Fourteen . . . I thought as my eyes widened and my heart beat an impossible rhythm. My hands shook as I recalled the girl’s face to my mind, connected the memories to the present. Her long blond hair, her slim body, her dark-brown eyes . . .

“Sapphira?” I whispered, a red-hot slice of pain cutting though my stomach. Was it her? No . . . it could not be. She was safe in a faraway place.

He had told me she was safe.

She had been sent from New Zion. She had not drunk the poison . . . she had been safe, survived the mass death . . .

Devastating pain slashed through my head as I thought of her face again. The fear and panic as she pulled from the man. Her bruised lips, her split skin. No, it cannot be.

My focus spun and my vision swam. I could not think. I needed the potion to think. I needed what only Meister could give me.

But then a piercing, feminine scream came from the building to my left. Without thought, my legs propelled me forward.

I ran. I ran as hard and as fast as I could, stones from the rough, loose ground slipping into my sandals and slicing my skin. My legs were weak as I pushed myself toward the building, but that did not matter when another scream followed—this one was softer, as though the screamer was being hurt. My Sapphira being hurt . . .

“Sapphira!” I choked out, almost inaudibly. Panic infused my every cell, rushing to erupt into the well of sadness building in the pit of my stomach. I reached the wooden door of the barn structure and pressed my hand against the dark-stained wood. The pulse in my neck beat so fiercely that it was the only sound I could hear . . .

. . . until I pushed through the door, and everything stopped—time, sense . . . life.

My body was motionless as I stared around the room. Bile and vomit crawled up my throat at the putrid smell clogging the air.

Girl after girl, mostly young and slim, lay still in row after row of narrow beds separated by flimsy curtains. I ran past a brunette, then a blonde, searching their gaunt faces. Their eyes were either closed or dazed—they were lost to the potion, their arms just as marked and bruised as my own.

And then I stilled. My lips trembled. I knew these females. Mary . . . Eve . . . Bilhah . . . Martha . . .

Martha!

They were from The Order. These girls, some as young as fourteen, were females from New Zion.

My people.

And . . .

A moan came from the far corner. “Sapphira,” I said, each syllable filling me with dread. I was not imagining things. I saw her face, her beautiful, angelic face.

This was not the potion playing tricks with my mind.

Not this time.

Sapphira was here when he had told me she was safe. I did not understand. My heavy mind would not let me process it. And the male from outside was pinning her down, one hand digging his fingernails into the flesh of her arm as he parted her legs with his legs. His other hand wrapped around her neck, choking her, cutting off air. Then suddenly, I saw her slim, fragile body go limp. A clear bag hung on a metal pole beside her . . . and the potion inside was dripping into the vein of her arm.

Sapphira . . . my Sapphira . . .

I lunged. I threw my body at the man pressing Sapphira down. I hit at his arms and used my long nails to scratch at his skin.

“Bitch!” he snarled and threw back his arm. I lost my balance and fell to the ground. My arm smacked against the floor, sending a lightning rod of pain splintering through my bones. But when I looked up and was met with the hazy dark stare of Sapphira, her fragile body succumbing to the unrelenting will of the potion, I forced myself to my feet.

I staggered back toward the male, who was hovering yet again over Sapphira. Mustering strength I did not know I possessed, I hurled myself at him, pulling on his arm to stop his hand from resting upon Sapphira’s exposed thigh. “Stop!” I shouted, my voice grazed and raw. I had to stop him. I had to save her.

This time, when the male tried to throw me off, I held on with all of my might. My arms wrapped around him, and acting on pure instinct, I sank my teeth into the side of his neck. And I bit down hard. I bit so hard that the male staggered to the side and slammed my back against the wall. Breath whooshed from my lungs, and my arms fell from around his neck. I dropped to the floor, exhausted and depleted, drained from all the fighting. But I had to try. I had to get back up. I had to save her.

The door slammed open. My heart sank with pure fear before I even looked up. Because I did not need to look up to sense his presence.

“What the fuck?” he snarled, his deep voice sounding like daggers drawn, threatening to slice into my cold and broken skin.

“Stupid bitch fucking attacked me like some rabid dog.”

Meister’s feet pounded across the floor so fast that I curled in on myself, desperately trying to escape his wrath. But his wrath was not focused on me. I heard a shuffle, a pained shout and a struggle for breath. Meister had the other man up against the wall, his bulging arm braced at the base of the male’s throat. The male reddened as Meister placed his face close, teeth bared, lips pulled back like a hound escaped from hell itself.

“You touched her?” Meister hissed, spittle landing on the male’s face.

He shook his head in protest. Blood trickled down his chest from the bite I had taken from his flesh. I took advantage of the distraction to crawl across the floor. Sapphira’s arm was hanging from the bed. I reached out and took her hand in mine. She was so cold. Her fingers were so weak.

Sapphira . . .

I turned my head to see the male struggling to breathe, the tips of his feet kicking at the floor. His eyes stared straight into Meister’s, yet the contact did not cause Meister to flinch. His strong arms held firm as he bled the male of his life’s breath . . . as he watched the light fade from his eyes. When the male’s eyes had begun to frost with the imminent call of death, Meister leaned in close, his mouth to the male’s ears, and he said softly, delicately, “You touched her. No one touches her.” Meister’s head drew back, and he watched with interest as the male’s skin blotched with red. “I can’t let it happen, Dale. Even the best of soldiers must obey my commands. No exceptions. No weaknesses. Remember? We are at war, and I am the commander.”

In one last-ditch attempt to fight for his life, the male thrashed with the remaining stores of his energy. But his effort was futile. Meister’s unyielding grip held tight, and within seconds the male’s body slumped in Meister’s hold. His arms sagged, his feet dragged the floor, and his eyes never blinked again, forever frozen on his murderer.