The seawater pressed against him, but it was the alloy of the ch that truly strangled his Soul Sense. The mont he recognized the tal, a sharp jolt went through Ethan. He had seen it before—deep beneath the Silverwood estate, in the hidden dical bay he had stumbled across while searching for Lyla’s father. The walls of that chamber had been made of the sa oppressive material.
Does the Silverwood family have even more secrets? The thought ca unbidden, tight with unease. And Liam Silverwood... how did he get his hands on a spatial pouch embroidered with the emblem of Hurricane City?
But this was no ti to linger on suspicions. He forced the thoughts aside; urgency left no room for speculation. Under normal conditions, his Soul Sense could sweep two hundred kiloters without the Shatterstar’s help. Here, wrapped in the half-finished ch, it was choked down to barely a thousand ters.
When the machine was complete, the alloy would no longer hinder him. On the contrary, it would beco a vast amplifier, a weapon in itself. For now, though, he had to work with the narrow reach left to him.
The ch shot downward, cutting through the dark water with a speed Ethan could never match in his Travel Form. In a blink he had plumted three thousand ters, into the crushing black beneath the waves.
"Bottod out... and there’s nothing!"
Bitterness filled his mouth. What had looked like a lead dissolved into nothing at all. Regret hit him with the weight of the sea. Back at the Whitmore estate, he never should have let Lyla leave with Astrid. If he had stopped her, none of this would have unfolded.
He swept the seabed again and again, but found nothing except scattered wreckage from the fishing boat. The trail ended there. With a surge of frustration, he drove the ch upward and broke through the surface, spray raining down as he paused to think. South. That was the only choice left.
The first storm of panic was ebbing, and he forced himself into calm. He pulled up the map, his gaze settling on the reef where Lyla’s phone had first been discovered. It lay at the southernmost tip of Timshell Island, technically still within its waters, roughly two hundred and fifty kiloters southeast of Crescent State.
He engaged the Shatterstar’s systems, pushing his senses outward. Far beyond Timshell, he located the two Serpent Islanders—an incredible one thousand eight hundred kiloters away.
The tiline was tight, impossibly tight. From the mont he severed communications and entered the underground facility outside Ashwick, barely any ti had passed. The longest delay had been the half hour it took Williams to crack the vault. In all, no more than an hour had slipped by since his last call with Lyla.
In that single hour, Lyla had reported being at the House of Zane—one of the Noble Eight Lineages. Then, she had been attacked near Crescent Isle, two hundred and fifty kiloters out, and sohow transported another one thousand eight hundred kiloters, to a naless island at the edge of the Grand Ocean. Already they were beyond the Siren Sea, into open, endless water.
What kind of force could move two unconscious people such a distance in so little ti?
"That’s it! The House of Zane... Amber Zane!" Ethan’s voice cracked the silence.
"Shatterstar, pull up the recent call history for this number: XXXX-XXXX-XXXX," he commanded, reciting Lyla’s digits.
A chi acknowledged the request, and a mont later the call log shimred before his eyes. The first thing he saw was a list that twisted his gut: more than twenty missed calls, every one of them to him. His phone had long since died, abandoned in the chaos of getting the Shatterstar working, and he hadn’t thought to charge it. It was still lying uselessly in his Mindscape.
It was obvious now—Lyla had felt sothing was wrong, or had tried desperately to warn him. Guilt stabbed through Ethan, sharp and quick, but he shoved it down. This was not the ti to wallow. He scrolled further up the list.
Just as he suspected, before the string of unanswered calls to him, there was another outgoing call. The tistamp placed it while he was still in the underground base beneath the ruined factory. The call had lasted two minutes. The number was registered to Crescent State.
"Shatterstar, call this number."
The line was busy. Sharp tones beeped in his ear.
"Force the connection," Ethan ordered. He couldn’t afford to wait.
The call broke through, and at once he heard a familiar voice. "Aunt lody, you don’t have to worry. I’m sure Kiara will be fine... Oh, and Lyla called earlier, completely out of the blue. She asked if sothing had happened to Kiara. Did you tell her anything?"
Ethan’s chest tightened. Amber Zane. Lyla’s childhood friend, her confidante—the sa Amber who had once masqueraded as a man at the Silverwood estate.
"No, I didn’t..." ca the reply, calm but hesitant. Ethan knew that voice too. lody Quinn, matriarch of the Quinn family.
"Kiara? Kiara Quinn?" Ethan cut in, his voice taut. "What happened to her? What did Lyla say?"
Silence slamd down. For a mont he thought the call had dropped. "Hello?" he pressed.
On the other end, the two won had gone still. They pulled their phones away, staring at the screens as if the devices themselves had betrayed them. A strange man’s voice had just pierced their private conversation.
"Who are you...?" they demanded together, their tones sharp and cold.
"It’s Ethan. Tell what Lyla said!"
"Ethan?" Amber’s voice curled with disbelief and contempt. "Don’t make laugh. Him? Hardly. Who are you really, and how did you manage to hack into this call?"
Ethan’s jaw clenched. That woman had never once given him the barest scrap of respect.
"Amber, you conniving, two-faced bitch," he snarled, his fury boiling over. "Don’t make fly over there and slap the arrogance right off your face. Now talk! What was the last thing Lyla said to you?"
In her sprawling villa, Amber Zane froze. The glass of red wine in her hand shook violently, liquid spilling over her fingers. The blast of Ethan’s rage through the phone had left her stunned, her mind suddenly blank.
"...Ethan? That’s you. I rember your voice." The second voice was softer, steadier. lody Quinn. A woman attuned to sound more than anyone else, master of music, unable to forget a voice once she had heard it. They had t only once, yet recognition ca instantly.
"Uh... Aunt lody," Ethan said, and for a fleeting mont his anger cracked, embarrassnt slipping in. "You might want to hang up. I’ll call you back later. Things are about to get ugly."
"Ethan... CRASH!..."
Amber’s shriek tore through the connection, high and jagged, followed by the shattering of glass.
"Save your hysterics!" Ethan roared, no longer caring if lody was still listening. His patience was gone, stripped bare. "Now listen carefully. Lyla is missing. So stop playing gas and tell exactly what I need to know!"
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