Chapter 31
Needles of pain prick every inch of my skull, the lids of my eyes. When I try to open them, I suck in a sharp breath, shut them again. The lighting is low, wherever I am, but it’s enough to hurt.
It’s freezing, and I’m sitting on something hard. With a groan, I bring my hands up to massage my temples. I open my eyes again, slower this time, let them adjust. My vision is blurry; odd, dark shapes surround me. I hear a soft sound, like a girlish sigh. Delia, I think.
And then I remember.
Panic bursts through me, and terror has my vision clearing shockingly fast.
I recognize where I am in snippets.
The hard, cold pew beneath me. Low, flickering candlelight. My harsh, shallow breaths echoing against cavernous, stony walls. The pillars. The giant stained-glass window of a saint shoving a lance through the chest of a shadow monster.
The church. I’m at the church where Hayden saved me, revealed his truth to me.
“Nice place, right? Love the vibe.” I jerk my head toward her voice to find Delia sitting on top of the altar, one leg tucked against her chest, the other dangling over the side, swinging back and forth.
“You’re welcome, by the way. If it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t have had your sexy little vampire-reveal party here.
Could’ve had you jump off the campus bell tower, but there’s no stained glass there. Not as picturesque, you know?”
I lick my lips, dry as sandpaper. Delia was the one behind my sleepwalking episode?
A low, pained groan turns my blood to ice. Delia glances down at the base of the altar, and I stand up, shaking horribly, to follow her line of sight. I clap my hands over my mouth.
“Hayden,” I choke.
Hayden, wrists and ankles handcuffed, is slumped over on the ground, unconscious. Strangely, he looks drenched in water, his shirt and jeans soaked and his hair plastered to his skull. His skin is gray, and he’s not moving. Not even a little.
“Oh, don’t worry.” Delia nudges Hayden’s chin with her ballet flat. “Just a little holy water. Come on. You think I’d kill him right now? After everything? Please. I thought you knew me.” She purses her lips, and her voice drops to a whisper. “I’m gonna take my time with him.”
Delia hops off the altar and looks down at Hayden thoughtfully, nudging him again with her foot. When he groans, it sounds worse this time.
This can’t be real. I squeeze my eyes shut and lean heavily against the back of the pew, trying not to puke.
I need to keep her from hurting Hayden more. How?
My eyes snap open, and I look wildly around the church for anything helpful. A couple rows back, hanging on one of the stone support pillars, I find it: a wooden cross with tapered ends. It’s not much.
But it’s something.
Delia’s still staring down at Hayden, looking deep in thought. I hold my breath, inch my way out of the pew, willing my heart to stay calm.
I break into a run.
Delia’s laugh echoes behind me, but I make it to the pillar and swipe the cross, holding it like a knife. I whirl around, but Delia’s not at the altar. She’s not anywhere.
“My, my, so disrespectful.” Delia’s breath brushes my temple, and she hooks her cold chin over my shoulder, pressing close against me. She slips the cross from my hand and takes ahold of my index finger. “This is a gentle reminder for you to mind your elders.”
With a sickening crack, Delia bends my finger back until it lies completely flush against my hand. I scream, the pain so shocking and sudden I double over, gasping, my stomach lurching.
Delia grabs my hair and drags me back. “Don’t do that.
” She throws me down on the front pew, where I cradle my injured hand to my chest. Delia wags the cross at me, looking terribly disappointed.
“Must I remind you that you have nine other fingers and ten more toes? Not to mention teeth. And if that’s not enough?
” Delia presses the sharp end of the cross against Hayden’s temple.
I go completely still. Compliant.
“That’s what I thought.” Delia leans against the altar, dropping her head back with a sigh and twirling the cross.
I’m trying very hard not to cry. Something tells me I’ll be punished for it.
Which is ironic, given that before tonight, the one person I felt the safest crying in front of was Delia.
The thought pushes me over the edge, and, horrifyingly, I feel tears leak out of the corner of my eye.
When Delia notices, I turn my face away.
“Sorry,” I say thickly. “I’ll be quiet. Just, please don’t hurt him any more.” I feel a whoosh, and Delia’s suddenly sitting beside me on the pew, offering me a thick white cloth with a small cross embroidered on the edge.
“Jesus, Rose,” she says gently. “I’m not a monster. You can cry, for fuck’s sake. Here. Have a chalice veil.”
“I don’t understand,” I whisper. “I meant it when I said I loved you.”
Delia slides her eyes over to Hayden’s inert form.
“I know you did,” she says finally.
“I think Hayden meant it too. He really does care—”
An earsplitting crack shuts me up. Delia’s snapped off a huge chunk of pew in her fist. She stands up, throwing it over her shoulder, and wipes her mouth.
“Alright, Rose. I need you to understand something right now. That guy?” Delia stabs a finger at Hayden. “That guy is a selfish. Piece. Of. Shit.”
“Wh-why?” I whisper. But I think I can guess. I think I’m starting to understand. Delia turns her eyes to me, and they’re raw. Yes, I think I might know.
“He killed Nico,” she says simply. Looking lost, she walks back to the altar, leans against it.
“I told you a version of the truth. Nico and I were passing through a forest. I was thirsty. Nico hunted for me because I asked. He saw a girl, eighteen, perfect for draining.” Delia’s eyes find mine.
“Little did we know she was already claimed. I watched, horrified, in the bushes while Hayden ripped Nico’s head from his body to save you.
“When Nico was dead, you both ran, and I wanted to chase after, avenge him, but I couldn’t…
I couldn’t leave him.” Delia’s eyes get hard.
“Do you know what happens when a vampire dies? They…revert to their human form. So, however old they are, that’s how old their corpse is.
Nico was thousands of years old, Rose.” Hatred and sorrow contort her beautiful features into something ugly.
“Hayden left me with a pile of ash. I didn’t have a body to hold.
” Her jaw grinds together, her fangs poking from her lips.
“I went to every witch and warlock I could find. Pretty quickly, it became clear that once you meet the true death, that’s it. There was no bringing Nico back.
“So then my quest changed. I was no longer interested in resurrection. I wanted revenge.” Delia sighs dreamily.
“Fuck. Like I’ve said before, I love witches.
I found a particularly sadistic one.” With a graceful leap, she perches back on the broken altar, crossing her legs.
“Together, we came up with: What if Hayden was forced to go through what I went through, but over and over and over? The love of his life, a silly little mortal girl, would fall in love with him and die, violently, just before she turned nineteen, despite his very best efforts, and then reincarnate to do the whole song and dance over again.” Delia claps her hands, dark eyes bright.
“I get a human to do the dirty work, and then, you wanna know the best part? The very best part?
“His dear, sweet, darling best friend, Delia, is always there to mourn alongside him, wipe those tears of his away…so she could eat them for dessert.”
Delia bares her fangs down at Hayden, and a clap of thunder shakes the church.
“Do you know what it’s been like, Rose? To listen to him bitch.
And whine. Like a fucking mule. Because he lost you for, like, a couple of decades?
And then he gets you back!” Delia’s voice is rising, shrill.
Her hair is fluttering as if in some invisible wind, her eyes filling with darkness.
“He had no clue. No clue how lucky he was.”
“So,” I begin in the tiniest voice, “it was you who cursed him?”
“No,” she says, “I cursed you.”
“What?” I blink, dizzy. “So…so it wasn’t…like, proximity to him wouldn’t have changed—”
“Nah, all his stupid theories were wrong.” Delia shrugs a shoulder.
“As far as proximity goes, I did need you to fall in love with him. Otherwise, doesn’t hit as hard.
So, yeah, when he was all emo and shit and said he was gonna stay away this time, I had to be a little more hands-on, as it were.
He was surprisingly stubborn. I was so annoyed when he rescued you from the truck and then just left you there. Very not him, by the way.”
“The accident,” I croak. “That was you?”
Delia frowns at my tone. “Don’t sound so surprised. That was nothing. I mind-controlled a sleepy driver to get sleepier, no biggie.” Delia snorts all of a sudden. “And come on, you had to have been a little suspicious…like, a full ride to Payen? You actually thought you’d earned that?”
This whole time. Delia’s orchestrations are the only reason I’m here. I feel so, so stupid.
“You killed Remy to get close to me.” Something horrible occurs to me. “Did Hayden know?”
Delia throws her head back and laughs. “My god, no. That fucking hypocrite got all Buddhist after he killed Nico. He just thought I’d mind-controlled Remy to go back to New York.”
“Then why—”
“Because she was a bitch.” Delia pouts, folds her arms. “I just left out the part where I sucked her dry. She tasted terrible, by the way.” Delia cocks her head, giving me a very fangy smile.
“I’ve heard your blood’s divine.” Her face morphs into annoyance.
“Julian wanted to drink your blood so bad. Word to the wise? Never turn an entitled asshole. They’re so much worse when they’re vampires. ”
“You…you turned Julian?” I rasp. I close my eyes, try very hard to breathe down my nausea. My finger dangles uselessly, throbbing with pain that shoots all the way up my arm to my throat.