Chapter 20 | Sephania
Sephania
“Don’t take too much from my daughter,” my mother says from the corner of the room.
I’m sitting on the edge of a cot in one of the private sleeping rooms upstairs. Cyprilis is beside me, staring with a wide, deferential gaze at the blood beading on the small cut I made to my arm.
We’re joined by “Mother” Jinneth, Iron Sister Keffa beside her, and Garroway near me. The poor dhampir looks more nervous than I do.
“Yes, Mothe—” Cyprilis cuts herself off at a glower from me. Only one person can call Jinneth “Mother” when in my presence. “Yes, ma’am,” she amends.
“Master is going to hate this,” Garro croaks, biting his lower lip. He can’t tear his gaze away.
I narrow my eyes at him. “Skartovius is your master, not mine, Garro. Besides, he doesn’t need to know.”
The dhampir looks shocked I would even suggest keeping such a secret from Lord Ashfen, which makes me smile. I can be duplicitous as well, cub.
When Cy bends her head forward and takes my arm, her fangs glinting in her open mouth, I look away. She makes connection and I wince at the pulse of her slow, rhythmic drinking once her teeth have dug below the surface of my skin.
I look away to fight off the thrum of excitement that runs through me as she feeds, threatening to turn me into a mess. It’s always the same when one drinks blood—an arousal that is difficult to fight off. I’ve often preferred not to fight it. But in this moment, I definitely don’t want it.
Instead of focusing on the young-looking vampiress drinking from my arm, I stare at the parchment in my hand. We spent two hours compiling the list I required from Sister Cyprilis in exchange for my Loreblood.
There are six names on the list, the sheer number making my heart sink.
Two of them are humans living in Nuhav. Slavers.
The despicable scum she was sold to by the House of the Broken once Father Cullard tired of the poor girl.
Either one or both of them is responsible for the three children Cyprilis birthed.
She doesn’t know who the father of her children is, specifically, because they often took turns with her or took her together.
The thought of it disgusts me.
Even more disgusting, however, are the other four names: the vampires she was eventually sold to in Olhav, ripped away from her two children and soon-to-be third.
The third child led to massive blood loss and was going to be the death of Cyprilis, so one of the vampires turned her to keep her “alive” and make sure their investment was worth the cost. Together, the quartet kept her locked away to satisfy their base needs for years, as her human children grew up destitute and motherless in Nuhav.
One has to wonder if they’re even still alive, or if all this is for naught.
I briefly glance over at Cy, watching her suckle me like a babe to a tit, head bowed and lank hair framing her face as she sips.
My arm is nearly numb, not from the bloodletting but from being held upright and from the girl’s damned white-knuckled grip on me.
Can my Loreblood really be the answer to her problems? Can it sever the connection to her vampiric master enough to bring her humanity back to light? To give her warmth when regarding her whelps, rather than cold disregard and terror?
If it can, then this is groundbreaking. I imagine Keffa and Jinneth both realize it, which is why they are here to overlook the goings-on. If this . . . test truly succeeds, then I am a more powerful weapon than we even realized. I am a defense against the blight that consumes both cities.
It’s no wonder Alacine Mortis wants me so badly. I can’t even fathom what a cunning, diabolical bitch like her could use my blood for. Control, of course. Evermore power.
I’ve wanted to make a difference my entire life. To save Nuhav from their vampiric overlords and, in recent times, to change the entire society of the bloodsuckers in Olhav, where I will assist Skartovius in reshaping the city in his vision.
This can be the difference, I recognize.
If it works, then by the spirits and deities, it can blossom into something great.
I just never expected my great revolution to begin in the dreary, well-cracked confines of a dingy house owned by perpetually maligned women.
Fitting, I suppose. The women of the Chained Sisters are the foremost tarnished among both cities, the foremost wounded, and therefore deserve justice more than anyone else.
My fingers stiffen on the parchment I hold in my free hand. Staring at the names, committing them to memory. Scowling at them. I don’t recognize any of the vampires or humans, and I’m thankful for that. It doesn’t matter if I know them. I will find them.
Iron Sister Keffa, the painter of the giant naked portrait of my mother, is something of an artist. She spent two hours sketching rough drawings in ink under each of the six names, her drawings based on what Cyprilis remembered of their faces.
Now I have tiny portraits to fit each bastard, which will make finding them easier.
Justice begins with this list.
“That’s enough, girl,” Jinneth says in a scolding tone.
Though my thoughts have run wild, Cyprilis only drank from me for around thirty seconds. Just like that, the moment is over, and Garroway gently pulls Cy’s gasping face away from my arm.
I hide the bloody smear so Cy isn’t enticed to try drinking more, and wrap a bandage around the small wound. When I stand up from the cot, a wave of dizziness passes through me before I can steady my feet. I look down at Cyprilis, whose eyes are bright with vigor.
“Should I . . . feel anything yet?” Cyprilis asks, imploring the room with a wide stare.
Garroway chuckles, patting her bony shoulder. “It will take some time, lass. You must be patient. I have no doubt you will feel it in time. You’ll know.”
I nod down at the vampiress. “I will return every night for a week, until we see changes. That is my promise to you, Sister Cyprilis.”
I am not doing this because I pity you. I am doing this because I feel an innate urge for vengeance on your behalf.
At least that’s what I tell myself.
Jinneth and Keffa are left inspecting the vampiress to make sure she’s all right and relatively unchanged. I take Garroway’s hand and move for the door—
Halting when it flies open on rattling hinges.
Vallan Stellos takes up the entire frame, and then some. My eyes flash wide at the expression on his face, the violence with which he’s entered.
He looks wrong. There’s no other way to describe it. Vallan has perfected the indifference on his flat, handsome mug. But through the beard and mannerisms I’ve become acquainted to over time, I’ve learned a thing or two about this giant vampire.
There’s rage below the surface on his face, expertly hidden from anyone not knowing what to look for.
“Vall?” I eke out.
His eyes zero in on the bandage around my wrist. He takes in the room, the inhabitants, and lands on Cyprilis swiping away droplets of blood from her lips.
Then he sniffs the air and I know he can smell it.
“What the fuck is going on in here?” he demands.
I flare my nostrils, instantly defiant. “Nothing you need worry yourself with.”
Garroway, the damned dunce who can never stop himself, says, “Our little honey badger is helping a friend, is all, Vallan. What’s got your beard in a knot?”
“Nothing,” he snarls, and I know it’s more than nothing. Much more. “What’s that?” He nods his chin to the paper in my hand.
Garroway begins, “Awful inquisitive, aren’t you—”
“It’s a list of people we’re going to kill,” I answer matter-of-factly.
My big brute grunts. I love hearing that disgruntled sound, even if I hate what I see shadowing his face.
“Good,” he says. “I’ll help. Let’s go.”
Vallan looks ready to explode. I’m sure he’s had murder on his mind all evening, and this sounds like the perfect outlet for him.
I wonder, Is it wrong my body is sizzling with anticipation and lust just now? Truehearts weep, what’s fucking wrong with me? I’ve never looked forward to killing more than I have in this moment, staring into Vallan’s soulless, murderous eyes.
Garroway lifts his hands in surrender. “Master Skar isn’t going to like us setting off on our own, disrupting his finely wrought schemes.”
“Fuck Skar’s schemes,” Vallan says.
I smile wide, pushing past and slapping his ass on the way through the door. “That is what I want to hear, you big brute!”
He pauses at my usage of his sobriquet, staring down at me. “Who are those people on the list?”
“See for yourself.” I lift the page with the tiny pictures. “Recognize any names?”
“No.” He shrugs. “All the same to me.”
My smile returns. We head down the hall toward the stairs—
A hand grips my wrist, spinning me.
Garroway searches my face, all mirth gone from his smooth features. He looks suddenly serious, and I rarely see this side of the dhampir. “If we’re going to do this, little honey badger, then I want something from you as well.”
I flare my nostrils. “This isn’t a negotiation, Garroway. I’m not tallying favors to save these grotesque fucks—”
“I want a list of your own, lass.” His voice is startlingly flat, like he’s morphed into a different person completely.
“If you’re doing this for Sister Cyprilis, then I’m doing it for you.
You’re going to write down the names of every person who has ever harmed you, and you’re going to give it to me. ”