“Damn, he’s getting old.” The taunt is barely true enough to get away with. There are new streaks of silver in my father’s hair. Otherwise, he’s unchanged.
“You fear him,” the stranger wearing my father’s face says. It’s not a question.
I shake my head and laugh, letting bitterness coat the sound. “I loathe him.”
“Yet, the resemblance...” He points to himself, then me.
“Don’t even think about finishing that sentence,” I warn him. “Deliver your message and get lost.”
If I could kill this veydra, I would, but I’m wounded, exhausted, and dealing with too many unknowns—like how he recovered so quickly from the beating I gave him.
“S’lach wants you to enjoy your freedom.”
“Done,” I snap. “Anything else?”
“He says to tell you he’ll see you soon.”
“Cryptic message received,” I snarl, advancing on him as fury overcomes my fear and my bladed wings begin to smoke. “If I ever catch sight of him again, I’ll force my sword down his throat and make him pay for his evil deeds in blood. You can tell him I won’t be silenced; not now and not ever.”
Nodding, the messenger smiles and backs into the tunnel in even, measured steps, revealing a flicker of strange facial bands before he’s swallowed by the darkness. “Until we meet again,” he whispers.
His ghostly words echo, and I shiver violently as the door to the locker room is blown from its hinges.
THIRTY-SIX
Unspoken rule of the Fringes #17:
Demand retribution or be eternally wronged.
CELINE
Luca catalogs my injuries, frantically running his hands over me. His knuckles are swollen and bloodied—it’s the first thing I notice when he careens into the locker room. The second thing: yellow eyes, wilder than I’ve ever seen them.
The hair on the back of my neck stands on end, and I stare at my feet.Chill out. This is the real Luca.Even with the reminder, it’s hard to shake the gross violation of being tricked. Second Coming, or whoever he is, toyed with me, wore Luca’s face, and helped me limp from the tunnel... just because he could.
“I’m okay,” I say firmly, pressing a kiss to his trembling palm. “I swear it.”
“That was a veydra in the ring with you.” Luca’s voice is more hiss than speech.
Sickening déjà vu rolls over me. I don’t want to have this conversation again. “I know.”
“How?”
I flinch. The answer isn’t going to make Luca calmer. It’s best to get it over with, though—get all the bad out on the table so we can sort it all at once. Slowly and without inflection, I tell him what happened, including what Second Coming said to me while wearing Luca’s face... and my father’s.
“Motherfucking shuck. He was taunting you,” Luca snarls.
I roll my shoulders, working through the kinks with a wince. Hearing him confirm my suspicions makes them easier to process.
“I’ll kill him,” he promises.
I risk lifting my gaze to his chest. “Wewill kill him.”
Slipping my eyes closed, I raise my chin for a kiss. Luca’s mouth crashes into mine, his tongue slipping urgently inside. I can taste his fear on my behalf. Pulling back, I frown. “How many times do you knock?”
“Two, why?”
His answer is a knife to a balloon—and I slump in his arms as the lingering panic and adrenaline evacuate my body all at once. “He didn’t know the answer,” I say. “That’s how I knew he wasn’t you.”
