Chapter 66

66

MINA

Trent had quite the head start—he was sitting casually on the altar-tongue when I made it down, with a lantern at his side, making the teeth around him glint.

"Where is Sylas? What did you do with him?"

"He did it to himself, Mina."

I strode up to him. I still hated him with all my heart—and he wasn't allowed to hurt me.

"Don't," Trent said, swinging the lantern at me.

"You can't do anything to me."

"Yeah, but we're at an impasse—because you can't save him. If you do, you'll die. He told me. So—why would you?"

"Because I'm not you, Trent, obviously," I snarled—then noticed Braden's body on the ground, in the middle of a large pool of blood, and had a strong idea where the stain on Trent's jeans had come from. I detached the flashlight from my shoulder and swung it around—Braden's blood had found certain grooves in the design on the floor to seep into, before it'd dried. I eyed him again. "Do you believe in fate or not?"

"Of course I do."

"Why do you think you deserve a better fate than others? And don't tell me it's because you're a better person—we both know that you're not."

He puffed out his chest. "Certain lineages?—"

"Oh, fuck you," I said, cutting him off. "Look, I'm going to give you a choice here. Either I kill you, or you show me how to open up this stupid fucking thing." I pulled out the gun I'd bought two short weeks ago and pointed it at him.

If I'd faced him with it back then, my hand might've shook—but not now.

Never again.

A panoply of emotions ran over Trent's lantern shadowed face, while he tried to figure out how to play the game. "But either way, I die?—"

"Yeah, you do. I guess your fate didn't account for that. Too bad, so sad," I said, as the others finally reached me. "Nine, I think there's a lid on the ground down there somewhere—see where the blood trickled into those grooves at the edges? Can you pry it open, please?"

"Of course," he said, and set about doing so, while Royce supported Omara and kept Sirena behind him.

Omara reached out to put her hand on my arm. "He's not lying, Mina."

"I know," I said, while Nine put his back into the stone.

"Which means that you will die. And your child, with you. "

I gritted my teeth. "Look," I said, staring down Trent. "Either this motherfucker's the luckiest asshole to ever live—or I am." I finally turned toward Omara. "Sylas is not going to kill me. I don't care what anyone else believes. I have been through enough, and I know life isn't fair—but it is my goddamned turn to be happy."

"There . . . is something . . . fighting me," Nine's translation device told us, as the monster himself sounded pained.

A dark crescent appeared at the edge of the stone, and a horrendous stench wafted out, the sweetness of old death and decay. But if my man was down there—I was going there too.

"It was really nice meeting all of you." I stepped up to the dark gap in the ground. "Please make sure Trent dies," I said, and jumped in.