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“I don’t know.” He almost choked on the words. “After she threw me out the window, she rushed here to attack the gods. I have no idea what’s wrong with her. All I know is she’s not herself.”
Bella was definitely not herself, but Faris’s soldiers didn’t appear to care. They had her surrounded, and they were preparing to shoot.
“They intend to kill her,” I said, my quiet voice a terrible contrast to the storm of fear and anger raging inside of me.
“We won’t let that happen,” Nero promised me, helping me up.
Bella was too busy fighting Faris’s soldiers to target us. Harker charged at them, knocking them aside to get to her. But when he was finally standing in front of her, she gave him a frosty look—like she didn’t know him at all—then she plunged her knife into his gut.
“Harker!” I called out. A wave of magic hitched a ride on the tail end of my scream, knocking out all of Faris’s soldiers. And, surprisingly, Bella too. She must have used up all of her magic for now.
“Tend to Colonel Sunstorm’s injuries,” Nero ordered Colonel Fireswift. Then he swooped me up into his arms and carried me to Bella.
Another second, and he was holding her too. I felt a ripple tickle my skin, then we weren’t in the gods’ hall anymore. Nero had whisked us away to a different world.
“I know this place,” I said, looking around.
It was nighttime here, dark and moonless. So there wasn’t much to see. But I did recognize the small log cabin in front of us. Nero had built it for us. This was our safe place, the place we’d bring Sierra to if anyone ever came for her.
Bella stirred, letting out a pained moan. Nero set her down on the soft grass, and then we watched. And waited.
Bella’s eyelashes fluttered open. “Leda?” She looked up at me, confusion crinkling her brow. “What’s going on? Where am I?” She sat up, touching her face. A hint of panic crept into her voice. “Why am I bleeding?”
I sat down next to her on the grass. “What’s the last thing you remember?”
“Eating with Harker in his apartment in New York. And then…waking up here.” Her hand flashed to my face. “You’re bleeding too! Were we attacked? Leda, what the hell is going on!”
“We were attacked,” I told her, slowly, gently. I took her hand. “By you.”
“What?” Bella frowned. “No!” She drew her hand away. “I wouldn’t attack you. Not ever.”
“It wasn’t you, Bella. Someone was controlling you.”
“Who?” She sucked in a raspy breath. “How?”
I told her everything I knew. About how I’d encountered her a week ago, as she was stealing the gods’ Nectar. And everything that had happened today in the gods’ hall.
As I spoke, she listened in silence. But as soon as I was finished, she jumped up. “I attacked Harker?” She started to pace. “I tried to kill the gods?” Her breaths came out in short, panicked gasps. “Why would I do that? And why can’t I remember any of it?”
I managed to get to my feet. “I don’t know. Like I said, we think someone is controlling you.”
“I…” Bella ran her hands through her hair.
It was strawberry-blonde again. When she’d been trying to kill us, it had looked platinum, almost white, even lighter than my own hair.
“Who?” she asked me. “Who did this to me?”
“I did.”
We all turned to look at Ava, the former Demon of Hell’s Army, Bella’s grandmother, and my aunt. She looked just like my mother Grace, her twin. And I hated that.
“Try not to all look so shocked,” Ava said in a soothing, lullaby tone. Her Siren’s Song was softer than my father Faris’s, but no less potent.
“Your magic won’t work on us,” I growled at her.
“Oh, really?” Her brows lifted, and a satisfied smirk curled her lips. “It seems my magic worked all too well on your sister.”
“Stay away from her.” I linked my hand with Bella’s, intertwining our fingers, reminding her that she wasn’t alone.
