Chapter 86 Kidan
KIDAN
The Dirt Diggers and their vampires gathered in the same abandoned community hall GK became a vampire in. Samson’s choice of location made Kidan grit her teeth. He wanted to remind her of the last time he’d defeated her.
No matter how hard she thought about it, Kidan didn’t understand this weird bond between June and Samson. She prayed his feelings weren’t romantic, the very image making her ill. But for some reason, June believed in her, believed Kidan could do the unimaginable and break these ancient artifacts.
The least she could do was believe in June as well.
Kidan walked to the Dirt Diggers, anger still flickering in her about their plan involving Yusef.
Adjoa Piran came to stand next to her, dark eyes sharp. “What is all this?”
Kidan faced her, inhaling deeply. “Daric didn’t kill my parents. The dean… made him do it.”
For the first time, she saw the iron woman waver, a small stumble back. Mist clouding her eyes.
It was Osa Rojit who spoke, tense. “Are you sure?”
Her parents’ fear from the memory threatened to choke her again, but she pushed it aside. “Yes. The dean wanted your group disbanded. Daric was the glue that held you all together.”
Mikhail Temo let out a curse, muscled hand tightening into a fist. “How could she do such a thing?”
She let them deal with the finding for a few moments. Then she told them about Samson and the blade artifact.
Kidan lowered her voice. “If I can’t break it, you need to have your vampires ready. We are leaving this hall with the artifact one way or another.”
Adjoa still appeared a little lost.
“Do I have your support?” Kidan asked.
Adjoa blinked, and slowly her dangerous determination returned. “We will be ready,” she said.
A chorus of doubtful echoes thrummed.
June opened the door and Samson Sagad appeared.
He came with the few Nefrasi still loyal to him.
In his gloved metal hand were two curved blades.
Kidan had seen those weapons in the mouths of Uxlay’s lions, in the goddess portrait in the artifact room, strapped to her back and arcing like metal wings. And now here they were.
Samson walked slowly to her. Gasps and whispers flanking him. He tipped her chin up with the end of one of the cold blades.
“She claims she can break this artifact.” He spoke to the crowd, though his spoiled eyes were on her. “Once the blade artifact is broken, according to legend, vampires can feed on any human, and actis will no longer have to kill to feed vampires.”
Mocking laughter came from his followers, the tattooed woman Kidan recognized from the throne room. At least twenty vampires, even some Piran and Temo students who protested the dean’s ways, were also present.
“And if she fails to break them, I’ll kill her right here,” Samson said, all menace.
Their hatred plumed toward one another, and it took every effort not to stab him with the mythical blades.
After a second, he withdrew the blade and presented it to her along with the other one.
“I’ve tried to break these for sixty years, heiress.”
Exhaling, Kidan tightened her hold on the wrapped hilt. They were heavy, constructed of pure, dense silver.
Kidan looked to her sister. June smiled from the back of the room, eyes sparkling.
Tears? She was too far to tell but the nod was clear, sharp, and determined and it was all Kidan needed. GK’s face was grave yet alert. Ready for anything.
A soft hum reached her ears, morphing into a foreign language. A song in Amharic, deep and mournful.
The longer Kidan held the renowned blades, writing appeared on the smooth surface. This time no one interrupted Kidan from reading it.
As long as the water blade remains whole, vampires shall drink only from graduated actis.
“I can see it,” she whispered. “They’re… laws.”
“What?” Samson said, studying the blades. “I see nothing.”
She gave him a triumphant smile. “Guess you’re not special.”
His face became a storm. “Just try to break it.”
On the second blade, more writing appeared.
As long as the water blade remains whole, Varos and the Six Manes shall drink only from vampires.
Kidan paused. Varos… the second blade affected Varos and the Six Manes? All this time they were bound too. Forced to feed on vampires only. Had Susenyos known?
Taking a deep breath, Kidan started with the first one, pressing on opposite ends. Pushing hard along the curved scorpion tail-like tip and the cloth-wrapped end. It was like moving iron.
She pressed again, gritting her teeth this time.
Nothing happened.
Fury slithered into Samson’s eyes.
Please work. Please.
She needed power. Power no one could steal from her, power to bring back all she’d lost by ruin and blood.
There had always been something inside her, even as a child she’d sensed it.
Kidan could never name it—but it was solid and sharp-edged, a reckoning that wanted out, to break the world and rearrange it.
And as she touched this foreign blade, they sang to each other, calling one another to wake.
To march to the horizon and arm themselves for war.
Pressure built in her chest, in her very heart, as if the thing she was breaking was inside her too.
A scream rose and erupted, making everyone near her step back. She hardly recognized her own roar. It sounded many and one. Come from the skies and the earth.
Kidan strained. The object bent and bent but it did not break. Instead, a powerful glow shot through the surface like lightning. A flicker, there and gone.
A calling to its twin blade.
Eyes catching silver, Kidan reached for the second blade and brought its edge to the first. The moment they touched, a spark came alive.
Everyone took a collective step back. Kidan’s eyes burned, but she kept looking. Power surged through her fingertips, similar to Adane House’s law, but more permanent, grounded to her bloodline. She felt charged like a live wire, her cells burning and healing all at once.
A violent gust of wind sent her braids flying.
The writing upon the blades vanished like the words had never existed.
At once, every vampire in the vicinity fell to their knees, clutching their fangs. Painful groans reverberated as if they were growing new fangs.
Samson’s eyes widened, a flicker of light parting his night eyes.
Kidan’s heart raced as she lowered the blades. Maybe she didn’t have to shatter them. Holding them was somehow… enough.
Adjoa reached for Sacro’s bent back, alarmed.
“Sacro?”
After a moment, Sacro slowly straightened, tasting his fangs.
“Did it work?” Adjoa whispered.
Every breath was held. Sacro moved toward June, the one who had never graduated Dranacti, never killed.
June offered her palm, swallowing.
Sacro pricked her finger and brought it to his tongue, not once pulling away to spit it out.
He lifted his head and smiled. “We can drink from any human.”
A roar of cheers erupted once again. Kidan’s eyes widened, and she swayed.
Dranacti no longer applied. The bond between actis and dranaics was no more.
She’d truly done it. She stared at the blades in her hands, still feeling her veins rush with power. It would have been a shame to destroy such a beautiful creation.
Kidan smiled. This was only the beginning.
June smiled too, her eyes creased, tears of joy flowing.
“Bindbreaker,” Samson whispered in wonder. He rested his hand on Kidan’s shoulder, and she tensed, ready to fight. But there was a rare light in his face—unrestrained and awed. He squeezed her shoulder with ice-cold fingers, and… laughed.
A laugh that sounded too normal, almost human.
“You. All this time I had been looking for you.” Even his voice wasn’t his own, almost childlike. Pure.
Confused and disconcerted, Kidan did not pull back.
Samson turned to the crowd. “This is only the beginning!” he shouted. “Find the mask the dean stole from Adane House and bring it to us. The sun artifact has suppressed our strengths but no more. It will be shattered soon! Once we are truly unleashed, we will crown a new Sage!”
Kidan’s ears buzzed with the sheer exaltation from the crowd. As suspected, some slipped away quietly, hurrying to inform the dean or others.
Let them.
Let them know she was coming.
In the distance, Kidan could hear a divine sound.
Uxlay campus. Screaming.
In the faceless crowd, she searched for a familiar set of night eyes and twists. An amused smile.
I did it, Yos. I did it, so where are you?
A sharp pain tore across her temple. She groaned, stumbling.
Samson reached for her but she shook him off, getting down from the raised platform.
The blades in hand, she wove through the crowd, catching glimpses of wonder on Adjoa Piran’s face, approval in Osa Rojit and Mikhail Temo.
But she was too far away to hear them and in urgent need of privacy.
Her mouth felt weird, aching and burning.
She didn’t want to throw up in front of all these people.
Her stomach heaved dangerously.
A vampire from Goro House grabbed her, eyes shining. “You have freed us.”
She couldn’t speak, afraid her tongue would fall out. What the hell was happening to her? Another grabbed her, saying thank you. They shoved and crowded her, until there was no more air.
“Please. I—I need to leave.”
Her words were swallowed in their excitement.
A clinking sound greeted her ears, and she sighed in relief, turning to him.
GK had a firm hand around hers, a wave of black clothing cutting through the crowd.
He slid a glance at her face and without a word, he seemed to understand. They disappeared into a blur of speed.
GK left her outside a bathroom, and she rushed inside, hand to her mouth. As much as she tried, she couldn’t expel whatever was twisting her gut. Honestly, she would feel better if she retched.
She splashed water on her face, down her neck, sighing at the coolness. Her skin was melting. A fever coming over her and a tingling inside her teeth, itching like a stubborn wound. She lifted her gums, searching for injury.
Did she swallow something sharp? Or did she catch a cold—
“Ah.” She let out a hiss, slicing her finger on her teeth.
Blood plopped onto the sink.
Her heart pounded, staring at her thumb.
Slowly, she widened her mouth.
Her canines were abnormally… large, and filed to a point.
Kidan jerked away from the mirror, blinking rapidly. Shook her head, rubbed her eyes, and tried again.
Kidan had seen this version of herself in her old apartment, before Uxlay, repeating the mantra You are not like them over and over again. But those had been visions born out of dehydration. Her fear of her darkness.
This was clear as day, and her teeth—were like theirs.
His.
Fangs.
“What the fuck,” she whispered.
She ran her tongue over her canine and cut herself instantly, swallowing metallic blood.
“Fuck,” she said, spitting out the rest.
Panic rattled inside her.
Was she… a vampire? Because these were fangs.
A burning along her inner elbow made her suppress a scream. God. What was happening to her? A tear bubbled up as she rolled up her sleeve quickly. Her spine went stiff.
Golden letters were branded into her brown skin, making the room spin.
As long as the water blade remains whole, Kidan Adane will drink only from vampires.
Her broken gasp was the only sound in the world.
She quickly shoved up the sleeve of her right arm. There was another haunting law, a near twin to the first. One she’d absorbed into herself.
As long as the water blade remains whole, Kidan Adane will drink only from graduated actis.
Professor Andreyas’s voice echoed cruelly, making her chest heave.
A law always applies to his master first… It is called Absorption.
“This can’t be happening.” Her voice was thinner than air.
Trembling, Kidan reached for the cursed blades.
The swell of power inside them surged into her veins, the tug between her will and something larger.
She tried to break it, but it was forged with ancient steel, and it refused to bend.
She tried to return the laws, to make them crawl back onto the steel, but they only glowed on her brown skin.
They had it so wrong.
The artifacts were no different than houses. They carried a law to be inherited and absorbed. Hadn’t the professor warned her?
A house master is a soul imprisoned with one law. A Sage is a soul imprisoned with many laws. And Kidan had built herself nothing but a cage.
Quickly, Kidan cut a thin slice along her arm, hissing at the pain.
If she was a vampire, it would heal by itself.
The cut remained open, burning. Slow realization trickled in.
It was only the First Bind she’d absorbed, which meant Kidan was still human everywhere but in her teeth. In what she drank.
Breathless, she let the blades slip from her fingers. They met the stone with a furious impact, rattling the sink and mirror.
GK knocked on the door, asking if she was okay. She could barely hear him.
She met her dark gaze. Terrified pupils. Sharp fangs.
You’re human, she begged.
But she’d known long ago that word failed to describe her. There was no good here, no fragile beauty, and certainly no mercy. She was no divine thing.
The burning taste in her mouth was clear now. She should have recognized it earlier.
In the end, after all these months, only her true companion remained—an unimaginable thirst for blood.