She’d done it.

It was a bird, not a human, but Sydney had still taken only a few mangled bones and made the creature whole. Brought it back to life.

In seconds, she was across the room, prying the lid off the red metal tin. The last—the only—pieces of Serena Clarke lay nested inside, wrapped in a scrap of fabric. Sydney reached for them, heart racing— and stopped.

Her hand hovered over the remains.

What if it wasn’t enough?

A bird wasn’t a girl. If she tried, and failed, she’d never get another chance.

If she tried, and failed—but what else could she do? The rest of Serena was ash, scattered across a city hundreds of miles away.

Would it make a difference?

Sydney had never wondered if the where mattered as much as the

what, but now, as she nestled the lid back on the tin, she thought, Ghosts are tied to the place where they died. She didn’t believe in ghosts, but she had to believe in something—that thread of light, the closest thing she could find to a soul. If there was any of Serena left, beyond the bones in this box, it would be there.

Sydney would just have to wait.

XV

TWO WEEKS AGO

CAPSTONE

STELL’S plane had landed at dawn. He didn’t know why a video conference wouldn’t suffice, but the board had insisted on his presence, and short of outright defiance, Stell had had no choice but to go.

In his absence, he’d left Rios with strict instructions. No procedures were to be put into effect in his absence. No commands given or followed unless they came expressly from him.

The last thing Stell needed was a mutiny.

Now he stared across the nondescript conference table at five nondescript faces atop nondescript suits. Stell suspected that by the time he left the room, he wouldn’t be able to pick any of them out of a lineup, let alone a crowd.

“First a failed EO capture,” said the woman in black, “now a failed extermination.”

“You’ve made quite a mess,” added the man in gray.

“We’ve faced difficult EOs before,” said Stell. “It’s only a matter of time—”

“Only a matter of time,” cut in the man in black, “before EON and its interests are both dragged into the spotlight.”

“My team is doing everything we can,” said Stell.

“That isn’t strictly true,” said the man in black. “We called you here because we believe your personal bias has prevented you from utilizing every asset at your disposal.”

“Bias?” challenged Stell.

“We don’t deny,” added the woman in navy, “that you’ve been integral to the development of this organization—”

“Development? I created EON. I brought you the first intel, I explained the threat level—hell, I had to convince several of you of the very legitimacy of EOs.”