Page 20 of Creatures that Breathe

“Focus,” Lev growls. “Shit. Listen!” He’s shaking me. “Black flames.” Slicing, instant pain slashes my cheek.

A punch.

Lev again. “He burned. Kadmos burned. They burned him.”

Secrets. He’s feeding me secrets. A lead to the king’s killer. He’s bringing me back from the surge, siphoning pain away.

Pain that would gladly kill me if I let it.

With his arm bracing my shoulders, I limp forward, stumbling to keep up. I shut my eyes to focus on draining oxygen from the air when it changes, goes from humid and foul to cold and rank. We’re outside.

A bone cracks in my hand, breaking or setting, I’m not sure. I stare at a slimy brick wall through a sheet of freezing rain. Hot metal licks my mouth.

Black smoke, black flames. I gag on air, lungs swollen.

A week thinking of Leni, and it’d nearly cost me everything.

Save her? You can’t even stay upright.

Pathetic.

“Where is she?” I mutter, pushing free of Lev’s support, only to collapse hard against the wall. It’s wet. I slide. “Where’s the girl? Leni. Where—”

Lev’s frown deepens as I struggle to stay upright. “Focus on the king before you kill yourself.” He pins my shoulder to the wall with a clenched fist. “Need me to go over it again?”

“No. I have it.” I glance at the Ballasts’ neon light. It bursts with a loud pop, momentarily lighting the entire alley before we plunge into black.

Lev swears—Russian, messy—and snaps his fingers. “Hey. Eyes on the prize.”

My throat feels dry and scratchy as I clear it. “Black flames,” I repeat, grinding my teeth against the wracking pain to take in the information, to convince my body that I haven’t lost sight of my mission, that the curse can release me, because I’m still on the Divine path of revenge.

I don’t know how long it takes, but the next time I’m lucid, Lev hums in the back of his throat. The lines of his forehead are smooth again, and his voice is no longer frantic. “Here I thought Atlas sent you to watch me.”

I wince as my thumb snaps into place and push off the wall with strength I don’t yet possess to square my shoulders. “Please. You begged Atlas to come.”

“Guess you’re not so perfect,” Lev taunts, but the undercurrent of worry sticks. “You good?”

I shrug, force a curve on my mouth. Inside, I’m screaming, where is she?

5

Leni

the antithesis of beach

Smile, Leni. You got what you wanted. He’s a murderer.

Before me lies the chilling and irrefutable proof.

The spymaster is not to be trifled with. As in, dare to trifle and have every bone in your hands clobbered to confetti.

He’d ... goaded.

Strut around the broken male like a lion upset the gazelle laid down and rolled over. Get. Up.

I press hot, bruised fingers to my stomach, waiting for the churning to commence, the cottonmouth, the creaky bones and weak knees. But there’s nothing. Only a numbness that spreads through my limbs, disconnecting me from reality.

I drag my gaze from the Annihilator’s prone body to the expanding pool of shimmery pink beneath him and experience none of the usual revulsion, none of the terror.

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