There was anger in her voice, but also sadness, a sadness so familiar it tugged at my heart. Panya had lived her entire life in the desert, moving from one encampment to another, one community to the next, never finding a home until she met Adam. She had worked her fingers bloody to build the homestead, and she had wept when it became clear we could not stay. She knew better than most what it was to dream so hard for a better life that the dream became an enduring ache in the center of your chest.

“Then tell us,” Nassar said. “Who are you? What do you want?”

“Don’t pretend you care for us, simply because you have dust in your veins,” Panya said. On her pretty face a sneer was little more than a crease, like a single cloud marring a summer day. “You left the desert. You surrendered your freedom to become one of them, even though they will never see you as more than a desert rat. You don’t understand anything. We know we’re no more than waste to you and all the other spoiled Councils brats. But that man—our Adam of Light—he is greater than all of your leaders, greater than all of your citizens. He is bolder and braver than any person you have ever known. Do not think for one second we will let you get in his way.”

There was pride in her voice, ringing as clear as a bell, but I did not like the way she smiled. We did not want to push the hostages into a place beyond fear. We needed them to be obedient, not reckless.

“We’re not trying to get in your way,” Bhattacharya said. “We’ll do what you say. Do you need me to record a message for my aunt? Do you want me to tell her to make SPEC stay away? I’ll do it. Just tell me what to do.”

There was something unnerving about the way he stared at me as he spoke. I had the foolish urge to snap at him, tell him to avert his eyes. I didn’t know if it would help or hurt to have Councilor Bhattacharya receive a message from her nephew. I could not risk undermining whatever Adam would say in his own contact with SPEC and the Councils.

“Not yet,” I said. “And until we have use for you, you are to stay quiet.”

“Okay. We can do that.” But Bhattacharya was still looking at me as though he were trying to see what lay beneath my skin.

I turned away from him to speak to Dag. “We need to secure—”