“Look how the tapestries tell the story of the exiles,” Kor says. He steps up close behind me, and with his hands on my shoulders, he spins me slowly around to take in all seven illustrated scenes in succession. “Like the unicorn, the exiles were hunted.” He points to the tapestry depicting the hunt. “And they were eradicated.” He pivots to the illustration of the hunters with the dead unicorn. “But they weren’t really.” We look together at the most famous of the tapestries, the one of the unicorn wearing a collar surrounded by a fence. “They’re still alive somewhere. But they’re not truly free.”

I see it. I want it to be true.

“We’re going to be the ones that set them free, Ada. We’ll reunite our two societies and usher in the next Renaissance.”

It sounds pretty great, in theory.

“But what if they don’t want to be reunited? They seem intent on staying hidden.”

“If that’s what they want, it won’t matter once we have you in there. They don’t have the right to keep their knowledge from us, and you will be able to share what you find with us, whether they know about it or not.” His breath, warm on my neck, sends chills down my spine as I let his words sink in.

The Inner Chamber talked a lot about me learning from the exiles, finding out what they’ve been up to and what kinds of things they know. But Kor is clearly saying more than that. He’s saying he wants me to steal from them.

“What you’re implying, that’s not what the Inner Chamber said would be my job.”

Kor turns me to face him, and his eyes, glittering with flecks of blue, yellow, and gray, are fierce with passion. “They don’t all know,” he explains. “You going to Genesis, it will be the most important thing the Families have ever accomplished. You will be receiving instructions that come directly from the Grand Master himself, and some aspects may be classified to only the highest echelon of the Inner Chamber.”

“Are you talking about the Oculus?” The Oculus is the most restricted inner circle of the order. It’s based somewhere in Europe, and I hadn’t even been sure the Oculus still existed, as I’d never known anyone ranked high enough to confirm it. Despite knowing how important he’d risen in the Families, it hadn’t occurred to me that Kor could have possibly gained that much seniority.

“Yes,” he confirms. “While the rest of the Families have been focusing on stewardship of the memory of the exiles and on bringing their ideas into modern society, the Oculus has always been seeking the exiles’ physical location in order to work toward reunification.”

“How do you know all this? How did you get involved?”

He pulls a thin chain from under his shirt, absently toying with the pendant. It’s a silver cross entwined with a gold vine. The emblem of the Families. It belonged to Aragon, Kor’s father, before he died. “My father was a member of the Oculus.”