Chapter 22 #2
Beside me, a grinding sound started, and the floor opened. Slabs of marble lowered and slid back underneath, leaving a gaping hole. A block of deeply etched stone rose upward, shaped like a bed, and then the marble rearranged itself, closing the hole.
Excited voices raised in the crowd and anticipation filled the air. No matter how hard I stared, I couldn’t catch Lukas’s eye.
My hand was on the blade, but I couldn’t make a move until there was someone within reach that I could stab. At this point, I didn’t really care who it was, but whoever tried to place me on the altar was going to be my first victim.
My boyfriend’s name was on the tip of my tongue and Zaynan pressed his fingers to his lips. Glancing at Lukas again, his posture was still as firm and immoveable as my soon-to-be death bed. Finally, his gaze met mine.
It was as if he never knew me, and my heart squeezed in my chest. I could have been anyone. A stranger on the street, one of the maids scampering up and down the hallways with fresh linens. Gone was the man who stared at me like the sun and moon set on my ass.
That day he’d taken me to the river, and we’d seen the unicorn had been the best day of my life.
I’d scared the shit out of him, when I’d walked up to it.
The look on his face would remain forever engraved in my memory.
He looked terrified to lose me. He’d never said the words, but I’d known then that he loved me.
Whoever that man had been, he wasn’t here now.
Lukas stood up and walked down the couple of steps and stopped at the base, his long coat trailing on the stairs. How cruel it was that someone so fiercely beautiful in every way could have shown me love and then so easily have thrown it aside.
Annalise walked over to one of the attendants who handed her a long, double-edged sword. She carried it on her palms and stopped in front of Lukas. “You know what must be done. Your Queen demands it.”
He bowed his head, and his long silvery hair fell over his shoulders. He accepted the weapon as she laid it across his outstretched hands.
Annalise raised her arms at her sides, slowly bringing them up into the air over her head and the hooded men started moving, coming closer and tightening the circle they’d formed. Three of them separated from the group and walked towards me.
The moment I pulled the stiletto from its holster, was the same moment Zaynan darted toward me, lifting me off my feet.
The sound was like thunder, and it felt like I’d been ripped through a thick spiderweb.
He slung me over his shoulder and my hair loosened from its ponytail, spilling around my face.
The crowd yelled their outrage and disappointment over the sudden interruption, and I heard Annalise’s shriek rising above the commotion. The lights overhead shattered and the hooded figures swarmed us.
Zaynan had a solid grip on me, but I clung to him and turned my head to search for the man who would have let me be bled out for dinner.
Lukas was wielding the sword that had been meant for me, cutting down the robed men in vicious arcs. His coat and shirt were off, and streaks of red dripped down his chest. He was moving so fast that he appeared nearly translucent, and I kept blinking my eyes, trying to make sense of what I saw.
Red mist tinged the air as the crowd fled, and Lukas clashed with the assailants. Annalise had disappeared and I couldn’t see Kalix anywhere.
My chin banged against Zaynan’s shoulder blade as he moved us and in a split second, we were in a small room. He dumped me on a cushioned bench as if I were a sack of potatoes, making me grunt.
“What were you thinking, going in there?”
Pulling myself up, my fingers curled around the edge of my seat. “I don’t know, maybe because I couldn’t just sit around and wait to find out what happened to him? It's not like Annalise would let either of us live. Didn’t you say she was pissed?”
He gave me a dirty look and twirled around. His hands went to his hips and then he raised his fist and punched the wall. “All of you are fucking crazy,” he growled, and ran his bleeding hand through his hair.
I stood and wrapped my arms around my middle. “It’s not like I asked for any of this.”
Zaynan’s jaw ticked to the side. The floor rolled beneath our feet as something crashed to the ground with a thunderous boom on the other side of the wall. “We need to get out of here.”
“What about Lukas?” I asked.
“I have the feeling he can take care of himself.”
A puff of smoke drifted from under the edge of the door, and I shoved the stiletto back inside its holster. “It doesn’t sound friendly out there.”
“Quiet. I’m thinking.” Zaynan rubbed his chin. “The Fourth. I think you should be okay there; people say it’s pretty friendly. Compared to other places I could leave you. Don’t look at me like that.”
Another boom. “But how will he know where I am? I barely understand this Realm and you’re going to just dump me somewhere else?”
“You’ll be fine, take my hands.”
I stared at his outstretched hands. “You know what he did to Kiam, right?”
He smirked. “Unlike Kiam, I’ll flay him alive if he tries anything with me.”
“You already touched my ass, how much worse can it get?” He had to, to carry me, but knowing Lukas it wouldn’t matter.
He drew closer and waited for me. “Come on, we need to go.”
Something hit the door and I grabbed his hands. “Fine, whatever. Are you going to come back and help him? How will he find us?”
He tugged me closer and every cell in my body screamed at me to get away. “You drank his blood, he’ll find you.”
“You’re going to have to hang onto me. I’ve never done this before on my own,” he warned me. “Tighter than that.”
My arms wrapped around him the same way they did with Lukas when he’d relocated us the few times. “What the hell? You don’t know how to do this?”
He took a deep breath. “No. But I’ve done some reading and watched others.”
Lukas had told me Kiam grabbed him from the Third Realm, which apparently my home was. “Wait. So, you didn’t know you’re a vampire?”
He rolled his eyes. “The insatiable urge for blood left me confounded my whole life.”
“Dumbass,” I retorted.
A cracking sound split the air, and the door caved in with a gust of wind.