Page 32 of Bride of the Enemy Alien

“Is it contagious?”

“No.”

“Is it going to bite me?”

His gaze flicks down to her.

“Not unless you cut it out.”

Merra sniffs. “I haven’t ruled that out.”

Rhazek blinks once. I look away before I laugh, because finding any part of his throat glow funny feels like taking sides in a war I don’t understand and wasn’t consulted about joining.

“Does the fragment control it?” Rosalind asks, looking at him over Merra’s shoulder.

“No.”

“Does the sphere?”

“No.”

“Does Krix?”

That one makes him react. He pauses before answering. The glow dims and then returns, thin as a buried wire.

“Krix owned many things,” he says. “Not this.”

The words should be reassuring, but nothing about this room is reassuring. The cistern is ugly, the sphere is glowing, the floor wants attention, and I am two emotional steps away from sympathizing with the enemy because he looked like someone put a knife into an old wound and twisted.

Nope. Absolutely not. Not going to feel sorry for him.

My sympathy is rationed. I have a list and he’s nowhere on it.

Probably.

“Then why did it answer?” Adran asks, folding his arms.

Rhazek’s gaze shifts to the burned line across the stone.

“Because the fragment asked a question broad enough to wake anything taught to listen.”

Cold moves through the cistern.

I do not like that “taught to listen”. It sounds too much like children learning when to be quiet around hungry adults. It sounds like collared animals and locked doors and arenas full of sand that speaks to warriors who survived long enough to resent it.

Rosalind hears it too. I know she does because all her attention snaps to him.

“Can the fragment use that reaction to find you?”

“I do not know.”

Syin makes a sound of disgust.

Rhazek looks at him. “Would you prefer a prettier lie?”

“I would prefer answers before we place you beside one of ours.”

“One of yours is standing beside me because she moved before your blade did.”