Vampire Blood (Vampire Bite #2)

Chapter Thirteen

Annika

I couldn’t tell if it was a dream or not. It had to be.

The forest stretched endlessly around me, shadows twisting and curling like living things. The moon hung low, its pale light barely piercing the thick canopy overhead. Each step I took seemed to echo, the sound swallowed by the hush of the night. My bare feet pressed into the damp earth, but I felt no cold, no pain. Only the steady pull drawing me deeper into the darkness.

I should’ve been afraid. The trees loomed, their branches clawing at the sky, and the air pressed heavy against my skin. But there was no fear. Only her.

She stood ahead, just beyond the reach of the moonlight.

The witch.

My ancestor.

The woman whose blood bound Aurelius and now ran through my veins.

She was cloaked in white, hair long and loose, falling in waves like shadows around her face. Her eyes glowed faintly, golden and piercing, and they never left mine. She didn’t speak, but I felt her call, a whisper in my bones that beckoned me closer.

“Why are you showing yourself to me?” I asked, though my voice was barely a breath.

She didn’t answer. Instead, she lifted a hand and gestured for me to follow.

The forest thickened as I moved toward her, the trees closing in until there was barely room to breathe. My pulse quickened, but still, I wasn’t afraid. Her presence was a balm against the unease, an anchor in the dark. I trusted her, even as the night pressed closer.

“You’re leading me somewhere,” I said, stepping over gnarled roots and tangled branches. “But why? What do you want from me?”

She stopped then, her feet barely seeming to touch the earth, and her eyes fixed on me with something that felt like sadness, or maybe regret.

“You already know,” she said, her voice echoing like the wind through the leaves.

I froze. It wasn’t just her voice. It was my own. Soft and distant, as if the words were coming from deep within me.

“Tell me,” I pleaded.

But she only reached out, her fingers grazing mine, and suddenly the forest was gone.

I stood at the edge of an ancient stone altar, the air thick with the scent of blood and earth. Chains wrapped around the carved stone, stained dark, and in the center lay a figure… shadowed, bound, but pulsing with something alive. Something wrong.

Aurelius.

“No,” I whispered, backing away. “This can’t happen.”

But the witch was behind me now, her hands on my shoulders, grounding me. “It’s already begun,” she said. “You must be ready.”

I turned to face her, panic clawing up my throat. “How? I don’t know what to do! I’m not—”

“You are,” she cut in, her voice suddenly sharp. “You carry my blood. My power. You must face him.”

I shook my head, but she tightened her grip. “Wake up, Annika,” she said. “Before it’s too late.”

I woke with a gasp, the chill of the earth seeping into my bones. My palms pressed against rough stone, and as I pushed myself upright, the world around me came into focus.

Ruins.

Broken pillars jutted from the ground like jagged teeth, their edges worn smooth by time. The stone beneath me was cracked and uneven, covered in veins of moss and creeping ivy. Shadows pooled in the crevices, and the air was thick with damp earth and something older, something ancient.

I didn’t remember how I’d gotten here. Did my dream lead me here?

My legs ached, my hands were scraped raw, and dirt clung to my skin. But none of it mattered. My gaze was drawn ahead, to the center of the ruins, where a dark, gaping hole waited.

The stairwell.

It spiraled down into the ground, carved from the same stone as the ruins, and it felt wrong. Too perfect. Too deliberate. The steps disappeared into blackness, the kind that seemed to swallow light and sound.

A shiver crawled up my spine.

No sane person would go down there. Everything about it screamed danger, whispered warnings that prickled at the edges of my thoughts. And yet, I couldn’t move away.

I stepped closer, my breath catching as my feet found the edge of the first step. The air that drifted up was cold and damp, carrying the scent of earth and something metallic, sharp. My fingers brushed the stone wall, feeling the grooves carved into its surface. Symbols, runes I couldn’t read but somehow recognized.

Blood magic.

It was the same power I’d felt in my dreams, the same pulse that had hummed through the witch’s words. It called to me now, a whisper in my veins, urging me down.

I tried to resist. My body trembled, every instinct begging me to turn back. But my feet moved anyway, step by step, the darkness pulling me deeper.

The air thickened as I descended, pressing in around me like a living thing. The stairwell spiraled endlessly, the faint light from above swallowed by the dark. My fingers brushed the damp stone walls, steadying me as I moved deeper.

When the stairs ended, the passage narrowed. The walls pressed closer, and I had to duck in places where the ceiling dipped low. It was colder here, the kind of cold that settled in your bones and didn’t let go.

The corridor twisted and turned, branching off into other paths, all of them shrouded in shadows. I hesitated at each fork, but something always drew me the right way, an invisible thread pulling me deeper into the maze.

Time lost meaning. My breaths echoed, too loud in the stillness, and my pulse became the only measure of the seconds passing.

Then I saw it.

A door, or what had once been a door. It was stone, covered in cracks and carved with runes, like the ones above. But this time, they glowed faintly, their edges tinged red, as if pulsing with the rhythm of a heartbeat. My heartbeat.

I pressed my palm against the center. The stone was cool, vibrating faintly under my touch.

The door groaned, the sound vibrating through my bones. Dust rained down as it shifted, splitting open just enough for me to slip through.

The chamber beyond swallowed me whole.

It wasn’t large, but it felt vast. The walls curved inward, the ceiling domed, and in the center, a stone sarcophagus lay raised on a platform. Chains draped over it, thick, rusted links that gleamed faintly despite the dark.

I stepped closer, unable to stop myself.

The symbols carved into the sarcophagus matched the runes above, but these glowed brighter; they burned red and gold, as if alive. I reached out, my fingers trembling as they hovered above the surface.

Power thrummed against my skin.

I jerked my hand back, my breath catching.

This was it. The source of my dreams. The place the witch had led me to.

The crypt.

“Annika!”

I froze at the sound of my name echoing through the crypt. It sliced through the heavy stillness like a knife. I recognized it immediately.

Panic flared hot in my chest. I stepped back from the sarcophagus, pulse racing as the faint glow of torchlight danced along the walls.

And then they were there.

Lucas burst through the doorway first, his eyes wild, searching and finding me. Relief flickered across his face before his gaze dropped to the sarcophagus, to the chains that rattled faintly, vibrating like strings pulled too tight.

“What the hell is this?” His voice was sharp, edged with fear and anger.

Kael followed, his eyes narrowing the second he saw the runes pulsing faintly along the stone surface. “Merciful heavens,” he muttered, stepping closer. “It’s him.”

Lucas was already at my side, his hand gripping my arm, grounding me. “What were you thinking?” he demanded, his voice low but trembling.

I couldn’t answer. My eyes locked on the sarcophagus. The chains rattled again.

Something shifted.

The sound was subtle at first. It was a scrape of stone, like something brushing against the inside of the lid. Then the runes flared brighter, a deep crimson glow that cast flickering shadows across the walls.

Lucas shoved me behind him, his body tense, but it was Kael who stepped closer, swearing under his breath. “He’s waking up.”

“No,” I whispered.

I looked down, and my breath caught.

The stone near the base of the sarcophagus was smeared dark.

Fresh blood. My blood.

It all clicked then. The pull that had drawn me here. The hum in my veins. The strange symbols etched into my mind, whispering to me even in sleep.

They had fed him.

I stumbled back, my legs trembling. “I didn’t—I didn’t mean to—”

Lucas shot Kael a sharp look. “Get her out of here.”

“No,” I said, stepping closer instead of away. My voice was steadier than I felt, but I couldn’t let fear take over. Not now. “We can’t just run. We have to stop this. Destroy him before it’s too late.”

Lucas turned to me, his eyes dark with fury and fear. “Annika, no. You don’t understand—”

“I do,” I snapped, cutting him off. My blood was still smeared on the stone, and I could feel its pull, a tether that connected me to the thing inside the sarcophagus. “My blood woke him. I won’t leave until we finish this.”

The chains rattled again, louder this time, the sound vibrating through the air. Lucas shoved me behind him, his stance braced like he was ready to fight.

Kael swore. “This isn’t a fight we can win, Annika. Not here.”

He was right. Every instinct screamed it. But I couldn’t leave—not yet. I shook my head. “We have to do something.”

Lucas’s jaw tightened, his hand flexing around the hilt of his dagger. “You want to destroy him? Fine. But we need a plan, not blind desperation.”

I pointed at the sarcophagus. “We don’t have time for plans.”

The runes pulsed again, bathing the chamber in blood-red light. The chains groaned, pulled taut by an unseen force. Whatever was inside was pushing against its prison.

“The witch hasn’t told me what to do yet, how to prevent this from happening,” I shouted desperately. “I… I can’t understand what she is trying to tell me in my dreams.”

Kael turned to the runes. “If he had the strength to get out of there, he would have been out by now. That means they need more of your blood. And that also means we have some more time.”

“But how much?” Lucas asked. “We could already be too late.”

“No,” Kael shook his head. “There is a shaman we need to see. She will help Annika decipher the message she has been trying to receive through her dreams.”

Lucas and I exchanged a meaningful glance, then he nodded.

“Alright,” Lucas agreed. “We go there now.”

But a voice cut through our intention like a blade. “Well, perhaps you could stay a bit longer.”