Page 18

E VERY NIGHT, K IDAN HEARD S USENYOS’S LOW HOWLS OF PAIN AND Etete’s soft footsteps hurrying to rescue him. She listened to their gentle conversation drifting up to her room from the lounge. The light trace of laughter and familiarity made her brows furrow. Etete would scold him like a mother, tell him not to push himself, instruct him to be kinder toward Kidan, and he would fall silent as if he listened. She didn’t understand their bond.

She had this gnawing sensation that he was getting closer to changing the set law, and therefore closer to owning the house, giving him yet another advantage.

Not today. No matter how badly Kidan suffocated in her memories of June, no matter how tightly her throat constricted, she wouldn’t leave without learning the law.

Kidan made sure Etete had left on an errand before approaching the hallway. She didn’t want to be rescued. Her fingers drew squares against her thighs, but she forced herself to walk in. Dean Faris said this would be easy. Her bones shook and grated against one another as June’s bloodied face appeared. A hand tore into her chest, squeezing and pulling, snapping the muscles free.

Why haven’t you found me yet?

Kidan whirled around to the sound of her sister in the rippling dark. “I will.”

Why did you kill me?

This voice wasn’t June’s. It was different, older, lashing on the sensitive flesh of her back like a whip.

You let me burn in that house. I should have known you were always like them.

The smell of burning flesh wrapped around her. Kidan threw up air, heaving until her throat tore inside. The nausea wouldn’t stop, and her open room beckoned her to safety. If she just stepped across the threshold, her veins wouldn’t bulge along her skin.

No.

She squeezed her eyes shut, forcing herself to stay.

Show me the house law. Show me the house law!

Over and over again, she screamed it inside her mind, splitting herself open.

Darkness closed over her vision. Her pulse skittered. This was it. She was going to die.

Blue flames began at the tips of her fingers, the sensitive pads peeling away in excruciating pain. Her mouth opened in a scream, but only black smoke engulfed it. Fire raced along her forearms like lightning, cracking and marking her flesh, and collided at her chest in blinding light. She pleaded for it to stop, but there was still so much of her skin left to burn. And this was going to be a slow, punishing death.

Kidan surrendered herself to it.

Let herself burn. Burn and burn.

Hours passed as she drifted in and out of consciousness. Then, when she was no more than a wilting breath, she whispered, I’m heiress to House Adane. Show me the house law. Please.

She could no longer feel her flesh, only relentless heat. Her hand rose before her, skinless, bone charred like white wood. Horror pulsed through her. It was too much. She had to escape, live—

Golden thread swirled and moved, forming itself into letters. She whimpered in relief and willed her weak knees not to crumble. To read. She needed to know the law her parents had set before they died. Her teeth cut into her lip from how hard she gritted them. The words imprinted themselves on the wall, seared into her mind.

IF SUSENYOS SAGAD ENDANGERS ADANE HOUSE, THE HOUSE SHALL IN TURN STEAL SOMETHING OF EQUAL VALUE TO HIM.

She bolted to her room with desperate speed and collapsed inside with a gasp, falling unconscious where she lay. A fading smile touched her lips. She’d done it.

Kidan woke up on the floor with a headache, but she’d uncovered the law. Relief curled through her, all the way down to her toes, and she sent some gratitude up to her parents. If they set this law, they obviously didn’t trust him. They were on her side. Susenyos was at a disadvantage. He couldn’t harm House Adane. He couldn’t harm her or June .

But… he had taken June. He’d broken the law, and perhaps he was being punished for it. She needed to know exactly how this law functioned.

Kidan grabbed her victim’s confession tape from the bottom of her vanity, stomach tight. She copied it to her phone—password safe—and mulled her plan of attack. Discovering the house law was the best ace she could hope for.

Today, she’d confront him.

She had to push him into a confession without giving too much away. Her heart pounded as she descended the stairs with the recording.

Susenyos was in the lounge that doubled as a study, sitting on the couch with his favorite book.

Kidan’s grip tightened on her phone. “If you tell me what you did to my sister, I’ll leave. You can have everything. The house, the money, everything.”

He regarded her with a bored expression. It was dangerous, this desperation of hers, and it only grew tenfold when she saw it had no effect on him.

“You sounded so much better unconscious.”

He’d heard her.

“Tell me,” she pushed through clenched teeth.

“Accusing me of such a crime… Perhaps I should file a complaint to the Law Courts. We all know how actis enjoy placing blame for their own depraved actions on us.” He cocked his head. “Perhaps you did something to June. I hear you apologizing a lot in the hallways.”

Kidan was stunned momentarily. He settled further into the couch, a rather satisfied expression on his face. He would never take her seriously because he believed she posed no threat to him.

“I’m giving this to the dean.”

He sighed and his black brows rose. Kidan approached. Her thumb rolled over the play button and pressed. The recording scratched, and Kidan’s throat tickled with the smoke of that day.

“Where is June?”

It was Kidan’s voice, but raw, the quality of a mad person attempting to reason. She’d been on her knees, facing the bound and gagged woman.

Susenyos drew closer, interested in the contents of the sick interrogation. Kidan watched him carefully. Was he worried or uneasy?

Music played through the phone. Kidan remembered choosing a thumping bass she’d been sure would drown out the sounds escaping a taped mouth. She’d relished the fear tightening her victim’s features. Kidan had brought the end of a lit cigar to her flesh, and the smell of tobacco and melting skin had suffocated her.

“I saw a vampire take her. They’d only find us if you told them where we were. Did you tell them?”

The poison in those words belonged to an animal who only craved the truth. Kidan burned her three more times, watching her skin blacken like paper and then peel before she broke.

Mama Anoet’s hair had stuck to her wide, sweating face, her small eyes growing large with terror.

This woman had once clothed and fed Kidan, protected her from this world. She was the only mother Kidan knew and loved. It was that love—and the horrifying act Kidan committed despite it—that made her unforgivable.

“ Yes. He wanted you two. You and June ,” Mama Anoet rasped when Kidan loosened the gag.

“Who? What’s his name?”

“I… I don’t know.”

Another scream as Kidan pushed the crackling end of Mama Anoet’s beloved cigar to the back of her neck.

Kidan saw the smallest of flickers in Susenyos’s eyes. It disappeared like a wick pinched between two fingers, but she knew it to be anger. He masked his expression, but it was no use. He’d already given her what she was looking for.

Kidan touched her ear, reminding him to listen to the next part.

“What’s his name?”

Kidan had teetered on the verge of truth, and finally she would get her confirmation.

“ Sagad! ” Mama Anoet had shouted. “His name is Susenyos Sagad.”

Darkness simmered in his eyes. “So, that’s your proof.”

“ Please ,” her victim pleaded.

The recording picked up the labored breathing of both, one in pain, the other vengeful. This had been the moment the truth shattered Kidan’s perfect world. The moment she learned that the one meant to protect her had colluded with the very devils they’d run from all her life.

It had seized every part of her, that rage. It was the sort that slipped into the depths of hell and rose cloaked in eternal flames. She remembered the rest in clipped images. Mama Anoet begging, a match lit, nicotine burning in her lungs from the cigars. Then the house was burning. She’d been too busy rejoicing in justice, too busy extinguishing one evil, to notice that another had slithered past and seared itself into her own eyes. Her neighbors screamed after arriving, terror lingering in their parted mouths, pupils filling black. Kidan had whirled around, ready to vanquish this monster too. The neighbors had stood outside, fire heating their skin, smoke drowning their lungs, but… there had been no other monster. They were staring at Kidan.

Her. The devil that frightened them.

A part of Kidan had died that night too.

Kidan stopped the recording.

“Why stop there?” His eyes were brighter than crushed stars. “Did you try to save her?”

Kidan blinked. What an odd question. Most people asked if she’d survived.

“Did you try to save her, or did you let her burn, little bird?” he asked roughly, coming to stand in front of her. She swallowed, and he followed the movement along her throat. Her heart beat rapidly from his proximity.

“I’m not a killer. It was an accident.” Her lips trembled. “The fire got out of hand, and I tried to help, but…” She’d been used to these words, practiced for the press and detectives. The catch in her throat was very believable.

He blinked up at her, his interest draining away. “How disappointing.”

She glared, hiding her wild beating heart.

Kidan had more than watched Mama Anoet burn. She’d enjoyed every muffled scream, the bulging of her eyes, as Mama Anoet realized the daughter she’d raised wouldn’t come to her rescue.

Of course her most volatile act he would find interesting. Disgust stirred in her gut. The urge to burn this house down around them both itched at her fingers.

“I want to know what you did to June. I want the truth, or I take this to Dean Faris tonight.”

Kidan’s fingers tightened on her device. She refused to let him joke or belittle his way out of this. He was caught.

He folded his arms, leaning back against the edge of the table. “Oh, I think that’s far from the truth. You want blood. You seek it in a glorious way, for a human. So even if I did tell you the truth, I don’t think you’d rest until I was quite dead, yené Roana.”

Yené Roana. Another nickname. He wasn’t taking her seriously. She needed to change tactics.

“I know the house law you so desperately want to change,” she bit out.

He stilled, the dancing light of his eyes punching out.

She smiled. Finally.

“‘If Susenyos Sagad endangers Adane House, the house shall in turn steal something of equal value to him.’”

His fingers twitched, body tensing like a rope eager to snap. Good.

“So, I’m thinking one of two things on why you want to change the law. One, you want to endanger the house without consequences, or two, you’ve already endangered the house and have had something stolen from you.” His breathing stilled, and Kidan’s eyes brightened. “Two it is.”

He remained quiet, emboldening her.

“You took June or hurt my parents, and now the house is punishing you.” She couldn’t keep the delight from her voice. “This is too good.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he warned, teeth gritted.

She got close to his face, within an inch of his chin, and craned her neck to meet those burning eyes.

“No? I think I’m getting pretty close.”

He wrapped long, warm fingers around her throat, squeezing until her heart thundered and she stiffened. “You’re wrong.”

He was so close she could count his thick lashes. Her pulse raced.

His other hand reached for the recording tightly grasped in her palm. “You’ve had this for a long time. I assume the reason it isn’t already with Dean Faris is that it implicates you more than me.”

He cocked his head, almost pitying her.

She focused on his chest. “I don’t care what happens to me.”

“Yet you care about the truth. You care about what happened to June, and going to prison would certainly mean giving up the search.”

Kidan suppressed a scream when his large hand crushed her knuckles, her bones pressed hard against the recording device.

“This is what you’ll do. Tomorrow, you will resign from Dranacti, hand Adane House over to me, and go back to your life.”

He kept squeezing until the device fell from her grasp and clattered to the floor. She tried to crush it under her feet, but he moved with unnatural speed. He shoved her aside, sending her into the cabinet of liquors and glasses.

“Maybe a few years in prison will make you more hospitable.” He smirked, and pressed the middle button.

Nothing played. He frowned, touching the button again, but the contents had been erased. Kidan had done so the moment she stopped it. Of course, he’d try and use it against her. She couldn’t be rid of it permanently, because she still needed it, which is why she’d made a copy before confronting him.

Kidan straightened unsteadily to match the fury radiating off him, a bitter smile on her face.

“You’re right. I’m not leaving until I see you killed for all the sick things you’ve done.”

He took a furious step toward her, then stopped himself, chuckling. “You have such vile expectations of me.… I look forward to proving them true.”

Kidan dragged her fingers through her hair, the room spinning after he left. She touched the butterfly bracelet that had once belonged to Mama Anoet. Her little blue pill. Her chest slowed. Breathe. The room found its center again. Even though it hurt, the pill was her greatest power.

Power because choosing how and when to die gave humans the thing they lost the moment they were born: control. Invincibility and punishment—both were somehow inside her, chained to this bracelet. And she would need them to bring the creature upstairs to absolution, or kill him, whichever she felt like first.

So what if Mama Anoet and her parents had failed to protect her? Kidan always found a way to survive.