Ragged sobbing snarls heaved in and out of Kirastasia’s downy chest like the thrusts of a merciless knife, mangling her heartstrings with rusted serrated edges—and the one holding the blade was none of than her darling angel Kahlan. The northern star to which the snowbird always flew, no matter how many pretty trinkets caught her maple eyes. How could a diamond compare to a galaxy? How could a sequin’s glitter compare to the burning brilliance of the sun? Kira could not help but lust after lovely faces and warm bodies; she was a succubus starved of affection, an inherently lustful appetite written into her very DNA, but perverted and twisted by too much neglect and not enough affection. Perhaps the brindled brutale would have turned out differently, if only she’d found the physical touch she needed to sate her appetite early on . . . or maybe she could have been taught to control herself, to curb the urges that tossed her in their wild, addictive current. But it was too late. Kirastasia was a luminous gem long ago cut into her current shimmering sharp-edged shape and could never revert back to the rough stone that once sheltered other possibilities from view. None would ever heal the hole that lingered in her heart, forever pouring out the vast oceans of love she tried to store inside. And with each word—with each wrenching wound Kahlan peeled into her breast—that hole grew wider . . . and wider . . .

Until Kirastasia could hardly breathe around the yawning abyss that opened its jaws where her heart used to be.

You love no one and nothing but yourself. Instantly the ice damsel’s jaws, which had been open to scream her hurt, slammed shut, muscles twitching with the force it took to close them. Kahlan had been torturing her with this whole conversation. Everything was a large-gauge needle plunged perpendicular into her flesh, her most sensitive nerves, electrified wire coiling under Kira’s tense muscles and shocked over and over again while her soul writhed on the cold steel table. Metaphorical bones snapping. Fur tearing out by the clump. Kirastasia could gnaw off her own limb right now, and the shock of sawing through her tendons would harm her less than the hideous truth the ex-healer stabbed her with. The hot, visceral scent of the ivory girl’s anguish flooded the den—thick and dark as blood. Her tears had been falling quick and searing down her face, but now their torrent slowed . . . congealed into huge bitter droplets that gathered in Kira’s red-rimmed honey pools before sliding like the procession of a funeral down either corner of her muzzle.

Not true. Kira believed what Kahlan said about her father. That was so like him—wounding her without giving a fuck. She knew Kershov didn’t care about her . . . but why did he have to be so aggressive in his hatred? In his disapproval and disappointment of the daughter who failed to be anything he wanted? But the relations Kahlan had with her sire weren’t what the pallid princess was trying to deny. No . . . that would be the insinuation—no, the explicit declaration—that Kirastasia was not capable of “love.” Not true. I CAN love. And you . . . as she thought, a hiccup wrenched at her throat, though her cries had been strangled down to tiny whimpers. You loved me too. Right?

“. . . never, Kah?” A pained rasp. A child’s whisper. She quivered in place. “Never?”

Her amber portals squeezed shut, pressing a few more burning tears from their lids. She could not stand the glacial mask Kahlan wore, the features that were once so soft and warm completely shut off from her. Even now, the young tigress knew she would forgive her love at the drop of a leaf. She still considered her father mostly responsible for the torment currently shredding her apart. Except . . . Kah gave no indication that she was sorry, none at all that she even wanted forgiveness. And Kirastasia could not tip the scales back in her favor if Kahlan had no desire to play along. Clamped shut like a clam against this brutal emotional attack, Kira did not notice the change that pulled Kahlan under and replaced her with a stranger. In fact, she noticed nothing until Kahlan referred to herself in the third person—THEN the striped dancer’s lanterns opened head tilting slightly.

The stranger-in-Kah’s-body spoke in a waterfall—continuous, rushed, as if a single pause would destroy the magic that brought him to the front. Meanwhile, Kira allowed him to talk. Silently. Blankly. Devoid of expression like some beautiful doll—a skill she would never admit had been passed down from her father. And then the stranger (Henadin?) gave her the opportunity to question him.

The white lady carefully sat down, mirroring “Henadin’s” pose. She blinked. And then Kira spoke in a voice as hollow as the organ meant to pump her life through her veins.

“What. The. Fuck.”

A beat—then more words, gaining strength as the impossibility and absurdity of the current situation exploded before her. Kira leaned forward, lips lifted just enough to bare her fangs. “I’m supposed to buy this bullshit about fractured souls and sentient separate consciousnesses? How very CONVENIENT! Kahlan decides to mortally wound me beyond reason, and YOU step in to—what, smooth everything over? I don’t forgive you, ‘Henadin.’ This isn’t between us. This is between ME and the bitch who slept with my—” She gagged. Residual tears bubbled up in her eyes.

Kirastasia was many things. But though she might have acted as if she had nothing but air between her ears, the lass was truly quite intelligent. She just never put that brilliance to use for more than anything but chasing tails. It made no logical sense for Kahlan to tear a new rip in Kira’s soul, only to fake Henadin’s existence as a way to get out of retribution. Kahlan wasn’t like that. Not even this corrupted Kah. “What am I supposed to do? Kahlan doesn’t WANT me. Apparently she has NEVER wanted me. So I don’t know what to do.”