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before he rushed in and cut her throat?
    She scooted into daylight, keeping the gun trained on the doorway as best she could considering all her nervous energy. She carefully stood, edged to the door, and circled to her left in a wide arc until she could see through the door into the hall.
    No Carlos.
    The door at the end of the hall was open. This man hadn’t acted alone. Someone in the hotel had helped him access their suite through the one next to it.
    â€œThomas?”
    Kara ran around the bed and knelt beside him. “Thomas!” She slapped his cheek lightly.
    Someone was banging on the front door. They’d heard the shots. Carlos had fled because he knew they would hear the shots. Her accidental discharge may very well have saved both of their lives.
    â€œThomas, wake up, honey.”
    He groaned and slowly opened his eyes.

    THOMAS AND Kara sat on the sofa in Merton Gains’s suite, waiting for the deputy secretary of state to end a string of calls. He’d greeted them briefly, noted the details of the attack on Thomas, ordered more security for his own suite, and then excused himself for a few minutes. The world was unraveling behind closed doors, he said.
    They could hear the secretary’s muffled voice down the hall behind them. Kara spoke quietly, nearly a whisper.
    â€œFifteen? Fifteen years? You’re sure?”
    â€œYes. I’m quite sure.”
    â€œHow’s that possible? You’re not fifteen years older, are you?”
    â€œMy body isn’t, nay—”
    â€œNay?”
    â€œSorry.”
    â€œNay,” she said. “Sounds . . . old.”
    â€œAs I was saying, I’m about forty there. Honestly I feel forty here as well.”
    Amazing.
    â€œSo these wounds of yours are a definite change in the rules between these two realities,” she said, indicating Thomas’s arm. “Knowledge and skills have always been transferable both ways, but before the colored forest turned black, your injuries in that world didn’t cross over here; only injuries from this world crossed over there. Now it goes both ways?”
    â€œEvidently. But it’s blood that transfers, not merely injuries. Blood has to do with life. Actually, blood defiles the lakes, the boy said. It’s one of our cardinal rules. In any case, it’s going both ways now.”
    â€œBut when you first hit your head—when this whole thing first started—it bled in both worlds.”
    â€œMaybe I really did wound it in both worlds at the same time. Maybe that’s what opened this gateway.” He sighed. “I don’t know, sounds crazy. We’ll assume that knowledge, skills, and blood are transferable. Nothing else.”
    â€œAnd that you’re the only gateway. We’re talking about your knowledge, your skills, your blood.”
    â€œCorrect.”
    â€œIt would explain why you haven’t aged here,” Kara said. “You get cut there and you get cut here, but you don’t age the same, or gain weight the same, or sweat the same. Only specific events tied to the spilling of blood show up in both realities.” She paused. “And you’re a general over there?”
    â€œCommander of the Forest Guard, General Thomas of Hunter,” he said without batting an eye.
    â€œHow did that happen?” she asked. “Not that I don’t think you couldn’t be Alexander the Great himself, you understand. It’s just a lot to digest. A little detail would help.”
    â€œMust sound pretty crazy, huh?” A grin played on his lips. This was the Thomas she knew.
    He squeezed the leather cushion by his side. “This is all so . . . so strange. So real.”
    â€œThat’s because it is real. Please tell me you’re not going to attempt another leap off the balcony.”
    He released the pillow. “Okay. Obviously both places are real. At least we’re still assuming so, right? But you have to