As I’m putting on my coat, Jude stands up again. “It’s not the way she makes it sound, August—she’s twisting the facts out of perspective!”

“You heard him, Fangoria, sit back down.” Daphne thrusts a finger at him.

“The Syndicate investigates all supposed ‘sunlight cures,’ no matter how preposterous they seem—we’d be fools not to!” He gestures around, taking in the mall, that terrible music still chugging away. “You’ll notice that the Syndicate sent only one sad little junior member to talk to you, and not a paramilitary squadron.”

“As far as we know,” Daphne shoots back. “You’ve told, like, a dozen lies since I first sat down. We’ve got no idea what else you’re hiding.”

Jude ignores her. “The Syndicate isn’t what you need to be afraid of, August. We aren’t the ones taking these nonsense predictions seriously.”

“What does that mean?” I freeze in the middle of wrestling my gloves out of my backpack, his tone snagging my nerves like a piece of barbed wire.

“It may be the Syndicate’s official position that the Corrupter is a fable, but the Syndics don’t speak for all of the undead. They can pass decrees that their respective lineages will be more or less compelled to heed, but they can’t direct individual beliefs.” He runs a hand through his soft-looking curls. “And the blood bond that ties a vampire to its progeny can be severed at any time, so the Syndics’ control isn’t absolute, even over their own descendants.”

“Just get to the point,” Daphne says through her teeth.

“I know you remember the Baeserta incident, August.” He waits until I nod, and then continues, “The Syndicate discredited the prophecies about the Shield in the 1800s and pronounced the believers a dangerous cult. There were only thirteen adherents back then, but the membership was up to twenty by the time the group arrived in Illinois, determined to bring about the apocalypse.” With a flourish, he folds his hands in front of him. “Only the original thirteen came from untraceable bloodlines; the rest were descended from the Syndics and severed from their lineages.”

Daphne rolls her eyes. “You know, when I said ‘get to the point’—”