"What happened to her?" Ingrid asked.
"Eric killed her." I came out of Azure's arms. The residual of her grip stayed on my shoulders for a second. "Not on purpose. He was already going down and his hand came round loose and the web was still live."
Nobody said anything.
Outside the wood, the hallway kept producing sounds.
I crossed the room with Azure's hand in mine.
Sophia was behind the desk with her head tipped back against the top of the chair, throat bare, eyes shut. Not asleep. Her hands lay flat on the blotter, fingers spread, as if the wood were the only solid thing left in the building.
"We kill the first patient." Ingrid was on her feet before I reached her. The chair scraped. "That's it. That's the whole of it. Nothing out there stops until she does."
"How do we find her?"
"I know exactly where she is."
"Good—"
"But the infected are protecting her themselves," Ingrid said. "So it won't be easy."
"No. It won't."
I went to the window.
