Elemental magic . . .

Silvio’s words swirled around and around my mind. Burn contained some sort of elemental magic? His shocking statement cut through some of my confusion. Well, that would explain why Benson hadn’t been able to reverse-engineer the formula yet and also why the drug affected elementals the most, like Benson and Bria had both told me. I didn’t like the feel of other elementals’ magic, much less it actually being absorbed into my system. Silvio was right. If I didn’t figure out what kind of power it was, or at least how to counteract it, the drug would kill me.

So for the first time, instead of trying to push it away or dampen it down or ignore it, I actually concentrated on the feel of the drug. But it wasn’t enough. Even as I tried to focus on it, my own natural defenses rose up, trying to smother the heat with my own cold rage.

“Fight it, Gin!” Silvio gave me one more urgent whisper before moving away.

Benson stepped back into view, holding a large needle full of pale yellow liquid. Somehow I knew that if he stabbed me with that, if he pumped adrenaline into my veins, it wouldn’t help me—it would kill me outright instead.

So I forced myself to relax. I let my legs go slack against the chair, unclenched my hands, and tilted my head back so that it rested on the cushion. Toe by toe, finger by finger, muscle by muscle, I relaxed every single part of my body as much as I could. I shuddered in a breath.

And then I let go completely.

My pain, my anger, my fear. I just . . . let go. I’d already eased the tension in my body, and without my emotions locked up tight behind their usual wall, the drug raged through my system unchecked.

It was brutal, like being boiled alive, but I swallowed down my screams and concentrated on the horrible, agonizing sensations sweeping through me, comparing them with all the other kinds of magic that had been used against me over the years.

Burn didn’t contain my own Ice or Stone power, for I would welcome those cold and solid sensations, even when they were killing me. And it wasn’t Air either, or pins and needles would have been stabbing into my body. Whatever magic was in the drug seemed the closest to Fire and the bright, hot burn I’d always associated with that power.

But it wasn’t Fire.

Not really, not exactly.

So what the hell was it, then?

I forced myself to focus on the sensations and the fire that wasn’t Fire that was still surging through me. The lab melted away, and suddenly, I was back in the Pork Pit, picking up that fork from the floor, the one the auburn-haired woman had been using.

Understanding flashed through me like lightning.

Maybe it was the drug and the hallucinations that went along with it, but in that instant, everything clicked into place, including Burn and exactly what kind of magic was in it.

And I knew what I had to do to save myself.

I lolled my head to one side and tilted it forward, so that I could see my right wrist shackled to the chair. I couldn’t move my arm all that much, but I managed to curl my hand around so that I could see the silverstone symbol branded into my palm—that small circle surrounded by eight thin rays that represented patience.

The Burn drug might have sent threads of acidic fire spinning through my veins, but I had spiders of my own.

Two of them, one in either hand.

I looked at my rune, and I thought of it as a real spider, sitting there in the palm of my hand, ready to do my bidding. And I pictured the same thing happening to my other rune on my left hand. Then I reached for my Ice magic. More of that damn acidic green fire covered the cold crystal spring of my power, trying to burn it to ash, but I ripped and clawed and tore off those stinging threads of silk, slicing through the sticky cobwebs of heat, until I could feel my magic—cold, hard, unstoppable.

Just like me.

I grabbed hold of that power and imagined pouring it into those spiders in my palms, until their bellies were as fat and swollen with my silvery Ice magic as the ones under my skin had been with their bright green chemical heat and pain and suffering.

Then I let my spiders loose.

They zipped through my body, carrying their own Icy strings of silk along behind them, weaving their own cold, crystalline webs in delicate but deadly patterns. Slowly, very, very slowly, a numb feeling began to spread through my body as my imaginary spiders froze me from the inside out.

And slowly, very, very slowly, things started to change.

My vision cleared, my breathing came more easily, and the sweat covering my body cooled. The agony from the drug lessened, although I could still feel the fiery combination of the chemicals and the elemental power licking at the strings of my Ice magic, trying to scorch right through them. So I focused on my own cold power that much more, using it to maintain and spread the numbness in my body. Anything else was too much for me right now.

But it was enough.

The longer I held on to my Ice magic, the more I could feel it freezing out the Burn drug in my body. I wasn’t a hundred percent—not even close to that—but I knew that the danger had passed.

This danger, at least.

“What’s happening? Why is her heart rate dropping?” Benson muttered, staring at the monitors. “She should be crashing hard right now, not stabilizing.”

“Perhaps that batch of pills was not as strong as the supplier promised,” Silvio murmured, his voice as bland as ever. “It did seem to flare out of her rather quickly.”

Benson stared at the monitors chirp-chirp-chirping out my vitals, his face completely crestfallen, as though someone had just taken away his favorite toy. He set the needle full of adrenaline down on the table, then started flipping through his pad, reading back through his scribbles.

It was the first time I’d seen him show any real emotion, other than twisted pleasure, so I decided to lash out with the only thing I could: words.

“What’s wrong, Beau?” I croaked, my voice hoarse and raspy from all my screams. “Did you not get the results you wanted? Aw, it’s too bad that your little science project failed. But really, you should have known better.”

He stiffened and gave me a withering glance. “And why is that?”

“Oh, c’mon, Dr. Frankenstein. Don’t you know that the monster never reacts how you think she will?”

His black eyebrows drew together in confusion. Maybe it was the drug still working its way through my system or simply my relief at being alive, but his puzzled expression made me giddy, so giddy that I started snickering, which soon erupted up into long, loud laughter, until tears were streaming down my face and my ribs ached.

But I couldn’t stop laughing—I didn’t want to stop.

Benson stared at me, even more confused than before. But my delighted peals soon made his uncertainty melt into anger. Red roses of embarrassment bloomed in his pale cheeks, and his blue eyes glittered with rage behind his silver glasses. He got to his feet, threw his pen and pad down onto the table, and ripped off his white lab coat.

“Clean her up,” he snarled, slapping his coat down onto the back of his chair. “I want her ready to go for round two as soon as possible. I’m going to check with the supplier and get a fresh batch of pills to use on her.”

Silvio nodded. Benson gave me one more disgusted look before stomping out of the lab and slamming the door behind him to cut off the sound of my merry, mercurial, maniacal chuckles.

•

Silvio spent a few minutes unhooking me from the monitors and other contraptions. He didn’t say a word as my crazy laughter finally slowed, sputtered, and then stopped. When he had finished putting the machines away, Silvio pulled out his phone and sent a quick text. Then he moved behind me, out of my line of sight, before coming back into view and setting a thick white plastic garbage bag on top of the table.

Clink-clink-clink.

I cocked my head to the side. I knew that sound—it was the clatter of silverstone blades scraping together. My knives were in that bag. Too bad I couldn’t get to them. Too bad I couldn’t do anything but sit in this damn chair.

I thought Silvio would grab my knives again and leave the lab, but he hesitated, then came over to stand beside me. And then he did the strangest thing of all.

He reached out and unlocked the silverstone restraint around my neck.

I blinked, wondering if maybe I was still flying high on Burn and hallucinating, but Silvio quickly opened the shackles around my wrists, then the ones around my ankles. We stared at each other, him as calm as ever, me completely confused. This had to be some sort of trap, some sort of trick on Benson’s part. No doubt, he had ordered Silvio to unshackle me just so he could watch me try to escape in my weakened state and take some more stupid notes for his so-called scientific observations.

But I didn’t care, and if there was one thing that I was good at, it was surviving impossible situations and leaving the bodies of my enemies strewn behind in my wake. Starting here and now with Silvio.

“Here,” Silvio said, leaning over the chair and stretching his hand out to me. “Let me help you up—”

I reached up, wrapped my right hand tightly around his neck, and used my left hand to push myself out of the chair. We tumbled to the floor. Silvio tried to slither out from under me, but I reached for what little magic I had left—my Stone power this time—and hardened my hand with it. I used my viselike grip to put even more pressure on his throat, squeezing, squeezing tight.

“You make a sound or a move that I don’t like, and I will crush your windpipe,” I hissed. “What the hell is this? Why did you free me? What game is Benson playing now? Is this all part of his f**king experiment?”

“No . . . game . . .” Silvio croaked. “Trying . . . to . . . help you.”

I lay on top of the vamp, waiting for him to start clawing at my hand or punching me in the face. If he really wanted to, he could throw me off him. My arms and legs were about as steady as a bowl of soup right now, and the only reason I was holding him down was that my body was complete dead weight.

But instead of fighting, Silvio stayed still. “You held up . . . your end of the . . . bargain,” he rasped. “You saved . . . Catalina . . . from him. Just trying . . . to return . . . the favor.”

His gray gaze locked with my much frostier one, but I didn’t see anything in his eyes except cool, calm clarity. Silvio had already accepted his own death, whether it was here at my hand or later on at his boss’s.

“Benson will kill you for this,” I said, trying to rattle him, trying to see if he really meant what he said. “You know he will.”

Silvio nodded as much as my Stone-hardened hand would let him. “I am . . . well aware of that.”

I stared into his eyes, but his calm expression didn’t flicker or waver, not even for a second. He was either sincere in his desire to help me, or he was one of the best actors I’d ever seen. Either way, I made my decision. No choice, really. As much as I hated to admit it, I wasn’t getting out of here on my own. Not when I was weak, still partially drugged, and running low on magic and had my bare ass hanging out of the back of a hospital gown.

“All right, then,” I said, releasing my grip on my Stone magic and Silvio’s throat. “If you’re so determined to betray your boss, then help me up. And find me some damn clothes.”

21

Silvio rolled me off him. He grabbed Benson’s white lab coat and tossed it at me before going over to a large metal safe in the back corner of the room.

Still lying on the floor, I stretched out my hand, dug my fingers into the fabric, and pulled the coat over to me. Even that tiny effort made sweat trickle down the small of my exposed back, and sitting up against the side of the torture chair made me pant for breath.

Silvio ignored my slow progress, spun the dial around on the front of the safe, and yanked the door open. He drew a black leather-bound book out of the dark depths of the safe before shutting and locking it again. He hurried back over to me. The vamp sighed, shook his head, and hoisted me up. It was all that I could do to stand upright, while he yanked my arms and body this way and that, maneuvering me around like a doll he was dressing. I gritted my teeth to hold back my frustrated snarls. I hated being so weak, so dependent, so damn helpless, but time was the most important thing right now, and if I had to be humiliated to escape, well, so be it.

Anything would be better than being strapped down in that f**king chair again.

Silvio buttoned the coat over my chest. Then he grabbed the plastic garbage bag full of my knives off the table and handed me one of the weapons, before sliding the book from the safe inside the plastic and tying the bag tight around my wrist.

“What’s that?” I asked. “That book.”

“Insurance.”

Before I could ask him what he meant, Silvio reached out, scooped me up into his arms, and headed toward the door. The bag of knives hanging off my wrist smacked against his hip, but he didn’t seem to notice.

“Turn the knob for me, then relax, like you’re still riding high on the drug,” he said. “We’ll get a lot farther a lot faster that way.”

I tucked the knife in my hand up the sleeve of the coat, then did as he asked and went slack in his arms. Silvio put his back into the door, pushed it open, and left the lab.

He stepped back out into the drug den. Some of the addicts perked up as Silvio walked past them, but when they realized that he wasn’t Benson with a fresh hit for them, they sank back down onto their pillows and slid deeper into their despair. Two guards had been posted at the bottom of the stairs, and they frowned as Silvio stopped in front of them.

“Where you are going with her?” one of the vamps asked.

“Upstairs to get her cleaned up. She threw up all over the lab,” Silvio said in a bland tone. “Boss’s orders. He has special plans for this one.”