Chapter Two
KYELLA
The moment I made the decision to let loose my abilities, it felt as if fire blazed through my entire body, tingling all the way down to the tips of my fingers.
My physical form felt invigorated with the renewed energy of my determination, allowing me to hyperfocus on what needed to be done.
It helped that my knee seemed to have completely healed, and while my cheek and tailbone were still a bit tender, the slight pain wouldn’t hold me back in this fight.
The time to act was now.
Clenching my hands into fists, I strained against the ropes binding my wrists and gave one sharp tug. An unpleasant burn and scratching sensation accompanied the ropes falling away, but it was minor. As Gregory and Frederick came within a foot of me, my attention fell fully onto them.
My chest rose and fell with my short, quick breaths as my heart beat wildly.
Let them get closer.
The few seconds it took them to close the short gap between us felt like an eternity as I waited, stomach fluttering with anxiety.
I had to believe in my strengths and abilities—I had to believe in me.
As they each grabbed for one of my arms, I finally let my upper lip curl back in a feral snarl, revealing the fangs that pushed from my gums, begging to be used.
Before they could register my weapons, I surged forward in a quick burst of speed, grabbing the side of each of their heads and smashing them together as hard as I could with my newfound strength.
Crack.
They fell like heavy sacks of potatoes at my feet, crumpled together. I didn’t think for a second the bludgeoning would kill them, but I hoped they’d stay unconscious long enough for me to handle Holmeth one on one. I’d deal with them after.
The big bastard let out a hiss of fury before he raced toward me, utilizing his enhanced speed until he was nearly on me.
Ducking under his outstretched arms, I grabbed the two daggers from the slumped figures of Gregory and Frederick, the same ones the fuckers had stolen from me.
I loved the strength the daggers imbued in me as I closed my fingers around the hilts.
Hearing the scuff of feet behind me, I crouched and whirled on the balls of my feet to whip both daggers through the air in front of me.
They sliced cleanly through the wood hilt of an ax Holmeth had procured from somewhere in the room.
The heavy metal of the ax head thunked into the planks beneath us, embedding itself deeply into the split wood.
“You little bitch,” Holmeth gritted from between clenched teeth as his nostrils flared with rage.
Just as I pushed to my feet, planning to spring away to put distance between us, two bruising grips latched onto my ankles and swept me back off of my feet.
For a brief moment, I felt weightless as I sailed through the air before I crashed to the floor.
The back of my head cracked against the wood, splintering the plank from the force.
I let out a cry of pain but tried to push past it in order to clear my head of the temporary distraction.
I needed to focus and get back on my feet. There wasn’t another option—this was do or die.
I forced my eyes open in time to see a cloth descending toward my mouth before it clamped down tightly over my nose and lips, forcing me to breathe in a sweet-smelling odor before I could stop myself.
Thrashing with violent strokes aimed toward the arm holding the rag over my mouth, I willed my daggers to make contact with anything.
Snap.
Snap.
White-hot pain scorched through my wrists as they broke, hands curling and loosening my grip. My daggers clattered to the floor as I howled in pain. The cry of pain forced me to take a deep breath of the poison, and a wave of dizziness came over me. A fog encompassed me, entirely invading my brain.
My temples and the area behind my eyes thrummed with dull pain as my eyes fluttered shut.
No. Fight. Stay awake.
The rough cloth was pulled away from my face, and I gasped, trying to clear my head by inhaling fresh air. Just as I forced my eyes open, I saw a fist flying toward my face and winced as it cracked against my jaw, whipping my head to the side with the impact. Holy shit, that hurt.
My senses felt dulled from the poison I’d been forced to inhale. Between my wrists and jaw, I was drowning in blinding agony. The taste of copper filled my mouth, and I spit the blood on the floor before rasping a ragged breath.
Fingers trailed along my chin before yanking it sharply up.
“Look at me, bitch,” Holmeth spat, spittle flying from his mouth and onto my face as he hovered above me.
As my eyes locked onto his, he grinned wickedly.
“Malakai warned us that you might have been turned into a vampyre during your stay here. Why do you think we tested you with those ropes? Goaded you? You aren’t very smart. ”
What? Why would he tell them that? Without a doubt, Malakai knew what I was.
It was why he’d orchestrated the killing of my family and devised a plan to try to emotionally manipulate me to willingly be on his side.
He wanted me under his thumb. So why not tell them I’m actually a dhampyr?
If he did, then these three would know about my venom and…
The force with which the answer came to me nearly knocked the breath from me.
This was his way of preparing his lackeys for my abilities without giving away the closely guarded secret of dhampyrs and our power.
That fucking bastard. Throwing his underlings to the wolves, of course.
He told them just enough to explain my strengths, but he didn’t want them getting any ideas about trying to gain any power from me.
Only he was allowed to do that, it seemed.
My face must have shown a fraction of my shock because Holmeth threw his head back and laughed. “Oh, this is just too fun. Now that we know exactly how rough we can be with you, the real games can begin.”
They were testing me the whole time…All the while, I thought I was being rational and smart. They played me like a fiddle. Shit.
Black dots danced in my vision, leaving me feeling as if I were caught somewhere between a conscious and unconscious state as I heard Gregory snark out, “We’ll be taking those daggers back now, love. I can’t wait to see how smoothly they cut through your skin after seeing what they did to that ax.”
Bile worked its way up my throat, burning and nearly choking me, and I had to force myself to swallow it down. The image of them cutting me up assaulted my mind, turning my stomach further.
The hand on my chin shifted to grab a handful of hair at the base of my skull, dragging me up as I struggled to find any strength to stand. Something hit me in the back of the knees, causing me to stagger backward and fall into a wooden chair.
“We know how hard it is to contain a vampyre, but this stuff sure does the trick to drug humans and vamps alike,” Frederick murmured, holding a dark bottle at eye level for me to see.
It wasn’t labeled. “This little poison is a personal favorite of mine. It’ll damage your kidney and liver with the dose we’re exposing you to, all while stripping your ability to fight back.
We’ll use as much as we need to, for as long as we need to, to get the answers Malakai expects from us. It’ll be such fun.”
Gregory’s chipper voice chimed in, “And while you will heal, we’ll ensure there is no reprieve from the poison, keeping your body in a constant cycle of pain and misery. The release of death will not come to you.”
A large clap sounded, making me wince at the noise before Holmeth’s stench assaulted the air around me once more.
“There’s no time like the present to get started.
As I said before, you choose how easy or hard this goes, and trust me,” he trailed off as he lowered his lips against the shell of my ear, his hot breath blowing against my skin and making nausea roil through my gut once more.
“I love that you’ve chosen the hard path so far. It pleases me greatly.”
“Go fuck yourself with the pieces of that ruined ax,” I spat back, using all the strength within me to pull my head up and keep it straight.
I wasn’t sure if it was the poison making me loose lipped or my hatred for these vampyres, but I found myself spewing the words before I could contain myself.
“How about this instead?” Holmeth questioned, flicking his hands toward the other two to set them into motion. I narrowed my eyes in caution of whatever they were going to do.
Once more, the cloth was placed over my nose and mouth, muffling my grunt as my broken wrists were tugged on top of the chair’s arms and bound. This time, it was cold metal that kissed my bare skin.
I tried to kick out with my feet and yank my arms away, but all my body managed was to jerk a few times. The headache and dots littering my vision intensified, and a constant ring whirled in my ears.
I felt the same metal wrapping around my ankles as the cloth was removed.
Surely I could break through these metal restraints…if I could just gain the full strength of my powers back. I’m sure they knew that, though, hence the poison. Hell, I’d settle for being able to hold my head up completely on my own at this point.
My head lolled onto my shoulder, and I glared at Frederick and Gregory as they stood, inspecting their work before pulling out the daggers and glancing to Holmeth. “Ready, boss.”
Holmeth stood a few feet from me with his feet in a wide stance and his arms crossed, looking down his sharp nose at me. Nodding in answer, he dropped his arms and rubbed his hands together, a glint of utter insanity sparking in his eyes.
“Let’s begin,” he said, as he leaned in toward me. The stench of him churned my stomach, and I swallowed a gag as he asked, “How vast is the population of this empire?”
When I didn’t answer immediately, his fist came flying toward my face.
There was nothing I could do to twist my face out of the way in time.
My head snapped up from the upper cut to my jaw, rattling my brain from the impact.
It took a few seconds for my shock to clear.
Feeling blood pooling in my mouth once more, I focused on spitting it out toward his feet. “Fuck you,” I rasped.
My lack of strength didn’t bode well for an escape, but I found comfort knowing that there was nothing they could do to force answers from me.
I would never betray the Tridian Empire.
I hadn’t been there long, but it was the first place that felt like home since before I was removed from my family’s farm.
The Tridian Empire had provided me hope for the future, for what the world could be like when vampyres and humans coexisted peacefully.
While I wasn’t a human, I still felt a sense of duty to the humans of the Thaician Empire, ensuring their freedom from Malakai’s tyranny.
I hoped they would one day feel the peace that I felt upon my arrival to this brighter, happier empire.
Without warning, Frederick lashed out with the dagger, cutting deeply into my thigh above the knee.
Biting down on my lip, I tried to contain the screams of agony that I knew would only serve to get them off.
Tears burned in my eyes, so I slammed them shut, forcing myself to breathe through my nose.
To my chagrin, the hot tears still spilled down my cheeks.
“How large is their army?” Holmeth asked.
Keeping my eyes shut, I prepared myself for the next attack as I murmured through the pain, “Fuck off.”
Those words would be my mantra with him until the end, no matter what.
My fangs split my lip open as a dagger opened a slash across my other thigh. The tears continued as he asked, “Who is their ruler?”
That was the question I needed. Thinking of Myrin, I felt a drive to stay strong course through my veins. I wouldn’t let her or her empire down. I would get through this, and I would get my revenge.
Swallowing down a lump in my throat, I forced my eyes open. I emphasized each word as they spilled from my lips, “Fuck. You. Holmeth.”
He clenched his hands into tight fists at his side, body shaking as he stared down at me with a sneer.
“You think you have any chance of escaping here? You don’t.
No one is coming to save you because no one fucking cares about you.
All you are is a fucking pawn in Malakai’s game, an expendable one now. ”
Despite knowing his words weren’t true, it still felt like a punch to the gut.
For so long, his words were the truth—existing as a simple pawn was my life for years.
No one cared enough to save me from my prison when I was simply Malakai’s Thrall.
Not until Dakath, Elijah, and Kolvar teamed up with Tristan to help me escape.
Without a doubt, I knew I had people who cared about me now, as well. I had Elijah, Kolvar, and Dakath. I had Myrin. I had Tristan, Rina, and Bailey. I had my whole life ahead of me to cement and strengthen the bonds with my chosen family and experience a life full of love.
I let my mind fill with all the tender moments I’d had with my new family as I plastered a smile onto my face. I stared right back at Holmeth.
“Fuck. You.”
With a roar, he flashed toward me and wrapped his hands around my neck. Squeezing until I couldn’t breathe, he sneered, “Try saying that now. Oh, you can’t? What a pity. Maybe once I snap your neck, you’ll wake up in a more accommodating mood.”
Would I survive if he snapped my neck? I knew I possessed rapid healing abilities, but a broken neck seemed much more extreme than a typical injury.
Panic seized my chest as the darkness dancing at the edge of my vision swarmed in further. Everything was obscured, and blackness crept in as my lungs emptied of air before I felt the sharp twist and a pop in my neck.
Then there was nothing.