Price of Blood and Joy (French Quarter Vampire Enforcer #3)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

Joy

The Elder Dimension stretched before me like a festering wound I had torn in reality itself.

My fingers trembled as I stared at the door—my door, the one I had opened with my own cursed shadows.

The memory of that moment crashed over me in nauseating waves: Ari’s triumphant smile, the red stars guiding my darkness, the terrible sound of reality screaming as the portal materialized.

“Good girl. You’ve just opened the Elder Dimension.”

His words still echoed in my nightmares, along with the devastation I’d glimpsed in Enzo’s eyes before I’d turned away like the coward I was. But I couldn’t let him die. He meant everything to me.

Thick smoke ran down my throat like grasping fingers, forcing harsh coughs from my burning lungs. Tears streamed from my eyes uncontrollably, hot rivulets cutting through the soot coating my cheeks as the toxic fumes from the burning bayou invaded every breath.

Eagerness flared in Ari’s blue eyes, making them gleam with predatory anticipation. His fingers clamped around my upper arm with bruising force. “Shall we?”

“Wait—no!” I pulled on my arm, heart racing. “That wasn’t the deal! You said if I came with you, you’d heal him first. What about Enzo?”

He tightened his grip. “You’ll do exactly as I say or your precious vampire dies a long, horrible death.”

I didn’t want to enter that darkness. I wanted to run back to Enzo, but if I did, I would only watch him die.

I dug my sandals into the soft and spongy ground. Across from the cathedral, orange flames licked hungrily at the cypress trees around us, casting dancing shadows that made the bayou look like the entrance to hell itself. “What is it that you want me to do?”

“I need you for protection.” He yanked me toward the suspended portal, my shoulder screaming as the socket threatened to give way. I tripped over a tree root and nearly fell, but he jerked me to my feet.

“From who?” Me? Was he kidding? My chest tightened.

I stumbled again as he pulled me toward the looming portal.

Its surface rippled like a liquid mirror, shot through with veins of gold and silver that pulsed like a heartbeat.

The air around it hummed a melody that was almost beautiful, almost familiar, but just off key enough to make my stomach turn.

“No—wait!” I dug my heels into the soft mud, felt it squelch and give way beneath me, but he was too strong.

One step. Two. The acrid smoke from the burning oak stung my nostrils. The oppressive Louisiana heat pressed against my skin, thick enough to taste. Cicadas screamed their final chorus. It was all I had left of home.

Of Enzo.

My foot crossed the threshold.

Everything inverted. The air tasted sweet—too sweet—like overripe fruit on the edge of rot mixed with honey and something floral that made me dizzy.

Cold kissed my skin, but it felt alive, curious, like invisible fingers trailing across my arms. Gravity felt wrong, as if I might float away or sink through the ground at any moment.

Colors were brighter, more saturated, hurting my eyes with their intensity.

I twisted back, my body moving through air that felt thick as syrup. Through the portal's shimmering frame I caught one last glimpse: Enzo's body crumpled on the cathedral steps, his white shirt soaked crimson. Real. Solid. Mine.

Then the portal sealed with a sound like a sigh, and I was drowning in beauty that felt like a trap—everything too vivid, too perfect, too wrong.

My knees buckled. The ground beneath me felt soft, yielding—not mud, but something else. Moss? Petals? I couldn't focus, couldn't breathe through the dizzying sweetness.

His grip on my arm shifted, loosened. Before I could think to run, Ari looped his arm through mine with practiced ease, his fingers wrapping around my elbow like a shackle—no longer dragging, but escorting. As if we were attending a ball instead of my kidnapping.

"The queen."

Pain shot through my temples. “Queen of what?”

He gave me a sinister smile. “The Unseelie. Your queen.”

“She’s not my queen.” My free hand curled into a fist at my side. I was human. I’d been raised human. Whatever Unseelie blood ran through my veins didn’t change that—didn’t make me one of them.

Ari’s grip tightened just enough to make my bones ache. “I suggest you be more respectful, because Alanna hasn’t been the same since her father was murdered and she was trapped in the Elder Dimension.”

My steps faltered, sandals squelching in the muddy ground. “What do you mean murdered?”

“Gunnar Khan murdered her father, and I am here to inform her that I have him.” Something in his tone—smooth, self-satisfied—made my teeth clench.

I had never met Gunnar and only knew that he was King of the Dark Demons. Dangerous? Probably. But a murderer? The only source for that was Ari—and he lied as easily as breathed.

The portal closed like a curtain, the burning bayou shrinking smaller and smaller until I could barely make out the cathedral’s stone walls. Enzo. Another dimension. God, I was leaving him. He was still wrapped in those vines, his blood infected with dead demon blood.

I'd go along with this. All of it. Whatever Ari wanted, whoever he needed me to face—I'd do it. Just let Enzo survive until I could get back to him.

"Stop." The word came out strangled. The darkness pressed against me from all sides, thick and suffocating. I couldn't see Ari, couldn't see my own hands. Just his grip on my arm, dragging me forward through nothing. My stomach lurched. "I can't—I can't breathe—"

A low chuckle rumbled through the darkness, so close it vibrated through my bones. He leaned closer, his breath brushing over my ear, and I could hear the smile in his voice. “Too late.”

I pushed at his hand; his fingers stuck to my arm like they’d melded to my skin. But then I was glued to the darkness parting right in front of my face.

Oh my God. Oh my God. This was really happening. I was going into another dimension.

I shook my head and pulled back. “No. I don’t want to go in there.

” People didn’t come back from the Elder Dimension.

That’s what everyone said—you could get lost, trapped forever in a place where time didn’t work right, where the rules were written by the Unseelie who’d forgotten what it meant to be mortal.

Ari's hand closed around my throat, cutting off my air. "If you don't keep going, girl, I'll torture your vampire a thousand different ways." His grip tightened. "Then do it all over again."

Tears pushed on the back of my eyelids, and I bit my lip, trying not to cry. I was done giving Ari the satisfaction of hurting me, breaking me. I straightened my shoulders and forced steel into my voice. “Fine. Let’s go.”

The void split like torn fabric. Brightness blurred my eyes in a painful wash of color, and I winced, blinking rapidly as tears streamed down my cheeks.

When my vision cleared, I looked down at my sandals. The soggy ground had vanished completely. Now a road of red-and-black-checkered tiles stretched out beneath my feet, each square gleaming like polished marble. The pattern was perfectly geometric, almost playfully precise.

Just breathe. Just breathe. Just breathe.

A soft breeze brushed over my face, blowing my hair across my cheek. I shoved it out of my eyes, wishing Enzo was here. Crap. I wished he could hear me.

Nothing.

No connection.

No way to reach him.

He was back there in that damn church, and I was here.

I held back a sob and inhaled. Ari gloated when people were in pain. I drew a deep breath and held my chin high.

Warm, flower-scented air replaced the humid bayou atmosphere, carrying with it the sweet fragrance of blooming gardens and something that reminded me of jasmine and roses.

Above me, two suns hung in a lavender sky—one pale gold, the other deeper amber—casting everything in a dreamlike double shadow.

Ari smiled. “Perfect. We’re not far from the palace.”

I followed his gaze and trembled. There, rising from gardens that seemed to glow with their own light, stood a fortress of impossible beauty. This was real. This was where he was taking me. Where I would face whatever queen claimed to rule over me.

Ari led me down the checkered path, his grip firm on my arm.

I looked over my shoulder, desperately searching for any sign of escape.

Maybe I could open the portal without Marsha’s magic—find some way to force it open and get back.

But the portal had vanished completely. Not even a shimmer in the air remained to mark where it had been.

I was trapped in this strange land with no way back to Enzo.

A forest lined both sides of the winding path, dense with trees I had never seen before.

Towering specimens with pristine white bark smooth as marble stretched toward the lavender sky, their branches heavy with leaves that shimmered like amethyst silk in the double sunlight.

The purple foliage rustled with a sound like wind chimes, soft and musical.

I tried to peer through the trees to see if there were animals, birds, or even the Unseelie. The shadows between the trunks could hide anything—or anyone.

There were trees that looked like pine trees, but wrong in every way.

Their needles were deep crimson—the color of fresh blood—and they gave off a spicy, cinnamon-like scent that made my nose tingle.

The bark was pitch-black, so dark it seemed to absorb light, creating an eerie contrast with the red and black tiles beneath my feet.

Something cracked like a twig. The hair on the back of my neck stood straight up. I desperately scanned the trees to see what had made that noise. But the darkness turned even blacker, as if it was trying to conceal something, something that made my heart race.

I glanced at Ari, expecting to see the same unease that was clawing at my chest. His face remained perfectly calm, that infuriating smirk still playing at the corners of his mouth. But then I noticed his hands.

His fingernails had lengthened into razor-sharp claws, gleaming like polished bone in the double sunlight. The transformation was silent, deadly—a predator preparing for attack.

Shitshitshitshit.

My mouth went dry as sand. If Ari—ancient, powerful Ari—was preparing to fight, then whatever was out there in those beautiful, musical trees was far worse than I’d imagined.

My pulse hammered in my throat as I watched his shoulders tense, his body shifting into a stance I recognized from watching Enzo hunt.

I leaned closer, my voice barely a whisper. “Ari—”

“Silence.” The word cracked like a whip. His eyes never left the treeline, and for the first time since I’d met him, I saw something that chilled me to the bone.

Fear.

The air shifted around us. Earlier, it had seemed almost effervescent, like breathing champagne. But now it thickened and took on a darker scent—rich and intoxicating like aged wine, but with an underlying metallic tang that made my stomach clench.

Strange bird calls echoed from the depths of the forest—not quite songs, more like crystalline laughter that sent shivers racing down my spine. Then the laughter stopped. Abruptly. Completely.

A thunderous rush of wings erupted overhead as dozens of birds burst from the purple canopy in a panicked exodus.

Their feathers caught the double sunlight like scattered jewels—emerald, sapphire, gold—as they fled whatever approached through the crimson pines.

The musical rustling of leaves turned harsh, branches snapping and cracking under heavy footsteps.

Then the forest exploded.

Warriors burst from between the white-barked trees like avenging angels; their boots pounding against the forest floor in perfect synchronization.

They moved with inhuman grace, armed with gleaming swords that sang through the air and armor that seemed to be crafted from liquid silver.

Their hair flowed behind them—long and pale as moonlight—so white it was almost luminous, reminding me instantly of Keir Rankin.

The lead warrior’s blade whistled as he brought it up, the point hovering inches from my throat. “Halt! Who goes there?”

I went absolutely still, not daring to breathe. The razor-sharp edge caught the light just inches from my skin, and I could feel the cold radiating from the metal. One wrong move and—