So here I am. The remaining sentinel stands beside me, within easy reach, but mercifully hands-off. Roland, Agatha, and Director Hale sit behind the table, Roland’s key on its broken cord in front of them.
I flex my hand, still waiting for the feeling to return to my fingertips after using it. Director Hale offers me a chair, but I’ll fall over before I sit down in here again tonight. My gaze find Roland’s. A minute ago, he paused on his way in and reached out, pretending to steady me.
“Do you regret it yet?” I asked under my breath. “Voting me through?”
A sad smile ghosted his lips. “No,” he said. “You make things infinitely more interesting.”
“Thank you,” I said in a low voice as he turned away. “For trusting me.”
“You didn’t leave me much choice. And I want my journal back.”
Now Roland sits at the table, gray eyes tense as Hale rises to his feet and approaches me, bringing his hands aloft.
“May I?” he asks.
I nod, bracing myself for the pain I felt when Agatha tore through my mind. But as Hale’s hands come down against my temples, I feel nothing but a cool and pressing quiet. I close my eyes as the images begin to flit rapidly through my mind: of Owen and the voids and the festival and the fire and Eric. When Hale’s hands slide back to his sides, his expression is unreadable.
“Give me context for what I’ve seen,” he says, taking his seat.
I stand before them and explain what happened. How the voids were made. How Owen finally got through. How I set my trap.
“You should have involved the Archive from the start,” he says when I’m done.
“Sir, I was afraid that if I did, I would be arrested for the mere fact that Owen still existed, and then Crew would go after him themselves, and everyone would suffer for it. As it is, Eric did suffer. I considered it my job.”
And I wasn’t entirely sure Owen was real.
“It is Crew’s job to hunt down Histories in the Outer,” clarifies Agatha.
“Owen Chris Clarke was not an ordinary History. And he was my responsibility. I gave him the tools he needed to escape the first time, and my crimes were pardoned on the assumption that he was no longer a threat.” I’m surprised by the calm in my voice. “Besides, I was in a unique position to handle him.”
“How so?” asks Director Hale.
“He wanted to recruit me.”
Hale’s brow furrows.
“Owen wanted my help. And I let him believe that I was willing to give it.”
“How did you concoct the plan to lure him here?” asks Roland.
“I didn’t,” I say. “He did.” I watch the confusion spread across their faces. “I imagine,” I add, “that he thought it would end differently, but the seed of the plan was his. He wanted me to be a diversion—to attract the energy and attention of the Archive while he achieved some ulterior goal.”
“What was his goal?” demands Agatha.
I hold her gaze. “He wanted to attack the ledger. He promised that, in exchange for my diversion, he would rescue me before I could be altered.”
“And you believed him?” asks Hale, incredulous.
“Why would he save you?” asks Agatha.
“I believed Owen would attack the Archive. And Owen believed I could be converted to his cause. I encouraged that belief in hopes that by insinuating myself into his plan, I would be able to assure his return to the shelves and end the threat he posed.”
“Quite a risk,” observes Hale, lacing his fingers. “And if your initial plan failed? If you had not been able to obtain Roland’s key, if Owen had never come to save you?”
“I weighed it,” I say. “Given Owen’s skills, I believed my strategy had the highest odds of success. But I hope you understand that I was playing a part. That in order to give myself the best odds, I had to commit to it.”
“I hope you understand that a Crew member is dead because of your charade,” says Agatha.
Behind my eyes, Eric’s body crumples to the grass.
“I do. That moment is scarred into my memory. It is the moment I nearly faltered. And the moment I knew I couldn’t. I had started down a road, and I had to finish. I hope you can forgive me for the selfish need to end Owen’s life with my own hands.”
Hale straightens in his seat. “Continue your account.”
I swallow. “When I was brought into the branch, I knew I had to introduce as much chaos as possible, a short burst of disorder to help ensure that Owen reached me so that I could stop him.”
“I assume that’s also why Wesley Ayers made such a scene?” offers Roland with a weighted look.
“Yes,” I say, leaping on the thread. “He was acting under my orders. Is he all right?”
“He’s the least of your worries,” says Agatha.
“He’s alive,” says Hale.
“He’ll be okay,” adds Roland, sensing my worry.
“You do have a way of inspiring allegiances, don’t you?” says Hale. “That boy running around shouting his head off, Roland here claiming he didn’t even feel you take his key—”
“I was caught up in the moment,” says Roland.
Hale waves him away. “And Owen Chris Clarke. You gained his trust, too. I marvel at that, the way he must have genuinely believed in your commitment.”
“Owen believed in his cause,” I say. “His focus was greater than my acting.”
“So you never actually considered defecting?” he asks, his question close on the heels of my answer.
I hold his gaze. “Of course not,” I say calmly.
Hale considers me, and I consider Hale, and silence descends on the room, interrupted only by the director tapping his fingers on the table. Finally, he speaks.
“Miss Bishop, your dedication and sense of strategy are impressive. Your method, however, is reprehensible. You circumnavigated an entire system to fulfill your own desires for revenge and closure. But the fact is, you achieved your objective. You uncovered the truth behind the voids and suppressed a serious threat to the Archive with minimal—albeit upsetting—losses.” He turns to Agatha. “Your sentence is overruled.”
Relief and hope begin to roll through me. Until Agatha cuts in.
“You forget,” she says to Hale, “that there are two charges against Miss Bishop. The first is for treason. Clear her of that if you will, but the second is that she is no longer mentally fit to serve. You cannot deny me that claim.”
Hale sighs and slumps back in his seat. “No,” he says, “but I can consider a second opinion. From someone whose pride isn’t so bruised.” He waves a hand at the sentinel, who goes to the door and opens it. A woman strides in, her blond hair pulled back in a messy ponytail, blood streaking her hands and the front of her clothes, soot smudged across her forehead and jaw.
Dallas.
“Sorry I’m late,” she says, wiping at the soot. “I had to take care of the body.”
My stomach turns. I know she means Eric.
“What is the situation at the school?” asks Roland.
“Chaos, but it’s calming.” Her attention slides to me. She raises a brow. “You look like you’ve had quite a night.”