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“Anyway, as I was saying.” He stroked his chin. “What was I saying?”

I shrugged, focusing on my environment at the same time, attuning to the sounds, the smells, and the slaughter. The deity had dragged me into a hell zone.

“Ah, yes,” he said, as someone screamed nearby.

I shuddered, hating every moment of this.

“Because I’m beyond your tiny brain,” he declared, “I have roughly assessed this area of the city to be where the curse originated.” He wiggled his fingers. “My magic might have your boot on its throat, but I can still get things done.”

Yeah, like teleport me all over the place. I didn’t doubt his skills for one minute, just wanted to shatter them.

“Unfortunately, I cannot pinpoint the exact location or find the culprit. So, I have another plan in case my first one fails.”

I stopped myself from rolling my eyes, my emotions on hold. The anger, the sadness, the pining for a vampire king—they were all compressed into a small ball and tossed into a box.

Get away from Aidan first, endure the internal chaos later. Because there was no way I was staying here with him.

He rambled on. “I thought to myself, why not attack big? What is the point of being meek about things? If the source of your curse dies in this nightmare before we confront them, then fine. But first, I want to consult The Scratchers.”

Wait, why did I know that name?

I swallowed, the iron stink of blood getting thicker on the air, along with the scent of things I didn’t want to think about burning. So much burning, my eyes suddenly able to pick out smoke plumes everywhere.

What the hell was happening to this place?

Just the beginning, I thought to myself.

Dread scraped rusty barbs across my soul. An acidic bubble burst in the back of my throat.

How many would die tonight because of this vile creature’s games?

“Why do you care?” he asked.

I blinked, then scowled at him. “What?”

“Why do you care about this?” He gestured around him. “This is no different than what people did to your kind. Have you forgotten the slaughter brought down when the academies were purged?”

As if I ever would.

I swallowed a second bubble of sickliness. “These…” I cleared my throat, an acrid breeze of burning flesh attacking my nostrils. “These people didn’t do this to me.”

Aidan sneered, as if disappointed in me. “But they would have celebrated it.”

“Don’t—”

“Paris Raine, I think you know better than to play this note,” he interjected. “We both know how hated you are, so spare me the hypocrisy.”

“I—”

“You are smarter than that.” He bent to inspect a dead werewolf man in human form with a hole in the side of his neck, his yellow eyes wide and empty of life. “If they knew who you were, they’d gladly hand you over for execution.” He touched the wound, his fingers coming back wet.

I steeled myself, my executioner training kicking in. If he was trying to get to me, it wouldn’t work. My walls were fortified, my determination a weapon.

He wasn’t wrong with what he said. But that didn’t make this right.

“Slaughtering innocents to get what you want is all shades of fucked up,” I rebutted.

“Depends on who you ask.” He cocked his head. “Imagine if this was the creator of your curse. I’d now be able to slam your head into the ground until it popped. And there would be no chance of you getting back up.”