He growled out five low words. “Who. The. Fuck. Are. You.”
His brothers started forward, as if to wrest Fake Willa from him, but he turned his head slightly, never taking his eyes from Fakey. “This is not our Willa,” he snapped. “Can’t you sense the difference? She reeks of Trickery’s energy.”
Siret laughed. It was a mean, rasping sound. “Not even close to my power, don’t ever get confused about that … but there is something there. Goddamn those asshole gods.” He closed in on Fake Willa, who was going a bit red in the face. I had a feeling she couldn’t actually breathe. “You’re good,” he sneered. “I’ll give you that. I wasn’t paying close enough attention, but now that Rome has pointed it out, I can see you didn’t quite get Willa right.”
Damn right she didn’t. Took you idiots long enough.
Five heads spun around, and I knew that they had heard me and this time they knew it wasn’t from the girl clutched in Rome’s heavy grip. A girl who was now clawing at his arm and gasping for air, both actions that were being largely ignored by the Abcurses.
“Willa?” Aros frowned, his eyes flickering around the room.
Siret stepped over to stand beside the golden sol, his back to Rome and fake Willa. “Where are you, Soldier?” He held one hand out. Aros did the same. Both of them standing there with a hand toward me.
I stepped up to them and placed my hands into their outstretched ones. Siret yanked me into him, his body wrapping around me pretty well considering he couldn’t see me at all. Aros made a small sound of annoyance, but didn’t fight as my hand was torn from his.
As I sank into Siret, everything inside of me sighed. It was a literal sigh of relief from finally being back with the Abcurses. Closing my eyes, I let myself go limp; it had been a long sun-cycle. Very long. My body was done. Siret supported my weight with ease, and I knew he was gearing to pick me up when Coen stepped out from behind his twin and said in my direction, “What happened to you, dweller?” His flat, heavy words and the look on his face were crazy-scary. It was that death-look again, the one he’d given me in the arena. Only this one was about a million times worse.
Elowin. Kidnapped and locked me down in this magical stone room. I couldn’t reach any of you mentally. Managed to break out by smashing the lock on the door. It was weakened by all the spells.
The room virtually rumbled then, and turning from Siret, I realised why. Rome had dropped fake Willa right on her fake ass before slamming his fist against a nearby pillar. The room shook, dust sprinkling down from above.
Heavy footsteps sounded and I spun my head back the other way to see Emmy and Atti sprinting into the room.
“Willa! Stop running off on me!” She was shouting as she skidded to a halt right in front of me. “Swear to the gods every time I turn my back on you, you’re disappearing. I will chain you down.”
Yael was in her face before she could say another word, and even though she didn’t step back, wariness still crossed her features.
“What?” she muttered, her eyes flicking across to Atti’s for half a click. She might not have even noticed that she did it, but I noticed. I had a feeling Atti didn’t think she was uptight anymore.
Yael drew her attention with his words. “You can see Willa?”
Emmy turned her gaze back to me. “What is he talking about, Will?”
Wiggling my way free from the absolutely blissful comfort of Siret, I faced my best friend. “I’m apparently invisible to sols. They can’t see or hear me. Our mental connection is okay, though, so they know that’s a fake Willa there.” I pointed to the ground where the imposter was still sprawled.
Granted, she was trying to crawl away, but Rome planted one foot on her back, making sure that she wasn’t going to actually get anywhere.
Emmy’s face went red, which was always a bad sign. If the red had just been on her cheeks, I wouldn’t have worried, but it was everywhere. Her forehead, her chin, her neck, and even the backs of her hands. She was about to explode. Two steps around the Abcurses and she had kicked off Rome’s foot and hauled up Fake Willa by the neck of her fake shirt.
“Who the hell are you?” she snarled. “What did they do to Willa? Why is she invisible to sols?”
Fakey started to sob. Not just normal sobbing, but huge, open-mouthed, ugly-crying sobs. Holy father of the gods. That was a terrible look for me. I had to remember to never cry like that.
There was even snot. Running down my … her … its face. Wipe your damn face you stupid idiot!
Siret’s chuckles washed over me, the effect of his laugh actually calming my anger.