Chapter 19 · My Mom Is Still Here

Rowan's breathing like she just ran through fire.

She didn't. She stood still the whole time while I dragged her off the train, down the platform, through the service tunnel that smells like rust and old piss. Now we're in some kind of maintenance room with flickering overhead bulbs and a door I can't lock because the bolt's been ripped out.

She's staring at her hands. They're shaking.

"Rowan."

She doesn't look up.

I step closer. My pulse is still hammering from the train, from the sleepers waking up, from the way she looked at me when I pressed my mark to hers and said *stop*. Like she wanted to kill me. Like she wanted to thank me.

"Rowan, talk to me."

"I heard it," she says. Her voice is flat. Empty. "The override."

I freeze.

"I heard the command string," she says. "It was in my head. It wasn't yours. It was theirs. And I—" She stops. Her jaw works like she's chewing glass. "I wanted to follow it."

My stomach drops.

"You didn't," I say. "You're here."

"Because you stopped me." She finally looks up. Her eyes are silver and wet and furious. "Because you used the mark.