Chapter 24
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
YORICK
“Puppers… I think you got in the wrong car,” I say as I hold Julian in his werewolf form. Why he dove into the car with me, I’m not quite sure. I can only imagine Casimir losing his mind since his lover willingly got himself captured.
Julian stoically sits on my lap while I pet him and bury my face in his black fur.
He presses his wet nose against my cheek, and I have to assume that’s his puppers version of an “It’s going to be okay” pat. It’s definitely not going to be okay, but we can pretend it will be.
“Julian, you really need to run the second the car stops. Once you’re out in the sun, he can’t do anything to grab you. Go back to Casimir before you get caught up in this and get hurt.”
Julian shows no signs of diving for the door and instead sits patiently on my lap.
“Well… I guess if you’re staying, you should wear a seat belt,” I say before wrapping it around both of us. The seat belt locks when I click it in place, and Julian is suction-cupped against me.
He looks disgruntled since his head is pinned at an odd angle by the strap. He tries to free himself as Morpheus glances back at me from where he sits in the passenger seat. Then Julian bares his fangs while I hold on to my vicious puppers.
Morpheus says nothing for the entirety of the drive, which isn’t very long. The car pulls into a covered garage, and the driver and Morpheus exit the vehicle.
“Julian, please run. You can make it to the sun. I’ll attack him and you take the opportunity to leave,” I beg, really wishing I could understand him when he’s in this form. Sadly, only Casimir can.
He shakes his head, and I can’t help but question why someone so stubborn ended up with me… though that doesn’t mean I want him to go anywhere. He is rather comforting.
I get out of the car, still cuddling the wolf to me.
While he’s the smallest wolf in his father’s pack, he’s definitely not a small creature, but I will cuddle him for as long as possible as I trudge after Morpheus and the other man who both get into an elevator.
I feel guilty, though, like I’m taking Julian deeper and deeper into this mess that I might not escape from.
My hand reaches up and bumps something in his fur.
I hesitate before hurriedly dropping my hand once I realize that he’s wearing a thin collar.
When the hell did he get a collar… and why?
The moment I was in the car, they took my phone and the driver gave me a very thorough pat down, but he didn’t think much about the wolf. I keep my hand down, refusing to draw attention to the collar Julian is wearing.
I debate just like… not getting in the elevator, but Morpheus drags me into it. Honestly, where would I even go before he’d catch me and drag me back… or would he finally toss me in the sun to get rid of me?
“How many people do you think died back there, Yorick? So many bodies. There would have been more if you’d kept your mouth shut. But you’ve never been good at that, have you?”
“I’m planning on doing it right now,” I grouse before pressing my mouth against Julian’s fur with no intention of speaking to Morpheus again.
“What are we going to do if Atticus doesn’t kill Wick?
I really can’t keep letting him get away with disobeying me without repercussions.
You don’t need two arms, do you? I shall have one delivered to him.
He’ll enjoy that. I do hate hurting you, but you’re really the only thing that aggravating man cares for. ”
“Do you plan to kill everyone in power? Is that what today was about?”
“Why do you always portray me as the bad guy, Yorick? I’m not such a bad guy,” he says as the elevator doors open and I step out on the top floor of what looks like a hotel.
He leads me inside a large room that has to take up a significant part of this level.
Morpheus guides me over to the couch and holds blood out to me.
I want to refuse it, but I’m in pretty rough shape and feel like shit, so I have little choice if I want to even start healing.
Julian sniffs the glass, and when he doesn’t knock it away from me, I decide that he must not have smelled anything in it.
The second the taste is on my tongue, I down the blood, unable to quench my thirst for more.
I feel like I’m starving, but more than anything, I find myself wanting Atticus’s blood, which makes no sense.
Of course I can drink my maker’s blood, but nothing about it should be any better than human blood.
Morpheus sits down in a chair while holding another glass that I want to take from him because one wasn’t enough. Instead, he gestures at the couch. I hesitate before sitting down across from him, Julian still on my lap.
Morpheus watches me closely. “You haven’t answered.”
“I didn’t know you asked a question.”
“Why do you always act like I’m the bad guy?”
I gape at him and wave around myself. “How could I possibly not? You’re fucking evil! What a foolish question.”
He chuckles and leans back. “Did you ever ask Atticus why I despise him so much?”
“I can’t fathom what he did to you that was bad enough for you to have killed everyone he’s ever cared for during the past thousand years. You’ve forced him into solitude; you’ve haunted him his entire life.”
“I have, haven’t I?” He seems rather proud of this.
“So what did he do? Slaughter your entire family?” I ask.
“He did… although my family at the time was only my lovely daughter Anna. She wasn’t blood-related, but I still loved her like my child.
I raised her, and when she became an adult, I turned her.
She fell in love with a young man… a human, even though I forbade her to.
And then when Atticus took her husband’s life, my daughter lost her own in the ensuing fight. ”
I stare at him in disbelief. “A thousand years and still you punish him?”
“I’d lived a thousand years before I met her or Atticus, but she was the only thing I ever loved.
She was the only thing that brought me true happiness.
I had lived an empty life until I met her.
It was like… I was broken. Nothing mattered to me…
until the day I saw her at barely a week old.
It was merely fascination at first, and then she became my whole world.
Then when she died, there was nothing left for me.
So I decided that I would make sure Atticus suffered as I did.
I would make sure he was never happy ever again.
While it can’t fill the hole left by her, it has given me some satisfaction.
I at least feel something when I’m making him miserable. ”
“It’s been a thousand years. How many people have you killed just because he cared for them? Why is it okay for you to kill all of these people, to take away children and loved ones from others, but Atticus must suffer for it?”
“I never said what I was doing was right. Please, Yorick. I don’t believe in right or wrong. But really… do you? You’ve been deceiving him for the entire time you’ve been a vampire, have you not? You’ve added to his suffering, have you not? You act like you’re innocent, but you’re not.”
Every word he says hurts, but I can’t deny it. “I just… I just did it so I could be with him,” I say, hating the words he’s spouting and trying to find a way to make myself feel less guilty.
“He might have suffered a whole lot less if you hadn’t. Maybe he could have even been happy now if it weren’t for you.”
I despise his words because I know they’re true. I don’t deserve any of the happiness Atticus gives me. “Just please, leave him the fuck alone.”
“Not yet. Not right now. First, I want to know where this poison came from. I asked the two fools you got poisoned by, but they had so little to say about it. Really, such insignificant people who got their hands on something rather significant. It’s genuinely a wonder how they managed it.”
“So you decided to poison Lou with it?”
“I did. She tried to attack me, you see? I had a lead telling me that she was involved, but when I confronted her about the poison, instead of telling me the truth, she spat lies at me. When pushed to the edge, she attacked instead of relenting, and all I had on hand was that knife you’d planned to stab me with.
Then I fed her lies until all she could think of was killing you.
It was simple, really. I told her that you’d poisoned Niles with that very knife, and once she had that in her mind, she was not to be reasoned with.
Love makes people do stupid things. I know Niles and Lou have been involved with the poison, and I would like answers. ”
“And you think you’ll get that by killing Wick and sending Niles out to decimate all of the vampires?” I truly never understand this man’s way of thinking.
“Wick was for you; I already told you that. I know he killed your parents, and it was my little gift for everything you’ve done all these years.
And the rest? I mean… either I could spend days or months or even years trying to track down the origin, or I could watch as Wick gathers everyone into one spot and I let them burn in the sunlight.
There might have been a few unnecessary casualties, but certainly less than there would have been if this poison got out.
” He seems quite pleased by this as he smiles at the thought.
“You are an actual psychopath,” I realize. “You might have only killed innocent people today.”
“I didn’t kill anyone. I merely pointed Niles in that direction and left him to do his work. My brother really is an overachiever.”
I’m seething. How could anyone care so very little about the lives of others? “You could have gotten us killed! You literally sent us there.”
Morpheus shrugs, obviously not caring. “You’re all fine… well, you look fine to me.”
I’m livid, but he doesn’t care. Of course he doesn’t. He never has. He’s only ever cared about his own wants and desires.