Chapter 30
ALEXANDER
It was barely a challenge to follow the path through Rothburn down which Tobias had been dragged.
The blood was so thick on the carpet that it squelched under Alexander’s bare feet with every step he took.
And Tobias had just been drained by Alexander himself – the blood pooling on the floors had to have been most of what was left in his body.
With every turn he took his horror grew, the impossibility of Tobias being still alive mingling with the abject panic that he was the one who had just as good as signed Tobias’ death warrant.
Vampire or not, he never should have sent Tobias away when he’d just been fed on.
He wouldn’t be at full strength, and if there was one thing that Vladimir could sense, it was vulnerability.
After Alexander defied him, and then he undoubtedly learned from Alexander’s blood just how much he cared for Tobias, there was no way that Vladimir would pass up the opportunity for revenge.
The opportunity to wound Alexander and show him just who was in control at Rothburn; that Alexander would never be able to escape his father’s power.
He was deep in his guilt and despair as he followed the trail of blood to a part of the house that he almost never visited – the cellar.
The stone steps leading down into the dark were slippery and he could see smears of blood on the narrow walls, as though Tobias had been slammed into them more than once on the way down.
But it was what he confronted when he finally made his way into the cellar that brought him to his knees.
He hadn’t wanted to believe it in the last few desperate minutes – that Tobias could truly be dead.
But the vampire in front of him, hanging by a hook pierced through its ankles, was undeniably no longer living.
The few places where the corpse’s skin wasn’t either flayed off or mottled with blood-filled bruises were bone-white, no blood left on the body at all.
The pool underneath it was smaller than it should have been, but the drain that had been set into the floor would have swallowed up most of the blood as it dripped from the wound made by the stake still impaled through Tobias’ narrow chest, right through his heart.
It was the face that Alexander couldn’t look away from.
There was nothing left of the man he loved in it, the bones broken beyond all recognition, the eyes gouged out. The hair that Alexander had run his hands through in the throes of passion was so matted by blood that it had lost all colour other than red, sticking stiffly to the corpse’s scalp.
Alexander’s chest cracked. His body felt Tobias’ pain, but his heart seemed to shatter over and over, like glass brought down over stone.
Knowing Vladimir, this all would have been done while Tobias was still alive, the killing blow only dealt when his father got bored of the torture.
How he’d done all this in such a short time was beyond Alexander, but Vladimir must have not wanted to miss any of his party to do something so unimportant as murder Tobias Osian.
Undoubtedly, he’d have had his minions savaging different parts of Tobias at the same time, to create the most unbearable agony while limiting the time it took to deliver the punishment.
Alexander’s face was wet. When he touched it with a bloodied hand, he realised that he’d been crying.
Grief washed over him like a wave, the knowledge that Tobias was gone and that Alexander had as good as killed him ricocheting through his chest. He bent forward, hugging his body as he let himself sob until he felt empty of anything except one singular, burning thought.
I’m going to kill Vladimir.
He’d lived for hundreds of years and yet never felt so empty, and in that moment, he knew that he wasn’t interested in going on. Not when he was never going to escape his father’s control or be able to live his own life. Not when he’d be constantly trapped in the same hell for all eternity.
Alexander inched closer to the corpse and retched as he reached for the lever that would release the chains from the ceiling.
It fell to the floor with a sickening thump, and Alexander couldn’t contain his stomach then, turning to vomit up blood all over the floor.
He would have to bury Tobias, but he couldn’t even think straight enough to do so right now.
He certainly didn’t want to inter Tobias on the grounds of Rothburn, not when the estate belonged to the man who had killed him.
Instead, he settled for smoothing back the hair from the ruined forehead, letting his fingers trace the words brutally cut into the chest muscles. Forgotten.
He would never let Tobias be forgotten. Not as long as he lived – no matter how short a time that was now. He closed the ruined eye sockets as best he could, hoping that Tobias would forgive him for leaving him here for lack of a better resting place.
“Goodbye, Tobias,” he choked out. “I’m so sorry. I… I…”
The words caught in his throat, although they bounced around his skull. I love you.
I loved you.
The hems of his tuxedo trousers dragged in the muck as he got to his feet, coated in so much blood he felt like he was dead himself. The last thing he did before he left was tug the stake out of Tobias’ chest, which released it with a sick sucking sound.
It was only fitting that his father met his end the same way Tobias had.
With one last look, Alexander started back up the stairs, the sounds of the party returning as he reached the first level of the manor.
He didn’t even turn heads, clad only in trousers and blood, because the revelry was in such full swing that many of the participants had shed their masks and clothes and joined him in a state of debauched undress.
The blood was flowing freely from familiars and goblets, the servants working to haul more and more bodies to the pile by the door.
Before, the centennial masquerades had disgusted him because they’d been a sign of his subservience. But now, he saw them for what they were – glimpses into hell. Proof of how Vladimir had turned the blessing of immortality into a curse.
He stopped at the bar to grab a bottle of vodka.
Smashing the neck of the bottle against the nearest table, he started to pour a trail as he passed into the ballroom, making sure to splash the century-old curtains and rugs.
He pushed through the mass of dancers to the centre of the ballroom, knowing that’s where his father would be.
Although when he reached the raised dais that the revellers were circling, he didn’t find his father. Instead, it was empty.
“Looking for someone?”
Alexander whirled around at the sound of his father’s voice behind him, slashing out with the sharp edge of the broken bottle. Vladimir didn’t move as the glass caught his throat and tore it, blood spurting from the wound. “You.”
“Funny,” Vladimir continued, as if his throat hadn’t just been slashed, “because I was looking for you as well.”
The wound was already healing over, Vladimir flush with Alexander’s blood – and undoubtedly Tobias’ too.
Alexander had mere moments before the bloodlust consumed him completely, and he used it to reach into the pocket of his trousers and pull out the lighter he’d stashed there after going for his last cigarette.
“You killed him.”
Vladimir looked at his nails, almost bored by the accusation. “I simply finished the job you started tonight. With some help. You know, Alexandros, you really should shadow your sister. You could learn a lot from her ruthlessness.”
The broken remains of Alexander’s heart fell into the pit of his blood-full stomach. “Maria?”
Vladimir smiled, confirming Alexander’s horror to be true.
He flicked open the lighter and tossed it to the ground, the flame catching on the trail of alcohol he’d left and quickly finding its way to skirts and suits.
Chaos erupted, which was exactly what Alexander had wanted – distraction, so that the rest of the Damianos clan wouldn’t interfere.
This was between him and his father, now. And the rest of them would be dead soon, anyway.
“Ah. You really did have a bleeding heart for that mortal, didn’t you?” Vladimir shook his head, tutting. “Good thing your sister took care of him for us. It’s given me the time to teach you the lesson you seem to so badly need.”
That hit him like a punch to the gut. He couldn’t believe that Maria, his own sister, would have tortured Tobias so brutally. He hadn’t thought she was a monster – and she was the only one of all of them he’d feel grief for ending along with Vladimir.
His father had freed him of that with a single sentence. There truly wasn’t anyone remaining here worth saving. He’d be able to burn it to the ground and pray he found peace in the afterlife.
Vladimir grabbed for him, and he dodged, leaping backwards onto the dais where his father had drained him a mere hour ago.
“All you’ve taught me these hundreds of years has been cruelty and greed. The world doesn’t need you anymore. It doesn’t need any of us. I drank from Tobias. I saw what you did.”
“Such a fascination with mortals.” Vladimir stepped onto the dais to meet him.
“And lowly made vampires too, it seems, if you know his secret. The funny thing was that I didn’t even remember the moment I’d made him, not until I drank from him.
I’d completely forgotten him. Which is why I had to remind him, so that he’d never think he was important enough to merit a place in a Damianos’ memory. ”
“He has a place in mine.” Alexander pulled the stake from where he’d tucked it in the waistband of his ruined pants. “He always will – would have. Unlike you. You’re the one here who’s undeserving. You’re the one who corrupted us all.”
Vladimir cocked his head as he began to circle Alexander like they were two animals locked in a fight to the death.