He watched her as if he were waiting for the punch line to a bad joke. “You do understand that sounds extremely ominous.”

“I give you my solemn oath that it has absolutely nothing to do with humans. It’s . . . internal business. Nothing to do with us.”

“How do you know that?”

“I know.”

He looked at Enola. “Do they pose a threat to us?”

“No. I mean, they could. Like, you could pose a threat to me right now.”

“Who held who at knifepoint?”

She allowed herself to crack a smile. “My point is, like, yeah, sure they could, but it isn’t their intent.”

“What is their intent?”

“Just . . .” Her worry for Ampersand reared back up. “Survive.”

“I need to ask,” he said, leaning toward her. “Your . . . Ampersand, for all intents and purposes, threatened to kill me, albeit indirectly.”

“Only if you threatened my physical safety.”

His expression grew serious. “Either way, I would really like to know, has he ever killed anyone?”

She hesitated, and noted his alarm at her hesitation. “He’s never killed a human,” she blurted. “I . . . can’t really speak to other aliens he might have offed in self-defense, but not humans.”

He eyed her, clearly skeptical. “I feel like there might be a caveat in there somewhere.”

“No. I just . . . he told me he’d never killed anyone or anything on Earth. So no, he hasn’t killed any humans.”

“UNTRUE.”

Cora jumped at the voice in her ear—a voice that was not Ampersand’s.

“What is it?” said Kaveh, snapping to attention.

“He’s talking to me,” Cora whispered.

Enola’s eyes were open, and he inclined his head toward them as much as he was able, causing Kaveh to jump to his feet. Enola looked like a sleeping dragon raised out of a pool of tar.

“NOT TRUE.”

“What’s he saying?” asked Kaveh.

“What’s not true?”

“OUR BELOVED HAS TAKEN THE LIVES OF MANY OF YOUR KIND,” said Enola. His voice was erratic, less computerized than Ampersand’s, but the intonation was all wrong, jerking and placing emphasis on random syllables. “EVERY SAMPLE WE HAVE EVER TAKEN FROM YOUR KIND BACK TO OUR SUPERORGANISM WAS KILLED BY HIS ORDER. YOU SPEAK MISTRUTH. OUR BELOVED HAS KILLED MANY HUMANS.”

“What?”

“What is it?” said Kaveh. “What did he say?”

Enola struggled to move his head toward them, but there was a strap over his brow ridge. His head was longer than Ampersand’s, his eyes smaller in relation to the rest of his head, making him look more dragon-like than any of the others. Everything about this creature screamed predator. “I HAVE ACQUIRED A LITTLE COUSIN. HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE? HOW IS IT DONE? YOU MUST TELL ME, LITTLE COUSIN, HOW DID HE DO IT?”

“How did he do what?” said Cora.