Kenzi throws her head back and laughs.
“And look what you became,” she points out with a broad, blood-filled grin. “A warrior. A queen. You would never have become that in his shadow. You needed to grow. To learn what you were capable of. All your life you’ve lived in the shadows. One person’s pawn after another. A tool. Now you are the master. You decide your fate. No one else. That is what I gave you.”
“You. Gave. Me. Nothing.”
It is small. A glint of silver amongst the darkness that I barely recognize for what it is. There isn’t any time to analyze the psychobabble she is spewing at me.
A trick.
A ploy.
Thrusting my knee into her stomach, I roll our bodies, snatching the small silver-hilted knife from the inside of her boot as I lay her out on her back. The knife is at her throat before her back hits the ground.
“You. Took. Everything.”
Kenzi’s nostrils flare, lips parting slightly as the pupils of her eyes dilate. Her body shakes infinitesimally beneath me. For a moment she is truly afraid.
“Then do it.” She bares her teeth and leans in toward the blade. My hand trembles, nicking the soft, vulnerable skin of her outstretched neck.
“Enough!”
The command catches me off guard and I hesitate.
Strong arms wrap around me and tear me off my sister. Surprise shakes me and I drop the knife to the ground as the scent of fresh pine and old leather assaults my senses.
No.
It is a trick.
He is dead. I watched him die.
“Enough.” His lips brush the shell of my ear and his warm breath cascades over the chilled skin of my cheek. “Krasnyy.”
“Stop.” I shake my head in denial, my hands covering my face as I let out a sob. “Stop. Please.”
“Red.” His voice is as soft as supple leather, his grip strong and tangible. But it can’t be him. He is dead.
“This isn’t real.” I wrench against his hold, twisting and turning as I keep hollering. “This isn’t real.”
Chest heaving, I struggle to take in air. Black dots etch across my vision. Numbness and tingling spread like wildfire through my limbs.
The world shifts in and out of focus. He is talking to Kenzi, and she says something back, but their voices are underwater, their speech distant and garbled.
Do they know one another?
How?
She killed him.
He is dead.
“This isn’t real.”
“I’m very real, my love.” Had he uttered those words or is it my imagination? Is it all my imagination? Will I wake up and find myself back in Elias’s shed, starving and close to death? It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been subjected to hunger-based hallucinations.
Is any of this real?
There isn’t time to contemplate further as the darkness washes me under and both imagination and reality cease to exist.