Bryce, the guy who’d fretted about me getting grass cuts, who’d faced a dragon for me, who’d lost the person he loved most, he deserved someone to fight for him too.
Gasps from the crowd rose above the crashing waves. Navy-blue light rolled like smoke off Bryce’s shoulders. His head snapped up, and when his eyes met mine, they shone even bluer than normal. Magic.
I’d let him win the Chosen One competition, and while he was at it, he’d also won me. The proof of my feelings shone before my very eyes. Like it or not, I cared about two things: nothing, and him.
Woman down.
I was a goner.
The light billowed, roiling to the ground like a cloak made of storm clouds. Bryce lifted his hands, color curling off his fingertips. He was too beautiful to look at, and even while my heart burst with affection, some darker part of me squirmed with envy. Bryce with his red hair and his tortured backstory and his throbbing magic. And yes, maybe I’d let him win, but destiny was destiny, and yet again events fell in just the right sequence that resulted in me taking my place in the shadows.
He was light, as bright as the glow of a Thanksgiving dining room, and I was the darkness watching from outside the window. He surpassed everyone’s expectations, and all I did was let people down. He was a Chosen One, and I’d… accidentally unleashed a dragon and raised an undead army.
I was like… the anti–Chosen One.
No. It couldn’t be.
… Could it?
Slowly, a sticky, uncomfortable feeling spread through me. It reminded me of the same sort of feeling I got trying to chasesuccess, then failing. The same sort of feeling I got when Will dumped me. The not-good-enough feeling.
The kind of feeling I tried to ignore when I failed to tick all those boxes on a first date. The feeling that told a truth I couldn’t run from: there was still some part of me deep down, a little girl who wanted to be liked. A little girl who thought, if she tried hard enough, maybe someone would think she was special. A frustrated little girl who hid her face in her pillow and cried at night because it seemed so easy for everyone else.
It was quite the villain origin story.
My mind raced, putting together the pieces.
As soon as I got here, people started getting kidnapped. Granted, that wasn’t my fault, but Amy said the presence of an Evil One brought with it other great evils, that bad things happening were a sign the Evil One was near. Perhaps my very presence was a catalyst that awoke evil in everyone’s hearts and began spreading crime and chaos throughout the city. Maybe the kidnappings were just a manifestation of the darkness I’d brought into the world… as the Evil One.
I licked my dry lips and took a tentative step toward Bryce. “Bryce.” I swallowed hard. “I need to tell you something.”
I’d always been pretty sure I wasn’t a hero. It hadn’t bothered me too much until now, until learning I was the villain. Now I felt a particular brand of ick, the same sort of feeling you get when a guest steps into your home, and all the things you used to be content with suddenly feel shabbier. Inadequate.
As a child, I believed I was a hero. Even later, when I knew better, I at least thought I was a peasant. I never would have thought I was my worst nightmare: the villain.
I’d inadvertently put on a new cape. The villain cape. I’d done the thing I was so convinced I was avoiding: I’d lost myself. Again. I’d failed. I’d failed like I’d never failed before, and everyone would suffer for it.
“Bryce,” I whispered, gazing into the eyes of the man I was predestined to destroy, “I’m the Evil One.”
Bryce’s lips parted, and his head shook infinitesimally. Of course he was in denial. He was too pure not to think the best of me.
Someone screamed.
And then another scream, and another.
Except they weren’t screaming at my proclamation. They hadn’t even heard it. Instead, they were leaping to their feet and pointing down the beach.
I pushed past Bryce and ran up the amphitheater steps, stomach plummeting. As Bryce caught up, the magic around him dissipated in the wind.
The shadowy silhouettes of the skeletal army we had accidentally summoned emerged from the fog. They were probably drawn to me somehow, and they’d shown up because they assumed I’d want to start planning world domination.
Fuck. I needed to figure out how to control my own army, and quickly.
“Back to the castle!” the king yelled, hiking his robes and charging away, heels kicking up sand in the faces of the peasants who followed.
I turned to retreat, only to find Amy standing behind us, looking at us with watery, expectant eyes. “It’s time,” he said, like we were supposed to understand what he was talking about. “You’re ready.”
“We need to run, Amy,” I said. “The king told us to retreat, so not running away from the murderous skeletons would not only be stupid, it’d basically be treason.”
