38. CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 38
Noa
Vampires thudded into the great hall: Barend, followed by Set and three others. From his position on the floor, Antoine held out a shaking hand, fingers splayed. He’d healed enough to speak, although his gravelly voice sent tremors along my spine. Death would use such a voice, nerve-jangling and arousing a shivery terror.
The Cariboo conscript lay unconscious at Antoine’s feet, still alive, although what waited for him might be something to avoid.
Set smiled at me with reassurance. Barend was on one knee, muttering his gratitude without making eye contact. Agreeing that he now owed a debt of honor.
“What will happen to Antoine?” I asked Set.
“We’ll take him home. Heal him. Our thanks to you, Noa,” she added quietly. “Barend won’t forget. Neither will Antoine. Their gratitude protects you.”
“I just want this over.”
So did the vampires. They closed in, cradling their sire before all of them vanished. Other than Set.
She gripped her hands. “Amal is close. I feel her energy.”
“Is she alone?”
“Too much turmoil to expect it.”
“I need them together,” I said evenly. Grayson and Amal.
“Shall I come with you?”
“No, she’ll know it’s a trap.”
“Then… may I?” Set slid a hand around my nape, leaned in with her fangs descending; my chest jerked like I’d been hit with a defibrillator.
“For protection,” she said, pulling back a fraction. “If Amal tries to turn you. My claim is stronger than hers. My venom in your veins will stop her.”
“Venom.” But the word “claim” chilled my blood. “You didn’t leave enough in the ruined runes?”
“The runes continue to protect you. The magic has healed. I offer an added level of protection.”
“What Barend offered.” Sacrificing a part of myself to achieve the goal.
“Not what Barend offered.”
Stress whipped through my veins, heated my fingertips. Angel quivered with readiness.
I forced my stiff lips to move. “How is it different, Set?”
She’d been Cleopatra’s handmaiden. Turned centuries ago, with knowledge gathered since the time of the pyramids and priests in white robes, the mysteries in mummified cats and a history of runes.
She cupped her palm against my cheek. “I know it’s hard to see the end. But in every life, we must choose to do what is right, no matter how it hurts. Duty does not come without cost, nor is it offered to the weak, those who sit and wait. Afraid to live. I would not turn you unless you asked, Noa Bishop. And even then, I would not turn one as strong and honorable as you.”
Her hand slid away while a smile played around her lips. “Your life as a vampire would be a disaster for the rest of us.”
“Julien,” I murmured. Too honorable to fit easily into vampire life.
“Julien,” she agreed. “Somewhere, along the thread of light, you’ll see the answers. What you’ve been asked to do. All I offer is protection.”
“How big a bite?”
“Not big at all.” She leaned in, her fangs a delicate piercing against the side of my neck. Seconds passed before she withdrew. “Now go. Find him.”
Angel jogged beside me as we ran down a silent corridor. “Up ahead,” she said without panting from the exertion. “Amal has a second throne room.”
“Thank you for being here.”
“No place I’d rather be—other than that tavern in town, drinking with the victorious, toasting the end of the blood queen and the rescue of the king.”
“Dread lord,” I said. “He’s not really a king.”
“Dread lord sounds so sexy.”
“If you want sexy, watch him move landscapes around.”
“No shit—he does that?”
“I wouldn’t lie.”
She focused on the gray stone corridor, the flashes of light through high arrow-slit windows. “How does it feel when a vampire bites?”
My feet thudded beside hers. “How does it feel to be an assassin?”
“Once, decades ago, the Blackfish cultivated that reputation. But not now. We accept kill contracts, but not because someone wants a problem solved.”
Muscles in my jaw ached. “Making those choices because they’re right?”
“Bad people live in this world, Noa. Preying on the innocent.” Angel’s voice lowered into steeled confidence. “I save those I can, and when I kill, when I order my men to kill… a decision can be morally gray and still be on the right side of justice.”
“When a vampire bites, all you feel is euphoria. And each time after that, you want more.”
“That could become a problem,” she said.
“I fight it every day.”
“How often have they bitten you?”
“Too many times. They say I need a lot of protection.”
My feet slapped against the stone, suddenly loud to my ears. The air chilled. Shadows turned murky. When I looked back, I was alone. Angel was nowhere to be seen.
It took only an instant to realize I’d slipped into a passage that closed behind me, leaving her on the outside. My body slicked with fear while my heart pounded. The alarm swarming through my head made thinking a struggle.
Work through it, Noa!
Amal never intended an easy approach. Traps would be everywhere. Even after the shadows in the throne room, the attack from conscripts, arrows, and her hybrid enforcer, I’d been foolish enough to stumble into a passage with dead ends. More of a pocket where I’d likely rot if I didn’t find a way out.
And I had no bow and arrows. I’d forgotten them in the madness of vampires.
But magic fueled passages, at least those belonging to the King of the Forest. I would find a solution if I focused.
Slowly, I ran my palms along the stone wall. Then the opposite wall. My fingers shook beneath the pressure to sense something—anything. Behind me, magic was smokey and solid, and six feet ahead, I came up against the same barrier.
Insubstantial mist concealed an impenetrable wall of black ice. Angel would be on the outside, looking for a way through. She wouldn’t find it. This trap was Amal’s doing. Her fury sank beneath my skin, and I felt her sick satisfaction. I’d spend my days circling this space the way I’d circled around a hidden cave above a nymph pool. My fingers might press until they numbed, but I’d never find a softening to mark the way out.
Every breath juddered with the remnants of old nightmares. I’d been trapped in the dark before, unable to move while terror approached. The feelings were the same, the panic rippling the way water ripples around a submerged predator. An invisible threat the prey still senses without knowing which way to run.
I needed to find Grayson. Needed to destroy Amal. When I gripped Pelonie’s rune stone, the grooves scraped across my skin. Of all the failures, why did this one feel like a puzzle I needed to work through? I’d opened passages before and saw no reason not to open one now. Although I’d not been consistent before… hadn’t understood how I did it…
I thought I heard breathing that wasn’t mine. Then a low laugh. “Such a determined little rat.”
Amal’s voice, bouncing around the passage as if she stood beside me. The same parroted trick she’d used with the dead witches and their upward flicking smiles. In unison, and devoid of emotion.
I glanced around the passage, peered through the dim light. Saw nothing that looked like Amal. “Are you worried?”
“I don’t worry about rats.” Another scornful laugh, floating through the dark mist. “I send my children after them.”
The abominations were her children?
“Perhaps you should worry more about those children. I left them behind in smoldering piles.”
Displeasure twisted the silence, a small victory. I ran my fingers over the passage walls, feeling for the weakness.
“I think you’re very worried about me,” I said. “The wrong choice I made. Barend took Antoine home. The vampires are not happy with you.”
“Many are on my side.”
“Perhaps not, now that you lost the hostage.” I pushed harder. “They say the sires are the worst when they’re angry. Set was also here. Wasn’t she your friend?”
“Betrayer,” hissed Amal, and although she was not physically present, the air moved as if she paced around. “Set never understood.”
“I think she understood what you’d become, and you hated her for it.”
The passage closed in with the grind of moving rocks.
My pulse jumped. “Let me out, Amal. Talk to me face-to-face.”
“Why?”
“I’m a worthy opponent. You’ve known that from the beginning. From the moment I came, I’ve heard you in my head. I’ve seen through your eyes. An alarming connection, don’t you think?”
“Lies.”
“I read your journal. The one where you drew a rune and scribbled about the nymph queens. I talked to them—Metis and Aine. I found the answers. What you were searching for so frantically. What you can’t pull from your muddled memories.”
The passage grew suffocating, and I syphoned energy, pushed the confining magic outward. Inches only, but it was enough to ease the pressure.
“You’d deny yourself the answers out of spite?” I asked. “No one else has what you want.”
A lie, but deceit was part of this game. And I would not feel sorry for Amal. We were different. She had no compassion, and I’d probably die because I had too much.
“I visited Pelonie before I came here,” I said into the waiting dark. “She’s the sorceress who performed the ritual. She wanted the wolves for herself. Wanted to steal your power. She’s immortal… more than a mere witch. They call her the Bone Woman. Sometimes, it’s the Wolf Woman. She still has a fondness for wolves. Bones are everywhere in her cave and she turns them into monstrosities. You two would get along well.”
“Don’t waste my time, rat.”
“Pelonie revealed the ritual, the chant she sang.” I wanted to press my back to the passage wall, slide down until I was sitting. The exhaustion slithered through me with the urge to give up. Let go of a fool’s quest and close my eyes. Drift off to sleep.
More of Amal’s games, I realized. Her messy magic seeping into this pocket with a vampire’s desire to mesmerize. To find my hidden fears and turn them into desires.
I splayed my fingers against the wall. Drew on the cold stone, used it to ground myself.
“The witch told me how Brenna, Malin, even Leonides pushed others aside to get the knife,” I said. “They couldn’t wait to cut their flesh. I suppose you were right beside them, spilling the blood and sacrificing what was most precious for the power you coveted.”
The entire passage vibrated. Bits of dust and debris fell from the ceiling, pelting me the way Amal’s voice pelted. “I’m going to kill your dread lord.”
“Then I’ll kill your wolf,” I said, no longer mesmerized but cold and unforgiving. “I have the rune you used. I stole it from the witch. Did you know the wolf lives as long as the queen? And you never once questioned what your immortality would mean to her. Never tried to find her, rescue her from the prison you created through your lust and greed. How many centuries has she suffered, locked away, and you’re too cold to care?”
“You will rot in that trap.”
“No, I won’t. I am tied to you by fate, Amal. I am a daughter of the daughters’ daughters, and I have suffered because of what you did. Countless other women like me have suffered for your sins. The future was in your scrying bowl, and you killed the Gemini Witches because they shouted the warning. You knew I was coming, and you were afraid.”
“Enough.” Her hiss was savage.
“The truth cuts, doesn’t it?” I pulled the stone from my pocket and pressed my fist against the far end of the passage. Enough of Amal’s energy lingered for the magic to waver, then fall away. Revealing the stone corridor leading into the queen’s second throne room.
Where Grayson hung on the wall.