“Ariadne.”
The sound of Bosque Mar speaking his sister’s name made Ren growl, but no one paid him any attention.
“You don’t have to fail,” Bosque whispered to Adne.
“Fail?” Adne repeated. She kept her eyes closed, and Ren sensed that she didn’t trust herself to stay in control of her mind and body if she looked at Bosque—even in this shadow form.
“What your father asked you to do,” Bosque continued. He ignored everyone in the room but Adne.
“No,” Adne’s voice rasped with uncertainty.
“Yes,” Bosque replied. “Tell me. What did your father want? What was the only task he bid you complete so his sacrifice was not an empty gesture?”
Ren flinched. Bosque was talking about Monroe, who wasn’t just Adne’s father. He was Ren’s as well.
“His sacrifice.” Adne’s hands had begun to shake.
Tendrils of smoke in the shape of large hands stretched toward Adne, enveloping her wrists.
“Tell me, Ariadne.”
“I was supposed to save him,” Adne whispered. “I was supposed to save Ren. But I didn’t.”
It’s not your fault, Adne. None of this was your fault. Ren was desperate to stop this, to break through Bosque’s manipulation, but whatever hold the Harbinger had over Ren prevented him from speaking.
“Will you deny my call, Ariadne?” Bosque Mar’s words echoed as if spoken in a vast, empty chamber. “Will you rebuke me when I offer you a chance at redemption?”
Adne didn’t reply. Her whole body trembled.
“I can give you a family again,” Bosque continued. “Your brother will be restored.”
“No!”
It wasn’t Adne who shouted at the shadow figure, but Sarah. She looked like a person who’d just woken from a long, exhausting dream and saw the real world again. She stared at Bosque’s astral form in utter horror.
At Sarah’s cry, Adne’s eyes flew open, pulling her out of the trance she’d been captured in since Bosque’s arrival.
“Ariadne, don’t listen to him. Fight back.” Sarah began to move toward Adne. “This is a terrible mistake. We never should have come.”
“You disappoint me, Sarah,” Bosque said. Beneath the smooth timbre of his voice, irritation crackled. “I thought you loved your son.”
“My son was born to expel you from this world.” Sarah’s voice shook. “I let myself forget who you are. And I’m glad Shay will never know how close I came to betraying him and everything I’ve ever fought for.”
“You are as foolish as you have always been.” Bosque’s silhouette crumpled into a dense ball of shadow that hurtled across the room, hitting Sarah full in the chest.
Sarah cried out and dropped to the floor, unmoving.
“Sarah!” Adne rushed to the fallen Searcher’s side. She rested the side of her face on Sarah’s chest. “She’s still breathing.”
“Not for long.” Logan walked toward the women with purpose.
Adne jumped up, barring his path to Sarah. “I won’t let you do this.”
Now that Bosque’s spirit—or whatever that shadow had been—was gone, Ren was relieved to see that Adne seemed to have recovered her strength. She faced off with Logan, defiant.
Logan smiled at her. “Are you going to kill me, Ariadne? I’m sure you want to, but I don’t think you will. You still have too many questions.”
“Maybe I do,” Adne said. “But as much as I need answers, you need my cooperation.”
“I’m listening.”
“Let her live,” Adne said to Logan, “and I’ll go with you. I won’t put up a fight. Wherever Bosque has told you to take me, I’ll go.”
No. The word was burning in Ren’s chest, but he couldn’t shout it the way he wanted to. He couldn’t stop her.
“We’re bargaining now, are we?” Logan steepled his fingertips in front of his face. “From where I’m standing, I think I’m the one holding all the cards.”
“If you really think that, then you’ll have no trouble stopping me when I take Sarah and go,” Adne replied.
Logan’s hands dropped to his side.
“Somehow you’ve been talking with Bosque Mar,” Adne continued. “And I’m sure you can manage some petty magic, but your real power is gone. You can’t summon a wraith to fight for you. Do you really think you can take me on your own?”
Logan stole a glance at Chase, whose eyes bulged as he nearly dropped his glass, and Adne laughed.
“Strength in numbers only works when there’s actual strength to back it up.”
“Fine.” Logan shoved his hands in his trouser pockets. “I’ll get an ambulance to take Sarah to the hospital, where she can be cared for.”
Adne shook her head. “She was just impaled by a plume of black smoke. There’s not a mark on her. How will a hospital help her? She needs to be treated at the Academy.”
“So you’re just going to run home and then come right back?” Logan snorted. “With an army of Searchers, no doubt.”
“No,” Adne replied. “I’ll open a door to my room and leave Sarah there. And I’ll come back alone—with one condition.”
“What’s that?” Logan asked.
“I have to be sure Sarah gets help,” Adne said. “I can’t leave her without telling someone where she is.”
“How wonderful that I’m beholden to the whims of a lunatic.” Logan glared at her. “You are not telling anyone about this.”
“You’re right,” Adne said. “I can’t tell anyone. I’d never make it back here.” She looked at Ren. “But he can.”
“What?” Ren frowned at his sister.
After giving Ren a brief, sad smile, Adne said to Logan, “I’m right, aren’t I? You can tell Ren where to go and who to talk to.”
Logan nodded.
“Then send him to Tristan,” Adne said. “You can wait until I’m here with you and I’ve closed the door to the Academy.”
“At which point you’ll hand over the tools of your trade.” Logan gestured to the gleaming skeins that hung from Adne’s belt.
Adne shrugged. “If it makes you feel better.”