Her arms had been bound behind her back.
When Rosalind managed to drag herself into consciousness, she didn’t know whether she was more surprised to see Alisa staring at her from across the room, similarly bound, or that her eyelids still felt heavy, as though she were lacking sleep.
“Alisa?” Rosalind wheezed.
“Good, you’re 1nally awake,” Alisa said. “I’ve been waiting for you. We need to get moving soon. I think Lady Hong is about to take Orion and evacuate from the city.”
Each part of that statement seemed more incomprehensible than the last. Rosalind winced, trying to gather her bearings. Her outer coat was twisted uncomfortably with her arms like this, cutting oP her blood supply. When she shifted, the fabric didn’t move, but she almost lost her balance, veering against the wall that she had been propped upon.
“My entire throat feels like cotton,” Rosalind grumbled. “What happened?
What do you mean finally? How long was I out?”
“I’m just exaggerating. No more than 1fteen minutes. I think you burned oP their sedative much faster than they expected. This is ideal. We can take them by surprise.”
Outside the window, night had fallen completely. It was pitch dark, the clouds dense and immovable, showing no stars. Rosalind tried to pull at the rope on her wrists. Nothing budged—she could feel the strain extending up her arms too, looping not only a simple knot around her hands but clasping her entire torso in place like she were about to be gutted and served at the table.
“What?”
Alisa tipped her head toward the door. She seemed impatient with Rosalind’s immense confusion, as though she should have been paying attention while she was unconscious during those 1fteen minutes. Rosalind couldn’t hear any noise in the hallway, but she could hear yelling from outside the exterior window. It sounded like there was a crowd on the streets again.
“They’ve been arguing. Orion has been asking for some cure… for you, if I’m not mistaken. His mother has said it’ll take time because ‘you’re not her work.’ The last thing I heard was his agreement to leave with her.”
“Leave with her?” Rosalind echoed, horri1ed. Her arms started to prickle with more feeling. Her blood was rushing back now that she was moving around, pins and needles darting up her elbows and into her shoulders. “Where?”
“I don’t know. But out of Shanghai, it seems—somewhere for her to
continue working fast without being caught by the Nationalists. They’re 1ghting back on the invasion with more success than expected. The Japanese are going to mobilize harder soon. If she doesn’t bring them results before then, they’ll stop funding her.”
Rosalind tried to ease herself further upright. It wasn’t only her arms that had lost feeling. Her legs seemed so weak that she wasn’t sure if she could stand up, though they had left her ankles unbound. She wondered for a moment why they weren’t afraid that she’d get up and run out, only to turn over her shoulder and see that her rope was tied to a metal loop in the Aoor.
“Merde,” Rosalind muttered. She yanked her shoulder hard. It did nothing to loosen her rope. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”
Alisa shook her head.
“Sorry to have lured you in like this.” She looked at her lap, the gesture uncharacteristically sheepish. “They caught me sneaking around a few days ago. I’ve been quietly sitting prisoner until they forced me to make contact at gunpoint this morning.”
Rosalind shook her head. “We would have shown up as soon as we got wind of her location, even if we knew Lady Hong was trying to get Orion into a trap. I’m just glad you’re safe.”
“Safe is a bit of a stretch. I did get pistol-whipped a few times.”
Rosalind grimaced. “You don’t look like you got pistol-whipped, if that makes you feel any better.”
“It does, actually. I’m sturdy.” Alisa pursed her lips, examining Rosalind up and down. “At least I was allowed to make that call myself. Did you 1nd it? Behind the bathtub?”
Rosalind, carefully, leaned her shoulder back against the wall. She felt the pressure of glass pressing into her arm—smooth, unbroken glass—and sighed in relief.
“Yes, it’s in my sleeve.”
She hadn’t been able to 1gure out why Alisa had included the line in Russian until Orion had asked her what it said. He couldn’t understand it. Which meant, for whatever reason, Alisa had intended it only for Rosalind’s eyes. Though it hadn’t made sense initially, she’d gotten a sneaking suspicion when her eyes landed on the bathtub in Juliette’s washroom. After she’d kicked Orion out, she had approached the bathtub cautiously, not sure what she would 1nd. What a surprise it had been to see the vial hiding there, very much not shattered into pieces, very much whole and intact, its green liquid glistening.
“You trickster.”
Alisa snorted. “Thank you. Now listen: I think Lady Hong already has a cure.”
Rosalind furrowed her brow. “What? How?”
“I don’t know what it is exactly, but I saw her experimenting on a soldier before I got caught. The moment it went wrong and he started screaming, she gave him a clear liquid that stopped everything.”
Rosalind didn’t recall seeing any clear liquid back when they were investigating Seagreen Press or searching Warehouse 34. It had to be new.
“I’ve been trying to make sense of why she would be arguing with Orion about needing more time to help you,” Alisa continued. “I keep circling around the phrase she used: she’s not my work. Rosalind, a cure must exist. It is only that you’re not her invention, so she’s telling Orion that to cure you, he needs to let her use him inde1nitely. Allow her to make her concoction again, give it to you, and then cure you.”
Understanding sank in like a mallet, knocking the breath out of her. It was just as Lourens said: If you’re asking for a cure, the only way forward is obtaining true immortality first. Stabilize the temporary solution I put there five years ago, then erase it.
“Did Orion sound like he was leading up to some plan?” Rosalind demanded. “It’s got to be a plan, right? He can’t be willing to just let her experiment on him. If she makes her invention, we have lost. The nation is going to fall.”
Alisa remained quiet for a few moments. Then: “I think he is, Rosalind. He didn’t sound like he was lying.”
This was unbelievable. Rosalind’s life wasn’t worth this much. He couldn’t give his mother the material for complete immortality just to save Rosalind from hers. It would be used for terrible purposes. World-ending purposes. He couldn’t choose her over the world.
“I can’t let him do that.”
“To be fair,” Alisa said, “if you bring out that vial now, that’s all she wants. It’s the only completed version with strength and immortality combined successfully. She could hand it oP to the Japanese. Her mission is achieved.”
“No,” Rosalind said at once. “Out of the question.”
Alisa nodded. She didn’t push the matter further, so clearly she had only made that suggestion to test how Rosalind felt about it. There was a reason why Alisa had left the message for Rosalind alone. The same reason Alisa went on the run for months instead of passing the vial to Celia when she suspected Oliver might intrude—Alisa trusted who she trusted, and wasn’t often swayed to open that circle. “Let’s stop them, then.”
That was easier said than done. Rosalind heaved a sigh. She strained against her ropes. “How?”
“I suspect we have help on the way.” Alisa used her chin to gesture toward the window. “Do you hear that?”
Rosalind listened harder. It was the same noises as before: faint yelling, albeit drawing closer and closer. “The battle in Zhabei?”
“No. If it were coming from Zhabei, it wouldn’t be slowly getting louder. While you were unconscious, I heard two projectiles hit the manor, too. There’s
a crowd approaching. I think they’re about to attack.”
Rosalind wasn’t comprehending what Alisa was saying, and this time she didn’t think she could blame the sedative still in her system. A crowd trying to attack the manor meant it would be people on their side, not Lady Hong’s. It meant people battling against the Japanese soldiers and units standing guard outside.
“Who would be attacking?” Rosalind 1nally asked. She rose onto her knees, trying to see out the window. Despite her best attempts, the scene was pitch dark. It couldn’t be the Kuomintang because they had another war occupying their attention in the north. But it couldn’t be the Communists, either, because their numbers weren’t strong enough to be concerned with something like this. Who else was left?
Alisa shrugged. “I don’t know. But once they get in, then we make our move.
I’d give it 1ve more minutes.”
The manor suddenly jolted, like something had struck its side. Another projectile, just as Alisa had said. It didn’t have the ePect of something as immense as the bombs that the Japanese were dropping, but it felt hefty nonetheless, knocking at some of the higher turrets.
“There’s still the problem of”—Rosalind shook her arms, gesturing to her ropes—“this.”
“I’ve been unbound for two days, actually.” “I beg your pardon?”
“Yeah.” Suddenly, Alisa lifted her hands, and all the ropes around her shrugged to the Aoor. “I kept up the pretense because I didn’t have a route out, so I 1gured I may as well play helpless.”
Rosalind didn’t even want to ask how Alisa had managed that. It would only make her feel bad about her own operative abilities.
Standing quickly, Alisa scuttled near, then examined Rosalind’s hair, musing for a moment before plucking out a hairpin. “Is this one poisoned?”
“Only at the sharp end. Be careful to hold the middle.”
Alisa held the middle, then angled the hairpin to stab at Rosalind’s ropes. She made quick work, sawing through the threads and Ainging away the pieces that came loose. The moment Rosalind was free, there was a cavernous thud that
echoed through the manor. Then: voices spilling inward, vibrating along the Aoors in accompaniment with gun1re.
Alisa helped Rosalind up. Rosalind, subsequently, barely had time to scramble for a hairpin and arm herself, too, before Alisa Aung open the door, looking left and right to survey their situation. No guards remained on watch. Voices echoed down the long corridor from the left.
Alisa gestured to their right. Rosalind followed her, sticking close. Around them, the manor felt labyrinthine in size, each turn extending for miles and the walls crawling with endless white. She could hear gun1re inside the house.
Another shudder vibrated along the ceiling. Alisa glanced up momentarily, frowning. Though Rosalind paused, meaning to ask what she had noticed, Alisa shook her head before Rosalind could get the chance, gesturing forward. A wooden banister curved into view around the corner. They took the stairs down. The moment they landed upon the second-Aoor atrium, they became fully enveloped by the roar of battle, 1nally entering the 1ght. Alisa ducked low when she proceeded forward; Rosalind had no clue what she was doing, but she mimicked Alisa nonetheless… right in time to avoid a spray of bullets going
exactly where their heads had been.
“Mon Dieu,” Rosalind muttered. “Mon Dieu—”
Alisa yanked her hand, hurrying her along. A scream echoed beneath their feet. Over the banister onto the 1rst Aoor, there came the synchronized clatter of new soldiers lifting their weapons. “Come on, come on, have some survival instinct, would you?”
“Survival instinct?” Rosalind hissed. “I am not a spy! I am an assassin! I am
suited for the shadows!”
Right on cue, a grappling 1ght exited a nearby corridor and slammed into their path. Alisa squeaked, rearing back to get out of the way. There was another staircase that descended ahead of them. A man wearing a black hat kicked one of the Japanese soldiers, letting him tumble down the steps. When the man wiped blood oP his face and charged down with his riAe, Rosalind stared after him, a wisp of recognition striking in her mind. A moment later, she realized where she recognized him from.
“That man in the hat,” she said, her voice quavering with disbelief. “He’s former Scarlet Gang.”
Alisa’s brow furrowed. As if a thought had just occurred to her, she gazed out beyond the railing onto the 1rst Aoor, onto the war zone beneath.
“Former White Flower over there. And there.”
Rosalind understood now. She understood who had sent the battalion for them. This was blatantly Roma and Juliette’s work. And Rosalind almost wanted to cry out of the gesture, because she had pulled the most underhanded move to shove them back, and still they had sent every resource they could manage to her aid.
Below, the glass-paned doors on the 1rst Aoor opened out into the vast gardens. Just as Rosalind was running a scan over the chaos indoors, she caught sight of Orion and Lady Hong outside. Though the gardens were dark, the manor had thrown all of its lights on, casting a bluish glow far enough to reach the tree line. Lady Hong clutched a box in her hands. Orion had planted his feet solidly in the grass. Rosalind couldn’t hear what he was saying from here, but she knew him well enough to read his manner. He was furious, mid-argument.
“I’m heading that way,” Rosalind announced.
“Wait, wait,” Alisa hissed, grabbing her arm before she could take a step. “What’s your plan? Shouldn’t we go for the blood supply?”
“Silas already messed with it. I don’t know how. I only know that they couldn’t use it. That’s probably why you saw Lady Hong reversing the experiments—she’d rather use her soldiers non-enhanced than have them end up dead like the chemical killings.” Rosalind’s eyes Aickered brieAy to another door near the glass panes. There was a stack of paper at the threshold, scattered across the Aoorboards, some corners stained with blood. They must have been pushed over in a rush. “The only way we stop her now is to stop her from leaving with Orion.”
Just as Alisa let go of her arm, one of the glass doors shattered entirely, a stream of bullets hitting its middle. There was too much going on to determine who had been shooting, whether it was coming from the inside or the outside. Rosalind, taking the disastrous sight as a prompt, hurried down the stairs at
once, pausing for a moment to pick up a discarded pistol lying beside a dead man.
“Sorry,” Rosalind muttered. She turned over her shoulder. “Alisa?”
Alisa suddenly inclined her head, listening to something in particular. When Rosalind paused for a beat, she heard it too: sirens. Police sirens, sent by the Municipal Council, most likely. It was no surprise given that the manor had turned into all-out war and this was foreign territory. Some neighbor or another was bound to call the police. The Kuomintang would be here soon too, and when that happened, no one here was going to escape unscathed.
“Get Orion,” Alisa instructed, coming down the steps. Her eyes were on the internal door, scattered with bloodied pieces of paper. “I’ll clear the manor. Destroy every piece of her research.”
Rosalind nodded. At once, they split. Alisa pushed her sleeves up, muttering a curse under her breath while she avoided a gangster with a blade. Rosalind ducked, making herself small while she crossed the Aoor.
The moment she emerged through the glass doors and stepped out into the night, Lady Hong caught sight of her.
And Rosalind raised her pistol.
