Jealousy

curling red-tinted hair pulled artlessly back and her fangs dimpling her candy-glossed lower lip as the aspect slid over her. The curls lengthened and loosened. She looked like an ad for Victoria’s Secret workout gear.

I slouched shapelessly. Sloppy gray T-shirt, green knit shorts I’d borrowed from somewhere, and my socks were probably dirty, too. They even felt gray against my toes, and my sneakers were new but already showing signs of hard use. I don’t believe in getting clothes that just look pretty or that’ll fall apart—they have to stand up to a lot of abuse.

Dad was real big on dressing for efficiency.

Anna surveyed me from head to foot, and my mother’s locket cooled against my chest. I’d tucked it under the T-shirt, but I never took it off. I could replace the chain if it broke during sparring, but I didn’t want to lose the locket by setting it down somewhere.

It was all I had left. And I suddenly didn’t want her greedy little blue eyes on it.

We were in here with just each other. I couldn’t see her bodyguards, and I wished like hell someone had stayed behind to watch this.

It didn’t look like it would end well. This sort of thing never does. I know what it feels like right before it starts.

Like thunderstorms threatening, prickling against the skin. Only this one felt like a hurricane just looking for a place to come to shore.

“What the hell do you want?” I didn’t have to work to sound unwelcoming. The space at the back of my palate that warned me of danger dilated, roughening, and this time the taste of rotting wax oranges was spoiled by a copper tang. The pressure of fangs against my lower lip turned probingly insistent. They were sharp, but I didn’t want to open my mouth and show them off.

She stepped forward, and I dropped into stance without thinking about it. Weight balanced, arms loose and ready, and every nerve awake.

“You’re bristling,” she said finally. A wide, sunny smile stretched her candy-gloss lips, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “You look like your mother.”

From anyone else, it would have been a compliment. She said it like a curse.

The dream turned over uneasily inside my head. This time I didn’t fight remembering it. “That just burns you up, doesn’t it?” My mouth bolted, the way it was beginning to do. I was sucking at the keeping-my-head-down thing. But having people try to kill you over and over again kind of robs you of a lot of tact. Not that I ever had much to begin with. I hadn’t needed it with Gran, and Dad didn’t care what I said as long as I didn’t cuss around him. “Why did you hate her so much?”

Anna actually rocked back, her weight on her heels as if I’d pushed her. Her eyes narrowed, her face contorting and smoothing in under a second. The grimace was so quick I almost doubted I’d seen it.

But that flash of hate in the very back of her pupils stayed longer. This time I was sure. And I’d just guessed, yeah. But it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that in Anna’s personal hate sweepstakes, Christophe and my mother were about neck and neck. Score one for me guessing someone else’s dirty little feelings. I didn’t even need the touch to do it.

So why did I feel guilty?

The svetocha took a gliding step to the side and I tracked the movement, the way Dad had taught me to. When it’s just one person you keep your feet down and your eyes on ’em, honey. Don’t let ’em move you around much, but don’t back down neither.

God, if I could just stop hearing his voice in my head, maybe it wouldn’t hurt so much.

“I didn’t hate her.” The sound of the lie was a sweet, tinkling bell. She had such a pretty voice. Candy over venom. “I just thought she should leave certain things alone. Certain things she wasn’t cut out for.”

“What kind of things?” My pulse picked up, running just under the surface of my skin. I’ve been in enough schoolyard fights to know the difference between them and deadly serious business. This one could go either way, and it all depended on the next few minutes.

Anna kept just out of range. Another few gliding steps and the doors were behind me. At least I had room to back up.

This is crazy. She’s another svetocha; she’s supposed to be on your side.

But I didn’t believe it. Not the way she was looking at me. Over Christophe? Because she hated my mother? What did that have to do with me? I wasn’t either of them; why couldn’t she just leave me alone? I’d always thought antimatter girls grew out of it. That it was just a phase or something.

Guess I was wrong.

“All sorts of things. Things you’d do well to leave alone, too.”

Jesus. I’ve had enough of this. “Oooooh.” I mimicked a shiver. “So scary. Why don’t you go play your mind games somewhere else? I’m busy with important stuff.” Like surviving. And trying to figure out who here wants me dead.

A cold finger touched my spine. Other than you, that is. The same nasty thought that had been floating around in the back of my head came back to the front, but I didn’t have time to chase it down because Anna’s face contorted and smoothed itself out in one swift motion. She bolted forward two steps. I braced myself and felt the warm oil of the aspect sliding down my skin.

Anna pulled up short. Her fangs were out, too, and we stared at each other over a field of air gone hard and hurtful, full of sharp edges. I heard soft muffled wingbeats and hoped Gran’s owl wasn’t about to show up and complicate things.

I ignored little flickers of motion in my peripheral vision. The back of my throat ached, the bloodhunger throbbing restlessly in its special place. I tasted copper, and the scent of warm perfume that followed Anna around turned thick and cloying. It was damn hard to breathe with that reek all around me.

Then, something meowed.

No, seriously. I glanced down and saw a large tortoiseshell cat twined around Anna’s ankles. It put its ears back, its head a wedge shape like a snake’s, and hissed at me. Blue sparks crackled from its blind-looking eyes, and I exhaled sharply.

It was an aspect in animal form. Some powerful djamphir have them. It was the first time I’d seen one.

“You’re a very impolite little girl,” Anna said softly. I think she meant to be terrifying, but I was busy staring at the cat. “You should be taught a lesson.”

I looked up just in time to catch her fist with my face.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

I’ve been socked in the face before. It hurts like hell, but if you’re wanting to put someone down, a face-shot isn’t the best way. Especially if they’re used to it, or if they know not to pay attention to the shock factor of getting a shiner. Most people who haven’t been trained flinch and think about saving their good looks.

No, if you want to put someone down, go for a gut-shot. Which is what I did. My head snapped back, I loosened up my knees and dropped down, then nailed her a good one right in the belly. My fist went in, meeting precious little resistance, and the cat hissed again, yowling. She folded over; I brought up my knee, and her nose crunched against the bony part.

Shit. Now it was really on. If I was serious about just staying under the radar, I should have just let her hit me.

I backed up, shuffling and hyperventilating, trying to push the red rage away. The world threatened to turn into the clear plastic goop that hardens over everything when the really weird shit goes down, the thing that slows down the world so I can move faster. It’s hard to fight that feeling off, and it’s even harder once the goop closes over you and the world tries to drag you into being slow and, well, human again.

But I stopped, panting. I couldn’t get enough air in through the crimson wash of fury bubbling and boiling