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Lyssa gazes down at me, the alley’s weak illumination painting her face in shadows. “One more thing,” she murmurs, almost gently. “Stop killing my people. Stay in your fucking lane. Because if you don’t, when our paths cross again, I will visit horrors upon you that Grandmother couldn’t even conceive of.”

And then she’s gone, a wraith disappearing into the gloom between the decrepit buildings crowding close on either side. I remain on my knees, wondering again if this is a trick, until at last I’m quite sure she’s gone.

With a shuddering breath, I drag myself upright on trembling legs, cradling my throbbing shoulder. My mind whirls with Lyssa’s words, with the seeds of uncertainty she’s so deftly planted in the fertile soil of my soul.

Did I really just agree to bare my darkest scars to the monster who put them there? To show her the moment my world shattered and my heart turned to stone? The memory of Adam’s lifeblood dripping between my fingers rises, and I have to pause and remind myself to breathe.

But if there’s even a chance Lyssa is right...

If Grandmother has been pulling my strings all along, using my grief and rage to forge me into a weapon...

I think of the cruel satisfaction that lights Grandmother’s eyes when she looks at me sometimes, a scientist appraising a particularly successful experiment. I shiver, and it has nothing to do with the cold night air. I’ve spent so many hours under Grandmother’s tutelage, drinking in her lessons on vengeance and death and the cold, clinical arts of wet work. I pushed down my misgivings, my doubts, armored myself in the certainty that she was the key to bringing justice to Adam. That she could give me the skills and the strength to do what I needed to do, even if I died myself in the act.

And God help me, it felt good.

It felt righteous, even as some parts of me recoiled in mute horror at what I was becoming. What I was allowing myself to embrace in the name of justice.

But—no. It’s not about justice. I’m brave enough to face that, at least. I didn’t want justice. Never have.

I’ve only ever wanted revenge.

Doubt slithers through my gut like a snake, sinking venomous fangs into the foundation of my quest. If Lyssa is telling the truth...

She could have killed me. Here and now. She meant to.

And she has no reason to lie, unless she only wanted to hurt me… But I don’t know. I just can’t tell.

Rubbing my burning eyes with the back of one scraped, filthy hand, I get to my feet and limp towards the closest street. Time to see about hailing a cab and figuring out my next step.

Lyssa was right about one thing—I need to know the truth. I owe Adam that much.

As I slide into the cracked vinyl of a cab’s rear seat, I let my head thunk against the window and watch the city roll by, the glass cool against my feverish skin.

Deep in my bones, I feel the first hairline fractures spidering through my ironclad resolve, the fury that’s sustained me for so long turning brittle and perilously thin.

CHAPTER 14

Lyssa

I’m still reeling when I get back to the Empire Grand. Scarlett gave a much deeper hit to my foundations than I could let her see.

Grandmother, alive?

No, really—it can’t be. I killed her myself, felt her hot blood slick on my hands as I cut her throat. And yet…Scarlett’s words ring true. A scar around Grandmother’s neck, easy enough for Scarlett to lie about—but the uncanny similarity in her training…

And the vendetta against me.

It all points to one chilling conclusion.

I pace my room, memories of my childhood threatening to break free from the mental prison I’ve locked them in. I’ve never told anyone, ever, about all that.

Not even Hadria.

The endless hours of training, the punishments for failure, the cold, calculating eyes that watched my every move—I buried them deep, but now they clamor for attention, demanding to be acknowledged.

For so long, I thought it was normal. I thought all children went through what I went through—and not just me. There were other girls, too. Older, sometimes. And younger. Sometimes they disappeared. Sometimes new ones appeared. But we were never friends, only rivals.

And Grandmother molded me into a weapon, a tool for her own ambitions. Day after day, year after year, she pushed me to my limits and beyond. Every failure was met with swift, brutal punishment. Every success with nothing more than a shrug of approval.