Chapter 44
MARCUS
Ishove Leah behind me and face my brother. Too close. He’s too fucking close. The bond sparks in warning, and I snarl at Julian, who lingers beyond the wards, idly leaning against the wall.
“Slayer,” he says, just to irritate me, in the way of all brothers.
His gaze is on my mate, and a rumble dredges from my chest. “Brother,” he says with a smirk.
His eyes are fully black, as they have been for two centuries now.
I have not seen him without his fangs fully descended in just as long.
Madness rides him. I know now not to wish for things to be different. They will never be different for him.
He slides off the wall, his joints liquid. Leah stiffens. “You don’t have to kill him, Marcus.” Her voice is quiet and desperate, but I know he hears her.
My soft mate. “I do.”
“He’s your family. I know what it’s like to lose family.
” Her eyes are shadowed, even as she draws the silver dagger from its sheath.
“If he can stop killing, I can find a way to…forgive him.” The last words are husky with emotion, one that makes me want to draw her close and show her how special she is.
“How quaint,” Julian interjects before I can answer. “No, slayer. He’ll have to kill me, because I’m the big bad and he’s the good one.” His final words are mocking. “Or are you so good, brother?”
I pull the swords from my back. Normally, I’d fight with fangs and brute strength, but the surprised flare of my brother’s eyes tells me I’ve made the right choice. I step away from Leah and swing both swords, warming my wrists up, loosening my shoulders.
“I should have killed you years ago.”
Julian snarls, baring his teeth. “And there it is, brother. You should have killed me and you didn’t.” He scores one thumb with a fang and plants a hand on the wall. The ward pulses, then dissolves, and Leah makes a soft, shattered sound.
She’s pale, and the hand that grips her dagger shakes. “It hurts,” she grits. “I’m fine. Go, Marcus.”
“Remember the plan,” I tell her in a low voice. It’s a simple one. I fight him, weaken him, enough for Leah to hold him with her magic while I cut off his head. My fight, but her kill. We burn his body. Even a vampire cannot return from that.
Julian saunters through the front wall, deceptively calm, but blood drips from his nose. I’d bet anything he spent these intervening nights draining humans just to build enough strength to break the wards.
Leah lays a hand on my arm.
“Be sure,” she mutters.
I hadn’t even realized I was leaning forward. Like in the arena, all I can focus on is the prospect of killing. As I did for years, ignoring the problem in front of me, hoping he would change.
My brother is still smirking, looking as if he can read my mind. “Maybe if you had killed me, your precious mate’s parents would still live. Is that it, brother? Are you racked with guilt over the problem you didn’t solve?”
The words punch into my stomach. I’ve had those thoughts on many a night, with the slayer in my arms, but I have not given them voice.
A roar tears from my throat, and I vault the remaining steps onto the lawn.
Leah’s cry is sharp. Julian and I meet in a crash of swords and teeth.
He blurs, faster than I can swing, and goes straight for the throat.
He might be mad, but he knows my reach with the swords hampers me.
Julian was a fighter like I was, as brutal as I was, and now—he’s more vicious, strong from the humans he’s drained and with no mate to protect.
For the first time in my many centuries, real fear flares. It’s a hot, uncomfortable feeling.
Julian bares his teeth, his hand squeezing.
It’s a gesture made to intimidate since I don’t have any air to breathe.
Cocky, my brother. I rip his hand away and punch him in the stomach.
We roll, and something wrenches in my chest when his face fills my vision.
How many times did we fight like this as kids?
I sink my fangs into his arm, rip at his hand.
Sinew and bones part under my fangs, and cool blood fills my mouth.
A pain-filled growl tears from his throat before he opens a wound of his own on my chest. We roll again, over and over, a grasping tangle of limbs that blur with speed and punches no human could match.
We are overgrown, vicious teenagers again, and I bleed into the dirt.
My side is cool and sticky, my head light.
“I’ve had worse,” I taunt. “From fleas.” A left hook to his jaw. Spit and teeth fly.
He grunts and slashes across my throat. I twist at the last second. He draws more blood, but the wound isn’t mortal. Close. Too fucking close.
Half my attention is still on my mate. I can feel the bond vibrating as she reaches for her magic.
I can feel her frustration, and I send her a thought-image of support, of my hands cradling hers.
The damn bursts inside her. I feel it, even as my focus slips and my brother’s arm knocks my head back and bars my throat.
Leah cries out and lunges with her dagger, leaping the steps. Julian flashes us away as Leah advances. He hisses at her and drops his knee onto my stomach.
“No further, or he dies,” he growls.
She freezes.
He’s watching my mate, and I am pinned like a bug. I can do nothing. The bond. My instincts reach for it, telling me to draw on the power. Mated vampires are stronger than any other, even the fallen like Julian.
Emptiness greets me. I can send her thoughts, but I cannot draw from her. Not unless we seal it.
Julian seems to realize at the exact moment. His smile is delighted, edged with madness.
“You haven’t completed it.” Julian’s voice is awed. “She’s unclaimed.”
He says it like he can remedy that.
“Do not,” I rasp. I swipe blindly at his side, but he does not feel it, even as muscle tears beneath my hands.
“I lost mine,” he whispers. His voice is broken, his gaze wretched.
“We do not get two,” I say as gently as I can.
His face twists. The mad light is back in his eyes. “Greedy, brother,” he mutters. His fangs are in my face.
Now, Leah, I tell her.
Her fists spark. The tether lashes out and disappears. Her magic isn’t there. It’s not enough. She palms her throwing knives, hurling them one after the other into Julian’s back. She advances, face hard and wary. She won’t use stakes until there’s no chance of staking me instead.
“I have to try,” he says, ignoring the impact of each dagger that buries itself in his back, even as blood sprays onto my face. “We are brothers, you and I. I thought to kill her, but now she could be mine.”
“I’ll rip your heart from your chest.” I thrash, aiming for his chest. It’s futile.
He’s been toying with me. He grins, fangs in my face before he slams his palm against my chest. A crack, then blinding pain.
I black out for what I assume is seconds, and when I come to, Julian’s arm is banded around Leah’s waist and his fangs are millimeters from her throat.