Chapter Twenty-Three
Kadie tugged against the thick silver shackles that chained her arms to the block wall behind her.
The silver burned her skin. She could feel the blisters rising.
The floor beneath her was made of cement, hard and cold.
The air smelled of old blood and death. The room was pitch black, making her grateful for her vampire vision, although there was nothing to see other than the man who held her captive.
From the moment she had awakened in this place – which she feared was a deserted crypt – she had tried to contact Rylan, but the man pacing back and forth in front of her had worked some kind of preternatural magic that blocked her ability to link to Saintcrow.
It wasn’t dark magic. She knew what that felt like.
She had no idea how long she had been there, but she didn’t think it was very long, since she didn’t feel an urgent need to feed. She stared at her captor. He was tall and on the thin side, with blonde hair cropped short and pale brown eyes that sent a cold chill down her spine.
For the hundredth time, she cursed herself for being so careless.
She had gone off to Cheyenne for baby formula, so excited and happy she had completely forgotten to pay attention to her surroundings.
She had quickly found what she needed. Leaving the store, she had walked down the street and ducked into an alley to avoid being seen when she transported home, but before she managed it, someone had covered her nose and mouth with a sweet-smelling rag.
It was the last thing she remembered. When she regained consciousness, she was here. Wherever here was.
How had he found her? Who was he? What did he want? He refused to answer any of her questions. One thing she knew, he had been a vampire longer than she had. He wasn’t as old or as powerful as Rylan, but he was a lot more powerful than was she.
She wondered if the baby was still alive.
She knew what a temptation the boy was to Rylan.
She had seen the naked hunger in his eyes, thankful that he had enough self-control to resist it.
She wasn’t sure why she wasn’t plagued by the same temptation.
Rylan had often claimed that, unlike all other vampires, she lacked the innate instinct to hunt and kill. And she was grateful for that.
Her head snapped up when she heard her captor talking on the phone, knew immediately that he was talking to Rylan.
“I want your power, master vampire,” he said. “All of it.”
Her heart skipped a beat when she heard Rylan’s voice come over the phone.
“How do I know you’ll let Kadie live?”
“I could kill her now.”
It was an empty threat, Kadie thought, and they both knew it. Without her, Trelaine had no leverage.
“You’ll just have to trust me,” Trelaine said, a sneer in his voice. “You give me your power and I’ll call whoever you want to come and turn her loose when you’re dead.”
“You’re a fool, Trelaine. I’ve been a vampire for a thousand years. If you try to take my power, it will destroy you.” Even as he said it, Saintcrow wondered if it was true.
Trelaine snorted. “I don’t believe you.”
“Turn Kadie loose and I’ll let you live.”
“Surrender to me, or she dies.”
“How do I know she’s still alive?”
Her captor held his phone to her ear. “Say something.”
“Rylan! Don’t do it!”
“Kadie, darlin’.” He murmured her name with all the love in his heart, then, speaking so softly only Kadie could hear it, he whispered, “Izabela.”
Her captor yanked the phone away from her ear.
“I’ll give you a day to think about it,” Trelaine snarled, and ended the call.
Later that night, when Trelaine had left to hunt, Kadie closed her eyes and concentrated on Izabela, picturing the witch sitting in her rocker, the black cat curled up on her lap, the one-legged crow asleep on its perch.
Kadie?
Yes! Izabela, I need you to work your magic. Locate me if you can. Then call Rylan and tell him where I am.
Are you hurt?
“No. Please, just call Rylan.
Consider it done.
Feeling drained, Kadie stretched out on the cold floor and closed her eyes. Everything would be all right. Everything would be all right. She repeated it over and over again until the dark sleep carried her away.
~ * ~
Izabela went upstairs to her workshop, filled her cauldron with water, dropped in a few of Kadie’s hairs, taken from the brush Kadie had used when she recovered from the plague, and dropped them into the pot.
She added a bit of Saintcrow’s blood, then waved her wand over water, chanting, “By the power of earth and sea, I bid thee reveal the whereabouts of Saintcrow’s woman to me. ”
Slowly, the water in the ancient cauldron began to bubble. When a thin gray mist rose in the air, Izabela repeated the chant, stronger this time. “By the power of earth and sea, I bid thee reveal the whereabouts of Saintcrow’s woman to me.”
The mist changed, grew darker, thicker. A drawing appeared showing what looked like a stone crypt set in the mouth of a cave. A pile of bleached bones lay scattered beside the crypt, the grave clothes in shreds.
Izabela added another drop of Saintcrow’s blood. “By the power of earth and sea, reveal the crypt’s location to me.”
The drawing of the crypt faded and a map of England appeared. A blood-red cross marked the location.
Smiling, Izabela pulled her cell phone from her pocket and took a picture of the map, and then called Saintcrow.
He was on her porch before she bid him goodbye.
“Come in,” she said, stepping away from the door to allow him entrance.
“Where is this place?”
She handed him her phone. “Do you recognize the location?”
He nodded. “It looks like the Dales. There are a lot of caves scattered through England and in the cliffs along the coast. Some of the old English royalty buried their dead around there centuries ago. Are you sure that’s where she is?”
Izabela shrugged. “Nothing in life is guaranteed. You of all people should know that.”
Chuckling, Saintcrow pulled the witch into his arms and planted a kiss on her cheek. “You can have as much of my blood as you want if I get Kadie out of this,” he said, and vanished from her sight.
“As much as I want,” Izabela said, looking pleased. “You can’t ask for more than that.”
~ * ~
It took a bit of searching before Saintcrow found the right cave, identified by the old bones and grave clothes lying beside it.
Lifting his head, he opened his preternatural senses searching for some sign of Kadie, but there was nothing but the scents of old death and decay.
Odd, he thought, until he detected a faint trace of preternatural magic.
Saintcrow grunted softly. Trelaine had obviously worked some kind of spell to mask any sign of his or Kadie’s presence. Standing there, Saintcrow did a slow turn, the back of his neck prickling with the certain knowledge that he was being watched.
He was about to enter the cave when a thick net interwoven with silver touched with dark magic covered him from head to foot and a half-dozen men materialized around him, dragging him to the ground.
Saintcrow cursed his foolishness. He’d been so worried about Kadie, so sure Trelaine was just a brash fool, that he had underestimated his opponent.
It was only natural that Trelaine would have prepared a trap of one kind or another far ahead of the time he planned to reveal his whereabouts. It’s what he, himself, would have done.
Several minutes passed while Saintcrow struggled to free himself from the net.
“Stop struggling or she’s dead!” The voice came from the mouth of the cave.
Saintcrow gave up the fight immediately. He turned his head to the left as a tall, slender vampire with blonde hair and brown eyes stepped into view, his smirk filled with victory and a hint of madness.
Kadie stood beside Trelaine, a thin-bladed knife at her throat, her hands bound in front of her.
Saintcrow cursed under his breath. Her wrists were red and swollen where the silver touched. In some places, the skin had been burned away.
“All right, you’ve got me,” Saintcrow said. “Now let her go.”
“All in good time.”
“What more do you want?”
“I told you. I want your power. All of it. I intend to drink you dry,” Trelaine said, with a cackle. “And then your power will be mine! Think of it! The power of a thousand years.”
Saintcrow muttered as oath as he wondered if anyone had ever tried to steal a master vampire’s power and if so, if they had survived.
Rage flooded his being at the thought of Trelaine stealing his power, of never holding Kadie in his arms again.
But he was willing to sacrifice anything, even his life, to save her.
“What about Kadie?” he asked. “Once you’ve got what you want, will you let her go? ”
Trelaine threw back his head and laughed. “You’ll never know.”
Kadie screamed when Trelaine dropped to his knees and buried his fangs in Saintcrow’s throat while his companions looked on, their expressions blank.
Kadie felt a wave of hope when, in a sudden burst of speed and power, Saintcrow threw off the net, grabbed Trelaine by the throat, slammed him to the ground, and threw the net over him. The vampire let out a scream as the silver infused with his own magic scorched his skin.
The other men darted forward, only to be stopped by a harsh word from Saintcrow.
Trelaine thrashed on the ground, unable to free himself, screaming curses all the while as the silver seared his face, hands, arms, and neck.
Saintcrow freed Kadie’s hands, bit into his wrist, scooped up some of his blood and spread it over her charred flesh. “Are you all right, darlin’?”
“I am now. How did you escape the net?”
“I was only pretending to be caught,” he said, his fingers lightly caressing her cheek. “You know silver has no power over me anymore. Anyway, Trelaine was overly confident in his magic and his preternatural power, and he sorely underestimated mine.”