Get your head in the game, Remo,another boy called out to him.
My head’s in the game,he grumbled.
Really? Because I could’ve sworn you wereprinsisa-gazing.
The look Remo tossed his friend was full of venom.She’s a kid, Aaron. A kid, who thinks she deserves the world on a fucking silver platter because her father wears a crown and her mother can manipulate stolenwita.His fingers were rolled into fists. Witashe took from my family, by the way.Witawhich I plan on setting free.
Dude . . .Aaron backed up.
What? You think our queen should be allowed to keep something that isn’t hers?
Aaron raised his hands.I don’t want to hear this.
When the boys faded, my fingers dented the skin over my elbows with such fury I was surely cutting off my blood circulation. “You planned on slicing my mother’s neck open?” I yelled.
Remo’s brow pleated in confusion. “Amara, I—”
The elevator dinged, snatching away the rest of his words—undoubtedly a lie—but the glass panel didn’t split open. Instead, it lit up and four words appeared: “Welcome to the Scourge.”
That word again.What did it mean?
The glass went dark, then brightened with adileinjecting venom into someone’s foot, followed by aquilaclawing through flesh, faerie bodies bursting into gray dust and human bodies being decapitated by laser beams, wounds oozing and bubbling with sores.
A wave of sickness slammed into my clenched teeth. The projection shut off and then a seam appeared in the glass wall that widened as the doors pulled apart. I scrambled out into the lobby, palms gripping my thighs, body hunched over. As I worked on swallowing back the vile taste of vomit, wind whistled through the gaping entrance, filling the lobby with an eerie silence.
“What’s a scourge?” My voice was flat even though I brimmed with rage.
“A whip. One that causes immense pain.”
I wondered how Remo knew this. It wasn’t as though he could look it up on his Infinity. Maybe he owned one. That made sense.
“Maybe it’s the name of this place,” he ventured.
“It’d be suiting.” Once I got my stomach under control, I straightened and turned to face Remo, who was standing near enough for me to touch him. Not that Ieverwould after what I’d just witnessed.
Unless it wasn’t true and this place was trying to stir up trouble.
“Did you once tell a boy called Aaron that you would hack through my mother’s neck?”
He blinked.
I took a small step back. Itwastrue. “I hated you before, but now . . .” My hands locked into fists so tight my knuckles whitened.
His eyes turned stony. “Trust me, I got that from the episodes I was subjected to. I didn’t know you had quite so many nicknames for me, and that my eyes were . . . how did you describe them to Giya again? Oh, right, the color ofdilepoison.”
“I might’ve said unpleasant things about you, but I never plotted your mother’s murder or your family’s downfall.” I backed up. “To think I was beginning to trust you.”
Color rose to Remo’s cheekbones. “I wasn’t going to murder her.”
“Like I’d believe you.” I whirled around and stormed out of the building.
Footsteps sounded behind me. Too quick and too near. “That conversation happened almost four years ago.”
“Just because it’s in the past, it doesn’t make it any less real.”
He growled. “I’m sorry, all right!”
I halted my mad dash toward the train and spun back around. “Is Remo Farrow apologizing for something?Wow.” I looked up at the unremitting white sky. “I hope someone’s recording this because I want to play it over and over after we get out.”
