The Damned (The Beautiful #2)(12)

Even I am taken off guard. Injuring an immortal like Boone is no mean feat. I am . . . strong. Stronger than I first realized. My anger has become a creature too large for me to contain. I should let him go. Apologize.

Instead I tighten my grip, the rage unfurling over my body like a second skin.

Apologies are for sheep. Let them all see what I’ve become. Let them fear me.

Something stirs at my back.

“No,” Madeleine demands. “Stay where you are, Arjun. A blow like that could kill you.”

“I can help,” Arjun replies carefully. “At the very least I can buy us some time.”

“You can try,” I whisper without glancing toward the half fey.

It’s foolish for me to bait an ethereal. Arjun’s touch could immobilize me. Leave me at my siblings’ mercy. But I am more focused on what will follow, should he bother to make the attempt.

They cannot corral me forever.

“I know you think yourself unafraid,” Arjun says. “That we should all fear you instead.”

I say nothing, though a twinge knifes through me.

“My mortal father used to say that anger and fear are two sides of the same coin,” Arjun continues. “They both make us behave outside our nature.”

“Or perhaps they simply distill us down to our essence. Maybe this is my nature now.” I glower at Boone, who raises his arms like Leonardo’s Vitruvian Man.

“I don’t believe that.” Boone’s voice is hoarse, but gentle. “Not for one minute.”

Madeleine blurs closer, pausing to my left. “Sébastien.” Her tone is laced in warning. Her teeth begin to lengthen, commanding me without words to stand down. “Don’t do this, mon enfant.”

Mon enfant. My child. Madeleine is the closest thing to a mother I have known since my own mother perished ten years ago. Nevertheless I ignore her, the bloodlust raging through my veins. The desire to kill and consume of utmost importance.

Tulle rustles to Madeleine’s right. “écoute-moi, mon petit diable,” her sister, Hortense, commands in the singsong of a medium conducting a séance. “Nous ne sommes pas vos ennemis.”

“Listen to her, brother,” Boone says, his hands inching toward his temples. “Our enemies are real. If we waste time squabbling among ourselves, there’ll be nothing left for the true fight to come.”

The rational part of me knows Boone is right. But I respond by tightening my grasp until he can no longer speak. The plaster around his head starts to powder, causing a shower of white dust to descend on his cherubic curls.

Another flicker of movement. “Let him go,” Jae demands, taking hold of my right shoulder. Each of his words is the point of a dagger at my back. “Now.”

“Do you still think me afraid?” I level a cool gaze at the assassin. One meant to convey nothing but contempt.

His scowl deepens.

It is all a lie. Everything I’ve done or said to this point is for show.

I am afraid. Deathly afraid. From the moment I first understood what had happened to me. But fear cannot be all I know. I will not let it be all I know.

Jae remains silent. My fear threatens to eclipse all else. I stoke my anger until it burns everything else away. The color leaches from Boone’s skin, the ink in his eyes swirling, spreading until the whites are completely black. His fingers turn into fists.

I know he is preparing to fight back. I should release him before the situation worsens. But the wrath continues flowing down my arms, surging through my stomach, burrowing into my bones. It makes me feel powerful. As if I am in control. I do not want to lose this feeling. I cannot be afraid. I cannot be weak.

What kind of beast surrenders to its basest nature?

The kind with nothing to fear.

So be it.

I squeeze tighter, feeling the bones in Boone’s throat begin to splinter in my grasp.

I don’t see Madeleine move until she has shattered my wrist with a single swipe of her arm. I roar and fly backward, slamming into the far wall. My body lands in a position of defense, crouched like a panther. Toussaint coils at my feet, his fangs bared, daring any of my siblings to tread closer.

I clutch my injured hand, feeling the crushed bones knit back together like torch fire through tinder. The sensation should feel marvelous, for it is further proof of my indestructibility; instead it only emphasizes my monstrousness. The utter loss of my humanity.

All the while, no one moves. Madeleine stands guard before a fallen Boone, who grips his throat and coughs, blood spewing from his lips. His eyes flash as Madeleine bares her fangs at me and hisses through her teeth.

Beside her, Arjun waits with his hands in his pockets, his monocle swaying from its gold chain. Hortense hovers behind Madeleine, her lips forming the beginnings of a smirk. Jae stares at me, his expression like that of a disapproving father. Odette looks . . . sad.

“It is as I suspected,” Nicodemus says. A casual observer might believe he is troubled by this turn of events, but I know my uncle far too well. He did nothing to stop me from injuring Boone, nor did he attempt to intervene when the rest of his progeny moved against me in force. There is a gleam in his amber eyes. One of supreme pleasure.

Nicodemus wanted to see what might happen. I suspect he is thrilled to witness how strong I am. How invincible his immortal blood has made me.

With Nicodemus Saint Germain, everything is a test.