He reached for her hand but stopped before touching it. The pause landed harder than contact.
"Mine," he said. "The first time I learned what my family fed to the grid."
Nora studied his face. "You said your family caused the curse."
"I said they fed it. Those aren't the same thing."
"You keep hiding behind half-truths."
"So do you."
The door split down the middle.
A soldier shouted, "Kane! On your knees!"
Nora turned toward the voice and raised her baton.
Elias caught her jaw and pulled her back. His palm covered the side of her face. His thumb rested just below her cheekbone, careful of the bruise.
"Look at me," he said.
"Take your hand off—"
"Look at me, Nora."
She did.
His eyes were close. His breath moved over her lips. The hard line of his mouth lowered, almost touching hers, then stopped.
"If you enter that chamber angry, the relay will use it," he said. "It will turn every doubt into a command. Every fear into a memory."
"And you know this because?"
"Because it already tried with me."
"What did it show you?"
"Nothing I want you carrying."
"That's not your choice."
"It will be if you say no."
The restraint in his voice caught her. Elias Vey had threatened guards, mocked the council, and walked into spells that could cut a person apart. Now he was asking permission to touch her mind.
That frightened her more than his arrogance.
"If you betray me," she said, "I'll use the link to take you down with me."
"I know."
"If you lie about Finn—"
"You won't have to kill me. The tether will do it."
"And if I say yes?"
"You remember him. I remember the truth. We cross the relay before Sera seals it."
"You don't get to call this trust."
"I don't. I call it survival."
The soldiers shoved through the broken door.
Nora drove her baton into the first man's knee. He dropped with a curse. Elias twisted the man's weapon away and fired a burst of dark energy into the ceiling. Stone collapsed between the squads and the tunnel.
"Now!" he shouted.
They ran.
The limiter chain snapped tight as Nora reached the relay door. Pain flashed across her ribs. Elias stumbled beside her, one hand clamping over his chest.
"Don't stop," she said.
"You try running with your lungs on fire."
"I am running with my lungs on fire."
"That's not the same thing."
The relay door stood at the end of a narrow passage, covered in old blood-red seals. The marks moved when Nora approached. One seal peeled away from the stone and floated toward her face.
Elias seized it.
The seal burned through his glove.
He hissed.
Nora felt the burn bloom across her own palm.
"You touched it," she said.
"I noticed."
"You could've warned me."
"You would've told me not to."
"Correct."
The door began to open.
A pressure rolled out from the gap. Nora heard voices inside. Hundreds of them. People whispering names, addresses, promises, apologies. Then the voices blurred, losing words one by one.
Elias grabbed both her hands.
"Say the tether with me," he said.
"I don't know the words."
"You don't need the council's words. Say what you mean."
"That's your plan?"
"It's the only one we have."
"You'd better be right."
"I usually am."
"You lied about Finn."
"I said usually."
The door opened wider. The voices rose.
Nora locked her fingers around his. His skin was hot, his grip steady. The link pulled at her heartbeat until she could feel his pulse beneath hers.
"I bind my pain to yours," she said.
Elias's eyes stayed on hers. "I bind my truth to yours."
"I don't surrender my memories."
"Neither do I."
"I don't obey you."
His mouth tilted. "That part was obvious."
"Say it."
"You don't obey me."
"And you don't leave me behind."
His smile vanished. "I won't."
The blood-red seals snapped shut around their joined hands.
Pain slammed through Nora.
She cried out. Elias bent forward with a rough gasp, but he didn't let go. Light crawled from his wrist to hers, then vanished beneath their skin.
The relay struck her with a memory.
Finn at twelve, sitting under the kitchen table with a broken toy lantern between his knees.
"Don't tell Nora," he whispered. "She'll make it worse."
Nora squeezed Elias's hand. "That's mine. Get out."
"I'm not in it," he said through clenched teeth. "I'm seeing it because you are."
The memory shifted.
Finn older now, standing in front of a wall of glowing relay marks. His face was pale. His fingers moved across the symbols.
"If she comes here, don't let them—"
The image tore apart.
Nora shouted, "Finn!"
The relay answered by ripping the glass plate from her hand.
It flew into the center of the chamber and burst into white fire.
All the proof Elias had stolen began to burn.
"No!" Nora lunged.
Elias caught her around the waist and held her back. His arm locked across her middle, keeping her against his chest. The contact made the pain in her side flare, but his breath shook against her hair.
"Let it go," he said.
"That evidence is the only thing we have."
"It's bait."
"You're lying again."
"Look at the seals!"
She looked.
The burning symbols were feeding into a single mark on the floor. A council relay stamp. Hidden beneath the report. Hidden beneath Finn's access record.
The proof had never been meant to leave the chamber.
Nora struggled against Elias's hold. "I can pull it out."
"You'll take the relay with it."
"Then help me!"
"I am helping you stay alive."
"Stop deciding that for me!"
She drove her elbow back. Elias loosened his grip just enough for her to twist free. She threw the baton into the fire.
The metal struck the burning plate.
The entire chamber screamed.
A shockwave hit Elias first. His knees buckled.
Nora caught him before he hit the floor.
"Elias!"
"Don't touch the fire."
"You can barely stand."
"Still smarter than you."
"Shut up."
"You first."
The flame rose around the evidence. Nora saw the report's last symbols appear in the smoke.
A public bounty order.
WANTED BY ORDER OF THE GRAYHARBOR COUNCIL.
NORA KANE — CONTAMINATED WARDEN. ELIAS VEY — FORBIDDEN HEIR.
DEAD OR MEMORY-CLEARED.
Below their names, a clock appeared.
00:19:59.
Nora stared. "What is that?"
Elias pushed himself upright. "A purge timer."
"For what?"
"The relay district."
"How many people are in it?"
"Enough."
"Give me a real number."
"I don't know."
She grabbed his coat. "You know everything when it helps you scare me. Try again."
"If the timer reaches zero, every active mind connected to this relay gets scrubbed."
Nora looked at the burning proof. "Including Finn."
Elias didn't answer.
She shoved him back against the relay door. His head struck stone. The tether flashed hot between them.
"Including Finn?" she demanded.
"Yes."
"Then we stop it."
"We can't from here."
"You said the relay recognizes your heart."
"It recognizes the curse. It doesn't obey me."
"Make it obey."
"You think I haven't tried?"
"I think you want it destroyed more than you want Finn alive."
His hand closed around her wrist. Not hard enough to hurt. Hard enough to stop her from pulling away.
"Don't put that on me," he said.
"Then prove me wrong."
The flames collapsed.
Ash drifted onto the stone floor.
Nora kept her eyes on Elias. "What did you give the grid?"
"What?"
"You said your family fed it. What did they feed it?"
His grip tightened. "Not now."
"When, then? After the city forgets itself? After Finn disappears for good?"
"Nora."
"Tell me."
"You don't want the answer."
"You keep saying that like it gets you out of answering."
A small pile of ash shifted between them.
Elias looked down.
Nora followed his gaze.
The ash pulled together.
First a chin. Then a mouth. Then two hollow eyes.
A boy's face formed on the floor.
Finn.
Nora's knees nearly gave out. "No."
Elias moved in front of her. "Don't touch it."
The ash-face opened its mouth.
The voice came from the relay walls, thin and broken but unmistakable.
"Nora."
She grabbed Elias's sleeve. "Finn?"
The ash twisted. Finn's eyes turned toward Elias.
"You shouldn't have brought him here," the voice said.
The countdown dropped.
00:18:42.
Elias reached for the ash, and Finn's face opened its mouth—