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You will not feel a fucking thing.

Even as I chant that to myself, unable to look away as Saren peels open his chest and offers me his black heart, I feel something.

Confusion, regret, sympathy, pain—things that I can’t allow to take root. As much as I want to hear out my rational brain, my gut refuses. My instincts flare with suspicion. And those instincts have kept me alive this long.

Now isn’t the time to reopen old wounds.

Now isn’t the time to piece together the puzzle of my memories.

Now isn’t the time for Saren.

Salem, Nina, and Kaya are at risk. They need me. Danny and Kane must’ve fled with them, because I haven’t found their bodies. More escaped, but not enough. Our numbers were already pitiful. Now we might as well be on the verge of extinction.

I need to focus on my people, on salvaging whatever is left of our plans. That leaves me with two choices: let Saren go, or take him with me. I’m not keen on either, to be honest. Letting him walk away is just asking for more leeches to come after us. Keeping him at my side is a distraction I don’t need. A constant poke at a scabbing wound.

In the chaos, my makeshift lab was destroyed. So I can’t exactly drug him. I have one dose left, secured in my bag for emergencies.

If the rumors are true, I’ll need it for a bigger foe.

Ivory Hill blocks the path to Briar Peak. And as powerful as Saren is, he’s not the only Maven. We’ve heard the stories from bandits and travelers. The horrors that come from hell disguised as paradise.

Fuck.

He has to stop looking at me like this—like he’s been waiting his whole life to see me.

It’d be too easy to fall for the trap.

“They fled east,” Saren says, reeling in his emotions and letting the tears dry on his cheeks.

“I know.” Sick of feeling beneath him, I push myself up from the snow and brush off my pants.

“What is to the east?”

That makes me pause, my eyes flicking up to his. “You don’t know?”

“Why would I?”

“Because your kind has taken over the fucking world,” I snap. I’m rubbed raw. From his earlier confessions and losing sight of the only family I’ve ever known, I’m hellbent on finding my people. They’re sitting ducks without me.

He scoffs and scans the area. “Those armored cars are slower. Engines barely hanging on. If that truck has any juice left, they’ll outrun it.”

“But lead the leeches right to where they’re going,” I argue. Fuck this. The truck is dead. Bullets destroyed any hope of getting it to start again. I’ve already looked through the ones left, and it’s the same there. The leeches either shot them to fuck or ripped out vital components.

I start walking away from him, back to my tent, but Saren doesn’t stop. No, he follows me and keeps yapping.

“How many are there? Others, like you.”

I don’t answer him.

“Is the girl Nina’s? Or yours?”

Again, I ignore him and push the flap aside. My bag is ready to go, so I sling it over my shoulder, double-check my pistol has ammo, and make sure my canteen is full. Just hinting at Kaya makes me stop. I glance at her rock collection, heart pinching uncomfortably. While Salem is our leader and the mastermind behind our plans, he’s nowhere near as important. Kaya was born pure. She isn’t sick like almost every single one of my kind. The pulse hasn’t woken inside her.

Nina is the same way.

If we have any chance at all of taking down the Telex, we have to find out why. What made them special when so many have fallen to the same sickness that Salem and I have. Chunks of my memories are fucking gone—only vague words and flashes of labs leave me with more questions than answers. I have no idea what sort of experiments were done on me in New Grove, only that they happened. Salem thinks that’s why the pulse woke up.

Someone infected me.