MasukSophie I woke the next morning with Leon's last words still circling in my head. "Curious people ask questions." I had spent half the night thinking about that. Not because I disagreed with him. I didn't. The problem was that I had begun to realize something I had not wanted to admit. People were already asking questions. I noticed it at breakfast.Atlas was sitting beside me, eating toast while reading something on a tablet. Selene had her hair tied into two small braids because Mum had decided she looked too serious every morning. Leon was across from us, slowly working through a bowl of cereal while occasionally glancing at the clock.He caught me staring. "What?""Nothing." He raised an eyebrow. I looked away. Atlas lowered his tablet slightly. "That was not nothing.""You all do that.""Do what?" Selene asked."Notice everything."Leon smiled. "You notice things too.""Not like you.""Different isn't worse."That sounded suspiciously like something Mum would say. I pushed my sp
Sophie The message in the children's book changed the atmosphere in our house. Nobody became hysterical, and nobody stopped me from going to school. Dad simply tightened security while making sure the changes were subtle enough that ordinary life could continue. The triplets, however, became more careful.They stopped discussing Aegis anywhere near windows, moved their meetings from the library to different rooms, and began treating every new piece of information as something that needed to be questioned before it could be trusted.I noticed something else, too. Leon had started spending more time with Atlas and Selene whenever they worked. At first, I assumed he was simply keeping them company. I was wrong.One afternoon, I walked into the library and found all three gathered around Selene's computer. Atlas was staring at a complicated diagram. Selene was trying to make sense of a series of encrypted files. Leon sat between them with his chin resting on one hand."What happened?" I
Sophie I didn't tell Daniel that I understood what he had just revealed. Not because I wanted to frighten him further, but because I needed him to keep talking. "Why did he want my family's names?" Daniel shook his head. "He didn't explain.""Did he ask for everyone?""No." His eyes dropped to the floor.b"He asked about the triplets."My fingers tightened around the strap of my schoolbag. "What exactly did he ask?""Whether they were really your brothers and sister. He wanted to know where they studied.""They don't study here.""I told him that.""What else?""He asked whether they were still going to the gifted academy."I stared at him. That information was old. The triplets had left the academy weeks ago. Anyone watching us should already have known that. Unless they were trying to confirm whether the change had actually happened. "Did you tell him?"Daniel looked ashamed. "I said they weren't there anymore." I nodded slowly. "That's all?""Yes." I believed him.At least, I belie
Sophie By the time Emily sent me the remaining files, I had already changed out of my school uniform and settled at my desk. There wasn't much left.A few photographs of historical sites, some handwritten notes, and the introduction we'd written together. The actual presentation was gone. I stared at the folder on my laptop, hoping that perhaps I had simply overlooked it. Nothing. I checked the backups. Nothing.Then I checked the school drive. The folder existed. The presentation did not. I frowned.Emily had sounded worried, but I wasn't convinced this was an ordinary computer problem. I opened my notebook. Under the observations I'd been collecting, I wrote: The file disappeared. The folder remained.I stared at the sentence. Then I called Emily."Did you delete anything?""No.""Did you move the presentation?""No.""Did anyone else have access?""Our teacher. Maybe the computer lab technician.""Did you tell anyone we were working on it?""Everyone in our group knows."I paused.
Sophie Marcus Hale answered the second challenge three days later. By then, I had almost forgotten about him.School had swallowed most of my attention again, especially because our history presentation had been moved forward. Emily and I spent two afternoons arguing over which parts of the project deserved more space, and I had begun to suspect that she would happily turn a ten-minute presentation into a forty-minute documentary if nobody stopped her.At home, however, my siblings had not forgotten Marcus. They had been watching.Not him directly, because they had promised themselves they would never invade his private life merely to satisfy their curiosity. Instead, they had been studying what he did with the information they gave him. That distinction mattered to them. I understood it now.Aegis wasn't supposed to be a collection of talented people who could do whatever they wanted. It was suppo
Sophie By the end of the week, my notebook had become something I carried everywhere. I never told anyone what it was for. At school, it looked like an ordinary notebook filled with messy handwriting, unfinished homework, and observations that probably made very little sense to anyone else.Emily once grabbed it from my desk. "What are you writing all the time?" I snatched it back. "Nothing."She laughed. "You've become secretive.""I'm not secretive.""You absolutely are." I smiled and pushed the notebook into my bag. She didn't know that I had begun noticing things differently.Our English teacher always touched her necklace when she was nervous. The headmaster never looked directly at people when he was lying. One of the boys in my class pretended not to care about his grades, but he checked every marked paper before anyone else. None of it seemed important. Still, I wrote it down.
Isla I had barely finished logging in when a soft knock at the office door pulled me from my thoughts. “Mommy?” Sophie’s voice floated down the hall, light and cheerful. And behind her, a familiar deep voice, steady, calm and impossible to ignore, answered, “I’m right here, little one.”My stomach
Isla Still, Lia’s worry was contagious. And Saxony-laced threats on anonymous lines were new territory for me. I dialed Alexander with fingers that felt clumsy. He picked up on the second ring, his voice cool. “You alright?” he asked.“Someone called...threatened...said something. The number cut o
Isla’s POVBy late afternoon, I had convinced myself that scrolling through glossy listings was not enough. If I was serious about reclaiming my independence, I had to see the places with my own eyes.The first apartment was tucked above a bakery. The smell of fresh bread greeted me as soon as I st
Isla’s POVThe night air still clung to me as I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling long after Alexander’s words had faded into silence. His voice had been steady, almost too steady, as though every syllable had been carved from stone. Wars do not always start with gunfire, Isla. Sometimes they star







