Ah. I know what he’s asking about. Adam pretty much tried to kill Ella right before . . . well, right before she basically killed herself. I’ve got my own guilt about that considering I sure as hell didn’t spring forward to stop him. I was planning to let the whole thing go, just chalk it up to being in the heat of battle. Apparently, Adam can’t do that.

Neither can Marina. She grabs Adam by the elbow, turning him away from the shape-shifting Katarina-Entity so she can confront him. Knowing her, this anger’s probably been stewing for a while now.

“What the hell was that back there?” she asks him. I almost expect Marina to start radiating her icy aura. I guess that doesn’t happen here in Ella’s headspace, though. Her wide-eyed death stare gets the point across.

“I know . . . ,” Adam replies, hanging his head. “I lost control.”

“You could’ve killed Ella,” Marina snaps at him. “You would have!”

“He didn’t, though . . . ,” I say, trying to keep things peaceable. They both ignore me.

“I don’t expect you to understand this,” Adam says, his voice soft. “I’ve never—I’ve never actually met Setrákus Ra before. But I’ve spent my entire life in his shadow, under his thumb, a prisoner to his words. When I got the chance to kill him, to free myself . . . I just couldn’t help it.”

“You don’t think we want to kill him?” Marina asks incredulously. “He’s been hunting us our entire lives. But we knew Ella would’ve died first so we . . . we stopped ourselves.”

“I know,” Adam replies, not even trying to defend himself. “And in that same moment I became the thing I’ve always hated. I’m going to have to live with that, Marina. I’m sorry it happened.”

Marina runs a hand through her hair, not sure how to respond to that.

“I just . . . I just can’t believe she’s gone,” Marina says after a moment. “I can’t believe she did that to herself.”

“I don’t think Ella’s gone,” I tell Marina, waving a hand at the deep blue marble walls of the hallway surrounding us. “I think she’s got something to do with our current situation, you know? I saw a bunch of Loric lightning bolts shoot out of Ella’s body before we went under.”

Marina smiles tightly, looking at me now instead of glaring at Adam. “I hope you’re right, Six.”

“The charm is broken, though. I tested it before we came here,” I tell them, remembering with no small amount of satisfaction how it felt to crack Setrákus Ra’s head with a rock.

Marina pinches the bridge of her nose. It’s a lot to take in, going from fighting Setrákus Ra to seeing him as a normal Loric to this.

“Is he . . . ? Could he be killing us right now?”