Into Darkness

27

Morgan gave her a look. “Sorry. I forgot you’ve been living in an alternate reality your entire life. Those red clouds you’re so used to seeing lurking over New Vienna?”

Lu nodded.

“They’re manufactured.”

Lu stopped dead in her tracks. “Manufactured!” she repeated in disbelief. The word echoed off the cave walls and faded to silence. “Why? How is that possible?”

Morgan shrugged again, a move heavy with pathos. “Science. Humans engineered powered flight, created nuclear technology, and sent unmanned craft into deep space, you think a few poisonous clouds circling the planet would be a challenge? They’re not exactly stupid, in spite of all their stupidity. As for why, well, population control requires creativity. You can’t achieve world domination and shape general opinion with some leaflets and a few dazzling speeches. You need really heavy-hitting propaganda, the kind people can’t argue with. The more in-your-face and damaging to your opponent, the better. Tangible stuff. Visible stuff.” Her voice soured. “Like clouds the color of blood that change life-supporting beams of sunshine into burning rays of death.”

Lu felt choked with hatred. All her life, she’d heard what vile bioterrorists Aberrants were, what dangerous traitors, what evil. And the truth was that the supposed proof of their evil was manufactured by the very people crying the loudest for their heads?

“So the Flash must have been them, too,” Lu said, anger quickening her blood. “The destruction of the rainforest in Brazil, the unexplained lights in the sky, the earthquake, the fire . . . that had to be them, too! That was all part of Thorne’s plan for world domination, wasn’t it?”

Morgan’s expression changed to one that looked suspiciously close to pity. She pursed her lips as if carefully choosing her words, then with a one-shouldered shrug that seemed to imply what the hell, she’ll find out sooner or later, said quietly, “No, pet, that wasn’t them. That was all you.”

Lu froze in openmouthed horror. “Me?”

“That’s not entirely accurate,” purred a voice from the shadows behind her. Lu whirled around, searching the darkness, her senses stinging and surging with a weird recognition.

From behind the curve of a giant boulder several paces away, a woman appeared. Dressed in head-to-toe pristine white, she was blonde, pale, and utterly feral. She eased onto the path with a catlike silence, her movements deliberate, her large, luminous eyes shining eerily bright.

Lu exhaled a breath that felt like fire.

Looking at this stranger was like looking in a mirror. The long, wavy hair, the slightly pointed chin, the forehead tipped with a widow’s peak, the tiny mole above the arch of the left brow.

The idea she’d been cloned sidled up and lingered beside her, unspeakably uncanny.

The woman smiled, but it didn’t touch her eyes. She said, “You had a little help, didn’t you, sis?”

There was an awkward pause. Then Morgan, sounding irritated, said, “Hope, this is Honor. Your twin sister.”

Honor. The Girl in her dreams. The Girl who was always so angry. Whom she’d managed, almost completely, to block. Her twin. Lu couldn’t think of a single coherent response. She said numbly, “My name isn’t Hope.”

A voice inside her head replied, Actually, flamethrower, it is.

Honor’s cold smile grew wider.

NINE

Before Lu had a chance to process anything beyond her own shock, Honor’s gaze honed in on the collar around her neck.

“Honor,” warned Morgan, just as the metal around Lu’s throat began to freeze.

It happened so fast. As cold became frost became ice, the collar crackled . . . and shrunk. Lu felt a stabbing pain against her carotid artery, and instinct kicked in.

She lifted her arms and flexed open her palms, aiming at Honor.

When the ball of fire cleared, with a roar and the acrid smell of burning fabric, Morgan was crouched on the ground with her arms flung over her head, coughing, the sleeves of her tunic singed and smoking. Honor was standing with her hands on her hips, glaring at Lu with those predatory eyes, completely unscathed.

“Overreact much?” she snapped.

The collar popped off with a muted tink! and fell in one solid, frozen chunk to the ground at Lu’s feet, where it promptly shattered to pieces.

Lu stumbled back, hands clutching her throat. “Did you just try to strangle me?” she shouted, livid.

Honor’s response was a roll of her eyes and an exaggerated sigh. “And they say I’m melodramatic.”

“What the hell is going on here?”

The growled question came from Magnus, who’d appeared as if from nowhere. He helped Morgan to her feet. Lu noticed he didn’t take her hands, but grasped her under the arms, stepping away as soon as she was standing.

Honor lifted her chin, examining Lu with a disapproving curl of her lip that managed to make her appear even more menacing. “Someone apparently has some trust problems.”

“Honor took Hope by surprise, that’s all,” said Morgan before Lu could spit a retort.

Honor said coldly, “I had to get that thing off of her—”

“By shrinking it?” Lu hissed.

“Metal contracts when it freezes—”

“You might have taken that into consideration, seeing as how it was around my throat—”

“I wouldn’t have hurt you!”

“Easy to say now!”

“Stop!” Magnus thundered, stepping between them.

Lu and Honor fell silent. Vibrating anger, Magnus looked back and forth between them, his dark eyes flashing fire.