“Brendan,” I said, but my voice was too low, too lost in the realization.
“What’s happening?” Kara yelled. “Brendan, damn it, why are they letting him in?”
Brendan’s head pivoted as he switched from one screen to another, examining the angles, willing it not to be true.
The gates swung open, and Morgan waved the cars forward as he slid back into his own vehicle. Light flashed off tinted glass as the door shut behind him, and his driver returned to his station.
“Stop them,” Eric said as the first car drove through.
Keys clicked furiously as another command was entered, but they had expected to find them on foot, not driving through the main gate.
We watched in horrified silence as the progression of vehicles made its way up the drive, bypassing every security precaution laid before them.
Brendan was speechless at his own mistake. But it was all of us who’d overthought it. There was no way to stop what was happening, it was too late to undo this now.
A wave of black doors opened down the drive as Morgan’s men stepped from their cars. They were relaxed and confident, armed with silencers and long-range weapons. Morgan walked forward, heading casually toward the steps of the mansion.
“Shoot him,” Brendan said, his hand pressed against the device in his ear.
The command went unanswered as Morgan’s gaze swept the men outside the front entrance. Seven shots were fired, but the cameras caught Division men falling, not Morgan.
“The sway,” Eric whispered. “Gods, he’s turning our men with a single glance.”
“Set a sniper,” Brendan demanded. “Get someone out of his sight and waiting at the main door,now!”
Two of the cameras showed their response, a half dozen men scrambling to change position, set up to fire on him. But they couldn’t kill him, Brianna had said. I glanced sideways at her, but she wasn’t watching. Whatever Brendan did now, he did under his own conscience, because Brianna was elsewhere, her pupils flickering against a sea-green iris. My gaze fell to Emily, hand resting on the hilt of her blade through the fabric of her shirt as she watched Brendan go against her sister’s advice.
We’d not revealed Brianna’s gift to anyone else. Only Brendan knew she was a prophet. To speak it now would put her in more danger.
I opened my mouth to call Brendan’s attention, but stopped short as my gaze caught on a screen.
“No,” he hissed as a Division soldier rushed a sniper set to fire on Morgan. Kara’s hands flew up to cover her mouth as a bullet from his own team ripped through his chest. A second monitor flashed as another Division man shot a gunman in the stomach and then turned to fire on the camera. Brendan frantically called orders over his headset, but it was too late. The soldiers from the gate and front entrance were moving through the house, taking down strategically placed men who were out of Morgan’s range.
He wasn’t even using his own army. He had turned ours against us.
I didn’t look at Emily as I ran. I wasn’t sure I could go through with this if I had. But Morgan had to be stopped, and there was only one chance, one person who might have the ability to stand up to his power without risking her and her sister.
“Stop!” Brianna shouted from behind me, but I couldn’t look at her. I had to do this. I waited in the doorway, hands pressed against the frame.
“He cannot die,” Brianna said to my back. “You can stop him, Aern. But he cannot die.”