“Jora,” I bark, startling her to attention. She uncrosses her arms, her face paling as I gesture to the sickly, sweating humans in the room. The Guards who had their magic stripped by Lyon look empty and lost, their hands shaking uselessly at their sides. “Take them to the infirmary. After they’ve been treated and cleaned up, they’re to report back to you. Put them in charge of the support staff . . . kitchen, custodial, and maintenance crews . . .” I pause, catching a flicker of a vision. A memory from Jora’s past that leaves me unsettled; she has sticky fingers. “And send a maintenance technician to my office. I want every one of Lyon’s locks re-keyed. Until I say otherwise, access to my office and apartment will be restricted.”

“Restricted to whom, sir?”

“Me.”

“What about your security detail? How will we—?”

I turn, fixing her with my strange new eye. She withers under it as if she knows what I’m seeing. “Was I unclear?”

“No, sir,” she says weakly.

“Then what are you still doing here?” My eye trails her as she double-times it to the hall. I turn, surveying the last Guard in the room.

“Zahra.” The fierce-looking girl wipes blood from her cheek. She was new to Michael’s Guard before the rebellion started, but she was sharp. Good with a computer. “I want a full report on the whereabouts of every freed Season up top. I want every single one of them found and a recovery team assembled. Once that’s done, you’re going to find Jack Sommers and Fleur Attwell and locate their former Handlers. I want to know exactly where they are. And bring Kai Sampson’s personnel file to me.”

Kai may be gone for now. But she’ll be back for the one person she cares about—her sister. And when she comes, I’ll be ready for her.

But first, I have a crystal to find.

March’s size is the only bright spot on his résumé, but I didn’t have much of a candidate pool to pick from when Lixue found him and brought him to the Control Room, and I appointed him head of my security detail. Jora may be a dishonest thief, but she was right; I’m Chronos now, and I should have a bodyguard. There’s no telling when someone—even among those closest to me—might try to slip a knife in my back.

Orb curled in one arm and staff in the other, I retrace my steps back to my new office, taking inventory of the visible damage along the way. March trods behind me, struggling to keep up. His pride radiates from him, nauseatingly sweet, and I’m already regretting my decision to hire him.