Chapter 10 | Sephania
Sephania
We continue drinking for another hour, acting nonchalant.
I can tell it’s difficult for Garroway, which exhilarates me for some reason.
He wants to glance over his shoulder every few minutes to make sure Pukren is still there, carousing with his friends, but I force him to face forward so our cover isn’t given away.
For Garroway, gone is the notion of smoking redcloud in the den through that ominous closed door. His shoulders are high, bristling, and I know I’ve ignited something deep, resentful, and dangerous inside him.
Deep in my heart, I know I should be trying to talk Garro out of whatever he has planned. If he has any plan at all, it can’t be a good one. There’s murder in his eyes, and I seem to be a willing accomplice.
By the same token, I’ve been more than a willing accomplice in recent months. I’ve been an accessory. Culiar, Peltos, Dimmon, Madame Kleora, Bregsitch—I had a hand in each of their deaths.
Truehearts flog me, I practically toyed with Peltos before letting his victim—Helget, now a strong vampiress in her own right—clutch his heart out of his chest.
And then, of course, there’s Baylen Sallow. The boy I grew up with, idolized, and learned to hate. The boy I called brother once upon a time, before he crept down a dark path with Dimmon Plank and the Diplomats.
If there is any guilt I should feel for the people I’ve aided in dying, it should be Bay’s demise that rattles me most. I went out of my way to climb the outside walls of Manor Marquin and steal into his bedroom while he recovered from our bout at the shadowgala.
And then I fucked him and slit his throat. As simple as that, with no remorse plaguing me. I gave him everything he always wanted from me and everything he always deserved, all at the same time.
It is Baylen’s murder, I realize, that began my descent into darkness.
I’ve allowed Garroway, Vallan, and Skartovius to corrupt me in ways I never thought possible as a young girl.
I’ve watched Skar peel a man’s skin from his flesh, torture him, and turn him into a vampire to keep him alive so he would suffer for even longer.
For eternity, if I hadn’t shoved a stake through his heart and ended his suffering.
Now I’m watching a familiar scenario play out in this dank brothel . . . and I don’t feel shame, guilt, or remorse.
If anything, it’s the opposite: I’m invigorated by the prospect of killing another man who deserves it. Pukren the flesh auctioneer sells innocent girls and boys—snatched up from almshouses, homeless, and shelters—to trade with other disgusting men.
Men like him are a plague on Nuhav. If I ever want to change my human home for the better, I can’t only rely on eradicating the vampires of Olhav.
That is a crucial step, of course—aligning Skar to my motives of giving Nuhavians a better life, if and when he takes over the Five Ministries.
But another integral part must begin here, in Nuhav itself, by snuffing out the depraved men who help keep my city splashing in the gutter.
Being a sewerboy or guttergirl isn’t a crime. Trading people like commodities is a crime, which Pukren is guilty of. His two ugly friends at his table probably are, too.
I can’t just go killing everyone without proof though. I don’t know those men, so I can’t be judge, jury, and executioner for them until I know more about them. Pukren, however, I do know.
I take a sip of my third ale, pondering everything.
It’s quite tasty, though I’ve never been a big drinker other than a short stint with the Grimsons when I imbibed to numb my wounds after matches with my peers.
Antones and Lukain talked me out of sinking down a drunken path, saying it would water down my skills and mind.
They were right. However, the numbness starting to course through me now doesn’t feel unpleasant as I think about my destructive habits.
Something rustling next to me gets my attention, and I jolt upright. I’m not sure how long I’ve been slumping, lost in my thoughts.
It’s Garroway, rising to his feet. I move to put another hand to his arm to stay him, but he nudges his chin over my shoulder. Slowly, I glance over and spy Pukren rising from his table on wobbly, knobby legs.
The auctioneer slaps the table once, says something to his accomplices, and heads for the door of the brothel. The tint outside the windows tells me we’re about two hours from dawn, which means he’s been here all night. He’s likely smashed.
Rather than following Pukren, Garroway heads for the stairs leading up to the bedrooms. I follow, furrowing my brow, and he says nothing as he ascends in the opposite direction as the auctioneer.
When we crest the landing, he takes us to the third room on the left—unlocked as the barkeep promised. Inside, he hurries to the window and slides open the wooden aperture. A brisk breeze filters in.
“What are you planning, Garro?” I whisper. I’m not sure why I’m whispering since we’re alone. Probably because I know what we’re doing is wrong.
“One thing I know about drunks,” he mutters. “They need to piss. Often.” Staring out the window and down, he clicks his tongue. “Right on time.”
I peer down onto the dark street. Below us, Pukren stands in a damp alley between the road and the brothel. He’s pissing on the wall, both hands working at his waist while he sways in place. He’s also humming to himself.
I start to have second thoughts about this. “Garro—”
He’s already through the window. Pukren is so noisily oblivious while his stream continues between his legs, he doesn’t even hear the soft thud of Garroway as he lands like a feather behind the man.
I blink, eyes widening.
“I hear you like to victimize young girls and boys,” Garro says. There’s no pithy comment to follow or sarcastic overture like I’m used to with the dhampir. His voice is dark, certain, seething.
Pukren spins around, cock in his hands. “What in—”
Garro’s hand snaps out, grabs Pukren by the front of his face. There’s a short, muffled cry from the auctioneer.
I blink again—
And open my eyes just in time to see Garroway smash the back of Pukren’s skull against the stone wall. A sickening crack rings out, blood blooming in a crescent on the wall behind Pukren.
Garroway slams his head three more times, until the back of the auctioneer’s skull is caved in. The man goes limp, groaning from a smashed brain. That doesn’t stop Garro from leaning in and biting into his neck.
I hear a ragged tear, loud slurping. When Garroway pulls his head back, a river of blood spills down his chin. He’s so forceful with his withdrawal his teeth rip out the ligaments and veins of Pukren’s throat.
He lets the body drop into the piss puddle. Then he raises his dead gaze at me, lavender-red eyes alight with a thrilling hue.
I force my mouth to stay closed, heart thumping. It happened in twenty seconds or less.
Garroway climbs up the side of the wall like a boogeyman from a fable, hiking himself up nearly twenty feet in three long jumps, never slowing his stride.
I can’t keep from gawking any longer.
His hands perch on the windowsill, leaning into the dark room. His smile is depraved, blood trickling between his teeth and down his chin and neck. “Blech,” he says. “Disgusting, tainted blood. The man tastes awful.”
The haze in my head clears. I blink quickly, knowing I might not have the chance for a while because Garro is taking my focus. He looks disarmingly dangerous and handsome, moon silhouetting him against the sky.
“Maybe my blood will taste better for you,” I say lowly.
“I know it will, lass. If you’d only offer it.”
He puts a hand out.
I thread my fingers with his without thinking. I expect to pull him inside the room through the window, but instead he pulls me and I gasp when my body pitches forward. “Garro! Wh-What—”
“The views much better from up here, Mistress.” He gives me a wink, which looks much more deadly and imposing when his face is covered in another man’s blood. “Join me.”
All I can do is nod. I’ve never seen this demanding side of the grayskin, and I’d be lying if I said it didn’t arouse me.
Seeing him put an end to a despicable man was only the first nail in the coffin.
Now watching him orchestrate a devious affair undoes me, and I willingly squeeze my body through the window despite knowing I’ll drop twenty feet if he drops me.
“Hold tight,” he says, arm wrapping around my tense middle like an iron band.
Before I can respond, he hauls me into the air and grunts when pushing off. My world goes weightless, stomach plummeting to my feet as he jumps ten feet in the air with me in his arms, acting like I weigh nothing at all.
I’m not a small girl. I’m tall and thick. To see him handle me so easily shows me how much strength he truly has, even as a half-blood.
His free hand grips the lip of the roof, which he drags us over. Next thing I know, I’m on my back on the hard shingles of the roof, staring up at the moon and black sky.
His body frames mine a second later, taking residence above me and blocking the moonlight. Blood drips onto my face as he smiles down, arms framing my head. My feet dangle off the edge of the roof.
Our eyes search each other—his red and wild, mine dark and needful. Then I reach up and grip his throat, surprising him. I bare my teeth and he smiles as I yank his face to mine. My mouth sears over Garroway’s bloody lips. I taste the hot iron, the metallic texture, as my tongue collides with his.
Lifting a knee between us, I feel the bulge of him, constrained against his pants. My leg runs friction against his length and he groans in my mouth as I deepen the kiss.
My other hand wraps around Garroway’s body and I tug him closer. He’s thinner than me, wiry and built to be manhandled. I know he loves every waking second of it.