Nit spent the next morning watching Blue-eyes's safehouse while Tabby worked with Elias, sorting through more scrap metal. It wasn't until early afternoon that Nit sent the signal. She stowed her things and retrieved her satchel, heading across town.

"He's with Beast," Nit warned.

"Perfect. Two for one. What a discount." This didn't surprise her as much as it should have. Realistically, it should have terrified her. But she had prepared for the possibility—that the two were connected when Blue-eyes had used Cochran's name.

She arrived at his safehouse and prowled about the street, sticking to the shadows, looking for traps.

"They're on the first floor, sitting at a table." Nit sent her an image.

She balked. "You're inside with them?!"

"I crawled in through the chimney." Nit sounded rather pleased about it.

Unlike Nit, she'd have to rely on stealth and silence. The doors would be rigged, and the windows were mostly boarded up. She'd have to climb to the roof. Its entry points would be far enough that any sounds she made might go unnoticed. Might...

She found a trap door not so different than the one on her own safehouse roof, used violet to unlock it, then checked for trapps. Two darts. She pocketed them and disabled the wires, then continued on with caution.

"Still talking," Nit said, updating her.

Pulling light from her surroundings, she turned herself into shadow. She'd have to act quickly before light sickness set in. She proceeded down to the first level where she found both men huddled together. She had all the confirmation she needed now. Blue-eyes wasn't Elliot Cochran's son, he was his apprentice. And given that he appeared a few years younger than her, he'd come from a younger cohort. That explained why she'd never recognized his face.

It was a shame, really. A shame she had to kill him. But there was no other choice. And she only felt a thimble of remorse that lasted mere seconds, monster that she was.

They sat arguing. She didn't hang around to see why. Sticking to the shadows, she removed her loaded blow pipe and sent a dart at Beast's neck. He froze, then surged to his feet at the same time Blue-eyes did. Their gazes searched the dark space where she stood, eyes sliding right over her. She loaded another right as Blue-eyes shot forward towards her. It lodged directly in his neck. She backed out of range. Beast hit the floor first, followed moments later by his apprentice. She'd made the sedative extremely strong.

"That was almost too easy," she said out loud, releasing the light from around her. Her temples pounded before her head relaxed. Nit fluttered from their hiding place in the form of a dragonfly.

"The hard part is yet to come."

As much as she hated to admit it, Nit was right.

***

While she waited for her victims to wake, Tabby traipsed around Blue-eyes's safehouse, exploring it. It was much the same as hers, though there were subtle differences. He didn't keep any poisonous critters to make concoctions. Some claimed poison was a woman's method. Even Spects. If that was his stance, he was weaker for it. Midnight used it plenty.

It took several hours for the sedative to wear off. Plenty of time to prepare. When it did and they began twitching, she slapped her victims awake. She had them tied to chairs with sturdy twine, side by side, completely naked and gagged. She'd stripped them of everything they might use in defense, including their dignity, and took their prisms as new trophies. Either she would find a use for them, or Elias would, never knowing how they'd been obtained.

She pulled up a chair and straddled it, resting her arms on the back. Her eyes roved over their naked bodies, basking in the immense power she had over them. Perhaps she should have felt some remorse for what was coming. But even as the emotion needled its way in, she reminded herself that Beast—along with the rest of the council—was instrumental in the art of control. How many times had she been forced to kill for her own self preservation? And now she had him in her thrall.

If her scrutiny of their naked bodies bothered them, they gave no sign. She had to admit, they were pleasant to look upon. Both extremely fit, like Midnight, even if Blue-eyes was on the skinnier side.

Cochran's face changed the moment he saw her mask—the one she always wore to the temple for her reports. "You!" His hiss was muffled by the gag.

She grinned. "Surprise."

He flexed his hands and fingers, straining against his bonds, trying to summon light that didn't exist.

She clicked her tongue. "Now, now. None of that." His eyes darted down to his fingers. Completely bare. "Looking for this?" She held up his ring and made a show of pulling the green light from it, draining it, for no use whatsoever. The strands of light dissipated into the air. The prism turned a dull shade of gray. She tossed it away and listened to it roll across the floor.

Poor Blue-eyes. He looked between them, his confusion plain. Caught in the middle of something much bigger than himself. With her mask, he wouldn't know her from Covington Hall. Wouldn't recognize her as Lizzie Weddel. She was tempted to remove it, simply to toy with him. But she had work to do, and the mask was symbolic.

"I imagine you know what you're in for," she said, looking between them. "A bit of fun, more or less. I didn't bring any tools of my own, but I found a plethora of options upstairs." She'd selected ideal weapons for this job, though a knife would be the most efficient for what she had in mind.

When the realization of her intentions struck them, they both grew still. All their fight—gone. Even after receiving an apprentice, Spects were continuously trained in torture, both on the giving and receiving end. Her victims did what they were trained to do. Their emotions fled, faces turned blank, and they retreated deep within themselves.

She went to Blue-eyes first, taking a fistful of his silky hair in her fingers. With a none-to-gentle tug, she jerked his head back and leaned in close to his ear. "It's a shame that you're so cute," she cooed. His eyes flashed with fury, but he didn't make a sound. "Now...all I want are names. Sounds simple enough, hmm? I don't expect you to have any," she added, kissing his pretty cheek before releasing him. "But your master on the other hand..." She looked at Beast, grinning. "I'll bet you have a few, don't you?"

He said something, muffled through his gag.

"Oh! What names, you wonder?" She tilted her head. "Your fellow Council members, naturally. I'm going to kill you regardless. There's no point in hanging onto them. I'd choose the quick and easy death, were I you."

She knew they wouldn't make that choice, but she had to give them the option anyway. She snapped her fingers and sent violet light to coat the walls, floor, and ceiling. It was unlikely that anyone would hear their screams passing by on the street below. But one could never be too careful.

"We're going to be here a while," she said, "so I'd best make sure the sound barrier holds." She removed their gags, then. "Feel free to scream as often and as loudly as you wish."

They didn't give her the satisfaction—not yet anyway.

She set to work, wrapping her knuckles in strands of violet light instead of cloth before turning to Blue-eyes. "Well, sorry about this. I don't expect you to have any names, but...feel free to choke them up if you do." He tried to spit in her face but she dodged it. "That wasn't very nice." She punched him. His head snapped to the side. The protection of light made her fist stronger than it should have been.

"He's not going to give you anything," Beast snarled. "I didn't train a coward."

It was the best motivation she could have asked for. She punched Blue-eyes agin, sharp and quick in the gut. He hissed, doubling over as far as his bonds would allow. If anything, she wanted him to crack in front of Beast, wanted the satisfaction of it. She battered him again and again, bloodying his nose as she broke it in several places, until it didn't much resemble a nose. Still, she forced herself to look at it—at the mess.

"Well done," she said, impressed by Blue-eyes's continued silence, but not surprised. Still, she continued, until the violet began to fade from her knuckles. The prism at her belt wouldn't last forever. She glanced down at it, then at the walls. "That's a shame," she tisked. "Best hurry things along." Retrieving a knife, she went to work on Blue-eye's fingernails. He screamed with his jaw clenched, pitiful. It set the hairs of her arms on end. Sent her mind spirling into the past. To those times where she was the one in the chair.

She couldn't blame him for the weakness, and she wouldn't blame him if he shattered. Spects were already broken to begin with. The Spectrum believed that broken people couldn't be manipulated. They failed to realize that the cracks they created were easy enough to shatter with the correct amount of force.

Her mind jumped back to the night she'd first been tortured. The night Midnight had come into her life. Clora had returned, but two acolites never did. They'd betrayed the Spectrum simply to make the pain stop. Both were found dead the next day. That's how things worked. The Spectrum whispered mercy but dealt cruelty. Every move was masked, just like the demons who served the light.

She looked up at Blue-eyes from where she crouched, studying the tears that dripped down his cheeks. His teeth clenched as he screamed again and again, flexing against the bonds with each nail she pried away. "How about we start with your name first. Not your number. Your name. Don't tell me you forgot it, even after all these years."

"I'm not telling you shit," he hissed.

"Fine." She shoved the knife under another nail, peeling it up. His hand shook against the bonds. She kept it flat with her own palm. His head flew back. Another scream ripped through him, spasming his body. Her stomach churned. "Well?"

"Carson," he cried at last, panting, bringing his gaze to hers. "Carson...Keely."

"Nice to meet you, Carson. Last time we met, you were Elliot Cochran at Covington Hall and I was Lizzie from the Chroma Times."

He let out a strangled laugh. "You bitch! I should have known."

"Yes. You should have. Your downfall. Don't you know? Only the strong survive. Isn't that right?" She turned to Beast. "He lead me here—to this very safehouse. To you." Beast snarled but he said nothing. "You know, Mr. Cochran, if you give me their names, you won't have to sit through this. Kind of selfish, don't you think? Watching your apprentice suffer? But I don't blame you. Self-preservation and all that." She waived her bloodied knife. "I'd probably do the same." She removed another fingernail from Carson's hand, tuning out his screams, shutting off her emotions, burying them in the casket she kept locked deep in her soul.

After another nail, her frustration mounted. She didn't let it show, under the guise of giving Carson a break, she moved over to Beast. She had no intention of starting easy. She lifted the axe leaning against his chair. "It's a shame, really." Swallowing the rising bile in her throat, she hefted it. Beast's eyes widened and he hissed. The handle came down. His scream all but shook the walls. The blade was sharp. It severed his wrist, cutting clean through. His head fell back and his cries continued as he strained against his bonds, throwing his body against the chair enough to flip it backwards. There in lay the problem of not bolting it to the ground. Annoyed, she heaved him upright again.

Carson found the energy to shout a string of insults while she worked. She ignored him, keeping her focus on Beast. His head was still tilted back, avoiding the wound as he groaned and cried. "Yes...probably best not to look at it," she agreed. "You might pass out."

The hand lay on the floor, but the bonds on his forearm held. She picked it up, gruesome as it was, to wave in front of his face. It roiled her stomach to do so.

When he looked up again, blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. His tongue, no doubt. "How thoughtless of me," she said. "I should have given you something to bite down on. Just don't bite your tongue clean off, or you won't be able to give me any names."

And then she saw it. Just there, in his eyes. A sense of victory settled over her. More hate than she had ever witnessed passed over his features as he let the stopper loose on his emotions. More than she'd seen from all the people on the streets who'd beheld her in a mask. More than she'd seen from her victims—all those she'd been forced to kill. There was betrayal there, too. Spects hunted their own kind plenty when the need for elimination was at hand. As far as torturning their own kind for personal means? She wasn't sure how common it was. He was her superior, a member of the Council. Perhaps he thought that granted him immunity.

Had he ever fathomed this?

She glanced down at the stump of his wrist and swallowed again. Blackness tingled at the edges of her vision. She pushed it back. "You'll probably pass out from blood loss soon. We wouldn't want that. I suppose I should wrap it." She sighed. "Better yet—" Pulling white light from her ring, she used it to grow his skin around the bloodied mess until a clean stump remained.

"Impossible!" he hissed.

"Oh, you can talk, can you? Well? How about some names."

"You'll have to kill me." The downside of healing him was removing his pain, making him bold again.

"I'm planning on it, just not too quickly." She started on the fingernails of his other hand next, until he was screaming and begging for her to cut it off. She fought the bile that continued to rise as she swallowed it down repeatedly. There could be no show of weakness in front of them.

She worked fast after that, mostly for her own sake. She took fingers, toes, ears—anything she could. Everything she did to Carson was useless. He had nothing for her. She'd known it from the start, but had hoped it would spur his master into truthfulness. When she could no longer bear to watch him suffer, she went behind him and offered him mercy, slipping a dagger across his throat. As the life drained from him, she leaned down and gently kissed his swollen lips. "Such a shame," she murmured. Beside her, Beast swore. "Well, you can't be surprised," she snapped, looking at him. "Now, are you ready to talk?"

He didn't say anything at first, so she picked up the axe and flashed it before him. He cringed. "I don't know all of them," he said at last. The words spilled out between his gasps, voice hoarse from screaming. Tears dripped down his face. Not from Carson's death, but from the pain. No matter how strong the man, when they were shown enough pain, they'd cry in the end. But pain driven tears were still tears.

"I'll tell you the ones I know," he agreed at last. "Just...end it."

"Good." She nodded, relieved for both of them. "Good."

***

Hours later, when her work was complete, she sent Nit with a message to Steiner. He rolled up to Carson's address under the cover of darkness wearing a cloak and sitting on the front seat of a wagon. She opened the door and beckoned him inside, fighting the urge to claw his eyes out for what he'd put her through.

Physically and emotionally drained, her head throbbed, and for the first time in a long time, she wanted to crawl into a ball and cry. She considered leaving the task of disposal entirely to him. But these were Spects, people forced into a position not so different from her own, regardless of the role they played. They wouldn't be buried in the depths of the Temple like their brethren. She was depriving them of that. The least she could do was see them to rest.

"Beast and his...apprentice," she offered by way of explanation, waiving a hand.

"I see." Steiner studied the bodies at her feet. She'd wrapped them in dark cloth, covering her work. "Do I want to know what they look like underneath?"

She gave him a brief shake of her head, lips curling. "I may have wielded the weapon, Steiner, but you gave the order." She put as much accusation into her words as possible, showing him with her eyes that this was on him.

His mouth flattened into a thin line. He nodded and took the first body, grunting as he hauled it over his shoulder. Effortless. As if he moved bodies like this regularly. Not for the first time, she wondered how he'd acquired his titles.

When they were stowed and disguised in the back of the wagon, she retrieved everything that might be useful and locked up Carson's safehouse. Steiner was already waiting. She took a seat in the wagon beside him, donning the cloak he'd brought. He clicked and gave the reins a slap, setting the horses in motion.

They passed the guards at the city gate, providing the necessary identification to go unbothered, then moved out of the city with other coaches, collecting tickets from each toll and turnpike gate they crossed, heading west along the Taewae.

"What did you learn?" Steiner asked at last, once the city shrank away behind them.

She ran her tongue over her teeth, still tasting vomit. She'd pulled up everything and then some after finishing with her victims, puking her guts all over the floor. The taste had turned rancid in her mouth. "Next to nothing," she said at last. The bitterness of her voice tangled with the flavor on her tongue.

Steiner's head whipped around. "Nothing? After all that?"

She let out a disgusted laugh. "Oh, Beast gave me names. Daunte Sanders was the first, then Seth Kour. That's all he knew."

Steiner swore.

"He didn't know of of Chester Bates. Surprised him when I asked, but he didn't know. And he certainly had no idea who the others were."

Steiner was quiet for a long time.

"Perhaps it was all for nothing," she said darkly.

"It wasn't for nothing."

"I know." Her voice was hollow. "It took him a long time to talk, though. I thought torturing Carson would help."

"Carson? His apprentice."

She nodded. "Beast didn't talk until after I'd slit Carson's throat."

It wasn't the hurt she'd inflected, or the heartlessness she'd shown that unsettled her. It was something else entirely. She thought about what would have happened had their roles been reversed, had it been her and Midnight in those chairs. "I don't think Midnight would have talked either."

"You don't know that."

"Save me from your false reassurances, Steiner."

He shrugged. "I just think that Midnight can't be the same as the rest of them, or else you'd have turned out differently."

"Differently..." She snorted. "I'm not much different. Although..." She hesitated. Should she even admit it? Would it show weakness if she did? Her entire existence hinged on being the opposite. "I almost couldn't stomach it," she said, the breath leaving her lungs. "After all that training. Something inside me still balked." The darkness of the night pressed in around them. Her hands were stowed beneath her cloak but they trembled. She was glad Steiner couldn't see it. "I still have three marks to hunt down. I don't think it's going to get any easier. This one should have been the easiest, playing one off the other."

"I meant what I said before, Tabby, that you aren't like the others."

She considered his words, wanting them to be true. But there was still work to be done. And she wouldn't operate under delusions.

Work... She thought about why she was doing it. She didn't need her father's name, but she wanted it. She wanted to take the power he'd stolen from her and shove it down his throat. This was the extreme she was selfishly willing to go to. All because she couldn't bear to torture Steiner for the information. But part of her knew—had always known that the Spectrum had to fall.

"Think of the good that will come of it in the end," Steiner said to placate her. "Think of what this will mean for Candela. For its freedom."

She grunted, chewing on the inside of her cheek, tempted to tell him that Candela's freedom might just save Prince Albert's life. Instead she said, "What of my own freedom? After everything I will have done to earn it, I'm not sure I'll deserve it in the end."

He gave no answer.

They dumped the bodies ten miles up the Taewae into its watery depths, weighted down by iron chains. She watched them sink below the surface, giving them a two-finger solute of respect, then turned and walked away. Steiner turned away shortly thereafter and followed her back to the wagon. Then they made their way back to the city she loved so much. The city she hated.