“Bailey,” Felix’s voice booms from all over. “The door.”
Seriously? I had no idea Felix was such a cockblocker.
“The investigation, remember?” Felix shouts from the outside world. “Someone’s here.”
“Fine,” I growl, and leaving a disappointed Dream Valerian, I return to the waking world.
The cooing of the cannibal birds is back, as is the stomach-turning smell of their cages.
I open my eyes. The door is already open, and Kit is standing much too close to me, a look of curiosity on her face.
I step back awkwardly. “Hi.”
“I’m here to take over for Kain for a bit,” she says, turning into him. “Did I come at a bad time?”
I plaster a smile on my face. “It’s fine. I was waiting to get out of here.”
“To do what?” she asks in Kain’s voice.
“I want to interview the strongest members of the Council. Anyone able to rip a person in half.”
“I see.” Kit morphs back into her anime character self. “Who would you like to start with?”
I prepare to watch her reaction. “You.”
Her face reveals nothing.
“With your power, you could turn into an orc and have its strength, right?”
She morphs into a giant green orc—a muscle-bound creature that Earthlings might confuse for the Hulk with tusks. “I’m a suspect?” she booms.
Being next to something this big activates primal fear in my amygdala, so all I can do is bob my head.
“Okay then,” Orc Kit growls and smashes a fist into the door. The heavy wood shatters into tiny pieces, answering my question about her strength. The birds stop cooing and blink at the orc with panic in their cannibalistic eyes.
I know what they’re thinking: We’re about to die.
Then again, they might be thinking how delicious my remains will be.
“Now,” Kit growls, taking a menacing step toward me. “Let’s talk.”
Chapter Sixteen
My breathing speeds up.
Am I a victim of my own success? The first person I formally question turns out to be the culprit?
It could be. Kit could’ve turned into Leal, the dreamwalker, to get close enough to push Ryan, the elf, off the cliff. She could’ve turned into a bird, pecked Leal to death, and opened the cages to blame it on the doves. And she’s just proven that she could’ve turned into an orc to rip Gemma, the animal controller, in half. The only part I’m not clear about is how she could’ve shot Tatum, the succubus, with an arrow from so far away—but perhaps she’d turned into an elf and got their perfect marksmanship?
But if Kit is the killer, why did she root for me at the trial? Reverse psychology, maybe?
One thing’s for sure: If she kills me now, it will prove I’m right.
I back away. As much as I love to be right, this is too high a price. Maybe I can still run? She’s blocking the door, but—
Instead of lunging forward and ripping me to shreds, Kit transforms back into her tiny round-cheeked self. “I only get the physical qualities of whatever I turn into, not the powers.”
Does this mean she isn’t going to kill me? That’s good. Now if only my racing heart would chillax.
“Is elven marksmanship a power?” I ask warily. “Or is that like orc strength, something you develop by having the right body?”
“That’s a great question.” She turns herself into a female elf. “Do you have a bow and arrow?”
I pantomime patting my pockets. “Let me just pull out the bow and arrow I carry on me at all times. It’s right next to my sword and ax.”
“Don’t be mean.” Elf Kit walks past me and sits on a chair, seductively crossing her legs. “As flattered as I am to be a suspect, why would I want to kill those four? Especially Tatum.”
I take a seat across from her. “Why especially Tatum?”
“She was the best lover I’d ever had,” Kit says wistfully and turns into Tatum, but without the signature succubus scent.
“Kit’s a sex addict,” Felix chimes in. “No surprise there.”
I know that; it’s the reason she was in rehab when we met. How does Felix know, though?
Hmm, maybe I don’t want to know the details.
Kit shifts back into herself, and her expression turns unusually fierce. “Killing Tatum was an atrocity akin to destroying an irreplaceable work of art. When I find out who did it, I won’t just kill them—I’ll turn into a drekavac to do it.”
I suppress an instinctive shudder. Drekavacs are horrifying creatures that are said to kill victims through unspeakable pain. They’re even scarier than pucks.
“I don’t think she’s bluffing,” Felix whispers. “She’s killed someone that way before. Someone who deserved it, but still.”
So Kit can torture-kill if she feels like it. She’s looking more innocent by the second. Not.
“Can you please tell me where you were and what you were doing at the time of the murders?” I ask in as steady of a voice as I can manage. “Kain said Tatum died six days ago, at—”