Bricks. Gray bricks.

No. Cobblestones.

Dazed, Harper took in her surroundings. Her gaze followed a straight line that extended into the darkening horizon. A road.

She looked up and spun around, recognition slowly dawning.

She was at the mouth of the alley in Vienna where she'd return after expeditions with the transporter quasar, having missed the hidden spot where she'd normally land by a dozen feet. Thankfully, it was the dead of night. Although her aim was off, not a soul was in sight. No one to witness the strange woman appearing out of thin air and staggering down the road like a drunkard.

She wasn't sure how she reached the townhouse. The only thing she remembered was stumbling along, running away from the acid pain burning through her veins, until she knocked on the door of the townhouse with a heavy hand. Declan was a dark blob in a box of light. The panic in his voice when he cried Harper's name told her she looked as bad as she felt. She fell into his outstretched arms, the world tilting around her.

Her vision swam in muddy swamp waters, green and black and gray. Familiar faces stretched into unfamiliar ones, distorted, broken into pieces and put back together. Fading in and out.

Someone picked her up and moved her.

Softness underneath.

A gentle hand touching her cheek, her forehead.

"I'll look after her," said a melodic female voice. "You must go." Blonde locks framed a concerned grimace above Harper.

She felt something cold and hard pressing against her lips. "Drink, mon chérie." The water felt like lava inside her burning throat. The darkness kept closing. Harper kept fighting it. Someone shoved something round and sweet into her mouth. Harper chewed mechanically. The taste of chocolate permeated through the dull cover of her senses.

"Here, step aside," a man's voice, smooth like a rich dessert wine. "I've got something that can help."

Harper wasn't sure what he'd done, but one moment her head was lolling as she fought the encroaching darkness, and the next her system was shocked into wakefulness with a single breath. It started at her nostrils and zinged through her head, dissolving the cotton between her ears.

Avian's face came into focus. "There she is," he said with a tight smile.

"You're wasting time. Aller, you must go," said Leonie, and Avian vanished down the hall.

Harper thought she caught a glimpse of Declan by the door. She tried to rise. "Wait," she croaked. Leonie held her back, and Harper had no strength left to resist. She slumped back into the sofa.

"They have the coordinates," said Leonie. "They are taking the helicopter. You must stay. You are not good."

Harper could only imagine. She sighed, knowing Leonie was right. Good, she thought. They were finally making a move on the Ra quasar trove. But there was something more important to Harper. More than the Society, more than their quasar trove, more than the Watcher's Order and everyone in it.

"My coat," she said, pushing herself up on wobbly legs. She found it draped across a chair and frantically rummaged through its pockets until she'd found what she was looking for.

One-time use, one call.

She called the only number stored in the burner phone Theo had given her. After three painfully long rings, the line connected. She could hear breathing on the other side, but no answer. She wanted to scream, where is Aisling? Where did they take her? And, more than anything, how could you let them?

But she didn't know who was listening. Instead, she asked, "Status?"

The line instantly disconnected. Harper cursed. She almost threw the phone across the room when it vibrated in her hand. A text message.

Ra moving trove. Bradbury crashing party t-60.

Harper looked at the time. Crap, that was in an hour. She bit her nail. Would the Watcher's make it on time? There was no way. Certainly not before MI6 arrived on the scene. She looked down at the words on the screen in black and white. When few minutes passed without a follow-up, she sent her response.

Aisling?

She stared at the rectangle of pixels, willing them to form into words that tell her Aisling was safe. When the message came, Harper's world came tumbling.

Message not delivered. Try again?

"We have to warn them," she said to Leonie, throwing the phone aside as she snatched her coat. She felt too weak to transport, but if she hurried, she could catch the Watchers at the rooftop before the chopper took off. "The Society is moving the trove. They know we're coming." There was no way the Watchers would get in and out within the hour. Ra's people would be there, waiting in ambush. And then Agent Bradbury and his people would jump into the fray. Harper couldn't risk losing the people closest to her. Declan. Avian. Even Wick. They were all family. She felt this viscerally after Gerard's passing.

Harper paused at the door when Leonie did not follow. "What are you waiting for?" she said, turning around to find Leonie looking back with a strange expression.

"I fear I cannot let you go, chérie," said Leonie, reaching behind her back. Harper knew what it was even before she found herself on the business side of a gun barrel. She wanted to smack herself for never noticing. She'd always had a feeling about Long Legs, something not adding up. With her beautiful golden mane, skin-tight jeans and knee-high dagger boots, Leonie sooner belonged on a runway than in the Watcher's Order. She never quite fit into the gritty, underground secret organization, but it never crossed Harper's mind that Gerard would have let a double-agent infiltrate the inner circle.

"So, what, then?" scoffed Harper, her heart in her throat. "You're going to kill me?"

"Not yet," said Leonie, her voice taut like a violin string. "You and I are going to wait until your Watchers reach the helipad. Close the door. Lock it. Now sit down."

Harper sank back into the armchair. "Why are you doing this?"

"That is not important."

"It is to me."

"Silence! Be quiet," said Leonie, rubbing her temple. She leaned onto the door, listening for anyone passing in the hall. The townhouse would creak when people moved in it like an old woman's arthritic bones. Tonight, it was as quiet as an undiscovered tomb.

Harper pointed at the bar cart in the corner. "Can I at least pour us a drink, considering we'll be here for a while?"

Leonie's lips thinned.

"Come on, Leonie. Have you ever even shot anyone before? If you are going to kill me, you could use the drink. And frankly, so could I," Harper said bitterly.

"Fine," Leonie said with a flick of the gun towards the liquor. "I'm watching you."

Harper rolled her eyes with arrogance she did not feel. She clutched the bottle in her hand to steady her fingers. She was half-amazed the glasses didn't shatter in her hands, she was squeezing them so hard.

"Leave mine at the table and sit back down," said Leonie, her accent heavier than usual. She drank thirstily once Harper sat back down.

Harper watched her. "How long have you been a part of the Society of Ra?" she asked.

"I was never a part of it," Leonie scoffed bitterly.

"Why did you help them, then?" asked Harper.

Leonie opened her mouth to speak, but her lips quivered like the words wouldn't come. Her eyebrows merged with confusion. "Because... I... I always wanted to join them." She ground her teeth together, but the words kept tumbling out. "Can you imagine? The power, the prestige, the quasars, all of it could have been mine, but I wasn't good enough. Finally, I found a way to give them something they wanted."

"A mole in the Order. That's how they set up the trap for us in Garmisch," said Harper, twirling the ring that was now empty of truth serum.

"Yes."

"But that wasn't all, was it?" Harper swallowed hard before her next question. She paid no mind to the glass in her hand softly glowing green. "Why did you kill Gerard?"

"To throw the Watcher's Order into chaos, making you more vulnerable to betray the location of your quasar trove." Leonie frowned like she couldn't believe she'd just said that.

Harper had thrown that question out hoping—praying—that Gerard, the one who was like a father to her, had gone gently in the night. She could understand Tank's betrayal. What would she have done if Aisling was in danger? What wouldn't she have done was a better way to put it. But Leonie's treason was the steel blade of a butcher's knife. Cold and hungry with a handle soaked in blood. No real purpose, only greed.

Harper closed her eyes, taking a steadying breath. "Tell me one thing," she said, her nostrils flaring. "Did he suffer?"

Leonie shook her head, casting her eyes down. "He went to sleep. I didn't want to kill him. I made it as comfortable as I could." A tear slid down Leonie's cheek.

Harper's voice was hoarse when Leonie met her gaze. "I believe you."

One moment Harper was squeezing the glass in the palm of her hand, the next she found herself appearing behind the blonde. She shattered the glass against the back of Leonie's skull. Leonie tumbled to the floor. Harper's hand throbbed where a shard pierced her skin, but the feeling was only secondary to the burning sensation through her whole body. The skin around her eyes was on fire. Blinking away the darkness, she hopped over Leonie who, disoriented, tried to lift her head up, and snatched the gun lying on the floor. She tucked it into her waistband as she flew out of the room. One of the newer Watcher recruits stood by the front entrance. It only took a second for Harper to determine he wasn't a threat. His concerned look at Harper's bloody hand told her as much. "Cuff the traitor. We will deal with her later," she said, wiping her hand on her coat before she snatched a set of car keys.

She drove like a banshee, speed limits be damned.

She couldn't let the Watchers get on that helicopter.