Slayer (Slayer 1)

“You okay?” Cillian whispers. I lean against him. I don’t answer, because I don’t know what the answer is. Rhys takes my other side, putting his arm around me.

As Leo loads the gear into the car, he seems preoccupied too. He barely looks at me. Which is fine. Good, even. He performed admirably as a Watcher tonight, and that’s all he is to me.

When Cillian and Rhys get in the car, I reach for Artemis’s bag to pass to Leo. She snatches it away. “I got it.”

“What’s your problem?” I ask, stung by her dismissive tone.

She lets out a shocked, bitter laugh. “What’s my problem? Do you have any idea what it felt like, running in and seeing you in the middle of an attack?”

“No, but do you have any idea what it felt like being in the middle of it? I was so scared, but—I wasn’t, too. It’s like, there’s this thing inside me, coiled, waiting, and it’s terrifying and exciting and strong. . . .” We stare at each other, both angry, both hurt. I relent first. “I’m sorry I scared you. I’m glad you were there.”

Artemis turns to put her bag in the car, but some of the tension drains out of her shoulders. “Right. I’ll always be there. Don’t g

o thinking you don’t need me.” But it sounds less playful and more . . . sour. She grabs my arm as I climb in, her grip almost painful. It probably would have been painful two months ago. Not anymore.

“Promise me,” she says, “you’ll listen next time. You won’t do something like this again.”

Something like saving another Slayer? Like taking on monsters and winning? I did okay. I won. And her only acknowledgment is asking me to promise I won’t fight to help someone again.

But . . . if I have to be a Slayer, this is exactly the kind of Slayer I want to be.

Artemis has no idea what it feels like. She’s always been strong. And now that I am too, she wants me to hold back. She still sees me as the one who got left behind, the one who needs protection and help.

I might not know how to untangle my emotions, but I do know that I need to stop lying about them. And I want to talk to her, to tell her everything. She’s been fighting these fights for so long. She really can help me.

“I can’t promise that, Artemis. But—”

She recoils like I burned her. Without another word, she gets in the front seat and slams the door.

On the drive back to Shancoom, the night seals us in. Something tremendous has shifted. Artemis is closed off, staring out the window. Rhys and Cillian are curled up around each other, half asleep. I’m stewing, annoyed at Artemis for shutting me out just like our mother does.

I reach toward her seat but stop, horrified. My hands are still covered in blood.

I stare at them, and I know what’s different. Why we all feel like strangers. I might have become a Slayer the day magic ended, but tonight was the first time I really was a Slayer. I was a creature of instinct and brutality, fighting monsters. And I liked it.

Now in the car, surrounded by my old life—my real life—that fact bothers me more than anything else.

I saw Cosmina. She was a Slayer. A real Slayer. A killer. But when I jumped in the pit, the only thought in my mind was about saving someone who needed me. It felt right. It felt good. Cosmina can hate me all she likes, because she’s alive to do it. Six werewolves will wake up tomorrow morning, sore but breathing. Because of me.

I just need to figure out how I can be a Slayer without losing what makes me Nina in the process.

16

I SIT STRAIGHT UP IN bed, my heart racing.

What is wrong with my sleeping brain? Of all the things I could dream about, my subconscious settles on Bradford Smythe again? I would have taken being back in the pit fighting monsters, or even a dream about the fire.

I need therapy.

“You okay?” Artemis mumbles sleepily from across the room.

“Do you ever have weird dreams about the Council?”

“Every damn night. Ruth Zabuto uses my fingers for knitting needles, and Wanda . . .” She trails off, muttering something about spiders and switches, and then she goes quiet, her breathing even.

At least Cosmina didn’t come hang out in my dreams. I’m more than happy never to see her again. And I don’t trust my Slayer dreams. Not only did my dream about her fail to give me very pertinent information, it also sent me to her against her will.

I flop back on my bed. It’s 4 a.m. and I’ve been asleep for only an hour.