Eris let out an irritated breath. “Fine. I’m not reaching for a weapon, to make that clear.” As the woman reached for the cuff of her uniform, Nyx couldn’t help but tighten her finger on the trigger. Eris noticed Nyx’s response, spreading her fingers to show her hand was empty. “Just watch.”

She folded back the cuff of her uniform, showing two metallic bracelets—inorganic shifters. Nyx didn’t have to turn her head to know Ariadne would have perked up at those. Eris typed in a few sequences on both bracelets, and the uniform threads changed color. She wore the same silver and gray as the military guards they’d just killed.

Ariadne was almost dancing with delight. “Oooh! They put shifter tech in the suits? How much can you change? Can you give yourself a tail? Can I have one?”

Nyx suppressed a sigh. She was the only one with a Mors still pointed between Eris’s eyes.

“Why would I want a tail?” Eris asked. “What would I do with—”

“You can have a tail if you want,” Clo interrupted. “Especially if you make her”—she gestured at Nyx—“lower the weapon.”

Ariadne nodded. “Put the Mors down, Nyx,” Ariadne said again, this time with more confidence.

Nyx bit her lip to keep from muttering a nasty swear. Trusting strangers over a godsdamn tail. Nyx couldn’t believe this. But Ariadne and Rhea were both staring at her.

Nyx lowered her weapon very, very slowly, but she kept her finger near the trigger.

Eris still didn’t move. “You aren’t with the Novantae. Our leadership didn’t mention another team assigned to this mission, and there is no way they’d appreciate two dozen corpses of soldiers that could have been deprogrammed.”

Nyx tensed. All of them had been her kills. Nyx thought it was easier to leave them behind and do what she’d been born to do.

Nothing in Nyx’s training had taught her how to spare someone. They only worshiped seven gods in the Tholosian Empire: Letum, Bel, Rem, Salutem, Phobos, Algea, and Soter. Death, War, Honor, Survival, Fear, Agony, and Salvation. There was no place in their pantheon for Mercy.

“We had no choice,” Rhea said, hands folded in front of her skirts. She was good at playing demure and nonthreatening; that made her more dangerous. “We escaped to join the Novantae.”

“So, let me get this straight. Your plan was to murder a Legate and his guards, commandeer a ship, and just . . . find the resistance?” Clo asked. “That’s not even a plan. Seven devils, that’s barely even a fraction of a plan. That’s like a note to self after a night of carousing.”

Ariadne bristled. “We knew where to go; we just needed a way to get there. We planned this for a year.”