Page 252 of The Edge of Darkness

His leather groaned as he leaned in. “And what’s that?”

My hand slid into my hidden pocket in space and found its prize: a cold, metal handle. I gripped it tight, as I said under my breath, “That not all magic can be seen.”

He moved at the same time I did, but I was quicker. I spun, and without hesitation, I drove an iron dagger toward his chest. His eyes went wide, and he maneuvered his body just enough to where the blade missed his heart. It sank into his stomach, just below his ribs. He stumbled backward over the tree roots, crashing to the ground.

I stood above him, my heart racing as I watched his tunic flood with red.

Blood dribbled from his lips—lips that had once kissed me in Elandrew’s library. Lips that had always held a genuine smile, and spoke words from the heart.

Those lips had belonged to Breck.

These? These were tainted with lies and deceit, stained with compulsion and malice, soaked in corrupted blood.

A flicker of light skittered over his body, and I couldn’t help but smile. I wasn’t wrong for stabbing him, or for finding satisfaction in it. Because when the flash of light faded, the face that stared up at me . . . was Killian’s.

My heart pounded in my chest as I stared at Killian.

It happened in a blink. The blade pierced his skin, and with a flicker of light, he shifted back into his natural form. It was no longer my friend who lay beneath me, it was my enemy. The fool who thought I wouldn’t notice his follies.

The moment we’d stepped foot in the woodlands it was obvious that whoever was leading me toward The Veil wasn’t truly Breck. And the only other possibility of who it could have been was Killian.

Breck had mentioned once that Killian had been fond of changing his face when he was young, but the ability was lost to him over time. I began doubting that claim at Elandrew’s Lumeri, when Killian’s hair color had changed. It only made sense that he would be the one to impersonate Breck.

Try as he might, Killian had never mastered the ability to move the way Breck did. Breck’s footsteps were light as a feather, his strides as smooth as a doe’s. Killian was too messy, too reckless. His nervousness, his demeanor, his responses, all of it had given him away bit by bit. When he hadn’t corrected me on the color of the bird he’d shot from the sky with his arrow, it solidified my suspicion.

“You’re clumsy, Killian,” I said. “Something your cousin certainly is not.”

The iron dagger was one I had plucked from Niall’s bedside drawer weeks ago, when Skadi had first manifested at the northern gate. I hadn’t returned it, hadn’t thought about the fact that it was in my hidden pocket until Killian had become a looming threat.

I could have used my power, but that would have been too quick a death for him. Death by iron, and the pain that came with it, was more fitting. I waited for him to begin to show signs of distress, but instead, a slow, unsettling smile spread across his face.

“One thing your mate failed to teach you, is that iron must be left in or on the body to render someone’s power useless.” He reached up and grasped the handle of my dagger with shaky hands, then yanked it free.

“No!” I lunged for him, but he drove his foot into my chest, kicking me backward.

I slammed into a tree, the air rattling from my lungs and leaving me hollow. I coughed and wheezed as I watched Killian rise to stand.

The bleeding had stopped. He was healing.

No, no, no⁠—

He staggered for a moment, then tossed the weapon at my feet. “Feel free to try again, if you ever get the chance.”

With that, he vanished.

I leaned against the tree, steadying my breaths as my ribs relaxed and my lungs worked through their spasms.

He’d ported.

He’d survived, and ported.

Fuck!

I should have listened to Niall and the Aether. I should not have trusted so easily this time.

I bent down and snatched up my dagger, then tucked it into the backside of my belt, but no sooner had I done so than a figure stepped around the trees and into my line of sight.

Long black hair, pale skin, yet . . . Just as I had come to suspect, it was not the queen who stood across from me.