The Ends of the World (The Conspiracy of Us 3)

Even if Jack was fine with us being together, the three of us would always be something—something that wasn’t Stellan and me, or Jack and me, or Jack and Stellan. Another thing, together, the three of us, that ached a little when I prodded it, but not in a bad way. In a way that somehow made each of the individual relationships stranger, and richer. Like the unfinished Rebellious Slave. The messiness of it made it not less, but more. At least that was how I felt. I didn’t know how Jack felt, and that was the problem. “I don’t want to hurt him,” I said.

“I don’t either. Trust me, I’ve thought about it a lot. But I think he’d be offended if we gave him a full bank account and a mansion and told him to go have fun. Being a Keeper is his life. So I’d say it’s his choice. What do you think? And what about Elodie, for that matter?”

Shadows passed the sliver of light under the door. “I think it feels really strange to be discussing the lives of our friends like they’re chess pieces.”

“Welcome to the Circle.”

He was right. We were a Circle family now. This was only the first of many situations that weren’t likely to come naturally to me.

“I say we tell both of them we’d like them to get our tattoo and be part of our family if they want. And if they ever change their mind and no longer want to work for us, that’s fine, too,” I said.

“I completely agree.”

• • •

In the end, we needn’t have worried. We did the ceremony twice more, and while the two of them were getting their tattoos done—Elodie’s on her wrist, matching mine, and Jack’s on the forearm opposite his compass—Luc, Rocco on his heels, came in with news.

The meeting was to be held in Rome. At the Vatican. And, because everyone had known it would be somewhere in Europe and so all twelve families were close by, it would be in just a few hours.

Stellan and I followed Luc and Rocco down the hall to a room with one whole wall covered by TV monitors to talk strategy. Rocco was falling easily into a Keeper role here in the Dauphin household. I had a feeling a lot of lines the Circle didn’t like blurred would be blurring for all of us.

The news on the TV showed a car on fire in one of Paris’s ritzy shopping districts, and footage cut to a police officer tackling a guy into a closed storefront, shattering glass all over a display of high-fashion boots.

Luc was studying the screens. He turned to Stellan. “I’m sure you thought I was just ignoring all that. My father would not have allowed it to happen. He would have sent troops out to crush any rioting immediately.”

“Iron fist,” Stellan agreed.

Luc nodded. He looked only slightly self-conscious when he looked at Rocco, and then at Stellan, both as head of another family and as past Keeper of his, who probably knew strategy better than he did. “I didn’t do that, but it was on purpose. I understand why they’re rioting. It’s not unreasonable. The world is a frightening place right now. Feeling like their leadership is unsympathetic toward them might not help matters. I had our troops contain and protect, and do what they could to minimize damage. We’ll address the rest once it’s over.”

Stellan looked surprised. I had a feeling peace and compassion were not generally recognized Circle tactics. “Rome looks like this, too. What’s the strategy for getting to the Vatican safely?” he said.

As we talked, it hit me how terrifying it was for us to be entirely in charge of our own fates like this. We’d been playing at it for so long, but this was real. I used to think all I’d be to the Circle was a symbol. A pawn. But we were a lot more than that. This was quieter and less glamorous and a million times more important than the tabloids and the parties. When we’d first met up with Fitz again, part of me had wanted to let him tell us what to do. But we didn’t need that. Throughout history people our age had done this, learning as they went. And we could, too.

Maybe this was how the world worked. You weren’t ready for something, but you did it anyway, because you had to.

When Jack and Elodie appeared, their tattoos freshly finished, and Colette followed, the conversation shifted to refining the plan for once we got into the room where the Circle would be signing the treaty.

I sat back in my chair and looked around at them. Luc and Rocco, a newly crowned young king and the person he trusted before the rest of us did. Colette, our fierce mother hen, who embodied everything we were trying to save in the Circle. Jack and Elodie, our two warriors, each so loyal in their own ways. And me and Stellan. I thought it was weakness how we kept needing each other more and more. But no matter how many times we put each other back together, we weren’t broken, neither of us. Any of us.

That was strength.

I’d been so soft and afraid when I’d come here. I’d melted and reformed into glass, hard and brittle. But now? I felt like steel. I sat down, and all seven of us decided together how best to save ourselves, and the Circle, and the world.

CHAPTER 28

Jack, Stellan, Elodie, and I were in a car in Rome a few hours later. We’d flown with Luc and Colette on the Dauphins’ plane, but we’d parted ways on the tarmac as they took a helicopter the rest of the way. We wanted to keep our presence here a secret until the whole Circle was assembled. If any of the families was prepared to shoot us on sight, or lock us up, they weren’t going to have the opportunity to do it until the rest of the Circle was watching and could remind them of their code.

Luc had left Rocco in charge of his security forces in Paris, and Nisha and the science team were still working on replicating the vaccine. Fitz, for his part, had made it very clear he didn’t think we should be doing this. When he realized we couldn’t be dissuaded, he’d reminded us to take the vaccine ourselves, just in case, and wished us well. Once this was over, maybe I’d actually have time to get to know my grandfather.

We’d meant to be at the Vatican half an hour ago, waiting to go into the meeting the second it started. But traffic was at a standstill, and every shortcut the driver tried was met with police in riot gear or crowds congregating in the streets, most of them in surgical masks or with bandanas tied over their faces.