UNDERNEATH MY WARM BEDCOVERS, I watched the footage on my phone for the fifth time since waking up this morning: Chae Rin outside a coffee shop in Thunder Bay, Ontario, beating the ever-living crap out of a group of pink-faced frat boys. She’d only been fifteen then, just started her training. I had to dig deep in the Doll Soldiers archive to find the historic post: Breaking: CHAE RIN KIM LOSES HER SHIT (AGAIN)! One hundred pages before it got locked by mods.

In the grainy video, you could just hear Chae Rin yell, “The hell did you just call me? I said come back here,” before kicking down a lamppost with the amount of effort comparable to passing a soccer ball to a two-year-old. Cell Phone Guy ran for his life just as his feed cut.

“Only one year into training! Can the Sect control their new Effigy?” Cable news television had eaten it up, and from that point on Chae Rin’s temper became her narrative. It made people understandably nervous.

One thing I’d learned about Effigies during my years as a lowly fan was that they were stronger than regular humans. They had to be; they were built to fight monsters.

We. I shifted uncomfortably in my bed.

It was the sort of deal where you get stronger as you go along. Strength with experience, or something like that. Except Chae Rin was the strongest Effigy by far, even before she started training. The dark purple bruise on my innocent, unsuspecting forehead could attest to that. If anything, it only highlighted just how little the world still knew about the Effigies, despite all the research. Just like the phantoms. So little information out there about the monsters of the world.

One thing was for sure: I’d have to be very careful the next time we talked. Hopefully Rhys had packed a helmet.

With an oafish grumble, I dragged myself out of bed, ready to execute plan B. Last night, we’d found a hotel in a quaint, rustic little town a stone’s throw away. Rhys had been checking in when a staff member told me about the fair happening today.

“It’s a promotional event in town,” he’d explained. “The circus does it whenever they debut shows. Should be going on all day tomorrow!”

I had to give it a shot. After getting directions, I dumped my phone into my sweater pocket and headed to the fair. It wasn’t a guarantee that I would find Chae Rin in town with the other performers, but if I did, something told me I’d do better on my own. Rhys was an agent of the organization Chae Rin was currently pissed off at, but I was an Effigy like her. Maybe she’d drop some of her guard if we could talk one-on-one.

Why the hell did Effigies have to be so damn hard to deal with?

Crossing my arms, I trudged through the town.

The fair was in full swing. Tons of people packed the streets, delighted by the juggling clowns, the makeshift acts, the rogue balloons, and the stands upon stands of food and merchandise. It was distracting, to say the least. I tried to focus on finding Chae Rin, but after two hours of searching and asking around, it became clear that she wasn’t here. Plan B was a bust.

“Jolie fille!” said one of the vendors as I approached. “Puis-je vous intéresser à un collier?”

“Sorry, I can’t understand you,” I told him absently, because I was still a bit distracted by the llama pen I’d just passed.

The vendor promptly switched to English. “A pretty necklace for a pretty girl?”

I never understood why some salesmen thought creepiness was the way to rake in profits. A polite “no” was ready on the tip of my tongue, but I stopped once I noticed the row of dolls on the wall behind him.

The vendor followed my gaze, grinning with all his teeth. “Ah yes, our matryoshka dolls. The finest quality, imported from Russia, carved by the country’s finest craftsmen.”

Please. I knew better than to believe that nonsense, but the dolls held me nonetheless. Little black-inked faces, red scarves, and flowery dresses painted with fine strokes onto delicate wood. The vendor took one off the shelf and popped off the top. One girl after another after another, each tinier than the last, until the vendor placed the final doll at the end of the row. As it was too small for any loving detail, the painter had opted to give her only a simple stroke that might have been a smile.

“Do you like them? They are very pretty, no?”

They fascinated me, the dolls. They drew me to them with their silent siren call. But their beady eyes and painted smiles felt twisted somehow, as if they were hiding secrets from me.

My skin was crawling. Why? Why were my fingers twitching? My mouth dried, and even still I couldn’t articulate why.

“Matryoshka,” I repeated.

It was Natalya who was the Matryoshka Princess, not me. Never once did it seem like a fitting nickname, but it was one Natalya had held on to with pride when she was alive. Matryoshka.

One girl after another after another . . . locked endlessly . . . helplessly . . .

A flash of pain shot across my head. I doubled over, my hand pressed against my left temple.

“Are you okay, little miss?”

I nodded, but then winced again. The pain beat against my skull, too loud for me to make out the voices now whispering beneath the dull rhythm.

“Miss?”

“Thanks,” I said quickly. “I should go now.”

I stumbled forward, but the pain kept pounding against my head, relentless. I shut my eyes to block it out, but by the time I pried them open again, I wasn’t at the fair anymore.

Scenes passed by like a torrent of wind, rushed and bewildering. Disoriented, I stumbled along, but I couldn’t feel the cobbled street beneath my sneakers.

It was wet. I looked down. No street. I was standing in a shallow white stream. Hot. And in front of me—a red door, deep in the mist. Grand and imperial. Magnificent. But fleeting. It vanished as soon as it’d entered my vision.

What the hell was going on? I held my head, every part of me trembling. I’d felt this before. At La Charte. In Brooklyn. After Saul’s diseased lips had violated mine.

Last time, I saw a girl sleeping in her study. This time I was in a beautiful penthouse, sleek and modern with its white settees and trendy pop art. A stylish and glamorous apartment. The very same one featured on an entertainment news show about three months ago.

That is, when Natalya had given them the tour.

I was in Natalya’s apartment in Madrid. And there was Chae Rin by the fireplace, leaning against the wall. Her arms fiddled with something behind her back.

“Anyway, don’t see it as something to feel embarrassed about.”

It was Natalya’s voice, her Russian accent.

Except they were passing through my lips.

I could panic only on the inside; my hands were moving without my say so, as if they weren’t mine at all. They took the top off of a crystal decanter on the shelf and poured scotch into a tiny glass. I couldn’t even stand the taste of alcohol.

“Like I said earlier, Chae Rin, just think of it as a learning experience.”

“Uh, y-yeah, okay. Thanks, Natalya.”

I’d never seen Chae Rin look this nervous before. And the guilt in her eyes—naked guilt. It was hard to ignore.

The ring . . . The whisper came from deep within me. This had happened before too, during Saul’s attack. A voice whispering to me from inside me. But this voice was distinctly different. It was Natalya’s. This time, it was Natalya whispering to me. . . .

“Chae Rin?” Natalya’s voice was beyond my ability to control. “Is anything wrong?”

At this, Chae Rin jumped.

Fire suddenly enveloped the memory in an unforgiving inferno. Grabbing my throbbing head, I stumbled backward, out of Natalya’s body, out of the apartment, out of Madrid, until I felt my feet splash back into the white stream.

No, this was all wrong. I didn’t want this. I had to get back home.

I shut my eyes. It took every bit of strength I had, but I managed to forcibly detangle myself from the trap of my own mind, dragging myself back into reality step by painful step. I collapsed, gasping for air as I finally forced my eyelids apart, dizzy and disoriented.

Thank god. I was back at the fair, crumpled on the ground in front of a pretty shocked circus performer. It was a little weird how she was tied flat against a brightly painted wooden target, but I didn’t question it. Not at first.

I saw the glint of the blade in the knife thrower’s hand before I realized I should be screaming.

“Bougez!” he screeched behind me.

People probably didn’t stumble in front of his target often, but I still hoped his circus instincts would be sharp enough to keep him from letting a knife fly while I was in his line of fire, a sitting duck. Thankfully, the knife stayed in his raised grip.

But he’d had help. There was a guy standing next to him, his hand wrapped around the knife thrower’s trembling wrist. The guy was perfectly calm, but the performer definitely wasn’t, and judging by his panicked eyes, I could guess that if the young man hadn’t grabbed him in time, I’d have gotten a brand-new hole in my head. It was only when the performer’s shock wore off and his arm slackened that he was let go.

As for the guy, he was really tall and thin, his chic, angled face, long, frail limbs, and shaggy hair reminding me of one of those Eurotrash models who always looked like an industry party away from rehab. The tight-fitting jeans and plain white shirt secured the look.

This was the guy who’d just saved me from an accidental skewering.

“Are you okay?” he asked in an accent I couldn’t recognize. There was a bit of Russian in it, but unlike Natalya’s it sounded as if it’d been sanded down and scratched away over the years, blending with too many things that made it now indecipherable.

“My head,” I whispered, but even whispering was painful. I still couldn’t speak. My throat now felt alien to me, hoarse from the sensation of carrying someone else’s words. I could only look up at the young man, at his delicate face framed by pale gold hair.

“Move!” said the female circus performer behind me, still tied to the target. That was when I finally noticed the knives sticking out of the wood, inches away from her skintight leotard.

“Yes, move!” It was the knife thrower this time. “You should not be here. We are in the middle of an act!”

Evidently. Crowds of people were gawking at me. My chic rescuer, on the other hand, looked seconds away from bursting into laughter. He was probably just some kid who’d passed by the right place at the right time. Luckily for me.

I looked around. Perhaps it was because of the crowd, but I couldn’t see the doll vendor. I couldn’t even remember leaving his stand. How did I get all the way here? It was like I’d been sleepwalking. . . .

“It’s time to get up,” said my rescuer, but my legs refused to cooperate. I flopped uselessly on the ground.

“Miss,” the knife thrower prodded, but the young man’s chilling stare stopped him dead. I wasn’t even sure if I’d seen it correctly. Its joyously murderous glint, in one moment dangerously clear, vanished the very next second, leaving a cold void in his catlike eyes.

This guy wasn’t normal.

The knife thrower must have felt it too, because his arm seized at his side.

“This young lady seems to be having some trouble.” I could smell the blood off his pleasant smile. “Please be kind and give us a moment.”

Leave, in other words. The knife thrower was too quick to oblige, turning to the audience and apologizing in French and English. He was probably too shaken to notice the knife slipping from his hand and landing on the soft earth at his feet.

“I’m sorry.” I slurred my own apology as the crowd began to dissipate. The female performer slipped out of her binds pretty easily and joined her partner in scurrying away to explain the situation to one of their colleagues.

“Never mind that.” The young man shifted the scarf around his neck. “Are you okay? Let me help you up.”

“No, it’s okay,” I said as urgently as I could. Gently batting his hand away, I’d just started to crawl off when he grabbed me by both arms and lifted me. I managed to stay on my feet this time, but the grip that kept me steady was the same one I was trying to get away from.

“Growing up, I was told never to reject help when it’s freely given,” he said in a friendly enough tone. “Or you may not be as lucky the next time around.”

His grip tightened.

“But then,” he continued, his thin lips red with Cheshire mischief, “Natalya never believed in luck.”

Wincing, I looked up at him, too shocked to speak.

With a long finger, he trailed a line down his sunken cheek. I was close enough to hear the scratch of his nail. “Do you?”

The knife thrower’s last blade flew, digging its point deep into the wood behind us. The golden strands falling from Creepy Guy’s head were the only physical proof of just how close he’d come to death.

Apparently, that amused him.

“Aidan,” he said.

Rhys stood where the knife thrower had been, his hard gaze fixed on the mysterious boy.

“Maia, get away from him.”

I didn’t need telling twice. I’d already taken advantage of the distraction, pushing myself away from him.

The boy laughed as I stumbled back. “This is curious. Where did you come from, Aidan?”

Rhys jerked his head toward me. “Tracked her phone.”

My hands found my cell phone in my pocket.

“Aidan, come on, don’t look at me like that,” the boy said. “You know I’d never do anything to her.” He tilted his head. “Unless I was ordered to. But that’s just the job, right?”

I swallowed.

Rhys stuck his hands into his pockets, but even then I could tell that they were balled into fists. “Vasily.”

The young man leaned forward. “Yes?”

“I’m really not a fan of clichés. But touch her again and I will kill you. I’m serious.”

At this, somehow, Vasily looked positively gleeful. “You can’t. You don’t have any more knives.”

“I always have more knives.”

When Rhys took a step forward, Vasily raised his hands in defeat. “Okay, okay. I was only helping her out.” And he laughed again. “Why always so dramatic?”

I inched closer to Rhys’s side. “Rhys, who is he?”

“An old friend,” Vasily answered at the same time Rhys replied, “An agent.”

Agent? I blamed the depiction of Sect agents on prime-time television for my utter disbelief: strong and strapping men and women, young but not too young, cool in black suits and shades, or in their red combat-ready flak jackets. Howard had fit the bill better than either Vasily or Rhys, the latter too geeky and the former too heroin chic in his jeans and coat to set off any authority bells. At the end of the day, it just showed how little I knew about the Sect, an organization that shared almost nothing with the world whose safety they were supposed to ensure.

I looked between the two of them, at Rhys’s anger quietly simmering as Vasily held his hands coyly behind his back.

“What are you doing here, Vasily?” It was more of a demand than a question.

“I was in the neighborhood, doing a few things here and there.”

“For Blackwell? You still his personal errand boy?”

The insult didn’t seem to register or, at the very least, Vasily didn’t seem to care. He considered his nails with a particularly pleasant expression. “Since I heard you were coming here, I thought I’d see how you were doing with the mission.”

“We’re doing fine,” Rhys answered shortly.

“Then where’s Chae Rin?”

Rhys frowned. I knew he couldn’t very well answer, Bathroom, without looking like a moron.

“You were sent the update too, weren’t you, Aidan?” Vasily hid his hand inside his pocket and moments later drew out a phone. “The update on the pending operation?”

Rhys nodded stiffly. I sucked in a breath and waited.

“I’m assuming that’s why you rushed out to find this girl.” He jerked his head toward me. “Things are moving along, but the situation is more time sensitive than ever before. To meet the Sect’s schedule, you’ll need to recruit Chae Rin within the next hour.”

One hour to find and placate a pissed-off Effigy. Should be easy.

“There’s something else,” said Rhys. “There’s another reason why you’re here, isn’t there?”

“Don’t be so paranoid, Aidan. I just follow my orders like everyone else.” Closing his eyes, Vasily lifted his head and breathed in the fresh air. “And who knows? Maybe I’ll catch a show while I’m in the area. What do you think?”

Rhys’s eyes narrowed, but it was obvious that Vasily was already done with him.

“It was nice meeting you, Maia Finley.”

I shivered at the sound of my name on his tongue.

“Oh,” he added, stroking the faded stubble on his chin. “One more thing—about the new circus act that debuted yesterday . . .”

Rhys must have reported it earlier, which meant by now the information was already circulating throughout the organization. Would Chae Rin get in trouble? I bit my lip.

“I heard a rumor from a particularly interested party. You could call it a lead.” He plucked a balloon out of a passing clown’s hand, twisting the string around his finger. “When you talk to the manager, remember to check for a white jewel.”

“White jewel?” said Rhys.

“I’m almost certain he’ll have it on his person.”

But Rhys didn’t look convinced. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Truthfully, I have other things to attend to. Otherwise, I’d check it out myself. Now that I’ve told you this, I’m counting on you to handle things quickly and professionally, as always.”

His smirk held a deeper meaning. A secret. Rhys must have known what it was, because his body stiffened at the sight of it, but it was a secret neither boy would tell.

“Of course,” Vasily continued, “since time is of the essence, if you’re not able to get things done, then I have orders to take matters into my own hands. And nobody wants that.”

It looked to be the case, because Rhys’s expression became colder and harder than ever before. I shuddered.

Vasily turned. “Quickly now.”

“Wait,” said Rhys, but Vasily had already disappeared into the crowd.