The Hounds didn’t look human anymore, most of them. Their bloodied bodies were half-feral, and many of them showed the marks of teeth and claws. Bad manners indeed. Now he understood.

Had to be Jonas’s fault, though. He hadn’t been here long enough for “his” Hounds to be in uniform.

Besides, from the complaints he heard, “his” were even more trouble than the ones they’d made from Jonas’s magic. It was comforting to know he was ruining Moore’s plans by proxy, if he couldn’t do it himself.

He saw Greer returning and amused himself by making up dialogue for her and the others as they ran about in a panic. Good thing for them Moore wasn’t here.

Dane grew bored and Greer wasn’t coming over to entertain him, which was disappointing. He closed his eyes, but something fluttered—dark and light and dark and light—and he sat up to look.

Everyone was frozen in the moment, then the lights went out again. All through the vast space, there was a single clang made up of more small sounds than Dane could count. But he knew what it was. Every cage unlocking. Every one but his and Jonas’s cages, of course. Before he could inhale to laugh, there was chaos.

The lights came back on in time for Dane to watch a half-feral Hound launch itself into the middle of the lab area. It was clumsy, still learning its new body, but even its flailing was impressive as its claws sliced through plastic and steel and cables as easily as if they were movie props.

“Hey, Jonas. Look.”

The staff were brutally outnumbered—Moore never planned for failure. As their tasers failed to stop the Hounds, panic set in and they tried to flee. Jonas perked up for the first time, squawking at the sight of a Hound gutting a technician and spraying a pristine row of white computers with blood. Nothing amused Jonas like a good bit of gore.

Dane caught a glimpse of Greer through the chaos, walking toward the near exit at a sedate pace, head high. Smart girl. The Hounds didn’t give a damn about her since she wasn’t running or fighting; they were all instinct and she had nothing they were programmed to hunt. Good. If she was alive now, he could kill her later, personally. Her and the weather mage.

The sounds of fighting and killing and dying were a chorus louder than Dane’s dreams, intense enough to make the cage bars hum with it. The possibility of getting free was exponentially larger than moments ago, but Dane couldn’t focus to think it through. Jonas was now rattling his cage and howling like a banshee. If Dane had been on the outside, he might have fought his way into Jonas’s cage just to shut him up. He had to think.

If they got out, they’d only be human in a sea of teeth and fangs and madness—their lack of magic made them less attractive to the Hounds right now, but he’d have to keep Jonas from taking a swipe at one of them. The rattle of a machine gun increased the danger. The soldiers didn’t have a chance against this

many, but they were going to try, and Dane and Jonas both had an uncanny resemblance to the things the soldiers were here to kill.

A familiar sound got him in the gut, a sound that terrified the animal still lurking in him. Fire. There was a terrible wailing that cut off into nothing, and the fire roared down from between the rows of cages, cutting so close that Dane had to get back from the bars or be singed.

“It’s him.” Jonas’s voice was raw, but Dane heard the anticipation. “You don’t get to kill me anymore.”

The fire died and Dane was looking out on a half-destroyed landscape, everything in a wide swath was reduced to ash and concrete.

“Let’s go.” Noah came walking up the aisle, into Dane’s view. He was bare naked and whole, like he’d come up out of his own fire that way, whole except for the remains of tubing under the skin of his chest. “Hold your breath.”

Dane did what he was told, pressing back and holding his breath as Noah’s flaming hands tore the front of his cage open and left it hanging from the hinges, dripping molten steel.

“Let’s go,” Noah said again, and like that, those hands were back to flesh. Dane let them pull him out of the cage and hold him up as he found his feet again.

“Where’s—”

“Here,” Noah said, cutting him off. “Just not in person. Are we bringing that too?”

Dane took a step on his own. He had to make this body work. Already, they’d caught the attention of a Hound feeding on a scientist under a broken table.

That. He looked over his shoulder at Jonas pressed up against the bars of his cage, reaching out, but not to Dane. Reaching for Noah.

Noah flicked a ball of fire at the Hound under the table and the fire swallowed it whole. A twist of Noah’s hand and the ball collapsed into a white-hot star shedding the ashes of his prey.

“Up to you.” Dane wasn’t in charge here, and he wasn’t going to pretend to be. They’d had to come for him this time.

“It’s your choice, ” Lindsay whispered in Noah’s mind. “Jonas was a favored pet. I’m surprised to see him in a cage like the others.”

Jonas. The man he’d decapitated in the elevator, then tried to incinerate. Minutes later, he’d been burning to death in his own fire.

“Don’t leave me.” Jonas was surprisingly coherent for a man who looked completely mad. “Kill me before you go.”

Noah didn’t need to guess as to the purpose of the collars. Jonas wasn’t a Hound and wasn’t a threat right now. If they left him, Moore would use him further. Noah ripped through the bolts and lock on the cage with white fire.

They had both come close to death in Noah’s fire. Noah had his second life. He wasn’t going to deny someone else a chance at the same.

“Do what I say, or I will kill you,” Noah warned. “Completely.” He grabbed Jonas by the wrist and dragged him out of the cage.

“We need to go.” Dane kicked apart a broken desk and picked up the leg. He was right, they had the attention of nearly a dozen Hounds now. They were cowardly things, yelping and cringing even as hunger and instinct pushed them to try to bring Noah down. “The door behind us goes deeper in. To get out, we have to get across the room.”

The lab was devastated and Noah could easily make out numerous Hounds stalking and fighting each other, beyond those creeping closer. They were too mad or too stupid to know what was happening out of sight, where Noah could hear the soldiers fighting to contain the revolt, even as more Hounds turned savage. He wasn’t leaving without wiping the place clean.

“When I tell you to go, you both go.” Noah pointed at the door across the lab. Lindsay could see it and would know where they’d be emerging. “I’ll make sure you get there.” He incinerated the nearest Hound, and the next. Stepping back, he nearly tripped over Jonas.

“Don’t go.” Jonas grabbed at his leg and Noah got him by the collar, pulling him to his feet.

“You’re going. I’m not.” Noah all but threw Jonas at Dane. “Get him out of here. Go on.”

“Happy to.” Dane pushed Jonas ahead of him as Noah blew a path clear with a knot of fire that tore the far door off the hinges. Noah walled the black path off with fire, closing it behind them as they went.

Now, he could work.

The Hounds came at him as though they were eager to die once he’d started killing them. Until Noah felt Dane pass beyond the reach of his fire wall, he kept his destruction to a minimum, killing them by ones and twos. Sometimes, they turned on each other, but his magic drew them in.

Once he knew that he’d done what he came to do—that Dane was free—he gathered his magic in as he had back in the school, when Lindsay was letting him play.

“You should go now. ” He didn’t want Lindsay to feel this the way he knew he would.

“Noah.” Lindsay didn’t have to articulate a protest, Noah could feel his fear and resistance like a weight. Lindsay’s presence twined more tightly around his mind, clinging like a vine.