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They really weren’t.

But one of them kicked him in the small of his back, nailing him directly in the kidneys. As he arched, because he couldn’t help it, he opened up a clean shot to the underside of his chin. Which was where the second kick nailed him.

His jaw wasn’t a good shock absorber—in fact, it was an amplifier, as his lower teeth banged into his upper ones and his skull sucked up the brunt of the impact. Stunned, he went limp, his arms loosening their hold, his defensive position weakening.

They weren’t supposed to kill him, because Lash was still alive if they were doing this. If the guy had died, he would have been taken in front of the king by his cousin’s parents, and they would have argued that he should be put to death even though he was technically a minor. No, this beat-down was just an eye for an eye for a bodily injury. Or at least, that was the way it was meant to be.

Trouble was, they kicked him over onto his back, and then one of them took a running start and planted both his combat boots in the center of Qhuinn’s chest.

His breath shot out of him. His heart stopped pumping. Everything came to a halt.

And that was when he heard his brother’s voice, “Don’t do that again. It’s against the rules.”

His brother . . . his brother . . . ?

This wasn’t for Lash’s injury, then.

This was from his own family, to recoup the injury to their name.

Qhuinn gasped for air and got nowhere with the inhales as the four argued with one another. His brother’s voice was the loudest.

“That’s enough!”

“Fucking mutant bastard, he deserves to die!”

Qhuinn lost interest in the drama as it dawned on him that his heart still hadn’t started up again—and not even the panic he suddenly felt at the realization kick-started the damn thing. His eyesight went checkerboard and his hands and feet started to numb out.

That was when he saw the bright light.

Shit, the Fade was coming for him.

“Christ! Let’s go!”

Someone leaned down to him. “We’ll be back for you, asshole. Without your fucking brother next time.”

There was a scramble of boots, a lot of doors opening and closing, and then a screech as the car took off. When another approached close on its heels, he realized the lights on him were not the afterlife, but someone else driving down the road.

Lying in the heap he’d been left in, he had some passing thought that maybe he could pound on his own chest. Like pull a Casino Royale and do self-CPR.

He closed his eyes. Yeah, if only he could 007 it . . . Not a chance, though. He couldn’t get his lungs to work in more than shallow draws and his heart was still nothing but a loose knot of muscle in his chest. The fact that he had no pain anymore was even more worrisome.

The next white light that came to him was like the mist that hung over the road, a gentle and soft fog that bathed him, eased him. As he was illuminated, he went from being terrified to utterly unafraid. This, he knew, was not a car. This now was the Fade.

He felt himself levitate off the pavement and he soared, weightless, until he was at the head of a white corridor. Down at the far end, there was a door he felt compelled to go and open. He walked toward it with growing urgency, and the moment he reached it, he went for the knob. As his hand wrapped around the warm brass, he had some vague thought that once he walked through, that was it. He was in between as long as he didn’t open the door and step into what was on its other side.

Once he was in, there was no going back.

Just as he was about to twist his palm, he saw an image on the panels of the door. It was hazy and he paused, trying to figure out what it was.

Oh . . . God . . . he thought, when he realized what he was looking at.

Holy . . . shit.

Chapter Eighteen

Cormia was not in her bedroom or her bath.

As Phury went downstairs to the foyer to look for her, he came to a decision. If he ran into Rhage, he wasn’t going to ask the questions that were on his mind. The shit with the trainees and the lessers and the war was no longer his territory, and he’d better get used to it.

The answers