I frown. “So it’s essentially a large-scale version of what would have happened if Blackwood had ever stepped down. Conner and Brendan would have won, the Lions would have succeeded in killing the best students from nonsubdued Families, the Bears would be dead or under attack, and the young Strategia would have been forever tilted in the Lions’ favor.”

“Exactly like that,” he says, and hesitates like he’s trying to decide if he should tell me something or not. “Layla and I used to talk as kids about opposing the Lions when we took over the leadership in our Family. We only hoped that the situation would remain stable enough until we had the power needed to enact change. But here I am actually doing it, years before I believed it was possible…and it’s because of you.”

I smile. “I’m not sure I can take credit, considering I did what I did mainly to stay alive.”

Ash doesn’t waver. “No, November. You saw an injustice and you corrected it even though you were uncomfortable and even though it involved sacrifice.”

I shift in my seat, not certain I deserve that praise and also not sure I want it. For me this has been about surviving and about finding my dad, not about correcting the Strategia power imbalance.

“You told me once that the Lions don’t rule the way other Strategia Families do,” I say, bringing the conversation back to Jag.

“The Lions are…unique.” Ash pauses to think. “Strategia Families typically rely on their leading members to make decisions as a group, on their elders to advise them, and ultimately on the Council of Families when big decisions become too complex. But not the Lions, not since Jag’s been in power. He’s more of a dictator than part of a Family.”

“So he’s Henry the Eighth?” I ask.

Ash leans back in his seat like he’s hunkering down for a long flight. “You’re definitely not the first person to make that comparison.”

I stare at the blinking lights below us, a world not yet awake and blissfully unaware that trained strategists and assassins are doing things that may change the course of their lives forever. “I remember you telling me that the Council of Families approved Jag as the leader of the Lions when they shouldn’t have, and that by the time they realized there was a problem there was nothing to be done. But I don’t understand that. Shouldn’t they have tried?”

“They did,” he says. “But Jag didn’t follow their advice, and in order to oust him they would have had to use force. And the Council of Families never uses force; they are a source of wisdom, a collective of elders who advise and oversee Family politics. The whole system is built on respect.”