Chapter 60


    Chapter Sixty


    “You heard thedy,” I say.


    We move into the hall. Michail took the cards from the security guys that Morgan froze, but we don’t


    need them. Jacob is already in the system.


    The door at the end of the corridor shes green before we reach it, and we walk through.


    Morgan turns left, then right. She guides us down a number of hallways. Then she pauses at an


    elevator bay.


    “I kind of think we should take the stairs,” she says.


    “Never second guess yourself.”


    We hustle into the stairwell and go down three flights.


    “We still need to ess the elevator to get into the restricted areas,” she says.


    “Copy that.” I link my mind to Jacob. We’re going to have to clear a subterranean floor.


    Already on it.


    We push out of the stairwell into the elevator bay across from us. Morgan presses the button. As we


    stand there, waiting for the elevator, tensions re.


    “Good call with the stairwell,” Jacob says. “Security guards made a pass of the halls two floors up. If


    they saw the elevator moving…”


    They would havee to investigate.


    Michail bounces from one foot to the other. Den is freakishly still. Morgan’s heart is pounding and


    even though she outwardly appears calm, I can tell she is far from it.


    “Nice and easy, everybody,” I say. “We’re in and out. We got this.”


    Den rolls his shoulders.


    Morgan nods jerkily.


    Michail doesn’t acknowledge what I said.


    When the elevator dings open, we stride inside.


    If the waiting in the hallway was bad, the slow, slow decline as the doors close and we push the button


    for the restricted floor is way worse.


    A panel opens on the elevator.


    “That’s biometric,” I say. Jacob, you got eyes on this?


    I can hack it but it’s going to take a minute.


    Is that hyperbole? Jacob, Confirm. Sixty seconds?


    No Jace. This is gonna take time, as in more than a minute.


    I nce at Morgan. “Will it read you, with the mour?”


    She nods. “I can retract it.” She bites her lip.


    I can see she’s hesitating. She does this… they’ll know it’s her. Noing back from it.


    “Fuck it. We’ll wait for Jacob to bypass the system.”


    She shakes her head. “We don’t have that kind of time, Jace.”


    I’m not happy with this. I didn’t anticipate this mission going off without some issues, but I wanted to


    incur the risks, not this woman.


    “It’s okay,” she tries to reassure me.


    I know a little something about betraying one’s people.


    N?vel(D)rama.Org''s content.


    I did it with my pack, and I know there will be a price for it.


    A terrible price for it.


    I’ve made my peace with that.


    Morgan has already been emunicated. What we’re about to do now, with it pointing back to her…


    who knows what the repercussions will be.


    Jacob, I need an update…


    Trying…this kind of thing is tricky.


    I want to stall, but I keeping back to that vehicle Morgan saw pulling up to the guardhouse and just


    how much heat might be on its way.


    Before I can say anything, Morgan’s looking at me and her eyes are blue again–that summer sky blue


    that’s soft and pale. Nothing like her current mour or even her usual more glitzy one.


    Then she’s leaning down and doing the retina scan and the elevator dings again before it starts its


    descent.


    “We’re in,” she says.


    Den has his gun aimed at the door. Michail too.


    I keep my arms lithe at my sides. I’m ready to shift.


    We exit to an empty hallway. The lights are extinguished. But as we move, the motion sensors activate


    and they turn on.


    There’s something in the air…”Morgan?”


    She doesn’t meet my eyes. “There is…testing that goes on here.”


    Den’s nostrils re. “I smell vampires...and wolves.”


    She nods.


    What the fuck.


    She’s been what? Imprisoning and experimenting on our people?


    “Split up,” I say. “Michail with us. Den…take that corridor. You see wolves, you set them free.”


    “On it.” He hefts the gun to his shoulder and takes off down the hallway to the right.


    “Den, wait.” I look at Morgan. “Are there wards or magic or whatever?”


    She shakes her head. “No. They don’t keep the specimens long.” She points left. “The important


    research and samples are protected. It’s this way.”


    The implication is clear–wolves are ‘unimportant’. Expendable.


    We go left.


    So they capture and experiment on us. And we’re of no value besides whatever parts they harvest.


    Am I angry? I’m fucking furious.


    She never mentioned this. Never thought to confide that one little bit of vital information. We’d known


    vampires who kept witches captive and bled them for their rare blood and used them for their spell


    casting abilities.


    But treating our kind asb rats? This was next level shit.


    Exactly what every member of our species sought to avoid, namely with humans. But knowing witches


    were in on this kind of research now too…”You know this is gonna start a war, right?”


    “It’s this way,” she says and she moves faster now.


    We pass severalboratories. There are other animals in cages. Rabbits, rats, even chimpanzees.


    “So I guess all thosemercials about being ‘green’ and ‘clean’ and ‘never testing on animals’ is all


    bullshit.” Michail lets out a low whistle.


    Morgan stares at me. “I’m not a part of thispany, Jace.”


    She’s right. And even if she had been, I have no right to judge her.


    She stops so abruptly I m into her back. I sling my arm around her waist to keep her from face-


    nting.


    “Stop!” she warns Michail.


    I don’t see anything. I switch to my wolf eyes. Still nothing. “What is it?”


    She rolls her hands and creates a ball of white smoke which she then blows from her fingertips like


    dusting flour or wishing on a dandelion.


    And then I see it, tiny threads. Faint glittering strings too fine to see normally.


    “What’s this now?” I ask.


    She calls on her magic and chants. She doesn’t break the threads, but rather elongates them, creating


    a high arch that lifts to the ceiling. Where the threads crossed or cut across the hall at odd angles, she


    murmurs other words to help drop those to the ground in bundles that are easier to see.


    “Don’t touch them,” she warns.


    Yeah, definitely wasn’t going to.


    We clear the twenty feet or so of spelled hallway and then we face onest door.


    “It’s just through here.”


    She’s moving her hands again, and this time, I see the wards, they’re like translucent curtains that she


    swipes aside, one after another.


    Finally… we’re in.


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