Chapter 19 Lazriel
~Lazriel~
Screeching.
Too much screeching.
I couldn’t suppress a grimace as Victor scraped his talons down the cracked door frame—both fucking sides.
I had no doubt he was specifically doing it to hurt me.
It was bad enough my pulse was racing like fucking mad, which he’d be able to both hear and feel with his highly-attuned senses, but now he’d made me show a reaction in my expression too.
A dark chuckle sounded from Sylas, thankfully redirecting some of my sensory focus.
“You think you can kill someone like me, vampire?”
“You mean a necromancer without a single flicker of power at his disposal?”
Shit. He knew. He knew Sylas’ magic was bound.
Sylas moved to step in front of me, but I threw my arm out holding him back.
It was instinct, I figured, for him to take the brunt of things, the heat of any battle or dangerous and dire situation, because of his power set.
A power set he didn’t currently have access to.
Halrow’s lips lifted at the interaction, my protective move basically reinforcing what he’d just said.
Better that than Sylas putting himself in a position he couldn’t handle right now.
“Careful with holding to such a simplistic thought process. Power doesn’t just come from supernatural might.
That mentality is how many believing themselves almighty actually fall,” Sylas spoke.
He tapped his chin. “Come to think of it, isn’t that what happened to you?
Say, three centuries ago, when your sire put you down? ”
Victor hissed and ripped off a chunk of the door frame.
Wow.
That had gotten under his skin majorly. Sylas and his pointed retorts for the win.
Last time I’d faced Victor, he’d done a similar thing to me, seemingly seen into me, and had a biting answer for everything, talked down to me, and unnerved me in so many ways with it. Talk about getting a taste of his own medicine. His reaction showed that he most definitely wasn’t used to that.
It was also clear that Sylas had been investigating Halrow.
What he’d just thrown at him wasn’t public knowledge or anything close to that.
I wasn’t surprised he’d been looking into the behemoth bastard. Sylas had marked him as a threat. Delving into his background would only have been the start of it. Something we’d need to get into once this immediate fuckfest was over with.
“I lied earlier,” Halrow spat at Sylas. “For dramatic effect, of course. You’ll survive the night.
Just not painlessly. My only instruction was to ensure you remain breathing.
That leaves the way open to a great deal of fun to be had.
In fact, I’ll start by having you watch me defile your hybrid love.
I do enjoy breaking the mind before the body.
It’s a much sweeter victory.” His gaze flicked to me, and I fought to suppress a shudder as he looked me up and down.
“Precious, our time together was cut far too short last time. I will enjoy remedying that. If you’re good for me, I’ll allow you some enjoyment too, before I employ the full force of my sadism that I’ve been fantasizing about unleashing all over that pretty body of yours. ”
“Shut the fuck up,” Sylas growled. “You aren’t touching him. You aren’t carrying out your instructions on behalf of your master.”
“I serve no master.”
“If you’re being instructed, yes, you very much do. Let me hazard a guess… Morien Morgrave? My formerly deceased-since-resurrected egomaniacal father?”
“Hmm, impressive. You are steps ahead to where we anticipated you would be.”
“Stop posturing. Get gone. And tell the motherfucker I know. His time is limited. Very limited.”
Victor sneered. “Posturing? Is that what you believe I’m doing?”
“You enjoy playing psychological games. You’ve made that clear. You mistakenly believed you’d found a victim in Lazriel. But you misread him through your arrogance, as well as your twisted relationship with his father.”
I jolted. Sylas knew about that as well?
A perverse grin spread over Victor’s face. “Did you know that Morien has been obsessed since Ryker Morgan put him down? So much so that he’s studied every little detail of his history, especially his gift for magical workarounds?”
“Obsessive describes him to a T. It’s no surprise to me,” Sylas rebutted.
I didn’t know how the fuck he was managing not to react to his father being brought up. But he was. He was that disciplined and controlled, especially in situations like this, where that mattered a hell of a lot. He was smart instead of reactive.
And, honestly, it really turned me on.
Not something I should be thinking about right now, but given that we’d been apart for so long, that I’d been apart from all three of my loves, I was kind of on overdrive when it came to all of that.
Or maybe I was also veering into that sexual territory because of Victor. Because of what he’d done to me. Latching onto something that was positive in a sexual way and my choice, rather than what he’d… subjected me to. Like some kind of mental barrier I was just automatically erecting.
“Several times Ryker Morgan has breached Celestial-level wards and protections with his defensive magic. But he’s the only one on earth who possesses that type of magic.
However, being able to breach such a thing can be done in other ways, something Morien discovered Ryker had passed down to Lucian.
Something I actually witnessed him employing once.
” His eyes flamed. “Using the foundational aspect of blood magic to transcend perceived indomitable magical might.”
Sylas tensed against me.
Victor’s grin widened as he tapped the exterior wall of the house.
“This ward that the Immortal, Cassius, erected gave you the ability to allow somebody through with an uttered invitation, much like a vampire being allowed into a private dwelling when such words are spoken. However, it was also fashioned to allow passage to a specific few. You. Velra Nox.” His gaze landed on me again. “And you.”
“What are you getting at?” I demanded, done with this shit, done with having to steel myself with him being here far too close.
“Your blood. That is what allowed you passage without Sylas inviting you with a magically-programmed command.”
“And?” I bit back.
“And, impetuous one, you bled a great deal during our last interaction. I had a friend of mine gather up every little drop. And the thing with magic and blood, especially when you have access to a highly-accomplished magic-wielder, is that they fuse very nicely. In exhilarating ways.” He pushed off the door frame and swept his hand down the length of himself with a dramatic flourish.
“As such, my scent currently reads as yours. I’m fused with your blood. ”
He pushed against the shimmering white ward and his fingers went through it, sending a jolt of adrenaline tearing through me, and Sylas uttering a curse. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t that the key to this lovely little lock here?”
My fangs dropped, my senses going into overdrive, my blood heating as I drew on the heart of the vampire, like my dad had been teaching me to do lately.
I felt his pulse thumping—steady but definitely… excited.
Prepping to react, to do something fucked, to come for us.
I heard him suck in a breath, the crack of his knuckles, the very slight shift of his stance.
I tried to scent him, but there was nothing there.
Victor made his move.
Unlike last time, I was able to register his movements, his speed no longer eclipsing my sensory abilities.
This time, I saw it fucking coming.
And as he burst toward Sylas, I spun into him, bodychecking him, and sending him flying across the room back toward the open front door.
He snarled at me in fury—and embarrassment, no doubt.
My lips quirked.
That had been oddly satisfying.
“Go,” I hissed to Sylas. “Call Cassius and Velra. Your phone’s in the kitchen.
” I rolled my eyes. “For some reason.” Bedroom would be way easier seeing as though we were right fucking there.
But it was what it was. If I had to guess, it was him trying to avoid contact and sink deeper into solitude through his pain of being without his magic, and so he could conduct his obsessive research without.
“You’ve learned a thing or two, I see,” Victor commented.
Like a never-ending infuriating soundtrack.
Infuriating? I was having an emotional reaction.
That was dangerous with him.
And what he likely wanted, what he was counting on.
To trip me up, to undercut me majorly, just like he’d done before in so many ways.
He was a sadistic bastard in every way, because he knew he’d already messed with me when he’d assaulted me—again, in so many ways—during our last encounter. Going this extra route now was just him proving what an irredeemable, merciless piece of shit he was.
But I couldn’t process that now, couldn’t let it fully sink in.
Deal with the trauma later.
I had to focus through all that. I had to ensure I didn’t lock down in response to it. I needed to access the vampire within properly—fully.
Not just that, though.
No, this time, I needed both.
Something my dad had wanted to work on with me.
But I’d left to see Sylas and deliver this news to him. And I’d needed to see him, Velra, and Cassius. Badly.
Well, I was a self-taught combatant. He’d already helped me with the vampire and drawing on my Ancient blood. I had to believe I could handle this. And I was nothing if not a quick study. Besides, responding to, and figuring a lot of things out on the fly was kind of my thing.
“Remnant has clearly been teaching you. But it won’t be enough.” He gestured out through the open front door. “Also, in case you were counting on it and factoring it into any sort of strategy against me, Daddy won’t be coming to save you this time.”
“What are you talking about?”