Eve isn’t responding. I’m so shocked by the blood that I don’t consider what her presence means. By then, it’s too late. She has burrowed into every corner of my mind, unearthing all of the secrets I kept from her. Her rage gathers like storm clouds.
You knew that woman? You planned to use her against me?
“What did you do to her, Eve?”
I don’t wait for a reply. Seizing control, I whirl around and head around the house. My legs still feel sluggish and unsure, and I nearly trip over a mound of dirt. Fear pulses through me in rhythm with my pounding heart. I pray that I’m wrong and Celine is fine. Eve wouldn’t possibly do this. She wouldn’t kill an innocent, no matter how angry she is at me.
I see a flash of Celine’s floral skirt behind the pile of firewood. Pressing a hand to my mouth, I walk up to her prone body. She lies on her back in the grass, her eyes closed. Blood trickles down her forehead and over her left ear. The source of the redness on the wood still in my hand. I fling it to the ground and stumble over to a hedge. Bending over, I retch.
My empty stomach yields nothing, but I can’t seem to stop my impulse to vomit.
Are you finished? Eve asks.
If she were in front of me, I would punch her. I don’t care that she knows it. You killed her. Eve, you killed an innocent. She wasn’t a Tracker!
She also wasn’t dead last I checked.
I scramble over to Celine’s body and peer down closely. Her chest moves up and down—barely. But she’s not dead yet. Relief overtakes me, but I’m still angry. You wouldn’t have cared if she died, would you?
Self-preservation.
What does that even mean? You didn’t know anything about her until just now.
“I woke in the dirt to find a woman kneeling over my body,” she says. “What would you have me do in such a situation? If you’d told me you were planning on being out here with this woman I’ve never met or heard of, I might’ve been a little less hostile.”
I don’t answer her. Not that she gives me the chance to respond; she knows exactly why I kept Celine hidden from her. It’s pointless to put up a pretense now.
“All this time, I assumed you were becoming more accommodating, but instead you were out here plotting against me. You even stole my dagger!”
Eve’s anger batters my mind. The past hour of shifting hasn’t helped. I’m so weak that when she pushes to the front again, her strength surging through me and eclipsing the hunger-induced fatigue, I’m helpless to stop her.
“I’ve had enough of this.” She races away from the house, down the slope and in the direction I came from.
Where are you going?
Reclaiming what’s mine.
The dagger. Alarmed, I say, You know what that blade will do to Celine’s husband. You’ll hurt him as much as any Tracker you plan to torture.
She exhales a laugh, her arms swinging hard as she passes the barn. The sun has disappeared now, and the world is caught in twilight. It’s less strange that she’s here now.
Sweet little Bree. Always looking out for others. I don’t care what happens to him or to you or to anyone else. I’m done compromising with you.
When has she ever compromised with me?
You’re pretty self-centered, you know that? Eve asks.
Stop giving me half-answers, Eve. I want you to talk to me!
I’m tired of doing what you want.
I try to plead with her, to threaten her, to reason with her. Nothing I say changes her course. She reaches the paddock and goes straight to the dirt mound I dug through earlier. With a few jerky movements, she scatters the soil and pulls out the blade. And then she plops down in the grass, weapon clutched in both hands.
What are you doing? I ask. You have to start moving. You’re going to draw the whole island’s Trackers to our location.
“Let them come.”
She sounds too calm for someone who has lost her mind. This is foolish and dangerous. You’re not going to hurt me by doing this.
No. You’re not the one I want to hurt tonight.
You will get us killed, I say. Nothing. Please, Eve. Don’t do this.
“Too late.”
Two armed men have appeared in the distance, coming up our hill. When they’re close enough to identify us as the source of the flare, they charge the rest of the way. Eve is on her feet by the time they reach us. She dodges the swing of a sword and swipes her dagger at the stockier one. It slices across his upper arm.
He cries out, staggering back. “Careful,” he says to his partner when he recovers. “She’s wielding a Scarlet Blade.”
Grinning, Eve waves the weapon in the air as she circles them. “You want it? You’re free to take it back. Provided you can stop me.”
The speaker lunges for the dagger, but she swiftly jumps out of his way. Her heart pounds against her ribs, excitement escalating with each passing moment. This feeling overtaking her is familiar; nothing will distract her from her desire to hurt these two men. So I don’t even try. I brace myself and hope no other Trackers show up by the time she’s finished with them.
The two men attack as one. I cringe from somewhere within Eve as one of their swords nearly impales her side. But she twists away and parries another blow with the dagger.
Without breaking the flow of motion, she slashes the stocky man’s neck, drawing superficial blood. The attack sends him on his knees as he experiences the magical effect of the blade. The excruciating pain it causes.
Somewhere out there, Gregor is feeling it, too.
You’re hurting Gregor. Finish them if you must, but stop being cruel to him.
Eve is too caught up in her bloodlust. She’s too fast and skilled for them. If I exhibit talent with my shifting, could the same be true for her? Could she be superior to other Nightborn? That would explain why she’s never lost in a fight before.
But she’s never had to fight more than two at once. And she’s never had to fight too many in a row. Not even Eve is invincible.
The stocky Tracker never sees her next attack coming. Her weapon whips out, sinking into his chest. A sound of pain leaves his mouth as he falls to the ground.
It takes longer for her to kill the second man. This has turned into a game to see how many times she can cut him before he collapses. A quick swipe across his wrist. A cut on his cheek. Little explosions of agony all over him.
Eve, that’s enough. Kill him.
Let’s see how many slashes it takes before he goes down.
I try to force my way to the front, but she’s not budging. I’m still weak from shifting, and her bloodlust strengthens her. If I could, I’m certain I’d be crying for Gregor and his wife. Two more victims of Eve’s cruelty.
A deep gash across his hamstring finally brings him to his knees. Blood soaks his sleeves and runs down his hands, making his hold on his sword slippery. His eyes no longer look hard; fear flickers in the glassy orbs. But unlike the Tracker she toyed with nights ago, this one has too much pride to beg. “Get it over with,” he growls.
Eve touches his forehead with the flat edge of the dagger. He flinches and holds his breath, his muscles frozen.
“I wonder what poor Twice Born had to die to strengthen you,” she muses. “Do you ever feel sorry for them? Do you ever think about what you’ve taken from them?”
“They deserved it.” He looks straight into her eyes. “I would kill them all if I could.”
Eve pushes down her anger. She still has the upper hand. “But you can’t, can you? No matter how much you take from us, you will never be like us. You might consider yourself the predator, but you’re only prey dressing itself up with false claws and a flimsy hide.”
She grabs his hair, jerking his head back, and slits his throat. He topples over on his side. After a few jerky movements and gasps for air, he goes silent.
Look away, I say, angry with her for making me watch the way his blood stains the grass. She has sickness in her that I’m afraid will eat me alive.
Eve does look away, but not because of me. Four more Trackers head toward us. Four too many. Even she won’t be able to handle this group. Start running. Now.
You’ve spent the afternoon searching for the extent of your power, she replies. It’s time I do the same. I want to see what I’m capable of.
You’ll get us killed. And if we live through this, you will have made Gregor suffer. Don’t do this to him, Eve. He’s not our enemy.
I’ve already spared Daniel for you. And how did you repay me? You lied to me, you tricked me, and you plotted against me. I’ve made too many compromises with you. Her hold tightens on the dagger as she waits for the Trackers to reach us. Maybe you were right about me all along. Maybe I’m an awful person. And I prefer things this way. Life is so much simpler when you don’t have to pretend to be anything more than a monster.
The four men converge on her at once. Eve swings and blocks and dodges, but they box her in, getting her from every side. I feel the brutal pain of a kick to the ribs and a fist to the mouth. She barely manages to down one and stab him in the gut when another tackles her.
The dagger falls from her hand. They immobilize her, pinning her arms and legs. Breathing hard, she spits at the one closest to us, a futile act of defiance. An image flashes through my mind: a glass jar filled with blood. It’s over. After years of avoiding this fate, the Trackers have finally overpowered us.
The one straddling Eve pulls back his arm, intending to clobber her in the head. He stiffens, his eyes and mouth wide. A dagger—smaller than the Scarlet Blade—is embedded in the side of his head. He collapses beside Eve. She wiggles one arm free from another attacker’s clutches and slams a fist into his face. She rolls away and comes up on her feet.
“Figured I’d find you behind this madness,” Tristan says as he runs up the rest of the way to us. “I was stalking two of these four goons when they got excited all of a sudden and headed this way. What are you doing here? Were you trying to make it easy for them to capture you?”
I never thought I’d be happy to see Tristan.
“I wanted a challenge,” she pants.
“There’s a fine line between bravery and stupidity, Eve, and I think you’ve crossed it tonight.”
The remaining two seem nervous now, as if they realize the odds aren’t in their favor. But fighting Twice Born is deeply ingrained in them; after assessing the new treat, they both attack.
The fight doesn’t last long. She snaps one man’s neck while Tristan impales the other in the chest. She snatches the Scarlet Blade out of her victim’s hand and wipes the blood on his coat. “You were right about this dagger. It does make things a lot more fun.”
She sounds too casual for someone who nearly got us killed. But she isn’t entirely unscathed. Her breathing is labored, and she’s struggling to remain upright. She might be able to hide these things from Tristan, but not from me. Her hold has weakened. It won’t be difficult for me to seize back control now that her strength has dwindled.
A thought flashes through my mind. Why take control when I can gain something far more valuable? Something I’ve never been able to access before? Her mind. She won’t be able to stop me from breaking through her mental block. Not in her current state.
Tristan says something, but I don’t hear his words. I retreat deeper inside, seeking out that little crack I sensed in her barrier the other night. It’s still there. The barrier itself seems to have grown more flimsy, like rotted wood that crumbles under pressure.
Eve senses what’s happening and stops mid-sentence. “Bree, don’t you dare.”
“What’s she doing?” Tristan asks.
I don’t stop. This opportunity is too tempting to pass up. So I press harder, widening the fissure. More thoughts and emotions spill out from her. One of them is stark fear, and it surprises me. I never imagined Eve would be this scared of losing control this way. What’s she hiding?
She resists at first and when she realizes it’s futile, she relaxes her control, trying to slip back into the background. Where she’ll be out of my reach. But I’m already in the background. I don’t let her push me to the forefront. I keep working at the crack, enlarging it bit by bit.
“She’s trying to break through my shield,” Eve says, panicked. “It’s working. Tristan, what do I do to stop her?”
He looks like he wants to smile. “So Bree is learning to be more assertive, is she?”
“This is no time to be impressed,” she snaps. “I don’t want her in my mind.”
Too late. I surge forward one last time, with all of my strength.
The barrier shatters.
A flood of memories surges around me. I’m drowning in Eve’s mind, in the part of us that’s truly hers. Seeing and feeling and experiencing everything that makes her the person she is. And for the first time in seventeen years, I truly understand her.
#
A mother croons to her young daughter, rocking her in her arms like she used to when she was a baby. “You’ll be fine soon, my darling.”
The girl’s throat feels scratchy and her head hurts too much. But she loves the feeling of being held in the woman’s arms. It makes her feel protected, loved. Try as she might, however, she can’t say this to the woman. She can’t talk. She can’t move. She can’t do anything.
Instead, someone else says, “It hurts, Mommy.”
“Be strong, Bree. It will be over soon.”
Bree. Something tells her this isn’t her name. She doesn’t feel like Bree.
Nothing.
That’s what she is. She is nothing and no one.
So she swims in the abyss of pain, unable to cry out for relief.
“I don’t know what it is, Madeline,” Bree’s father’s voice rumbles through the cracked door, reaching the other girl’s ears. “There’s just something off about her.”
“She is our daughter,” Bree’s mother says, traces of anger in her voice.
“You know what they say about those Twice Born, don’t you? About them being two when it should be one. It worries me—frankly, it frightens me. I see something in her eyes whenever I look at her. It’s as if someone else watches me from somewhere deep within her. I don’t even know whether the child I see every day is my daughter.”
Utensils clatter in the kitchen. “Richard, I think the fear of Twice Born has gotten to you. What are the odds that our own daughter is one of those things? Stop worrying so much and try to appreciate your daughter before she grows up and realizes how little faith you have in her.”
“Say what you will, my love, but I can’t simply let this go. Tomorrow I’m going to ask around about the Sunblade. Perhaps I can find them. They might have a cure for this, and then perhaps we can move on with our lives.”
Bree sleeps soundly through all of this. But the other girl lies awake, unable to lose consciousness until sunrise. Even if she could fall asleep at night, she doubts she would be able to tonight, not after what Bree’s father said. He used to be a good man but lately, he doesn’t even want to look at his own daughter. He’s not nice anymore.
She wishes she could say this to Bree. But no one ever hears her.
“Papa!” Bree throws herself into Richard’s arms, sobbing wildly. She clutches a white daisy in her hand, plucked from her mother’s garden just before the men showed up.
He tenses and grabs her upper arms, pushing her away from him. “What is it?”
“Mother—she’s hurt! Some men came and hurt her.”
The color drains from Richard’s face. “No, no, it wasn’t supposed to be like this. Heavens, Madeline—” His voice chokes off. He rises and tugs Bree toward the door. “Come with me. I’m going to set this straight.”
The other girl knows something is wrong. Run away, she urges Bree. Don’t go with him. He’s going to take you to the bad men.
Bree stops walking, as though she hears the girl. Her heart beats frantically. Her voice is small when she says, “Papa, I don’t want to back out there. I don’t want to go to those men.”
“It’ll be fine, dear. Come along now.”
His tone is harsh. She’s heard it before, whenever he’s displeased with her. Which seems to be too often lately.
She tries to pull her hand away. “Papa—”
“Come, Sabrina!”
Bree wrenches herself free. She races down the stairs, gripping the flower so tightly she squishes its stem. Her father pursues her through the back door. The sun set some time ago, and it’s nearly pitch dark out here. Not knowing where else to go, Bree hurries to the stables, the one place she’s always felt safe.
The stable keeper isn’t here. She rarely works after sunset. The stables are dimly lit by a lone lantern hanging from the back wall. Bree rushes past several stalls, looking for the trapdoor she and Henry found a few months ago. Maybe her father doesn’t know about it. Maybe she’ll be able to stay in there until this nightmare is over.
“Sabrina!”
Gasping, she wheels around to face her father. He enters the stables and takes slow steps toward her. “This is your fault. I won’t lose my son, too. I won’t let them take him because of you—whatever you are. Do you hear me? I won’t let you tear this family apart any more than you already have.”
Bree presses herself against the back wall as he moves closer. The daisy hangs limply in her hand. The girl inside her wishes she could do something. She wishes she could break his neck. But that might not be possible; he’s too big. If only she had a weapon. Like those swords the attackers carried.
To her surprise, Bree is also thinking about the weapons. Perhaps they’re not so different from each other, when it comes to survival.
“Leave me alone,” Bree whimpers. Her head feels funny. There’s pressure inside it, expanding slowly as it pushes against every corner of her skull.
Richard makes a sound of impatience. “I don’t have time for this.”
You have to protect yourself, Bree. Kill him!
He rushes forward. With a shriek, she lifts her hands to defend herself. The pressure in her head shrinks, turning into a prick-point right between her eyebrows. The white daisy disappears. In its place, she holds a sword, much like the ones the men outside carried.
Her father doesn’t see it in time. It slips into his gut. He loses his balance and falls forward, slamming her into the wall.
The force drops her on her side. Richard bounces off the wall, landing on his back on the stable floor. Dizzy and in pain, Bree barely registers the angry yells in the distance. She’s too busy staring in horror at her dying father.
The trapdoor, the other girl says. It’s in the stall to your right. Hurry!
Bree staggers to her feet, her white dress drenched with blood. Her daisy has returned to normal. Was it ever anything but normal? Her mind must be playing tricks on her. She wants to scream, to throw herself on her father’s body and weep. But she knows the bad men will come soon. She’s afraid of what they might do to her, too.
The trapdoor is painted brown like the stables. There isn’t a visible line where it begins, but Bree knows it’s there. She bumped into it once and it swung open. She feels along the wall, finds the crack, and sticks her fingers in to pull the wood free.
Splinters sting sharply as they dig into her skin, but she doesn’t stop until the trapdoor is free. Slipping into the chamber, she grabs the handle on the other side and pulls it shut.
The room is small, barely big enough for two people, and it’s dark. Frighteningly dark. Huddled up in a corner, she closes her eyes tightly and prays for this to end.
She wonders if she did the right thing, listening to the voice in her head.
Days have passed since Bree’s parents died and her brother was taken away. She has traveled far from home, alone and weary and hungry now, because people aren’t as kind to child beggars the farther away she gets from the pleasant countryside.
She keeps going. The voice in her head tells her to keep going.
Bree doesn’t believe the voice is real. She thinks it’s a result of her trauma, seeing her mother and father murdered—though the memory of her father’s death is hazier in her mind as time passes. And then one night a man attacks her as she rests in an alley. He shoves her into a wall and holds a knife to her throat.
Bree learns then just how real the voice is.
As her fear paralyzes her, the other girl takes over. She stabs the man with his own weapon. This freedom, the rush of anger at this man who preys on the weak, and the thrill of being able to act on that anger—all of it creates such euphoria in the other girl.
This is the first real memory she has of being a real person. She wants to feel it again. To feel worthy, alive. But it also fills her with shame. Killing is evil. Or so everyone says. If she enjoys doing something that’s evil, does that make her like the men who killed Bree’s mother?
No. She can’t be evil. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to survive. This man would’ve hurt Bree and then killed her. People like him don’t deserve to live.
People like him will be the reason she’ll be able to live.
Who are you? Bree asks after she reclaims her body. She’s timid and fearful.
The other girl needs to convince her that they’re friends—more importantly, that they need each other. She’ll protect her from the threats of this world, and in return, Bree will give her these brief, sweet tastes of freedom.
More than that, she wants Bree to like her, so that she won’t have to go back to being nothing and no one. So that she’ll have someone who cares that she exists, someone who might talk to her and play with her and grow to love her.
I’m part of you, she begins, and then realizes she doesn’t really know the answer to that question. Who exactly is she?
Anyone.
She can be anyone she wants. This is her rebirth.
Eve. My name is Eve. I’ll stop any bad man who tries to put his hands on you. I’m your friend, Bree. And we’ll always be together.