Altered

now I know what the Guild does to those they perceive as threats—the monsters they create from them.

And if I don’t find the resources to get back to Arras soon, there’s no way to prevent them from doing this to Amie.

SEVEN

IN MY SLEEP, I FACE THE GHOSTS that come for me. A wave of Remnants with Amie in the middle, reaching for me. I can only watch as Amie is swept into the crowd of soulless monsters. A new figure emerges where she vanished: a woman with wrists dripping red. The Remnants are gone now. I open my mouth to scream but no sound comes. Blood pools at her feet as she dissolves slowly into a puddle and then another woman rises from it. She’s naked, a long scar marring her belly, and her hair on fire. My mother. She points to me accusingly. Her eyes hollow. Dead. Because of me. I will the dream to change, coaxing my mind to wake up, reminding myself this isn’t real. But when I open my eyes, I’m at a bar, a whiskey perched in front of me. Next to it rests a tiny card. I lift it to read the inscription.

Drink me.

I look around, wondering where this dream has taken me. The place is familiar, although it lacks the color of the real location I encountered in my travels in Arras. Here the bar isn’t rich mahogany but a slab of ebony in a gray world. My eyes fall on the swinging doors. He’ll arrive any minute.

Cormac. The worst nightmare of all. But it’s not him. He’s stockier than Cormac with the same easy swagger, but his face is shielded by a fedora cocked too low.

Even as I fight the dream, I drift in and out of consciousness until light breaks into the room. Suddenly Jost’s arms are around me, waking me.

“I was dreaming,” I murmur.

“Nightmares?”

“Yes.”

His arms tighten around me, coming to rest in a cross on my chest. I feel the steady thump of his heart against my back. “You can rest now.”

I relax into the security of his embrace, but I don’t sleep. We’ve been on the surface barely over a week, and I’ve discovered so much. Too much. Seeing Valery, which I am increasingly sure was not my imagination. Being attacked by my mother. The strange experience in the Old Curiosity Shop. Cormac must have a hand in it all, but to what end? Does he hope to scare me back to Arras?

The events of the day crowd my mind, each bringing a question that I can’t answer. Sleep becomes impossible while knowing my mother is locked somewhere in the safe house. I replay the attack and rewind farther and farther into my memories of her and my father.

My parents were never risk takers. They’d hinted at rebellion in whispered conversations, but the only openly anti-Guild action they ever took was to try to keep me from being retrieved. If there was more to their treachery, it was as hidden as the mysterious tunnels under our house. I wish I could talk to my mother or that my father was alive to direct me. I resented when they got involved with academy issues or offered unwanted advice about classmates. Now I ache for their guidance.

I close my eyes, trying to wash the memory of them from my mind, but they persist in the space between sleep and wakefulness. My parents were affectionate. Kind to each other. But what I remember most is how my father adored my mother. How he tried to fill the void of the third child the Guild would not grant or remedy the scars of her thankless job. Now she’s a monster created by the Guild. I squeeze my eyelids tighter, willing myself to sleep, but images from home haunt me. Love notes. Morning routines. My mother pinning up her hair. I catch a glimpse of an hourglass scar behind her ear and startle awake, but close my eyes again quickly lest Jost wants to talk.

Did I imagine it? Have I added the scar to my memory as I try to understand who my mother was, or have I simply overlooked it for years?

My fingers touch my own scar. It feels the same as ever—slightly raised, but hardly perceptible. And yet it throbs, announcing me for who I am. My father’s words linger in my mind—remember who you are—but I’m no closer now to understanding who I am than I was that night.

As each second ticks by, I see the lies surrounding me. The secrets everyone kept from me. When did my parents dig those tunnels and why didn’t they tell me? How did Enora upload the program that led me to the truth on the digifile? Who gave her access? On Earth, the darkness is everywhere, and I’m trapped in it. How can I discover who I am when my world is built of secrets and shadows?

I only know one thing: I’m no safer here than I was in Arras. That’s one message Cormac’s made clear. He knows where I am, and he’s still pulling the strings. So if Kincaid is the most powerful man on Earth, I’m going straight to his compound. Enora told me once to make allies. She couldn’t have been more right.

* * *

We travel into the mountains the next day in a death trap Dante calls a crawler, which looks like a cage with wheels. Kincaid’s estate rests on several acres located comfortably outside the Icebox but still under the Interface. Far enough away to supervise his business there while still having room to wrap an intimidating perimeter fence around his land. And though I’ve yet to meet him, our first glimpse of his home colors my impression of what kind of man he is. The estate is extravagant in the worst sense of the word. Kincaid must be a man who tries hard to impress if this is where he lives. We can’t drive close enough to the estate to park the crawler there, so Dante stops outside one of the long, winding pathways to let us out. My mother is sedated and bound in the back—for our safety, according to Dante.

The opulence of Kincaid’s estate takes me by surprise. I shouldn’t have expected it to be any different, based on the Sunrunner’s safe house in the grey market, but it pulls at me—the luxury off-putting in a world where there’s not enough food to feed the population. It’s nearly an entire metro unto itself, and I can’t help thinking it puts even the compound of the Coventry to shame. In the center, the main house governs the landscape with its red-tiled roof and twin spires watching over the grounds. There are balconies that overlook the magnificent spectacle below. Palm trees and shrubbery line the walkways, and everywhere I turn faces frozen in marble stare back at me, locked in a permanent display of horror and beauty for those deemed worthy to enter the estate.

Pillars loom overhead, creating an artificial lighting system that mimics the sun. It’s bright and warm, and the light sparkles off the water in the pools and fountains, nearly blinding me. But tucked behind the stately buildings and manicured gardens, a series of smokestacks billows against the Interface.

“Jax will show you in,” Dante says, gesturing to a lanky boy waiting at the top of the stairs. “I’m going to see to our prisoner.”

“I want to see her. I need to talk to her,” I say as Dante turns away. I have so many questions for her. No matter what the Guild has done to her, she might still have answers. And I miss her.

“I promise you can later, but right now she needs to be secured for—”

“Our safety,” I finish for him.

“Exactly,” Dante says through tight lips.

The friendliness Dante exhibited toward Jost and me on our first meeting has cooled. He brought us here, starting out at first light, and he barely spoke to us as we took the twisting roads through the mountains to reach Kincaid. Maybe my talent unnerves him, but I suspect it’s something more.

“Welcome,” Jax calls as he bounces down the steps.

“Kincaid is expecting us,” Dante says.

“I’ll take care of them,” Jax says, “and I have a message for you once you’re done, uh…” He stares at my mother in Dante’s arms, undoubtedly wondering why we’ve brought a Remnant onto the estate.

“I’ll find you later,” Dante says, carrying my mother away.

Jax is so skinny he looks years younger than Jost or Erik. But his eyes are surrounded by wrinkles, and they light up when he grins widely as he sticks his hand out to shake each of ours, repeating our names as we introduce ourselves—the greeting so easy and natural that I can’t help but relax a little for the first time since yesterday’s crazy events.

“I had them put some drinks in the assembly room for you,” Jax tells us. “Kincaid is in a business meeting,