“Don’t call him that.”

“You’re right. Where did you take the ashes?”

“Away. Far. Where his whore and his bitch won’t find them, won’t find solace in mourning him.”

“Good enough.” He turned, saw she’d put on a T-shirt, cotton pants, was barefoot. “I brought her here. She set it up so Tonia and me, we’d be the ones to bring her to New Hope. She bragged about it, after … She had cupcakes.”

“Cupcakes?”

“Raspberry and wild violet. Fruit and flowers. She offered me one, and then I knew. All the time she’s been here, I didn’t see the dark in her.”

“Did you look?”

“Not really, not especially. I bought it. I helped save a traumatized kid. I’m a hero.”

“I looked. In her, in Starr.”

“Starr?”

“I saw almost nothing in either. Both block. Tonight, I could in Starr, could see she blocks rage and grief and fear. It wasn’t until tonight I saw what was in Petra.”

“You’ve had days. I’ve had years.”

“Just you?” She arched both eyebrows. “Is that because you’re a hero?”

“Kiss ass. If you hadn’t warned me about the damn cupcakes, the fruit and the flowers, I’d have taken one. Poison and black snakes. I’d be dead because a pretty girl baked me a goddamn cupcake.”

He looked older, she realized. Closer to the man at the circle of stones than the boy on a motorcycle.

“I don’t think so. I think before you took it, you’d have seen.”

“Well, we’ll never know, will we? I didn’t take her out on the spot. She had more than I bargained for, and that was stupid. Stupid.”

“Maybe, but she was prepared and you weren’t. She was someone you helped, someone you thought needed help.”

“I didn’t move fast enough, hard enough, so she got Denzel. Then I could only think of making her let him go, keeping it between us. She snapped his neck while I stood there. Snapped his neck like you’d break a stick in two.”

Grief soaked his words. “He didn’t mean anything. He was harmless.”

“She killed him to hurt you, to damage you.”

Fury slapped back. “You think I don’t know that?”

His grief nearly flattened her, and opened something inside her that made her step to him, made her put her arms around him. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry about your friend.”

Duncan stiffened against the comfort, then dropped into it. “He never hurt anyone. Lots of big talk about being a warrior, but he never hurt anyone. It wasn’t in him. And she killed him like he was nothing. She killed Carlee. Her father found her in her room with her throat slit. She killed Carlee because we … shit.”

“You loved her. I’m so sorry.”

“No, no, not … We just got together sometimes. She was as harmless as Denzel. She wasn’t a threat. She killed Mina, and would have killed Bill Anderson, but he was over at Will’s. He wasn’t home when she went into his place and wrecked it. Why did she do all that? They didn’t matter. I mattered, you mattered, Tonia mattered.”

She started to draw back, but he was holding on now, so she gave it another minute. “You didn’t look straight into her.”

He pulled back. “Fuck that. What’s that mean?”

“You saw evil. You saw the dark and the vicious. You didn’t see the product of the two who made her.”

“One black wing, one white, the weird hair and eyes. I get it.”

“You didn’t see those as symbols. You didn’t see that the dark in her, merging from them, is twisted. It’s … flawed.”

“You’re saying she’s crazy.”

“I’m saying she’s crazy.”

He paced away. “Well, that … makes perfect sense.”

“She’s sly with it, a rabid fox. And they’re patient, Duncan, really patient. All these years they waited, plotting, planning. They sent their child to … infiltrate.”

“She could’ve done a lot more damage once she was in. She could’ve done more than plan an ambush.”

“She probably did. Little things. An illness, an accident. When we look, we’re going to find the place she held her rituals. We’ll purify it. We hurt them, as my father did in the mountains, as my mother did on that same field. They’ll take time, again. And so will we. Petra’s father died for her. She won’t forget it. I know. They loved.”

“That’s not love.”

“It is. As real as any. Parent for child, child for parent, mate for mate. They loved. Now they’re grieving, and they’re hurt.”

“So are we.” Sticking his hands in his pockets, he looked up at the stars. “She liked killing. I saw that when she killed Denzel.”

“It gives her joy, causing death and pain. I … understand that better now. I felt, for a moment, I felt joy when I put my sword in Eric. I never want to feel that again.”

“I got that,” he murmured. “I get that.”

“We wanted revenge, both of us, so there was chaos. People fought, but there was chaos. There won’t be the next time. We’ll get more soldiers, make more, and we’ll have leadership instead of chaos.”

She let out a breath. “I failed.”

“Bullshit.”

“I failed because I went with impulse and anger.” Remembering, she rubbed a hand over the cuff on her sword hand. “I wanted Eric’s blood on my hands, and I got it, but I forgot strategy, tactics.”

“Not altogether.”

“Mostly then. You had my back. So, thanks.”

“I guess we’re even there.”

“How’s the side?” When he shrugged, she made an impatient gesture. “Lift up the shirt.”

“It’s fine, but maybe you want to see some skin, since I saw so much of yours.”

“Don’t be a dick.” She laid a hand on his side, palm to skin. “Still some heat.” She cooled it, remembering her mother’s advice. Slowly. Layer by layer.

“There. Is Tonia—”

He grabbed her as he had before, yanked her to him. “I need this,” he said before his mouth took hers.

She knew need, and it confused her. She wanted, didn’t want. Her blood beat so fast, so fast, she heard it in her head like tribal drums.

Her mind ordered her to pull away, but she gripped his hair, let out a sound of shocked pleasure as his tongue swept hot over hers.

He had visions of a windswept cliff over a boiling sea—and her. Of a forest so green the air tasted of it, and her, always her. A circle of stones under a sky red as blood, and her calling the thunder.

Of a bed in the moonlight, bathed in it, and her under him, moving, moving, moving, her eyes like storm clouds.

Visions swam and swirled through him until, dizzy with them, he drew back.

“Did you see that? Do you feel that?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know. I can’t think. I have to think. I can’t do this.” Storm-cloud eyes met his. “I don’t know how to do this.”

“I could walk you through it, but …” He turned, paced away, decided the best place for his hands was his pockets. “I think I need some space. I need to take some space, some time. And I need some distance from you. I guess you need it from me.”

“I can’t be distracted by—”

“Shut up.” He strode back to her, and the air seemed to quake and sizzle around him. “I really don’t like being called a distraction, so just shut up a minute. Which one of the bases could use me as an instructor? I’m good at it. It’ll be hard for Mom, but she’ll deal. I can help recruit from wherever that is. I can scout and report and help train.

“And take that space, take that distance.”

It stunned her, worried her how much she wanted to insist he was needed here. How much she didn’t want him to go. “You’d help most with Mallick. They’re so raw there.” And there he could train and be trained, she realized.