Ify knows Céline doesn’t mean to be flippant about it, but she asks herself how Céline could possibly know what Ify’s been through, what she’s done. What she would have to face if she were to do exactly what Céline is suggesting.

The wind blows softly on her back, and she closes her eyes. And there she is again.

A dark, dank room. Two men walk in from around a corner. Her fingers clench into fists where they’re bound to a chair. The men wear all black and don’t bother hiding their faces. Their hands are gloved.

Static.

The first is stretching his gloves on his hands. “Let’s talk about that higher purpose of yours.”

Static.

The man is holding bees buzzing in his hand, their metal shells gleaming.

Static.

Hissing through her teeth, “Please, please, please no more.”

Static.

A knife comes out of a man’s vest pocket, cuts away her pant legs. And the bees swarm her legs and burrow beneath her skin and—

She gasps when she returns to the lake. It takes her several moments to realize where she is, that she’s not in an underground chamber being tortured, that she’s not Peter, that she’s not being strapped to a chair while another version of herself—another Ify—waltzes through the aboveground facility with a government official at her side. She dashes away tears. No. No, there has to be another way. She can’t go back to that facility.

She can’t.

■  ■  ■  ■  ■

The thoroughfares of Abuja glow with neon light. It still startles Ify how much Mandarin there is in the signage, like it is gobbling up the English. The signs of Chinese investment in the recovery of this place are evident, but there’s a further penetration. Foreign smells wafting from roadside restaurants, foreign chatter overheard in the streets and alleyways. A mixture of fashion trends she doesn’t remember: kaftans tailored to look like tangzhuang jackets with straight Mandarin collars, cheongsam in bright multicolored prints.

A shout rises above the music. Ify dismisses it, part of the chaos of urban nightlife, until she hears it again, followed by an unbroken string of Cantonese. Suddenly, she hears English mixed in, then she recognizes that voice: Grace.