Chapter 20
Chapter twenty
Damien
I was falling.
For a being who had called darkness home for centuries, who had navigated the shadows with ease, there was something uniquely terrifying about plummeting into an abyss without control.
Time warped, stretching seconds into eternities. My mind fragmented into shards of memory and sensation.
Not my memories. Hers.
A hospital room. Luna’s beautiful face contorted with pain, sweat-slicked hair plastered to her forehead as she bore down and screamed, a primal sound that contained both agony and determination.
Then a different cry filled the room—thin and reedy.
A tiny red face, eyes screwed shut, mouth open in outrage at being thrust into the cold, bright world.
Luna’s eyes filled with tears as she reached for her daughter, whispering, “Hello, Aria. I’ve waited so long to meet you. ”
The memory shifted, dissolved, reformed.
Luna stood proud despite the tears streaming down her face.
A tall man with Luna’s eyes addressed her, his voice cold.
“You have broken our most sacred law. You have mated with a rival pack alpha and produced a child that weakens our lineage.” Luna’s voice shook but held steady when she said, “She is my daughter. She has shifter blood.” The man shook his head.
“The council has decided. You are banished, stripped of pack protection.”
I continued falling, the darkness rushing past me, and still the memories came.
A different crypt, this one covered with a strange glowing orange moss.
A woman with dark braided hair holding a small child while sitting on a rock formation away from the moss while examining her bare feet.
“Fuck, Luna, I think it climbed into my boots.” Her friend’s eyes rolling back in her head as she and the child in her arms went limp simultaneously. Luna’s panic, immediate and visceral.
The memory fragmented, replaced by impressions rather than clear images—Luna’s desperate research, countless dead ends, the growing shadows beneath her eyes, the dwindling of her bank account, the frantic calls to specialists who couldn’t help.
Until Dr. Felix at the Repository.
I’d seen countless humans die over my centuries. I’d caused many of those deaths myself. Yet the thought that formed as I fell was not of my own impending impact, but of Luna failing in her quest to save her daughter and friend because I wasn’t there to help her.
To protect her.
To save her.
Something lashed around my torso, jerking me to an abrupt halt that would have broken ribs had I been human. The leather strap cinched tight, cutting into my chest and arms, the burn of friction against my skin a welcome reminder that I was still in one piece.
I looked up. Luna’s headlamp created a halo of light above me, her face a mixture of strain and fierce concentration as she braced herself against a stone pillar, the whip that had caught me secured around it to create a crude pulley system.
Sweat glistened on her skin, and her hair had come loose from its braid, framing her face in wild tendrils that caught the light like filaments of gold and copper.
“Gotcha,” she grunted, her muscles trembling with the effort.
Caught between up and down, I shifted my gaze downward.
Twenty feet below, the darkness was punctuated by dozens of wooden stakes, their sharpened points aimed upward like the teeth of some colossal beast. They were made of heartwood, lethal to vampires even if—especially if—one didn’t catch me in the heart.
A single puncture would mean true death.
“Damien,” Luna called, her voice strained. “A little help? You’re not exactly lightweight. Try to swing to the wall and climb up.”
I shook off my momentary paralysis and grasped the whip, preparing to swing myself. “I’m coming. Hold steady.”
“No other choice,” she gritted out. “This pillar feels about as stable as my credit score, so let’s get on with it.”
“Right.” I began to swing, the leather whip slick beneath my palms.
Except I didn’t have enough slack to reach the jagged stone wall several feet away. Despite the narrow hole I’d fallen through, this cavern was enormous. I wrenched at the leather whip around my torso to give me a few more inches, but it had cinched tight.
“Luna, I need more slack,” I called.
“Um…” Her gaze flicked behind her to the stone pillar. “Shit.”
Tremors ran through her arms, and the pillar she was braced against shifted and crumbled with each movement.
Okay. Think.
Whatever I did next, I had to hurry. With the whip squeezing my arms to my sides, I awkwardly wriggled one hand closer to my obsidian blade holster at the back of my belt. I’d have to cut myself loose first. And afterward? Get out of here somehow without bringing the whole crypt down on top of us.
But then I saw it.
A dark shape moving across Luna’s shoulder, eight legs advancing. Fuck. The Brazilian wandering spider from our camp had somehow made the journey with us. Its distinctive posture signaled it was preparing to strike, mere inches from Luna’s exposed neck.
If it bit her, the neurotoxin could incapacitate her within minutes, potentially killing her within hours. And in this place, with my ability to help heal her compromised…
“Luna,” I called, keeping my voice calm. “I need you to hold very still.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What? Why—“
“The spider from camp. It’s on your right shoulder.”
Her face went still, only her eyes moving to try to glimpse the spider without turning her head. “Well, that’s inconvenient timing.”
The pillar at her back that helped support my weight shifted again, a shower of stone dust raining down. The spider, disturbed by the movement, raised its front legs in threat display.
“You think it’s just passing through?” Luna asked, her voice tight.
“It’s about to strike.”
I could see the calculations running behind her eyes. If she moved to deal with the spider, she risked dropping me onto the stakes below. If she continued holding me, the spider would likely bite her. Either way, the outcome wouldn’t be pretty.
“Drop the whip,” I said with quiet finality.
Her eyes snapped to mine, fierce and indignant. “Excuse me?”
“Let me go. Get the spider off. Save yourself.”
“Not happening,” she gritted out. “I have anti-venom anyway.”
I did a quick inventory of everything still attached to my body.
When I looked below me again, my stomach dropped, nearly taking the rest of me with it. “You mean the anti-venom in your pack? The pack no longer attached to my back and now hanging from a wooden stake down here?”
Luna’s eyes widened. “Fuck me with all the razors yet again. You and your ‘I’ll carry the heavy stuff’ chivalry bullshit, Damien.”
The spider inched closer to her neck, its movements becoming more agitated as the pillar continued to shift and rain down dust all over Luna. I was still too far below to reach her, the wooden stakes waiting patiently beneath me, the whip holding me immobile.
“Release me and brush it off,” I insisted. “You might not get bitten. My death is preferable to yours.”
Her jaw set stubbornly. “Says who?”
“Your daughter needs you. Jade needs you.” I met her gaze. “I’ve lived centuries. You’ve barely begun your life.”
“And Elliot needs you,“ she countered, strain evident in every line of her body. “So shut up and just climb the whip really fast.”
The spider’s body tensed. The pillar groaned ominously.
“If I shift my weight any, that pillar won’t last,” I said, my voice raw. I rarely begged, but for her life, I would. “Please, Luna. Drop me. I won’t let you die because of me.”
For a heartbeat, our eyes locked in a moment of naked honesty. The intensity in her gaze made my chest tighten.
“Neither of us is dying today.” Her eyes narrowed with determination. “Not on my watch.”
In a burst of strength, Luna jerked the whip sideways, sending me swinging in an arc toward the wall of the cavern. Then she dropped the whip.
My momentum still carried me toward the wall, but I’d never make it. I was still too far out. Time turned to syrup as I seemed to hover in midair, reaching, stretching toward salvation.
Freed from bearing my weight, Luna slapped her shoulder hard enough to dislodge the spider. In the same motion, she brought her other hand behind her and grabbed one of the foot-long poles from her foldable cot strapped to her back.
Then she threw it down toward me.
Shaken loose, the spider sailed toward me as well.
I began falling yet again.
The pole, the spider, and me raced toward the stakes below, but if I could grab that pole, wedge it into the wall, and say a prayer that it would hold my weight…
“Grab it!” Luna shouted.
I extended my arm as far as I could over my head. My finger grazed it, just barely.
But that was enough.
With a curl of my knuckle, I had it in my grip, then I flung it toward the wall. It caught between two narrow outcroppings, and I held on. I jerked to a stop, the momentum nearly dislocating my shoulders, my body dangling only inches above the stakes.
“Yes!” Luna shouted.
The pillar behind her chose that moment to give way completely.
The steps she stood on crumbled with it, sending her toppling forward toward the hole. She twisted desperately in mid-air, reaching for anything to arrest her fall.
“LUNA!”
In that split second, I knew with absolute certainty that I would save her from death, stakes be damned, rather than watch her die. But she found purchase above me, her fingers grasping at the hole’s mouth, her body swinging.
“Okay?” I shouted, unable to keep the desperation from my voice. “Luna, are you hurt?”
“Just my dignity.” With a grunt, she hefted herself up. “What’s left of it anyway. You?”
“Fine.” The word was grossly inadequate to describe the flood of relief coursing through me.
With my foot, I managed to hook my ankle around Luna’s pack. Nearby, I spotted the spider scuttling away. Still alive, the bastard. Hopefully this would be our last rendezvous.
I began the ascent up the rock wall. As soon as I neared the top, Luna reached down to help me the last few feet.
Her hand clasped mine, warm and strong, the contact sending a powerful jolt through my system.
Finally, I crested the top and collapsed against the broken staircase, sweat drenching the whole of my body.
Luna sat beside me, close enough that our shoulders touched. I could hear her heartbeat slowing, smell the combination of sweat and adrenaline on her skin. For several minutes, we simply existed together in silence.
“You were going to let those stakes kill you,” Luna said, her voice accusatory. “You were ready to die rather than let that spider bite me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?” Her eyes searched mine, demanding honesty. “Why would you do that for me? A stranger?”
The answer seemed so simple to me.
“I already told you. For Aria and Jade. And because I saw your memories when our blood mixed. I know exactly what you’re fighting for.
” I paused, choosing my words carefully.
“When you’ve lived as long as I have, Luna, you learn that some lives burn brighter, matter more. Yours is one of them. Unquestionably.”
Her expression softened before hardening again. “That wasn’t your choice to make.”
“Wasn’t it your choice to risk yourself for me just now?”
She opened her mouth to argue, then closed it, clearly recognizing the parallel. Our eyes held for several moments, something deep and unspoken passing between us.
“We need to get going,” I said, breaking the tension.
Luna nodded but made no move to stand. “Okay, but what happened to your shirt?”
I glanced down at the worn tatters where my shirt used to be. “Something had to die, I guess.”
“Yeah…” Her gaze traced down the lines of my chest, lingering on the ancient suns tattooed across my collarbone.
“Luna?” My voice came out rougher than intended.
She blinked, color rising in her cheeks. “Yeah, I just wasn’t…um…expecting you to have so many tattoos. Or, you know, so much skin.”
“It’s just the normal amount of skin,” I replied with a chuckle.
“Right.” She looked away and cleared her throat, though her eyes darted back briefly. “What do they mean? The suns.”
“Protection mostly. From my time before…when I was still fae. Before my vampire transformation.”
“Still fae…” She nodded slowly. “Oh…”
Her fingers lifted, hovering just above my tattoos as if she might trace the patterns, before she caught herself and pulled back. The almost-touch left my skin tingling with heady anticipation.
“At least we know for sure that this really is a death trap,” she said, changing the subject while getting to her feet. “In case there was any doubt.”
“See? All according to plan, then. You know your stuff.”
She grinned infectiously, her dirt-smudged face glowing with humor. “Is that a compliment or a complaint?”
I pulled myself up, ending closer to her than I’d intended. For a moment we stood there, our bodies nearly touching, her warmth radiating between us like an invitation.
“It depends on if I have to fall again,” I answered.
“I won’t let you fall,” she said, staring up at me.
Too late, I thought.
I was already falling for Luna.
Helplessly. Hopelessly.
Like plummeting into an abyss I never wanted to escape from.