“There’s something I’ve been wondering forever now. Something I just have to ask.” Joaquin stopped drumming. “Did you think of me often? I mean, of that night? Of the moment I penetrated you?”
I managed a mean smile. “Every time I sharpened a pencil.”
Ajax laughed. Joaquin’s eyes knifed into slits.
“Well, I thought of you,” he said, licking his lips. “The way you screamed for mercy. Did you know the taste of your skin altered on my tongue as I pumped and pumped and pumped away? It was like innocence…gone sour and ruined.”
My jaw clenched, but I didn’t blink. “Well, I’m all grown up now. Not a shred of innocence to be found.”
He shrugged. “That’s all right. I prefer the powerful ones even more. Like your mother. She was tasty.”
My heart jumped in my chest despite myself. “You lie.”
Ajax laughed again. “Joaquin’s toying with you. After all, your mother went into the arms of the Shadows willingly. She wasn’t like you. She didn’t distinguish between good and evil. And you know why? Because she knew. There is no light and shadow. There’s only a gray rainbow, and a choice as to where you pin yourself on the spectrum.”
“You mean like your mother?” I said, and smiled when he froze. Both pair of eyes were fixed on me. I was the only one who saw Warren’s grip curl around the knife still in his hand.
“Don’t you talk about my mother.”
“Your mother, who was so bad she was good,” I continued, watching his already pale face drain of color.
“You think you’re better than me? Morally superior, because you’re a so-called agent of Light?” And I suddenly knew that’s what he thought.
“Half Light,” I corrected, careful to keep my eyes off the sawing motion behind Joaquin’s back.
“I told you before. There’s no such thing as better or worse in this world, or any world. You think you’re less evil than I, but all you really are is weaker. It’s only a matter of degree, you see? And of knowing at what point you’re going to break.”
I jerked my head once. “I told you before. I don’t believe that.”
A slim grin snaked up his cheeks. “And I told you I’d make you a believer.”
“You really want to know what I believe?” I said, taking a step forward, and I wasn’t just buying Warren time to do whatever it was he was trying to do. I really wanted to tell him. I wanted Ajax to know there was at least one solid core difference between him and me. “I think it kills you to see what you’ll never be. What your mother tried to be and couldn’t. You destroy things because you think it’ll erase her betrayal, fill you up, make you whole. Instead, with each death you grow emptier and emptier. The darkness inside of Ajax Sand casts its longest shadow over himself.”
“Spare me your false righteousness,” he bellowed, spittle flying from the side of his mouth. “You’re no better than I am!” He motioned back to the foyer. “You killed those guards like they were junkyard dogs. Don’t try and tell me you didn’t enjoy the power that gave you!”
“Those guards,” I said, through clenched teeth, “were initiates, not innocents, and killing them before they metamorphosed just saved me the chore of having to do it later.”
“How does she know that?” Joaquin asked, but Ajax didn’t answer. He was watching me. “We masked them. She couldn’t have known.”
“Because they stank,” I said to them both. “Like you. And especially like you.” I stared Ajax down, and found his blue eyes so empty they were like glass. But he was breathing hard.
I took another step toward him. “You do stink,” I said, lowering my voice like I was confiding in him. I inhaled deeply, and wrinkled my nose. “When I’m near you, it’s like being buried neck-deep in a Dumpster. And that goddamned cologne you’re wearing isn’t any better.”
Joaquin was silent now, straining to hear us, watching Ajax’s face, Warren all but forgotten behind him. Power had begun to swirl like a riptide in the air; I felt it. I was taking it from Ajax, and I began to smile. Even though I could see the outline of his conduit tucked inside his jacket, just one short thrust from my chest, I had the confidence he’d rather use his hands on me. Or, at least, he would by the time I was finished.
I dipped my own hands in my pockets, casually and cocky, and felt the hilt of the whip against my palm. I closed my fist around it. Meanwhile, I used words.
“I know why you like to kill star signs.” I lowered my voice to a whisper. “And I know why you kill innocents. It’s for their Light. You want it for yourself. You want to be Light.”
“Shut up.”
“You think their blood will cleanse you and you won’t have to live in the stink and squalor of your own putrid flesh—”
“I said shut up!” Ajax thundered. It was amazing how a man could shake and remain so rigidly still. I could tell he was afraid to let it break, that he thought his control might shatter into a thousand pieces…and he’d never be able to piece it together again.
“But you’re the one who’s got it all wrong. It’s not your flesh that reeks. No, no.” I leaned forward and pressed on the hairline fracture that had snaked across his restraint. “It’s your soul. It’s fucking maggot-ridden. And nothing can mask that stench.”
He hit me so fast I never saw him move. And so hard I flew across the room, my torso slamming into a marble pillar six feet above its base. He was bolting toward me even as I fell, and there was no time to reach for Hunter’s whip. I gained my feet just as another cry sounded and there was a flurry of motion behind Ajax. He paused, hearing it, and I leapt.
My shoulder caught him in the diaphragm and the scent of fungus and rot spilled out over me as he grunted, losing his breath. Ajax was a seasoned fighter, though. He didn’t need breath to perform; the madness of the martial dance was ingrained in him, and he kneed me as he backpedaled, pulling me tight so I couldn’t draw away. He struck breast, ribs, and belly. My turn to gasp for air, and then he did release me…enough to send a fourth knee plowing into my face. My head snapped back, my mouth instantly filling with blood, and I glimpsed a silvery sheen passing over his head as he slipped his conduit from behind his back.
I tried to dodge, but his other hand darted out, lifting me from the ground by my neck, and he puckered up, blowing me a kiss before sending me rocketing back across the room and into one of the marble pillars.
It didn’t jar or hurt as much as it would’ve if I were mortal, but I still crumpled to the floor and had to figure out if anything was broken before I rose to hands and knees. Of course, Ajax knew this, and was already heading my way with poker in hand, but confidence was fueling his ego, and it didn’t allow his pace to quicken to more than a swift saunter. I remained where I was, head bowed in defeat while I reached into my pocket. Ajax laughed, grasping his poker in front of him with both hands. I still waited. The poker lifted. And three seconds later the whip lashed out like an unraveling tongue, barbed tip coiling tightly around his neck.
The pain contorting his face would’ve been satisfying enough. The underlying surprise, however, was icing. Not that I was into petty gratification. His mouth moved soundlessly and his free hand went to his throat where his Adam’s apple had been punctured, seeking relief. There was no slack in the leather, though, and the more he fought, the more the barbed tip twisted, tearing him up inside.
He made a gurgling sound, and I jerked him forward, the steel points digging in deep. Over his shoulder I saw Warren kick at Joaquin. He was still half tied to the chair, and I had a brief moment to wonder where, and what, Joaquin’s conduit was…until it dawned on me that his body was his weapon. This was his job. To use his body to steal innocence.