And in the distance, the current rippled. An undertow, pulling her another way. And just as quickly, the spell broke, as if the connection between Rebeka and the creatures had been snipped to a thread, only a single fiber still remaining. The calmness Rebeka felt receded, and in its place surged fear.

Rebeka tried to steady herself.

“Go.” She waved her hands at the soldiers, scrabbling to recover that calmness, that oneness she’d felt moments before. “You never saw me. Get out—”

The undertow pulled harder now. Angry, churning. Someone else was trying to wrest control from her.

The soldiers’ expressions changed. They narrowed their eyes—started reaching for the rafter. She couldn’t sense one of them at all now, and her hold on the other was slipping, fraying, about to break.

No, she screamed, silent, and dove back into the darkness, like falling backward into deep waters.

The second soldier’s vision snapped into hers. With monstrous arms, she made him snatch his rifle back up from where he’d dropped it. Aimed it at his companion, just as a hand wrapped around her ankle. Tugged at her.

Br-r-rap.

The bullets struck the first soldier in the back, and he dropped immediately to the tower floor. There was a rush of shadow, buzzing and roaring like a gale, then nothing but blood spreading across the planks.

Rebeka was shaking all over now. But she forced herself to look at the remaining soldier, the one holding the smoking gun.

Seeing through his eyes, she brought the gun’s barrel under his chin.

She was ready for it, but still yelped as the bullet spray wrenched away his jaw, his brain, his hair, smearing it across the tower walls. She felt it, a dull pain, but there nonetheless.

Rebeka gritted her teeth. She would not empathize with these Nazi monsters. Whether they were under the influence of the dark energy or not, they deserved all of their pain and more. She only wished . . .

The corners of her eyes burned. She only wished she’d understood how to control them sooner. Whatever—however—this was.

She eased down from the rafter and stepped over the first soldier’s body. She had to find Daniel, before the other soldiers—and there were surely others—found him first. And Phillip and Simone—even Liam, the only person who might have the slightest clue how this all worked. And if the Nazis were here, then Helene was in danger, too. All of her Resistance contacts.

Oh, God. Rebeka sank against the stone wall, throwing a hand out to catch herself just in time. What had they done? How many more innocents were going to die because they’d killed a few monsters in Siegen?

Rebeka’s head was buzzing so hard she barely felt the tidal wave until it was all around her, black vines choking her, tangling around her limbs. A wall of hatred and fury, crushing her under its weight.