After checking out of the motel, Kyra found the private investigator from last night waiting for her out the front. He didn't look like he'd slept well.

  "I've been instructed to drive you."

  They didn't speak at all on the way to the Maxwells' riverside estate, one of many that Victor's family owned across the Litten Dominion. Each had a full complement of staff maintaining the grounds and auxiliary structures. In this one, the main feature was an aviary that could fit Kyra's entire home. In fact you could have stacked a second house and still have room for the birds to poop on top.

  To her displeasure, she got to see the aviary up close after the private investigator dropped her off at the front of the structure and the butler escorted her through to a glass gazebo at the center. There she waited in a wooden chair and listened to the nightingales rehearsing their morning songs.

  She wasn't sure how she felt about birds living in more luxury than her. But looking at them, they were some beautiful birds and had more musical talent than she ever did.

  A maid came by and poured some tea.

  Somehow she'd arrived half an hour early, so she took the chance to meditate.

  She'd been told to be here at eight, and eight came and went. And then another hour passed.

  At last the sharp clack of high heels snapped her out of her meditation. The woman approaching was about her age with smooth dark hair and dressed like she'd just come from a meeting with the president.

  Lorelei Maxwell. Victor's younger sister and the heir apparent to the most influential family in the Litten Dominion.

  Behind Lorelei's practiced smile was a barely concealed contempt. Her eyes were the sort that came from years of peering through false friends and ulterior motives. Cold and calculating and ruthless. This was a woman who didn't need appraisal magic to get a person's measure.

  A maid came by quickly with fresh tea and poured two cups before being waved off.

  Lorelei took a seat, looked her dead in the eyes, and said, "What can I do for you, Kyra Mori?"

  No apologies and straight to the point. Sending the message that she'd already uncovered Kyra's identity after a single phone call from someone else's phone. Her excessive lateness was clearly deliberate, intended to show who held all the power here.

  "You aren't concerned that I'll tell Victor you had a man on his tail?"

  "Don't you think you're making vinegar out of honey?" Lorelei replied smoothly. "My brother was returning from deployment, so I sent someone over with a gift. Imagine my employee's concern when he spotted a strange Gamorese woman trying to insinuate herself into Victor's life. What he did after that was out of his own concern for my brother's welfare."

  She'd been expecting this sort of denial, and she was ready for it. It would have been simple to call Lorelei's bluff by doubling down on her threat to reveal the surveillance to Victor. But there was the potential to achieve a lot more here.

  "You don't have him under surveillance, yet you know his deployment schedule?" she said.

  "Isn't it only natural? We're family."

  "But Victor has never been that close to his family, has he?"

  Lorelei's eyes narrowed. "So you didn't just come off the streets. You've had your eyes on him for a while."

  "He's been very open with me," she replied.

  "He's hardly known you a day."

  "He's already decided to move to Lacris-Cheree."

  Lorelei almost spat out her tea. The cup rattled against the plate when it was set back down.

  Kyra smiled inwardly. It was nice to know that with all the resources at her disposal, Lorelei Maxwell still had her weaknesses.

  To her credit, Lorelei recovered quickly. "You want me to believe that you're the reason he's going?"

  "Since you were able to find out when he was returning from deployment, I don't imagine he could have made plans to relocate without you knowing."

  Lorelei had no answer to this because the conclusion was inescapable. Victor was dancing to Kyra's tune, and Lorelei now had to scramble to find the name of the song. "What do you want from us?"

  "Who's having Victor followed?" she asked. "Is it your parents, or did you order it by your own initiative?"

  "I've already explained the misunderstanding." Lorelei stuck to her story.

  "Maybe I should be negotiating with your parents instead." She made ready to stand up.

  "They don't know anything about this," Lorelei added quickly.

  Kyra leaned back in her chair. "So it's all on you."

  "If you're after our money, you won't get it from him," Lorelei warned. "Everything will be passed on to me, and he'll only be getting a stipend from the family trust. A trust that I already control, and I can change how much is paid out to him."

  She had to hand it to Lorelei. Just when it looked like she held all the cards, the businesswoman managed to muster some off the floor. The new cards were worthless given her true motives, but it was a commendable attempt against the opponent Lorelei thought she had.

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  "Maybe I'm not after his money," she replied.

  Lorelei shook her head like she was dismissing a blatant lie. "I can give it to you upfront. All the money you might ever get from him. But you must never speak to Victor again."

  The two women sat in a ponderous silence. Under other circumstances, Kyra might have felt offended by the insinuations, even if they were true. But here she couldn't help but feel a little touched.

  "You really love your brother, don't you?" she said. "It's a shame you don't know how to show it to his face."

  "What would you know about us?" came the cold reply.

  In fact she knew a lot about both of them. While Lorelei hadn't been on Benny's list, she had been on Kyra's. This was even though she'd told Benny that her plan required a soldier. An influential and well-connected financier would have worked too.

  Benny had a lot to say about Lorelei. There was no surprise there. A rich, power, and capable woman, the heiress of the Maxwell family would have served Benny through many timelines.

  In the end she went with Victor for a couple of reasons. Among them was the belief that Victor would prove easier to recruit. Having now met Lorelei, she considered her judgement correct. Cunning and ambition were fine traits in a business leader but were too much of a liability in a plan that required secrecy and absolute loyalty.

  Another factor was that she'd hoped to get the best of both worlds. That by recruiting Victor, she would get most of the benefits of recruiting Lorelei anyway.

  There was one notable factor that she gave no weight to, and that was Victor's exceptional talent as a hunter. While he was probably humankind's foremost talent, she didn't consider his strength to be key in overcoming human extinction. The reason was simple. If the world could be saved by putting Victor's talent to use, Kyra wouldn't be here.

  "It's actually my intention that he eventually reconcile with his family," she told Lorelei.

  It was her earnest desire. It also happened to serve her plans.

  Lorelei was weighing Kyra's words carefully, trying to see through to her scheme. At last the heiress said, "That won't change any of his entitlements, whatever you may believe."

  "What if I simply want what's best for Victor?"

  Lorelei started on a rejoinder but then hesitated and settled into thought. Even if only for a moment, the other woman seemed ready to reconsider her judgement.

  Kyra latched onto this opportunity. "How about I extend a gesture of goodwill by sharing something that can save your family a lot of embarrassment and potentially some money?"

  "Go on." It was clear that Lorelei no longer knew what to make of her. All her previous assumptions had been challenged, and with this next piece of intel, her entire perception could be turned around.

  "There's a scandal brewing in the Maxwell One Banking Corporation," she began.

  The bank was only one of the Maxwell family's many enterprises, but it was the one by which everyone in the Litten Dominion knew of them.

  Dominion residents may not know that half their homes were powered by a Maxwell nuclear facility. Or that most of the trucks that supplied their local supermarkets had a Maxwell engine under the hood. Or even that the food being delivered in those trucks was grown using fertilizer made in a Maxwell chemical factory.

  But everyone had a checking account, and a third of them banked with the Maxwells. That was a lot of people to disappoint.

  "Your employees have been creating fake accounts without the customers' consent," she continued.

  This was dirt that had come straight from Benny, and she wasn't worried about it changing in this timeline because the events were rooted deep in the past. It was already in the soil, waiting to be unearthed.

  Lorelei looked confused. "Why would they do that?"

  "Because the numbers must go up. Month to month, quarter to quarter. Old stretch targets become the new expectations."

  Lorelei gave this some thought. "All right. We'll conduct an internal audit, catch the employees boosting their metrics, and fire them. I'll thank you for bringing this to my attention. But do you really think it's enough for me to trust you?"

  "Like I said, it's just a gesture of goodwill. Had I wanted to see your family take a knock on the teeth, I could have stayed quiet," she said.

  "In any business with thousands of employees, a few bad hires is unavoidable. The worst that could happen is that a couple of customers complain. Banks get complaints all the time. And frankly most of the customers wouldn't notice."

  "This has already affected more than a hundred thousand people."

  Lorelei's face shifted. The scale of the problem was a few zeroes worse than a couple of complaints. "There's no way it could have gotten this out of hand."

  A couple of affected accounts and you can put it down to a handful of rogue employees. Get within sprinting distance of a million and the entire organization looks rotten.

  "The employee who cheats gets the numbers to keep their job," Kyra said. "It's the honest ones who are let go. Bit by bit the company fills up with cheaters. The managers may catch on, but their own bonuses are on the line. All the incentives along the chain need this behavior to continue."

  "How's this for an incentive? We're going to come down hard on everyone involved—and everyone who turned a blind eye to it."

  Kyra smiled. "So you believe me."

  The question caught Lorelei off guard, but she was quick to regain her composure. "I'll order an internal investigation. If it is as you say, then you've done us a great favor, and we'll repay that debt. But—" Lorelei paused to emphasize this point. "This doesn't mean we'll forgive anything you do to my brother."

  Kyra stood up to leave. "You'll have him back in a couple of months. You can decide for yourself then if there's anything to forgive. As for now, I think we're done here."

  "Do you really mean to help us reconcile?"

  "As long as you don't interfere with us. That means respecting our privacy. You know what I mean by that, don't you?"

  There was a moment of hesitation before Lorelei said, "Can't you tell me what you want from him?"

  "Goodbye, Miss Maxwell. I'm sure you'll make the right decision."

  Back in Lacris-Cheree, Kyra strode through the ICU ward until she found the room she was looking for. The patient inside wasn't alone.

  Lori looked up. "You made it."

  "I promised, didn't I?" She slipped in and shut the door behind her.

  The comatose woman on the bed looked like an older version of Lori. The wrinkles on her middle-aged face told of a life mixed with a measure of joy and two measures of sorrow. She couldn't help wondering if the woman could have been as brilliant as her daughter would be, had the circumstances of her life gone differently.

  "The flight went smoothly," Lori said. "No complications. Rastane kept his word. He got my mom home."

  The girl's voice was strained like it was carrying a lot of weight. Maybe there was also a touch of relief buried in there.

  "You missed Tristis," Lori said. "He stopped by earlier."

  She didn't answer and instead moved closer to her disciple.

  "He's out there right now," Lori continued. "Training. While I'm stuck at the starting block."

  "It isn't your fault," she said gently.

  For a long moment Lori said nothing while staring at her mother.

  Tentatively Kyra put her arm around the girl and hugged her from the side. Lori's head turned into her shoulder and they sat there listening to the rhythmic beeps of the machines.

  She wished she knew what to say. They came easily to her mind, the words of comfort and reassurances. The problem was that they were all falsehoods. She didn't know what the future held or if the girl's efforts would be paid back on herself. She'd told enough lies—lies that had to be told. And maybe just sitting here in comfort was in a way a lie too. But some lies felt worse than others.

  The shoulder of her blouse was wet through.

  She was meant to go see Benny soon, but she decided that the regressor can wait.