...Compromise...

Cammie

Liz didn't collapse. She didn't start convulsing. The only reaction she had was a wince. But even Lizzie knew what had just happened. Her eyes snapped to mine, widening in fear. "Cammie—"

But I was already grabbing her arm and pulling.

Another shot sounded, ricocheting off the concrete. Bullet. Which meant whatever Liz had been hit with wasn't a flu vaccine. It also meant that whatever had been in that needle had been intended to be one shot.

It had been intended for me.

I pulled Liz behind a building as another shot went off. Too far. Someone was angry.

"Cammie, my hand's going numb."

Turning to Liz, I eyed the area the needle had struck. The skin was irritated but no discoloration. The first thing we had to do was slow Liz's heart rate. Until we got back to the mansion, there was no telling what she had been hit with. I tried to keep my mind from the worst case scenario.

It wasn't an uncommon method of killing, mostly reserved for subtle assassinations from a distance. Depending on the toxin, effects would begin immediately or within a few hours.

"You're going to be fine, Liz," I said, reaching up and taking hold of the necklace around my neck. My nail caught on the small switch embedded into the back of the locket. "Try to calm your breathing."

The gunshots had quieted. Scanning the area, I knew there was a minuscule window to go after Evelyn. Assuming it was Evelyn who'd shot and not someone else who wanted me dead. Every second she slipped further from capture. Every second allowed her to get further away. My eyes flickered to Liz again.

Liz who didn't work in the field.

Liz who had just come to check on me.

Liz who hadn't told the boy she liked how she felt yet.

A car swept around the corner, screeching as it stopped in front of us. In seconds, Aunt Abby and Bex were helping me lead Liz into the backseat as I relayed what had happened. As soon as Liz was secure, Bex turned to me. "Let's go," she said.

I shook my head. "Wait."

She paused mid-turn, eyebrows raising. "What?" she asked. "Cam, she's going to get away."

There wasn't time for me to reply. Abby was already climbing into the driver's seat. "Cammie, I know you're concerned, but you need to go." She glanced at me in the side mirror. "We'll take care of Liz."

Then she slammed the car door and sped down the street.

The apartment building was in a state of poorly organized chaos. People were flooding the lobby, rushing through halls, standing in corners with wide eyes. No one knew where the gunshots had come from. Everyone was looking for answers. It wasn't hard to slip in unnoticed.

Bex took the less conventional ways of entrance, while I made my way to the staircase. The elevators had been stalled in the panic, which worked to our advantage. Stairs took longer to escape down.

The stairway was crowded. Which meant Evelyn would be having a hard time moving through the building too. My only concern was for the civilians— their safety. Evelyn hadn't needed to shoot the bullets. There'd been a slim chance she would even hit. That display hadn't been for me. It had been to start a panic. And if Evelyn was spiraling, who was to say she wouldn't take a few shots at some randoms. With all the panic, it would have been easy to walk out and blend in.

It's what I would have done.

Bile rose in my throat at the thought. No. I wouldn't do that. That wasn't we did. What I did. I wasn't these girls. I'd never make that choice.

Screams. People running, shoving, yelling. Something cold in my hands. Something painful in my chest.

The air left my lungs as I pressed myself against the wall. A woman and her daughter pushed past me roughly, eyeing me for a split second. My breaths were starting to even out again. I shook my head, blinking against the pain growing behind my eyes.

The flashes had been slowing down over the weeks. They hadn't exactly been my number one concern. And there was no way to talk to Alyson alone. No one was allowed to, and with everyone on rotation monitoring her, I hadn't been able to sneak a conversation.

A part of me didn't want to. As much as I hated not knowing things, a voice that sounded suspiciously like Zach's was always there with a desperate whisper. Maybe I didn't want to know.

When I'd gotten home for my senior year, I'd been told that sometimes our brains tuck our memories away for our own safety.

Maybe I didn't want to know who the girl with black hair who knew how to assemble a gun was. What she had done. How she'd been born.

The stairway was clearer the higher I climbed. People didn't give me a second glance as I shoved my way against the current of bodies. I needed to focus. Remember what I was doing, why I was here. My heart raced in my ears, and my thoughts trailed back to Liz.

My gut clenched.

My friends had gotten hurt before. Macey had broken an arm. Bex had taken a bullet. It came with this line of work. Both of them were fully prepared to take that risk.

But Liz chose to stick with the books and computers. Liz hadn't chosen to work in the field. She'd come out to that gazebo not as backup, but as a friend wanting to talk. She'd known what I was doing, and she'd chosen to come out anyway. Now, who knew what was happening to her back at the school?

It took longer than I'd hoped to get to the roof.

By the time I stood overlooking the panic six stories below, the masses had spread out like a puddle. Bex was below, sifting through every exit possibly known. I scanned for anyone out of the ordinary. We knew who we were looking for, which helped slightly' but Evelyn had been under the radar for two weeks, more than enough time to get a decent disguise.

Then again, this was a girl who was spiraling. If Clara and Alyson were to be believed— something I still had doubts on— Evelyn's primary concern was my death. Nothing else mattered. That single-mindedness may have been enough to make her slip up.

Or it could have intensified her methods.

Who knew what Liz had been injected with.

Below me, police cars were starting to arrive. I took a step back from the edge. "Duchess we have to go."

Bex began to argue over the comm.

"Liz is more important, Bex."

She didn't reply for a few seconds. I started back down the stairs.

"She can't get away with this, Cam."

Liz didn't deserve this.

My throat burned as I slipped past an officer. "She won't."

Zach

Cammie and Bex burst through the doors sooner than I'd hoped. A quick glance at Cammie told me everything I needed to know, everything I'd feared.

No trace of Evelyn.

Cammie was blaming herself.

The girls' eyes were trained on Dr. Fibbs who was bent over Liz. Abby had brought her in a half hour ago. In that time, they'd run her blood through too many tests to count. Fibbs still hadn't identified the toxin. A knot had been tightening in my gut since she'd come in.

"How is she?" Bex asked.

Liz sat up, and Fibbs quickly pushed her back down. "There's a slow-moving toxin in my blood," she said, her words spilling out as if saying it out loud would make the answers appear. "We don't know what it is, but from what we can tell, it's slowly paralyzing me." She sounded far too unbothered. Then again, this was Liz, and these were the facts. Maybe that's all she was clinging to.

Cammie looked between the adults gathered. "How do we stop it?"

"We have to find out what it is first." Rachel placed a hand on her daughter's shoulder. There was a concern in them I had rarely seen. I'd been around long enough to know the headmistress considered these girls family. It didn't take a genius to see.

Dr. Fibbs walked around the table and handed a file to Cammie. Bex leaned closer to read over her shoulder. "We believe it to be a hybrid of some sort. There are quite a few different toxins that could give us this slow reaction, but this blend is something I've never encountered before," he said slowly. His voice lowered as he continued, "If we don't identify a remedy soon, I'm unsure if we will be able to counteract the effect."

Everyone's breathing seemed to quiet.

After a few seconds, the silence was destroyed by the door bursting open.

"What happened?"

I'd only heard Jonas yell a handful of times. He was the reserved one. The level-headed one. The logical one. Emotional outbursts were Grant and my domain.

But as Jonas pushed his way through Macey and Bex, level-headed was the furthest description of him. There was a worry etched so deeply into his expression, it made me wonder what had happened for a split second. He pushed up his glasses as he went to Liz's bedside. No one stopped him.

Grant scrolled in behind him, coming to stand beside me. He nodded towards Jonas. "Someone was just informed of what was happening."

"Where was he?" I asked.

"Where do you think?" Grant rolled his eyes. Jonas hadn't really left Clara alone more than a few hours a day. I didn't really blame him. He was worried about her. I was too, though she seemed to be doing better every day.

Jonas turned suddenly, looking at Dr. Fibbs. "Can I see that?" he asked, pointing to the folder in the man's hand. Not really waiting for a reply, he grabbed it and flipped it open, scanning the contents as he paced beside Liz. A second later, he froze. "Zach, have you looked at this?"

Everyone turned to me. My brow furrowed as I took the folder from Jonas. The data on the sheet only made partial sense to me. Grant leaned over my shoulder. A second later he looked at Jonas. "What?"

The folder was snatched out of my hands.

"It's one of theirs."

Just like that, everyone in the room was firing questions.

"One of the girls'?"

"What will it do?"

"How long do we have?"

"Everyone shut up!" Grant had always been the one without a filter. Still, it was effective. The room went silent again as Jonas skimmed the folder again.

He glanced around the room a moment later. "It's a complicated blend, intended to cause a slow death." He frowned. "Knowing them, it's probably intended to be incurable."

Of course. They'd been the Circle's attack dogs after all. But I'd be damned if I allowed Cammie to lose someone else because of me. Not someone innocent. Not a girl who had done nothing in her life to deserve any of this.

"It's not incurable," I said, turning toward the door. No one asked where I was going. No one tried to stop me. "Jonas, find out what you can. I'll be right back."

Alyson

The door slammed against the wall when it opened.

He was angry.

"Someone's cheery this morning." I didn't look away from the ceiling. He was no fun when he was in a bad mood. It wasn't fair. I hadn't even tried to irritate him last time we'd spoken. This was out of my control. My stomach clenched at the thought.

Zach's voice was hard as ice. "Not now, Alyson." There was a pause as he took a breath, one I recognized as him steeling himself for something unpleasant. His eyebrows always twitched when he did it. I turned my head a fraction towards him.

He was watching me with guarded eyes and a set jaw. His thinking face. When it came to me anyway.

"Spit it out, Zachary," I said, sitting up and stretching my arms above my head. "Whatever it is, I doubt it'll be pleasant."

"Evelyn attacked."

My arms froze above my head for a split second. I shook them out, hearing my shoulder pop. "She tends to do that," I replied evenly, turning to face him. When he didn't say anything, I rolled my eyes, standing up and taking a step towards the barrier. "Don't chicken out now, Zachy," I said. "You obviously graced me with your presence for a reason."

As always, Zach hesitated. His eyes were enough to tell me he was worried. And if he was talking to me, he must be desperate. But most importantly, it meant my dear brother was out of options.

After all, there was no other time he came to me for things.

Zach squared his shoulders and met my eyes. "Evelyn used one of your poisons. I need the antidote."

I blinked, a grin dipped in sarcasm spreading across my lips. "Sure. Let me just get on that," I said, gesturing around the bare cell of a room that had been my home for weeks. Maybe Zach was as dense as I'd always thought. Maybe he hadn't changed at all. "I do hope dear Cameron can wait while I make it."

Maybe I hadn't either.

To my surprise, Zach didn't tell me to be quiet. He didn't roll his eyes and start demanding things. Glancing at him, I was met with a mask contemplation. With a jolt, I realized that he was actually asking me for help.

There was no way for me to help from the inside of a cell. He knew that.

Zach took a step towards the glass. "Do you have an idea where Evelyn got the poison?"

So, he was going to avoid his little problem. Fine. I could play. Sitting back down, I smiled. "I know a lot of places she could have gotten the poison. A few are more likely than the others."

"Don't make this difficult, Alyson," my brother warned.

I scoffed. "I'm not making this difficult, Zachy. You are." I picked a hair off my leg, twisting it in my fingers. "You need help," there was no stopping the grin that spread across my lips, "and you must be desperate if you're asking for my help."

The door opened again. "He's not." My eyes widened as Cameron stepped up to the glass, my father trailing behind her. "I am."

Cameron hadn't been the one poisoned. She wasn't the one dying.

Evelyn had missed.

Evelyn never missed.

Cameron Morgan was asking my help.

My mind was racing, emotions not seeming to make up their mind on what to feel. If Evelyn had missed, then she was spiraling. Without Clara and me there to keep her head level, she wouldn't stop until someone was dead. Cameron was standing in front of me. Somehow, I wasn't exactly disappointed about that. I wasn't happy about it either.

I didn't know how I felt about it.

"Alyson." My father had only spoken to me twice in all the time I'd been here. Now here he stood with my brother and darling Cameron. Asking my help.

People didn't ask my help with saving lives. They asked me to end them.

Carefully, I stood up again, taking my time. I didn't really care who was dying. It wasn't Cameron. Most likely, it was one of her sisters. But they were asking my help. Zach was asking my help. My father was asking my help. With what? Finding something I wasn't even sure existed? It was a last resort. I was a last resort.

Like always.

"Alright, then," I said, my eyes trained on Zach. "How about a compromise? If you want my help, then I get out of this delightful little room." Maybe I didn't know what I felt, but I knew what I wanted. "And I'm not coming back to it."

Zach frowned. Hesitant. Typical.

Cameron stared at me, her gaze burning until I met her eyes. Normally, I could read her expressions fairly well, but right now her face was blank. Her voice was steel as she said, "Save my friend's life, and you have a deal."

Behind me, the door slid open.