Chapter 4 #2
It was, after all, the truth. I was the bearer of Zefiah, the Blade of Retribution, a weapon that came from Shiket herself. A responsibility that placed me a step closer to a goddess. But the cost was that she was one day destined to kill me.
After close to ten years wielding her, I had long come to terms with this.
I’d rather die by her blade than by vampire teeth or cannibals’ axes or the countless fevers that had sprung up in this foul world since the sun fell.
I had witnessed so many better people than me suffer undignified, cruel deaths.
What right did I have to be picky about my own?
“Vampires can’t wield a god-forged blade,” I said sweetly. “A bit inconvenient for my hunters, isn’t it?”
“There are many things worse than death. And the Shadowborn elevate such cruelties to an art. Have you ever looked closely at the face of a soulless? Does that qualify as life, do you think?”
A chill ran up my spine.
This, after all, was the curse hidden beneath my blessing.
If a vampire drained me, or a soulless ripped off my face, or an illness destroyed my body, I’d be left begging for Zefiah to end me.
I would suffer eternally until she pierced my heart.
A potential fate she warned me of with every scolding of my carelessness, but one I preferred not to think about.
I gave Septimus a cool smile.
“Vampires and cats have so much in common,” I said. “You both like to play with your prey. But do you piss on the carpet, too?”
A barely there glint of delight in his eyes. He replied smoothly, “Only occasionally. But I only lick others, never myself.”
I barked a laugh. “Oh, look at you. So clever.”
I took another half step closer; subtle, casual.
{Careful,} Zefiah warned, and I ignored her.
Septimus took a long drag of his cigarillo, letting the smoke plume through his nose.
“It is up to you whether you trust me. But, as much as it pains me to praise the Shadowborn, they are excellent hunters. They know you will be going to the Temple of Yiferis, and they’ll be there to meet you.”
The Temple of Yiferis.
Only now did it occur to me that he was, perhaps, being truthful.
Because I was going to Yiferis. How had he known that?
As if he heard the question I did not ask, that smirk lifted one corner of his mouth. “Surely you know how good the Shadowborn are at gathering information.” He tapped his temple. “Once they set their minds to it. Or their victim’s minds, more accurately. Avoid Yiferis. Save yourself the trouble.”
“You must think I’m a terrible divine warrior if you think I’d take the word of a vampire over my blessed mission.”
The phrase came with a hint of sarcasm.
{Six bleeding blades,} Zefiah muttered. {And you accuse him of playing with his food.}
Amusement flashed in Septimus’s eye, there and gone again. I wasn’t sure why that look gave me such a thrill—why I enjoyed the little challenge in it. It was different from the way any other vampire had ever looked at me. With the challenge of a competitor, not a predator.
“I assure you, Vindica Ultis, I am in no position to judge any divine warrior.” He glanced down at the dead Shadowborn woman. “Perhaps an extra vampire head will ease your goddess’s ire.”
{Enough of this,} Zefiah sniffed. {We have listened to him for longer than we should.}
I agreed. And yet, still, I found myself watching him. Intrigued.
“Why are you bothering to warn me?” I said. “Why would you think I’d believe you?”
Was he, perhaps, attempting to sabotage the House of Shadow? The Houses of Shadow and Blood had been allies for ten years, both carrying out Nyaxia’s war against humanity. Still, vampires were ruthless creatures. Even their alliances were lined with teeth.
“You can choose not to listen,” he said. “Perhaps, oh holy chosen one, you can withstand the consequences. But human flesh is so . . .” His gaze dragged up my body. Lingered at the triangle of exposed skin at my neckline, at the smear of blood there from my fresh wounds.
Until now, he had been perfectly composed. But now, ever so faintly, a flare of his nostrils.
Hunger.
“Fragile,” he finished. “And what a waste it would be, to let the Shadowborn peel it from you. A treasure like you, splayed open on a laboratory table.”
I watched him. Clung to that single tell, the invitation to this game. My inability to let things lie, to turn down a challenge, was one of my many vices. I knew it.
And yet.
I cocked my head. Smiled.
{Kyrene . . . } Zefiah warned.
I stepped closer.
“And what is your interest in my flesh?” I crooned.
{Goddess help us,} Zefiah groaned. {Spare me this indignity.}
A familiar expression flashed in the vampire’s eyes. Delight. And how strange, that it felt like looking in a mirror.
He leaned closer. My heart leapt beneath my skin with every inch closed between us, a body recognizing its intrinsic predator—or, perhaps, its playmate.
Zefiah was close, now. Just a few steps away.
“It’s beautiful flesh indeed,” Septimus said. Involuntary goose bumps rose on my skin as his fingertips, cool and smooth, brushed the underside of my chin, tilting my face. Angling my throat, already smeared with blood, toward him.
“There’s something about humans,” he murmured. “You’re so soft.” His thumb slid over my jaw. “So alive.” A sweep of hair behind my ear. “So . . .”
He leaned closer. My hand moved slowly, slowly, to my left side. Palm opened.
He whispered, breath heavy in my ear, “Predictable.”
The next movements happened at once. A flurry of fabric, as Zefiah went flying out from beneath the curtain to meet my call. A sweep of silver, as Septimus, just as quickly, withdrew into the shadows, leaving my strike hitting nothing but empty air, a half breath too slow.
Footsteps echoed in the night.
I whirled around, half expecting to see the vampire behind me.
Instead, a familiar large form trudged through the forest.
“Kyrene!” Marko was doing a terrible job of keeping his voice down, and his drunkenness struck me all over again, somehow so much more obvious than it had seemed an hour ago. Perhaps I should have left him behind after all. It was a miracle he was alive.
{Idiot,} Zefiah grumbled.
Undeniably. Yet, I felt an inexplicable wave of relief. I wouldn’t exactly say I “liked” Marko, but I felt a bit incomplete without his presence. Like a splinter that had been there so long it just seemed like a part of your body.
“Here,” I called.
I turned around, Zefiah raised, her glow illuminating the corners of the abandoned room. Two corpses. Red and black blood, human and vampire, now mingled in the cracks in the wooden floor.
Nothing else.
Septimus was gone.