“Let him go?”

“No. But move him somewhere not as terrible. It must be terrible, Jess. From what I’ve read . . .” Her voice faltered, and it took a heartbeat for it to return. “Wolfe suffered horribly there. They were going to kill him before his mother finally intervened. I didn’t know human beings could be so . . . cold. So cruel. And especially not . . . not in service to the Library.”

Jess did, unfortunately, though it seemed to him there were always more terrible surprises left in the world. “How long before they find you?”

“I’m not sure. They’ll have searched for me inside the Tower first, probably most of the day. If the Obscurist is involved, it won’t be long now.”

“Then we don’t have much time.” His body felt hot and cold at once, and the feeling in his stomach was like that of standing in a very high spot, looking down at the drop. He took her hand and held it. “Morgan, please. I need to know if you can ever forgive me.”

“For sending me to the Tower?” she asked, which was blunt and painful, but he nodded. “Most days I don’t blame you. Some days I do. I tell myself they would have caught me eventually, that you just spared me pain and injury and maybe even death fighting the inevitable. But it still hurts. As long as it does, I can’t . . .”

“Can’t feel the way you used to,” he finished for her, and she slowly nodded. And there it was, the drop he was falling off of, a long spiral down to an inevitable painful impact. “All right. That’s fair enough.” All the nerves in his fingers seemed uncomfortably aware of the feel of her skin, the softness, the warmth. The way her hand curled around his and held on.

“No, it isn’t fair at all,” she said. “I’m sorry, Jess. It isn’t that I don’t care for you—I do. I just—”

“Let me make it up to you. Come with me,” he said. It was an impulse, a wild thing he couldn’t quite control. “I’ll take you away somewhere.”

“Where?”

“Away. Anywhere.”

“Jess, they’ll find me.”

“Then we’ll run.”

“They’ll find me. Until I can get this collar loose, it’s no use even trying!”

“And if you do get it off?”

“Then maybe things will be different,” she said. There were tears glittering sharply in her eyes. “This isn’t easy. I’m sorry.”

Jess stepped closer, and she didn’t back away. He eased hair back from her face and let his fingertips linger. After imagining her for so long, having her here seemed more like a dream, except for the velvet evidence of her skin. Easy. Nothing about how he felt for her was that. He knew he loved her, but it was shot through with dangerous thorns: guilt, jealousy, fear.

It occurred to him in that moment that for all his missing Morgan before, he’d missed nothing but a fantasy. As Glain had said: a challenge, distant and safe. But this girl, standing in front of him now, was far more real, honest, and complicated.