I just about fell out the tree. What the hell? Whose side were they on, anyway?
I scrambled down with all the grace of a rhino, landing hard on my wet rump. Enough was enough. Bad Celia was going down. Insult knew no injury like this. My paws dug into the snow, crunching through the icy surface and into the soft white stuff I now officially hated. My eyes focused on the warm glow of the family room lights as I crept, my claws itching to cut. No longer could I see them, but I could sense them. I needed to get my double away from my family and outside to me.
My roar signaled my arrival, long, strong, clear. Shayna bolted onto the deck first. Her movements so quick, I thought she merely pointed in my direction. The tip of her knife sliced into my tail. I hissed. My tigress had barely dove us out of the way before Shayna could strike a vital organ. I roared again, challenging Larissa’s Celia to come down. She inched her way to the edge of the deck and narrowed her eyes.
Crap. I guess I was pretty damn scary. My sisters backed away from her all at once. Shayna lifted another dagger, and Taran’s hands fired with white and blue. Bad Celia glanced back at them, appearing genuinely confused. “What?” she asked.
Emme clasped her hand over her mouth. “Y-you’re not our Celia.”
“Of course, I am,” she said.
Taran’s jaw clenched tight. “Then why aren’t you changing and going after her? Why are you letting Shayna fight her for you?”
Yeah! They figured it out, knowing I’d never permit them to fight my battles. Now we had her. Watcha gonna do now, poser?
The other Celia shrugged. Then changed into a golden tigress and leapt off the deck.
Shit to the seventh power.
Like my human likeness, the golden tigress resembled mine to perfection. Larissa’s power should have shocked me stupid. Instead all it did was rile my beast. I remained a very still, very pissed-off statue for roughly two-point-five seconds. Then my rage slapped my astonishment upside the head like I was a spoiled heiress. I charged my other half and rammed into her with my claws out. There remained only one true me. And my beast planned to keep it that way.
We fell into a tumble of furious fangs and wicked claws. Her incisors dug into my shoulder. I pushed back the stabbing pain and surrendered to my beast. Larissa’s creation didn’t possess the thick hide of my tigress, nor did she hold that animalistic intuition and viciousness to survive. I shredded through the loose fur and into the tender muscle beneath until the snow streaked with crimson and chunks of fur. My victim roared in agony, the sounds mimicking my tigress’s voice so closely, it became almost too much to bear. So I focused on my task rather than the virtual hamburger Larissa attempted to make of my brain. My sisters screamed, likely unsure whether the real Celia suffered or not, and torn whether to act.
As my fangs found the imposter’s jugular, she changed back, resuming her human form. My sisters gathered around, their power accelerating from their distress, but failing to act. Their gazes danced from me to her when I dropped her on the ground. They seemed unsure who to attack, who to defend.
“Fuck,” Taran sobbed.
My stomach lurched whenI saw what they saw—my small body reduced to nothing more than frayed chunks of flesh. Ribs shone white and slick, protruding with each torturous breath. Hair stuck to the deep gashes on my face—her face. Sweet Jesus. What’s happening? My eyes burned and my head spun, no longer able to distinguish the illusion from a very twisted reality.
The imposter reached a hand toward Emme, blood spurting out of her mouth as she spoke. “Help me, Emme. Please help me.”
Emme extended her hands, her palms glowing with that soft pale light, ready to heal, ready to mend, ready to save. Just before their fingertips touched, Emme stumbled backward, falling on her backside. Tears streamed down her face. She shook her head and covered her ears, wrestling with her contradictory emotions.
Shayna dropped her blade. It fell flat against the layer of ice beside her. Her face blanched and her hands shook as she tried to find her words. “Is she . . . Could she . . .”
I couldn’t take the suffering. I changed, falling into a kneeling position to cradle the other Celia’s na**d body against me. She felt cold—my God, so cold—her skin supple and moist against mine. I pushed her red-stained curls from her face. She appeared so innocent then, young, helpless, incapable of harming another soul, the menace of her beast nowhere in sight.
She locked her gaze on mine just before I snapped her neck.
The crunch of her vertebrae made me drop to my side. Shayna and Emme choked back screams. Taran hollered with rage and grief, dropping to her knees next to me with her flaming blue and white hands inches from my face. The heat roasted my skin. I recoiled as if burned, unable to take the breadth of her fire. Something in my expression made her stop mere seconds before setting me aflame. Perhaps it was my own horror staring back at her, or maybe the fact that I didn’t fight back. Either way she stopped. Thank heaven she stopped.
I bit my bottom lip hard enough to taste blood, unable to take the tormented grimace wrinkling Taran’s beautiful face. So instead I focused on the burden I still held in my arms, and how the slight weight suddenly seemed unbearable. Her lifeless green eyes continued to stare at my face, despite her lolling head. I wanted to toss her away, deep into the pine forest. It wasn’t really me after all, was it? But I couldn’t seem to do that to myself. So I sat there, watching, waiting, while my sisters’ cries reverberated against my skull.
The thick clouds above vanished like a vial of ink poured into the ocean. The strong wind and freezing sleet ceased. Slowly, Larissa’s creation dissolved into water, clean and pure, creating tiny rivers against the blood-stained snow. When she finally disappeared, all that remained was a small clump of my hair draped against my knee.
I barely felt Taran and Shayna helping me to stand. Shayna said something about hypothermia, but I couldn’t be sure, nor did I really care. I swallowed hard. In my arms, I had held the dead me. And nothing would ever wipe that memory.
Chapter Seven