Chapter 41
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The villa’s opulent living room wasn’t designed with military strategy in mind.
Valeria’s decorator—or whoever furnished this place—had gone for luxurious, not functional design, which meant the maps and papers kept sliding off the too-low coffee table, no matter how many times Severin rearranged them or how colorfully he swore.
The couch was too soft, and the chairs were too small, and everyone was grumpy, crammed in together, elbows jostling, knees bumping, in a too-small room where tempers were unraveling faster than the plan in front of us.
Gabriel sat beside me on the very edge of the couch, a folded map balanced on his knee as he sketched the corridors leading to the council chamber, which we’d use as a funnel to trap the Drax.
We’d settled on a two-pronged approach. One advance team to go in quietly and take out as many hostiles as possible. Then a full assault on the weakened security forces before Giovanni knew what hit him.
Emilia was working on her own plan—not that she’d share the details—to get Blackwood out of the city in the next two days, removing him from the equation completely.
Not a perfect plan but the beginning of one.
Valeria sat cross-legged on the floor, her gaze empty as she stared off into the afternoon sun, as if she’d forgotten we were here.
Gabriel had returned from the countryside, face as grim as I’d ever seen it, a new resolve to him. He’d quietly explained what he’d found to Valeria, held her while she’d cried, then sat down and begun planning my uncle’s demise.
I tucked my feet under me, debating what to say. Not that there were any words to fix the damage Giovanni had done.
In the months since my father died, my uncle had gone from trusted mentor to enemy, but now, he was something else. Something to be stamped out and erased from the world, then the stain washed clean so there was no residue left behind.
“The city is the real problem.” Gabriel tapped his pen against the margin of the map, showing the wide perimeter around the target building.
“Even with twice the manpower, we cannot fight Giovanni in Venice. The canals limit our approach vectors, the density of the buildings means fire is catastrophic, and the humans—”
“Are everywhere,” Dante finished from the armchair. “Yes, you’ve said. Several times, now.”
His brother pinched his lips together. “It bears repeating, asshole. We can’t take the chance of mass casualties. Which means Giovanni has to leave Venice.”
“Which he’s not going to do.” Nico yawned, fingers laced behind his head. His wineglass was half empty, his bare feet dangerously close to Gabriel’s map.
“Actually, he will.” I’d been turning over the Basin problem in the back of my mind for the last two hours and had come to one irrefutable conclusion.
“My uncle would leave the security of Venice for the Basin. He would do anything to reclaim the thing, and we just so happen to have two. The real one and the fake one. We could leverage his own greed against him. Lure him into the open, and the Basin is the best way.”
“We could set a trap,” Severin agreed, standing behind the settee, the same spot where he’d been since he’d arrived. “What did you have in mind?”
“First, I want solid numbers, Severin,” Gabriel interrupted, setting down his pen. “We’re not leaving anything to chance. I want to know we can bury them with firepower, if nothing else.”
Severin clasped his hands behind his back, chest out.
“Four thousand Draconi soldiers are at the fortress. Battle-trained, long-service veterans, not conscripts and many are powerful enough to hold their own against any magic-wielders Giovanni has fighting for him. Blackwood’s guards will make a stand, but only the ones who create the Drax are marked.
Nico told me to look for the silver stars, and we’ll take them out first.”
Four thousand.
“Numbers on Blackwood’s contingent and any Dynasty guards who defected to join his ranks?” Gabriel looked to Severin, but it was Valeria who answered.
“Less than a thousand at last count, according to my spies,” Valeria said from the floor, holding her phone face down. “That number may even be lower.”
“Four hundred priests will fight with you.” Emilia’s voice was firm, the first time she’d spoken since she’d arrived.
“They are not soldiers, but their magic is every bit as strong as our enemies, and they know how to fight. And in this battle, their particular brand of magic will be effective, given what we are facing.”
“The Drax,” I said.
“The Drax,” she confirmed. “They are constructs of dark magic, birthed from forbidden spells. My priests cannot fight them the way Nico can—his shadows are birthed from a different source—but they can encase the nests using ancient binding spells before they are complete.”
“So… they’ll stop the Drax from hatching?”
“Exactly. Not kill them but trap them before they cross over into this realm. Which won’t address the existing Drax but will prevent them from adding to the numbers.”
“We still don’t know how many Drax there are.” Dante’s jaw flexed. “We don’t know how many his guards can summon or how quickly. We’re planning around a variable we can’t quantify.”
“Which is why the guards who summon them are the priority target,” Nico explained. “They also have a dark mark here.” He tapped a spot below his right jaw. “There will be a black stain, like a tattoo, and those silver stars on their lapel.”
Dante looked at me.
“We’ll have to get close, then,” I mused.
“Which is why you’re not getting close at all,” Dante growled. “Moglie.”
I refrained from rolling my eyes. “We’ve been over this, marito. We don’t exactly have the excess manpower to…”
The first sound could have been anything. A soft click, like a joint popping, the kind of thing you dismissed out of habit. And yet, the fine hairs along the back of my neck stood all the way up.
“Something just happened to the wards,” Emilia murmured, staring down the darkened hall. “Almost like…”
The thing materialized out of the dark hallway.
Like shadows fragmenting apart, then solidifying.
The Drax was wrong in all the ways I remembered from before, too many legs moving in a horrible, purposeful rhythm, its shell of a body gleaming, mouth gaping, mandibles clicking.
Valeria curled in on herself and moaned.
A second one appeared directly behind the first, and for one frozen second, everyone in the room went completely still.
As one, we burst into motion, the coffee table flying sideways as Severin vaulted over the couch, papers scattering, wine glasses shattering, shards flying everywhere as he threw himself in front of Emilia.
Dante burst out of the armchair. Nico was on his feet, shadows bleeding from his hands, lips pulled back from his fangs as he roared out a warning. Gabriel had his knife out—useless against these things—lunging for Valeria, taking her arm and dragging her behind the couch.
Sensing movement, that first Drax lunged for Gabriel, rounded body low to the ground.
Gods, the thing was hunting.
“Gabriel,” I screamed, reaching for him.
Which was why I didn’t see the second one when it hit me from behind and slammed me down to the floor.
I threw up my arm, fragile skin and bone my only shield against all those teeth, but this was all I had. I braced for the coming pain, panic seizing my lungs and squeezing them tight, wringing every drop of air out in a scream that ripped between my lips and ended on a curse.
The beast wasn’t after my body—it wanted something far more valuable—and while injuries could be healed, I seriously doubted I’d survive long without my soul.
Oh gods, my heart was going to burst, it was pounding so fast, and there was no way out, no way for me to stop this. Time slowed to a crawl as fetid breath shoved up into my nose and down my throat.
Sharpened mandibles closed around my wrist and cleaved, blood spraying as arteries severed, tendons, too, my hand going limp, arm numb.
Pain blurred my vision as I kicked up with both feet, heels hammering the bottom of the hard shell, and sent the Drax skittering away.
I’d barely gotten upright, and the thing was back, spraying blood—my blood—all over the floor.
I made it two agonizing steps.
Then I was down again.
My face smashed into the rug, and the nauseating weight of the creature landed across my back and legs, pinning me down like gravity had decided to take the fucker’s side. I shoved up, arms and legs straining.
Shoved with everything I had, and it didn’t matter.
I couldn’t budge the heavy fucker off me.
All around me, people screamed, and fire roared, Nico’s shadows obscuring most of the chaos. Then cold flooded through me, like I was slowly being immersed in a vat of ice water.
This wasn’t pain, exactly.
This was my marrow being sucked out of my bones, a tide that would never come back in. Emptiness carved a hole deep inside me, my legs jerking uncontrollably, and the Drax drew and drew and drew, with a hunger that would never be satisfied.
It was done.
I was losing my soul.
The horror I’d understood intellectually was happening to me, and I couldn’t save myself. All I could do was make a pathetic moaning sound, fingers clawing the floor.
More feet pounded in. Gunshots. Shouting.
Valeria’s soldiers, but they were too late, and now they’d just die, too.
Dante roared.
A sound of such raw, helpless fury, even that cold, drawing sensation paused.
Fire erupted, blistering heat washing over me, wool burning as the rug caught fire, flames crackling, the floor beneath me smoking. Another wave of flame rolled across the room, and I knew with a sickening certainty that fire wouldn’t work.
Only Nico’s shadows killed these things.
But he would try. Dante would give his life trying to save me.
The room darkened, my vision going spotty.
“Dante, stop…” Nico’s voice cut through the heat, a raw scream I’d never heard from him before. “You’ll hurt her… get back… let me…”
I tried to say something, but the pulling only grew stronger.
I wasn’t all the way gone. I still felt my blood pumping out through my wrist, the rough rug scratching my cheek, and the horrid weight of the Drax crushing me down to the floor. But the edges of my awareness were thinning, my thoughts floating away, where I couldn’t hold on to them anymore.
“Stay the fuck out of my way…”
A crash. Something heavy toppling, the floor shaking violently beneath me. Through the slits of my half-opened lids, Gabriel fell to his knees beneath the other Drax, his knife hand speared through by the sharpened tip of one stabbing leg.
Oh gods, no. Please.
Spare him.
Those blue eyes found mine across three meters of scattered papers and broken glass, across the fire and shadows and screams.
His gaze burned with pure fury.
The incandescent rage of not being able to stop the inevitable.
I opened my mouth to tell him everything would be okay, but nothing came out.
The cold deepened.
Entombed me.
The room turned gray, color leaching out of everything, like the warmth fading from my dying body.