Three phone calls, a cold shower, and forty-seven minutes later, Lucas, Alec, and I stood in a circle around Tori. She was still in the midst of the transition, but with no other teleporter at hand, we were out of options. All fake manners and real hostility were let go of temporarily as we made a reckless plan to get from one side of the country to the other. Tori had to get us to Denver International Airport in one shot, where we would take a plane for the final stretch to Daizlei. Never mind that she’d never teleported with this many people before, or this far.

I tried not to let her cautious glances bother me too much. I was Selena Foster, after all, and she’d known what she was getting into before she chose to be my friend—in a way. That didn’t make it any easier, though. While her mom may’ve been a bitch and unworthy of her affection, that didn’t mean she’d wanted to see the other side of me lash out. She’d been giving me sad, almost scared looks for a little while now, and as much as I wanted to be unconcerned by it, I wasn’t.

“We should talk. Get us through this, and maybe we’ll get a chance some time next year,” I said.

Her lips twitched as she took my hand, but my joke fell flat. “I’ll get us there, one way or another.” She reached out, taking Alec’s hand in her other, and Lucas sealed the circle.

“You ready for this?” Lucas asked.

“She doesn’t have a choice,” Alec said dryly.

I wanted to respond, but lost my nerve when she took a steadying breath. She looked from one person to the next, as if committing our faces to memory.

Can she really do this?

The dark circles under her eyes didn’t help my confidence. She sucked in one last breath of air, and my world went black.

I squeezed my eyes shut as the nausea rolled through me, putting all my strength into gripping the two hands I was holding.

“Agh!” Someone yelled as the ground rushed in too fast.

In a split second, I’d twisted underneath Tori to take the brunt of the impact. Nothing had prepared me for the searing pain in my head when bathroom tile greeted us. Time stood still for a moment, everything slowing to a crawl. I couldn’t make out the shapes in front of me, but the ringing in my ears wasn’t good. As the black receded, the world came back into focus, and Lucas was saying my name over and over again, along with something about dying.

“Holy fuck, that hurt.” I groaned and pushed off the tile floor. My fingers scraped across jagged cracks where my body had left an indent.

“We need to move. The cops are going to be here any minute.” Alec hoisted Tori into his arms. She was passed out, with even darker circles under her eyes. Her cheekbones were far too prominent, but at least she was alive. That was something.

“Take Victoria and go, but I’m not leaving her.”

“Then pick her up, goddammit, but—”

“I can walk. I’ve felt worse,” I said.

My body betrayed me when my legs shook so violently I could hardly hold myself up. Clutching the bathroom counter, I looked at where we’d landed. Given the indent in the floor where my head had hit, I was lucky to be conscious. Thank god it wasn’t Tori; I didn’t think she could’ve survived that impact. Not to mention being in the throes of the transition. She would have been a Made Vampire before sunset. As it was, she already looked feverish again. If I’d had the strength, I would’ve insisted on carrying her.

I tugged my arm loose from my jacket to remove the small knife I’d put there not even an hour ago. A small splotch of blood was smeared against my skin, but the cut had already healed. I cursed, shoving it into the holder on my hip. Rushed footsteps sounded less than a hundred yards away, and with Tori unconscious, there was no way to get out unseen.

“We need to leave,” Alec insisted. He walked out of the bathroom before I could yell for him not to. They were coming.

Lucas wrapped an arm around my waist and moved me along.

“They’re going to see us—”

“He’s got it covered. Just keep walking,” Lucas urged silently, pulling me along.

My legs quaked, but kept moving. As we rounded the corner of the bathroom, he flattened me to the wall as men and women in police uniforms rushed by. Not a single one of them glanced in our direction. How the…?

“They only see what he wants them to,” Lucas whispered as we stepped out into the terminal.

The airport was bustling with people, and I had no idea how many were friend or foe, not to mention human. We followed Alec, steadily gaining speed as my legs strengthened. My hearing and eyesight were already back to normal, and the pain was fading fast. As we rounded the next corner, I slipped from his grip, and picked up the pace.

“Lily,” I said, raising my voice just enough to be heard several hundred yards away.

Her head whipped around, eyes searching for me. Her left hand trembled violently as the filthy tissue she clutched slipped from her fingers.

“Selena?” she croaked. Her gaze flicked to the men on either side of me, widening when she saw my unconscious roommate.

“We ran into some complications, but everyone’s fine.” I pulled her to my side and kissed her forehead. Alec made an impatient noise next to me, but he needn’t have bothered. I was completely aware of the time crunch. “Where’s Blair?”

“Attempting to feed the hollow leg left in my care.” I turned to see my cousin holding a corn dog with mustard. Her light blond hair was pulled back in a braid, making the tiny scars that covered her all the more visible. She silently held the corn dog out to my sister and stepped back. She was more tense than usual, but I chalked it up to our situation. “We need to board. The first flight is leaving any second, but she refused to get on without you.” She thumbed at Lily and turned to the ‘flight attendant,’ who was glaring at us. I doubted she was actually a flight attendant, given that Daizlei didn’t let humans into our school. Probably just a normal Supernatural who worked for the Council or the school.

“We can’t leave. Not without Alexandra!” Lily yelled, suddenly pissed and panicking. Mustard flew everywhere, and her eyes turned dark. Oh fuck, we didn’t have time for her mood swings.

“Lily, get on the plane or so help me god—” I started.

“What took you so long?” she said suddenly, sighing in relief. She ran to the empty air and threw her arms around herself. What the…?

“She sees what he wants her to.” Lucas grimaced.

My sister walked to the flight attendant, now placated, and entered the hallway that led to the plane. I stood, staring in horror. Whatever small slice of peace we’d found in all the chaos of leaving was going to be lost the moment my sister realized she’d been lied to and manipulated.

“Stop.” My voice cracked with emotion that I couldn’t contain.

Alec was already pushing past me when he slammed into an invisible wall. He cursed, turning to me. This boy had done nothing but piss me off since I’d met him. I could see why Lucas found him insufferable.

“We don’t have time for this. We need to get out of here, and she wasn’t going to leave without the redhead.” His eyes turned predatory before shifting to Blair.

She stiffened, her hands not so subtly moving to the blade on her belt, and he deflated instantly.

I cocked my head to the side.

“How do you know what my sister looks like?” I asked pointedly.

“It’s my job to know things.” He turned his glare back on me, and Blair sighed. She already knew what the issue was. Anyone who’d been with Lily for ten minutes could tell.

“Then you should have known that she’s already half gone, and when she loses her fucking marbles because she finds out what you did, she’s going to start throwing them at you, and not even your precious mistress will save you then.” I wanted to say more, to let the impact of what he’d just done fully hit him. Lily was in the worst place she’d been since my parents’ deaths, and he’d just screwed with her mind to get her to cooperate. It was unforgivable, because she already couldn’t tell the difference between nightmares and reality.

Blair grabbed my arm and tugged me toward the plane doors. “Leave it. As much as I would love to see you kick his ass, your roommate isn’t looking so hot, and your sister’s going to unleash hell on that plane as soon as she figures out what just happened.”

I glanced at Tori. Her face was drawn. She had at least another twelve hours before the transition faded. She could hold out that long, though. Lily couldn’t. I needed to get her back in a secure environment where I could start working with her to calm the madness. Otherwise, someone would pay.

I loved Alexandra dearly, and I would worry until I saw her, but Lily was running out of time before she snapped again. I had to trust that my headstrong sister would keep her word and make it back to Daizlei by nightfall. She was unpredictable at times, but she wasn’t dumb. If Vampires had killed Aldric Fortescue and the Council had declared a state of emergency, then we weren’t safe. No one was.

Alexandra knew that. She had to.

“Let’s go.”

* * *

I ended up giving Lily enough Xanax to knock out a horse, hoping she would sleep for the rest of the flight. She was now drooling contently against the blanket I’d squished into the corner where her chair met the wall. Blair had taken up my other side along the aisle, effectively keeping the others away and giving us room.

I tugged on the neck of my shirt, sweat rolling down my temple. What was it about tight spaces that bothered me? I could’ve blamed it on the warehouse, but that wouldn’t be true. The lack of escape or maneuverability had always agitated me, long before I’d even heard of Daizlei. It just got worse every time. I wasn’t the only one struggling in the stale air of the airplane, though. Blair fidgeted right and left, her back straight as a board against the seat. The last flight we’d taken had nearly caused a panic, but this time she was prepared. We’d done enough drills over the summer for her to know how to handle her own claustrophobia.

“When she wakes up, there’s going to be hell to pay,” I whispered.

“I don’t agree with that bastard’s methods, but at least she’s on the plane.” Her jaw clenched and unclenched.

I narrowed my eyes. “You know him. How?”

She continued staring at the seat in front of her. Her eyes glazed over. She got like this when we talked about the warehouse, but never anything else. There was history between them, but not the good kind.

“Alec Hunter was a senior the year I entered high school. Our paths crossed, and he burned me. That’s all you need to know.”

I turned forward, giving her a moment before speaking. “If there’s an issue, we’ll take care of it. One way or another.” It was a promise, and one I didn’t make often. She was the exception to all my rules, though, because she was like me.

Blair nodded once, and I let it be.

The amount of shit that had hit the fan in the last twenty-four hours was unbelievable. I hadn’t been any closer to finding out who’d sent the demons when the Vampires showed up, Tori was bitten, Aldric Fortescue was killed, and now, to make matters worse, Lucas was involved. I didn’t really care one way or another about Aldric, but I was probably the least happy to see Anastasia ascend to the throne early. I could only imagine the frenzy the Council had fallen into, but all anyone knew were rumors at this point. Apart from Alec, and he wasn’t spilling his mistress’s secrets anytime soon.

With the heat of several hundred bodies pressing in on me, I was feeling pulled in too many directions, and needed something to ground me among the madness. I settled for blaming Mariana for keeping us out of the loop when the attacks had gotten worse. If she’d at least told us, this might not have come as a surprise, and I sure as hell wouldn’t have wanted Alexandra to leave the States.

“Your mother didn’t say anything about this the entire three months I was there. She never mentioned the attacks—or that people were being taken. I’ve walked into a world at war nearly blind. If it weren’t for Daizlei and the whispers I heard, I wouldn’t even have known that tensions were running high when the summer began,” I said under my breath.

Blair sighed. “She’s changed since your mom died. She’s distant now, afraid of the Supernatural and our world. She avoids it, even though she tries to come across like she doesn’t,” Blair said, staring at nothing in particular.

I knew her well enough now to know she did that when she was uncomfortable. “When I met her, she was the spitting image of Supernatural wealth and sophistication. You were too,” I said.

Her mouth tightened, and her lips pursed ever so slightly. “We all wear a mask, Selena. My mother is no different.” She paused and looked at me. “After Elizabeth…I don’t think she knows what to do with herself. You may have walked into this world blind, but you’re not alone. Every break, she calls me back to that godforsaken house and cuts me off from the world. If it weren’t for Daizlei, I wouldn’t have seen any farther than her garden.”

I wasn’t the greatest at knowing what to say when people were vulnerable. I settled for nodding and changing the subject. “Anastasia’s going to call for war, and the Council is too divided to have a chance of standing up to her. We need to be prepared.” When she just continued to stare at the back of the seat, I assumed she was lost in her own brilliant and terrifying thoughts.

“We’ve lived through worse. We will make it through this.”

I nodded in agreement.

The scars on my palms prickled, and I thought of the other me.

The one with glowing violet eyes.

One of us would be here to see it through.

For the world’s sake, I prayed it was me, because she would shatter what was left of it when the Council was done.