“I like you, Roddy.Don’t make me change my mind about that.”
It was the only warning she was going to give him.
“To my everlasting surprise, I feel the same about you.”Roderick smirked at whatever he saw on Kira’s face.“You’re good for your cousin.You’ve brought out a ruthlessness in her that will serve our House well.”
Kira didn’t know what to say to that.Or whether she should be insulted or flattered.
Roderick took advantage of her distraction to walk through the gate, leaving her as the last standing on Ta Sa’Riel’s side.
“My uncle has given me quite the cast of characters to wrangle,” Kira remarked.
“I’m sure he has his reasons,” Silas murmured.
“He always does.”Kira glanced at Silas.“Look after him for me, would you?”
“It would be my greatest honor, little heir.”
Kira grunted and stalked forward, stepping through the gate without a backwards glance.
Thirteen
Kira
Thesoundofretchinggreeted Kira on the other side.She glanced to her right to find Jin bent over a fallen tree, Dylan rubbing his back soothingly.
“What’s wrong with you?”she asked, walking over to him.
His face was nearly green as he wiped his mouth and looked up.“I feel like my innards were just yanked out through my eyeballs.”
“Descriptive.”
“It’s the Mea’Ave,” Dylan explained as the gate closed.The energy powering it snapped off like someone had flicked a switch.“He must be sensitive.”
Call her crazy—but it kind of felt like she and Jin had traded places for a moment.She’d always been the one most affected by the Mea’Ave.
Though she tended to pass out rather than throw up.
“What’s the matter, Tin Can?”Raider asked, coming up to them.“Your body not obeying your brain?”
Jin slumped against the trunk.“How do people live like this?”
“I’m going to have so much fun with this,” Raider gloated.
“You’re an asshole.”
“Yup,” Raider agreed.“Every snide comment you’ve made about meat sacks.Every joke.Every insult.Prepare to have them revisited twice over.”
“Kira—stop him!”Jin demanded.
Nope.
Not a chance.
He deserved every bit of what Raider was about to heap on him.
To avoid responding, Kira looked around, Raider and Jin quickly forgotten as she got drawn into the scenery of an entirely different world than the one she’d been standing on seconds before.
As she’d suspected, they’d come out at the bottom of a large, rocky ravine.The stairs she’d seen were more numerous than she’d originally thought.Many of them led nowhere, stopping in midair or on top of platforms that served no purpose that she could see.They were covered in moss and lichen.There was also a tang in the air that Kira couldn’t quite place.
