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Another darkling knocks me off my feet. Fire rockets up my arm. Blood. My blood. The smell hits the darklings instantly, sending them into a wild fervor.
Zombies are about to dine on your flesh, Summer, unless you awaken your inner badass.
“I AM NOT FOOD!” I roar.
I kick out, catching a darkling square in the face. The creature stumbles back, shakes its head, and then crouches low, prepared to lunge.
“This is it,” Mack whispers as we press together, shoulder-to-shoulder. “I love you, Summer.”
Even though we’re seconds from dying, I feel a sense of pride swell to fill me. “Being your best friend was the highlight of my life.”
A dark streak in my periphery. An ear-shattering shriek splits the air. The darklings recoil from us, but they don’t flee, instead crouching ten feet away, heads cocked . . . like dogs waiting for instruction.
“It can’t be,” Mack cries, and I follow her gaze to Evelyn. She’s standing between us and the darklings, making choppy hissing grunts that the darklings seem to understand.
“Evelyn?” I say, forgetting that she’s one of them.
Her head jerks in my direction, and I fight the urge to flinch.
Up close, there is absolutely no illusion that she’s anything close to human. Emaciated cheekbones protrude below enlarged black eyes, their depths wild and feral and brimming with an ancient hunger.
The potent stench of corrupted magic seeps from her graying flesh—rotting lilies and copper and old blood.
But unlike the other darklings, her eyes aren’t completely black. Rings of white light pulse around the edges of her irises.
“Evelyn,” I breathe, trying to sound soothing and not horrified, “why are you here?”
She laughs, a terrible inhuman sound that makes me wince. “No choice,” she insists. “No choice.”
The darklings mill patiently around us, waiting for their master to tell them what to do. But she just said she doesn’t have a choice, which means someone is calling the shots.
The same person who stole the soulstone.
I nod slowly. “Someone else is controlling you?”
Evelyn makes a low, whimpering noise that breaks my heart.
“Oh, God,” Mack murmurs. “There has to be a way to help her.”
“Who is your master?” I persist. “Can you give us a name?”
“Can’t talk,” she whines. “It hurts. Can’t talk.”
Jace shakes his head. “This is pointless. She’s been spelled into silence.”
But I refuse to give up. If we can figure out who’s using her, perhaps we can save her. “Anything, Evelyn. Anything you can think of that might help us so we can help you.”
“Did this to me,” she snarls. “Did this to me. Did this to me!” The darklings react to her anger, growling and baring their teeth.
“Easy,” I whisper as the others press against the wall. “Who did this to you? Who is controlling you?” b her hand just as we hit the first floor, and we spill out into the hallway.
Somewhere in the struggle, I lose Kyler.
“Where should we go?” Jace asks. All the blood seems to have drained from his face. He’s dressed in striped blue satin pajamas and loafers.
“I don’t know.” I look around, trying to formulate a plan. “I don’t understand. Why are they here? They should be attracted to the Evermore, not mortals.”
Oh, God. Valerian. Where is he tonight? At the bonfire? Please, please let Asher and Eclipsa be with him.
