Chapter 24 August
August
We walked along the wooden deck that lined the shore of the Sea of Mavrola. The salt-tinged breeze tangled through Winnie’s hair, and though the afternoon sun bathed us in gold, unease clung to her like a second skin. She kept glancing at the water like it held ghosts only she could see.
But when she stopped in front of a small apothecary, her spine straightened and her chin lifted.
She flipped her hair over one shoulder like armor, masking whatever war she was fighting inside.
The moment we stepped inside, the bell above the door gave a startled chime and the woman behind the counter—a middle-aged woman with streaks of gray threading through her dark hair—locked eyes with Winnie and dropped the small glass bottle in her hand.
“Oh, there is no need to worry over me,” Winnie said, her voice light but cold. “I just have a question and then you’ll hopefully never see me again.”
The woman’s gaze flicked to me and she paled before dipping into a deep bow. “Y-Your Grace. It is an honor. I can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done for us.”
Winnie didn’t pause. She waved a dismissive hand as she stepped farther into the shop, her eyes scanning the shelves. “We don’t have time for the formalities. I just need the location of someone—Alden Gran.”
The woman’s posture stiffened. “Why are you looking for him?”
Winnie picked up a bar of soap and sniffed it, as if we had all the time in the world. “Old friends.”
“You didn’t seem like friends the last time you were here.”
“Excuse me?” Winnie’s tone sharpened.
“Father may not have seen you terrorizing those poor boys, but I did.”
I took a half-step forward, instinct clawing its way through my throat, but Winnie had warned me. Stay back. Let her handle it.
So I did. Barely. My hands curled into fists at my sides. I leaned against the frame of the doorway like I didn’t care, but every muscle in my body was tensed, ready to act the second she needed me.
Winnie’s eyes glittered with something dangerous. “Which one was Alden?”
“Oh, so you didn’t even know who they were? You just take from whoever you please?”
“Which one?” Her voice cracked like a whip.
“I do not answer to you. You are not Mother.”
Winnie stepped forward, smile slow and cruel. “No. I am your queen.”
Gods help anyone who forgot that.
“They are traitors to the coven and will be dealt with as such.” Winnie’s eyes narrowed. “Should I add you to the list of people I need to deal with?”
The woman blanched. “I—I had no idea. I swear it! I may not care for you, but your brother… your brother has proven to be just like your father, even with his difficulties with magic. Caring. Honorable. I am loyal.”
Winnie took a step forward, letting the silence stretch between them. “Which one was Alden?” she asked.
“The one with the red hair,” the woman answered quickly.
Winnie gave a single, decisive nod. “And where can I find him?”
“He lives right outside of town. The blue house with green shutters.”
We walked toward the woods as the sun started to set.
Silence stretched between us. I couldn’t help but replay the conversation in my head as I looked at her.
She tried to act like it wasn’t bothering her, but I could hear her heart and saw how her fists clenched and unclenched.
You take from whoever you please. Traitors to the coven.
And yet her brother—the one who took responsibility when Winnie came with me—was no where to be found.
“Did Adar ask you to handle this for him?”
She shot me a look. “No. One of Papa’s friends stopped me in town and told me. Adar acted like nothing was wrong at breakfast.”
I followed closely behind her as she headed down the driveway that led to a nicer home compared to the ones surrounding it. Large windows sat on both sides of a wooden door. Candles illuminated the inside, and though no one was in view, I could hear three heartbeats, one closer than the other two.
So he didn’t know what she was doing. “He isn’t going to be happy about this.”
“Since when are you my voice of reason?”
I smiled and gestured to the door. “After you, Winnie.”
Every step she took, I felt it like a thread pulling tight in my chest. I wanted to reach for her elbow, to guide her away from the house and back into the dark—anywhere but here.
Not because I feared the danger inside. I feared what I’d do if she got hurt.
I feared what I’d become if she didn’t come back out.
I swallowed that impulse like I always did. Stuffed it down with all the other things I wanted and couldn’t have.
She stopped and turned to me.
“I thought you couldn’t come into people’s homes. Like it was a vampire’s weakness—like the sun—or something.”
“No. It was just another one of Carrow’s rules.”
She scoffed. “You followed none of his rules. Why didn’t you come into my home?”
“Because your father had a protection spell on your home, actually one larger than any other I’ve come across. It reached all the way to the trees, and I wasn’t testing it.”
She gave a soft smile before looking back at the door.
“It’s probably spelled,” I muttered as I shifted on my feet.
“Oh, I’m counting on it.”
She placed her hand on the door and inhaled deeply as she concentrated. I knew that look all too well. Whatever feeling magic gave her, it must be similar to what I feel when I feed.
Gods, just looking at her turned me on. I loved how easy it was.
How my mind went from murder to worship with a single glance.
She could’ve burned me to ash and I’d still think she looked divine doing it.
There was something wrong with me—I knew it.
But knowing didn’t stop the craving. I didn’t want her. I needed her.
Her eyes shot open and the door blasted into the home, splintering and knocking over glass.
She stepped inside, scanning the room. I held my breath as I stepped in after her, half-expecting to be set on fire from the protection spell they had on the door, but nothing happened. Winnie took all of the magic.
She turned her head to a redheaded man who must have fallen out of his chair in the chaos, and his eyes widened.
My fists curled at my sides. That part, small and battered as it was, still screamed to pull her behind me. To shield her. Even though I knew she didn’t need it. Even though I knew she’d hate me for trying.
“Miss me?” She waltzed through the room, picking up a glass that hadn’t fallen, twirled it in her hand and then dropped it to the floor.
He shot a hand forward and muttered some words in another language but Winnie raised hers and seemed to grasp onto thin air. It was the same thing she had done the night she saved me from the witches.
She poked her lip out. “Oh come on, I thought you’d be smarter than that.”
The man let out an agonizing scream as Winnie pulled her hand towards her and the man flew across the room until he was on his knees before her.
A woman and another man ran out of a back room, the man holding a sword.
I started to step forward and stop him, but before I could, Winnie glanced at them and the sword’s metal melted in the man’s hands.
The man screamed as he fell forward.
Gods alive, she was perfect. Dangerous. Terrifying. Every time she wielded her magic like that, like the world existed just to kneel at her feet, something primal in me howled for her.
Winnie crouched down in front of the redhead and smiled. “I warned you.”
What was she talking about? When did she have a problem with him before?
“You’ve disrespected my brother. You’re planning gods know what to take him down. Do you know what happened to the last person that hurt my family?” She leaned in. “I burned him alive just so I could hear his screams.”
The man writhed under her invisible touch. “The two of you are not fit to lead the coven.”
She scoffed, but before he could disrespect her more, I spoke. “Do you not realize that the only reason you are free to practice magic is because of her? Both of their sacrifices are the reason you are safe from persecution and yet you still try to fight them?”
The man turned to me. “Your Grace.”
So he did know who I was.
“We will never be safe. Their line is the reason we can’t go out into the night. They are the reason innocent people are hunted. It is time to end the lineage. Stop them, and we will be one step closer to stopping the vampires.”
With that, something cracked.
He wanted her dead.
He wanted her dead.
My vision went red, not just from rage but from the part of me that saw only one solution: rip his throat out. Tear him limb from limb. I tasted blood. My own lip, split from how hard I bit down to keep from snarling. They had no idea. No idea who they were provoking.
But they did now.
The woman crouched next to the man with the most wretched-smelling, burned hands let out a cry. “No.”
She saw me looking at her and turned back to the injured man and continued whispering words as her hands hovered over his.
With my fangs bared, I said, “Do continue telling me on how you plan to stop vampires.”
Winnie looked up at me with a sparkle in her eyes but she shook it off and turned back to the idiot nearly crying on the floor.
“I thought about killing you, but that’s not enough for me. Because I have to assume you aren’t the only one with these ill thoughts towards my brother.” She patted him on the cheek. “I’d rather you be a walking warning to everyone else.”
“Please no.”
“You called me an abomination, looked down on my brother and me for what we lacked. But honestly, I think we are more powerful than anything you can fathom. I can take and take and take. Would you like to know what happens when I take everything from you?” Winnie gripped his throat and though I couldn’t see what she was doing, the goosebumps on her arms told me all I needed to know.
He screamed so loudly that I wished for a moment I didn’t have exceptional hearing. Winnie let go of him, and he slumped to the floor.
“You become nothing.” She stood and adjusted her dress. “Let your accomplices know that if they don’t back down, they will have an empty void just like you.” She stopped at the door. “I wonder… when you have kids, will they lack a connection to magic like you?” She laughed. “I hope so.”
We stepped outside into the night air. The salt still hung thick, the wind sharp as it curled around us like it knew we didn’t belong here.
She walked ahead of me, fire still in her steps, her jaw tight with leftover rage.
The magic still clung to her like heat lightning, crackling beneath her skin.
She was high on power, and she wore it well.
I caught up, and for a moment, we walked side by side. The air buzzed between us, heavy with things neither of us dared to say. My hand twitched. I could almost feel the press of her against me.
She glanced over, lips parted like she was about to say something. Her gaze dropped to my mouth and lingered. Every inch of me tightened in response. I clenched my jaw, forcing my thoughts back into the box I kept them locked in. But gods, she made it hard. Everything about her unraveled me.
“You held back,” she said softly, a whisper in the wind.
“You asked me to.”
Her steps slowed, just enough for me to feel it.
“That must’ve killed you,” she added, the faintest trace of a smile playing at her lips.
I didn’t answer. Couldn’t. Because it had. Watching her handle it, watching her burn like the storm she was born to be, and standing in the shadows—silent—was agony.
But I’d do it again. For her. Always.
“They might tell everyone that you’re a vampire.”
“What are they going to do? Attack a castle of vampires? Attack you when they know you have an endless amount of magic from said vampires?”
She placed her hand on my arm to take us back and paused, looking up at me.
Her heart rate spiked. “August.”
I shifted my expression, trying to hide every emotion I felt from her. “Take us back before my guards start looking for me.”
“I’m hungry,” Winnie muttered as we appeared in our chambers.
“I’m sure you are after the mess you made.”
She rolled her eyes and tried to hide a smile.
You’d never realize it looking at her, but she loved to eat. She attacked a plate with the same intensity she brought to everything else. It used to catch me off guard. Now it just made me smile.
And I could use a distraction from those annoying feelings that were trying to come to the surface. I turned to open the door, already planning what food we could send for, and immediately regretted it.
Lavina stood just outside, arms crossed over her chest, her lips curved in that same cold, knowing smirk she always wore.
Of course she was here. Of all people.
Winnie stiffened beside me, and I could practically feel the wave of disdain roll off of her. Lavina’s eyes flicked down and I followed her gaze to see mud on my boots.
“What were you two doing?” she asked. “It’s not a good idea to go outside alone.”
“I don’t remember asking for your opinion,” I said flatly.
She ignored me and looked up. “You shouldn’t leave without your guards, brother. You know that.”
“And you shouldn’t still be walking around after what she did to you,” I shot back.
Lavina’s eyes darkened. She’d kept glorious distance between us since Winnie nearly killed her. And I preferred it that way.
“I was simply making sure no one was breaking the rules,” she said sweetly, then turned to Winnie with a tilt of her head. “But I suppose you two know all about breaking things.”
Winnie smiled and raised her hand. Fuck. I had to say something before Winnie decided to roast her right now.
“Go play court watchdog somewhere else,” I muttered. “Before you say something you’ll regret.”
She stared for a moment longer. “I’ve planned dinner for tonight.”
“Gods alive, Lavina! I thought we decided for the health of everyone that we weren’t doing that anymore.”
She shrugged. “I’m bored.”
I almost denied her, but I felt a ripple of something sharp and electric coming off Winnie. Not dread. Not unease. Excitement.
Did she like the dinners? Did she enjoy watching my family claw at each other with veiled words and fake smiles? Or maybe she liked the tension. The danger of it. The chance to show she didn’t flinch.
How twisted was that?
“Fine,” I said through my teeth. If Winnie wanted dinner, she’d get dinner.