"If there's a secondary team within range, they scramble. Fifteen minutes, maybe less."
"Then we're gone before that." Celeste's voice hardens. "Kael, finish the second guard and pull your wolves. We're leaving."
A short sound on the comms. Final.
On Alexei's feed, Simone in the back seat. Lira against her shoulder. Eyes closed.
"She needs medical attention," Alexei says. "She's dehydrated. Barely conscious."
"Dalton will be ready when you arrive," Celeste says. "Kyle, drive. Don't stop."
The engine revs. Gravel under tires. The feeds blur with motion.
Through the comms, Simone's voice. She's talking to the girl, a murmur I can barely catch.
"Maximus." Alexei is back on channel. Calm. Precise. "The girl is wearing a cord around her ankle. Thin. Almost invisible. It's not standard Konstantin equipment. I've never seen it in any facility."
"Celeste." I key the channel. "How is she?"
"Simone has her. She's stable."
Through the comms, Lira's voice again. Faint. "Is my mother okay?"
Simone answers before anyone else can. "We're working on it."
Celeste is in the vehicle.
"We're forty minutes out," she says. "Have Seraphina ready."
Celeste comesthrough the gate after midnight. The vehicle's headlights sweep the compound yard. Simone is out of the back seat before the engine cuts, one arm around a girl who can barely hold herself upright. Dark hair matted against her face. Skin sallow under the floodlights. Collarbones sharp beneath a shirt that hangs off her frame. Her legs buckle on the gravel and Simone catches her, takes the weight, keeps moving. Lira's hand grips the back of Simone's jacket and doesn't let go.
Dalton is waiting at the medical wing entrance. Elena beside him. Seraphina stands behind them, hands open, already reading the air around the girl before Simone reaches the door.
"Lira," Dalton says. His voice is careful. Steady. The voice he uses for the survivors. "How old are you?"
"Nineteen." Her voice is hoarse. Thin. "I think. I've been in there so long I've lost track."
Simone doesn't stop. She walks Lira past them and into the wing, one arm braced around her waist, and Dalton follows, and Elena follows Dalton.
Seraphina doesn't follow. She turns to me.
"The girl is wearing a cord around her ankle," she says. "There's a monitoring charm woven into it. Adrienne's work. Passive. Designed to signal Adrienne when the girl crosses a boundary. Subtle enough that Konstantin would never detect it." She pauses. "Adrienne knew where her daughter was. She built her own failsafe."
The bracelet is still in my pocket. The frayed cord. The chipped blue bead. Adrienne didn't need Seraphina to find the girl. She needed someone to open the door. Someone outside the oath.
Celeste stands beside the vehicle. Her face is still. Her hands are shaking, fine tremors she's holding at her sides. She sees me and the tremors stop, and I don't know if that's the bond or the will or both.
I cross to her.
"Conference room," she says. "Now."
We're halfway down the corridor when Seraphina finds us. She's running.
"Adrienne's wards are collapsing," she says. "One by one. She's taking them down herself."
"The farms," Julian says from behind us. He heard her.
"Exposed. I can feel them. Three positions." She's already mapping them in her head. "North Georgia hills. Southern piedmont. Eastern buffer zone."
