Twiceborn by Marina Finlayson

might negotiate my return.”
    I snorted. “You want to make a deal? The fact that I haven’t struck you down where you sit for your flagrant betrayal is the only concession you’re likely to get from me. And why you would imagine I’d ever trust you again is beyond me.”
    And yet, here I was. Desperate times call for desperate measures, as they say, and the times could hardly be more desperate, with most of my thralls destroyed in the strike on Ingrid, and the wolves off licking their wounds. Trevor, the pack leader, wouldn’t even take my calls, an insult he would never have dared when I was at full strength.
    In hindsight, it had been a foolish move. I should have waited and let Valeria take her down, but I’d been afraid to let Valeria grow too strong. The more successful she’d seemed, the more allies had flocked to her aid. And Ingrid had given the impression—wrongly, as it turned out—of being an easy target. Instead I’d weakened myself, perhaps fatally.
    Jason’s drink arrived and he took an appreciative sip, considering me over the rim of the glass. “What if I told you that business with Luce and the bomb was all part of the plan? That I wanted Valeria to believe I’d betrayed you so I could spy on her for you? A double agent, as it were.”
    I sipped my own drink, equally cool. “I’d say you were the worst double agent in history. Not a single piece of information from you in over six months? Spying’s clearly not your forte.”
    He threw his head back in a familiar gesture and laughed, showing even white teeth. “Exactly. You know me too well. And that’s why we work so well together. I made a choice, and it was a bad one.”
    “So now you want to unmake it.” I spun my glass in damp circles on its coaster, ignoring his earnest look. “I’m afraid it doesn’t work like that.”
    “Be realistic, Lee. Getting rid of Ingrid all but wiped you out. You know you need help. Don’t let injured pride stand in the way. I have a lot to offer. Valeria is planning an attack on Alicia even as we speak. With me on your side we could set it up so Valeria bought it as well. You’d be home free.”
    A pretty picture. My sisters dead, the proving over and me the last one standing—he knew the way to my heart. Imagining Valeria dead, in particular, was one of my favourite pastimes. My other sisters were mere obstacles on the path to success, but with Valeria it was personal. It was her smugness I couldn’t stand, as if being the eldest automatically granted her superiority. The way she wore her hair up, braided around her head in a not-so-subtle attempt to give herself a crown she hadn’t yet earned, made me grind my teeth every time I saw her.
    Fortunately that wasn’t often. The last time had been at Ingrid’s house; before that, not since she’d killed Monique, our youngest sister. I’d barely made it out of that ballroom alive. Valeria’s ball gown had been sprayed with scarlet; even her perfectly braided hair dripped gore.
    “You’re next,” she’d mouthed as I’d stared through the smoke, my own face bloodied in escaping Monique’s fate. She revelled in the proving. To the rest of us it was a bitter necessity, but to her it was a cause for sheer delight.
    Jason still waited for my answer, watching me with a lazy glint of amusement in his eye as I checked the room. It was three-quarters full, mostly of businessmen lunching on the company account. My thralls were at a table by the door, one watching us, the other with his eyes on the street. The one watching nodded when I caught his eye. Nothing to report.
    My cool act probably wasn’t fooling Jason. Finishing off Ingrid had cost a lot, both in money and in lives. Add to that the blow of Jason’s defection and his almost-successful attempt at killing me, and my situation remained dire even though months had passed. Continual harrying by Valeria hadn’t helped. Here a thrall would go missing, there a deal would fall through or another