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The two girls lunged apart, alarm flashing through their gazes. Lina jumped to her feet, grabbing a thick stumpy branch from her forgotten pile of gathered wood and placed herself between Odette and Zoya.
“Stay back.” She brandished the branch like a club.
“Are you an idiot, Lina? You brought her here? Did you really think you could keep her hidden?”
“I said stay back.”
Odette glared at Lina. “I’m not going to hurt her.”
She was almost as shocked as Lina that those words had left her mouth. But it was true. Odette would rather find the person who had locked them into the skull pact and deal with them than kill this innocent girl. This girl that meant so much to both Rothbart and Lina.
Lina’s eyes narrowed. “How can I believe you?”
“You don’t have a choice. One shout and I’ll have the other assassins here in seconds.” She gripped the pendant around her neck. “Or I can get Zoya to safety.”
“I won’t be safe there.” Zoya stood behind Lina, her chin raised defiantly, her brown eyes flashing. “I wasn’t safe at home even with Rothbart’s disguise. I’d rather live my life.”
Odette released the pendant and spread her hands. “This is living?”
Lina and Zoya exchanged a love-struck glance.
“More than I was,” Zoya said.
“Didn’t you hate her?” Odette asked.
Lina’s expression turned sour and Rothbart’s sister dropped her gaze to the ground.
“Only because she hurt me so badly,” Zoya whispered. “She’s the only person who could. But I’ve come to see, if it wasn’t for her, it just would have been someone else and I would’ve been dead for sure.”
Odette approached Lina, knocking the branch in her hands to the side. “What happened to your disguise?”
Zoya ran a hand through her ebony locks. “We had to get past the gates for the portal beans to work. Once we passed the gate, one of the sorcerer’s spells stripped me of my disguise.”
“Do you know who it was?”
At that, both girls shook their head. “They wore all black and their faces were covered,” Lina said. “But they had magic. Well, once they moved off the estate, at least. They broke down the front door with a battering ram, giving us time to go out the window. We barely made it. If Zoya hadn’t had those beans with her…”
“And now you’ve put her life in more danger by bringing her here.” Odette shook her head. “Lina, what were you thinking?”
“Maybe that she is loyal to her fellow captive sisters,” Elna’s voice sounded from behind.
Nausea churned in Odette’s stomach as she turned. Elna and the other assassins came through the brush, with murder in their eyes.
“No.” Lina spun to Zoya. “I swear that is not true.”
“It’s okay, Lina,” Zoya said. “This was my idea.”
“Then we owe you a thank you,” Elna said. “You have been much more accommodating than our leader has.”
She took a step forward, and Odette moved so she was in her path of attack. “Stand down.”
Elna’s lip drew back, and she sneered at Odette. “And here we are again, ladies. Our fearless leader failing to follow through.”
Odette stood her ground. Why should one innocent life have to die because they had decided to be murderers? She refused to hurt another person who was important to Rothbart. “We can’t kill her,” Odette said. “Not before breaking the swan curse, otherwise there is no telling what Rothbart will do to us.”
“You told us you had convinced the sorcerer that we didn’t have her.” Elna’s eyes flashed with malice. “So if we kill her now, there is no reason for him to suspect that we are to blame.”
The assassins spread out in a wide circle. Odette knew their tactics. In a moment they’d attack from all angles, and there’d be no way she and Lina could stop them from hurting Zoya.
