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He tsked. “That’s quite the mouth.” He grabbed her around the back of her neck, fingers digging in. Then bent down, leaningin close, his hot breath grazing the shell of her ear. “I would’ve enjoyed fucking it that night at the club.”

Shay spat at his feet.

He slapped her hard enough that her head whipped to the side.

“Hey, don’t touch her!” Tanner snapped.

Austin shoved him in the back of the head. “Eyes forward, Atlas.”

Eilidh giggled. “You sure we can’t play for longer, Austin? I’m having fun.”

“The city’s being evacuated. We gotta go. So lucky for you two,” he rammed the barrel of the gun into the back of Tanner’s skull, causing him to rock forward on his knees. “We can’t take our time.”

A hollow click as he took the safety off.

“It’s truly an honor that I, of all people, get to blow out that brain of yours, Atlas.” Tanner’s pounding heartbeat was audible, his shallow breaths clouding in the air before him. “That brilliant,brilliantbrain. I bet Lucent Enterprises would pay good money to study you. Maybe this won’t be such a waste after all.”

Shay peeked at Tanner, her breaths shaking through her. His hands were interlocked behind his head, the index finger of his right hand twitching toward his left wrist. Pointing at something.

As if it had a mind of its own, the fish skeleton on her wrist—a conduit tat—began to glow.

Illusion. He was asking her to use illusion—the rare magic that wouldn’t hold long enough for them to slip away.

But illusion wasn’t the only power slumbering inside her.

Could she do it? Could she find the strength to control her uncontrollable gift just enough to survive this? She didn’t know. But she had to trust herself.

“Say bye, Atlas,” Austin crooned, finger teasing the trigger.

Now. She had to do thisnow.

“I’m so sorry, Shay,” Tanner whispered hoarsely, as if any of this was his fault.

Her heart pounded, death so close she could practically taste it.

No. This wasn’t happening. They weren’t dying—not today.

No.

She squeezed her eyes shut and breathed, her whole body tingling as she summoned her magic?—

And scared the shit out of Atlas as she bellowed a battle cry and lit those assholes up with lightning instead.

20

Yveswich General Hospital

YVESWICH, STATE OF KER

“Noon?”Lace seethed.

Darien stood across from Roark out front of the hospital, the others murmuring behind them, all of them processing the massive fucking bomb he’d just dropped—and calculating how many hours were left before the Fleet army would seal off the city, trapping all who failed to make it out in time behind an impenetrable forcefield. The kind that incinerated anything—living or dead—that tried to get through it.

Lace added, “That’s less than seventeen hours from now!”

Less than seventeen hours was a goddamn joke. There were millions of people in Yveswich.Millions.Evacuation efforts had already begun, but Darien knew the public was being told so little that a lot of them would choose to stay in their homes. Choosedeath—without even fucking realizing it.

“How much do your people know about this?” he demanded of Roark. To the others, he said over his shoulder, “Someone go and get the truck. We need to leave—now.”