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“The hospital’s too crowded!” another aide said. “We don’t have a choice!” His words were ridiculous. The hospital was nearly empty now.

“We can take her to Whitesides,” I said. “To the Governor’s Hospital!”

Fare yanked me around. “They’re not taking plague patients there,” she hissed at me. “Not ones this far gone.”

“How many?” I choked out.

“There are thirty left, with the new arrivals,” Alric said. “Just thirty.”

“Justthirty?” I spat. “That’s thirty people you’re leaving to die!”

“Nedra, we have to go,” Fare said firmly.

She pulled at my arm again, but I jerked away and made a dive for Ernesta. “Not,” I started as one of the larger aides grabbed me around my stomach, “Without. My. Sister!” I kicked at him, screaming in frustrated rage, angry tears springing to my eyes. Alric joined the fray, and Fare, and someone else, a potion maker who flirted with me sometimes during breaks. I bellowed, kicking out, scratching Fare across the face, making the potion maker wheeze when my foot connected with her stomach, but I didn’t care, they had to let me go, they couldn’t just expect me to leave my sister here to die.

Alone.

I was losing ground.

“Don’t drink that!” I shouted as Alric and Fare and the others pulled me to the door of the hospital. I lashed out, grabbing the heavy mahogany, holding on as long as I could, my fingers slipping on the smooth wood. “Nessie! You hear me? Don’t you drink that! I’m coming back for you!”

I lost my grip, and the others pulled me to the boat, holding me so tight that my bucking body never touched the stones. The alchemists already on board tutted at me, some sympathetically, but I didn’t care. “How could you?” I spat at them as the skipper pushed the boat away. “How could any of you?” I stood up, the boat wobbling. I think they thought I would dive over the side, swim back to the quarantine hospital. A few people even reached for me, aiming to hold me back, but I shook them off.

“The Emperor gave the order,” one of the alchemists said. It was Frugal Frue, the alchemist who had been stingy with potions. I wondered if he knew how much tincture of blue ivy had been left behind.

“The hospital is closing,” another alchemist said. “And besides”—she turned her head toward the huge castle-like building—“none of them would have made it anyway.”

FORTY-EIGHT

Nedra

I refused tospeak to any of the traitors on the boat.

As soon as we disembarked, I tried to board a ferry back.

None would go to the island.

Fine, I thought.I’ll steal a boat tonight. I’ll go back on my own.

But first there was something else I needed to steal.

I barely registered the walk up to Yugen. Mentally, I stoked my rage, preparing to pry the iron gates apart myself to get to campus—but I didn’t need to.

The gates were already open.

School had resumed. Posters littered the gates detailing new methods to protect the students, including strictly enforced potion regimens, no off-campus activities allowed, screening for visitors, and no visitations to any hospital, even for medical students. I wondered how many parents kept their children at home regardless.

I marched onto campus, the feeling surreal. Everything felt so aggressivelynormal—students casually walking from the cafeteria, study groups gathering by the library. I wondered what day it was. How long had classes been back in session?

Didn’t they know that everything was different now? That the world had ended already?

I ignored the graveled paths that intersected with the lumpy iron statue of Bennum Wellebourne and went straight to the administrationbuilding. I stormed down the stairs to Master Ostrum’s office and grabbed the doorknob.

Locked.

I rattled the metal, pulling on it, but it didn’t budge. My open palm slammed into the frosted glass window on the door, and it shook so violently it nearly cracked. I kicked at the wood, cursing, and tried the handle again. As I pulled away, the door opened.

“Nedra?” Master Ostrum looked surprised to see me.