“Locate Cami,” I say. When nothing happens, I repeat the command a second time, then a third and even a fourth before I give up and throw the silver object across the room.

Tears prickle at my eyes as the truth hits me, really hits me, that the serum has finished taking effect.

I’m out of time.

It wasn’t just the door to the command center. I didn’t want to believe it then, but my denial couldn’t change the truth:

I’m not a Speaker anymore.

My words no longer carry any power.

Ward was right when he said that just a few weeks ago, I would have given anything for this. I used to lie awake in my cell every night praying that I would wake up and be free of my curse.

That’s how I thought of it—as a curse.

But I’ve since learned the truth: Speaking is a gift.

A precious, indescribable gift.

One that I no longer have.

The sorrow I feel at what I’ve lost—at what was taken from me—is overwhelming, but I can’t lose myself in it, not yet. Not when the warning within me is only growing louder, my rising panic making me certain that something is very, very wrong.

I need to find Cami. I need to find Kael. I need to find them now.

“Think,” I whisper to myself as I pace the length of our room. “Think.”

I stop suddenly as I realize that, if I were Cami, there’s only one other place I’d be, even if I’d visited twice already today.

I bolt out of our room.

Hurry, hurry, hurry, my inner voice keeps urging.

Hurry.

Hurry.

Hurry.

So I do. I run as fast as my legs can carry me along the darkened hallways before turning down the left-hand fork and barreling toward the holding cell. My heart is pounding in my chest and not just from the speed of my journey. I can’t shake the trepidation I feel.

That trepidation eases somewhat when I reach the end of the tunnel and see Cami standing above the open trapdoor. Some of my panic dissipates, but not all. That inner voice is still calling to me, still warning me.

I push it aside and say, “I’ve been looking for—”

I break off suddenly when I see him. First his head, then his shoulders, then the rest of his body as, rung by rung, Ward steps up the ladder and out into the open space before us.

There’s nothing I can do but gape in shock as he pauses beside Cami, standing calmly at her side.

“What are you doing?” I demand, not even sure which one of them I’m asking.

“I had to let him out,” Cami says. “I had to.”

Ward is free.