Chapter 35
Chapter Thirty-Five
My hands shook as I knocked on the door of the modest-looking townhome in Chynon.
What I had was less than a lead—a Vyenur had reported to his fellows that he’d heard screams coming from this particular house for nights on end—but I refused to ignore it.
The news had trickled through lines of communication now fuzzy from the Covenant’s destruction, and had eventually reached Noah.
He’d been fuming at my refusal to let him accompany me the last time we’d met, but I’d allowed him to get a few good hits in before I’d left.
It had been over two weeks since Adrienne had been taken.
Two weeks of questioning immortals who had any ties to the Covenant.
Two weeks of dreaming of her. Two weeks of waking screaming her name.
I’d gone so far as to burst into Lord Montag’s estate demanding I search his premises, only to come up empty.
She had vanished from Oylen.
Last night Ralph and I had gone to her family home in the outer city, but the house had been empty.
A few times she’d mentioned in passing her brother worked at the docks in the hopes of making enough to leave the country altogether.
She had even taught him Kysoi with that hope.
I’d spoken with the dockmaster, but he’d never heard of a Louis Valois.
In fact, he’d never had anyone working there under that name.
I knocked again on the door, contemplating how satisfying it would be to kick it in, when it opened.
The male who stood on the threshold was perhaps five hundred years old, maybe a little less—though it was difficult for me to tell the age of a being who was less than a thousand.
His sandy blond hair swept back from his face with the wind and his eyes widened in surprise.
Lucas Landry was not a member of the Covenant, which meant if he had her, there were other forces at play.
“You’re…” he breathed.
“Eamon Azad.”
The male stared for another heartbeat before he shook himself and took a step back. “Yes, sire. Goddess, what an honor. Please, come in, come in.”
Slowly, I crossed the threshold, scanning each floorboard and stair tread as if there might be any sign of her.
“News has reached us here about your triumph over the Covenant,” he said, tripping over his words as he gestured toward the parlor closest to us. “I daresay soon you will be the ruler of us all.”
I did not acknowledge the comment. There had already been talk amongst our kind that I would take over in the absence of the Covenant. But the thought was deplorable—I was sure there would be another way, we just had not found it yet.
The parlor was comfortably situated with its overstuffed couches and settees.
Crystal decanters of synthetic blood gleamed nearby—a facade for what truly happened beneath this roof, if my instincts were correct.
He gestured toward one settee outfitted in a beige damask, chattering about offering me a drink and any hospitality I needed.
“I’m afraid the last two givers I acquired were not suited to polite society, so I cannot offer you warmer. ”
The scent of sunshine called to me, emanating from somewhere nearby. Fresh flowers caught in a springtime breeze, soured with fear and sickness. My muscles coiled to spring the moment I sat and I stared at the thick rug at my feet.
“A giver?” My voice did not sound like my own, dripping with ice and fury.
But my host did not appear to notice as he busied himself with a fine cut-crystal glass, pouring the thick synthetic blood into it.
“Yes, one was a female giver. It was truly a pity, beauty that she was. Her mother assured me of her education and allure, though I should have known better than to trust Penelope Valois. But I’d heard from an acquaintance she would be worth forgiving the debt, but I suppose we are all wrong every so often. ”
The edges of my vision pulsed while the male turned with a theatrical sigh, as if he was truly regretful.
I clenched my hands into fists. “And where is this giver now?”
He paused at my tone, steps stuttering as he made to cross the room. “My…my lord?”
My gaze slid from where she’d been kneeling on the rug, however long ago, to the doomed male before me. “Where is she now?”
“She…” He cleared his throat, pitch higher than it had been. “She was ill, nothing like what I’d been promised. You would not have wanted her, my lord. As feral as a venefica with all her scratching and kicking.”
Pride swelled for my mate.
“I could not drink from her without her illness, nor could I influence her. A-any time I gave her my blood she retched.”
My fury was not the burning flame it once had been in my youth.
Now ice trickled through the holes Adrienne’s absence had left and, with preternatural slowness, I rose to my feet.
Images flashed through his mind of my mate, wrists chained together, dirt and blood smeared across her face.
Memories of her screams as he fed, her infected wounds.
Another memory: Adrienne crying out for someone, but he could not understand the name.
Those nights were followed by the long silences when her screams had died and the light bled from her eyes.
“Eamon,” I growled.
He blinked. “My lord?”
I took another step forward. “The name she cried out. She was calling for her mate, for Eamon.”
Even with all his immortal gifts, it still took a moment for understanding to click into place. When he thought of Samuel Raynott—a name I’d heard whispered a few times within the scum of the city for his trafficking of human blood givers—I did consider showing him a small bit of mercy.
“She…no. There’s no way. I did not sense—there was no bond. Her mother said…” He was babbling, retreating until his shoulders hit the cabinet with a clatter of crystal.
Another image of Adrienne corralled in a similar way, the fear on her face, her screams as he chased her through her apartment.
I’d seen the wreckage, scented the unfamiliar blood from a wound I prayed to the goddess my mate had given him.
My hand shot out to wrap around his throat, pinning him in place.
“Adrienne Valois is mine.”
Blood tears streaked down his cheeks. “P-please, mercy.”
But as I bit into his flesh and scented the blood that had been splattered across her apartment, I found I had none to give.
I tore open his throat, savoring his scream before I shoved my hand through his breastbone.
To a human it would have felt like sticking their hand in snow, but for a youngling such as him, his blood was warm against my skin.
I wrapped my hand around his heart, but I did not pull it free yet.
“Mercy would have been to hold the old woman who accrued the debt accountable instead of kidnapping her daughter. Mercy would have been to free her when she showed signs of having a mate. You are old enough to know them, Lucas. What are the signs of a human with an invoked blood mating?”
He spluttered, blood dribbling from his lips as the wound in his throat struggled to heal.
“That’s right. An aversion to another immortal’s blood. Illness if another vampire touches them. Immunity to compulsion.”
More tears. More brutal visions of my mate.
“Killing you quickly is a mercy you do not deserve,” I breathed, leaning in close enough for him to see the swirl of power in my eyes. “I can only entreat Keryes to ensure you live each moment of my mate’s torture for the rest of your soul’s existence in the underworld.”
“P-please, have mercy,” he repeated.
A bitter smile pulled at my cheeks as I flexed my hand.
“No.”