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when the teacher asked a question. I thought of walking through a bad part of
town at night, keeping close to the buildings, sticking to the shadows.
I thought of sneaking across the lawn behind Cyrus's mansion to meet with
Nathan at the gate, and pictured the guards looking at me and seeing nothing.
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Then I realized I was already an expert at invisibility. No one had seen me
without me wanting them to for years. My face, my build, even my hair color
were so nondescript I could rob a bank without anyone identifying me. This
would be a piece of cake.
At the same time I thought it, another wave of confidence rose within me. It
was darker, ego driven and wild.Crazy.
It was Dahlia.
"I drank her blood," I heard myself saying, as if from far away. "I think
it's doing something to me."
Cyrus stepped back. Even Nathan seemed frightened.
I am invisible, I chanted in my head as I wiped the oil on the stone. The
flowery scent calmed me, even as the stone seemed to burn from my concentrated
energy. All my thoughts and visualizations flowed from my body through the
fingertips of my right hand, into the stone.
Then, just as abruptly as the sensations came, they stopped. The dark energy
left over from Dahlia's blood soaked into the stone, leaching some of me with
it, and I jerked my hand back.
"She did it," Cyrus said, almost breathlessly. "I can't believe she really
did it."
"What? What did I do?" Before they could answer, I picked up the stone, so
cold it burned, and gasped as my hand,then my wrist, then my arm vanished as
though dissolving. I looked at my feet, only to see the floor they should be
standing on. I waved my fingers in front of my face, but they weren't there
anymore.
The room spun around me. Without visual confirmation of my body in its own
space, I lost my sense of balance for a moment, stumbling against the counter.
"Grab her!" Nathan shouted.
"How?I can't see her!" Cyrus reached out uncertainly and I grasped his arms.
The second the stone touched him, he vanished as well.
We stood perfectly still, holding each other for balance. I would have paid
anything to see the expression on Cyrus's face.
"Well, we know it's not just figurative invisibility now, don't we?" he said
with a rueful laugh, and I laughed with him.
Something was finally working to our advantage.
Chapter Twenty: Origins
Sitting up, Max blinked in an effort to bring his vision into focus. When he
tried to rub his eyes, chains rattled and his arms met with marked
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resistance.Waking up in another dark, strange place, restrained.
Perfect.
"I wondered when you would wake."
Bella.He wished he could see her. "Did she hurt you?"
There was a squeak. Something nudged his foot. When he looked up, he saw her
face.
"The drugs will make it hard to see for a while. Relax, and let it pass." Her
fingertips brushed his face. She wasn't bound.
"Did they hurt you?" he repeated. His tongue felt as if it were covered in
fur. He'd kill for a drink.
The scent of her blood assaulted him, and he involuntarily lunged toward her.
He heard her startled intake of breath, felt her withdraw a bit. He'd scared
her. "Sorry, can't help it."
"I know." She placed her cool palm against his forehead. "No, they did not
hurt me. They tended me better than the Movement did. At first, I did not know
why, but& "
"Why didn't they tie you up?" Not that he wanted her restrained. He just
wondered why she was free and hadn't tried to make a break for it yet.
"I could not go far. I am& in a wheelchair." She whispered the word like a
curse. "I am crippled."
He closed his eyes, though he couldn't see worth a damn, anyway. "I'm so
sorry, baby."
"Do not be sorry. They followed us from the cabin. You could not have
prevented it." She moved away, and he wondered why he hadn't recognized the
sound of the wheelchair as it moved across the dirt floor of the room.
"You sound awfully calm."Too calm. Something was wrong. He couldn't put his
finger on what.
Anne. That bitch had sold them out. When he got his hands on her, he'd rip
her black little heart right out of her chest.
"I have had time to think." Bella returned with a bag full of blood. He
didn't know where it came from, and he didn't care. She held it to his mouth
and he tore into it, not caring that some of the contents probably ran down
his chin and stained his shirt. Only when he'd drunk half of it did he
consider it might have been drugged. He jerked away, the remains of his meal
sloshing onto his lap.
Bella shrieked and jumped back. "You should have drunk all of it!"
"Why?" He struggled against his shackles. "Are you in on this? What do they
have planned?" [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]