Serina hadn’t explored the prison compound fully. She didn’t know if there was a meeting room or any large space beyond the terrifying processing room. So she hoisted the injured girl up the narrow staircase and helped her onto the nearest cot in the prison guards’ rooms, one without any blood. A line of women followed.

“It’ll be a tight fit,” she said. “Anyone feeling intrepid should explore the building, see if there are any larger spaces we can use.”

Then she pushed her way down the stairs and back into the choking air.

She ran back to Hotel Misery. The hike normally took fifteen minutes; she sprinted it in ten, stopping to cough every few yards. Panic beat in her chest. There were still women filing out of the hotel when she got there, even as the wall of fire raced toward them.

“Hurry!” she yelled. And, “Where are the firearms? Did someone move them?”

No one answered. They were too preoccupied with their own survival.

Serina raced to the room on the second floor where they’d stashed the weapons and ammunition.

They were still there.

She swore under her breath. Her fault for forgetting to tell the women to bring the weapons. And it was too much to move on her own. She grabbed what she could—two firearms and a couple bags of ammunition. If there was time, she’d find someone who hadn’t left yet and ask them to grab more. She was scared the fire would ignite everything and they’d lose their one advantage—

A dark shadow filled the doorway, silent as a ghost, and even through the haze of smoke, Serina recognized him.

Nero.

Suddenly, she was sure no lava was coming.

“You set the fire. A distraction so you could steal our weapons.” Her voice sounded thick, distorted, in the dirty air. Her hands shook. She couldn’t shoot him with her arms full. She needed one firearm, held the right way—

She dumped all but one of the firearms onto the floor, the clatter and clank too loud.

“I wanted you scared,” Nero said, and it was the first time she’d heard his quiet, mild voice, and it chilled her to the bone. “But the boat’s coming soon, and I want it full of soldiers. That fire’s shooting smoke a hundred feet in the air. The Superior will see it, and he’ll know something is wrong. He’ll send troops to investigate, and they will kill you all.”

Serina’s lungs collapsed in on themselves, her organs and bones cracking and falling inward, crushed by despair.

A smoke signal.

A hundred feet in the air. In full daylight.