Chapter 826
The feedback died as the system shorted out.
The impostor ripped off the white mask. Underneath was a face I didn’t recognize—a mercenary with a scarred cheek.
“You ruin everything!” he screamed. “The Phoenix will rise regardless!”
“The Phoenix is a myth!” I yelled. “And you’re just scavengers!”
𝖬𝗈𝗌t 𝘳𝗲a𝗱 𝗍h𝗶𝘀 𝗐ее𝗸 𝘰𝗇 𝘨𝖺𝗅𝘯𝗼𝘃e𝗅s.cоm
“Kill her!” the mercenary shouted. He pulled a gun from his jacket.
The crowd screamed. Panic erupted. People stampeded toward the exits.
“Skye, get down!” Alistair shouted.
But before I could move, a figure lunged from the shadows of the wings.
A woman in a blue dress.
For a second, I thought it was Victoria. The height, the hair… My heart stopped. Had they turned her? Was this why she’d been missing for two days?
Then she turned, and the light caught her face. It was a mask—a hyper-realistic silicone mask modeled after Victoria’s face.
Psychological warfare.
She held a jagged piece of glass and rushed at me.
“Die!” she shrieked.
My hand flew to my thigh, fingers brushing the hilt of the ceramic knife. But I hesitated. Even knowing it was a mask, seeing Victoria’s face twisted in hate froze me for a fraction of a second.
I sidestepped, grabbed her wrist, and twisted. She was weak, uncoordinated. I shoved her away.
“Where is she?” I yelled at the stage. “Where is the real Victoria?”
“Gone!” the mercenary laughed. He raised the gun—not at me.
At the ceiling.
“Alistair, the chandelier!” I screamed.
He fired. Bang. Bang.
The bullets struck the main support cable of the massive crystal chandelier hanging directly above me.
The cable snapped with a sickening metallic twang.
Alistair didn’t rappel down like an action hero—he didn’t have the strength for that. Instead, a shot rang out from the rafters.
Crack.
The bullet struck the chandelier’s secondary chain, making it swing wildly to the left just as it began its descent. It wasn’t enough to stop the fall, but it changed the trajectory.
I dove.
CRASH.
The sound was deafening. Tons of glass and metal smashed into the floor mere feet from where I had been standing. Shards of crystal flew like shrapnel. Dust billowed up in a choking cloud.
I lay on the floor, covered in dust, ears ringing.
“Skye!” Alistair’s voice was panicked in my ear.
“I’m okay,” I coughed, pushing myself up.
We looked up at the stage.
It was empty. The mercenary and the fake Victoria were gone.
Only the broken chandelier remained—a monument to the chaos.
Lucian ran onto the stage, dragging an unconscious Travis Tate.
“We missed him,” Lucian said, looking toward the back exit. “The impostor escaped.”
I stood, shaking glass from my dress.
“He didn’t escape,” I said, staring into the darkness where the fake Liam had vanished. “He lured us here to show us that they can wear our faces. They can be anyone.”
I looked at Alistair as he emerged from the service stairs, limping heavily, his face pale with exhaustion. The war had just changed. It wasn’t just about money or code anymore. It was about identity.