My heart beat so loud I could hear it, like a battle drum in my ears.
"Give me. Mynecklace," I repeated, something huge and destructive building inside me. I was sosickof people hurting me and stealing from me. The keepers took my only friend. I wasn't going to let this shadowkind take the locket I’d sworn to protect.
"It'smine," I snarled, my hands lifted in front of me and glowing bright pink, the knife limned in the light. "I want it back."
"In your dreams, firecracker," Mav laughed.
His smirk had me seeing red.
8
Ilaunched myself at him, hands first, picturing all the awful things the keepers had done to me, sinking so deep into those memories and letting the pain fill me with so much power I didn't see the bathroom anymore.
I stopped seeing Mav's tall, tentacled body, stopped even seeing the locket.
I sawthem—my darkest nightmares. My keepers. I saw the cruel end of the cattle prod, saw the gleam of satisfaction in their eyes as they handed out punishments. Some of them hurt us because it was necessary to train us, but otherslovedit, and sought out any opportunity.
I slammed my hands into their ruthless bodies over and over, a wheezing scream in my throat and my eyes burning as I cried. They were going to kill me like they killed Vann. But I'd die in defiance, exactly like he had.
"Shit," one of them grunted when I slammed my palm into their stomach, burning through their suit to the flesh underneath. "Alright, I tried to be nice."
I jolted hard, my head snapping back, when a palm connected with my cheek. Heat flashed through my skin, followed by sharp pain, and for a long moment I stared emptily into space, stunned.
When I blinked my eyes to focus them, they didn't land on my keepers but a whirlwind of burned scales and dark blue skin.
Ah. Oops.
Mav had me wrapped entirely in his tentacles, and it hadn't been a palm that struck me but the flat tip of one. His mouth was pressed into a flat line, his eyes burning bright blue.
"Back with me?" he asked, watching me closely.
I swallowed, shaking with adrenaline and the remnants of fighting for my life. "Yes."
"Where'd you go, firecracker?"
I glanced away, not liking the close way he watched me, reading all my emotions. "Somewhere bad."
I jumped at the velvety brush of a tentacle on my throbbing cheek, and my heart stuttered when I realised he was brushing away a tear.
"Well, you're not there now. You're in the void."
I screwed up my face in a scowl. "This is worse. Was that supposed to be comforting?"
Mav scoffed. "Why would I be comforting the girl who killed me?"
I shrugged. "Maybe you like me. Maybe you've grown a heart and you're going to let me go."
He smirked, sidling closer until his body pressed up against the tentacles confining me—and removed the knives I’d stashed earlier. He even found the scalpel in my bra, dammit! "If you think I'm a knight in shining armour, you've got the wrong idea about me, firecracker. I'm as bad as they come."
"It was sarcasm," I muttered, scowling. "Let me go."
Mav's dark mouth kicked up into a crooked smile and my heart skipped, both in nervousness and because of how handsome he was. I didn't care that he was blue or monstrous; my sad little heart was just happy for the attention.
"Why would I do that when I've got you exactly where I want you?"
I remembered what he said to Sang about wanting to play with me too, and swallowed, looking up at him with wide eyes.
"God, you're cute," he groaned, and I made a shrieking, surprised sound when he kissed me.