Chapter 14 #2
I heard her, but I couldn’t see her. I threw off my attacker and spun around, scanning the thinning crowd of bodies to spot Ragna’s sheen blonde braid.
Vampires dragged her toward the castle and threw her at Silver’s feet.
With the blade of an axe balanced between the nodules of her spine, Ragna was bowing to Silver before her death.
And it was Kayn who held the weapon.
I forced my way past the two vampires grappling with Drak and dashed toward the castle.
“It is one person’s life. Focus on the vampires instead.” Freya’s words were sensible, but heartless.
Still, my attention jerked to a nearby vampire. I wanted to show the Gods they had chosen wisely. This was worship, and obeying their commands would make my mother proud. Ragna’s ragged voice split through the thought again, and I flicked my eyes back to the castle. They were only a few steps away.
Lining the blade up, Kayn lifted the axe above his head. I’d witnessed a hundred executions. Masked men and women dragged witches, and those who defied the bloodshed law into the streets, and then the villagers were forced to watch the beheading.
“The vampires are escaping instead of dying.” Loki laughed with reckless amusement. “I told you Lux would fail us. You should have listened to my plan instead.”
I clamped my eyes shut, trying to silence their voices.
I could no longer follow them blindly. Ragna’s head was at stake.
Sorry, Mother. Quickly peeling my eyes back open, I lunged at Kayn with the pendant in my fist, but I was too late.
Axe crunched against bone, and a guttural scream erupted from my lips.
When I plastered the silver against his neck, he stumbled and dropped the axe.
Wood and iron fell to the dirt with a thud…along with Ragna.
Blood spilled from her spine. She was another limp body with dust coating the surrounding air, but she had not lost her head. I’d interrupted the full strike of the blade even if it wasn’t enough to save her life.
My heart plunged to my feet as I fell against the dirt beside her. Cupping her shoulders, I shook her helplessly, as if that could stop the bleeding, as if my desperation could mend her shattered spine.
She was gone.
Tears blurred my vision and all thoughts of pleasing the Gods and eliminating vampires were long forgotten. My fellow witch and friend was dead—used as a pawn in my sister’s sick game.
“Ragna, please.” Sorrow sucked the air from my voice, and each word hurt my throat to speak, but I kept begging. “Please wake up. You have to watch Alva grow up. I saved her. Please, Ragna. Don’t leave me.”
My sister spoke from somewhere nearby, but I couldn’t see her through the tears swimming in my eyes.
“You should have made me queen.” A shadow blocked out the moonlight, dimming the area over me and Ragna.
Closer now, Silver’s warm breath brushed my ear.
“Now you know what will happen to our mother and Stasia if you trick me again.” She paused, letting this sink in as I shuddered.
“I’ll meet you in the light of Yggdrasil’s fire, where every ounce of your power will burn away.
Goodbye huntress, enjoy your abilities while they last.”
After wiping away a blur of tears, my head snapped up, but Silver was already nowhere to be seen. She’d fled with the vampires.
I couldn’t tell whether a half-second or half an hour had passed when Drak appeared beside me. He was a blur as he ripped Ragna from my hold and sank his fangs into her neck. Her limp arms and legs splayed across his leg, and he propped her torso with his knee.
“Drak, don’t!” I screeched.
He pulled back from the bite with bright red blood staining his teeth. “I’m doing this for you.”
“Kill him before he makes another vampire.” Odin spoke in a low tone, haunting and slow as he instructed me to lift the stake.
I forced my arm back down, keeping the muscles rigid, so that I didn’t give in to the temptation to kill Drak here and now. Shaking my head, I tried to free my mind, but Odin’s presence was heavy. The only reprieve came from knowing Drak wasn’t hurting Ragna.
He’s turning her. For me.
But this world couldn’t abide by more undead. There weren’t enough humans to feed them. Vampires were starving along with their food source, but Drak was creating another one. For. Me.
A quiet, burning rage grew within me as I watched him transform her. He was saving her, in a sick and twisted way, but Ragna would hate becoming the enemy. Most of the Blood Council were vampires, save for some humans who knew and supported them, and Ragna despised those who’d hunted down witches.
She’d despise vampires too, and herself, if she became one of them.
Sounds of battle ebbed. Once Silver’s focus had shifted to compelling Kayn and tormenting me, her army had backed down. Too many vampires were lost to my stake.
Except for the one who was once a witch. The woman before me, whose blood drained from her veins and flowed through Drak’s.
Clouds passed overhead, obscuring the glow of the moon. Shadows of an approaching storm swallowed Mara in an eerie darkness, even for the night, and the erratic weather was growing increasingly unpredictable.
After a minute, her eyes moved beneath the thin veil of her eyelids. She was coming back, but as a vampire. Lightning struck somewhere in the forest behind Mara’s Keep with a crack.
“Now you will have to slay her too.”
No, I can’t. I won’t! But my body didn’t listen to my heart. I gripped the stake in my fist. Making the Gods proud—fulfilling this destiny—was the purpose of my every heartbeat.
The battle before Mara’s Keep was over, but the war within me had just begun.
“Kill her.” Odin insisted.
I pictured Ragna’s body succumbing to black blood, like all vampires did when I staked them in the heart. Her skin flaking and fluttering away in the wind. At my hand, her entire existence would be swept away, and in that moment, I wanted nothing more.
Fuck. Drak was right.
Madness had its claws in me.
Distant thunder roared in agreement. Perhaps Odin’s son was brewing some madness of his own, for another jagged bolt of lightning flashed, brightening the sky for a moment before darkness swallowed Mara once more.