Vicious (Villains, #1)

by V.E. Schwab

Eli seemed intent to slaughter them, but Victor didn’t see why a useful skill should be destroyed, just because of its origin. EOs were weapons, yes, but weapons with minds and wills and bodies, things that could be bent and twisted and broken and used.

he knew there was no time or place for building trust or loyalty, but perhaps these could be supplanted by need. And need, Victor had learned, could be as powerful as any emotional bond. The latter was neurotic, complicated, but need could be simple, as primal as fear or pain. Need could be the foundation of allegiance.

“You’re going to come back, right?” she asked when they reached the door. Victor looked over his shoulder. “Of course I will,” he said. “That’s my favorite lighter.”

“We’re not coming back then, are we?” “Not tonight.”

“How do you know?” “Because I know you. I see you.” Eli drew his fingers through a ring of water on the table. “I don’t want to be forgotten.”

“Tell you what,” said Victor. “You remember me, and I’ll remember you, and that way we won’t be forgotten.” “That’s shit logic, Vic.” “It’s perfect.” “And what happens when we’re dead?” “We won’t die, then.” “You make cheating death sound so simple.” “We do seem awfully good at it,” said Victor cheerfully. He lifted his glass. “To never dying.” Eli lifted his. “To being remembered.” Their glasses clinked as Eli added, “Forever.”

Wondered what Victor would do to occupy his thoughts once Eli was gone. If Eli was gone.

Victor saw the pieces of his game lining up on the city-shaped board, chess and Battleship and Risk. His move.

There was a moment, before anyone else reached them, when Mitch saw Victor smile. A wolf’s smile, thin and sharp.

“Well?” asked Victor as they made their way down the concrete halls. “Do you feel I’m wasting your time and talent?”

“I don’t need a bodyguard,” said Victor. “I noticed that,” said Mitch. Victor let out a cough of a laugh. “Yes, well,” he said, “I don’t want everyone else to notice, too.” Mitch had been right. Victor Vale was a wolf among sheep. And it took a lot to make 463 hardened criminals look the part of prey.

“A good friend, Mr. Turner, is very hard to find.”

There were some people you had to stay away from, people who poisoned everything in reach. Then there were people you wanted to stick with, the ones with silver tongues and golden touches. And then, there were people you stood beside, because it meant you weren’t in their way. And whoever Victor Vale was, whatever he was, and whatever he was up to, the only thing Mitch knew was that he did not want to be in his way.

For and ever.

The words were several pages apart, separated and surrounded by a sea of black. Not only that, but the word ever had been altered, part of a larger word, the for- preceding it blotted carefully out, which meant Victor was not trying to piece together the word forever from the text. He clearly wanted it to be two separate words. Distinct. For. Ever.

“Well,” said Victor, “how hard can it be, right? You’ve done it once. But being afraid and being unwilling are different things. I don’t think you want to die.”

as if he’d just set down a heavy burden. Victor supposed that in many ways he had. After all, Victor knew pain enough to know how much Dominic had been in, and was frankly impressed by the man’s threshold. But while he might be able to function in pain, his powers clearly didn’t flourish under it.

And it’s hard. Like walking through water. The world resists, when you break its rules.”

She hated living in such a limp world, every glazed eye and simple nod a reminder that nothing mattered.

“Littering,” said Mitch as Victor started the car. “Let’s hope that’s not the worst crime I commit tonight,”

“It was like this secret birthday party,” she added softly. “Just for you, before everyone else could join in and celebrate.”

“Who taught you to sing so loud? The little Sydney I knew could barely chirp.” “I’m not that Sydney anymore.”

“We used to have the same eyes,” said Serena. “Yours are paler now.” “I like that we’re finally different,” said Sydney, fighting back a shiver. “I don’t want to be you.” Silence fell between the sisters. A silence full of shifting pieces.

“I don’t need you to be me,” said Serena at last. “But I need you to be brave. I need you to be strong.” Sydney squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m not afraid.”

She hadn’t told her to run away. She’d told her to go somewhere safe. And over the course of the last week, safe had ceased to be a place for Sydney, and had become a person. Specifically, safe had become Victor.

“Call me a cat,” said Mitch, pushing up off the planks. “I’m still working through my own nine lives. And just so you know,” he added, raising his gun, “I like to think there’s a special place in hell for girls who feed their little sisters to wolves.”

“There are worse ways to die,” said Serena. “And worse things to do than die. I promise I’ll make it quick.”

Victor should be here by now. She couldn’t hear him, but that was because he was so quiet, she told herself. He was always quiet. And safe.

“And Ulysses stopped up his ears against the siren’s song,” recited Victor, pulling the plugs from his own ears as Serena collapsed to the dirt lot, “for it was death.”

And it felt good. He had been worried that after so much waiting and so much wanting the actuality of shooting Eli wouldn’t live up to the dream, but it did. The air buzzed around them and Eli groaned and braced himself against the chair as the pain multiplied.

“It’s why I let you stay,” said Victor. “Why I liked you. All that charm outside, all that evil inside. There was a monster under there, long before you died.”

“You aren’t some avenging angel, Eli,” he said. “You’re not blessed, or divine, or burdened. You’re a science experiment.”

Victor’s gaze shifted to it, taking in the row of knives. Just like that day. “How nostalgic of you.” He put a foot on the table and knocked it over, sending the weapons scattering across the concrete.

Sydney Clarke gave second chances. But the dog had already had his. She’d fixed him once,

Mitch had a horrible feeling that he was wrong, and his curse had followed him all the way here.

Eli wanted this kill to be his, not the Merit Police Department’s, and certainly not Serena’s. His.

She hoped it left a scar, the kind she could see, the kind that would remind her of the moment when everything changed. Not that Sydney thought she’d ever forget.

She could feel the absence of her sister, the place in her where the threads had been. What she didn’t know was why Eli would have done it. But she meant to find out.

The grave was unmarked except for Victor’s book, which Sydney had set like a stone at the top of the patch of dirt that morning, waiting in the shadow of a stone angel for the diggers to finish and go away.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

A moment later, the cold ran up her arms, and caught her breath, and beneath her hands a heartbeat fluttered, as Victor Vale opened his eyes, and smiled.