Page 47 of Snag (Conduit #2)

“Seriously!?” Presh cries, grabbing fistfuls of the longer fur around the sabertooth’s neck as if she might be able to slow the beast down if he decides to charge again. “You said you needed help!”

“What I need,” Bellamy says, “is leverage. And insurance.”

I smile involuntarily, ignoring the blade lightly pressed against my skin. I can’t decide if Presh is just extremely gullible, or whether she’s so pure hearted that she actually does believe that everyone deserves grace and forgiveness. Redemption.

So much so that she’s willing to speak for Bellamy even after she murdered her friend Kris.

That morality, that goodness, is a completely different sort of strength. And perhaps an indication of the power Presh will eventually wield.

Reck shakes his head, straightens, and crosses toward Presh and the sabertooth. He notably stays on the far side of Muta, though, not getting between me and the coiled bushmaster. Muta, not remotely concerned about me, continues to sulk. Or it’s possible he likes the sun-warmed pavement.

“Take care of that, would you, Zaya?” Reck says over his shoulder. “I’ve got to get DeVille back. I’m not interested in having my interior shredded.”

Bellamy tightens her hold on me as Reck moves, as if she thinks he’s just feigning disinterest .

He isn’t.

The athame slides harmlessly against my skin.

“Seriously?” Bellamy mutters, echoing Precious from a moment before. “He really doesn’t give a shit about you. So … that was a hate fuck? When he thought I was you?” She pauses, curling her lip. “Not that the asshole was capable of getting hard enough to actually penetrate.”

“As much as I enjoy having conversations with a knife to my throat,” I say, curling my fingers around Bellamy’s wrist, “let’s not.”

She shudders under my touch. To be perfectly honest, I’m not a fan of the press of her discordant energy either. It raises all the hair on my arms and prickles at the back of my neck.

“You promised!” Presh cries, pulling my attention to her.

The young awry hangs out of the back passenger side of the SUV, glaring in our direction. The sabertooth tiger attempts to climb into the vehicle with her, over her, but she shoves his face away. There is no way he’ll ever fit in the back seat.

Reck appears to be moments away from slaughtering everyone, starting with the ridiculously long-fanged tiger.

“You promised, Bellamy!” Presh shouts, pressing her hands against the base of the sabertooth’s neck, trying to straight-arm him away from her. “You said you needed help!”

“I lied, you utter fucking moron,” Bellamy shouts back, sounding more like a pissed-off elder sister than a deadly dire awry.

“You didn’t!”

“I did!”

“Zaya!” Reck snaps, getting his arm around sabertooth DeVille’s neck and yanking him back. The tiger is double his size, but Reck moves him, then holds him away from Presh, seemingly easily. “I will fucking leave you behind!”

“Are all my siblings this fucking stupid?” Bellamy asks. “The gryphon has a bit of that Greek god thing going on, but that doesn’t mean he knows where to stick his —”

Still holding her wrist, I easily twist out of Bellamy’s hold, pivoting to look at her. Her arm is now extended between us. She blinks, disconcerted. I pluck the dagger from her hand.

Sickly layers of misdeeds and residual from multiple sacrifices coat the blade. Bellamy has cut more than just herself with this dagger, and each time, she’s fortified it with more and more dire-wrought essence.

All of that crumbles under my touch. Until the athame is nothing more than a decorative knickknack.

The dire awry’s disconcertion flicks to the dagger in my hand, shifting from disbelief to sharp anger. “You have no fucking right!”

“I do, actually.”

“Given to you by what fucking —”

“The universe, I suppose.”

She tries to twist her wrist free from my hold. Then, when that doesn’t happen, she yanks down hard, over and over. Dark-tainted essence, born of frustration and a mounting fear, infuses the sticky blood still covering her forearms. Those barely healed cuts well with fresh blood. Potent blood.

But whatever spells she’s trying to manifest fizzle under my touch before she can even direct them to a purpose.

She tries again and again. Blood flows from the gashes she previously made in her arms. Then when all that fails to impact me, previously healed scars on those arms begin to burst open.

Blood drips down from the arm still extended between us, pours down along the arm she’s raised toward me in an attempt to quell my simple touch.

Her eyes blaze, all but whited out now. Her lips turn blue against the pallor of her tanned skin.

She’s draining her life force.

Bellamy is formidable. She’d be even more powerful if she learned to pull power to her from natural, unlimited sources.

Against anyone but me.

“I won’t …” She gasps as if the words have been wrenched out of her depleted lungs. “I won’t be his any longer.”

I tilt my head, blinking as threads of destiny spark around us, as if called forth by Bellamy’s declaration.

Presh, DeVille, and even Reck blaze in the corner of my eye.

Layers of complex, multicolored threads of fate — of life force, as some call it — twine around each of them, binding them together, linking them with me, then streaming outward in all directions.

So many vibrant paths extend from Precious specifically that —

“Look at me while you’re killing me,” Bellamy snarls, slumping against my easy hold on her wrist.

“That, you’re doing yourself,” I say mildly, though I do turn my attention back to her.

She laughs, already sounding near dead. “Can’t even grant me an easy death …”

The crack of bones and a muffled scream from the direction of the SUV let me know that Reck has coaxed DeVille back into his human form.

I take a moment to look at Bellamy’s threads. I’ve never met a dire awry before, and I still don’t remotely understand why she needs to reach for power in her blood or in the life force of others in order to cast.

A thick rope of fate — quickly darkening to black under my gaze — is wrapped around her neck as if strangling her.

A blackened tangle of threads is centered over her heart …

all the edges seemingly … cauterized. I have to angle my head, peering out from the corners of my eyes to catch a glimmer of the cobweb-gray threads that stretch toward Presh.

I assume they extend to Reck as well. The sibling bonds.

A single thread stretches from Bellamy directly to me. I cup my free hand around it.

“What are you doing?” Bellamy shudders under my hold. Involuntarily reacting to the touch of my power, rather than trying to get away from me. “What are you doing?” she repeats. Her voice is thin, but … awed?

“Presh!” Reck shouts. “Fuck!”

Rapid footfalls herald Precious’s approach, and then she’s at my side with all her glorious destiny blazing around her.

“Zaya, please,” she pleads.

I close my hand around the thread that ties Bellamy to me. Are we linked in this moment simply because I’m holding her upright as she dies? Or are we linked because —

“Zaya!” Presh reaches for me. No, for us. She hovers her hand over where I’m still holding Bellamy’s arm aloft.

“Don’t touch her, Precious,” Bellamy snarls, protective and fierce even with her dying breath. And that’s a choice in and of itself, isn’t it?

What a tangle of lies Bellamy has woven. An uneven and patchy tapestry. What did the dire awry do when she was called to the compound and found that a cage had been set up for her little sister …

Did Bellamy even know she had siblings before that?

Did she help Precious escape?

The younger awry seemed to slip away from Federation territory so easily, even if she mixed up the train stops. Did Bellamy have a hand in that, only to then be tasked with getting Precious back?

She’s desperate now. And not because she’s dying.

Dying might honestly be a relief for her, though Bellamy’s too fierce to admit that, even to herself.

The tangle of cauterized threads over her heart expands … almost as if it’s taking a breath. Then a half-dozen of the ends waver, lifting, reaching …

“You’ve been killing yourself one thread of fate at a time.” My voice is remote, weighted with power. “Every time you sacrifice another for energy, you kill a little more of yourself.”

Precious shudders. The hand hovering over mine shakes. “Please, Zaya …” she whispers.

Bellamy sobs, just once. In grief and fear.

But not for herself.

“Please,” the dire awry quietly begs. “Don’t hurt her … don’t hurt … sister …”

Precious lays her hand over mine, angling her head to catch my attention.

She reaches up and pulls off my sunglasses, tucking them away in the pocket of her lilac hoodie.

When she meets my gaze, her eyes reflect the purple nebulas blazing from my own eyes.

“Zaya. If Bellamy goes back to him, he’ll force her to make more of those berserkers. To make up for the ones we all killed.”

I look back at Bellamy. She’s pale, wavering on her feet. Blood no longer drips from her arms. That tangle of blackened threads over her heart rustles again, reaching out for …

Precious?

“What do you see?” I ask the young awry.

“You,” she whispers reverently. She squeezes my hand lightly. “You are so beautiful.”

I laugh, completely involuntarily. Only Precious could gaze at all the power I carry — both great and terrible, as Reck mockingly called it — and call me beautiful. “What do you see of your sister?”

She swallows, then turns her gaze to Bellamy. “She’s dying.”

“Yes.”

Bellamy chuckles weakly, swaying forward and back. “I concur.”

Precious tightens her hold on me. I grip Bellamy, keeping her on her feet. The young awry raises her other arm. Her hand shakes as she points to Bellamy’s neck and then at her heart. “There and there …”

“Yes,” I say. “What do you want to do about it?”

“Fuck me,” Bellamy groans. “This is not a good time for a mentoring session.”