8
WHEN I WOKE, MY BODY
WAS SORE FROM HEAD TO foot. I stayed still for a moment and
concentrated, trying to determine if anything was broken. I didn’t
think so. I was lying on my back in a cold, dark room. The air felt
thick and smelled stale.
“Noah?” My voice
creaked out. “Are you there?”
I shrieked as someone
grabbed me by my hair, dragging me up to my feet. I stumbled along
on weak legs as whoever it was didn’t slow their pace to let me
catch up. Finally, I was thrown forward and I landed hard on my
knees on a stone floor.
The first thing I saw
when I pulled my hair back out of my eyes was Noah. He sat ten feet
away from me, his back against the wall in the corner of the room.
His throat was torn open and bloody and he stared at me through
glossy, half-shut eyes. His chest moved with rapid, shallow breath,
but that was all the movement I could see. He looked like an animal
had attacked him and left him behind to die.
“What have you done
to him?” I choked out.
“I just nibbled on
him a little,” a small voice said. “I’ll finish him
later.”
I struggled to
breathe and slowly looked to my left. The blond girl stood there
holding hands with a tall, dark-haired man with pale gray eyes.
Another man with very short blond hair stood alongside them. They
watched me carefully as I got to my feet.
They were vampires.
The same vampires Matthias said we should avoid coming face-to-face
with.
There was no time to
let myself fall apart, but fear ate at my insides. Noah was dying,
and we were trapped in the basement of an amusement park with a
clan of bloodthirsty monsters.
“Who are you?” the
dark-haired man asked.
“I—I’m Jill.” I tore
my gaze away from Noah. “Who are you?”
“I am Isaiah. This is
Ethan. And I believe you’ve already met Patricia.” He studied me
for a moment. “Why did you come here, Jill?”
I licked my dry lips.
“I—I’m here because I wanted to rescue Jade.”
Sometimes the truth
will set you free. I was fairly certain this wasn’t one of those
times, but lying to vampires didn’t serve any purpose. They could
make me tell them the truth with a look. And if they found out I
was lying, it wouldn’t do much to help me get out of this in one
piece.
Showing my fear right
now would only mark me as a victim. I took a deep breath in and let
it out slowly. I had to stall for time. I had to get Noah help as
soon as possible. That wound looked really, really
bad.
If Declan and
Matthias were nearby, they might be able to help.
A horrible thought
occurred to me. Maybe they’d received Noah’s message and they’d
left the park to look for us, thinking that all was well and that
we’d found the dhampyr with no problem and already taken
off.
Shit.
“Why would you want
to rescue her?” Isaiah asked.
I forced myself up to
my feet and was surprised that I was able to do so without
discovering a broken ankle or a more severe injury. I felt shaken
and sore, but nothing more than that. Small mercies.
“I think keeping
someone prisoner so you can suck their blood whenever you want
isn’t exactly fair to her.” Bile rose in my throat as I looked at
my friend bleeding to death in the corner.
I swallowed back
tears. Noah, I’m so sorry.
“You’re being honest
with me,” Isaiah said. “I’m surprised.”
I forced myself to
meet his gaze. “If I wasn’t, you could just influence me to tell
the truth.”
“We could. So the two
of you decided to come here to my park and steal my
dhampyr.”
“That was the
original plan.”
He pressed his lips
together, his gaze cold and detached as if analyzing a small insect
under a magnifying glass. “Kill her.”
Another vampire I
hadn’t seen emerged from the shadows behind me and grabbed me in
his crushing grip. I fought against him, but he easily wrenched my
head to the side and I felt his cool breath on my
throat.
“No, wait! My blood
is poison!”
“Stop.” Isaiah held
his hand out. “What did you say?”
The vampire holding
me didn’t let go, but he didn’t bite me, either.
“My blood is
poisonous to vampires,” I said shakily.
What might seem like
an asset to me right now really wasn’t. The moment the vampire
holding me bit me and then died from it, my secret would have been
revealed anyway. There were too many vampires in the room. They
would have killed me before I had the chance to take another one
out. Admitting it up front was my only chance for my life not to
end in the next minute or two.
“She smells so good,”
the vampire holding me said, and he drew his nose along my throat.
“I have to taste her. It’s driving me mad.”
“Taste her and I’ll
kill you myself.” Isaiah approached me slowly, cautiously, and
walked a slow circle around us. I watched him warily, my attention
flicking with concern toward Noah again. If I died here, he would,
too. No matter what, I had to be strong for the both of
us.
Isaiah looked into my
eyes. “You’re the one they’re talking about, the mythical poisoned
human meant to bring death to us all. Were you sent here to
assassinate me?”
I felt his influence
wrap around me. While it did nothing to lessen my fear, it did
freeze my body in place so I couldn’t struggle any longer. I became
as limp as a rag doll. “I don’t even know who you
are.”
He flicked his chin
at the vampire behind me, who finally and begrudgingly let me go.
Then Isaiah clutched my throat so tightly it cut off my breath. I
couldn’t move, not even to grab his wrist. He inhaled and his eyes
blackened and the veins branched across his forehead and down the
sides of his face. “You’re a great danger to us.”
He released his hold
enough to let me gasp for breath, but didn’t let go of me
completely. He nodded in Noah’s direction. “What is that man’s
name?”
“It’s . . . Noah.
He—he’s hurt. Please, you have to let me get help for him. He’s
going to die.”
“Yes, you’re right.
He will.”
“The little girl bit
him.” I squeezed my tears back. She more than bit him by the looks
of it. The little monster had gnawed and torn at his throat to get
to his blood rather than simply pierced his flesh with her
fangs.
“That little girl is
much more dangerous than she looks,” Isaiah said. “She’s over a
hundred years old, even older than I am.”
I gasped. “She looks
like a child.”
“She is a child.
Frozen forever at five years of age, mentally and physically, only
with an eternal thirst for blood and difficulty following the rules
we set forth for all who live here. We try not to let her attack
anyone without supervision, or she tends to make a mess like this.
She doesn’t understand that there’s a much more civilized way to
feed.”
“I’ve tried to teach
her table manners.” Jade’s voice made me strain to look to the left
but Isaiah held me in place until the dhampyr came into my
peripheral vision. “But she’s a naughty girl sometimes. And she
doesn’t use her napkin to clean up after teatime. It makes quite
the mess.”
I swallowed hard.
“Why does Jade think Patricia’s her daughter?”
Isaiah sighed. “She
lost her own child years ago in an accident and never recovered
from it. We choose to go along with her fantasies since they make
life around here much more pleasant.”
“She needs
help.”
“No, she doesn’t.
Besides, Patricia likes having a doting mother again as well as
living so close to an amusement park. Children.” He smiled, showing
his fangs. “Such simple creatures.”
I honestly didn’t
give a shit about Jade anymore, all I cared about was Noah. I felt
bad that she was crazy and stuck living with vampires, but my
priorities had quickly shifted. I didn’t want to let myself lose
hope, but the sand was falling through the hourglass at a furious
pace.
“Your blood, it’s
intoxicating . . .” Isaiah’s face looked monstrous and his upper
lip peeled back from his teeth.
“Bite me and you
won’t like it very much. That warning has to be worth something to
you. I could have let your friend die.”
His jaw clenched.
“Yes, of course. How rude of me. Your warning is appreciated.” He
brought a sharp silver blade up against my throat, pressing deep
enough to sting and I whimpered at the sensation of warm blood
sliding down my skin. He touched it and raised his fingers to look
at the nearly black shade of it.
My teeth were now
clenched. “You need to let me go.”
“I can’t let you
leave here.”
Panic sliced through
me. “I told you who I am. I warned you about my blood. And now you
need to let me help my friend. We won’t come back, I swear
it.”
Isaiah shook his
head, the knife now pressed to my jugular just above his grip on my
throat. “No. What I need to do is to kill you.”
“No—”
“I promise to make it
fast—” He stumbled forward a foot, pushing me backward. The
influence he’d had over me suddenly lifted and it was as if a cold
glass of water had been thrown into my face. I leapt back from him
as his hand fell slackly to his side. The knife clanged against the
ground as he dropped it. He moaned, and it was a pained sound deep
in his throat.
I didn’t know what
had changed to make him release me, but then he turned and I saw
what it was. There was a knife with a familiar carved silver hilt
sticking out of the back of his skull. Isaiah grappled for it and
pulled it out with a sick, smacking sound. He fell to his hands and
knees on the cold stone floor.
I half expected him
to burst into fire and ash, but a knife to the brain, even a silver
one, just wasn’t enough to kill a vampire. I looked over to see
Declan standing under the archway leading into the cavernous room.
He looked furious enough to kill after throwing the knife at the
vampire’s head as if he’d been playing a game of darts—hard enough
to penetrate a skull.
Declan flicked a
glance at me. “I thought I asked you to wait in the fucking
car.”
He did have a point
there.
I didn’t have a
chance to say anything before three vampires including Ethan
swarmed toward him.
Declan dodged out of
the way just in time to miss a knife aimed for his throat. He
knocked it out of his attacker’s hand, snatched it up, and sank it
into the vampire’s chest. Before he’d exploded into fiery ash,
Declan had his silver stake in hand and was ready for the
next.
The second vampire
growled, crouching low like a wrestler, then jumped at Declan,
grabbing him and throwing him to the ground hard. I didn’t see the
weapon make contact this time, but the vampire was gone in an
instant. Declan’s stake skidded on the ground, coming to rest a few
feet away from me.
Ethan’s fist
connected with Declan’s jaw and he staggered back, hitting the wall
behind him. He was out of weapons. I grabbed for the stake as fast
as I could.
“Declan!”
When he looked at me
I threw it at him. He snatched it out of the air and sank it into
his attacker’s heart.
It had all happened
in less than fifteen seconds.
Declan’s head was
bleeding from hitting the wall. He wiped at the wound by his temple
absently as if it was more of an annoyance than an actual
injury.
I thought the attack
was over, but then Patricia raced across the room, hissing and
screaming like a child possessed. Declan grabbed her by her long
blond hair to hold her back from him.
“What in the hell is
this?” he growled.
“A
vampire.”
Patricia screeched.
“Let go of me! You’re a bad man! I hate you!”
Declan look over at
me with shock and disgust etched into his features. “What kind of
monster would do this to a helpless child?”
My face felt tense.
“That helpless child did that to
Noah.”
He glanced over his
shoulder at Noah, his expression turning from disgust to grim
concern. He let go of Patricia like she was on fire and she
scrambled back from him, clawing at the air like a deadly
kitten.
Jade had stood
silently in the shadows of the room watching everything, not moving
or speaking. The woman made me very nervous. Finally, she came
forward, wringing her hands.
“This isn’t good.”
She shook her head back and forth. “All I wanted was to introduce
you to my family. This isn’t good at all. They’re all dead now and
who will come to dinner? The Ferris wheel keeps spinning and
spinning and no one shall ever ride it with us again.”
Declan stared at her
for a moment. “This is the
dhampyr.”
She looked up at him.
“Oh my, yes. Dhampyr, dhampyr. That’s what I am. You are like me,
just like me. We shall be marvelous friends, won’t we? All I want
is for all of us to get along like a happy family. Can that be?
Please? Will you stay for dinner, sir? We’re planning a lovely
buffet and shall make all the food forget after the meal is
over.”
My heart broke to see
the bleak expression on Declan’s face as he regarded the crazy
woman. He hadn’t let on that he’d had any hope about finding her
alive and well, nonviolent and sane, but he must have had a lot of
it. That hope was what I saw fade away from his gaze as he realized
that his one clue to his future was a babbling
lunatic.
“Declan, it doesn’t
matter,” I said. “We have to help Noah.”
He drew in a breath.
“You’re right.”
He turned to Isaiah,
who was recovering slowly from his head wound.
“Kill me,” the
vampire gasped. “And be done with it.”
“Why would I want to
kill an old friend?” Matthias asked, finally entering the room,
glancing around at us each in turn.
“Your majesty.”
Isaiah raised his gaze to the former king.
“I thought it was
your clan here, Isaiah, but I wasn’t sure. I would have predicted
that you were one of those who set up camp so close to so many warm
and happy potential victims. You were always lazy that
way.”
“I’ve followed the
rules, your majesty. We don’t murder humans when we feed from them.
And we make them forget immediately. There’s no harm
done.”
Matthias glanced at
Noah, whose breathing had become less noticeable. “Doesn’t look
like it from where I stand.”
“That was a rare
mistake. But we don’t claim to be perfect.” Isaiah struggled to
stand, but failed. The wound in the back of his head had already
begun to heal, but he still seemed worse for wear. Even a vampire
couldn’t bounce back immediately from having their brains scrambled
like a dozen eggs.
What the hell were
they waiting for? I forced myself to remain in one place and
swallowed back the panic about Noah. I hated to think it was too
late. If we could get him to a hospital he might still have a
chance.
“I know you’ve sided
with those who believe in awakening Kristoff,” Matthias
said.
Isaiah looked
nervous. “It’s a lie.”
“You don’t know what
a mistake it will be when he—” Just then, Matthias clutched his
hands to either side of his head and a ragged scream escaped his
throat. He collapsed to his knees.
“Matthias!” I ran to
his side and grabbed his shoulder. I looked at Declan whose brows
were drawn tightly together.
“What’s wrong with
him?”
“I don’t know.
Matthias, what the hell’s happening to you?”
Matthias turned and
clutched my upper arms so tightly I thought he was going to break
them off from the rest of my body. The next moment Declan was
there, pushing him away from me.
“It’s Kristoff.”
Matthias looked as if he’d seen something that scared him. “He’s
being awakened right now. I can clearly see it in my mind’s eye. I
can see his mind, everything, every thought that’s going through
his head. It—it can’t be stopped now. He’s drank the blood of a
dozen human sacrifices. He’s covered in it. It fills his mouth, his
hands, his senses—the smell, the taste, the feel—he’s awake. And he
can see me, too, right now . . . and he wants to kill
me.”
Goose bumps had
broken out all over my skin. I didn’t like seeing him like this,
filled with pain and fear. I much preferred the cocky, powerful
vampire king to be totally in control of himself, but this—this was
despair. Defeat. All because of something he saw in his head. He
had a psychic connection to his twin brother. That sounded scary as
hell to me.
He blinked hard.
“It’s already gone from my mind. It shuttered off as if he didn’t
want me to see any more of his plans. The—the bond is stronger than
it ever was before.”
“He’s free,” I said.
It wasn’t a question.
“What I’ve been
trying to prevent all of these years, it was in vain. Kristoff is
king again and every vampire currently in existence must follow his
rule if they don’t want to be hunted down and brought in front of
him to face his wrath. This is only the beginning.” He slowly got
to his feet and, looking drawn and terrifying, he loomed over
Isaiah. “You would really side with him over me?”
Isaiah shook his
head. “I side with whomever is king. I have no
choice.”
“No, I suppose you
don’t. And neither do I.” He glanced over at Jade. “I need your
dhampyr’s blood to heal my recent injuries.”
Isaiah’s jaw tensed.
“If I give her to you will you let me live?”
“Yes, you may
live.”
“Then take her. Take
anything you want. Kill her if you have to.”
Matthias didn’t
hesitate. He went toward Jade, grabbing her arm tightly. Jade let
out a frightened shriek that didn’t sound human.
“You can’t kill my
mommy!” Patricia screamed and she moved like a pale streak through
the room.
I watched in shock.
“No, Matthias! She has a knife!”
But it was too
late.
The girl launched
herself at him and plunged the knife deep into Matthias’s back. He
growled in pain, let Jade go, and swatted at the child vampire. She
fell to the ground in a tiny heap.
Matthias swore loudly
and reached backward to grab the knife and pull it out, a mirror of
what Isaiah had done only minutes ago.
Jade cowered away
from him, reaching out for Patricia.
“Come here,” she
cried.
“He’s a bad man.”
Patricia was back on her feet, grabbing for the discarded knife.
Despite her small size she looked like a monster ready, willing,
and able to kill.
Declan snatched her
right out of the air by the back of her blouse as she jumped toward
Matthias again, this time aiming for his chest. She hissed at him
and instead tried to stab him with her weapon, but he grabbed it
out of her hand and threw it to the side before placing the child
firmly on the ground.
“Behave yourself,” he
growled.
Isaiah crawled over
to her. “I’m sorry, your majesty. Patricia shames us all, both with
what she did to your friend, and what she’s tried to do to
you.”
Matthias glared at
him. “There are more important things than this to deal with right
now. I’ll heal.”
“No, she must be
punished immediately.”
I saw him snatch the
knife off the ground. The next moment I heard a sharp,
bloodcurdling scream and then saw a small burst of fiery
ash.
There was absolute
silence in the room for several moments as I registered with horror
what he’d done.
A keening wail filled
my ears. Jade scrambled forward, gathering Patricia’s ashes in her
hands. Tears streamed down her cheeks. “You bastard! You murdered
my baby!”
Isaiah looked at her
with pity. “She wasn’t your baby. She was and always has been an
abomination that never should have been allowed to—”
And then he was gone
as well. As the ashes cleared, I saw Declan standing there, stake
in hand, a look of redhot fury replacing his normally cool, stoic
gaze.
“Declan—” His name
caught in my throat.
“That fucking monster
killed that child.”
“She wasn’t a child.
She was old—a vampire, just like the others.”
Declan dropped the
knife and squeezed his eye shut. “This is what comes from me
helping a vampire in the first place.” He opened his eye and
pointed at Jade. “You cannot drink her blood,
Matthias.”
Matthias straightened
his shoulders even though it looked as if it caused him pain. His
new wound would take a little longer to heal. “Don’t you
understand? My brother is awake now. You know what this
means.”
“I only know what
you’ve told us.”
“It’s the
truth.”
“You really believe
that all that stands between you and the power to stop Kristoff is
forcing this dhampyr to give her your blood?”
Matthias’s expression
turned icy. “That’s exactly what I believe. And if you stand in my
way there will be repercussions.”
“I’ll stop Kristoff
myself,” Declan snapped.
“You
can’t.”
He frowned. “How can
you sound so fucking sure about that?”
“Because he’ll have
power over you, dhampyr. And he won’t hesitate to use
it.”
“Power over me?
Why?”
“Because he’s your
father.”
I felt as frozen as
when Isaiah mentally influenced me. How did Matthias know that? I
hadn’t told him. He was already gone when Dr. Gray shared that
information with me.
Declan reacted to
this as if he’d been punched in the stomach. He even took a step
backward. “What the fuck did you just say?”
“Kristoff was
Monica’s lover twenty-nine years ago shortly before I imprisoned
him. Her only lover. He kept her on a
tight leash and his jealousy was not something anyone would have
wanted to face. I’m certain that you’re his son.”
Declan’s gaze shot to
me and he looked confused by the bleak look he must have seen on my
face. He didn’t speak for a moment. “Did you know
this?”
My stomach sank. I’d
wanted to tell him, but it never seemed like the right time. I
should have told him anyway. “I didn’t want you to find out like
this.”
“You knew?” His voice
was barely audible.
I felt ill. “Noah
needs help. Now. Please, Declan. Anything else can
wait.”
I ran to Noah’s side
and sank down beside him. His pulse was weak. His forehead felt
cold and clammy. His throat was open and ragged and bleeding
profusely. I wasn’t sure if he was unconscious or if he simply
didn’t have the strength to keep his eyes open.
Declan crouched
beside me and checked Noah’s vitals before shaking his head.
“There’s nothing we can do for him.”
“No.” I felt like
hyperventilating. “He can’t die.”
“He’s already lost
too much blood.”
“We have to do
something. What are we supposed to do without him?”
Declan looked at me
and there was a strange set to his gaze. “Noah lies here bleeding
to death after you drag him into this mess, and all you care about
is that when he dies he won’t be able to help us anymore, is that
it?”
I struggled to
breathe. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
I didn’t. I wasn’t
being a mercenary. It wasn’t all about my needs, my problems. I
cared about Noah deeply, but he was an
integral part of this puzzle. I hadn’t given up yet—on myself, on
Declan, on anything. And I wouldn’t give up on Noah,
either.
But Declan didn’t
seem to understand that. He stood up, leaving me on the
floor.
“I’m sorry about your
friend,” Matthias said. “But it changes nothing. Kristoff needs to
be stopped and I need the blood of this dhampyr. Will you stand in
my way?”
Declan hissed out a
long breath. “If you kill her, or harm her, I swear I’ll break you
in two.”
He left the room
without another word.
I didn’t move or
speak, but I turned away, clutching onto Noah’s still arm as I
heard Jade’s fear-filled shrieks a few seconds later. I didn’t cry.
I felt numb and shaky as I tried desperately not to hear the
sickening sucking sound as Matthias fed on the woman’s blood. It
took all my concentration not to let myself vomit.
Matthias’s hand on my
shoulder a few minutes later made me jump. I looked up at him
expecting his mouth to be bloody, but it wasn’t.
“It’s okay,” he said.
“I’ve taken all I need.”
I swallowed. “She
stopped screaming.”
He looked over his
shoulder. “She fainted, but she’ll be fine.”
“Did it
work?”
“I don’t know yet.
But thank you, Jillian. If it wasn’t for you, this wouldn’t have
happened. I owe you for this.”
I nodded, crossing my
arms tightly over my chest, feeling sick to my stomach. “Can I take
you up on that favor right away?”
He eyed me. “Of
course. What do you want?”
I looked down at
Noah, who’d only an hour ago been so concerned for my well-being
that the idea of me being in pain had upset him. There’d been a
couple of times when I thought he was my enemy, someone who’d
betray me at a moment’s notice, but he wasn’t like that. He was a
good kid, and he didn’t deserve any of this.
And yes, I’d admit
it. I still needed him around because of his head for research and
his knowledge of all things Nightshade and dhampyr.
Steely resolve filled
me, giving me some well-needed strength.
I didn’t want to do
this. I didn’t want to ask for this. But I had no
choice.
I looked up at
Matthias. “I want you to turn Noah into a vampire.”