Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter
Thirty-Five
I cycle to the hunting lodge, bow bouncing between my wings as I cross the stone bridge. There are silver arrows stashed throughout the palace. It’ll be fairly straightforward. Shoot Gustavsson in the head, and then beg Aliz to share his heart with me. Bile burns my throat, and I look up.
The moon looms full and bloated over the woods. It won’t look red until midnight, during the eclipse. The wind nips my shoulders and the gaps in my flowy sleeves. Hopefully Elia has found a way to heat up the palace, or I may freeze to death before midnight strikes.
Elia has decorated the surrounding trees with the same crimson fairy lights as the rest of the house, and I recall that first dream of the maze, a crow with bright red eyes pecking Aliz’s dying body.
The ball is already in full swing when I walk in, hallways crowded with vampires drinking from wineglasses. Just one misdemeanor will give me an excuse to kill.
To steal a heart.
The vampires around me turn to stare, and as I avoid their thirst-filled gazes, I realise I am somewhat underdressed.
My skirt falls just above the knee. The surrounding vampires are in floor-length gowns covered in ruffles, lace, and crystals.
Some look like avant-garde dresses straight off a runway, while others are period pieces from a myriad of countries and centuries.
And all, regardless of their cut or style, are dripping with opulence.
Elia promised she’d convinced Gustavsson to play in a string quartet, and as I glance towards the end of the ballroom, I see him.
My heart hammers in my chest. Even though he’s one of four, I somehow hear his cello above the rest, the sound of it engraved in my ears. He doesn’t glance in my direction.
Unease bubbles in my stomach. I soon spot Stephan and Ife amongst the dancing couples, the vampire laughing, throwing her head back while her human boyfriend whispers something in her ear.
Stephan is dressed as a scarecrow, hay sticking out from a patchwork suit, a straw hat hiding his thick brown hair.
Ife is in an ethereal black gown with a bodice constructed entirely out of feathers, which elongate as they cascade down into the skirt.
Silver details are sprinkled throughout, lines are painted around her eyes, creating swirling shimmers.
Her hair is in braids, pinned atop her head with a little piece of hay sticking out, linking her costume to Stephan’s.
I’ve never felt jealous of them until now, when I realise I’ll never have what they have. Even if I miraculously get rid of the mark, even if Aliz decided that her feelings for me are real, we would never be able to act like they do. She wouldn’t love me in public.
“How do I look?”
Beside me, in a nineteenth-century suit full of tears and loose threads, is Julia.
Her skin is painted in a myriad of blues, greens, and purples.
There are a few carefully placed lines cutting across her skin.
Stitches, holding together the mismatched hues.
And pulling it all together are two metal bolts, glued to her hair.
“Ghastly,” I say. “Are you Frankenstein’s monster?”
“The one and only,” Julia says with a grin. “Want to dance?”
“I’m not very good,” I warn her.
Julia laughs. “Me neither,” she says.
Her cool hand feels brittle in my own, so light it could snap if I hold it tight. She glances around, trying to figure out the steps of the dance. “I think it’s a waltz,” I say, putting an arm around her waist and pulling her closer.
“I love waltzing,” she says, stepping on me.
“My favourite dance,” I reply, stumbling out of the way of a couple who clearly know what they’re doing.
Stephan and Ife soon glide past us, too, and Ife calls out, “You’re doing great, sweetie!”
“Thanks, Mum!” Julia shouts back. When she looks down at me, she’s still smiling. And as I look at her, I decide that it won’t be so bad. If Aliz sires me, at least I’ll have vampire friends. And I’ll be able to tell Julia everything. She’ll understand, won’t she?
The waltz comes to an end, and I feel a hand on my shoulder.
“Can I have this dance?”
Aliz’s hair is combed away from her face, and at first, I have no idea what her all-black costume is supposed to be. For once, it’s not a suit. Rather, it’s an amalgamation of old leather and some other sturdy fabric, with a heavy cape falling past her waist.
“Sure,” I say, and I send Julia an apologetic glance.
“Save me another one for later,” Julia says before disappearing behind the other dancing couples.
“I don’t know how to dance,” I say, far more self-conscious of how I’m moving now that Aliz is in front of me.
Aliz raises a brow, giving me a you don’t say look. Considering she’s the heir to the Astra family, I shouldn’t be surprised that Aliz is able to lead me so easily. We turn, and I feel something hard press to my thigh. I glance down and see a scabbard. I swallow and look up at her again.
“What exactly are you dressed as?”
“It’s a little hard for me to text like this, Cassie,” she says.
“Just tell me.”
She twirls me, and when I’m facing her again, she says: “This is Catherine Lovelace’s old uniform. So, I suppose you could say I’m dressed as a vampire hunter.”
Aliz doesn’t smile or laugh after saying this. For a horrible second, I think she’s going to say it. I know what you are. But she doesn’t. Her expression is somber for an entirely different reason.
“I’ve found someone,” she whispers. “Well, Elia found him.” Aliz’s grip is tight on my waist. She glances towards the stage and then back down at me. “Gustavsson.”
I struggle to keep my expression straight.
If we kill Gustavsson before I get a chance to talk to him, I’ll never know why he was at my prom.
But there’s too much at stake to worry about keeping him alive.
I swallow hard and look over at our target.
He’s fixated on a few girls in the crowd, occasionally smiling at them. Is that what he did during my prom?
“Are you sure you want to do this, Aliz?” I ask.
Her expression softens, but the sadness remains there.
“Yes. I can’t make you give up your mortality because of me.
Because this is my fault. If I’d stopped to think for one fucking second before giving you my blood, I would have realised it was a bad idea.
But I was so worried about you.” The quick waltz is nearing its end, and Aliz’s voice tightens.
“I hadn’t been able to think of anything but you, and suddenly”—she lets out a shaky breath—“you were dying. And I couldn’t let that happen. ”
She presses her forehead to mine, and I breathe in carefully. The next dance starts. “How will we do it?” I ask in a low voice. I already have a plan bubbling in my head.
“Uh…” She glances over at him. “I could tell him I need to talk,” she says.
“No,” I whisper. I grit my teeth, feeling sick before I say it. “I’ll lure him upstairs. He won’t turn down my blood.” Before Aliz can interrupt me, I add, “I won’t let him drink. We just need to get him out of the crowd. You wait in your sister’s room. I’ll get him there.”
Her hands shake as it becomes real. “It’s dangerous.”
“Of course it is,” I say, and I reach up to cup her cheek. “But if you really want to do it, this is our best plan.”
Despite being in a crowd, despite all the loose lips around us, Aliz ducks down and kisses me. A short and chaste kiss, but just as sweet. “Are you sure?” she asks.
“Yes,” I say. “Do you know how to use that thing?” I ask, glancing down at the sword.
Aliz gives a brief nod. “I was a bit of a fencing prodigy as a child,” she says. She takes a deep breath. “I just have to imagine I’m my father. Or sister. Or literally any other Astra to have walked the earth.”
“I’ll meet you up there at the end of the next dance,” I say.
I still can’t believe she’s agreed to this. My hands tremble. If Gustavsson remembers me, and I have a feeling he does, he’ll reveal my identity. Perhaps a part of it. He might say my name, and all of Aliz’s questions will come tumbling out.
Hopefully those questions will be answered after we get rid of the mark.
I take a deep breath and reach back within myself until I’m the same vampire hunter I was before reaching Tynahine. When I could slip into a blood party and convince anyone I wanted to follow me off into a dark and dangerous place.
I start to cross the ballroom, and before I reach the stage, I bump into Elia, whose costume is a long muslin gown, Roman inspired.
The sort of thing she probably wore in her youth, two thousand years ago.
Her hair is half up and half down, silver threaded throughout it.
She looks like a goddess, the little half-moon on her head telling me she’s meant to be Diana.
“Good luck,” she whispers. She was the one who was able to convince Aliz. I squeeze her hands, trying to find the words to thank her. Instead, I just nod and walk on.
The stage looms above me. The four musicians are in ruffled suits from the eighteenth century, with short trousers and knee-high stockings. Capes fall behind them, and their instruments are decorated with skulls and spiders. One of them has even put on a powdered wig.
Gustavsson is in the same getup, though his is a little less flamboyant. Instead of silver or green, his suit is black and white. And when his eyes meet mine, I know I’ve got him.
“Professor?” I call up. His fluid playing, which until now hadn’t faltered at all, stutters, the scent of my blood turning his eyes crimson.
I’ve done something a little risky, enough for all the vampires around me to turn and stare, too: I’ve made a small cut on my palm, which healed immediately, but left a film of blood.
“What is it, Cassie?” he asks. “Haven’t seen you in class.” His voice crawls under my skin, familiar. But I keep my face set in a mild picture of lust.
“I’ve been dying to see you,” I say. “How long are you playing for?”
He looks at me, aghast. I press on.
“I want to continue our conversation.”
“Won’t Miss Astra mind?” he asks, glancing across the ballroom. I shake my head.
“She doesn’t have to know.”
He raises a brow and then looks at his fellow musicians. They stare at me, thirst staining their eyes red, but they don’t stop playing. “I can escape at the end of this pavane,” Gustavsson says. “One minute.”
I glance up at the crystal ceiling, the moon hanging between the branches and red fairy lights. We’re going to get rid of it. At the other end of the ballroom, I spot Elia drawing Julia into conversation, possibly to keep her from seeing me.
“Where shall we go?” asks Gustavsson. “There’s a lovely maze out there.”
He jumps down, leaving the quartet as a trio.
“Upstairs,” I say. “I want to see the rest of the palace.” I press my hand, with its drying blood, to his, and he inhales me a little deeper.
“Wherever you want, then, Cassie,” he says. He grabs my wrist and pulls me through the crowd. I get déjà vu as I walk behind him, trying to keep up. My stomach burns.
Is this what happened on prom night? Did Vicki stand in a corner and watch as he dragged me, willingly, to another end of the hotel?
My throat tightens as I try to clear my mind of what might have happened. Of what he did that I no longer remember.
“It’s closed off,” he says, sounding disappointed when we reach the bottom of the grand staircase.
“Don’t tell me you’ve never broken the rules,” I chide, climbing over the red rope. He lets out a short laugh.
“See, I told you you were going to get me into trouble,” he says.
“Isn’t that what you want?” I ask, running up the marble stairs, past the portrait of Ada Astra, who watches as he chases after me. I laugh, speeding up, my heart thumping. I feel my pulse in my ears, nausea crawling up my chest.
I just need to get him into Ada Astra’s room. Then we shut the door and kill him.
I spot a silver arrow behind one of the statues. Hopefully I won’t have to use it. Hopefully Aliz hasn’t forgotten her own skills and we’ll get it over with quickly.
“I don’t remember you being this fun last time, Rebecca!” he calls, just as I’m about to reach the end of the hall, where Aliz is hiding.
The sound of my name almost knocks me off my feet, and before I can even think of how to respond he grabs the back of my head, threading his fingers into the pleated crown, and slams me against one of the mirrors.
The pain blinds me for a second, and when I open my eyes, his hands are clasping my cheeks, and his eyes glow a vibrant red, boring into mine before he says: “Kill yourself.”
“No!”
The scream comes from Ada Astra’s room. Aliz runs out while I feel blood trickle down my face. She’s not wielding her sword, instead she simply sprints towards us while Gustavsson stares back at her, amused.
“The useless heir,” he says, before reaching forward and licking my face.
I can’t use my stake. It would damage the heart.
Instead, I lunge at him, knee between his legs.
Just as he lets out a groan, he turns into a bat.
I’m not allowing a repeat of Inverness, so before he can fly off, I reach for the silver arrow behind the statue.
I ignore the pain in my head as I aim and release the arrow.
He transforms back into his humanoid form, the arrow in his stomach.
I don’t look at Aliz. I don’t have time to see her expression—the slow realisation that I have lied to her about absolutely everything.
“Not a bad shot,” Gustavsson says, his voice jarringly calm. Despite the fact that the silver will burn him, he wraps his hands around the arrow in his stomach, and pulls it out in one fluid motion, his hands sizzling. “But you should have aimed for my head.”
He’s wounded, but even so, before I can reach him, he again turns into a bat, disappearing down the staircase.
“No!” I shout.
I reach the arrow too late. When I pull back my bow, he’s gone.
“Cassie?”
Adrenaline continues to pump through my veins, and I lower my weapon, turning.
Aliz stares at me, face drained of colour. “He compelled you to kill yourself,” she says, voice tight.
“I’m fine,” I say.
I look along the hallway, into the open door leading to Ada Astra’s room. The open window is visible from here. And cut out against it, is a silhouette.
I recognise her even with a mask on. The woman who taught me how to survive in the shadows.
Penny lifts a weapon, a crossbow armed with a long stake, and fires.