All of Us Villains

Monsters couldn’t harm you if you were a monster, too.

What is happily ever after to the child is a nightmare to the monster.

You want to know something funny?' he asked. "In a choice between staying here or going home, I'd still choose here. With you.

High magick fell from the stars, and when we found it, we did what humans always do. We decided it was ours to claim.

I think deep down, some people don't want their stories yo have happy endings.

Survival could make villains of any of us.

The nightmares had not taught him to fear the dark. The nightmares had taught him to become it.

In this story, the princess slayed the dragon.

Gavin had glared at Alastair Lowe and his brother from the back of the pub and wondered what it would be like to have someone in his life like that. Someone who knew him. Someone who saw him. Someone who would celebrate when, not if, he came home.

Her touch was cold, but his was colder

My family is proof that even depressing stories need a punchline

All of these people thought she’d failed, but really, her story had been stolen from her. And she had no idea how to get it back.

I think, deep down, some people don't want their stories to have happy endings.

His chest ached, as if his very heart had turned to stone and weighed down upon his lungs and bones. He didn’t remember the last time he’d cried. But after a night miserably hoping this was one final, heartless test, he wasn’t in the mood to shed tears. He was in the mood to spill blood.

Even if Alistair was sick of twisting himself into something cruel, he didn’t know who he was otherwise. Goodness served no purpose in the tournament. And no matter what he felt for Isobel, she was still an opponent. And it wasn’t as though Isobel actually returned those feelings, anyway.

But that was what this alliance led up to. Not a kiss stolen in the dark, or a priceless gift given without being asked. A duel.

By the end of the morning, his hand was stained white with sins and red with blood.

There's more to every tournament than just who wins... Every champion has a reason to compete, and they deserve to win. Even if they they don't make it out alive

Villainy in the modern age was a delicate balance.

What happened?” she asked quietly. He shuddered. “I had to fight off Thorburn and the Blair for it. But I won.” “Are they…?” Her heart clenched, thinking of Briony. She didn’t even realize Briony was working with Finley now, though she supposed she shouldn’t be surprised. Alistair shook his head. “No. I didn’t kill them.” But he looked shaken, and he’d clearly been hurt. For her sake. “Why did you do it?” Because no matter how hard she tried, Isobel couldn’t reconcile the image of Alistair, wounded and shivering, with the one who had almost murdered her hours before. “Because I hate the way you look at me,” he spat. “Like I’m a monster.” “Aren’t you?” Isobel had learned that Alistair wasn’t invulnerable, but the role of the dragon was one he’d fashioned for himself. One he wanted. “Obviously, I’m not a very good monster.

She gasped when she exposed the wound, his flesh split open and brimming with blood. Swallowing her dread, she pressed her hand to it and in her other, she squeezed a Healer’s Touch spellstone. She cast it once, twice, three times, until all it’s magick had depleted. The blood stopped flowing. Still, the wound didn’t close. She moved on to the next stone. And the next one. “Come on, Al.” And the next. And the next. Finally the wound closed, and his broken patella was mostly set, but she exhausted the stones and Alistair hadn’t opened his eyes. Clutching his hand, Isobel rested her cheek against his chest, listening for a pulse. At first, all she heard was the noise of the forest crickets and owls. Then she finally made out his heartbeat—faint but there—and far beyond, the sound of approaching footsteps. Probably Finley and Elinor returning to finish her, too. “Seven letters,” she whispered to Alistair. “To endure.” “Survive,” she heard him rasp. She almost thought she’d imagined it at first, but then she lifted her head and realized his eyes were open, watching her. He let out a wheezy breath, then smiled. She realized she’d never seen Alistair smile in a way that wasn’t meant to be a threat. “Hello, rival,” he whispered.

His guilt told him to let Isobel go free. His grief told him it was a blessing he had someone here, that he’d never done well alone. And his heart warned him the only one of them in true danger of being hurt was him.

Why wouldn’t she just make it herself?” “It’s just a test. It’s always a test,” Alistair answered. “And I keep failing.

Kill or be killed. It was a somber affair.

I never claimed not to be despicable, too

With each new word spoken, Alistair glimpsed monsters out of the corner of his vision, like shadows writhing along the walls. There were dragons and goblins, leviathans and wraiths. In every story his family told, the villains won. They crossed the lines no one else would. They struck when the hero least expected it.

Hendry sighed and changed the subject. “I had a dream today—” “Typically, one has them at night—” “—while napping in the graveyard.” Despite his charm and freckled nose, Hendry was still a Lowe. He had a little villain in him. The Lowe family graveyard was his favorite place, full of vague, unnerving epitaphs for those who’d died young—even excluding the tournament, their family had a surprisingly large amount of tragedy in its history. “In the dream, you really were a monster.” Alistair snorted and mashed the games buttons. “What did I look like?” “Oh, you looked the same.” “Then what made me a monster?” “You were collecting the spellrings of dead children and hiding them in your wardrobe, cackling about souls being trapped inside them.” “Don’t be ridiculous,” Alistair said. “I’d do something like that now.

The Lowe family had always been the undisputed villains of their town’s ancient, bloodstained story, and no one understood that better than the Lowe brothers. The family lived on an isolated estate of centuries-worn stone, swatched in moss and shadowed in weeping trees. On mischief nights, children from Ilvernath sometimes crept up to its towering wrought iron fence, daring their friends to touch the padlock chained around the gate—the one engraved with a scythe. Grins like goblins, the children murmured, because children in Ilvernath loved fairy tales—especially real ones. Pale as plague and silent as spirits. They’ll tear your throat out and drink your soul. All these tales were deserved.

Isn’t it better to have hope?” No, not for her. Isobel might not have ever called the Macaslan estate her home, but she had been raised on a legacy of corpses and filth and rot, scavenging in the most revolting places for magick so her family could thrive. And in a choice between an ugly reality and a pretty delusion, Isobel would always choose the truth. “But the hope is empty,” she said. “Why can’t you understand that?

Alistair gazed at her intently, and her stomach fluttered in a way that was both terribly distracting and terribly pleasant. Last night, Isobel had committed to being a proper champion, and proper champions did not feel this way about other ones—not even their allies. It was foolish. It was dangerous. And as harshly as Isobel had scolded Briony for chasing fairy tales, a part of her desperately wanted to return to the Cave with Alistair. To see how far these feelings could take them. To pretend their story was anything other than a tragic one.