Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
SILVANUS
My head smacked off the wall, then hit the floor with a heavy thud. A flurry of glass shards sprayed my body, slicing just about every inch of my skin.
Anger seethed through me, my bloodthirst primed.
Ears ringing from the explosion, I pushed myself onto my knees, my boiling fury brushing all pain aside.
Smoke choked the ballroom, the moans of my people echoing around me. Terror and rage skewered the Heart of All, and my vampiric vision began to peel back the smoke like a clearing wind. It found mortals moving surreptitiously through the garden space, weapons at the ready.
I don’t think so.
Plucking a large shard of glass from my right cheek, I got to my feet.
Filth in my palace.
Filth to be cleansed from existence.
A man and woman lurked at the edge of the smoke, both wearing tinted goggles over their eyes. I recognized the technology, instruments used in the war to pick out a vampire’s cool body temperature, an attribute I didn’t share with my kin.
Running hot allowed me to inch closer to these mortals through the smoke.
Excellent.
“Keep still, all of you!” a gruff male voice barked.
Guns cocked, the air crackled with threat, and the hovering warchoppers continued to whir outside.
Incredible distress in the Heart of All told me this wasn’t an isolated case.
Had these mortals attacked my other palaces?
Extra heat under my rage galvanized me onward. These people would die here tonight. I would show no mercy.
Until you do…
I needed to be careful here. Bullets and other weapons would hurt my vampires, but an executioner’s stakeblade through the heart would kill them. And there were executioners here. I sensed them, malicious clouds lurking close by.
As king, I possessed the ability to unravel the lie of the magical potion in their system. First it came as a small skip of electricity over my body, then I smelled the cocktail of different bloods, picking up on murderous vibrations as the cocoon of deceit unwound to reveal the murderer within.
They moved into sight, just behind the man and woman. Ten of them behind the only person who had spoken so far.
I could also hide myself from their heightened senses, allowing me to move closer still.
Your blood will paint my tongue.
“This is how its gonna go,” the gruff male threw out, clearly the mouthpiece of the operation.
I sent more reassurance to my vampires before he continued. Things would be alright, I’d make sure of it.
“The palace is under lockdown,” the mortal filth continued. Why did I recognize that voice? “There’s a shitload of warriors with me, including executioners, along with a whole arsenal of hurt. So don’t piss us around.”
I expected a chortle that didn’t come.
“We want the king,” he added. “Come willingly, Silvanus. I know you’re here somewhere. This doesn’t need to be painful. You can make the right decision. The ultimate sacrifice, if you like.”
I didn’t respond.
“It’s time to end this. You’ve…” He drew a hesitant breath. “I know what you did to him.”
Ah, I realized who this man was now. “Hal.”
Paris’s friend. The one who’d begged for his own life at the expense of his friend’s.
“We meet again,” he answered. “Bit of a role reversal now, eh?”
My lips curled into a smile. “Only I’m not going to betray the ones I care about to save myself.”
“Shut the fuck up!” He pointed his gun in various directions, unable to pinpoint where my voice came from.
Excellent. I’d touched a nerve. “Did you tell your friends here what you did?”
He spat, a tickle of magic in the air. He was a mage after all. “You’re not holding the cards here, king.” He said that last word with pure vitriol.
How amusing. “Are you sure, Hal? You speak so bravely with an army at your back, but you’re nothing more than a coward. Whatever I did to Paris, you offered him up as a sacrifice to save your own skin. I think that is much worse.”
Hal grunted as his companions stirred enough for me to know I’d rattled the henhouse.
My goodness, my smile was wide.
“I’ll kill you,” he rasped.
No answer from me.
“You made him a thrall,” he tossed out desperately. “Turned him into a slave.”
“Not really. He mostly hung around my bedroom looking pretty.”
How delicious the air became, rich with the stink of mortal anger. Reminiscent of stagnant water.
“Surrender and do the right thing!” he snapped.
Why not just attack? They’d come here with such flashy bravado, so why not see it through to a bloody end?
Their bloody end.
My bloodthirst flared like a rampant beast, and death was the only thing that could quench it.
“Your time is over,” Hal bleated on, throwing in many details about the losses of the war. How we ruined this world, how after my demise, the Global Order would be next. He mentioned the other palaces, confirming that particular detail.
Bastard!
I snarled, my hands curved into claws.
The smoke cleared then, dissipating quickly as if sucked away by a vacuum. It had been removed by a spell, the orange glow of magic on Hal’s hands made it obvious.
Did a spell help them bypass the defenses on the island’s causeway? Most likely, which would call for tighter protections going forward, seeing as these mortals were intensifying their strategies.
More people gathered in the garden dressed in black, balaclavas over their faces, stab vest across their clothes. The warchoppers hovered out to sea in a line of three, with more bodies showing up on the slope beyond the garden.
Hal wouldn’t be dying until he gave me what I wanted.
I met Hal’s green stare, the fear those eyes once held replaced by arrogance.
We’d see how long that lasted.
“Leave,” I demanded. “While you still can.”
Mercy? Again?
He snorted, removing his balaclava. “We’re not going anywhere.
” The filth spat on the ground. “You should be scared, king. This is the end of your taint. I’m taking you down and taking Paris home.
” There was another bite of laughter from the bearded mage.
“Whatever you think I did, I always had his best interests at heart. He’s my friend, he’s my… ” He didn’t finish.
More than a friend? Fascinating.
“He’ll be with me by sunrise,” he added. “And you’ll be bone dust on the wind with the rest of your brood.”
Now, I wasn’t one for pettiness. However, when backed into a corner, words sometimes fell from my mouth with intent to cause the most damage possible. Because no mortal would ever get the better of me.
“I can still taste him,” I said, licking my lips for effect.
His fair, golden face blanched. “What?”
“His blood, his cum, they are both heavenly,” I continued. “My lips are still humming from the kiss we shared. The elf really knows how to make a vampire feel good.”
It seemed like a small betrayal to speak of Paris in such a way. Sullied what we’d shared. But anything that broke this irritating chatter from the cowardly mage was a boon.
That got no response from Hal, and it felt like the world held its breath. But bloodthirst radiated in the Heart of All. My people were ready for violence as much as me now.
We had to fight. This palace would not fall to the likes of this cowardly mage and his ilk. We were resilient, we would survive.
“You’re lying,” Hal finally spoke.
A woman tried to intervene. “Sir, we—”
“He’d never touch you,” he spouted, face full of fury.
I didn’t answer, using silence as a weapon.
He aimed his gun at my chest. “He’d. Never. Touch. You.” He enunciated each word like that would somehow make me agree.
Again, pettiness broke through. “In the shadow of abandonment, he sought comfort in my cock.”
Goodness, I would have to explain myself to my vampires for these revelations they were overhearing.
The mage quivered with confusion. Good. I was glad to see my goading land.
I licked my lips, my fangs bared. I wouldn’t kill him straight away, not until he spilled every detail of this operation. But I would taste him, and taste him well.
“Fuck you,” Hal growled, and fired his gun, a spray of bullets pelting my chest. They bounced off me as if meeting steel, the Heart of All retreating into the deepest, safest parts of me.
I didn’t die easily.
“Cunt!” Hal screamed, reloading. “You dirty, lying cunt! Fucking kill them!”
The mortals moved.
“Attack!” I roared, my vampires charging at my command.
The first of the executioners leaped into my path, twirling his stakeblade as the battled boomed around me. An elf, one of his pointed ears missing a chunk of its lobe.
I ducked his swing, grabbing him by the arm and twisting it, popping his bones. He wailed, and I snapped his neck, tossing his body into a different man firing a shotgun at Vaughn.
He made short work of him, snatching his weapon and blowing his head off, the blood spraying like a crimson firework.
Such a satisfying sight.
My friend nodded at me before tearing out the heart of another man.
The chaos rang harder, a throng of bodies tearing into each other, guns firing, swords cleaving. One of my people lost her head, which would grow back so long as her heart avoided the kiss of a stakeblade.
Zara. A relatively new vampire.
Her head bounced across my feet, coming to a stop nearby. She hissed at the executioner coming toward me.
The werewolf leapt through the air with terrific speed. I went to grab her, but she landed a kick to my face, sending me spinning to the ground.
Impressive strength and speed. But not enough to save her.
Springing to my feet, I dodged her stabs, punching the weapon from her hand. She snarled, going to sweep my legs out from under me. I jumped, bringing my right leg up in a kick that missed her by inches.
She laughed, her yellow wolf eyes flashing. “I’m taking you down.”
Cockiness. The bane of us all.
Her stakeblade returned to her hand as if it’d never left.
I attacked her again, and she spun out of my trajectory with the elvish lightfeet her blood lent her.
“Not so amazing, are you?” she mocked, a mortal man falling down dead beside her.
Another executioner joined her. “Agreed,” he said to her.
A terrible ache bloomed in the Heart of All. I saw the cloud of crimson bone dust as the sorrow seared through me. A vampire gone. Gilbert. One of the rebels I’d asked to be freed from the dungeons.
His loss joined the permanent pain that would never leave me, another hole in existence.
I’m sorry, I sent out to his soul. Be at peace.
Grief, my constant bedfellow, taunted me again. The red stone shone brightly in my chest, pulsating its sadness, scarlet veins spidering across my skin.
“The Heart of All!” the woman roared.
They all attacked me at once. I ran, dashing across the ballroom into the corridors.
Not from fear, but because a plan had sparked to life, one to make them pay a terrible price.