CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Fear Is the Stone

CHLOE SAT IN THE BACK OF THE BEAT-UP WAGON HER FATHER drove, watching Joshua watch the city slide by. She could practically see the miles—and the busy world that filled them—etching themselves onto his strange little mind. Chloe held the raven’s eye in her hand, trying to remember its warmth from long ago, trying to imagine what Isabel might have done to it. But maybe she’d done nothing, just like she claimed. Maybe she’d only needed to feel that power again. Chloe could relate to that.

In the front seat, meanwhile, her father and Isabel weren’t talking. He’d asked how the dinner had gone, and Isabel had only replied, “It’s nice to know Chloe has such good friends.” Her voice sounded sad.

Good friends, yes. And truth be told, it was because of Horace and his mom that Chloe had the raven’s eye now. The most suspicious part of Chloe imagined that Isabel had been trying to plant some dangerous device in Horace’s house, to do away with the Fel’Daera somehow, once and for all. And if there was even a chance that that was true, Chloe would take this danger with her instead.

Isabel and her father were murmuring now, discussing directions. Isabel was telling him not to take the Kennedy. Her father agreed without complaint. Joshua, meanwhile, looked confused. Chloe didn’t know much about driving around the city, but hearing her father give in to Isabel so easily made her grind her teeth. She felt like she could practically crush the raven’s eye in her hands. She gripped it so hard that after a while, it felt as warm as it had when it was working.

They crossed the river. Chloe caught a glimpse of it gleaming in the twilight, lined by trees, a surprising slice of wildness here in the city. She thought back to the riverbank two nights before, and that horrible Auditor. Despite everything, despite all of Chloe’s power, what might have happened if Isabel hadn’t shown up when she did? Her rage boiled higher. She hated the thought that she might’ve actually needed Isabel’s help. She gripped the raven’s eye until her fingers hurt, squeezing it harder and harder.

So hard it started to burn.

Chloe opened her hands. Her palms were warm—warmer than they should have been. And there between them, deep in the center of the raven’s eye, she spied a speck of light. A golden spark, small and distant. She stared and stared, hardly daring to breathe, watching as the tiny glint of light grew brighter.

“What did you do?” she whispered.

Her dad looked at her in the rearview mirror. “Sorry, Clo, what did you say?”

She ignored him. She lifted the raven’s eye up, cupping the tiny glow in both hands. Isabel turned, looking over the seat. When she spotted the yellow light, her face went slack with wonder—or was it dismay? “No,” she breathed.

An icy finger of dread ran down Chloe’s spine. “What did you do?” she said.

Isabel turned to Chloe’s father. “Take us to the lakeshore. Hurry.”

“No,” Chloe said, her voice as thick as dirt. The glow of the raven’s eye continued to grow in her hands, like a candle flame drifting slowly up from the deeps. “Stop the car. Stop the car, Dad.”

“We can’t stop,” Isabel said. “They’ll find us.”

Chloe held her breath. She’d endured so much over the years—overcome so much, escaped from so much—that fear no longer came easy. But somehow these words chilled Chloe straight down to the marrow.

They’ll find us.

“The Riven,” Chloe said.

“Yes.”

Chloe’s dad looked over at Isabel but said nothing. Joshua, meanwhile, huddled against the driver’s-side door, watching Chloe fearfully. Chloe wrapped the raven’s eye in her hands, trying to bury its blooming light. “What did you do?” she asked for a third time.

“It was an accident!” Isabel cried. “I told you, I was only playing, trying to see what Jess’s harp could do. I was only peeling back the veins, pulling them inside out. There was no danger, not with that little harp, I never—”

“Danger,” Chloe said. “Danger of what?”

Isabel hesitated. She looked at Chloe’s dad, as if he had the answers, but he remained silent, gripping the steering wheel like he was strangling it. “Obversion,” said Isabel.

Chloe had never heard that exact word before, but she knew that the obverse of something was its opposite. “A reversal, you mean.”

“Yes.”

“So instead of hiding us from the Riven, now this stone is revealing us. It’s calling to them!” Chloe looked down at the orange-yellow light leaking from between her fingers. It grew slowly brighter by the second. She started rolling down the window, letting warm night air push into the car.

“No!” Isabel said. “You can’t just get rid of it.”

“The hell I can’t.”

Isabel reached over the seat and pressed the tip of her finger against the leestone. “It’s warm. Don’t you see? The light—it’s already grown from nothing into something.”

“What does that mean?”

“The light of an ordinary raven’s eye shrinks for a reason. And now, with the obversion . . . it grows for a reason.”

Chloe knew all too well that the usual purple cloud of a raven’s eye shrank whenever the Riven were focusing on the bearer of the stone. It shrank as the leestone absorbed that attention and eventually lost power. But now everything was backward. This burning yellow cloud was growing. “They already know we’re here,” Chloe said. “Is that what you’re saying? They’re already after us?”

“Yes,” said Isabel. “And whatever security we’ve earned from the leestones at Horace’s, or at the academy, it’s gone now.”

“Then I’ll destroy the stone.” She leaned toward the window.

“No!” Isabel said. “It won’t matter—in fact, it might make it worse. You might bring every Riven in the city down on us.”

“According to you,” Chloe said.

“According to me, yes. I’m sorry, Clover. I never meant—”

“Stop it! Just stop it!” cut in Chloe, tired of excuses.

“It’s okay, Belle,” her father said soothingly—maddeningly. “It’s okay.” He looked in the rearview mirror anxiously, but not at Chloe. She realized he was checking to see if they were being followed. More than any of them, he knew what it was like to suffer at the hands of the Riven. And he was the one Chloe was worried about now.

Chloe cursed to herself, resisting the urge to look back. She didn’t know what to believe. If only Horace were here—maybe he would be able to logic out what was happening, figure out what Isabel done, how this damn Tan’kindi was actually working. Or better yet!—he could send it through the Fel’Daera, erase it from existence for a while. But she couldn’t risk taking it back there. She glanced over at Joshua. The boy was still cowering against the door, clearly afraid of the burning leestone.

“We need to get to the lake,” Isabel said. “Someplace with a pier. We need to throw the stone into the water—the deeper, the better.”

“Navy Pier,” said Chloe’s dad.

Isabel shook her head. “Too many people. We need someplace quieter.”

That didn’t make much sense to Chloe. Safety in numbers, right? Surely the Riven wouldn’t dare to chase them down when there were crowds of people around—assuming any of this was true in the first place.

Joshua spoke. “There’s a closer pier anyway.”

“Where, Joshua?” asked Isabel. “Tell us where.”

“Almost straight down the road we’re on. Go all the way to Lake Shore Drive. Just a little bit north, there’s a beach with lots of sand. A long pier, hooked like a clothes hanger. The water is deep.”

“Perfect,” said Isabel. She leaned into Chloe’s dad, patting his arm. “Get us there. Fast as you can.”

They drove on, gunning it between stoplights and sitting nervously when they were caught by a red. The leestone grew brighter and warmer in Chloe’s hands. Time and again she almost chucked it out the window, Isabel’s warnings be damned. How did a raven’s eye work? And how had Isabel reversed that process? Chloe had heard Horace’s tale about tossing a raven’s eye into the street, shattering it, and how it had drawn Dr. Jericho away, saving him. Maybe with things in reverse right now, Isabel was right—maybe shattering the stone would be the worst thing she could do.

Or maybe this entire thing was a lie.

And then, as they were stopped at a red light, a flash of movement caught Chloe’s eye. A strange, slashing flicker in the driver’s-side mirror. Chloe twisted in her seat, staring out the rear window. A block back, she saw a towering figure just crossing the street. The figure turned and began sprinting up the sidewalk after them.

A Mordin.

“Dad, we’ve gotta move,” Chloe said.

“I can’t. The light’s red. I’m boxed in.”

Now Chloe spotted another Mordin behind them, farther back on the far sidewalk, swiftly closing in.

“We really need to move, Dad.”

Chloe searched for the third Mordin that she knew had to be nearby. A little park off to the left was empty. Nothing up ahead. And then, just as she turned to the passenger side, the smell of brimstone drifted in through the open window, sharp and unmistakable. The same instant she caught the smell, she saw it—Mordin number three, hurtling down the cross street straight at them, all arms and legs and grinning teeth. It was no more than thirty feet away—a mere three or four strides on those monstrous legs. Isabel saw it too and gasped.

Chloe fumbled with the button for her still-open window. “Now, Dad! Now!”

The words weren’t even out before the engine roared. The wagon lurched into reverse, then surged forward. Chloe was thrown back in her seat. Tires squealed. Horns blared. And then a great gnarled hand reached in and caught the edge of the open window frame. The car actually heaved to the right under the force of the blow. The Mordin held on, loping alongside as they accelerated, glaring savagely in at them. It was particularly ugly, with a cruel nose and wideset eyes. It stank even worse than Dr. Jericho. It struggled to reach inside, but Chloe swung her fist as hard as she could against the long, bony fingers still gripping the door. Once, twice, three times. She might as well have been pounding on steel.

The Mordin growled and took a mighty leap, landing heavily on top of the wagon. The roof buckled. Joshua curled into a ball, keening.

Chloe went thin, so filled with rage that she barely heard the Alvalaithen’s song. She shoved the raven’s eye into her pocket and slipped out of her seat belt. She bent over the backseat, digging around in the hatch. It was heaped full of junk, and she didn’t even know what she was looking for, but she had to do something. She would do something.

Her father sped down the street, weaving this way and that, but he couldn’t shake the Mordin. The creature scratched at the roof with nails that sounded like they were made of steel.

Chloe’s hand found something cold and hard, buried deep in the junk. She focused on the object, letting her fingers find purchase, knowing at once what it was—a crowbar. Holding it tight, she let her own lack of substance spread into it, turning it into a ghost. She pulled it easily from the pile and got up on her haunches.

Joshua stared. “What are you doing?”

“Chloe, no,” said her dad, watching in the rearview mirror.

“Just keep driving,” she told him. “Don’t stop.” And then she stood up.

Her top half emerged through the roof of the car. The wind whipped her hair. They were passing through a cemetery, dark rows of tombstones on either side of the street. The Mordin crouched overhead like a hulking, horrible marionette, clinging to the luggage rack with one powerful hand and raking at the roof with the other. When he saw Chloe, he reared back in surprise, but quickly recovered and reached for her neck.

She felt his ghastly fingers pass through her throat as his hand closed on nothing. The Mordin stared, shocked, and was nearly shaken loose as the wagon swayed violently, but he hung on and broke into a greedy grin. “You,” he said, the word spilling musically from his ugly mouth like the strike of a bell.

“Me,” Chloe said, and she laid the ghostly crowbar deep across the meat of his thigh, and let go.

The Mordin shrieked in pain—a ghastly, trilling sound that split Chloe’s ears. He clutched at the bar now melded in his flesh and toppled off the roof, spilling into the street like a bundle of lumber, rolling to a stop as they roared away.

Chloe sank back into the car and released the Alvalaithen. She looked out the back, watching as the Mordin staggered to his feet and limped toward the curb.

“What did you do?” said Joshua into his hands, his eyes wide.

“I took care of it.”

Isabel’s eyes were on her too. “That was smart,” she said. “That was brave. If only I had my harp, I could have helped.”

Chloe didn’t reply. Truth be told, her heart was hammering over what she’d just done. She’d melded the crowbar inside the Mordin’s body—something she’d never done to a living creature before. Even a creature like a Riven. She’d considered it on the riverbank, with the Auditor, yet hadn’t actually had a chance to attempt it. But now it had just . . . happened.

“If I had my harp,” Isabel was saying, “I could undo the obversion.”

Chloe had heard enough. She pulled the raven’s eye from her pocket and thrust it into Isabel’s face. The raven’s eye was so bright now that it blinded her, so warm that her leg felt sunburned. “Why the lake?” she demanded. “I don’t need water to bury this. I can take it down into the ground and leave it where it’ll never be found.”

Isabel looked startled—frightened, even. “That’s too dangerous.”

“I can manage. I finally learned how to go underground, no thanks to you.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Isabel said, turning away. “We’re leaving a trail of smoke. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire. And how do you put out a fire?”

“Water,” Joshua said.

“That’s right. It’s the only way.”

The car rolled on, as fast as her father dared. Once, Chloe spotted another Mordin lunging from a dark alleyway, but they sped on past before it could reach them. Was it true that the raven’s eye couldn’t be buried? If her father hadn’t been here—and Joshua too, she supposed—Chloe would have put Isabel’s claim to the test. But she couldn’t afford the risk that Isabel might be speaking the truth. She couldn’t do that to her dad, not now.

“I don’t blame you for not trusting me,” Isabel said, not looking at anyone in particular but obviously speaking to Chloe.

“That’s right,” Chloe said. “I spectacularly don’t.”

“You think I did this on purpose.”

“I think lots of things,” Chloe replied.

Isabel twisted around again. “Then tell me: if I wanted the Riven to find us, why would I have warned you what was happening? Why wouldn’t I just let the raven’s eye burn, let the Riven come?”

Chloe hadn’t considered that, but she didn’t let an inch of doubt creep onto her face. “Maybe you’re just extra sneaky.”

“Or maybe I’m lost. Maybe I’m doing the best I can with the mess that’s been handed to me.”

“Like I said before,” Chloe said, not budging an inch, “get in line.”

Isabel held her gaze, steady and piercing. Chloe gave back as good as she got. Finally Isabel’s eyes dropped onto the dragonfly. “You could leave the car at any time, I think,” she said. “You could do with the raven’s eye whatever you think is best. And yet here you still are.” She flopped back into her seat, crossing her arms like a smugly satisfied child. Chloe had no answer for her.

They swung onto Lake Shore Drive. Off to the right, the dark waters of Lake Michigan stretched out to the horizon like an ocean. Joshua directed them to the beach. They passed a golf course and a marina, getting ever closer to the lake, but eventually they reached a point when Joshua was uncertain how to proceed any farther.

“There are no roads,” he said. “But the lake is still a ways away.”

“Which way is the pier?” Chloe’s dad asked. Joshua pointed, and he wrenched the wheel, sending the car bouncing over the curb and down a wide, deserted sidewalk that cut through an area wooded with shrubs and scrubby little trees. Chloe caught a glimpse of a sign that said bird sanctuary.

“I’m going to get you close, Chloe,” her dad said. “And then you get out. You move fast. You get rid of that thing.”

Cloe nodded. “Don’t follow me. Everyone stay in the car.”

“But—” Isabel began.

“Stay in the car,” Chloe repeated. “Especially you. I’m handling this.”

Far up ahead, they could see that the sidewalk ended in darkness. The lake lay somewhere beyond. Chloe leaned forward, gripping the raven’s eye.

“Go faster,” she told her dad.

“Chloe, it’s a dead end, we can’t—”

“Go as fast as you can for as far as you can. Wait until the last second. When you need to hit the brakes, tell me.”

Her dad glanced at her in the mirror, then nodded. The car surged forward, the engine straining. Chloe loosed the song of the Alvalaithen, drinking from it deeply. Power coursed through her as she went thin. She moved to the center of the seat, crouching. She willed the seat to stay firm beneath her. She’d learned years before—after the accident, when the earth had nearly swallowed her up—that in order for matter to feel solid beneath her, she had to believe that it was solid. Until that terrible day, she’d always unthinkingly believed in the earth beneath her feet. And ever since, she’d learned to wrestle that belief into being, to hold on to it tenaciously whenever she went thin, and even—when she had to—to point that belief where she needed it.

The station wagon careened over the sidewalk, bouncing madly. In the headlights, a thick row of shrubs grew nearer and nearer. Chloe waited, ready to spring, sure they were past the point of no return now but trusting her father. The shrubs loomed ever larger.

“Matthew,” said Isabel, bracing herself.

“Now!” her father shouted, and stomped on the brakes.

Chloe uncoiled, timing it almost perfectly. She leapt with all her might, diving between Isabel and her father. As she knifed through the cold plane of the windshield, she felt the distinctive warm hum of flesh streaking through her calf—someone’s fingers. It was Isabel, trying to catch her. To stop her? Save her? But of course she couldn’t be stopped, didn’t need saving.

She sailed over the plunging hood of the wagon as it screeched toward a halt. She felt herself tumbling in midair and she curled into it, somersaulting, air rushing through her and not slowing her at all. She sliced through the line of shrubs. They were covered in thorns that couldn’t touch her. Beyond: open air, darkness, the faint sound of water. A sandy beach, sloping gently away. Still thin, still clutching the raven’s eye, she sailed far out over the sand, a hundred feet or more. She opened out of her slow spin and somehow found herself descending feetfirst. She touched down, sinking into sand up to her belly.

It was shockingly cold down deep, where her feet were, and she felt a flicker of panic. But by believing she would not sink, she pushed back steadily, coasting as if she were water skiing, holding out her hands for balance. Still sliding, she gradually willed herself out of the cold ground, letting the ground grow solid bit by bit beneath her—from fog to feather to water to earth. Gradually she lifted and slowed, until at last she popped free entirely. Airborne again just for a moment, she let the dragonfly go still and then hit the ground running, headed for the darkness ahead where the lakeshore lay waiting.

She laughed out loud, exhilarated. That was a stunt worthy of Neptune’s cape. Sorry—cloak. But the thrill was short-lived. The sand was wet and soft and sprinkled with coarse vegetation. It was hard going. The wind off the lake blew straight into her face.

She ran for a hundred yards or so and then slowed to a trot, exhausted. She picked her way across the lumpy sand, almost like tiny dunes. She looked back once or twice but saw nothing—just the dark line of bushes and trees, and the city behind, with the bright lights of downtown far off to the south. She’d left her father back there without protection, and Joshua too. Even Isabel—without her harp, she was as vulnerable as any of them. But Chloe had the raven’s eye. If the Riven were still in pursuit, surely they’d be coming after her, not them.

At last she reached the foot of the pier. She leapt over a ribbon of brackish water and onto the wide concrete surface. Relieved to be off the sand, she broke into a run again, the wind ripping at her. It was dark, and there were no railings—just a six-foot fall into the water on either side—but the light of the raven’s eye lit the way now, gleaming like a torch. She set her sights on a small light tower shining far out on the hooked pier, a thousand feet from the shore.

She ran and ran, out onto the black water. She saw no one. The only sound was the soft slosh of waves against the pier and the slap of her tired feet. At last she arrived at the light tower, a latticed structure about thirty feet high with a platform at the top, like a miniature Eiffel Tower. A security fence surrounded the base. Chloe went thin and slipped inside, then mounted the ladder that led to the platform high above.

At the top, shielding her eyes against the bright green warning light that shone here, Chloe looked back to shore. She guessed she’d come nearly a half mile since bailing out of the car. Were the others following? Waiting? But it didn’t matter. She’d come here for one reason, and one reason only. She turned toward the dark, windy expanse of Lake Michigan. She shifted the raven’s eye from one hand to the other; it was so hot now she could barely stand to touch it. She reared back, ready to throw, and as she stepped into it, a single thought sliced across her mind.

Please be true.

She let the raven’s eye fly. It soared like a comet out over the waves, so bright that its reflection shone like some luminescent underwater beast, racing to catch up. The leestone arced into the water, plunging into its reflection, still burning as it sank beneath the waves. Chloe watched it sinking slowly out of sight, stubbornly fading, until at last it was swallowed and the darkness of the deeps ate it up.

She stood there for another minute, breathing hard and waiting, until finally she realized she had no idea what she was waiting for. She descended the ladder, slipped out through the fence, and started slowly back down the long, curving pier.

She wasn’t even halfway back to shore when she heard them. Footsteps, several sets, heavy and slow. And though she couldn’t smell anything—she was well upwind—she knew immediately what it was.

Riven.

She found that she wasn’t surprised. She didn’t even feel a lick of fear—not for herself anyway. Just as long as they hadn’t discovered her father’s car.

Three huge shapes, eight or nine feet tall, marched down the pier toward her, backlit by the fading glow of twilight behind. Side by side, the Mordin completely blocked the pier—not that they could stop her, of course. But as they came closer, she saw they weren’t alone. Another figure walked in front, smaller and feminine. For one crazy moment Chloe thought it was Isabel, but then she saw. Long, pale arms. A dangling white braid. The glint of a small red stone.

Chloe went thin immediately, swiftly drawing on the Alvalaithen’s power. But no sooner had she done it than the Auditor was right there with her, inside the dragonfly. The Auditor yanked a thick ribbon of the Medium toward herself. Chloe wrestled with the invader briefly inside the Tan’ji, feeling violated and infuriated—a silent tug-of-war, a struggle of wills.

In that first flush of rage, Chloe pushed the Auditor’s presence down hard, feeling for a moment like she might be able to oust her from the dragonfly completely, as Horace had done along the riverbank. But she couldn’t do it. Not alone. This time, all the Auditor’s attention was on her, and the Riven surged back hard, staking her claim, easily snatching enough of the Alvalaithen’s power to make herself every bit the ghost that Chloe was.

“Come now,” the Auditor said silkily, coming closer, showing not the least hint of effort. The red stone on her forehead shone clearly now. “Surely there’s enough for two.”

Not wanting to look desperate, Chloe stopped fighting, but she held on hard to what she had and stayed thin. She’d learned the other night that the best the Auditor could do was fight her to a draw. Infuriating and humiliating, yes. Fatal, no. Chloe stood her ground as the Auditor and her escorts approached, stopping just ten feet away. She realized the Riven were breathing hard after their long chase. She eyed the Mordin, catching a faint whiff of their foul stench now. None of them was Dr. Jericho.

“Hello again,” Chloe said to the Auditor. “Looks like you recovered from your little fainting spell on the riverbank the other night.”

The Auditor narrowed her chillingly blue eyes and shook her head. “Na’gali ji kothuk,” she said, her words like the flickering blades of knives, her voice like a crackling fire. “Do not presume to know me. I am Quaasa—merely one of many.”

Chloe nearly took a step back. Apparently this wasn’t the same Auditor as before. And then Chloe remembered—the Auditor on the riverbank had had green eyes. “I see,” said Chloe. “Must get pretty confusing at the Christmas party.”

“Let us not waste time with jokes,” the Auditor said. “I believe we have business to attend to.”

“And what business is that?”

“Why don’t you tell us?” sang one of the Mordin, his face particularly lean and skeletal. Chloe was surprised—she’d never heard any Mordin except Dr. Jericho speak English before. “You put out a beacon that was felt for miles. We are simply answering the call.”

“That was an accident. A butt dial. My bad.”

The Auditor smiled thinly. “More jokes,” she said. She stepped aside, indicating one of the slouching Mordin behind her. With a start, Chloe realized it was the ugly Mordin who’d jumped onto the station wagon. He was favoring his right leg heavily, the flesh of his thigh still impaled by the crowbar. “It does seem you had some doubts, if indeed you meant to call us. But no matter. I’m still glad you did. I’ve very much wanted the chance to . . . get to know you.”

The Auditor bent down in front of the ugly Mordin. Her poisonous presence thickened again inside the Alvalaithen. The Auditor took hold of the crowbar and considered it thoughtfully for several seconds. Chloe realized she was making the crowbar go thin. Sure enough, the Auditor lifted the crowbar out of the Mordin’s flesh as if it were made of smoke. The Mordin grunted and buckled slightly, but stayed on his feet.

“My compliments to your Tan’ji,” the Auditor said, examining the crowbar briefly. Then she lifted her blue eyes to stare hungrily at the Alvalaithen. “Truly, it is quite spectacular. Ja’raka Sevlo told me all about it—and you—but I had no idea it was this extraordinary.”

“Who?”

“Ja’raka. You’ve met, dear—many times.”

“Ja’raka.” Chloe whispered the word to herself. “You mean Dr. Jericho?”

“Yes,” the Auditor said, frowning faintly. “Though the Quaasa don’t care for blue-sky names.”

“No, of course you don’t. You’re way hardcore. But if Dr. Jericho told you all about me, I don’t suppose he included the part where we tricked him, back in the nest. He ended up looking pretty stupid.”

“Oh, he told me—trapped in the dumin. Unlike you, we do not disguise our failures. And Ja’raka would be the first to admit that he should have sought our help sooner that night.”

“He had your help on the riverbank the other day. That didn’t turn out too well either.”

The Auditor frowned. “Do not concern yourself. I will discuss those events with him.”

“What, are you his boss or something?”

Another crystalline laugh. “I am Quaasa. The Mordin do not answer to me, and I do not answer to them—not even Ja’raka Sevlo.” She spread her pale, graceful arms. “I am everyone’s equal.”

“Yeah, you just keep telling yourself that,” Chloe said.

The Auditor hefted the crowbar thoughtfully, then slowly approached. Chloe stayed her ground. They were both formless, their bodies turned to phantoms by the Alvalaithen. Nowhere near as colossal as the Mordin, the Auditor nonetheless stood almost a foot taller than Chloe. The triangular red stone in her forehead seemed to glimmer rhythmically.

Without a word, without a sound, the Auditor plunged the tip of the crowbar into Chloe’s chest. At first Chloe felt almost nothing at all, because the crowbar had no more substance than she did, but then a trembling bolt of cold took up residence right through the center of her heart. The Auditor had allowed the crowbar to resolidify inside Chloe’s body. If Chloe herself were to become solid again with this inside her, she’d be dead in an instant.

Holding the crowbar in place, the Auditor leaned in, watching the flickering wings of the dragonfly. “I wonder how long you can last,” she whispered.

Chloe didn’t so much as blink. “Dr. Jericho wondered the same thing in the nest. It turned out to be longer than he liked.” There was a limit to how long she could stay thin, of course—just over three minutes, give or take. She’d been thin for a minute or two already, but as far as she was concerned, the limit didn’t exist until she hit it.

“You cannot do this forever,” the Auditor said. “I know you cannot, because I cannot.” Her voice was so lovely, so reasonable, so perfectly hateable. Her presence shimmered revoltingly along the taut strands of the Alvalaithen’s song.

Her rage bubbling up high and hard, Chloe stepped in closer to the Auditor, impaling herself more deeply on the crowbar. She felt the tip emerge from her back. “Let’s find out how long we can last, then,” she said, lifting her scarred right arm. She reached up for the Auditor’s neck, reached right inside and parked her rigid hand within the boneless flesh of that smooth white throat. “Let’s find out together.”

An unmistakable surge of fear flared briefly in the Auditor’s eyes, but she didn’t back down. Chloe could feel the creature’s pulse thumping in her palm, keeping time with the rhythmic glinting of her bloodred stone. Neither of them spoke or moved. They stood there like that for a long time—twenty seconds? Forty? Waves slapped sloppily against the pier. The flat blast of a boat horn rolled across the water—once, twice. The Mordin shifted furtively, gesturing and muttering quietly among themselves. Chloe had the strange sense that they were making predictions.

Chloe’s heart continued to pound around the crowbar. The flow of power from the Alvalaithen began to slow, growing tight, but she refused to panic. She purposefully clenched and unclenched her fist inside the Auditor’s neck, and when the Auditor didn’t flinch, Chloe broke the silence, making sure her voice showed no sign of effort. “I suppose you know this is how I destroyed the crucible. Maybe you’ve noticed my scars.”

The Auditor nodded gingerly. Was that a hint of strain around her eyes? “I see your scars. And I feel them, too—all of them. The ghosts of knives and hammers under your skin. I’m beginning to understand what Ja’raka sees in you. Do you know, I rather think he admires you?”

Knives and hammers—that hit too close to home. And as much as Chloe tried to ignore it, staying thin was becoming more difficult by the second. She held on hard as the Alvalaithen’s song was stretched toward the breaking point. Could the Auditor feel her struggles? How much longer could either of them last? For an instant, Chloe considered running. There was nothing stopping her. But no—she wouldn’t run. She would outlast this creature, no matter what it took. She was the Keeper of the Alvalaithen, and the Auditor nothing but a filthy parasite. “So Dr. Jericho is a fan, is he?” Chloe said lightly. “Next time you see him, tell him the feeling is not mutual.”

“Why not come with us, and tell him yourself?”

“Why not take a long swim with a big bag of rocks?”

The Auditor frowned, baring her teeth. Then she slid the cold, solid shaft of the crowbar slowly across Chloe’s chest, letting it come to rest dead center through the flickering dragonfly.

Chloe nearly lost the fragile grip she still had on her power. But then two of the Mordin stepped forward in alarm. The gaunt-faced Mordin barked what sounded like a curse. Chloe understood at once. “They’re calling your bluff,” she said. “You could never allow this instrument to be destroyed. No more than I can.”

The Auditor’s scowl turned into a rueful smile. “You are correct,” she said, her voice cracking now with unmistakable strain. “I cannot destroy what is precious.” And then she slid the cold metal up through Chloe’s neck—her chin, her mouth, her nose—and brought it to a halt directly between Chloe’s eyes. “There. Much better.”

Chloe went rigid, clinging painfully to the last desperate threads of the Alvalaithen’s song. It was like she’d been slowly inhaling a great breath and was still trying to pack more air into lungs that were close to bursting. She wondered if she might faint.

But the Auditor was grimacing openly now too, clearly at her own limits. She glared at Chloe, eyes alight with rage and disbelief. “You are close to the end, Tinker,” the Auditor said. “Step back. You know you want to save yourself.”

Chloe clenched her fist ever tighter inside the Auditor’s throat. She forced her own lips to move. “Do not . . . presume . . . to know me,” she snarled.

Without warning, a new voice cut through the windswept night, shrill but firm, coming from the shoreward end of the pier.

“Stop!”

The Mordin hissed and whirled around. The Auditor spun too, the crowbar slipping out of Chloe’s skull, swift as an arrow. With a gasp of relief, Chloe released the Alvalaithen and staggered back, blinking hard. The gaunt-faced Mordin leapt and seized the small figure that stood out there in the darkness, curly hair bobbing in the breeze.

Isabel.

“Don’t hurt her,” Isabel said as the Mordin dragged her closer like a child. “Please don’t hurt her.”

The Auditor, sagging as much as Chloe, could only watch them approach. Chloe took a breath, recovering, and reached for the Alvalaithen again. She went thin, and a beat later she felt the Auditor do the same. This time they were both so exhausted that neither of them wrestled for control of the Tan’ji. Chloe let the Riven take what she would, seething, promising herself that someday the creature would get what was coming to her.

And now Isabel was here. Unarmed and helpless. Pleading for Chloe’s safety. What was the woman thinking?

“You,” the Auditor said, seeming to recognize Isabel. “Why are you here, Forsworn? And without your proxy, too.”

Proxy—the harp, apparently.

“I’m not here to fight,” Isabel replied. “I’m here to talk. To negotiate.”

The Auditor considered her for a moment, and then turned to study Chloe’s face. She looked back and forth between Chloe and Isabel, then started to laugh. “How exemplary. You are here to negotiate. For your . . . daughter, if I’m not mistaken.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Chloe said. “I’m not her d—”

“Yes, that’s right,” Isabel interrupted.

Chloe was filled with fire. What did Isabel think she was doing? “There’s no negotiation necessary,” Chloe said. “I’m not in any danger.”

The Auditor ignored her, speaking to Isabel instead. “It was you that lit the beacon.”

“Yes. By accident.”

The Auditor nodded as if she understood. “Fumbling with powers you were never meant to understand,” she murmured sadly. She sounded sincere. “And now you’re here to make amends for your mistake. To save your daughter.”

“I don’t need saving,” Chloe said. “You couldn’t stop me from leaving if you tried, I—”

“Quiet,” said the Auditor calmly, holding up a long, pale hand. Chloe was so infuriated that she lost her words entirely. The Auditor rounded on her and continued. “You do not yet understand the predicament you are in, Tinker. It is true I cannot stop you, but neither can you escape. I am Quaasa. I am everyone’s equal.” The Auditor sipped at the dragonfly and—to Chloe’s astonishment—let herself sink briefly into the concrete pier, up over her ankles. Then she rose smoothly to the surface again and smiled. “There is nowhere you can go that I cannot follow.”

The sight—and the very idea—sank into Chloe’s bones like bitterly cold air. This Auditor seemed much more skilled than the one at the riverbank. Between her astonishing mimicry and the presence of the Mordin, maybe it was true. Maybe Chloe couldn’t escape. Even now she was exhausted from staying thin for so long; she was already starting to lose her grip on the Alvalaithen for a second time. But as her doubts rose higher, so did her outrage. She tried to crush her fears back down again. “You’d be surprised where I can go.”

The Auditor simply shook her head. “Nothing surprises the Quaasa,” she said, making Chloe practically quiver with fury. Then she smiled in a gruesomely friendly way and plucked at a thread of the Alvalaithen’s waning song. “I grow tired. You do too. Let us not push each other to the edge again. Let us catch our breath, five seconds only—and then we will resume. Is this fair?”

Not fair, not at all, but Chloe had no choice but to accept the offer. She wouldn’t last even another minute, and she didn’t dare allow the Auditor to stay thin while she herself did not. She nodded, watching the Auditor warily, and then they both released the Alvalaithen at once. The Auditor silently counted off five seconds on her long, four-knuckled fingers, and they took the reins again, each to their corners. She gave Chloe an agreeable nod, as if to suggest that this poisonous stalemate was fine and dandy. Chloe wanted to rip out her braid by the roots.

The Auditor turned to Isabel. “You want to negotiate, Forsworn. But with what? You know we have no use for your . . . talents. We cannot invite your kind into our nests.”

“It’s not my talents I’m offering. It’s information.”

Chloe felt dizzy. The mysterious remark about the Riven having no need for Tuners threw her, and suddenly here was Isabel, offering up information to this monster. What was she about to say? Chloe opened her mouth to stop her, but Isabel beat her to it. “I know where you can find easier quarry,” said Isabel. “Another Keeper. A Warden.”

The Auditor cocked her head, clearly intrigued. “What Warden? Where?”

“First, let my daughter go. Promise you won’t follow her.”

“No.”

“Then I have nothing to tell you.” Isabel’s eyes flickered onto Chloe for a moment, still pleading. Chloe stared daggers back at her.

The Auditor hesitated, and then said, “Tell me what you have to tell me. If I believe you, your daughter will be free to lose herself in the city again.”

“Swear it,” Isabel said.

The Auditor shook her head. “The Quaasa take no oath but their own.”

Isabel sighed in apparent frustration. She glanced at Chloe one last time and then spoke. “The girl I was traveling with—the empath. She’s gone back home. She’s there now. You know where she lives already.”

Chloe surged forward. “Are you serious?” she fumed, storming up to Isabel. “What is wrong with you? You used her to find the Wardens again, and now you’re betraying her?”

“I’m saving you,” Isabel said calmly. “You are my daughter. April is not.”

The Auditor watched Chloe with interest. “So the empath has gone home, you say. April, is it?”

“You tell me,” said Chloe.

The third Mordin, silent so far, spoke. Shorter than the others, his voice was a deep and hearty wind chime. “The Wardens would never let her go back home by herself. If she’s there, she’s not alone.”

“I don’t know anything about that,” Isabel said. “I only know she went home.”

Chloe blinked, but said nothing. She herself had revealed to Isabel that April wasn’t traveling alone. Was Isabel lying to the Riven now, or had she forgotten?

The Auditor stepped gracefully forward, the wind tugging at her hair. She walked a slow, thoughtful circle around Isabel, the crowbar still dangling from her hand. “I wonder,” she said. “It would be foolish of me not to suspect that this entire endeavor is nothing more than a poorly conceived trap.” Now she circled Chloe, coming so close that the tip of her long braid swung through Chloe’s shoulder. “First, a beacon we could not ignore, borne by the one Tinker who has the least to fear from us. Next, the unexpected arrival of her Forsworn mother. And finally, this tale of a new recruit, conveniently alone outside the city, willingly offered up.” She stepped back up to Isabel. “Tell me, Forsworn, where is your proxy?”

“In a safe place. I wouldn’t dare bring it near an Auditor—not with my daughter present.”

“I see. And why should we believe this tale you tell? Why should we not get what we want right now?”

Chloe could not help herself. The fool of a Riven actually believed this whole setup had been planned. “And just what do you want, exactly?” she said.

The Auditor shrugged. “The same thing we want from every Tinker. Acquiesence. Cooperation. Fellowship, if we find you worthy. But failing that?” She drew hard on the Alvalaithen, forcing Chloe to heave desperately back against her. Laughing softly, the Auditor eased up at once. “Surrender.”

The Auditor lifted the crowbar and ran Isabel through, straight into her belly. Isabel flinched violently and slapped her hands over the spot, only to find that the crowbar had no substance. She was unharmed—for now. She blinked at it for a second or two, then lifted her face to the sky.

The Auditor cocked her head at Chloe. “You have a weakness for family, I think. Your father was worth risking your life—and the lives of your fellow Wardens—that night in the nest. How much, I wonder, is your mother worth to you now?”

Chloe didn’t hesitate even for a second, not sure whether she was driven by anger or bravery or bitterness or fear. Or something worse—something she wasn’t sure she wanted to name. “Nothing,” she said. As soon as the word was out, she felt a knot tighten in her throat. She summoned up a fresh jolt of rage—the harp, the accident, her father, April—and swallowed it down. “She’s worth nothing at all.”

The Auditor raised her perfect eyebrows. “Explain.”

Chloe forced herself to look at her mother. “Explain, Mom.”

Isabel still held her head high. She didn’t flinch. “I chose my harp over my family,” she said, her voice thin but clear. “I nearly killed my daughter, and then I abandoned her. I left my family without so much as a good-bye, and I never came back.” Now she turned her head, looking Chloe straight in the eye. “She is my daughter, but I am no mother of hers.”

The knot leapt painfully back into Chloe’s throat. She gritted her teeth, willing her face not to move. The Auditor took a deep breath. She stood there looking lost in thought for several long seconds, and then at last pulled the crowbar from Isabel’s belly. She tossed it over the edge of the pier. It disappeared into the dark water with a gulp.

“There are many abominations the Wardens would foist upon the world,” the Auditor said softly, “but none are more regrettable than the Forsworn.” She turned to the little pack of Mordin, and the four of them began talking quietly in their own tongue, their words crawling through the air like insects.

Isabel had her face turned to the heavens again. Chloe tried to imagine something to say to her. She was so infuriated with her, but whenever her anger threatened to spill over into words, she remembered Jessica’s terrible tale, and the pain Isabel must have suffered the day the Wardens made her a Tuner.

Overhead, out across the lake, stars were creeping in upon the fading twilight. Chloe didn’t know any of their names. How she wished Horace were here right now, to help guide her, keep her true, help her understand what came next.

The Auditor interrupted her thoughts. “We leave you now. Remember this day.”

Chloe tried not to act surprised. “What, like you’re doing us a favor? Letting one Warden go only to chase down another?”

“We do not do favors. We do what is necessary.” Chloe frowned. Why did those words sound so familiar? “We will pay a visit to April’s home, and we will see what we shall see.” She waved a long finger in the air, scolding. “Do not attempt to follow us, Forsworn. Do not intervene.”

“I won’t,” said Isabel.

The Auditor turned to Chloe. “Tell the Wardens not to bother contemplating a rescue,” she said, but Chloe was already making plans. It must be 9:30 by now. It would take an hour or so to get Horace and arrive back at the Warren. And then they would set out for April’s house—all of them. She didn’t know where April lived, but they would have to make it on time. “I will have my sisters with me,” the Auditor continued. “And Ja’raka too. You slipped away from us on the riverbank, but only because your mother saved you. She saved you again tonight. I do not think she means to save you a third time.”

“I don’t even need—” Chloe began, but before she could spit back her reply, the Auditor’s presence slid from the Alvalaithen like a shadow chased by the sun. Despite herself, despite her fury and dread, Chloe gasped and greedily pulled every inch of its power into herself. It was clean again, hers alone. Her knees almost buckled beneath her.

“Need is a funny thing,” the Auditor murmured. She glanced over at Isabel. She looked back at Chloe one last time. Her eyes were earnest and strangely sad. “Maybe you can forgive her your scars,” she said, and then she turned to go, sprinting nimbly up the pier, the shadows of the Mordin falling swiftly in behind her.