“What do you see?” Mr. Forkle asked.

Sophie’s eyes narrowed. “I’m assuming you’re looking for a better answer than ‘a bunch of cities.’ ”

Flori giggled.

Sandor and Bo snorted.

Mr. Forkle grumbled something under his breath that started with “You kids.”

“Why don’t you just tell me what you want me to say?” Sophie suggested.

“Because I’m trying to teach you, Miss Foster. Your friends look to you for guidance, and lately all I’ve seen you display is despair and frustration. If you’re going to lead them, you need to do better.”

“Lead them.” The phrase felt heavy on Sophie’s tongue. “Is that your big plan, then? Dump all the responsibility on me, because I’m the moonlark?”

“Need I remind you that you’re the one who chose to involve your friends? I’m not criticizing you for that—your friends have proven invaluable to our efforts. But you can’t ignore the responsibility that you took on when you recruited them.”

Sophie’s insides twisted.

She’d never intended to “recruit” her friends. They just kept asking questions about what she was doing and offering to help. And eventually, she’d realized she needed them.

But now everything that happened wasn’t just her responsibility—it was her fault. Like when Lady Gisela knocked Tam out cold and dragged him away, even though he’d already agreed to cooperate.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Mr. Forkle said gently. “And not because I’m violating the rules of telepathy, in case you’re worried. The burden you’re carrying is written in every shadow on your face—and you must not blame yourself.”

Sophie forced herself to nod.

Guilt was dangerous for elves—almost as sanity-shattering as violence.

But it sure wasn’t easy to let go of.

“I want Mr. Tam home safely every bit as much as you do,” Mr. Forkle assured her. “As does the rest of the Black Swan. But that cannot be our only goal. So I need you to step back and remember what we’re fighting for.”

“What are we fighting for?” Sophie countered. “It feels like all we ever do is… try not to die—and sometimes we’re not even very good at that.”

Mr. Forkle looked away, blinking hard, and Sophie was sorry she’d brought up what had happened to his twin brother. But… if they didn’t change something, it was only a matter of time before they lost someone else.

“We’ve been playing defense for far too long,” he said, clearing the thickness from his throat. “And that is never a good way to win. That’s why I need you to look at the map again—truly look—and tell me what you see.”

Sophie dragged out her sigh and tilted her head, trying to guess what he expected her to say. “I see… a divided world.”

“An unevenly divided world,” Bo added.

He had a point. The elves had a bunch of huge cities—and that wasn’t counting their individual estates scattered all over the planet. Meanwhile, the other species seemed to be much more confined to their capitals—except the gnomes, who lived with the elves.

“The ancient Council felt it would be easier to ensure that each leader upheld the tenets of their treaties if the various species were separated from each other,” Mr. Forkle explained. “So they did their best to keep everyone confined to their respective homelands.” A quick series of taps made glowing lines appear across the map, outlining the invisible boundaries around each species’ territory—and their lands were much vaster than Sophie had realized, with borders extending well beyond their capitals. “And the arrangement has had its share of success. We scattered our cities to better keep an eye on everything. And no major wars have erupted among the intelligent species—though what happened with Serenvale was a close call.”

Bo shifted his weight, not looking happy to hear a reminder of how the ancient ogres stole the gnomes’ homeland and forced them to flee to the Lost Cities.

Flori looked even less thrilled.

Mr. Forkle kept his focus on the map. “Time, however, has complicated things. Populations have grown. Resources have been depleted. And many are beginning to feel restricted by their boundaries. Particularly when you consider this.”

He tapped a rapid rhythm against the metal, and thousands more cities appeared across the parts of the map that had previously been empty, most scrunched so closely together that their labels overlapped in a tangle of letters. But Sophie could still tell she was looking at the Forbidden Cities.

Human cities.

“The Council let each intelligent species choose their homeland—and kept land for ourselves and the Neutral Territories,” Mr. Forkle continued quietly. “But they left the rest of the planet to humans, because they’re so much more prolific. And many now feel that decision was a mistake. Some have even begun calling for drastic changes. I believe you’ve heard about the proposal for building a Human Sanctuary that circulated a few decades back, haven’t you, Miss Foster?”

“Alden mentioned it a while ago,” Sophie agreed. And the thought of moving all the humans to what would basically be an enormous prison still made her queasy. “Was that the Neverseen’s idea?”

“It’s hard to say where the murmurings originated. But the idea gained some powerful supporters, even among those considered to be respectable and influential. And though the Council shut it down, they failed to address the larger conundrum that’s been festering beneath the surface of all of our worlds for centuries now.” He turned to meet her gaze. “We’re spiraling toward war. And not an isolated battle. A global conflict involving every living being.” He let that sink in before he added, “That’s why the Black Swan was formed—and why Alden and Quinlin have carried out so many of their own secret investigations throughout the last few decades. But it’s also why the Neverseen exist. And why King Dimitar forged an alliance with them and unleashed the plague upon the gnomes. I suspect it’s even why the trolls enlisted Luzia Vacker to help them experiment on their newborns. We’re all reacting to the same problem. Only our solutions separate us.”

“But… why?” Sophie had to ask, pointing to the map. “I thought we could make anywhere inhabitable. So if this is all just about space, couldn’t we hollow out more mountains or sink more cities under the ocean or—”

“We could,” Mr. Forkle interrupted. “But who would live there? Not every territory is ideally situated for that kind of expansion—and people generally don’t like leaving the place they’ve come to think of as home. There’s also no telling what complications might arise from scattering the species. But even if we resolved all of that, it wouldn’t address the fact that humans are polluting our planet and stripping it of its natural resources while simultaneously building weapons that could destroy everyone.”

“My queen has expressed many concerns about that,” Sandor noted.

“As has my king,” Bo agreed.

“And rightfully so,” Mr. Forkle told them. “It’s an incredibly disturbing situation. And I assure you, the Black Swan has been hard at work on a solution.”