Mei
Mei didn't look back. She knew that if she did, the sheer terror of whatever was gliding through the pines behind her would paralyze her heart. The air had turned from the damp, earthy scent of the Green Belt to something sterile and sharp—the smell of a laboratory, of ozone, of the very silver that had melted Alaric's life.
Her boots skidded over a slick patch of pine needles, her arms flailing for balance as she crested a small ridge. The metal tin in her pocket banged against her hip, a heavy, rhythmic reminder of the target she had painted on her own back.
Run, Mei. The voice wasn't in her head; it was a pulse in her marrow. Through the bond, Alaric was no longer just a distant hum of frustration. He was a frantic, thundering drumbeat. The violet mark on her wrist was white-hot, a branding iron that seemed to pull her toward the West Wing with the force of a magnetic north.
