The Brightest Night (Origin #3) - Jennifer L. Armentrout Page 0,114

the road in front of the warehouse. He picked up speed and the wind caught strands of my hair, blowing it back from my face.

He sped down the road, past the rusted-out cars. When he whipped the vehicle left, he narrowly avoided colliding with a truck that must’ve been a bright, cherry red at one time. White-knuckling the bar, I pictured myself flying out and face-planting in the road at any given second. Heart thumping, I almost missed the movement. Something darted out from behind the truck, running behind the work van with faded letters. The glimpse had been quick, but I saw bright auburn hair.

Nate.

The bag of food I’d left out had been there the following morning, but it was gone the next time the sun rose, and I’d been so very hopeful that it had been Nate who’d retrieved the food and not a strong squirrel who’d carried it off.

I almost shouted for Eaton to stop the vehicle, but if he did, there was a good chance we’d all go flying into the air. Not only that, I didn’t want to delay getting to someone who sounded gravely injured.

Cranking my neck, I tried to see if Nate reappeared, but he seemed to have vanished. At least he was still alive. That was good.

“Evie?” Eaton snorted, shaking his head as he one-handed the steering wheel of the cart and sped down the steep hill.

I turned toward him. “What?”

“Makes me laugh when you introduce yourself and answer to that. One of these days…,” the general said. He spun the wheel, and the cart went up on two wheels. Under the rumble of the engine, I heard what I thought was the Lord’s Prayer coming from Jeremy. “You’re going to take back the power the name you were born with gave you.”

22

It was strange how something I’d been trying to figure out could leap right out of General Eaton’s mouth and smack me upside the head.

Take back the power the name you were born with gave you.

Kat had said there had to be something Luc had done that snapped me out of it in the woods. There was something he’d said. It was the same thing that had pulled me out of my sleep.

Nadia.

He’d used my real name, or as Eaton would say, the name I was born with. And that wouldn’t be such a big deal except that the Daedalus hadn’t trained and programmed me when I’d been Evie.

I’d learned everything when I’d been Nadia.

There had to be a connection there.

What, I had no idea, and right now wasn’t the time to figure it out.

I was trying to stay alive.

General Eaton drove like we were in the safety of a steel tank, and Jeremy had definitely been reciting a prayer. Several times I almost flew right out of the vehicle, and I was only seconds away from joining in on that prayer when we bumped over a meadow where grass was as tall as the sides of the cart.

I half expected a damn velociraptor to pounce on us.

Except it wasn’t a dinosaur from Jurassic Park that almost took us out as we cleared the tall grass but a slow-moving cow getting her late lunch on.

I almost died three times in the ten minutes it took us to get where we were going.

The entry house turned out to be a farmhouse, one that was still operating based on the cattle Eaton dodged with impressive ease. When the cart slammed to a stop beside a similar one, I jumped out of that thing with speed that even impressed me.

“Doc Hemenway is here.” Jeremy looked like he might vomit as he poured himself out of the back of the cart. He looked down at his stained clothing. “Good. That’s good.” He was trying to convince himself, and all I could think about was the blood covering him and what kind of wound would cause that.

My steps slowed as I neared the back door. The home looked normal, but at the same time, it seemed to pulse as if it had a heartbeat. Or as if the bones of the house were having a hard time containing whatever was inside. I hadn’t felt anything like that before, not with a Luxen or an Arum. “Spencer is a … friendly?” I asked.

“Yeah.” Jeremy’s voice was hoarse. “Yeah, he is.”

Eaton was stalking toward the open back door, the limp all but gone now. “Where are they?”

“In the dining room.” Jeremy motioned me to follow.

Eaton had already