Page 25 of Tempt

This cannot be a coincidence. His face, his tenor, his possessions, and his nightmares cannot be a coincidence.

Indeed, he isthatboy. Or he was.

Accepting the truth spikes her veins with anxiety. He’s alive yet not nearly the same. More importantly, he’s depraved, submitting to horrid dreams, and living an outcast life. If he were enjoying a happy and malevolent life as a deity, his resurrection would bring her joy, and she would be glad for Malice. But this rekindled existence has done nothing but harm him, turning him into a monster who likes to endanger everyone else for his own gain.

This is her fault. If she hadn’t destroyed his mortal life, he wouldn’t have died, and none of this would have happened.

“How curious,” Malice says, glancing at her. “Feeling wistful? Bittersweet? Nostalgic? Tell me, are you reminiscing?”

Wonder tightens her grip on the archery buckle across her chest. “What are you babbling about?”

“Your eyes have turned into spigots about to overflow.”

She thrusts an arm across her stinging tear ducts. “Just because I favor open books, that doesn’t mean I am one.”

“Mmm, something we have in common. Have you been homesick? Is it finally hitting you that we’re here? How’s your soul coping? Go on, I like getting answers.”

“You might get them if you’d shut up long enough for me to respond. Where are you going?” she demands when Malice veers into a copse densely populated with offshoots and a gurgling brook.

He points. “It’s called left, otherwise known as west.”

“I know that’s west,” she bristles. “I’ve taken this route a thousand times.”

“So have I, and the best way to access the Archives is my way.”

“We need to go east. The economy section—”

“What the fuck? You can’t be serious,” he whines, flipping his head toward her. “That passage is unreliable and too narrow for my testicles to fit through. And putting it mildly—”

“You consider thismild?”

“—it’s also the most boring area of the repository. A fucking snooze-fest of ledgers.”

“Are you an imbecile or an imbecile? That is precisely why it’s the most frequently unmanned section. Furthermore, it’s canopied by the most trees. Hence, it’s easier to breach the structure from there without being spotted. I know what I’m talking about.”

“Look at you. As ramrod as a cock.”

“I am not getting defensive!”

“No, you’re getting aroused. Don’t worry, competition does it for me, too.”

For Fate’s sake, he sniggers as if this is hilarious. It’s the most pretentious sound Wonder has ever heard, grating on her flesh as rivalry blasts up her veins. In the near future, she’ll need a ladle with which to scoop the memory from her temporal lobe.

On the flip side, he’s right. Blood courses through her scalp, prompting a heady rush.

Mmm, something we have in common.

Oh, he has no idea how much they have in common. Will she tell him? Malice has forfeited most of his rights, but not that one. He doesn’t seem to have a clue about his past life as a mortal, but he deserves to know.

Yet she’s dubious whether heshouldknow. It might send him into a tailspin. By the same token, it will force Wonder to share the details of her role in his former life, which will make him despise her more than he already does, which will hardly induce him to be civil, much less cooperative.

The rivalry progresses during their quest, each of them quarreling over the subjects of research, clamoring for the last word. And when not sparring about that, they feud over an assortment of other logistics, like the best nooks to search within the Hollow Chamber’s forbidden channel.

They fling their expertise at one other like darts, aiming to strike true and get higher points. It’s a petty match to see who knows more, to win the game, to get the medal.

Huff. The only reward he’s going to earn is an honorable mention.

Then again, what’s become of her scholarly, investigative decorum?

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