Page 212 of Blood and Ruin: The Complete Series

A gesture I won’t forget anytime soon.

“You don’t have to worry about them,” I tell him as something inside me settles, knowing on some deeper level that they cannot beat me. Their powers are too weak, and not one of them is an alpha or a true leader of any kind.

“What are you—”

“Try not to die too quick, will you?” The guard cuts Malik’s question off, just as everything around me starts to move in slow motion.

I watch as the other guards raise their energy spheres right at us. The smug guard thinks he has the upper hand, but from the power pulsing inside my chest, I know he doesn’t stand a chance. None of them do.

The darkness inside me boils to the surface, finding its targets. It grows, expanding outward, seeping from my skin.

An inky mass of smoke flies out of me and straight toward the guards.

“What the—”

The guard doesn’t get the chance to finish his sentence before my power lashes out like whips and wraps around every one of them. It drags them upward before coiling around their necks, slowly tightening its hold.

I watch on as if it’s someone else controlling this, but I know it’s all me. A part of myself that’s been pushed down and hidden for too long.

The guards try to release its hold from their necks, but their hands slide right through it, as if were made from smoke.

I wait until they’re about to pass out before slamming them into the walls around us. Each fall to the ground with a hard thump, knocking them out.

Malik’s eyes are wide when I turn to him.

“Ruthless… I like it.” He smiles, but it slowly drops when he sees me still staring at him. I sense his fear as he holds his hands up. “I’m not the threat here, remember?”

His fear becomes a palpable thing, something I can taste in the air around me as it grows. “I know.” He isn’t a threat to me. My power can sense that.

Malik relaxes, but frowns. “What are you, Kiarra?”

I open my mouth to answer, but I don’t have one. Who or what I am is never something I’ve really thought about. I didn’t truly learn about my ability until King started his sessions, and by then, I was only trying to survive long enough to get me andMoranafree.

Why I never fit in with any of the other supernaturals never topped my list of things to figure out.

But in the darkness on that metal table, something inside me awoke… Something dark; and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to go back to being what I was before. What I am now is something I’ll have to eventually figure out, though.

“I don’t know,” I tell him, exhaustion sitting heavily on me after using my new abilities.

“Let’s get out of here before reinforcements come.” We move to the door, opening it to find it quiet outside.

My mind turns to the shadow beast, wondering where he went. As if I summoned it, he appears in front of us.

“Oh, now you come.” Malik narrows his eyes on it, still wary of the strange beast.

“Find anything?” I ask, but it tilts its head as if he hasn’t a clue what I’m asking for, which I know is a lie. It understands everything I’ve asked it to do so far.

“Show us the way out,” I command.

Immediately, it turns and heads down the hall.

“Why does it answer to you?” Malik asks as we silently follow the shadow beast.

“I think it’s somehowconnectedto my abilities.” Or, at least, that’s what I feel. The connection springs to life as if answering yes.

Malik sighs, shaking his head. Pausing, he glances back at the way we came. I see the sliver of doubt and fear in his eyes, but also a spark of hope.

It reminds me so much of myself when I was in King’s hotel and desperately craved my freedom, but also feared what that would mean.

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