There was a beat of silence, broken only by the tick of the hall clock. Mom closed her eyes briefly. “Please clarify,” she said.

“At the park, right after the Harrower attacked. I heard her voice. She said my name.”

“Iris,” Leon repeated, giving me a searching look. “What about Saturday?”

“I wasn’t certain that time. I thought I imagined it—that’s why I didn’t mention it.” I glanced away quickly.

“This is your cousin?” Mickey asked. “That girl who was at Harlow Tower. The one who was responsible for all those killings last year.”

I thought of the twin scars on the backs of my ankles, slender lines of puckered flesh where Harrower talons had torn through the skin. Tink bore those scars as well. But we were the lucky ones. We were alive. Patrick Tigue and Iris had bled Kin girls all across the Cities in their hunt for the Remnant, and most had not survived. She and Tigue left a trail of bodies behind them—names that were etched in my memory, faces I still saw in my sleep. Mickey’s investigation into the deaths was how he’d stumbled upon the Kin’s secrets in the first place. But, guilty or not, it wasn’t as though Iris could be arrested and prosecuted.

Mom must have had the same thought. Though Mickey alerted her to any suspicious reports that might indicate Harrower movement, there wasn’t much he could do in this situation. “Iris is a Kin problem,” she told him.

Mickey snorted. “She’s an everyone problem, from what I remember.”

“But not everyone can deal with her. We can.”

He ran a hand through his hair. “She’s been there—Beneath—all this time?”

Mom hesitated a moment before answering. “We think so.”

I looked at Mickey. He knew better than any of us just what the Beneath was like. But for once, he was entirely unreadable, his face blank. No hint of Knowing came to me—not that familiar sense of stillness and quiet. No flicker of memory. Finally, he said, “Poor kid.”

“Sympathy would not be my first reaction,” Mom said.

The blank expression vanished. He gave Mom an amused look. “Wasn’t mine, either. It was just the better one.”

“Regardless,” Mom continued, “if Iris is back, we need to figure out what she’s after.”

“Revenge,” Leon suggested. “She’s trying to get back at Audrey.”

But that didn’t seem right. Iris had never wanted me dead. She’d needed me. Needed my blood.

For an instant, Harlow Tower rose in my mind. I saw the gold lettering that spelled out its name, the flat surface of its roof, powdered with snow. I saw Iris across from me, the triple knot burning against her throat. She kicked a knife toward me. The metal was cold in my grip. Show me your blood or I’ll show you his, she said.

And then—

Audrey.

“I don’t think she was meaning to attack me,” I said. “She’s been trying to communicate with me. She’s…” I remembered my dream. Listen. “She’s trying to tell me something.”

“By sending Harrowers after you,” Leon said.

“Sounds like her standard MO,” said Mickey.

“No,” I said. Another memory surfaced: the two of us standing on a deserted street. An empty gray sky above us. Something clicked into place. “She’s trying to break through the Circle, I think. She must be trapped Beneath. When we were there before, she couldn’t get us back out on her own, remember? We needed Shane to bring us back out. She must be trying to use the demons’ powers to get through and talk to me.” And since Kin powers didn’t work well Beneath, it had apparently taken more than one attempt.

“Last time she wanted to talk to you, she tried to get you to unseal Verrick,” Mom said. “I think we can agree that whatever she wants, it isn’t anything good.”

“But what are we supposed to do about it?” I asked. “Go Beneath and ask her to stop? Send Shane with a cease and desist order?” If he was even still in town.

“If she’s tried this twice, she’ll try again,” Leon said.

I was worried about Iris, too—but not for the same reasons. “Hey, I’m not helpless anymore, remember?” I said. I might not have had any Guardian powers of my own, but neither did Iris. “If it comes to an Amplifier versus Amplifier showdown, I’m pretty sure I can take her.”

Mom sighed. “On her own, Iris isn’t strong enough to pose any real danger. But if she’s allied herself with another powerful Harrower, then we may have a situation on our hands. Esther needs to be made aware of this—and loathe as I am to even say it, the elders should be involved. I’ll let Ryan know the Guardians need to be on the lookout. And I don’t want you taking any chances, Audrey. Keep your phone on you at all times. If you sense something suspicious, don’t wait for Leon’s instincts to kick in. Call him. And then call me. Got it?”

“Got it.” I paused. “What happens if the Guardians catch her?”

“Then a decision will have to be made,” Mom said. She looked away. “Iris did some terrible things. Even if she wanted to come back to the Kin, they most likely wouldn’t let her. She got Guardians killed. The elders will never forgive that. It’s probable they’ll seal her powers, to guarantee she’s no longer any sort of threat.”

The sealing of powers wasn’t an easy subject with Mom. Or with me, for that matter. “Is that what you would do?”

“I don’t know, Audrey. Ask me when she’s not endangering my daughter, and I’ll give you a better answer.”

I didn’t reply. I looked past her, through the window. Dark had fallen outside, and tiny insects were collecting on the screen. Shadows were thick in the yard.

Iris was out there somewhere, waiting in the Beneath. And whatever her purpose was, she wasn’t going to stop before succeeding.

Leon was right. She was going to try again.

In the days that followed, Iris’s return was never far from my thoughts. I found myself listening for her, always—a thread of sound in the air, that particular pitch to her voice as she spoke my name. She seemed to whisper just beyond my hearing. I was alert for any sense or sign, any prickle of Knowing. At night I tossed and turned, chasing sleep. My dreams were nebulous and disjointed, images of smoking skies and sunlight underwater that evaporated the moment I woke.

I called Gideon as soon as I got out of bed on Saturday, to make certain that Iris hadn’t tried her hand at haunting him.

“For the fiftieth time, I’m fine,” he told me. Some of my tension eased; his exasperation was strangely reassuring. “And the role of my mother is already taken, so you and Tink can quit auditioning any time now.”

“Tink’s been pestering you, too?”

“When is she not pestering me?”

“Fair point,” I said with a laugh. “But admit it. You like us fussing over you.”

I was relieved to hear him sounding like himself, but I couldn’t quiet the voice that echoed in the back of my mind, murmuring that Iris was here, Iris was home. Biding her time, maybe, waiting for any opportunity. She would emerge from Beneath once more. And Iris knew.

I wasn’t the only one struggling with Iris’s reappearance. Shortly after I’d finished my conversation with Gideon, Elspeth called.

“You saw my sister,” she said. Her voice was thin and strained.

“I didn’t really see her,” I answered. “I heard her.”

“How did she sound? Is she okay?”

Iris hadn’t exactly been okay before she’d gone Beneath, and I doubted an extended stay had improved her any. I hesitated, choosing my words carefully. “I don’t know. I’m sorry, Elspeth.”

“If you see her again…tell her to come home. Just to come home.”

I guessed that meant Elspeth didn’t share Mom’s theory that the Kin elders would have Iris’s powers sealed if she were ever caught. Or maybe Elspeth just wanted her back in any capacity. Within the worry of her tone, I caught the faint note of hope.