CHAPTER 16
DANI AWOKE TO brIGHT, blinding light and a dull pain in her side. She screamed, arching off the hard wooden table. But try as she might to get free, arms held her fast.
“No, please,” she begged, about to scream again when a wrist was pressed to her mouth.
“Drink, Dani,” Alex commanded. “You need to take more blood.”
She gasped, trying to turn her head. “It hurts.”
Oh gods, it hurt. But she was too weak to fight. Her limbs felt cold and watery. The unfamiliar room swirled around her, dull and blurry at the edges.
“Can’t you give her something else?” Alex snapped. “She’s still in pain.”
“I’ve already given her more than I should have.” Sera dropped something metallic onto a tray. “If I give her any more, she could pass out again. She has to get more blood down if she has any hope of surviving this.”
Alex pressed his lips to her forehead, then lowered his wrist back to her mouth.
“You have to take more. I’m so sorry it hurts.”
His voice sounded far away. Dani struggled to focus, to hang onto what he was saying when she wanted to drift off again, to escape the pain. She closed her eyes and he shook her again, forcing her to stay awake.
“Please,” she whispered. “It hurts.”
“You have to drink, or you’re going to die. And I will not lose you, Daniela. Not like this. Now drink.”
She wanted to be sick, was sure she couldn’t keep anything down with the pain radiating through her belly. But somehow, she drew one weak mouthful of blood, then another.
“That’s it. You’re doing so well.” He turned to Sera. “You’re sure it’s in there?”
“No exit wound.” Her voice had taken on an edge. “I have to get the bullet out. I can’t find it.”
“You have like, four pairs of surgical gloves on.”
“I know what I’m doing, Alexander,” she snapped.
Dani whimpered at the pressure as Sera’s fingers probed her side.
“You’re hurting her.”
“I gave her the strongest sedative I could without knocking her out entirely. If I do that, she can’t drink. We just have to get enough of your blood into her, and then she’ll start to turn. It’s the only way.” She swore under her breath. “Urgh, I just had it.”
“Take the damn gloves off. You aren’t going to kill her if you touch her by accident.”
“Yes, please mansplain germ theory to me, since only one of us actually went to medical school. It’s important that I wear gloves for this, you know.”
“You don’t have to wear four pairs. This isn’t about preventing infection and you know it. This is about you being terrified you’ll lose control of your power.”
Sera hesitated. “If I do, I could kill her.”
“You won’t. I trust you. Now, get the damn bullet out. Hurry.”
The world blurred around the edges again. Dani tried to hang on, tried to keep drinking from Alex’s wrist, but felt everything around her slowing as she slipped away.
When she woke again, the room was dark. The sticky, bloody clothes she’d been wearing were gone and she was in an unfamiliar bed.
“Her heartrate is too slow,” Sera murmured, her fingers cold at her wrist. “And I don’t like her color. But she’s held on this long.”
“Her fangs are starting to change,” Alex said softly. “It’s taking.” He traced her face. “Can you feed her this time? I’m getting a little dizzy.”
“I would, but I think it needs to be your blood. You’re her mate. We have juice in the fridge, and I can make you stir fry with protein, but her best chance of the change taking is feeding from you.”
“No, you’re right. I’ll be fine.”
Dani blinked, finally managing to force her eyelashes to part. She tried to speak, but her throat was so raw it hurt.
“Alex,” she croaked.
“You’re awake,” he murmured, eyes glassy. “You’re going to be okay.”
“I feel terrible.”
“I know. You need to take more blood.”
And this time, when he pressed his wrist to her lips, when that first taste touched her tongue and she moaned in relief, when she felt the soreness in weak canine teeth that were trying to descend from the top of her mouth, she knew.
She was changing.
And there was no going back.
She drank deeply, until she thought she would pass out. When at last she was sated, Alex smoothed her hair and lay her gently back against the pillow.
“Dante just texted,” Sera murmured. “Everything is in place.”
Dani tried to hang on, desperate to hear what they were saying, even as she was so exhausted she wanted to sleep for weeks.
Alex quietly swore. “We’re down to four hours.”
“One of us needs to go,” Sera said. “You stay. I’ll meet him at the rendezvous point.”
“No, it should be me.” Alex hesitated. “If something happens, if she starts bleeding internally again, you’re the one with the expertise to help her. I would just be here, alone and panicking, and that won’t do either of us any good.”
“Okay.” Sera didn’t sound happy. “But you look really pale. Let me make you something to eat before you go.”
“There isn’t time. I have protein bars back at my apartment.”
“Fine.” Sera sighed. “At least drink some juice and hydrate before you go.”
Dani felt Alex leaning over her. Lips brushed against her forehead. “I’ll be back as soon as I can. Everything is going to be okay now. I promise.”
She tried to reach for his hand, to beg him to stay, but exhaustion dragged her under before the words could form.
In his apartment back at the castle, Alex checked his phone for what had to be the tenth time, hoping for an update from his sister saying that Dani had woken up.
To be fair, Sera had texted every quarter hour as promised, after making him swear he would let her know when they were about to go dark. So far, there had been no change.
Dani would be okay. She had to be okay.
“Any news?” Henri asked quietly from beside him.
“She’s stable. But she lost a lot of blood. Sera said if we hadn’t gotten there as quickly as we did, it would have been bad. It’s still touch and go. We’ll know more over the next twenty-four hours.”
“Any theories on who shot her?”
“Plenty.” Alex felt his jaw tighten. “But she wasn’t coherent enough to answer questions. She just kept slipping in and out of consciousness, asking for her sister. Sera said the sedative was making her hallucinate.”
“The worst of it is behind her now.” Henri squeezed his shoulder. “You turned her. Your blood will allow her body to heal.”
“I’m terrified for her, Henri.” Alex paced across the sitting room. “You know what happened with my mother. And hers was an ordinary, planned turning where she and Father did everything by the book. This was anything but. If I didn’t give her enough blood—”
“You did everything you could. Dani is strong. Now you need to be strong for her.”
“You’re right.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Sera was amazing. She managed to get the bleeding stopped. I was sure we would never get enough blood into her to get the turning process started, but somehow, we did.”
“I just texted Isabella again.” Dante came into the room and quietly shut the door behind him. “She didn’t answer.”
“She’s probably busy in the lab. You know how she gets.”
“She left me on read. And this is the second message I’ve sent that she’s ignored. I don’t like this.”
An uneasy feeling churned in Alex’s gut. “We knew this was never going to be easy for her, going against Judas. She got us the information we needed.”
“I know you want to believe she’s with us, Alex,” Dante said quietly. “But I’m not sure we can trust her.”
“I said some harsh things when I confronted her. The conversation got very heated. I think she needs the help that she never truly got after Mom passed and maybe is now at a place where she can finally acknowledge that.”
Henri cleared his throat. “How many prisoners do we think are down there?”
“About three dozen at last count, but that number may have changed. I’ll work on unlocking the shackles and you and Dante can take them out two at a time.”
“Even taking them in groups, that’s going to be a lot of trips. And it runs the risk either of us might not be able to dematerialize in to get the last groups out.”
Alex sighed. He’d considered that, of course. Most vampires couldn’t shift into smoke and travel at all. For the few that could, making too many jumps in a row was taxing.
“As soon as I get all the shackles unlocked, I’ll be able to help. The wards in the castle prevent anyone who isn’t recognized from passing through. Sera was supposed to be here, but she can’t leave Dani. That leaves just the three of us.”
“We’ll make it work.” Dante checked his phone. “We should go. They’re moving on the research facility now.”
“On three,” Alex said, making sure he had the fae dagger secured. “One… two…”
The moment he reformed in the prison ward, he yanked one of the preloaded syringes Sera had given them from his pocket, prepared to jab it into the neck of the first guard they encountered. He turned, scanning the long cell block.
Dante reformed beside him a few seconds later. “There’s no one posted at the north end of the unit. Henri’s checking the other side.”
“You think they got pulled in order to double the security detail on the king? Maybe they were tipped off about the attack on the research facility.”
“Could be.” His brother nodded towards the first cell. “Either way, we won’t get a second shot at this.”
Alex recognized the woman with dark curly hair he’d spoken to on their first visit.
“Your Highness.” Her face broke into a broad grin. “I knew I recognized you. You came back for us.”
“We don’t have much time. Put your hands through the bars. We’re going to get these off and then my brother is going to take you someplace safe.”
He touched the dagger to the lock, and carefully said the words in Elvish to unlock the spell. He held his breath, feeling briefly dizzy for a second as he pictured it failing, all of this having been for nothing. But then the shackles glowed blue and fell away.
“Hurry,” Dante urged him. “Henri is checking the rest of the ward, but this is taking too long for my liking.”
Her cellmate hurried forward. Alex freed her. Dante grabbed their hands. “This is going to feel a little weird.”
The first woman turned to Alex. “I’ll never forget this, Your Highness.”
A second later, they vanished in a swirl of smoke.
Two lives saved, he thought, hurrying to the next cell.
They quickly fell into a rhythm. The aberrant prisoners held their arms through the bars.
He released the shackles. Dante and Henri ghosted them out of the prison in pairs.
It took several minutes to clear each cell.
Alex could feel Dante’s eyes on him as he began to make mistakes reciting the words, his pronunciation getting sloppier.
They were down to the final ten prisoners they still needed to free when he realized he was sweating through his clothes.
“Your Highness?” Henri asked in concern, gripping his arm. “You look pale.”
“We’re almost done. Just a few more.” He shook his head to clear his vision. “I think the spell must drain a little out of you every time you repeat it. I can feel myself getting tired.”
And he’d been weakened before they’d even started from having to give Daniela so much of his blood. He should have taken Sera’s advice and stopped to eat something.
“Fae magic. Everything comes at a cost. Any bargain you make with them takes something from you in return.” Henri nodded to the dagger. “Do you want me to take a turn? I’m pretty sure I’ve heard you say it enough times by now.”
“Let’s just keep going. The pronunciation is a beast and we’re nearly done. I’m not sure I’m strong enough to dematerialize people out at this point anyway. You or Dante will have to take me on the last trip.”
Henri looked on with concern. “Sire—”
“Please. Let’s just hurry.”
He managed to empty the next two cells, had just sent Henri away with a pair of shaking women when the corridor flooded with blinding light. There was a loud explosion. Smoke filled the air.
He whirled, trying to focus, to concentrate long enough to scatter himself back up to his apartment in the upper wings of the palace. Surely he could travel that far? But his limbs were shaking with weakness, and even as he thought it, he knew it was no use.
“Alex!” Dante’s terrified shout carried through the smoke. “Where are you?”
Someone slammed into him from behind, nearly knocking him to the ground. Somehow, he managed to deflect the blow, sidestepping them in the dark and confusion and smoke.
“We’ve got them, sire.”
Through the ringing in his ears, he recognized the head of his father’s security detail, watched as they wrestled Dante to the ground and locked a set of fae bracelets around his wrists.
A guard came up behind him. Whirling, Alex punched them in the jaw.
He had one chance, seconds to decide.
Lunging forward, he stabbed the dagger into the lock binding his brother’s wrists.
“Stop him!” Judas Visconti roared.
Hands reached for him, but by then, Alex had already muttered the Elvish incantation, his legs giving out as he did so.
As he collapsed to the dank stone floor of the prison, he saw the shackles fall free.
“Alex,” Dante choked out, horror filling his eyes.
“Go,” he shouted to his brother. “Get out of here.”
Alex watched as one of the guards jabbed a syringe into his brother’s arm, sure he wasn’t going to make it.
Somehow, he did, vanishing in a blur of smoke.
His father’s scream of rage filled the dungeons.
In the terrible silence that followed, he slumped to the ground. The shackles they’d managed to lock around his wrist burned colder than anything he’d ever felt, sapping away any last will he had left to fight.
He thought of Dani, alone back in Sera’s safe house. If his father’s men found her, if she died because she needed more of his blood and he couldn’t get back to her—
Footsteps loomed over him.
“Where did they go?” When he said nothing, Judas continued, “You have one chance to secure a reduced sentence for the sanguine whore, and for your brother, and that is by your full cooperation.”
“Like I’d ever trust you,” he spat.
“Have it your way.” His father motioned to the guards to take him. “This is far from over, Alexander. You may think you’ve won, but make no mistake, you will comply, one way or another.”