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It had been exhausting and, in the end, pointless, because no matter what, it was as if people could see how damaged I was right from the start.
“Hush, child,” she whispered like a lover, like some smooth playboy coaxing me into bed. “It’s not your fault. That’s what I want to change, though, the rules others put in place that keep people like us from being truly free. We are either forced to play a game we are destined to lose, or we have no place in this world.Help meto build a better one.”
“How?” I didn’t even mean to ask that, but something in her voice pried away all my worries, all my doubts. It left me ready to believe every word she said.
“Let go. I’ll take away those rules, those fears, and make yourtrulyfree. I know you want it. You want to embrace the power you’ve found, you want to do what is natural to you instead of what you’retoldyou should. That’s what I did to the others—Ihelpedthem. I took away those rules, those fears and I let them be what they truly were without worry.”
That splinter dug in deeper, her essence sliding through me, stealing away my objections.
Was this what it felt like to come under her power? There was something inescapably tempting about it. It was like each fear I had, each part of me that wanted so badly to change how the world was, to changeme, went away. I didn’t care if people liked me, if I belonged anywhere.
I wasme. I was powerful and beautiful and terrifying on a level they couldn’t comprehend. I wanted to tear the souls from bodies as I saw fit. I wanted to ruin anyone who had dared cross me in my life. I wanted to bask in that darkness just because I could.
Something pressed to my lips—warm and soft and familiar.
I returned the kiss without thought, as if driven by an instinct inside me, something calling me back from the brink of madness. It wrapped inside me, a presence even deeper than Lilith’s influence, than the part of herself that whispered to me.
When my gaze cleared, I found Troy there. He broke the kiss and moved back so I could see into his bright silver eyes, a mixture of him and his wolf.
It was the mate bond. If I’d ever doubted the truth of it before,herewas the proof.
I had ripped Lilith’s presence from him with my powers, but he’d managed to coax me back from the edge of madness with just that kiss, with just a gentle tug upon the bond we shared. It was a trail of crumbs I could follow.
He was inside me deeper than Lilith could ever get.
Which was when the reality hit me. She was a liar, whispering things to me that helped her—not the truth.
Yes, I’d had a horrible life in alot of ways, but she’d forgotten thegood. She’d left out Gran, who had stayed up late with me, trying to teach me to read tarot cards because she’d known how lonely I was. She’d missed the way Grant always warded a place before leaving me, even when he knew damned well I could handle myself, just because he cared. She’d missed how Hunter would stare at my ass openly, even in public, and how much I liked it despite the glare I’d give him. She’d left out the way Kase would pull me against his chest while I slept, as if he couldn’t get me close enough. She’d missed how Troy rumbled out a growled,mine, when he kissed me.
There were some horrible things in the world, but that didn’t wash away the good.
A low sound to my left drew my attention to Kase. On the other, Grant stood, a glowing over his skin as if he couldn’t fully contain the power inside him. Their eyes had gone black, telling me they’d lost the battle Troy had just helped me win.
Troy was fine—was it because I’d removed the influence once before? Maybe it was like a virus and once he’d gotten it, it couldn’t happen again?—and Hunter hadn’t changed.
Then again, he was a hellhound. He wasn’t an immortal like the others, so maybe she didn’t have power over him? The whys didn’t matter at the moment, really.
Troy moved beside me, and Lilith’s face showed the fury at having her plan thwarted. Then again, I doubted many others had stood against her like this.
“No matter,” she said as if she wasn’t fuming at her failure. “I offered you freedom, but you’ll choose death instead. Fitting, really, to have your little friends here tear you limb from limb. Worse, with the barriers breaking down, I wonder if you’ll have an afterlife at all. Even if you have a soul, I bet it will just drift to nothing like the mist here.”
The thought of being trapped in purgatory forever was a pretty horrific one, but something to worry about later. Like if I lost.
Kase let out a chilling sound, one so much like Olin had but worse. Grant was deathly still, those black eyes of his calculating and terrifying.
I’d freed Troy before, had freed wolves since then, but it wasn’t as if I had the same ability to do so here. Either man could tear me to pieces before I ever got close enough to do anything.
But…
I’d done it before, the only way I knew how. I wasn’t as clueless as I had been then, fumbling blindly for something I didn’t understand, something I refused to fully accept.
I shifted, letting myself fall into the now familiar reaper form just as Grant and Kase charged, as Troy and Hunter readied themselves to deal with the men who had become like brothers to them, to kill them, no doubt, if needed to protect me.
I used the power of this form, the shadows I was made of, and reached out at once in a hard shove. I targeted that now familiar presence, that splintered piece of Lilith she used to infect others. In this form, I could see it, like an ugly red infection inside each of them, something that throbbed poison through them. It was easy to find, to target and blast away.
It took only a split second, the mist at the edges of the platform moving away as well from the power.
The black faded from their eyes, that splinter of Lilith dissolving as my power forced it from them. All four collapsed to the stone. I had to trust that they were fine, that it was a side effect of what I’d done—the flames dancing along Lilith’s arms said I had my own problems to deal with.
