The music drives on, but all around me people have frozen in place like pillars.

I want to announce, maniacally, that the rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated. I laugh, but no one around me is smiling. It is a private joke between fate and me. I will soon be disappearing, for good this time no doubt, and the Historian already knows I am here. The charade, at least for me, is over.

Luka tugs me toward the exit. Farther back, Claudia and Piotrek are worming their way toward us through the stunned mass, Ana and Nino in their wake.

I turn back at the door one last time and, after winking to the nearest camera, bow grandly before Luka drags me out by the arm.

The butler in the cell outside stops us as we make for the main tunnel.

“This way,” he says, leading us in a different direction. He slips a package into my hand. And then we rush through a narrow passage to come up into a decrepit building.

When we emerge onto Visoka Street, I turn my face to the starless sky.

It is raining.

*  *  *

We range farther through the city than we ever have, Claudia chattering in outrage and then awe at my actions earlier. The outrage, I expected. Even anger. The awe, well, I didn’t see that coming.

“It’s like you gave fear, life, everyone the finger,” she says with relish. “I wish Ivan were alive to see it!”

Me, too.

Claudia talks about how some girl dancing next to her started to scream the minute I took off my mask as though she had seen a dead body.

She might have, I think.

We end up on the edge of the city, where we race up a fire escape, free-climbing the last story to the rooftop to take in the lights of Zagreb. And I know it’s the last time I’ll see them.

“How many Progeny are in the city tonight, do you think?” I say.

“Two hundred,” Claudia says.

“Three,” Nino says.

“And they’re all talking about you,” Claudia says.

Luka reaches down and takes my hand. Our heads turn in unison at the sound of running steps. Nino, sprinting for the edge of the roof. I scream, and Luka lets go of me to hurry after him. I follow suit, already afraid of what I’ll see. But before I reach the edge I hear Nino’s whoop from somewhere below. Luka stops on the edge of the roof, shakes his head. A second later, Piotrek blazes past us. Ana pulls off her shoes and lobs them one at a time onto the neighboring roof before following suit.

Claudia catches my arm when we’re the only ones left.

“You met him, didn’t you?”

“Yes. Not just him. Nikola was there, too.”

Her eyes widen.