Rhiannon turned to me. “Thisis why I went to the Consulate. This is why I left you. I am sorry, Ember.”
Her voice was even, devoid of any real emotion, but her expression was open. Rhiannon’s version of candor didn’t always register with people, but I knew it for what it was. She loved us, even if it was sometimes difficult to tell.
But even that love could not excuse the secrets she hinted at. The flagrant disrespect she’d shown me as her superior officer. Before I could say a word, she was talking again. Again, I bit my tongue. This time for real, drawing a hint of blood, metallic resentment clouding my mouth.
“Have you explained to her?” Rhi asked, directing her question to Lara as her hand slipped out of mine.
Lara shook her head. “Didn’t figure Miss Company-Line would care.”
“That’s not fair,” Rhi said, her voice dangerously soft. “Ember stayed. When we all left, shestayed.” My eyes fell to my lap. It was the first time any of them had acknowledged what I’d done. Lara opened her mouth, as though she might argue, but Rhiannon shook her head. “I know exactly how hard it was for you in the Asylum, Lara. But you could have left at any time. I made that clear to you. You chose to stay in. How many did you get?”
Lara’s answering smile was so dangerous that a chill slipped down my spine. “All of them. I got the whole damn bunch of them.”
My stomach nearly dropped out of my body. Who had she killed in the Asylum?
Rhiannon nodded. “Good. She’ll be pleased.”
My blood ran completely cold at Rhi’s reaction. This was not at all what I expected. I couldn’t bite my bloody tongue a moment longer. “What thefuckis going on?”
Rhiannon took a deep breath. “The Automat was a good choice. The spirits here keep this place safe.”
Every atom of my being stilled. The air was saturated with secrets. The look that passed between them enraged me. It was all so obvious now—I’d been kept on the outside of something bigger than me, bigger than my sistren. The betrayal cut deep, but even while bleeding out, I wanted back in. I wantedusback, and if letting the hurt of this moment go was the way, I’d let it go.
“Yes, yes.” I pushed all my frustrations into a tiny box inside my heart. “Get to the part where you tell me,in detail, what has been going on behind my back.” The two of them shared thatlookagain. Like they were considering the wisdom of coming clean with me. I practically threw myself backwards in my chair. “For fuck’s sake. How long has this been going on?” Rage churned within me in waves, a rising tide, tight pressure mounting in my chest.
Lara finally had the decency to act worried. “It wasn’t like that, Ember. We had to keep this small. So small that you, Sera, and Max would stay safe.”
Rhiannon stared into her cup of tea. “And Sera still got hurt. That was a message.”
I shook my head, crossing my arms tight across my chest, the crisp fabric of my navy three-piece suit crinkling under the pressure. “Start explaining or I’ll start making calls about the two of you.”
Rhi pried one of my hands out of the pretzel I’d formed across my chest. “You wouldn’t. I know you wouldn’t, Em.”
I snatched my hand back from her. I hated being called Em, and she knew it. “Then explain. Now.”
Rhiannon sipped from her teacup, her lipstick leaving a mauve stain on the porcelain. When the cup clinked on its saucer, she closed her eyes for a half-second, her impossibly long lashes fluttering. “Since the Consulate formed, there have been Authority moles.”
I nodded. This was a well-known fact, and frankly, even if it wasn’t, it would be easy to believe from a strategic standpoint. “Just as we have people inside their institutions as well.”
Rhiannon sighed. “Not in the same way, Ember. The humans’ ability to sense us has kept us out of their inner circles. They have our own spying on us—changing the course of our operations.”
I swallowed hard. It wasn’t that I couldn’t believe that our people would do such a thing. Everyone had their price. It was the way Rhi’s shoulders sagged when she spoke, like knowing these things was unbearable.
“The Authority has infiltrated the Consulate at the highest levels.”
If she thought I would react with shock, she was wrong. All I felt was numb—a dull feeling of acceptance washing over me.Yes, that made sense. The way things had moved around just enough to give us the impression progress was being made, but nothing really changed. Circumstances simply shifted.
The names humans once called us were no longer acceptable in polite society, but it was rare for a parapsych and a human to become friends—or for average parapsychs to hold high-paying jobs, or positions of power at all—at least in wider society. Our mere existence was no longer considered a blight on humanity, but neither were we allowed to operate in the open. Instead, our people were relegated to the shadowy bits of society. There when humans needed us, but otherwise pushed to the edges.
“And what does this have to do with Lara and the murders?” I asked, hoping to get to the point sooner.
Lara answered this time, crossing her arms over her chest. “The Authority has been weaponizing parapsychs against one another. They have a powerful Cognoscenti in their employ, who has predicted some of the most powerful parapsychs the world has ever seen. Mediums who can walk in the netherworld, thaumaturges with the ability to do actual magic, seers who don’t need divination tools…”
I shook my head as she trailed off. “No one like that exists. We would hear about it.” Lara and Rhi shook their heads, in almost perfect unison. Understanding dawned on me, like fog clearing in my mind. How had I missed this? “They hire other parapsychs to kill them—or frame them for crimes so perverse they end up in the Asylum…” My stomach turned as reality crystallized—as all of the experience my long life had afforded came to a fine point. “Where they are…”
I couldn’t say it, but Lara could. “Studied.”
The things they might learn chilled me to the marrow in my bones. If they learned the truth of what and who we were… would any of us ever be safe again?
