The officer hesitated. Callum shifted the barrel, firing a shot that grazed the man’s ear. Not enough to cripple, enough to prove his intent.

“Next one won’t miss,” he promised.

Slowly, the man reached for the card hanging at his belt. He unclipped it, then backed toward the checkpoint barrier. Callum watched as he slid the card into the reader, then punched in a code and scanned his palm. A light began to flash green as the electric field disengaged with a soft hum.

Callum wouldn’t take any chances.

He pulled the trigger and the officer crumpled to the ground as he broke into a run and passed over the barrier.

The twin towers in the center of the plaza rose into the sky. He was so close now. Just two more blocks. Just two more blocks and he would reach her.

Shouts erupted behind him—reinforcements arriving, alerted by the gunshots. He didn’t look back, couldn’t afford to waste the seconds. His lungs burned, muscles screaming as he pushed himself harder, faster.

He had to get to her. He would do anything to get to her.

Maximus’s mask caught the sun as he turned toward Lira, each movement controlled, deliberate, a predator calculating the kill. Shadera recognized that stillness. Had embodied it herself before taking a life. And though her body screamed with pain from a hundred injuries, though her broken ribs threatened to pierce her lungs with each breath, she moved.

Her hand found the slit in her dress, fingers wrapping around the gun strapped to the top of her thigh. The metal was warm from her body heat, familiar and comforting in her grip as she slid it free. Every movement sent fresh fire racing through her torso, but she kept her face blank, refusing to reveal pain.

Three steps brought her between Maximus and Lira. Her arm extended, the barrel of her gun aimed directly at the golden mask. Steady. Perfect. Even broken, she was the best the Daggermouths had.

“Not another step,” she said, her voice carrying across the suddenly silent platform. The medicine dulled her pain, but sharpened her focus, narrowing her world to this moment, this confrontation.

Maximus’s eyes locked on her.

His head tilted slightly, as if amused by her defiance.

“You would threaten me?” His voice carried the confidence of a man who had never faced consequences. “In my Heart? Surrounded by Veyra?”

“Yes.” No hesitation. No fear. Only certainty.

Greyson appeared at her side, his own gun drawn, aimed at his father’s head. The tension in his body matched her own—coiled, ready to spring. She didn’t need to look at him to feel his presence, to know they were perfectly aligned in this moment.

“It’s over, Father,” Greyson said. “Your Heart is broken.”

Movement flickered at the edge of Shadera’s vision.

A Veyra officer shifting his weight, hand dropping to his weapon. She tracked him without moving her gun from Maximus, calculating angles, timing, priorities.

One bullet for Maximus, then pivot to the officer, but that would leave Greyson exposed to—

The shot cracked through the air before she could move.

The Veyra officer dropped a neat hole through his faceplate, body crumpling then rolling off the platform’s polished surface. Shadera’s gaze snapped to the source as horrified gasps rippled through their audience.

Captain Mikel stepped forward from his line of men at the back of the platform, his weapon shifting targets to Maximus’s head.

“Traitor,” he hissed at Mikel, the word dripping with venom.

Shadera’s fingers tightened on her gun, the weight of it reassuring despite the tremor spreading through her muscles. Three guns now pointed at Maximus.

The air between them seemed to crystallize, tension drawing it taut, ready to shatter at the slightest movement. Shadera’s heart hammered against her ribs, each beat a fresh burst of pain. She could feel blood seeping through the open wounds beneath her dress, warm and sticky against her skin.

Maximus tilted his head, then he laughed. The sound was hollow, echoing strangely behind his mask, a sound devoid of mirth or humanity.

“Do you think you’ve won?” he asked, his voice almost conversational now. “Do you think this is it? The great revolution? The downfall of the Heart?”

He took a step forward, seemingly unconcerned by the weapons trained on him. Shadera's finger twitched on the trigger, but she held her fire. Something in his confidence made her hesitate.

Maximus turned toward Lira, his eyes fixing on her bare face. “I must admit, daughter, I’m impressed. This—” He gestured toward the scattered masks on the platform, the unmasked women below. “—this I didn’t anticipate. The only move you have made that I did not see coming.”

His words sent a chill through Shadera’s spine.

What other moves?

“In fact,” Maximus continued, his voice swelling with perverse pride, “I’m proud of you. The only one who managed to do something under my nose.”

Shadera saw the slight stiffening of Mikel’s back, the shudder in Lira’s chest.

They knew something.

“Did you truly think I wouldn’t know about your plans? Did you think you were so clever hiding the rings underground, thinking it would save them from my bombs?”

Shadera’s heart seized.

It wasn’t just Lira who’d acted, Jameson had to be a part of this if the Boundary is underground.

“While everyone focused on this spectacle,” Maximus said, spreading his arms to encompass the ceremony, the platform, “my loyal Veyra were busy elsewhere. They hacked into Callum’s system using the same techniques he’s so proud of. Fed him false footage while we moved undetected throughout the city.”

Her hand tightened on the gun.

“The rebels in the Entertainment District?” Maximus continued, his voice almost gleeful now. “Detained. It was bloody, I’ll admit. Messy. But we managed to keep some of them alive. For questioning. For examples.”

Greyson’s face had gone pale, and Shadera realized he had been left in the dark like her.

“The Daggermouths?” Maximus chuckled, turning his masked face toward Shadera now. "They were rounded up like rats in a trap.”

Each word was a knife to her flesh, splitting through skin and twisting.

“And Jaeger Nolin, the Wolf,” Maximus said, seeming to savor the name. “Your leader. Your father figure. I have something special planned for him. Something that will make what you endured in that cell seem like a lover’s caress.”

No. No, no, no.

Shadera’s vision blurred, her heart convulsing as its rate quickened.

Not Jaeger. He wasn’t supposed to leave the Boundary. He was never supposed to leave.

“Kestrel Farrow,” Maximus continued, his voice softening in a way that made Shadera’s skin crawl. “Oh, she is exquisite, isn’t she? Such fire. Such intelligence. It would be a pity to waste her. No, I think I’ll keep that one. Find uses for her talents. After I break her, of course.”

Maximus paused for only a breath. Letting his words settle, ferment.

“And Callum.” Maximus turned back to Lira, whose face had gone ghostly pale. “Your lover.” Greyson tensed beside her. “Your co-conspirator. I’ll take my time with him. Perhaps I’ll even let you watch as I peel him apart, layer by layer. As I extract every secret, every plan, every thought he ever had about you.”

Shadera watched the gears turning in Lira’s mind, watched as she decided how to respond. Choosing between begging for his life and not giving her father the satisfaction of seeing her flinch.

She chose the latter and when she spoke, her voice was steady, cold as steel.

“And Brooker?” she asked. “What are you going to do to him this time?”