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Before she could reply, Erasmus, who was glancing around the room at the takeout containers and blankets, said, “Have you been living in here?”

The woman remained silent.

Erasmus said, “What’s your name?”

She pulled the tattered sleeves of her sweatshirt over her fingers—fingers that looked like they had been burned several times, likely from lighting all those candles. “Helia,” she whispered.

“Like the goddess.” Erasmus’s voice was as quiet as hers.

The woman gave him a funny look, but nodded. “Like the goddess.”

Rain began to fall from the ceiling. At first, the girl and her dog did not notice it, too distracted by what was going on in the old building to care about a little bit of rain. But soon, the water drops were growing in size, and the basement was flooding.

Erasmus, Elix, and Helia didn’t notice. They kept talking, unaffected by the water rising past knee-height.

The girl and her dog began to panic. “Help!” she called to them, Singer echoing her plea with a bark.

She sloshed through the water, moving as fast as she could toward the group of three peculiar people, but it was like moving through quicksand. No matter how hard she ran, she couldn’t reach them, and soon the water was too deep to stand in.

“We have to get out of here!” she shouted. But they did not hear her. She could see them, but they couldn’t see her. She was alone.

She treaded water to stay afloat, but it just kept getting deeper, pushing her head closer to the ceiling. Erasmus, Elix, and Helia were down below, unaffected by the rising water. They kept talking, their faces obscured by the dark, rippling depths.

The girl swam up the stairwell, her dog paddling behind her, but the door was sealed, and they couldn’t get out. Her head neared the ceiling, and soon Singer went under.

“No!” she cried out on a broken breath. She dove under the surface, attempting to grab him, but he was already gone.

She came up for air, gasping, and bumped her head on the ceiling.

“Help!” she called again, but it was no use.

The space in which she had air left to breathe kept getting smaller, and smaller, and smaller…

And the girl began to drown.

14

Border Stronghold

PARADISI, STATE OF KER

Darien barked to Tanner, “Clean the wound and stitch her up!”

The hacker acted without delay, hurrying to Ivy’s side as Darien pushed past Joyce, who was leaning on the seat over Loren, back door open.

“What happened?” Darien demanded.

“I don’t know, she just stopped breathing,” Joyce said. “I gave her more serum—”

“How much?”

“One vial.”

He lifted Loren out of the truck and laid her down on the ground. Joyce rushed after him, clutching the case that held the vials of serum.

Darien grabbed it from her and pushed the hem of Loren’s sweatshirt—one of his—up to her chin. He unzipped the case, bit the cap off a syringe, and filled it with one of the vials.

“Come on,” he muttered, watching the teal liquid fill the tube too goddamn slowly. To Loren, he said, “Stay with me, baby, stay with me. Come on.”