We tumble to the floor, darkness complete once again.
I move to roll away, but her thighs cage in my hips, planting like roots into the ground. I flail blindly, desperate to knock her aside.Run. Run. Run.The only thought there’s room for within my brain. Adrenaline and panic lance through my veins as I feel the cold grasp of her fingers locking into place around my neck.
“Shh,” she croons. “It’s done. Don’t make me do something I’ll regret. The only people who get to seemypower don’t live to tell the tale. And C wouldn’t like that one bit.”
But it’s not in my nature to surrender so easily. I might be cut off from the fire within, but there’s a new source pulsing against my skin.
Flames burn behind us in the night. Cool night air waits just on the other side of a gate. If only we could reach it.
…You’re a monster…
I close my eyes. Calm. Focus. The thread of her energy drums in the fingers at my throat. I pull it. Hard.
Her shoulders slump. Her grip on my neck relaxes. It dislodges the connection, but it’s too late. I have what I need now.
“You think you’re so clever.” Her voice comes out muffled, slow. Like she’s chewing taffy. “Weaken me all you want. I cankill youwith one thought, Checkmate.”
“That’s your power?” My throat is scratchy from abuse. It doesn’t matter. All I need is a distraction as I pull the stolen energy together, balling in at my core. In my mind I see it, flaring like the sun. My nostrils fill with the scent of it—sweet and slightly burned, like toasted coconut. Can she smell it? Does she feel my torso heating under her?
“Mmm hmm.”
“Through touch?”
I hear a noise like brushing and guess that she’s shaking her head, forgetting or not caring that I can’t see. “I just need to establish a connection. Would you—would you say we’re connected, Checkmate? Do you want to find out?”
My body alights as I release the energy. For one second, I glow with the fusion happening within my body. It detonates as it leaves the confines of my body, singeing the pores it passes through.
It burns!Oh god—it BURNS!
My limbs shake with shock as I try to brush the invisible embers incinerating my cells away. But there’s nothing to brush away. Nothing to stop this impossible searing pain.
We are thrown apart with the force of the explosion. My head smashes into the floor as I land. Somewhere in the back of my mind I know I need to stay awake, that I probably have a concussion. But every inch of my skin feels like it’s peeling from the inside out, and there’s something wet slicking down the back of my neck.
It hurts too much to try to move.
Brown and gray spots dance in my vision, and I let them. Chase them until they fill everything inside. Until everything else is blocked out.
Until I simply stop…
…being.
I would have expected better of you, Reina. Were my orders unclear when I told you to bring her to me unharmed?
No, sir.Sheattackedme.
Then how did she come out so much worse for wear?
I’m sorry, sir. It won’t happen again.
Damn right it won’t. You’re dismissed.
The scent of antiseptic burns my nostrils. And something faintly metallic. The cool surface below me is soothing against my scorched body.
A wave of fatigue crashes through my thoughts, and then nothing else matters, but the black water rising up to claim me again. If only those voices would shut up so I could sleep.
What about the girl?
Have a little soft spot, do you? Don’t worry. She’ll be better than ever after a dose of my latest concoction.
