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Nova retched, covered her mouth, and then did it again—away from Leaf’s side. She fell from the horse and tumbled onto the sandy riverbank. Her hands shot out to break her fall. Her bones jarred as she braced, coughing and choking. Dismay and dread crashed into her, causing her diaphragm to heave, but there was nothing in her stomach.
Empty.
Just like her brother’s eyes.
She wilted. Sobbed. A warm hand slipped around her forehead, preventing her face from hitting the ground. Leaf grabbed her chin and forced her to face him. No comfort this time. No concern.
Tired blue eyes flashed with a warning. “Start talking.”
“Not you, too,” she rasped. “Please don’t be cruel. Please don’t hurt me. I can’t… I can’t…”
Leaf’s breath hitched. He let go and stood back. “Tell me what the fuck is happening. I’m too tired for this shit.”
“You’re a bastard.”
“Yes.”
At least he didn’t deny it. She sat back, wiped her nose, and the absurdity of her situation caused hysterical laughter to bubble out. “How did I get here? With an angry man who looks like someone I loved. With…”
She stopped, about to reveal everything about her brother. Some kind of misplaced loyalty tested her heart. It forced her to consider if Niles was the one she should run to for help. But the instant the idea hit, her heart revolted.
Niles was sick in the head. Always had been, and she’d been too weak to face the truth.
“He always had a morbid fascination with the Roman emperor Nero,” she mumbled. “He wrote school papers on him that disturbed the teachers. How did I not see the signs?”
Leaf tensed. “You knew Nero?”
“That wasn’t always his name. Looks like he changed it after all.” She took a deep breath to steel herself for the rest. “He thought I was his competition. I don’t understand. Did Ichallengehim? Did I say something to make him believe that I hated him? I just can’t… I can’t understand how he thought we were in arace. Would he have picked this path of vengeance if it wasn’t for my stupid morals?”
“Nova!”
Leaf’s harsh tone snapped her back from the edge of hysteria. She faced him, saw the confusion and danger in his eyes, and knew with surety that Jace was nowhere in that mind of his. Even if she could somehow explain the elven ears, the personality was different beneath all that similarity.
He’d have come to the same horrible conclusion if he was.
“I think Nero is my twin.” Her voice sounded robotic. “And I think he destroyed my world.”
Leaf’s expression blanked.
Stupid woman. You just told a deadly warrior that your twin is the man who bombed the world.
But she couldn’t run.
Nova had always pushed back against Niles. She took naysayers and used positivity against them. She supposed defiance was something she shared with her brother. Only he created negativity. She challenged it.
“My brother was a calculated man,” she explained, feeling her strength seep back into her bones. “He always said the only way this world would prosper was if it was small enough for one person to rule. We argued semantics all the time. I thought he was pushing my buttons, making me furious by challenging my views. But all this time, he was testing… making a plan. I couldn’t see it then, but I see it now.”
“See what?”
Nova stood and brushed sand from her knees.
She met Leaf’s eyes. “He didn’t reveal the true depths of his psychopathy until days before the end. But I remember him faking facial expressions in the mirror when we were children. I remember him playing poker, losing money for rounds until he was almost broke—all so he could study his opponents. But he’d win it all back, and then some. Nilesalwayshad an ace up his sleeve.” Her voice quietened. “And I somehow guessed every time.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Confusion hit the Guardian’s achingly familiar blue eyes.
“The day before the first bomb dropped, my brother visited me. We had dinner. We argued. And then he boasted about winning a race I didn’t know we were in.” She grabbed Leaf’s collar and tried to shake him. “He was so smug, so sure that I would come running to him, begging for forgiveness. But all I wanted to do was find you—I mean, find Jace. He was the only person I thought of when the world ended.” Tears glimmered in her eyes as she studied the face of her friend. She punched him on the chest. “Why can’t you be him?”
Leaf stepped back. “Because I was born… not thousands of years ago.”
