A HEART OF BITTER POISON

(BOOK 2 OF THE SHADOW REALM SERIES)

BRYNNE WEAVER

Copyright © 2022 by Brynne Weaver

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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For my love, who every day lifted and encouraged me. Thank you for helping me breathe this story to life.

While you live, shine

Have no grief at all

Life exists for only a short while

And time demands its toll

~Seikilos, 200 B.C.E.

CONTENTS

Playlist

Lu’s Drinks Menu

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by Brynne Weaver

PLAYLIST

I usually write with music going in the background. If you ever need some audio inspiration, here are the songs I listened to the most while writing Poison. Please feel free to send me your recommendations, I’m always looking to add to my playlists and I love finding new music!

~love, Bx~

Let It All Go - Birdy & RHODES

Particles - Ólafur Arnalds & Nanna Bryndís Hilmarsdóttir

I’ll Be Good - Jaymes Young

Someone To Stay - Vancouver Sleep Clinic

Somebody - RHODES

Hurricane - Fleurie

Benediction - Luke Sital-Singh

The Night We Met - Lord Huron feat. Phoebe Bridgers

1000X - Jarryd James feat. Broods

Almost Gone - Luke Sital-Singh

Bones - Josh Record

The Youth - MGMT

Ashes - Céline Dion

Say It Again - Joshua Hyslop

Sirens - Fleurie

Mayday!!! Fiesta Fever - AWOLNATION feat. Alex Ebert

Dangerous - Big Data feat. Joywave

California Halo Blue - AWOLNATION

BURN IT DOWN - LINKIN PARK

Get Some Freedom - Big Data feat. Dragonette

Civilization - Justice

Perfect Holiday - Big Data feat. Twin Shadow

Twisted - MISSIO

Ways To Go - Grouplove

Miracle Man - AWOLNATION

Put Me To Work - Big Data

Unglued - Big Data

LU’S DRINKS MENU

The Diviner (from the Tipsy Trope)

~2 oz Empress gin (1 oz on bottom, 1 oz on top over spoon

~1 oz Indian tonic

~1 oz grapefruit juice

~Garnish with flowers and grapefruit slice

The Siren (from Mary Stewart at The Monarch Marina)

~1.25 oz calvados

~1.25 oz cognac

~0.5 oz lemon juice

~0.25 oz maple syrup

~Shake - serve in chilled coup with edible glitter

Bloffee (from Hannah R.)

~Coffee or espresso

~Top with whipped cream, chocolate sauce, a touch of red dye, and red sugar, OR

~Steam milk with red dye until frothy, and top with red sugar

Garibloody Cocktail (Lu’s own recipe)

~1.5 oz Campari

~4 oz fresh blended or squeezed blood orange juice

~Add Campari to a highball glass over ice. Top with foamed blood orange juice. Rim with red sugar and garnish with blood orange slice

Fangria (from Nat)

~1 bottle (750 ml) dry red wine (pinot noir or merlot are best)

~1/2 cup brandy

~1/2 cup Cointreau or Triple Sec

~1 cup orange juice, no pulp (can substitute pineapple juice)

~1-2 oranges, sliced

~Combine all ingredients and refrigerate overnight (the longer the better)

~Add other fruit as desired (e.g. apples, grapes, cherries, pineapple)

~Top each glass with a splash of lemon-lime soda or sparkling water

CHAPTER 1

When you’re a vampire, emotions aren’t just feelings that live trapped in your chest. They have scents. Colors. They have flavors. 

Betrayal tastes like copper. Like blood in your mouth.

Like a coin for the ferryman. 

I know what you’re thinking. But, vampire, blood technically tastes like iron, not copper. Maybe to your limited human senses it does. And you’re right, there is a difference. A subtle nuance. But I don’t just taste the blood. I taste the meaning behind it too.

Iron is the symbol of strength, like the bars that hold me in this cage. 

Copper is the symbol of love. 

And nothing in any realm is more dangerous or corruptible than love. Nothing is more lethal. Nothing cuts deeper. 

No betrayal is worse than when it’s delivered by the hand of someone you love. 

Like the Reaper and me. 

I close my eyes and that moment is so clear. Struggling to stay up on my feet, hoping that I’d live long enough to just tell him. I wanted him to know I was in love. I expected him to fight for me. 

Except he didn’t. Quite the opposite, in fact. 

Turns out, my love belonged to me alone. And it was used against me. It lured me right into this fucking cell. And even worse, it clings to me, unwilling to let me go. I remember every whispered word in the dark. Every long and heated look. I can still feel every touch. And I just can’t seem to convince myself that it was all an illusion, even though every day in this place shows me otherwise.

“You’re thinking about him,” Ediye warns. Her dark eyes shred me with a suspicious, all-knowing glare. When you’ve been friends for over three centuries, it’s hard to get away with hiding your thoughts.

The Reaper’s voice floats back to me from the time we sat in the restaurant on the way to Ediye’s house. You have a very expressive face, he’d said. Which had almost sounded like a compliment, at least until he opened his mouth again. It is a disadvantage for a vampire. You should work on that.

What a dick. Or, as Ediye and I have dubbed him, That Asshat Reaper Motherfucker.

I roll my eyes at myself. I’ve spent the last hour vacillating between thoughts of how shitty life is and thoughts of the Reaper, and neither are the kinds of thoughts I want to be wallowing in. Not that I have much choice, really. It’s not like the Shadow Realm has furnished us with comfort or entertainment in our threadbare stone cell.  

So, I refocus my attention on the only positive thing left to cling onto. Ediye.

There’s one thing that will take my mind off everything, I say in sign language. Ediye gives me a dead-eyed glare; she already knows what I’m going to say. Sing it again.

Ediye shakes her head, her expression resolute. “God no.” 

Please.

“Why? You’ve already heard it sixty thousand times.”

Only seventy-eight.

“That’s seventy-seven too many.” 

I’m sad. Cheer me up. 

There’s a long silence. I give Ediye my most innocent doe eyes from where I rest my head in her lap. It’s not a challenge for me to look pathetic either. I haven’t eaten in days. My face is puffy and swollen from torture and tears. A fever rages through my body. Sweat mists my brow no matter how many times Ediye sweeps it away with the rag she’s torn from the edge of her shirt. 

And worst of all, I’m fucking broken-hearted. 

“Look on the bright side, babe. At least you didn’t mate with him,” Ediye says, her eyes darting down to my torn shirt where a scar would now live above my heart if I had. 

I heave a heavy sigh and look away. Because the truth is, the idea of mating with That Asshat Reaper Motherfucker had crept up on me. And, like a dumbass, I was considering it. I was even starting to long for it. 

The thing is, I was just so lonely. It had been centuries since the last of my sisters was stolen from me. Centuries of hiding, centuries of living a transitory existence among humans, their lives so fleeting. So, when I had no choice but to be attached to the first immortal aside from Ediye in three hundred years, it didn’t take much convincing for me to let my guard down. 

Fucking idiot. 

And now I am alone. And hurt. And exhausted, and sore, and sick, and starving, and a thousand other horrible things. Yet, I’m still longing for it. 

Like a dumbass. 

“I love you dearly, but your choice in men is fucking appalling,” Ediye says, stroking my hair away from my bruised skin. “He is truly the worst of the lot.” 

I narrow my eyes to slits and try to hiss, but no sound comes out. Another swell of sadness threatens to drown me in the absence of my voice. Not even a hiss. My voice that once steered ships onto rocks, that brought the most powerful men and women to their knees. It gave me joy, even when I had to hide the sound of it just to stay alive. It became something precious and rare and exquisite. Now it just… doesn’t exist. It’s been erased, even though I still hear the faint echo of it in my mind. But, like ink corrupted by water on a page, the edges are blurred and warped. The memory is not the same as the real thing. 

Tears crest the edges of my eyes and I look away to the iron bars of the door. 

“Oh babe. I am sorry. I’m so sorry.” Ediye casts her worried gaze across my forlorn, bruised face. 

Without regular blood to feed on, the injuries from my super fun daily sessions with Gallus, torturer extraordinaire of the Shadow Realm, are no longer healing. Not that they do heal much anyway on the rare occasions when the Shadow Realm sees fit to toss me a bag of blood that’s been sitting around somewhere when it should be in a fucking fridge. If it wasn’t for Ediye’s limited spells, I’d be little more than a fragile human on the brink of death. And even then, the magic-laden necklace the Reapers have locked around her throat gives her only enough power to keep me alive so Gallus can mete out more of his daily punishments. 

“You do still love that Reaper of yours, don’t you,” Ediye says, her voice soft with kindness.

The crevice in my heart cracks open. Fresh pain seeps to the surface. I look further away from Ediye, trying to swallow the fire that closes my throat. Between the damage from Semyon’s silver injection, the ever-present hunger, and the swell of emotion, my throat seems to always be sore here. A headache blossoms, scratching at my skull. I rub my fingers along my temple, careful to avoid putting pressure on a crooked ring finger that still hasn’t healed from yesterday’s visit to Gallus. 

He’s not my Reaper, Ediye. Not anymore. 

Ediye leans down and places a kiss to the sheen of sweat that coats my brow. She wraps my pounding head in her embrace and rocks me gently, whispering a spell to ease the pain that scorches my brain like lightning. 

“You’re the absolute worst in a breakup, you know that, right? 

I nod.

She sighs. 

Finally, Ediye takes pity on me. She clears her throat the same way she always does before she’s about to sing. 

“When I was young, I never needed anyone, and making love was just for fun. Those days are gone...”

I hear the feet of our guard shift in irritation from outside the fortified door of our cage. The corners of my lips turn up ever so slightly. 

“Living alone, I think of all the friends I’ve known, but when I dial the telephone, nobody’s home...”

The guard heaves an exasperated sigh. 

Belt it out, you bad bitch. Give it all you’ve got, I sign, my little smile growing wider. Ediye’s eyes dance above me and she takes in a gulp of air that fills to the bottom of her lungs.

“ALL BY MYSELFFFFFF, DON’T WANNA BE, ALL BY MYSELFFFF, ANYMOOOOORE.”

“Stop that infernal singing!” the guard shouts. 

“Make me, motherfucker!” she yells back. She sucks in another lungful of air as I quake with laughter on her lap. “ALLLLLLL BYYYYYY MYSELFFFF, DON’T WANNA BE, ALLLLLLL BYYYY MYSELFFFF, ANYMOOOOORE!!!”

The guard smashes his sword against the bars of the door in an off-beat percussion. But Ediye doesn’t stop. Not as her voice warbles around her fit of giggles, not as she veers purposely off-key. We laugh like disobedient children until tears stream down our faces. Ediye finishes the song and still we laugh, and when it finally dies away, we sit with fading smiles lingering in our faces. 

You know you’re my best friend and I love you more than anyone, right? I sign, watching as her eyes glow with warmth. 

“I know,” she says. “I love you too.” 

When our smiles finally die away, Ediye whispers a spell into my skin and presses a kiss to my forehead. If I had a third eye, that’s where her lips would land. But my intuition clearly died somewhere along the way. That eye is blind. Or maybe it sees just fine, and I chose instead to stare into the shadows and convince myself that no harm ever came from the dark. 

I was wrong. 

As my thoughts descend into the abyss of my bleak reality and all the wrong choices that led me here, Ediye moves on to other songs, dabbing my sweaty skin with her disgusting rag. She runs her finger across my eyebrows and her voice softens until it’s a lullaby. And before long, I fall asleep. 

I know this dream. I’ve dreamed this dream so many times. But it’s not just a dream, it’s a memory. And like so many vampire memories, it’s one that likes to surface when it’s hungry for a piece of my soul, rising like a creature from the great unfathomable depths of the sea.  

I see a cabin ahead, a lantern flickering within. I followed a man back here, a man I overheard in the tavern boasting about how he’d caught a witch and he planned to make her suffer. He was loud, brazen. Seeking attention. He roamed from the bar to several tables, telling his tale to disinterested patrons. No one believed him. He could barely hold his pint of ale upright, so who would? 

But I did. 

Something about the gleam in his eyes… the scent of him. The way his heart thrummed faster with his words. I smelled it. Adrenaline. Anticipation. 

I smelled truth. 

And now, at the cabin set back far from the road, I watch him climb the steps, each thud of his feet on the groaning, uneven planks cutting through the still air. He means for the sound to be heard. He means to terrify whoever is locked inside. 

The man thumps his way further into the shadow of the moon with every step he ascends. But I have liquid patience in my blood, don’t forget. I have time to spare. So, I wait. I stand unmoving until he makes it to the landing of the porch. When he finally thunks his heavy boot onto the last step, wavering on his bowed legs, I bend and throw a pinecone against the side of the house. It hits far to the left of the door, obscured by the dark.

The man lurches to a halt and looks in the direction of the sound. He sways a little on his feet. 

I throw another to the same spot. 

“Who’s there?” he calls into the night, staggering a few steps toward the sound. 

He never sees me leap from the dark, clearing the steps like a phantom. He never hears me land behind him, silent on my bare feet. I creep right up to him, so close I could count every wiry hair on the back of his neck. He smells of whiskey and sweat. Unwashed linen. And a woman, her scent a mix of sage and starlight. 

I feel the anger bubble in my chest. It’s always struck me as ironic that a man like this can be so disgusting and yet so delicious. And he fits all the criteria to become one of my meals. Not that there are many. 

I lean toward the back of his neck and blow a thin stream of air across his skin from pursed lips. His hand darts to the sensation and he ducks, spinning.

“Boo.” 

I clip the human in the temple with my fist and he crashes onto the porch. It takes only two unconscious breaths before his thick, floppy throat starts rumbling an ungodly snore into the night. 

I roll my eyes, then I bend to pick up his ankle and drag him into the cottage. 

The single-room cabin is lit with lanterns, the light flickering across the thick planks of a table and the quilts that cover the chairs and the bed. I hear a scuttling noise in the shadow of the corner and see the witch trying to melt into its sharp angles. She’s tied with magical bonds, looking fierce and suspicious, like a trapped and vicious creature about to bite off a limb. I hear the blood quicken through the chambers of her heart. I can smell the bruises beneath her skin, the sweat and grime on her clothes. She glares at me with ebony eyes, daring me to come closer. 

“Hello,” I say. 

She says nothing, only narrows her eyes at me. I like her already. 

“I’m Leucosia. And you are?..” 

She looks at me for a long moment, unsure of whether to trust me with something as important as a name. She must see something worthy because her eyes soften just a little. 

“Ediye,” she finally replies. 

“Do you happen to know this piece of shit?” I ask, tugging the man’s ankle up to the height of my shoulder and waving it around. 

“He’s the one who caught me.” 

I look down at the man and back to the witch again. Her midnight skin glistens in the flickering lantern light. I can sense the power of magic in her, and I wonder how an idiot drunkard like this could have captured someone like Ediye. But when I look more deeply into her eyes, I see pain and loss beneath the fear and rage. There is grief. There is a well of it so deep that its waters are heated by the core of the earth. 

Humans may be weak, but there are still ways to catch an immortal, even ones that contain immense power. A bait that could not be refused. An exchange to save someone she loved, perhaps. Something horrible held over her as an incentive. Something he likely still stole from her even when she promised to comply. A sin for which he should suffer. 

“Want to have some fun?” I say, trying to keep my smile from growing too wide. 

The witch looks at the man. Rage and disgust are fierce in her eyes. Her gaze collides with mine in a wicked grin. “I do.” 

“We will be great friends, Ediye. I just know it.”

Ediye... Ediye… I move my lips but the sound never comes. For a moment, I’m confused. Why can’t I hear my voice? 

“I’m right here, Lu,” she whispers, taking my hand. 

Recent memories start to overtake the centuries-old images. Memories of the silver injection burning my voice away. Memories of Ashen descending the dais to embrace the resurrected soul of another woman. Memories of suffering and sickness, and the cage we now live in. 

I hear footsteps and the clank, clank, clank of keys approaching from down the hall. I already know it’s the guards, coming to drag me to Gallus so he can hollow out more of my heart. 

Stop fixing me, I sign, casting a weary gaze to Ediye. I should be afraid. I know what’s in store. I know what will come when the footsteps stop at the door. But I’m just too tired for fear anymore. I just want a promise from Ediye instead. 

Stop fixing me, I sign again, but she shakes her head. 

The key slots into the lock. 

Stop fixing me, please Ediye. 

The hot, calloused hands of the guards grip my arms and pull me from Ediye’s lap. I land on the stone floor and slide toward the door between their unrelenting grip. They slam it shut behind us and drag me to my feet. 

I give one last, pleading look to Ediye through the bars of our cage before they pull me into the dark. 

And so begins another day as a prisoner of the Shadow Realm.

CHAPTER 2

At first it was legit medical experimentation. Gallus is a multitalented torturer, after all. He does have some modicum of medical knowledge. He spent the first days of my captivity trying to find out what had already changed within me from Semyon’s injection, and what needed to be done to complete the transformation but with an edge of advantage for the Shadow Realm. I was sicker then, so I lucked out in a way. I don’t remember some of the incisions and blood draws and injections of random-ass shit. I was too busy seizing or passing out, or occasionally vomiting, which I tried to aim at Gallus but usually missed. Usually. 

But for every moment that was hazy or dark, there are many more that are bright with glass-like clarity. There has been pain beyond measure. Loss beyond fathom. Rage beyond the fiercest, burning fire. And helplessness, bitter helplessness that has filled every crevice left behind by everything that’s been stolen. 

Ember looked on those first few days with a gleam of delight in her eyes. She played nurse to my deranged doctor, passing him scalpels, subduing my limbs with silver shackles. With illness and rapidly waning strength, it’s not like I could fend her off. I did manage to spit in her face once, which was awesome as it was both bloody and stinking since they refuse to even give me a fucking toothbrush. She was not as delighted as I was. 

Since they haven’t found anything in me that’s told them what their next steps should be, they started asking me questions, trying to ‘motivate’ me with pain. Maybe they should have thought of asking questions in return for… I dunno… blood. Or clean clothes. Or a hot shower. I might have answered them. Maybe. It’s not like I have much to tell them anyway. I don’t know what was in the witch serum, I don’t know what they were going to inject me with next back in Semyon’s lab. But I’m sure as shit not going to tell them a shred of anything that might help their cause now. 

But now, there are no more questions. Ember never shows up to watch anymore. I think even she is too disgusted by my daily sessions here. It’s only me and Gallus. It’s only punishment for my crime. Maybe they think I’m a broken weapon that can't be salvaged. Maybe they’re just messing around until they find some way to complete my transformation, having their fun while they figure it out. It seems they only keep me alive to put me through this, day after day. And I think they will keep going until the end of time, just like the human myths of hell.

Ediye’s words from the first night I met Ashen ring in my mind as Gallus pries one of my fingernails free of my flesh with a pointed wooden skewer. 

It will be a reaping worse than death. 

She got that right. 

We spend the next hour or so playing this little game, Gallus pulling nails, prying them off with sharpened wooden sticks that leave splinters in their wake, me screaming without sound, my heart breaking. Honestly, I think that’s the worst part. That’s what makes me cry the hardest. No matter how bad it hurts when he’s finally removed the last of my nails, all my fingers and toes bloody and throbbing, my heart hurts even more. It feels bitten with burning venom. It’s so hot with rage and loss and sorrow, so nearly void of any light. 

The guards drag me back to our cell when Gallus is done with me. Dirt from the damp stone floor rubs into my raw toes where the nails should be and I try not to cry with the pain. I don’t want Ediye to see my despair as we draw close. I look up at the door and I can see her hands wrapped around the bars. 

Ediye backs away as the guards open the lock and fling me inside the cell. I land hard on my side where recently cracked ribs still haven’t healed. I grip my torso with throbbing fingers and roll to my back. The lock clinks shut behind me and Ediye rushes to my side. 

I can’t catch a break. Get it? I sign with a weak smile. Ediye’s not looking at my face though. Her eyes well with tears, her gaze caught on my bloody fingers. 

“Oh my darling,” she whispers as she takes my hand and examines my fingertips. Her lips tremble. The smile crumbles from my face and I take a deep breath. My own lashes are wet and my eyes sting. 

You have to stop fixing me, I sign. 

“No.”

STOP, Ediye. Please.

Ediye shakes her head. Tears crest the boundaries of her eyes and coast across her ebony skin. “No, Lu. You have survived much worse. You’ve been burned to a lump of charcoal. You’ve had your voice stripped away. You’ve lived past that weird shapeshifter serum. You’ve made it through all that, and you will survive this too. I can fix you.” 

How are you going to fix this, Ediye? I ask, showing her one of my fingernails I managed to swipe from the floor when Gallus released my shackles and pushed me off the exam table. I’m not sure what finger it belongs to, but I press it to the angry, bloody nail bed of my index finger anyway. It fucking hurts. Ediye grimaces as she watches it slide in the blood and sebum to fall onto the floor. If I was a healthy vampire, I’d already be healing. But that doesn’t happen anymore. 

Even if you could, I don’t want you to fix me anymore. I give her a long and weighty look. She leans in to hug me and I hold my breath, my throat burning hotter than ever with her closeness. I’m convinced this is part of my torture. The Reapers must be hoping I’ll cave and eat my best friend out of sheer desperation. Then I would be truly finished. My soul would be broken, and I would never recover. 

But I am not going to let that happen.  

I pull away and struggle to stand, Ediye hauling me up by my elbow and leading me to the bed. I feel scraped out, like a pumpkin at Halloween. I’m not sure if I’m the grotesque husk or the mess that’s left behind to rot. 

“Please. Please let me give you some of my blood,” Ediye begs, dampening her smelly rag in the stainless-steel sink and returning to the bed to wipe the sweat from my forehead.

No. 

“I know you can stop. I trust you.”

You shouldn’t. I don’t trust myself, Ediye. And there’s no point anyway. It’s only prolonging the inevitable. 

Ediye lets out a slow, heavy breath. Deep down, she knows I’m right. We’ve had versions of this argument twenty-nine times now, and every time we’ve come to this same conclusion. She trusts me. I don’t. I won’t drink. We are doomed. 

Only now, I’m prepared to do something about it. 

Not that I say that, though. I don’t think I need to anyway. Ediye looks worried, more worried than usual. I give her a half-smile, keeping it as lighthearted as I can manage. She totally sees through it. 

“What?” Ediye says, suspicion weighing her voice down by several notes. 

Nothing, I sign. 

“That’s not your nothing face.”

Sing it for me and this can be my nothing face. 

“Noooooooo.”

Look at my hideous fingers, I sign with a pout, turning my nail-less nubs toward her and twinkling them like jazz hands. Sing it for my sad little fingers. 

Ediye grimaces, glancing at my hands before training her eyes to mine. “They are pretty awful.”

Sad little pinky, I sign before waving one of my little fingers in her face. You won’t really deny naked pinky, will you? He’s missing his hat. Only your song will cheer him up. 

“Ugh fine,” she says, rolling her eyes. A hint of a smile casts a fleeting light across her lips. “But I’m only doing it for naked pinky.”

I beam at Ediye and lie down with my head in her lap. She strokes my hair from my face and smiles down at me, but there’s so much sadness there. Her eyes are glassy. I think she understands. These are our final days, our last hours. There’s nothing left to hope for now, other than to spend our last moments together.

“When I was young, I never needed anyone, and making love was just for fun. Those days are gone...”

I close my eyes. I fall asleep, exhausted, broken. And this time I dream of nothing at all. 

I hear hushed voices and I drag my eyes open. My head is clutched in Ediye’s lap. Her arms draw me close, like she might shelter me in their shadow. 

“I will need to take samples,” an unfamiliar man says. It’s a human. The smell of him makes my throat raw with fire. He’s older, judging by the timbre of his voice. The accent is familiar. Swiss, I think. He sounds nervous and out of place. Aren’t we all. 

“We will provide what you need,” a guard says. 

I peer through the shelter of Ediye’s arms and look toward the door. The guards flank a small man who must be in his sixties. He pushes silver-rimmed glasses up his nose as he regards me with a look of both pity and disgust, thinly veiled beneath a mask of fear and medical professionalism. He runs a hand over the shining surface of his bald head and then turns to one of the guards. 

“Take me to the lab,” the man says, and the guard nods. A scientist then. How fun. 

The three leave down the hall, and my heart collapses in stuttering beats beneath my bones. 

“What the fuck is going on?” Ediye whispers, releasing her grip on my head so she can watch for my reply. 

More experiments, I guess, I sign. I don’t think we’ll have to wait long to find out. 

We sit for a while in silence, listening for any sounds down the corridor of boots or keys or voices. I watch Ediye as she keeps her eyes on the bars of our cage. The obsidian necklace tied across her skin has started to rub it raw with its magic. Blisters carve an angry line around the glowing beads. But Ediye has never once complained. 

When she finally looks down at me, I give her a smile and choke down the emotion in my throat with a thick swallow. 

I love you, Ediye, I sign.

“Shut up,” she says. I can see the tears already glassing her eyes. I don’t think I can bear to see her cry again. I force my smile to grow wider. But with a single sound, it’s yanked from my skin. 

A clank at the end of the hall. 

There are two pairs of boots down the corridor. The jangle of keys echoes on the stone walls. 

My heart claws its way up my throat and I swallow it down as I meet Ediye’s eyes. Her onyx gaze fills with sorrow, replacing the light that was there just a moment ago. 

See you soon, I sign before clasping her in a tight hug. Her shoulders start to shake within my grasp. 

“I hope so, love,” Ediye whispers, gripping tighter as the key slides into the lock and the iron door squeals in protest. A hand clamps like a vice around the back of my neck and wrenches me out of Ediye’s arms. She lets out a strangled cry and grasps onto my grimy, bloody sleeves. The guard kicks her away and she lands on her back, her helpless expression turned up at me. I look at her face one last time, her brow crinkled in despair, tears streaking across her dark skin in glistening layers.

It’s okay, I try to say, but not even a squeak comes out as the guards drag me from the cage. Motherfucking Reapers. I should have stuck to my plan. I should have burned this whole place to the ground, somehow. Fucking idiot. Everything I said I wouldn’t do, I did. Everything I said I would do, I didn’t. And now I’m fucked. Worst of all, I’ve screwed my best friend over too. That thought overwhelms me every time it creeps into my brain, which is often. I try to push it down but I can’t, and the tears flood my eyes as I say I’m sorry, over and over without sound. My bloodied toes scrape the floor as I try to right myself. I don’t want Ediye to see me like this. But I’m powerless to stop it. 

Ediye calls my name as the door slams shut behind me. She scuttles to the bars and my last sight of her is her hands wrapped around the iron. The last thing I hear is her calling my name.

CHAPTER 3

I can’t stop myself from shaking. 

It’s so fucking embarrassing. Seriously. 

I’m a five-fucking-thousand-year-old vampire who has lived through all manner of horrors over the centuries, and I’m trembling at the sight of a frail old man with a needle in his hand. 

At least the little bald scientist doesn’t look any more comfortable with our current situation than I do. His Adam’s apple bobs with a thick swallow that makes my own throat burn with hunger. The butterfly needle quivers in his expert grip. Gallus watches off to the side with a bored expression, the thick, heavy muscles of his arms bulging as he folds them across his broad chest. I glare at the sweeping lines of his tattoos flowing beneath his rolled-up sleeves. He’s not even close to me and yet I’m terrified. He doesn’t need to touch me. He doesn’t even need to be in the room. 

It’s this table. This place. These silver shackles locked across my wrists and ankles. It’s this endless cycle, day after day after fucking day. 

I don’t know how long it’s been now. Maybe twenty days? Thirty? My infallible vampire memory was definitely fucking fallible in the first few days of my imprisonment. The hours blended into one another, a seemingly endless loop of vomiting and seizing and sweating and shaking. But in the days since, as my condition has evened out to a more consistent level of pain and despair, I’ve memorized every detail of this place. 

There’s a silver table where Gallus stores his tools. It shines with a brighter spot near the left edge where there’s a dent that captures the light of the overhead lamp. 

There’s the ridge of stone that is darker than the others on the wall that faces me. It’s the shadow I focus on. In the worst moments, I imagine it can swallow my pain as Gallus takes his hammer to my bones or his scalpel to my flesh. 

The smell of antiseptic. Sometimes I make stories to entertain myself about how he got it. I imagine Gallus passing into the Living Realm, waiting at a pharmacy counter to pay for rubbing alcohol as the woman in front of him buys lottery tickets and scratch cards. I imagine him becoming annoyed, yet powerless to stop the human social conventions of waiting in line. I like the idea of him being the powerless one for a change. 

I look for anything that will take me away from my body, if even for a moment. As long as it’s not memory. That’s been the only condition I’ve placed upon myself. Why? Because if I was going to survive a broken body in this room, I couldn’t live in a broken heart. In the days that have passed, I’ve only allowed myself that luxury in the cell with Ediye. And it feels like a luxury to wallow in my sorrow. It’s like slipping into a hot bath. It’s like lying beneath the Reaper’s silky sheets, feeling his fingers coast across my skin. 

But I can’t keep going on like this anymore. I know they’ll never let me leave. The Reapers won’t give me a swift death here in the Shadow Realm, not after the crime I’ve committed against them. Not if I’m a weapon they can’t fix or figure out. And even if this little Swiss man can do it, I refuse to fight for the Shadow Realm. I’m only prolonging the inevitable when I keep fighting to survive.

So, this time, as the little old scientist pulls the tourniquet tight across my arm and taps my weakened vein with his finger, I let myself fall away into memory. Memory of the Reaper, his hand on my back as he dipped me toward the floor when we danced in Bit Akalum. His palm on my cheek as he looked into my eyes with such sorrow in front of the cafe in Cairo. His kiss as he pressed my back against the wall by his bed. 

And every word floods back to me with the images that scroll through my mind. 

I’m the one who is left defenseless as you dismantle my walls, stone by stone, he’d said in his room, whispering his words across my skin. 

If you’re trapped in the Realm of Light, I will still find you, he’d said as he brushed my cheek with his thumb, his face so beautiful in the lamplight and the passing cars near the Khan Al-Khalili market. 

Can you try to place your trust in me? he’d asked as the song faded away and our dance came to an end. And even though I’d only smiled, that’s what I did. I placed my trust in him.  

Him. Ashen. 

And every word he said was a lie. 

I close my eyes and tears roll across my skin. 

I don’t feel the prick of the needle. I don’t notice when the tourniquet is removed from my arm. It’s not until I smell my own blood as the surgical steel is withdrawn from my skin that I realize the procedure is already over. 

“I need time to analyze the sample,” the little scientist says. I open my eyes, watching as he turns toward Gallus and caps the needle, pocketing the vial of blood in his lab coat. 

Gallus heaves a deep grumble that resonates in his chest. “How much time?”

“Four hours. Perhaps less.” 

“Do you require anything else to complete the task?”

The scientist pulls his glasses from his face and uses the edge of his shirt to polish the lenses before pushing them back onto his nose. “If it’s not too much trouble, food and coffee would help.”

“This will be arranged,” Gallus says with a single nod. 

The two men begin to talk about the logistics of the scientist’s meal. 

My eyes slide to the behemoth leaning against the wall. 

In their commonplace exchange, they don’t notice something uncommon at all. 

The little man has stood too close to a predator.

I curl my fingers around the edge of his sleeve, drawing the fabric into my palm like a spider collecting a web around its prey. 

My body can’t take much more punishment. If I destroy a piece of this little man, Gallus might just mete out more suffering than I can endure. If I have enough strength to hold onto him, to maybe reel in his flesh and break his bones, I might finally get what I’m hoping for. 

Death. 

Neither Gallus nor the scientist notice the stealth of my grip as they speak. They are so easily distracted by their important words, their self-interested thoughts. I close my eyes and try not to smile. 

“I will gather what you’ve asked for,” Gallus says. I hear his arms release from across his chest and fall to his sides as he pushes his body from the wall. His footsteps drift toward the door. “Come.”

My heart bursts a furious beat into my throat. This is it. The last moments of life. The love I feel for living, for all these centuries past... it captures my breath. It burns in my chest like a hot knife. And the sharpest blade of all is the love for the man that I lost. I finally let myself have something I wanted, after so many years away from immortal kind, and look where it got me. The betrayal carves hot tears into my skin as I open my eyes. 

The scientist seems to hesitate close to the table then tries to step toward the door to follow Gallus. His shirt pulls taut across his arm as I cling to his sleeve. His arm recoils toward mine and I grasp his warm palm in my shackled hand. 

My fangs descend and paint my tongue with a thin veneer of venom. The old man lets out a surprised yelp as I meet his eyes with a menacing smile. I squeeze his hand, trapping him in the vice of my fingers.

“Fucksakes,” I hear Gallus growl. 

There’s a thud, a muffled cry. 

But the sounds come from the other side of the steel door. 

I hear the sharp intake of breath as Gallus realizes something is wrong. The singing call of a sword sliding against a scabbard fills the room as he draws his weapon. His footsteps scramble to the door and he rushes from the room. 

The heavy door swings shut with a muted thud. I hear fighting in the hall. A clash of metal against metal. My eyes dart to the exit and back to the little man in my grip. 

“I’m he-here to ge-get you out,” he stammers, reaching with his shaking free hand into the pocket of his lab coat. 

He draws out a key. His eyes flick to my shackles. 

I nod. It takes a breath to convince my hand to do so, but I relax my tight grip until I can let go. My throat feels thick with searing heat, as though I swallowed lava. I see the red light within my eyes brighten in the reflection of the old man’s glasses before he turns away and fits the key into the first lock. 

The man says nothing as he fumbles with the shackles, his eyes flicking constantly toward the door where the sounds of fighting grow louder. He releases my wrist, then my ankles, then heads back up to my remaining hand. My heart is surging against my bones. My fingers start to tingle as I strain and stretch them within the silver cuff. In my head, I’m screaming at him to hurry up. Needles start pricking at the bone behind my eyes. 

Not now. Not now.  

I fight my body to keep my nerves at bay. Deep breaths. Calm my heart. Center my chakras or whatever the fuck I’m supposed to do. Whatever it will take to not have a seizure. 

The last shackle releases from my wrist and clanks on the steel table. For a heartbeat, the scientist and I look at one another. 

If he thought I would thank him, he got the wrong girl. 

I erupt from the table and crash into him, knocking us both to the floor. The air rushes from his lungs as his back hits the stone. 

“Please, please no,” he whispers as I lean toward his face and smile. “I saved you.” 

Maybe so. But I’m not in a merciful mood. 

I tear into his neck. He squirms and thrashes against me. Blood rushes down my throat and eases some of the desperate burn that has been my most constant companion all these days caged in the Shadow Realm. 

There’s a loud crash of metal against the door and the sound of fighting stops. The voices go silent in the hall. I’m probably still going to die, right here in this room, alongside this human who is quickly growing weak in my grasp. But at least I’ll die with a meal in my belly.

The door flings open. 

“Shit,” Cole says, blood sizzling in the flame of his sword. He surveys the scene in front of him and I glance beyond his legs to the hall. There are bodies on the floor. “You weren’t supposed to eat him.”

I shrug, my mouth still clamped around the man’s throat. He lets out a weak cry that vibrates on my lips. Too late now. 

Cole’s eyes flicker across my face and around the room then back again. A crease deepens between his brows. He walks toward me and grasps my arm, his touch both firm yet gentle, as though he’s trying to avoid causing more pain. I twist in his grip, my fangs still deep in the little man’s flesh. I’m so desperately hungry. I’m not ready to let go. “Gotta leave, Lu. There’s not much time. Ediye’s waiting.” 

Ediye. 

I drop the unconscious man. His breath is shallow and his heartbeat slow. Blood trickles down my chin and neck. Cole pulls me to my feet and I grimace in pain. I guess it’s not enough of a meal to fix so many injuries. Things don’t work the way they used to, it seems. 

Darkness creeps into Cole’s expression as his gaze bounces between my eyes. I’m getting the sense he’s realizing this rescue mission might be harder than he thought. “Come on,” he says, turning away and pulling me with him toward the door. 

The first body in the hall is that of Gallus. 

Cole steps over the hulking frame of my torturer, his carcass crumpled against the wall and split wide open, his sword resting in his open palm. Before I can cross over his thick legs, I grab the dagger sheathed at Cole’s side and whip free of his grasp. 

I drop to my knees and raise the blade, slamming it down into my dead enemy’s chest. No sooner does the knife crunch through his bones then I’m drawing it away to strike again. My vision vibrates with red rage. I drive it into his lower abdomen. I use both hands to drag the blade up toward his chest in a vertical line, then I plunge one fist into his warm viscera and tear his intestines from his flesh. I shove them into his face and heave a silent scream across his skin. You should know how this feels, I bellow, the sound living only in my head. I punch my bloody fist into his cheek. You should know- 

“Lu… Come on Lu. It’s already done,” Cole says, catching my wrist. He squeezes when I try to pull away, but not enough to force the blade from my fingers. I turn to him with a fierce glare, my whole body shaking with fury, but he leans in closer. “Get your revenge by living.”

His words slap me out of my rage.

I bank the embers of wrath and give a shaky nod. Cole hauls me to my feet, my slew of injuries screaming their furious pain at me with every move we make. We hop over slain guards and slip through blood, passing by my empty cell where the door stands ajar, held open by a dead Reaper’s legs. I start to panic thinking about Ediye, but when I cast my frantic gaze ahead she steps from the corner of the corridor and into view. 

“Thank the goddess,” she whispers when we stop in front of her. I glance down at her neck. The obsidian chain is gone, only blisters left in its wake. She gives me a lopsided smile and turns to Cole. “It’s all clear so far.” 

“It won’t be for long,” Cole says, leaning around the corner to double check our pathway of escape. “Follow me.” 

We take a turn to the right and jog down the hallway, twisting through the bowels of the building. There are several dead guards along the way and a few barred gates for which Cole has heavy keys. We arrive at a set of black stairs and run up them by twos. My toes ache, still so open and raw. I don’t have time to dwell on why the fresh blood I drank hasn’t healed them enough to at least keep them scabbed over. 

We stop at the last step and Cole checks the adjacent corridor. His arm darts behind him and presses Ediye and I into the wall. I’m wedged between them both. I hear voices in the hall to our left. 

My heart is thudding in my chest, ringing its drum into my ears. My fingertips are numb, the tingle flowing up to my wrists. I can’t feel the pain of the empty nail beds anymore. Needles drill hot cores from my eye sockets. My arms and knees start to jerk. 

“Cole,” Ediye whispers, her voice urgent. I see her grab his arm and I feel them both cage me into their grip. Cole looks over his shoulder and concern flashes through his eyes. “Seizure.” 

“Fuck,” is the last thing I hear before black stars collapse my vision into a pinprick of light that flares and burns out. 

When I wake, I’m jostled by a powerful set of arms. Heat cascades through my body. My teeth clatter and my flesh feels numb, like a surge of electricity has seared my muscles until they melted onto my bones. I open my eyes and Cole glances down, that concerned expression firing through his eyes once more. He doesn’t break the cadence of his stride until I tap his arm and he sets me on my feet.

“Okay, Lu?” he asks, his hand wrapped around one arm, Ediye’s around another. 

I nod and swallow, my tongue scraping the roof of my mouth. It feels like I’ve been chewing on cotton. Cole’s brow twitches with suspicion and I nod once more before finally turning my gaze to the space around us.

The dais. 

The smoke that cascades upward like a waterfall to the height of the towering ceiling. 

The shaft of light from the window that sits above the fog of the Shadow Realm. 

I remember this room.

It’s empty now, no figures on the dais, no Reapers in the shadows, no souls about to be reborn into another life. 

Cole presses his dagger into my hand. 

“Almost there,” he whispers, pointing from where we’ve stopped in the shadows at the edge of the room toward a row of cauldrons near the door at the other end of the grand hall. “Ready?”

I nod, even though my legs feel unsteady and my body weak. 

“Run.”

My heart surges and we take off from the safety of the pillars that line the room, running as fast as we can go. Cole drops my arm and leads the way, his fiery sword illuminating the shadows and the souls that linger in their dark embrace. Ediye clings to my arm, pulling me forward. My lungs protest, the broken ribs piercing my chest with every ragged breath.

A Reaper guard materializes from a hidden chamber and shouts a warning before Cole cuts him down with his sword. He’s faster and more powerful than any Reaper I’ve seen, even more than Ashen. His grace isn’t bound by this realm. The flaming arc of his blade is the perfect shape of a scythe as it swings from his left and slices through the torso of the guard, spilling hot blood across the floor.

“Don’t stop!” he calls over his shoulder as he jumps over the slain guard. He powers ahead and I know he’s aiming for the torches to light a cauldron that will take us away from this realm. 

Another guard bursts from the shadows, landing between us and Cole. Ediye drops my arm and points her palms toward the demon blocking our path. 

“Lizazzu salmani sunu,” she says, and the guard is immobilized, only his eyes darting around in confusion as his limbs stiffen like stone. 

Ediye glances toward me and smiles as I give her the thumbs up. “Christ that felt good,” she says with a fleeting smile. 

We focus on our target ahead. Cole grabs a torch and tosses it into a cauldron midway down the line. The flame roars to life across the black and gold stones. He anchors a foot in the fire and leans toward us, beckoning for us to run faster. Ediye pulls me in her wake, her free arm pumping in rhythm with our bare feet as they slap against the stone. 

“Lu!” a voice calls from behind me. It echoes across the pillars and dances in their shadows. 

The rich timbre. The deep pitch. The surprise and urgency. It will never cease to amaze me how two letters can communicate so much. 

I halt, pulling Ediye to a stop with me. She looks beyond my shoulder with a murderous glare. I pivot a slow turn, my breath trapped in my lungs. 

Time grinds to a halt. The only movement in all the Shadow Realm is Ashen’s eyes. They catalog everything in no more than a beat or two of my heart. All the bruises that haunt my skin. The gore that smears my chin. My gaunt cheeks and cracked lips. The dirty, ripped clothes that hang from my bones and the angry slashes of blood where my nails are missing from the hand that grips my blade. The fierce and feral glare that lives in my glowing red eyes. 

Ashen’s lips part and his beautiful face is filled with both rage and a flash of something that crashes like a wave on a rocky shore before it’s swept back out to sea. Maybe loss, or regret. I don’t give any more thought to what it might be. 

Within one sharp exhalation my hand is empty, my blade lodged to the hilt next to Ashen’s heart.

CHAPTER 4

I harden my glare until it sings as sharp as steel. Ashen looks down at his chest and back up to my eyes before he falls to his knees. His hand closes around the handle of the dagger and grips it with waning strength. 

“Ashen,” a female voice calls out with desperation. I didn’t notice her in the shadows. I didn’t hear her heartbeat or catch the scent of lilac that drifts toward me now, mixing with the scent of sizzling blood. 

Davina rushes up behind Ashen and grasps his shoulders, trying to keep his body from toppling over. She doesn’t look up at us. Her gaze is trapped on the blade and the blood that drips from the wound, pooling on the floor. But Ashen’s eyes don’t leave mine, not as he pitches forward, not as his free hand splays on the stone. 

I break the chain between us and turn away. Ediye and I run. We run as guards shout from the darkness and plunge toward us from hidden recesses of the grand hall. We run as I hear my name wheeze past Ashen’s lips on a ragged breath. And when we’re close enough, we jump into the cauldron, crashing into Cole’s arms as the flames erupt around us. 

The fire falls away and we tumble out of the cauldron and into the Living Realm, landing in a room I’ve never seen. Cole scurries to his feet and grabs an iron lid, closing the cauldron so that no Reapers can follow us from the other side. 

We heave desperate, greedy breaths, pulling air into our lungs as we stare at one another. No one seems to know where to start or what to say. It’s like there are so many questions to choose from that it’s impossible to begin. 

“Thank you,” Ediye says to Cole. I nod vigorously in agreement. I can hardly believe any of this is real. I was so ready to die in that dungeon that this seems like a dream. 

Cole looks at Ediye for a long moment, his gaze darting down to her blistered neck as his jaw tightens. He looks away, scanning the room. “Don’t thank me yet. We aren’t much safer here. Come on.”

Ediye takes hold of my hand and we follow Cole out of the room, into the darkness of an old, small cottage. This house is not like the other Reaper buildings I’ve seen so far. It’s quaint and warm, with sheepskin throws on worn armchairs and layered rugs on scuffed wood floors. Dried flowers and dusty vases decorate the antique furniture and lend color to the faintly yellow plaster walls. Outside the leaded windows, however, the same gray fog obscures the sun. The light that does filter in is close to the horizon, cut by the shadows of pine trees. 

“Where are we going?” Ediye asks as we exit the cottage and stride toward a black sedan waiting in the mist. 

“Hartington. It’s a couple hours south. We’ll make it just after nightfall, hopefully,” Cole says as he opens the rear passenger door for me and Ediye guides me in. I lie across the seats and she pulls a blanket over me. It feels like the softest thing that’s ever touched my skin. It smells like irises and springtime near the sea. Smelling something so beautiful makes me realize how fucking disgusting I am. The relief and embarrassment and frankly, probably the smell of my own grossness brings the sting of tears to my eyes. 

Ediye slips into the passenger seat and twists around to survey my face. I give her a thumbs up and she returns it with a weak smile before facing Cole as he starts the car and barrels down the fog-coated driveway. “What’s in Hartington?”

Cole doesn’t answer for a breath or two. “Hope.”

We tear free of the fingers of fog that seem to chase us down the driveway like they’re unwilling to let us go. We skid onto a gravel road and speed into the light of the setting sun. 

It feels like it’s been a year since the sun has touched my face. I sit up enough to feel the kiss of light on my skin. I close my eyes for a breath, but I feel Ediye watching. We observe one another in a silent conversation of worry and wariness, and I sign a question to her. 

“Lu says you’re working with angels to keep the balance of the realms. She wants to know if you were once an angel too.”

Cole’s eyes meet mine in the rearview mirror. It takes him a long moment to answer, and when he does his voice comes out thin and strained. “It feels like another lifetime ago. Maybe two. I guess it was.” 

“How is that possible?”

“I gave up my wings to become human, for a chance to infiltrate the Shadow Realm.”

I tap Ediye’s seat and sign a question to her. She smirks before she turns toward the driver’s seat. 

“Lu wants to know if we can call you Cole the Mole now.” 

Cole’s eyes roll in the reflection of the rearview mirror. “Funny.” 

“Wait… if you gave up your wings, were your wings the ones used to make the Angelwing poison that the werewolves used against-”

I kick Ediye’s seat before she can say that motherfucker’s name out loud. She turns and glares at me before facing back toward Cole.

“-against your… colleague?..”

“No. I relinquished my wings for my mission.” Cole’s eyes connect with mine again and they narrow in what looks like a grimace. “About my colleague-”

I punch the back of Cole’s seat and he grunts. 

“I don’t suppose Lu killed him for good, did she?” Ediye asks. I feel her gaze land on me, but I’m too invested in glaring daggers at Cole in his mirror to look her way. 

“No, she didn’t. The others I slayed with my sword will not come back though.” 

Cole’s eyes soften and I think I can read his thoughts in them. It looks like an apology, for taking vengeance that was due to be mine. I’m not sure if that makes him more angelic or less. He refocuses on the road ahead and reaches a hand back toward me, grabbing the strap of a bag in the footwell behind Ediye’s seat. 

“Check the main compartment. There’s blood for you in there,” he says, his voice quiet. 

I unzip the bag and pull out one of two thermoses. I unscrew the cap and the scent of warm blood hits my nose and the back of my throat, flooding my mouth with venom. Cardamom. Cinnamon. It’s missing honey, but it’s close to what Mr. Hassan made for me in Cairo. My gaze shoots to the rearview mirror and I feel the sharp question in my narrowing eyes, but it’s one I don’t want to know the answer to. 

“Some things might not be what they seem, Lu,” Cole says, and I know he understands. Not all questions are ready to be asked. Not all answers are ready to be heard. 

I sip my drink and watch out the window as we fall into silence, all of us still reeling from the rapid escape from the Shadow Realm and, for Ediye and me, the days spent in captivity. The blood from the thermos isn’t as potent as the concoction the apothecary once gave me, but it’s warm and flavorful, and it slakes the hunger that still crushes my throat in its grip. 

Ediye and Cole strike up a quiet conversation about our time locked in the dungeons but they keep it pretty technical. How many days it’s really been (twenty-six, holy fuck), how often we were fed (not nearly enough), what kinds of questions we answered (hardly any, which was payback for the lack of food). 

Eventually, I finish the first thermos and lay back across the seat, clutching the blanket up to my nose. I’m too exhausted to drink the second thermos, or to follow the murmured conversation between my friend and our rescuer. With little more than a blink, I fall deep into sleep. 

We’re still driving when I wake, but the sun is down. I pull my eyes open. Even my eyelids feel slick with sweat. My clothing sticks to my skin. I look at my hand where it lies in Ediye’s palm, her head bent over my fingers as she inspects them. 

“This shouldn’t be,” she says, looking up at Cole across the center console of the sedan. “She had a full thermos. This at least should have healed.” 

“Which one did she drink?”

Ediye turns toward me and sees me watching. She hides her worry behind the flash of a kind smile as she reaches for the empty thermos. “The red one.” 

“Give her the other, the blood should be much stronger.” 

Ediye nods and unscrews the cap, pouring it into the stainless-steel lid. The same cinnamon and cardamom scent wafts toward me on robust notes of a richer blood. It smells sweeter, like it’s been stirred with honeysuckle. Something pleasant, not thick and cloying. 

“Sit up, babe. Drink this,” Ediye says as she passes me the cup. I bring it to my lips, taking a long draft. 

One swallow is all it takes to know. 

It tingles like the fizz of champagne. I feel the effervescence hum in my throat. It passes over the burn of my lost voice and slips behind the wall of my chest. 

It is time and history. Power and loss, rage and longing. 

I draw the cup away from my lips and hold out my hand for the thermos as though I want more. Ediye passes it to me as I grip the little mug between my knees. She watches as I unscrew the top. 

I press the button for the window and empty the contents onto the road. 

Ediye protests but I don’t listen, not even when tears flood my eyes and my vision turns to red. I throw the thermos onto the road and then the cup, then close the window. With a final, menacing glare at Cole, I curl back down on the seat, turning away from them. 

“What the fuck?” Ediye whispers. 

“It’s his blood,” Cole says, his voice quiet. Ediye blows out a long, steady breath. I press my eyes closed as I feel the weight of her hand rest on my hip. 

There’s no more conversation in the car.

CHAPTER 5

I don’t sleep, though I try. It isn’t long anyway before the car slows and turns to the left, then another left, and then crunches down a gravel driveway. I pull myself up and look toward a small, unassuming farmhouse flanked by colorful flowers and tall hedges. The door opens and Eryx appears, his wide grin illuminated by the patio lights framing the covered porch. 

The car grinds to a halt and Cole is out the door without even turning off the engine. He bounds onto the porch and wraps Eryx in a tight embrace. When they pull apart, Cole’s palms press to Eryx’s face before their lips meet in an impassioned kiss. 

“An angel and a demon in love. I can’t imagine truer magic than that,” Ediye says as she reaches over and turns the ignition off. She glances back at me and I nod with a faint smile. A fleeting pang of jealousy washes through my veins as I watch them part to smile warmly at one another. My heart feels raw in the shadow of such joy. 

Let’s go, I sign, grabbing the blanket to clutch it around my shoulders. I’m hoping it’ll hide the worst of my bloody shirt and my bruised arms for Eryx. 

“Lu! I’m so happy to see you. And Ediye, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Cole told me about you,” Eryx says as he lets go of Cole’s arms and walks toward Ediye, the sharpened feathers of his wings scraping the stone walkway as they drag in his wake. He pulls Ediye into an embrace and she huffs a laugh at his enthusiastic greeting. Eryx lets her go and walks toward me but I take a step back and he stops short of touching me. His eyes flow over my face and I give a slight shake of my head. His throat bobs in a thick swallow. I’m so beyond gross, stained with blood and marred with bruises. Making Eryx pass out the first time we met by drinking Ashen’s blood was fun, but I’m not really in the mood for a sequel. More than anything, though, he just looks sad. Desperately sad. For me.

“Come inside,” he says, putting on a warm smile and gesturing toward the house. “You can get cleaned up and rest for a while.” 

Cole grabs the bags from the car as Eryx leads us inside the house. There’s nothing remarkable about the space, it’s just comfortable and inviting but a little dated and bland. Cream colored leather sofas take up a little too much space in a small living room, pictures of flower arrangements and landscapes hang from the walls. We follow Eryx past the kitchen and up a narrow set of stairs that leads to the bedrooms. Ediye and I are each given a room with a bathroom between us, and Eryx and Cole have the master suite across from us. When our bags have been deposited where they belong, Ediye heads for the shower as the rest of us regroup in the kitchen.  

“Here,” Cole says, offering me another thermos that’s been waiting on the counter as Eryx starts gathering ingredients to make Ediye an omelet. “It might be a little cooler now, but I can warm it if you need.” 

I hesitate to take it and dart a wary look toward the black canister in his hand.

“It’s human blood, but flavored.” Cole pushes the thermos toward me. 

I swallow as I take the thermos and draw it to my chest, not breaking my gaze from Cole’s. I nod. 

“I’m sorry. I should have told you about the other thermos back in the car. About who it belonged to.” 

A film of tears coats my eyes and I look away, nodding once more. I drift toward the kitchen island and heave myself onto a stool. For a while I just look at the thermos, unmoving. I run my finger over my warped reflection on the polished surface, thinking about all the times I’ve suffered. Injuries after battles, losses of loved ones, the agony I endured when I burned at the stake. Despite all those horrible moments, I’ve been thinking that this time feels like the worst of them all. 

At first, I wasn’t sure why. But now I know the reason. Before, there had always been something to hope for. There were more battles to win. There were loved ones to avenge. There was the knowledge my plan had worked, that I would heal from the burns to grasp a chance at another life. This time, I don’t feel hopeful for anything. I don’t even feel like myself. No voice. No miraculous healing power. No respite from my memories of trauma and loss. It’s just more hiding, even more than before. It’s more loneliness. My life feels like a monument of loss. It’s just suffering for the sake of suffering.

Cole reaches across the island and uncaps the thermos, pouring the blood into a ceramic mug. I watch his eyes as his focus stays on the viscous liquid, a soft smile lifting the corners of his lips. When he meets my gaze, his smile brightens.

“Here,” he says, pushing the mug across the counter. “You’ll feel better if you drink this.”

I don’t think I will, but I give him a weak smile of thanks anyway. 

Cole watches my hand as I raise my mug to my lips and take a sip. He nods toward my fingers. “Ediye said you should have started healing by now.” 

I keep my eyes on Cole and give a slight nod. 

“Any ideas why it’s not working?” 

I shake my head as he passes me a pen and a few sheets of printer paper. My movement is slow as I write. The pressure of the pen against my skin angers the raw, empty beds of my nails. 

Maybe it’s the witch’s serum Semyon gave me. Maybe because the process of hybridization hasn’t been completed, I write, showing Cole my note. 

“Maybe,” he says, but his tone is doubtful. 

A slow but weak smile pulls at the edges of my lips. Or maybe my labia is taking up too much energy fighting to not become a parachute. 

I show Cole my note and his head tilts, his eyes narrowing in question. 

Did you not see the hybrid’s enormous dick?

Cole’s eyes narrow further and he looks at me as though I’ve grown a second head. 

I sigh, realizing That Asshat Reaper Motherfucker probably would have gotten it. He might have even laughed. No, he definitely would have laughed, or at least come back with some dry retort that would only make me try harder. 

Never mind. 

Cole is silent for a long moment as he watches me drink. The sound and smell of eggs sizzling in the pan drifts through the kitchen and Eryx puts some bread down in the toaster. Again I think of That Asshat, this time remembering his love of butter. I never thought I’d be out of the dungeon in the Shadow Realm, so it never occurred to me to prepare for memories I didn’t want to relive. Every little one feels like a shard of steel to the heart, even sharper when I’m not ready for the strike. I look into my cup and sigh again. 

“Cheer up, Lu. It can only get better from here,” Eryx says, casting me a bright smile over his shoulder before turning back to his pan. The tips of his wings clink across the ceramic floor. I exchange a dubious glance with Cole and he shrugs. I’m not so sure of Eryx’s angelic optimism. After all, I don’t even feel that much better with all the blood I’ve consumed, only less hungry. That perpetual glaze of sweat still coats my skin and my head pulses with a ceaseless ache. Not a great sign of things to come. 

“We need to find someone that can help you,” Cole says after a long moment watching me in silence as Eryx plates up Ediye’s food. 

“The apothecary in Cairo. He might have some ideas,” Ediye says as she enters the kitchen. She squeezes the water from her hair with a towel. “He likes Lu and he’s partial to vampires. And if he can’t help, I’m betting he’d be able to direct us where to start.” 

CERTAIN PEOPLE might figure we’ll head there. Too dangerous, I sign to her, shaking my head with a solemn glare as she puts a voice to my words for Cole and Eryx. 

“Is there someone else who can help? Another apothecary you can think of?” Cole asks, turning his gaze to Ediye as she takes her plate from Eryx and sits next to me. 

“If there is, I would only trust Mr. Hassan’s recommendation.” she says. 

“Well, it’s not like we can go back to the Shadow Realm to take the corridor there, so it will need to be a commercial flight,” Cole says as he looks me over with a doubtful quirk of his brows. “Can you hold your shit together for that many hours in a tin can in the sky stocked with a human buffet?”

Eryx laughs, the sound like wind chimes warmed by the summer sun. I almost sigh at the way it brightens the room. His beautiful face glows with the spark of an idea. “Don’t be silly, Cole. Lu has the freedom of the Realm of Light. I can take her to Cairo through our portal in Blue Falls.” 

I look between Eryx and Cole. “That could work,” Cole says, nodding. He turns his attention toward Ediye as she devours the omelet. “I pulled in some favors among witches and gathered some supplies. They’re in your bag.” 

Ediye nods, not taking her eyes from her food. “I saw. Thank you. It’s a good start.” 

“Your grimoire and all your supplies were burned, correct?”

Ediye shakes her head around a mouthful of toast. “I have backups of lesser-used spells and rarer supplies hidden in Fairfield.”

“Excellent. Eryx, you take Lu to Blue Falls in the morning and get her to Cairo. Ediye and I will go to Fairfield and gather up what she needs then meet you there.” 

Ediye’s chewing slows and we exchange a heavy look. Aside from my daily excursions with Gallus to the torture chamber, we haven’t spent any time apart since we were captured. I know she doesn’t like the idea of separating any more than I do. But her onyx eyes flow over the unhealed bruises and cuts on my face. The slime of sweat that still covers my skin. Ediye swallows her bite of toast and gives me a resigned nod. I can see what she’s thinking, that it’s the best plan we’ve got. 

“I know you’ve not had reason to trust anyone but each other,” Cole says, and we tear our tangled gaze apart to look at him. 

Eryx places a hand on Cole’s shoulder and gives us both a hopeful smile. “We won’t ask you to trust us. But if you give us a chance to prove it, we will not let you down. There will never be peace between the Realms, but there is balance. Right now, the four of us are the best shot at keeping it and we’ll only manage if we work together.” 

I shift my gaze to Cole. I stare into his eyes, trying to tunnel to the depths of his soul. If what he said is true, he gave up his wings for this. He gave up the life he knew for this chance. 

I feel the heat of a tiny ember in my chest when I bore into the only thing I can find in his gaze. Hope. Maybe I don’t hope for the same things as he does. I might be a little more invested in becoming the biggest pain in the ass the Shadow Realm has ever seen. But still, it’s something I can grab onto. It’s a fire I can stoke and draw life from. 

I nod. Okay, I mouth. 

Cole’s face lifts into a grin. Eryx absolutely beams, the light from the kitchen fixtures glinting on his feathers and reflecting across his skin like a suncatcher. I lower my eyes from their enthusiasm but I can’t hide the faint trace of a smile on my lips. 

I slide off the stool and give my unlikely companions a salute before pulling my thermos and mug with me, giving an apologetic parting glance to Eryx who tries valiantly to disguise his disgust at my cup of blood. 

My feet feel leaden as I trudge up the stairs. My muscles ache from use after so many days doing nothing but surviving in a cell. Being this close to human is painful and the feeling of weakness is still foreign after five thousand years of near indestructibility. 

I set my meal down in the bathroom and retrieve my bag from my room, then turn the shower on. I almost dance with glee at the thought of removing my clothes, which are now little more than shredded rags. I want to burn them, or flush them down the toilet. Maybe both. 

As the water heats in the most anticipated shower of all time, I rummage through the main compartment of the bag Cole packed for something to sleep in. I pull out a tank top and a pair of sleep shorts and place them on the counter before moving on to search for a toothbrush in the smaller front section of the bag. 

The first thing my fingers touch is cool metal wrapped in leather. The handle of my kaiken. 

I pull the dagger free of the bag, holding my breath as though a wisp of air from my lungs could make it disappear. I slide it free of its sheath and turn it over in my hands, pressing my eyes closed. The weight the blade settles in my skin as though it’s a piece of missing flesh returned. When I can breathe again, I peer into the shadows of the bag, my fist still gripped around the handle of the kaiken as though something sinister might rush from the pocket to bite me. My fingertips graze a flat sheaf of leather and I know immediately what it is. 

I pull out the leather journal that the Reaper gave to me. 

My heart stutters in my chest and blood thrums in my ears, drowning out the sound of water hitting the bathtub and flowing down the drain. Tears sting my eyes. I swallow a sudden mace in my throat that feeds the ever-present flame. 

I open the journal and flip through the pages. One-sided conversations stare back at me, and I hear the Reaper’s replies to every one. I smile through tears as I come across the page of ASSHOLE in different fonts. I read the note I tried to write in Cairo but couldn’t finish, the one about being trapped in the Realm of Light. The Reaper’s promise floats through my mind. I will still find you.

I read the last note I wrote to him. It’s next to the torn shreds of the page I ripped out and slapped to his chest before we kissed. 

I’m not all vampires, it says. 

A laugh bubbles up from my chest. I’m definitely not all vampires, that’s for sure. I could never have known at the time just how true that statement would be. 

I flip to the next page where there’s a bump, an irregularity on the paper. 

There’s a note in a different ink, an unfamiliar script. Sharp. Precise. Careful. Every letter purposeful. Like every one was sacred when it was transferred from hand to page. 

I’m sorry, it says. Taped next to it is my necklace from Ediye. 

A long breath passes through my pursed lips, my eyes fixed to the note and everything those two words could possibly mean.  

I tear the necklace free, shutting the book as though something else might fly from the pages to twist the blade already turning in my heart.

CHAPTER 6

It’s the most glorious shower I’ve ever had in all my life. 

Cole and Eryx have an assortment of soaps and body washes and shampoos and conditioners lining the shelves in the shower and the edge of the tub. I try every one. And I mean, Every. Single. One. I stand in the stream until my skin is scrubbed raw and the water goes cold.

I feel a little better when I get out, but even dripping wet and wrapped in a towel I can tell my body temperature isn’t quite right. Since my encounter with Semyon, my internal thermostat has been set to simmer. I’m just too hot. All the time. I haven’t grown accustomed to it and I don’t think I want to. The more I consider it, the more I don’t mind heading off to the Realm of Light with Eryx to get to Cairo. If Mr. Hassan can help me, I’ll do almost anything to get there. Even smell a dead hybrid’s dick again. Hell, I’d even smell a live hybrid’s dick. So you know, you KNOW, I am serious. 

I dry my hair and get changed, heading back to my room with the intention of getting as many hours of rest as possible. The sound of conversation and laughter downstairs lulls me into sleep. Despite my hopes, however, I end up waking in the deepest night after a steady stream of nightmares. It seems that the Shadow Realm doesn’t want to let me go. 

After figuring sleep is a lost cause, I decide to get up, wrapping myself in a crocheted throw and taking my journal and dirty clothes from yesterday with me. Fuck, they really stink. I feel bad now for poor Cole having to sit with me in that car for so long. Now that I’m clean, the smell is ten times worse than it was at the time. 

I crack open my door, not wanting to disturb my new housemates. The lights are all off, everyone is now in bed. I hear the steady cadence of three pairs of lungs and someone’s gentle snore. Eryx’s hummingbird heartbeat outpaces the others. A little smile ghosts across my face. I drift soundlessly down the stairs and into the kitchen, rummaging until I find a barbeque lighter. Then I head out the back door with my kaiken strapped to my thigh. 

There’s no moon. The stars are vibrant orbs of swirling color in the heavy black blanket of night. As I hoped, there’s a fire pit in the backyard close to a small wooden barn, a pond nearby on the left. Its surface is so quiet that it reflects the sky as a perfect, polished mirror. Tall cattails frame the dark water, frogs croaking night songs from hidden grasses on the shore. 

Four adirondack chairs circle the stone hearth of the firepit and I set my things down on the one that faces the barn. I stack some wood and kindling from a pile next to the building onto the bricks and light the bonfire, then sit for a while and watch it consume the wood. When it’s hot enough, I throw in my clothes and stare them down until they melt into the embers beneath the flame. 

I turn my journal over in my hands, running my fingers across the embossed golden vines and flowers. Even without a moon, I can see the metallic hue shimmer in the starlight. The thought of the Reaper choosing that design because I might like it… the idea alone, whether it’s true or not, is enough for me to reconsider tossing the notebook into the fire. That’s why I came out here really, to shed my skin and burn it. To turn this memory into ash. It’s just… I can’t quite make myself. Maybe if I felt angrier. Sometimes I do. Maybe even if I felt sad. I feel that often too. Right now, however, I just feel raw, scrubbed as clean as my skin. 

I open the book to the last note and glance at the writing again. 

I’m sorry. 

I don’t look for too long at those letters adorning the top of the paper like a title. Maybe the empty pages that follow would be a book of broken promises. These thoughts are bitter and morose, I know. But we vampires can’t help it sometimes when so many years pass through our eyes into a well of memory that will never die.

I keep my eyes on the fire as I slowly tear the page free of its spine. The little fibers separate like skin ripping free of the flesh below. I know such sounds well. Gallus made sure I wouldn’t ever forget them, even if my vampire memory one day atrophies. If I remember nothing else, I will never forget those sounds and the feeling of the pain that came with them. 

I’m sorry.

I look at those two words one last time before I crumple the page into my fist and throw it into the fire. It glows bright orange. Worms of hot light eat the edges first, chewing the paper until the words are lost forever. 

I tear the next page of text free of the book. I’m not all vampires, the final line says. I compress the paper in my palm and throw that in the flame too. Maybe I’m not any kind of vampire anymore, I think as I watch the paper burn. 

Maybe I can do this page by page. I can work backwards all the way to the start. Maybe I just need to deconstruct my pain one moment at a time. Throwing all of it into the flame at once is too much to bear, another loss all its own. But one page, then another, and another… watching the physical memories burn one by one is something I can handle, until I can’t anymore. 

I don’t know. How bad is it, really? 

That’s the last line on the next page. It was after our encounter with the angel in Saqqara, moments before Ashen offered me his blood for the first time. 

I hesitate. The memory of taste fills my mouth. I swear I can still feel the hum of his presence in my veins. My fingers press on the edge of the page, ready to pull but unable to. 

A sluice of ice-cold water seems to slide down my spine. 

That’s when I hear it. 

Silence. 

The frogs have gone quiet. There are no insects chattering in the night. Even the stars lose their shine on the wave of instinct that coats the world and invades my pores. Time grinds to a halt around me. 

I hear a ripple in the water of the pond. It’s the sound of tiny waves breaking the polished tension of the surface and lapping at the shore.

I rise from my chair, clutching the notebook to my chest. The blanket falls around my bare feet. I step away from it slowly, one foot after the other. I don’t want to be caught in its tangled embrace. 

My nostrils flare as I try to take in every scent around me. The dewy grass that bruises beneath my soles with every silent step I take toward the barn. The fabric softener that clings to the fibers of my clothes. The smoke that lifts toward the sky. 

I can’t catch anything beyond the smell of the fire or the crackle of wood breaking beneath the flame. 

But I know I’m not alone. I know it.

I dart on my tiptoes for the last few steps to the barn, grasping the latch of the iron handle and pressing it slowly with my thumb. It makes a quiet clunk, the only sound besides the fire in the night. 

I close my eyes. I focus on steady breaths in and out. When the pins of the old door grate against the hinges, I lift the handle a little to ease the gravity of the planks of knotted wood under my control, keeping my pace steady and smooth. As soon as there’s just enough room, I slip inside, then close the door until only a crack is left through which to watch. 

I unsheathe the blade from my thigh and press my face to the thin wedge of space between the door and its frame, squinting into the night. And I wait.

I hear it before I see it. The reptilian sound of skin against the earth. 

Slick, ridged scales glisten in starlight as a snake serpentines out of the pond, sliding across mud and grass. The wet tongue flickers and catches the reflection of the bonfire light. It’s enormous, larger than an anaconda. I know with certainty that it is not of this realm. 

I watch as the snake makes a careful procession toward the fire. It slows as it reaches the blanket I left behind. I cursed inwardly that I didn’t toss it into the fire, even though it probably wouldn’t have made a difference. 

The pace of the snake’s tongue quickens. It raises its head and tests the scent on the blanket. A low hiss emanates from its neck. It is pleased with what it’s found.

The giant head drops back down to the grass, obscured by the bright flame between us. But I don’t need to see it to know it will follow my scent straight here.

I close the door behind me, careful not to make a sound, lifting the metal hook over the latch with my raw fingers. The pain is absent in the wake of my fear and the desperation to survive. 

I turn and take in the space around me. My night vision is not as clear as it used to be before my encounter with Semyon, but it’s still better than the average human. I see shelves of hand tools and stacks of empty plant pots to the left. An ancient tractor takes up the center of the room, a ride-on lawn mower dwarfed by its rust-colored frame. A stack of heavy-duty truck tires forms a tower to my right. 

I dart toward the tires and place my journal on the floor, unwilling to relinquish the dagger from my grasp as I pull the top tire from the pillar. I hobble back toward the door and place it against the planks of wood to create the start of a barricade. Pressing my eye to a crack in the wood, I look for the snake, my breath hitching as I see it sliding in my direction. It’s following my scent. 

I run to the stack of tires and grab the next one, hauling it over to the door and placing it on top of the first. My breath is coming in shallow pants. My heart is pressing my thick blood through my veins with furious beats. It’s ready to crawl from between my ribs and leave me behind. 

I hold my breath as I look through the crack toward the fire. 

The snake is gone. 

Shit, I whisper without sound.

I back away from the door. My eyes can’t seem to fix on a solution in this barn. They dart around like a trapped bird, unwilling to stay on any perch for longer than a flutter of wings. 

For a moment there is nothing. 

Just darkness

Just the thrum of my heart. 

And then a sharp and violent crack. 

The silence is split by wood splintering. It crashes over the shelves, clattering on the dirt floor. The thrashing snake scatters tools as it wriggles into the barn through the hole it created in the weakened wood. It pauses only long enough to lock the black slits of its eyes to mine and bare its fangs in a menacing hiss. Venom sprays toward me. 

Now that it’s seen me the snake intensifies its efforts. Its black body twists through the gap and its head drops to the floor. It keeps its eyes on mine. I back away, my lungs screaming fog into the cold air. I glance at the kaiken in my grasp. It’s not even as long as one of the snake’s fangs. 

I laugh. Even as I widen my stance and brace for a fight. Even as a bead of sweat drips into my eye and burns. Even as my own fangs descend and my pupils brighten with glowing red light. I laugh and laugh. 

There is no way I can outrun or out-jump this creature slithering into the darkness in front of me. There’s nowhere I can hide where it won’t be able to strike me. There’s only one option. 

Suck it up and fight like a vampire. 

…Get it?..

…Suck it up?..

Ugh, I know. But if you spent a month being tortured, you’d probably be a little deranged too. 

My laughter surges but dies just as quickly when the snake finally pulls the last of its body through the jagged hole in the wall. 

The creature and I hover in a moment that takes no more than a pounding heartbeat yet feels like a century as we assess one another. And then it launches. 

The serpent rushes across the floor. I dart to the right as its yawning mouth snaps for my legs. It misses. It strikes again and I roll to the left. I feel anger roll from the beast as it falls short again. 

I scramble to my feet. I spot a hatchet in the pile of tools scattered on the floor and run toward it. The snake thrashes back and its massive body twists and coils as its head tracks behind me. It hisses and I feel the rush of air from its lungs as it strikes out. I don’t turn to look, but I feel the near miss. The smooth edge of a tooth glides across my bare heel. 

I drop to the floor and slide through the dirt with my free hand outstretched. I grasp the handle of the hatchet and whirl my arm around with all my strength. I catch the body of the snake in a deep blow before I crash beneath the shelf. 

The snake erupts into a frenzied rage. It whips and thrashes and hisses. It sprays venom into the shadows. The scent of blood colors the cold air. 

The tail snaps toward me in its haphazard fury and breaks the shelf. I cling to my weapons as I push myself closer to the wall for cover. Splinters of wood and broken tools slide and drop around me. Scurrying beneath the caved-in line of the break, I hug the wall, aiming for the far end of the shelf toward the front of the barn. I crouch in its shelter as the snake lashes across the floor. 

I look toward the beast. Its head is near the tractor, hissing into the darkness in its tantrum. I chance popping out enough to look at the hole above the shelf. I might be able to make it. 

Clutching my kaiken and the hatchet, I scramble from my cover. One last glance back at the snake. One big breath. Then I climb. 

I barely make it onto the shelf before a vicious hiss fills the room. I don’t turn to know it’s spotted me. 

The snake whips me with its tail and knocks me off the shelf. I hurtle through the air and land in the dirt in the center of the room. The hatchet falls just beyond my hand but I manage to keep hold of my dagger. I flip to my back and try to scurry away, but the serpent catches my foot beneath the weight of its body. 

My fingers graze the wooden handle of the hatchet. The snake’s massive head slides over its coils and bloodied scales toward me. The beast might not have an expression, but I can feel the rage. The need for revenge.

The head draws back to deliver my death. 

It starts its strike with a furious hiss just as I manage to grab onto the handle of the hatchet. I throw it at the snake’s open mouth. The blunt end strikes one of the fangs and snaps it like a twig. The ax doesn’t hit like I hoped but it does knock the snake off course. It offers an instant of distraction. 

I sit up as the snake dives toward me, its angle a little off. My shoulders twist. I pivot away. The snake’s head is so close I could count every scale. 

My kaiken plunges into the eye of the snake in a fatal blow.  

It takes both hands to hold fast to the handle as the head quivers. The body contorts and thrashes in loops of erratic motion. I taste dust and the sweet venom of my success. I smell sulfur and blood and something familiar, something that gives me an instant of pause. Something like-

A flash of light blinds me. Blood cascades over my body in a pulsing spray. For a moment I wonder if it’s my own. 

The heavy head of the snake is stuck to my dagger but its body coils away, severed in a clean and smoking strike. It twists into the darkness as though still enraged. The scent of seared flesh floods my nostrils. 

I look up from the serpent head impaled on my blade. My gaze collides with the eyes of a demon, his pupils consumed with black flame. 

Ashen lowers his sword as the hellfire burns the shadows between us. 

The deadliest predator has entered the room.

CHAPTER 7

Flame ripples across the sword. It throws light across the looping, twisting body of the snake. It illuminates the Reaper from below, casting the rest of the barn into shadow. 

I can’t move. Ashen’s beauty is equal parts devastating and terrifying. His skin is radiant in the light from his blade. His short, dark hair falls across his forehead. Smoke pools around his feet. His eyes burn with the darkest flame, boring into me like twisting knives. A muscle ticks in his clenched jaw as his gaze bounces between my eyes. 

My heart surges against my bones. Lightning claws through my brain, striking at my skull. 

Asshat Reaper Motherfucker. If it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t have to suffer this constant pain. I wouldn’t have endured a month of torture. I wouldn’t be changing, maybe dying. I’d have fucking fingernails. 

To add insult to injury, I’m now covered in gore and the Reaper looks pristine, as usual. The sleeves of his black shirt are rolled to his elbows. The edges of his tattoos peer out at me from his open collar. Not a spot of blood is visible on his tailored black pants and his polished brogues. 

“Vampire-”

I bare my fangs in a silent hiss. 

“Lu-” he tries again, taking a small step toward me. 

I scramble back, my fingers still clutched around the handle of the dagger that impales the severed head of the snake. I draw it behind me and snap my arms forward in Ashen’s direction so that the head slides off the blade. He dodges the flying hunk of snake meat and I glare at him in disappointment. I cock my right arm back in a threat to throw the dagger. 

“Angelwing,” he says, his voice thin with a note of urgency. I halt my hand before I let the blade loose. “Are you sure there’s not still poison on the blade?” 

I glance at the dagger. Hmm. He might be right, though I suspect he wouldn’t leave such a risky, lethal poison to chance. I’m pretty confident he would have made sure it was clean before it found its way back to me. But just in case, I don’t think I’m ready to let go of such a valuable weapon. He’s fast, so there’s a good chance I might miss. And there is no fucking way I’m going back to the Shadow Realm. 

The red gleam of rage in my pupils reflects across the silver-infused steel of my blade. I slide my gaze back to Ashen and narrow my eyes. The light within them brightens in a threat. And he’d better fucking get the gist of it from my super expressive face that I need to work on. I’m not saving the chance of poison on the dagger for his benefit, but for my own. 

How did you find me? I ask, gesturing with my blade. 

“I will always find you, vampire,” he says. 

That is one promise I actually believe he will keep. Ashen leans a hint forward as though preparing to take a step. I point the tip of the kaiken toward him. 

Stay the fuck away, I whisper, every word slow and purposeful so there can be no doubt what I said, even without a sound. Ninmen Elsal, I breathe, hoping each puff of air from my lungs is close enough to a whisper that it will manifest a summoning. A reckoning. 

The Reaper tilts his head. I know he understands the translation of my ancient words, but he doesn’t know what they mean. I give him a vicious smile and a crease appears between his brows. “What are you doing out here?” he asks. 

I blink in irritated confusion and gesture toward the twitching mass of dead snake behind him with the toe of my blade. Killing your little pet, you moron. 

“I told you to stay inside.” 

What the fuck are you talking about? I demand, this time backing up my soundless whisper with bits of sign language that I can manage around my kaiken. Even though I know he can’t understand the words I make with my hands, I’m confident he’ll get the point. 

“My note.” 

As if that makes any more sense to me. My fury ratchets to new heights as I watch Ashen’s brows draw together and his eyes skim over my body. I’m only wearing a thin white tank top that now clings to my torso with sweat and snake blood. My navy sleep shorts leave little to the imagination. My legs are coated with dirt and blood spatter, bruises and cuts. Ashen meets my hard stare again and I see a thin thread of rage brighten the flame in his eyes. 

I rise up from the floor, holding my arms out wide. I harpoon the Reaper with my fiercest glare. My hands quake with anger. What is it, Ashen? I whisper. My silent breath spills through my sarcastic smile in a cloud. Don’t you like your masterpiece? 

A flash of fury blazes across the Reaper’s face. 

No? You don’t like what you made of me? Well, FUCK YOU, Reaper. 

“Your journal…” he says, trailing off as his eyes cascade down my body and drop to the floor, scanning the space around us. He finds the book where I left it in the dust by the tires. Ashen pins me with a dark look and strides over to retrieve the journal from the floor. He flips through the pages and looks back to me. “Where is the note?” he asks, his voice low and quiet, as though the resignation I hear within it is weighing down the tone. 

Where it belongs, I say, pointing to the door behind me with the dagger. In the fire. 

“So... so that’s it? You would believe my sister? Ember, who threatened you? Who took Aglaope from you? Who brought Molpe to you in chains, and dragged her soul down the halls of House Urbigu? Who snatched you from the Living Realm and burnt Ediye’s house to the ground?”

I see the exact moment when all the colors of Ashen’s eyes seem to collapse into an abyss of despairing shadow. The flame in his pupils snuffs out for the instant before he blinks. It’s so fast that I almost doubt it even happened. As soon as his eyes are open again, the fire is back, an impenetrable heat that keeps his secrets safe. 

“You never did trust me, did you. You were honest about that,” Ashen says, tossing the journal at my feet. His jaw hardens. “And so was I. It was the truth, Lu. Every word.” I hear his grip tighten across the handle of his sword. My gaze darts to the movement and I notice something new; tattoos across his fingers, black letters outlined with shimmering gold. They are the vertical lines and chevrons and triangles of an ancient language that very few of us still know. Sumerian. They’re dates. Two days ago, specifically. I meet his eyes again, my own narrowing to slits as I run through every idea of what they could possibly mean.  

We stand in silence for a moment that feels as long as five thousand years, staring at one another. Between the snake and now this strained encounter with the Reaper, the stress is starting to erode my hold over my broken body. My heart thrums too quickly in my ears. The sweat rolls down my spine. I want him to leave before I can’t keep myself together anymore. 

You’re sorry. Good for you. That means nothing to me. Now get the fuck out, I whisper, gesturing to the door again.

My skin feels like a film of fire over a pool of ice water, an impossible, uncomfortable clash of sensations. I resist the urge to press the fingers of my free hand to my temple as needles of pain scratch at my eyes. I don’t want to appear weak. But my palms are starting to numb. I can’t feel my toes. My left eye twitches. And none of this goes unnoticed beneath the veil of Ashen’s gaze. 

“Regardless of what you think of me, you need my help,” Ashen says, his voice still low and quiet. He takes a small step forward and I take an unsteady one back. “I can take you now.” 

You’re not fucking taking me anywhere, I whisper through pumping breaths. My vision starts to spin. I keep my eyes on Ashen as though he’s a shark circling in a raging surf. There’s no way I’ll be able to fight him off, not even with a blade of poison. Frustrated tears sting at my eyes. Ninmen Elsal, I breathe, trying to restrain the urge to weep. 

“Vampire-”

My legs buckle and I fall to one knee, fighting with all my strength against the numbness that’s climbing up my calves. Ashen takes another step forward and I tilt my head back. I press my knife to my neck. Surprise ignites the flame in Ashen’s pupils as his gaze locks on my dagger. 

I’m not going back, I mouth, shaking my head. I wish I could scream it. If these are my last words, they would split the night. They would carve the darkness in two and spill a final burst of furious light into the world. 

I don’t try to hide the desperation on my face anymore. Tears flow across my cheeks. Ashen leans his weight into another tentative step but I press the dagger into my skin. I smell my blood, as I have so many times in these last days. I keep my eyes on the Reaper and drive the point of the kaiken harder into my flesh. 

I know from the look on his face that Ashen cleaned the blade. 

There is no Angelwing here. What a fucking master of deception he must think he is. But I am not going to convince myself into falling for lies anymore.

You asshole. I knew it. There is no poison. 

“Lu, put it down.”  

Go back to Davina. I will not go anywhere with you.

A flash of sparks burst in the flame within his eyes. “Christ, Lu. I am trying to-”

A crack cuts off his words. A pinpoint of light tears time and matter. Lightning crawls away from the center, slow and consuming. It eats through the darkness of the barn and leaves black space behind, as dark and cold as the center of the universe. Distant suns glitter, galaxies spin. Gravity tightens its grip around us. And from the heart of the dark steps Ediye, her eyes a pool of comets and stars. Her midnight skin glows and hums in rage. 

“You owe me a promise. I said to bring her back unharmed, or I would come for you,” Ediye booms, her voice shaking the planks of wood and the broken tools around us in layers of sound. “Leave or I will see your debt fulfilled, Reaper.” 

I look to Ashen. He stands as unyielding as a block of granite. But I think I see a swirl of sorrow deep within the fury that resides in his eyes. 

“I am trying to help her,” he says, his voice low and measured. His sword is in his hand but there is only the dimmest flame on his blade and in his eyes, little more than a candle in a cold room. 

“You’ve helped enough already.”

The demon and the witch stand unmoving, immobilized like pillars of stone. I force myself to cling to consciousness as my gaze darts between them. I already know that Ashen will not back down. But when his gaze hooks on mine and doesn't let go, I know he won’t attack her either, even though he could. Despite Ediye’s power, he could still kill her. She doesn’t have the means to take his life for good. 

But she does have the means to take it for now. 

“I’ll give you to the count of five,” Ediye says. 

Ashen keeps his eyes on mine. I see the flame brighten in his pupils but he doesn’t move. 

The stars behind Ediye stretch as though we are gravity and we bend their light to our will. They become blades of constellations in the night. Their points all fix to Ashen. 

“One.” 

“Lu, I-“

There is no number two. 

There are only spears of light and the blood that coats them. 

Ashen falls to his knees, pierced by two dozen shards of stars. 

I drop my dagger. Tears pepper my cheeks with their sting as Ashen’s gaze leaves mine. His eyes fix to the blood that flows from his body. He turns to me once more, then falls unmoving to the floor.

You said you’d give him to five, I sign to Ediye as she comes to stand beside me. She picks up my blade and journal as we watch Ashen’s body turn to cinders and collapse into a heap of gray dust. 

“He lied,” she says as she takes my hand and pulls me to my feet, gripping my shoulder as she guides us toward the black swath of night sky that stretches before us. “So did I.”

CHAPTER 8

Ediye deposits me on the couch in the living room, yells for Eryx and Cole, and then disappears in the swirling magic of black space and glittering stars. I hear frantic footsteps upstairs and the sconces flick on, illuminating the stairs. Cole is the first to appear as he slaps the switch on the wall and squints against the lights that flare to life around us. 

“What the fuck, Lu. Are you all right?” 

I nod and look over to Eryx who joins us, stopping abruptly at the entrance to the room as his eyes land on me. The black portal swirls and churns with shimmering light as Ediye steps from the darkness. 

A loud crash disrupts the stunned silence as Ediye drops the snake head onto the coffee table, smashing the glass inlay. “What in the goddess is this?” 

Another crash sounds from the edge of the room. It sounds like someone dropped a tray of cutlery. We turn our gazes to Eryx, who has passed out on the living room floor, his wings spread across the wood. 

“Did… did he just… faint?” Ediye asks. I smirk at the combined irritation and incredulity in her voice. 

Cole winces, gritting his teeth as he lifts a blanket from the couch and walks over to lay it across Eryx, whose robe hangs open with an unflattering view of his balls. Not that there are many flattering views of balls when you think about it... They aren’t really the most aesthetically pleasing body parts if you ask me. I guess angel balls are the best we can hope for, and I can now say as an authority that they aren’t any better than your average balls. I smirk again at the thought of proposing to whatever higher powers reign in the Realm of Light to make them sparkly. Then I could nickname him Glitter Balls.  

“Yeah…” Cole says. His suspicious glance in my direction pulls me away from the idea before I can get too invested. He shifts Eryx’s head so he doesn’t snore too loudly. “Eryx has a thing about gore. He’ll be fine.”

“I’ll have to do something about that when he wakes,” Ediye mutters, frowning. She points down at the coffee table as Cole rises and rejoins us. “Now back to this thing. What is it doing here? It’s clearly not of this realm.”

Cole looks down at the one-eyed, severed head, its forked tongue splayed across shards of broken glass. “His name is Ningish. Was. A servant creature of the Council of the Shadow Realm.”

“Servant? In what way?” 

Cole shrugs, his eyes not leaving the snake. “Fetching souls, delivering justice, that kind of thing. Entertainment of the killing variety. I’ve never heard of him leaving the Shadow Realm, however. And he’s not the only one of his kind. He has a twin, a white snake named Zida.” 

Eryx stirs and Ediye pins Cole with a dark look of alarm, her eyes flashing briefly to mine. “Then I’m sure his twin won’t be too pleased that we killed her brother.”

“Probably not.”

Ediye lets out a heavy lungful of air and gives a resigned nod. She turns her attention over to me, reaching out a hand to trace a finger across the thin thread of blood on my neck. She tries to keep her expression serene when she meets my eyes, but I can see the wariness in her gaze. “Tell me what happened.” 

I let go of my own sigh. Ediye translates my words for Cole and I leave out no details about how Ningish tracked my scent or how he burst through the wall. I describe every missed bite, every spray of venom. A crease appears between Ediye’s brows as my hands slow until the words dry up in my flesh. I finally stop when I reach the moment I plunged my blade through the eye of the monster. But Ediye doesn’t push for more. She just waits for me to continue, watching as my hand drifts down to my kaiken, tensing and easing on the handle. When I shift my attention to Cole instead and glance back to her, I see a spark of pride and relief in her eyes. 

I’d already killed the snake. Ashen appeared and beheaded it, I sign after I reluctantly let go of my dagger. 

“You may have killed Ningish here in the Living Realm, but Ashen kept him from coming back,” Cole says. 

My brows draw together as I consider his observation. I hadn’t thought of that, but he’s right. We have the head sitting right here with us. There was no glittering ash when it died. Ashen must have given it an everlasting death with something more than just the burn of hellfire on his Reaper blade. Either that, or there was still enough Angelwing residue on my own dagger for one more final kill. 

I picture the sword in the grip of his palm and tilt my head as the image replays in my mind. Ashen had new tattoos on his knuckles. A date, two days ago. What does that mean? I ask, Ediye putting words to the motion of my hands. 

Cole’s expression grows stern and his eyes drift down to the self-inflicted wound on my neck. His lips thin as he chooses his words. “The Council has formed an army. Ashen’s been made Master of War. That’s the mark of his status.”

A cold wind skirts across my skin but I still snort a laugh. Master of War?

Cole gives a single nod. Judging by the serious look on his face, he doesn’t think the grandiose title is as funny as I do. “It gives him not only more political power within the Shadow Realm, but more physical power. He’s faster. Stronger. And Ember, she’s been given a position on the Council itself.”

Fuuuuuck, I mouth, drawing the word out. That can’t be good for anyone. And his blood in the thermos, how did you get it? 

“He gave it to Imani. He told her to add the spices and warm it when she was ready to give it to you.”

“Imani?” Ediye asks, her gaze bouncing between us. 

“She owns Bit Akalum, the club where all Reapers congregate, no matter what House they’re from. She’s not on the Council but she has a lot of power, and interests beyond the Shadow Realm. Interests that depend on a balance between realms. She’s been helping Eryx and me, setting up safe houses for us like this one, making connections with a few allies.”

“And the dagger and notebook?”

“Ashen gave her those as well.”

“If he gave all these things to her, did he know she was involved with your plan to get us out?”

Cole blows a thin stream of air through pursed lips. “If he knew of our plan, he never said anything to me or Imani about it. She told me Ashen just gave the items to her without any instruction aside from how to provide the blood. I’ve barely seen Ashen around lately, and haven’t spoken to him at all since you were captured.” 

Ediye tries to keep her expression impassive, but I see a star flicker briefly in her eye. “There’s a good chance he knew you were planning a rescue if he gave Imani these things, unless he just wanted her to smuggle them in for us. But why take such a risk that they would be discovered? He would know there was hardly any place to hide them in the cell. And Gallus would probably notice if Lu was feeling even a little better after a decent meal.”

Ediye’s comment about Gallus sparks a dark thought that, once ignited, paints Ashen’s actions with a sinister light. Semyon arranged for me to feed before he blew the roof off The Maqlu club, I sign, my skin erupting in gooseflesh at the memory. Semyon knew I’d need blood in my system to survive capture and what he planned to do to me afterward. Maybe Ashen’s motivations are the same. Maybe he needed me to live to finish the process, to become the weapon for the Master of War. 

Ediye’s hold on my eyes sharpens and I sit back against the sofa, lifting my shoulders in a noncommittal shrug. Now that I’ve thrown that thought out there, I’m not willing to delve any further into what Ashen’s motivations might be for giving his blood or retrieving my belongings. 

Maybe he did it for my benefit, maybe for his. Maybe he knew their plan, maybe he didn’t. The reasons why don’t matter anymore. Because the fact still remains, he stood on that dais and never raised a protest to stop us from being dragged down to hell. He didn’t petition for our freedom. He didn’t deny Ember’s claims, not about luring me in, or letting those fucked-up hyenas loose, or about his role in ushering me over to Semyon. Come to think of it, there was only one word he actually spoke that whole time. The name of another woman. Davina. 

Ashen watched it all unfold, then seized power from it. 

Motherfucker. I wish I could have a do-over of our encounter in the barn just now. I’d hurtle my kaiken straight at his dick. 

“Did he say or do anything else?” Cole asks, his eyes narrowed and wary as he watches my face. I realize only now that the red light is gleaming in my pupils. My fist is closed tight around the handle of my blade, my hand vibrating with rage. Cole says my name like a question and I force my expression into something less menacing. 

I nod at Cole, then turn my gaze to Ediye as I sign. He asked what I was doing there. He said he told me to stay inside, which didn’t make any sense at the time. But then he referred to his note.

“A note? Where, in your journal?”

My gaze slides between Ediye and the notebook next to me on the couch. Yes. It just said ‘I’m sorry’. The necklace you gave me was taped next to it on the page. 

“Are you positive there was nothing more?”

I didn’t see anything. 

“Maybe he wrote a message in hidden ink and you missed it. Where’s the note?”

I grit my teeth in a grimace of a smile as my eyebrows climb my forehead. 

Ediye’s eyes take on a flat glare. She knows me too well. “You destroyed it, didn’t you.”

I nod. 

“Let me guess. You flushed it down the toilet? You probably took a giant shit on it while you were at it, right?”

I snort. Dammit. I wish I’d thought of that. 

I shake my head. 

“You set it on fire?”

My grimace widens and I nod again.

Ediye sighs and looks to Cole with a weary expression. “Well, whatever useful information might have been there, it’s clearly gone now. But I suggest we get moving immediately and not wait for morning. We don’t know how close his portal is or whether Zida is lurking. And even if he did help us out in some way, I’m not entirely sure it wasn’t for his own benefit.” 

“Agreed,” Cole says, holding out a hand for me to take. “Come on, Lu. I’ll help you upstairs. You’ll probably want another shower before you enter the Realm of Light.”

I give Cole a grateful but weak smile and place my palm in his. He guides me to my feet then braces a steadying arm across my shoulder and looks to Eryx. The angel still sleeps peacefully beneath the crocheted blanket. “Anything you can do to stop that from happening again in future?” he asks as he looks to Ediye with a nod in the angel’s direction. 

“Don’t worry,” she says with a smile and a wink. “When I’m done with him, you’ll be able to fill this room with decapitated snakes and he won’t bat a beautiful eye.” 

“Thank fuck for that,” Cole mutters. He stops for just a moment when we reach Eryx’s side, letting go of me to kneel and sweep a gentle kiss to the angel’s cheek. When he rises, he grasps my shoulder once more and then ushers us up the stairs. 

When we get to the hallway, Cole deposits me at the bathroom door before checking every room. He returns with some clothes balanced on his palm, a simple white button-up shirt and jeans. He hands them over but hesitates at the door and I tilt my head in a question.

“I don’t know if this will bring you comfort or ease your anger, but I come from a realm of love. I know when I see something real. For what it’s worth, Lu, he cared about you. Maybe he still does.”

We stand unmoving for a long moment. It’s not just Cole’s words that settle like a ball of lead in my chest. It’s the regret and pain in his eyes, both so at odds with his radiant, youthful features. I feel like I’ve been knocked a bit off balance by him, and when I try to right myself nothing looks quite the same. 

But there’s no fucking way I’m ready to let go of an ounce of the betrayal and anger I feel, no matter how far I’m tilted off my axis. So I dart a dark look down at my body before pinning Cole with a red glare. I sweep my free hand down my torso. I point to my throat and mime talking and shake my head. I twinkle my sad little fingers in Cole’s face. And with every wordless communication, tears of fury and sorrow gather in my eyes until they threaten to spill across my cheeks. 

The look of sympathy that Cole gives me nearly crushes the last remnants of my broken heart. He lays a hand on my arm and gives a gentle squeeze. “I know, Lu. I know he let you down. But I choose to believe that a person can do terrible things without being terrible. I have to believe that.”

Cole leans forward and brushes a kiss on my cheek before he pushes his hands into his pockets and turns away down the hall.

When I finally step backward into the bathroom and close the door, it feels like the world beyond this room is turning around me, but I’m the one staying in one place.

CHAPTER 9

Traveling with an angel is… demeaning. 

There’s no other way to put it. 

For one, it just doesn’t appeal to my feminist sensibilities. Look, I don’t mind being rescued once in a while. I enjoy acts of chivalry. Exhibit A: when Ashen cut Jessie’s hands off. That was hot as fuck, if you ask me. I would have jumped his bones in that pool of pissy blood if it wasn’t for the hunger and poor timing. But clinging to Eryx like a baby koala as he hurtles us through the sky is just not my thing. 

Secondly, I’m a vampire. So I know you’re thinking it… 

…Just say it already. I’ll wait. 

Hold on tight, spider monkey.  

Ugh. There it is. It’ll be another fifty years before I get away from that shit.  

Thirdly, heights aren’t really my thing. While I’m perfectly comfortable flying a helicopter, that’s in a fucking machine. That’s not me as a passenger who is newly prone to seizures glued to a possibly deranged angel that faints on the regular. None of that makes for a winning combination. 

Lastly, Eryx smells like a jacked-up cinnamon bun. That sounds great I’m sure, but trust me, it loses its appeal when your face is smushed into the smell of sickly-sweet cinnamon sugar and cream cheese icing for two solid hours. As a result, I’ve been feeling more than a little queasy… a little travel sick… a little ready to-

Yep, there it is. I just hurled all over the forest. I’m pretty sure I got an innocent rabbit too, poor thing. Right on its fuzzy little ass. 

“Your friend Ediye is such a blessing, don’t you think? If it wasn’t for her spell, we’d be crashing into the woods right now. The only thing that’s worse than blood is vomit,” Eryx says with a cheerful laugh. It doesn’t fill me with reassurance. I cling a little tighter to the angel in my koala grip and he laughs again. “Don’t worry, I won’t drop you. Besides, we’re almost there.”

It’s only a matter of minutes before Eryx slows and lowers us to a clearing near the shore of the river where it pools beneath the Blue Falls. The sun is just starting to color the clouds with streaks of pink and yellow in anticipation of dawn. 

I slip my arms from Eryx and look around us, taking in the smell of the cool water as it falls over the rocks and crashes into the pool below. There’s no wind here, just the songs of birds in the shadows and the peace of time still waiting to pass from dark into light. These are the best moments of the day, if you ask me. 

I look at Eryx and his easy smile is already waiting for me. Maybe it’s the flight, or the fact that I just chucked my last meal all over the trees, but I feel a bit lighter when I return his grin. 

“Come on,” Eryx says, holding out his hand. I take it and he pulls us toward the water. “The sun is almost ready to break the horizon. It’s the best time for us to travel.”

We walk through the tall grass, the dew clinging to our clothes. When our feet land on the coarse sand of the riverbank, my heart starts to beat a little faster, my head pounds a little harder. I realize for the first time that I never worried about being unworthy of the Shadow Realm, even though I knew I didn’t belong there. I don’t belong in the Realm of Light either, but maybe I’m a bit scared of being unwelcome. My free pass to the domain of the angels doesn’t feel like something I earned, even though I guess I technically did.  

Eryx squeezes my hand. It’s only when he does that I realize I’ve been crushing his palm in a death grip. “Don’t worry, Lu. You’ll love it. I promise.” 

I focus on the falls ahead and take a deep and cleansing breath before stepping into the water. We wade into the pool toward the cascade, the cool river climbing up my body until it reaches my chest. Its soothing caress is a relief to my hot skin, and before I know it I’m letting go, diving beneath the rippling waves. When I break the surface, I watch Eryx as he swims underwater, his sharp wings cutting through the current. He comes up beside me and smiles, his skin radiant with joy. Before he can wipe the droplets from his eyes I smack the surface and spray him right in the face. His laugh shimmers enough for both of us. 

“Siren or angel, place your bets!” Eryx yells and dunks my head beneath the surface. I dive deeper and reach up to jab my finger into his armpit. When I come up for air he’s still laughing. I give him a menacing grin and launch at his head, pushing him under in retaliation. Right when I think I’ve gotten the upper hand, I’m sailing through the air and crashing into the surface of the water, nearly choking on my silent laugh. 

We spray flurries of water at one another, we dunk and pull limbs and smile until our cheeks hurt. When we finally realize dawn is casting long shadows through the trees around us we race each other to the waterfall, struggling to climb onto a ledge of rock through our laughter. 

“If you thought that was fun, just wait until you see what’s on the other side,” Eryx says as he stands and pulls me to my feet. When he looks down at me I smile, and I realize that this is the first moment of fun I’ve had in a long time. And though he returns my smile, I see a glint of sadness in his eyes. I think he understands just how elusive joy has been during my time in the Shadow Realm. Maybe even longer than that. 

Eryx steps beneath the stream of the waterfall and draws me with him, pulling me into his chest. I’m surrounded by the scent of cinnamon, of lilacs in spring. “Hold on tight, Lu. You’re in for a ride.”

Eryx’s wings fold around us, shimmering and lethal, sharp and iridescent. The water cascades across the blades of his feathers. I shield my eyes and look up at a filament of water that shines like liquid gold, as though the yellow warmth of dawn has unspooled to infuse the stream around us with light. My breath catches in awe as the stream of the waterfall slows until every drop is suspended. I reach out and touch a golden tear, grinning as it floats away from my finger and pings against another drop. 

The pressure in my head starts to build. Just like diving in deep water, Ashen once said. But before the sadness of memory can burrow into my chest, a rush of color and glittering stars bursts around us as though we’re a bomb that’s detonated time itself. 

When the fragments of dawn fall to our feet, we stand in another world. 

The Realm of Light. 

I step away from Eryx and press a hand to my heart. 

No. Fucking. Way.  

The space around us is alive with shouts of joy and peels of laughter. There’s a roaring, clattering sound and I look up as a roller coaster cart zooms overhead on a set of blue tracks. A Sky Screamer spins in the distance on the left, a Ferris Wheel looks out over a bright azure bay on the right. I can see figures surfing on the waves that curl into the shore. Roller coasters and water slides snake around us, passing cotton candy vendors and popcorn carts and ice cream stands. A little train bobs along its tracks in front of us, tooting a welcome as children on the cars giggle and wave. There’s music and dancing and churros and arcades, there are dogs that are dogs and not weird tripod crawler souls that hiss in your face. These are happy dogs, wagging their tails and playing with children and snagging stray popcorn from the ground. 

There’s a crackle of sound and I look up as fireworks burst through the sky in explosions of pastel light. 

It’s like a creamsicle overload. Everything about this place is candy sweet and ridiculous and I FUCKING LOVE IT. 

I beam a widening smile of disbelief at Eryx. Is this for real? I whisper. 

“Yeah, I mean… the whole place isn’t like this, exactly, but it’s pretty amazing… right?” 

He almost looks unsure, like he’s worried I might think it’s lame. But I don’t think that at all. I mean, it is lame, in the most amazing way. It’s not just amazing. 

It’s fucking epic, I try my best to say.

“Do you feel well enough for a ride or two before we take the portal to Saqqara?”

No. But also YES. 

I let go of his hand and race Eryx to the first roller coaster. There’s no line, of course. It’s too next-level perfect here for things like lines. We’re both still dripping wet as we sit next to one another and the braces slip over our shoulders to lock us into our seats, Eryx sitting on his folded, gleaming wings. My heart thunders but not with fear or loss or pain for a change, though my physical injuries still hum in my skin. It pounds with excitement. And maybe that will trigger a seizure, who knows? Right now, glancing over at Eryx and seeing the same excitement and joy in his face, I don’t give two flying fucks. I just wanna have FUN. Don’t look so surprised about it either. Like I said a while ago, I’m not the crusty old vampire of your imagination. I might be five thousand years old and capable of reciting The Lament of Ur word-for-word in ancient Sumerian, but… why? Why when roller coasters are so much better?

The gears turn and the car lurches forward, whisking us up a steep incline. From here, I get a view of the land and sea that surround us. There’s an archipelago of small islands in the water, some with white structures that point like pins toward the sky. Straight ahead, the amusement park skirts along a canyon cut by a river, over which a bridge leads to a grand white city. To the left, the rides are bordered by a high wall, and beyond that are green plains of grasses and wildflowers that sway in a gentle breeze. I point to it as we near the top of the hill. 

“That’s the city of Anur, straight ahead,” Eryx says, gesturing to the white towers and palatial buildings. “The House of Virtues controls this park and the closest quarter of the city. Those plains to the left fall under the stewardship of the House of Esagila. They have the ziggurat there on the left within Anur, you can see the top of it capped with gold.”

The ziggurat temple is blocky and imposing, surrounded by a fortified wall. The gold glints in the sun, making the building seem both beautiful and severe. I want to hear more about this place. I want to learn everything there is to know. But the bottom drops out beneath us and before I can think of anything else we’re plummeting toward the ground, rocketing through the park on tracks the color of the summer sky. 

I hold my arms up and scream with terrified delight even though no sound comes out of my mouth. And normally that loss would grip my heart in a tight fist of sadness, but there’s no time for that. Not with Eryx absolutely shrieking next to me. All I can do is laugh and laugh and laugh. 

And that’s how we spend the morning. Shrieking. Laughing. Maybe seizing once or twice. Okay fine, three times. The Slingshot is legit terrifying, even here in the Realm of Light. And yeah, I feel like shit still. I’m too hot. My head pounds. But really, it’s all worth it. Even though I’m sore, and I tire out fast like a human, and sometimes my brain feels like it’s sizzling inside the toaster that is my skull... it’s still worth it. Two days ago I was stuck in a cell. I thought I’d never have fun again. And now I’m making the most of it. Fuck the consequences. 

That’s exactly what I’m thinking as I eat cotton candy and stroll next to Eryx as he dips a churro in chocolate sauce with a look of absolute ecstasy layered on his face. I don’t usually eat much human food at all. It doesn’t always have… positive results. But straight-up sugar is at least easy enough to digest. See also: fuck the consequences. 

“Try this,” Eryx says as he catches me watching. He tears a piece off and makes sure it’s thoroughly coated in chocolate before passing it over. “Cole made me churros as dessert for our first date. His were better, but still.” 

I pop it into my mouth. It is fucking good, and an oddly decent accompaniment to cotton candy. I mime a question to him and back it up with silent words. How did you meet? 

“Oh, he killed me,” Eryx answers, his tone matter-of-fact and his face serious as he nods his head. I choke on my churro. 

What?!

Eryx pats my back as I cough and gives a wistful laugh. “Yeah, he killed me all right. I was human. So was he, at the time. It’s how he got himself noticed by the Shadow Realm.”

I look around us, feeling off-kilter, like some other secret might be lurking in plain sight. I roll my hand in a gesture for Eryx to keep going. 

“He made a deal. If he relinquished his wings for this mission, any human life he took in the Living Realm to get himself on the demons’ radar would be given the chance to become more than just a soul here in the Realm of Light. I had the choice to become an angel.” Eryx shrugs and smiles, tearing at a piece of the fried dough in his hands. “It sounded kinda great. And it has been. I mean, flying with knife wings is pretty kickass. Don’t you think?”

My smile grows. Yeah, actually, it seems pretty great. I nod and Eryx looks a bit relieved that I might agree.  

 Eryx leads me to a railing where we can look out over the cliff of the canyon to the river that leads to the sea. We lean next to one another, watching the water snake through the stone. “When I was told why Cole did what he did, I offered to join the effort to keep the balance. I sought him out. I wanted him to know I forgave him,” Eryx says, his smile faint with the pull of memory as he turns his gaze to the City of Anur. “It took a while to convince him it was true. He was angry at himself, even though he did what he had to do. Sometimes he’s still angry about it, especially when he has to reap an immortal soul and send them to the Shadow Realm.”

Eryx falls silent for a long moment and I think we both become lost in thoughts of Cole. My chest constricts when I imagine what it must feel like for him, to give up who he was, to have to do terrible things to earn a place among his enemies. To live among them day after day. To become one of them for little more than a chance of stopping some kind of war. My throat tightens and I turn my gaze out toward the sea. 

Were you angry? I ask after a long while, tapping Eryx’s chest and miming the emotion. He takes a moment to answer, but when he does he gives a gentle smile as he looks down at his hands. 

“Yeah. Sometimes. But I also saw what kind of person Cole is. A good man. A brave man. Even despite what he did to me and what he’s done to others. He made hard choices, not ones he wanted to make. It wasn’t difficult to fall in love with even the darkest parts of him. Those were the parts I saw first, the worst of him.”

I look down at my own hands, turning my palms over to look at my scabbed-over nails and the cuts and bruises that still lace my skin. I think of Ashen, wondering why he made the choices he did. Were they hard choices or easy ones? Was he trying to protect himself, or the interests of his realm? I can’t say that he was driven by some noble principle. And after what I’ve endured, I don’t know as it matters if he was. Because the anger and hurt I feel are still hot in my chest and bright with flame. 

My hand folds into a fist as I look to the sea again. It’s not the same, I whisper to myself, not expecting Eryx to notice the movement of my lips. But he does. He lays a hand across my shoulder and pulls me to his side. 

“Ashen is a demon, Lu. If you give your heart to a creature of the shadows, you have to learn how to love the darkness as much as the stars.”

We stand in silence for a long while. I turn his words over and over in my mind as the rides whirl behind us and the laughter and music fill the air. Somehow the atmosphere of this place loses its shine when my thoughts are trapped by shadows.

CHAPTER 10

Eryx leads me to a dais near the place where we arrived, a portal back to the Living Realm. A waterfall of light envelops us, depositing us in utter blackness, the scent of limestone dust swirling with the smell of the angel’s cinnamon skin. I open my eyes to darkness so complete it feels like it has weight. It presses on my face. Before I can draw a breath, a dim light starts to shed light on the shadows. Eryx glows, the flesh beneath his skin illuminating the darkness. It throws light on the ancient paintings adorning the walls that surround us. I take his arm and marvel at the way the veins are visible paths of darkness over the light, tracing one with my finger to watch the light brighten beneath my touch. 

“Cole calls me his glow stick,” he says. 

I snort a laugh. I’m sure he does. 

Eryx rolls his eyes but smiles nonetheless, taking my hand and leading us from the antechamber of the Pyramid of Userkaf. “My glow stick will lead the way.” 

We follow the long and narrow passage that leads to the entrance of the structure. The morning light starts to reach into the shadows, the heat of the desert creeping closer. Eryx dims until he returns to normal and we step outside just as dawn breaks on the horizon. We look around but see no one. 

“Come on,” Eryx says, turning toward me with open arms in an invitation for me to grip on. “Let’s get you better.” 

I give him a troubled smile in reply and press my cheek to the muscle of his angelic chest, wrapping my arms and legs around his back as he lifts us into the air. We take off over the Serapeum and I wonder how long it took my blood to dissolve in the sand, if it still stains the grains of sand where I knelt next to Ashen. Asallah libakkunu, I remember thinking, over and over as we drove into the city on our motorcycles that day. I overpower your heart. 

Eryx lands us on the roof of Mr. Hassan’s building, and we descend two flights to arrive at his doorstep. When he opens the door, his face splits into a sympathetic grin that dissolves almost as quickly as it appears. Ediye and Cole appear behind him, both looking relieved as the elderly apothecary ushers us inside. After a swift introduction to Eryx, we settle in his living room as he makes a fresh pot of mint tea and one of blood for me. 

“Azizati,” he says, patting my arm as he sits next to me on the green velvet settee. He pushes a mug into my hands and I relish the warm scent, spiced just right, heated to perfection and sweetened with a drop of manuka honey. 

Thank you for having us here, I sign, Ediye translating the motion of my hands. I’m sorry to put you in this position.

The old man lets out a warm laugh and taps my arm to encourage me to drink. “Nonsense. I’m glad to see you again so soon.”

Funny, to him it’s only been a month or so since I was last here. To me, it feels like a century has passed. It makes me think about time, how so many years can pass feeling like not much changes from one day to the next, and then all of a sudden life is thrown upside down and back again. 

I look at the apothecary and try to smile. I’m not well. I’m not able to heal like I should. I was wondering if you might be able to help. 

“Yes, your friends told me everything they knew. Let me see you, tifl alshaati almashur.” 

I cast a nervous glance over at Ediye and she gives a reassuring nod before I set my mug down and turn toward the old man. Mr. Hassan’s crooked fingers take mine and he examines the unhealed wounds on my hands, the cuts and scrapes and scabs on my arms. His watery eyes flow over my throat, his thumb pressing the spot where the injection of silver scraped my voice away. 

He begins a quiet chant as his hand unfurls and lays gentle pressure on my neck. His words grow louder, clearer. With them a fiery pain increases in my throat, beyond the ever-present discomfort I’ve tried to become used to. It burns hotter and hotter. Sweat beads on my hairline and drips down my temples. My breath comes faster until I hold it, gritting my molars against the pain. When I can’t stand it anymore I grip the old man’s wrist and pull his hand away, shaking my head. 

“Dhiaab alshaytan,” he says with a mock spit at the floor. He sighs and picks up my mug, pushing it into my hands and prompting me to drink. When I’ve had a long sip he pulls it from me and sets it on the coffee table, taking both my hands in his. My eyes dart to Ediye and she looks serious, her expression worried but contained. I can tell it takes effort. “Azizati. The silver keeps your body from healing itself. No matter how much blood you consume, it will not fix you. There is a spell there, attached to the metal itself. The only way to remove it is to dissolve the silver.”

Dissolve it… for fucksakes. That does not sound good. At alllllllll.  

Nitric acid? I sign, looking at Ediye. She gives a solemn nod. There’s determination in her expression but fear in her eyes. 

“We can keep the blood going into your system through a feeding tube,” she says. “The more silver we dissolve, the more you should be able to start repairing yourself, as long as you have a steady supply. We can put a tracheostomy in to keep you breathing.”

“Question. Why can’t we give her blood by IV instead?” Cole asks. Ediye turns to him slowly, her narrowed glare menacing and cold. 

“Question. When you’re hungry does Eryx just put a sandwich in a fucking blender and shove it into your arm?”

Cole blinks, blanching under Ediye’s scrutinous glare. “...no…”

“Exactly.” Ediye turns back toward me, rolling her eyes with a subtle shake of her head. God, I love her. “We would have to get as much blood into you beforehand as we can to start the process. Then we can keep it going through the tube.”

“The sahira can spellcast to hasten the healing,” Mr. Hassan says, gesturing to Ediye. The lines in his face seem to deepen as his gaze anchors mine from bobbing away on the rising tide of panic. This sounds dire, and judging by the look on the old man’s face, it really fucking is. “There is nothing we can do to stop the pain you will endure if we dissolve the silver. The spell in your throat is a ward. No other magic will be able to ease that suffering.” 

“Can’t you sedate her?” Eryx asks, his worried gaze bouncing between the apothecary and the witch. 

“No,” Ediye replies. Her shoulders drop, her voice is quiet. “We could only put her into torpor, but that will slow her metabolism and make things even worse. Vampires are immune to any other sedation. She has to do this awake.” 

Well, that’s a lot of fucking fear catching my sail. I’m nearly vibrating with the desire to bolt. Ediye rises from her chair and kneels in front of me, laying her hands on my knees. She gives me the most reassuring smile she can manage. But it’s still right there, nestled in her eyes. She’s afraid this could be goodbye. 

“Hey, babe,” she says, her voice quiet. 

I lift the corner of my lips in a half-assed smile. 

“Listen up. You’ve got a choice. You can keep on living the way you’re living now. Basically a human. You’ll always be sick like you are at the moment. It probably won’t ever get much better. You won’t have a voice. And sooner or later, you’ll die.” 

I gently pull my hands free from Mr. Hassan’s grasp. 

Well, you’re a fucking ray of sunshine, aren’t you, I sign. 

Ediye smirks. “I’m just keepin’ it real, babe.” She takes in a deep lungful of air and levels me with a look that says the time for jokes is over. My stomach twists, trapped in a tightening fist of nerves. “You’ve been through some pretty shitty stuff before. But you’ve always been yourself. Pure vampire. Able to heal. If we do this…” 

My lip wobbles as I watch the tears shimmer in Ediye’s eyes. She looks down and gathers her resolve, squeezing my knees in a bruising grip. When she looks at me with those glassy onyx eyes my heart goes as cold as crumbling stone. 

“If we do this, Lu, it’s gonna be rough. If it works, we might be able to find a way to reverse what Semyon did. There’s a good chance your condition will at least even out when your healing abilities return. But you need to know there’s just as much chance you won’t make it. If you can’t heal fast enough, you will die.” 

A life as little more than a sick human, or suffering and a high probability of death for a chance at getting back who I used to be. 

This is a real shits versus diarrhea situation, I sign.

Ediye gives a weak smile and nods. “Yeah. Yeah, it is. Maybe take a little time to think about it.” 

I pull in a lungful of air that slips past the burn in my throat and seems to fuel the needling hum of pain in my head. I can feel the sweat sliding down my spine. 

I look around the room, at Cole’s boyish face that hides so much sacrifice, to Eryx who was stripped from the Living Realm and still found a way to arrive at forgiveness and love. I look at Mr. Hassan, who pats my hand with fatherly affection like he knows it’s something I can’t remember from a childhood I’m not sure I ever had. My gaze lands on Ediye, my best friend, my ride-or-die. My soulmate. The woman who has had my back through the worst that life could hurtle at us. 

If I take this chance, I might not just get back something I’ve lost. Maybe I can help make their sacrifice and suffering mean something. If I make it, maybe we really can find a way to keep the balance of the Realms. And that’s something worth fighting for. 

No. I don’t need time. Let’s do it.

CHAPTER 11

Okay, so I naively expected it might take some time to get shit together for this procedure. I’m not sure why I’d think that, considering Mr. Hassan is an apothecary. He has things like medical grade tubing and scalpels, disinfectant and of course a shitload of potions. Nitric acid and blood are both in plentiful supply. So… yeah… there’s not much time to second-guess my decision and jump out the window to freedom. 

The old man sets me down in the corner of a bedroom where he prepares his trays of items and keeps an eye on me as I suck down more blood in one sitting than I’ve had in years. Cole enters the room and Mr. Hassan starts to ask him to donate, but doesn’t even finish the question before the demon is rolling up his sleeve for me. I take his offered wrist with a nod of gratitude before the bite. His blood is smoky and sweet, but not rich like Ashen’s. There’s no hum in my veins when his arm leaves my lips. 

Thank you, I whisper as he gives a reassuring squeeze to my shoulder before turning to press a facecloth to the puncture. 

Cole gives a gentle smile and steps back, his interest drawn to the apothecary’s work. “Don’t mention it.” 

“Try mine,” Eryx beams with a helpful smile, holding his arm out as he walks forward into the room. 

“Bad idea,” Cole says. 

I shake my head, agreeing with Cole. 

Ediye huffs. “Ye of little faith. Give it a shot.”

Cole and I grimace at one another as Eryx holds his cinnamon-scented skin beneath my nose. 

“Try it, I want to know what I taste like,” he chimes. My fangs are still coated in venom and blood when I mouth an apology to Cole through a doubtful grin. He rolls his eyes, preparing to catch his boyfriend as I bite the offered arm. 

I draw in a long pull of the angel’s blood. It’s as thick as honey and ten times as sweet. I glance up at Eryx’s hopeful smile and choke down a second swallow before letting go. 

“Well?..”

I try to contain my expression but Ediye cackles and I lose the battle, scraping my tongue across my teeth like a dog eating peanut butter as I attempt to rid myself of the cloying flavor. 

Too sweet, I sign, taking Cole’s offered arm once more to wash down the angel syrup with something more palatable. Fucking vile is what it was. 

“Don’t worry, my love. You’re just too pure for such a deplorable creature,” Cole says to his boyfriend who looks genuinely disappointed, casting a wink down at me. 

“Take some of mine next,” Ediye offers, but Mr. Hassan grunts from his table of supplies. 

“Keep your life force, sahira. You’re going to need every ounce of strength. Besides, we are ready to begin.” 

The old man’s solemn words suck the jovial atmosphere right out of the room. As if on cue, the sweat seems to double its efforts to increase my discomfort. It’s like a parasite that refuses to let go of its host. 

I let Cole’s arm go and he pulls me up by my slimy palm, directing me to a narrow bed that’s been covered with fresh linens. I unbutton my shirt then lie down on the table. 

We start with the gastrostomy, Ediye numbing the left side of my abdomen with a potion that smells like antiseptic and willow bark and other random, witchy shit like feldspar and burnt reptile skin as she chants a spell in a low and focused voice. She helps to guide Mr. Hassan with the incision and placement of the tube. His hands are steady and sure, and though I smell my own blood, all I feel is pressure. Eryx keeps me distracted with stories, Cole sets up blood bags on IV stands for gravity feeding. Each person has a role to play and when I really think about that it nearly overwhelms me.

After about forty-five minutes, the tube is set up and connected to the first bag of blood. My little medical team moves to the tracheostomy next. They approach the procedure with the same focus and precision as the last one. Having them work so close to my face feels ironically suffocating given their end goal, and the fear that coats my brain like a film is climbing through my body, shaking my fingers. Every moment is another step closer. And it doesn’t take many moments at all until I’m breathing through a tube. 

When the work is done, Mr. Hassan steps back and gives me a firm nod and a pat on the hand before turning his back to prepare the first in a row of glass syringes filled with nitric acid. 

“Okay, babe, doing great so far,” Ediye says as she hovers over me. I tie my gaze to hers like a boat to the shore in a raging sea. My heart is knocking on my bones, roaring in my ears. Ediye gives me a smile that splits me right in two. “You fight, Lu,” she whispers, her voice fierce. “You fight and when you think you can’t, you keep fighting. I’ll be right here fighting with you.”

I try to smile. My lips quiver. 

Time to suck it up and fight like a vampire. Again. 

Promise, I mouth. I’m ready to pay for my word with blood. Love you.

“I love you too.”

Mr. Hassan turns to us, the syringe in his hand filled with yellow liquid. I smell the acrid scent of acid. A surgical suction machine clicks on, whispering at my left. 

“Good luck, azizati. I am sorry for this pain,” he says. I give him a nod and turn my attention back to Ediye, whose eyes fill with the darkness of deep space, the mysteries of the cosmos. Galaxies and gasses and alien planets spin in the universe of her power. It is raw beauty, both terrifying and magnificent. If it’s the last thing I ever see, I think that’ll be okay. 

“En alsikunusi ilimes musiti ittikunu alsi musitum kallatum kutumtum,” she says. Her voice twists around me in layers of sound. Her words spread a warmth that snakes through my veins. 

I have called upon you, Gods of Night, with you I have called upon Night, the Veiled Bride. 

The apothecary presses the tip of the needle into my skin. It follows the path of the curse that stole my voice. 

“Alsi bararitum qablitum u namritum.”

I have called on Twilight, Midnight, and Dawn.

The apothecary meets my eyes. I see a flash of sorrow. I know in that instant he doesn’t think this will work. He thinks he’s sending me to death. 

It’s ok, I whisper to him with a smile. The only sound that comes out is the breath through the tube in my throat. This is a chance I want to take, no matter if it might fail. I have little else left to lose. I fold my hand around his as he keeps the needle steady in my flesh. 

“Tuub libbi tu seri liirtedaani, ema usaammaru suummiratiia luuk suud.”

May happiness and good health ever accompany her; whatever she wishes, may she attain her wish.

I keep my reassuring smile on the old man as I press my thumb down on his, depressing the first drops of acid into my throat. 

For a second or two, it burns no more than it does all the time. It’s no different than the pain of the silver lodged in my throat. 

But it doesn’t last. 

The burn grows hotter. My breath comes faster. My heart punches my ribs in alarm. 

The pain. The pain swells like a rising tide. An inescapable tsunami of suffering. It burns so blinding hot that I think even my eyes are scorched. I want to claw it out of my throat but Cole grips my arm. 

My eyes stream. I fight to stop from coughing. The taste of blood creeps up on my tongue. 

More acid is pushed into my throat. 

Ediye keeps chanting. I don’t hear her words. 

Mr. Hassan barks orders to the others. I don’t know what they are. 

A suction tube slides into my mouth. More acid is plunged into my neck. I want to scream but I can’t. I want to thrash but my limbs are held down. 

More acid. More blood. More pain, so hot. Like swallowing fire. Like drinking lava. The suction gurgles. I smell melting flesh. 

The edges of my vision blacken in distress. I push the darkness away. Made a promise. Must keep fighting. You keep fighting, Lu.

Another syringe. More acid. How can there be more? I swear it’s burned through the surface. I hear Cole curse. Mr. Hassan snaps at him. Suction, boy. 

“She’s not healing fast enough.”

“Change the blood bags.” 

The pain is crushing. Desperate. I would do anything. Give anything. My life. My soul. I beg for them to stop. Mr. Hassan sees it in my eyes.

“We have to finish what we started, azizati,” he says. I dissolve into tears when the needle presses into my throat. So much worse than the silver. Like the metal doesn’t want to let me go. 

The suction struggles. Something clogs the nozzle. A piece of my throat. It’s burning apart. I can’t keep up. I can’t. I can’t. 

When you think you can’t, you keep fighting. 

“Why is it not working?”

“Change the bags again. We have to keep going.” 

“But she’ll die.”

“We have to keep going.”

I can’t I can’t I can’t I can’t I can’t. 

I want them to stop. Just stop. Stop. 

I wish there was something good. I wish there was comfort. There is only pain. There can’t be more. But there is. 

A crash sounds from another room. Something breaking apart. Wood shattering. 

The world goes still. Eryx lets go of my ankles and darts to the entrance of the bedroom. 

The angel comes face-to-face with a furious demon. 

Smoke billows across the floor. A light brightens. It comes from Eryx, his skin glowing. His wings unfurl. He blocks the Reaper from entering the room. 

My eyes lock with Ashen’s over his shoulder. 

An angel of light, an angel of death. It must be time for my soul to go. Someone heard my offer. They’ve come to collect. 

“You’re killing her,” Ashen seethes. I think there’s desperation in his voice. And rage. He’ll burn the world. Maybe. I remember thinking that once before. 

Ashen’s blade erupts with flame. I try to yell for Eryx to get out of the way. A garbled spurt of liquid sputters from my throat. 

Ediye’s spell starts to change but Mr. Hassan pulls her back. “Keep her alive,” he says. He turns toward the door. “Anunnaki, let him pass.”  

I can feel Cole tense beside me. I know he wants to go to Eryx. “But-”

“This is my house,” Mr. Hassan booms. “Let the Reaper pass.” 

Eryx looks over his shoulder at the old man. He gives a solemn nod. He withdraws his wings enough for Ashen to get by without being cut.

“Come between us again and I will rip your wings off and feed them to my jackal, anunnaki,” Ashen growls. He knocks his shoulder into the angel as he strides into the room. 

The Reaper stops beside me. He takes only a moment to survey the macabre scene. He glares down at my throat, then at Ediye. He turns his fury to the needle in Mr. Hassan’s hand. His gaze darts to the feeding tube and the bag of blood hanging from the IV stand. He looks back to Mr. Hassan with a question in the black flame of his eyes. 

“Second drawer from the left,” Mr. Hassan says, nodding to a dresser. I think I hear approval in his voice. Maybe even the hint of a smile. 

Ashen’s eyes narrow in determination and he turns to the drawer. He rifles through the contents until he finds whatever he’s looking for. 

“What are you doing?” Cole asks. 

“She needs my blood.” 

Ashen drags a chair toward my bedside and sits, leaning toward me. He struggles with the sterile packaging of a butterfly needle. His hands are shaking. I’ve never seen them shake before. But I’m not sure this whole thing is real. Only pain is real. The scent of burning flesh. The wisps of acrid smoke. These are real. The Reaper might be a hallucination. I’m in agony. I’m delirious with suffering.

I hear another sound at the door and see Davina standing at the threshold. She looks around the room. Her eyes are innocent and wide. They land on Ashen and rest there.  

Fucksakes. I wanted something good, not more pain. The acid feels like it’s burning through my heart. 

“Eryx, get her out,” Ashen says, nodding at the door. He doesn’t look up from the work of his hands. Eryx hesitates, his gaze is tangled with Cole’s. Ashen seems to sense the inertia. The smoke and cinders of rage erupt from his wings. He lifts his unforgiving glare and pierces each of them with it. “Get. The fuck. Out.” 

Eryx and Davina leave without a word. Cole stays to suction more of my throat away. Ashen connects the feeding tube to the needle. Ediye’s chants continue to fill the space between us but I see her glare at Ashen. She’s ready to send all her fury his way. He ignores her, his eyes fixed only to mine. 

Mr. Hassan readies another syringe but the Reaper stops the old man’s hand. Smoke fills the space around us. Ashen’s face comes closer until he’s all I see. Those warm cognac eyes that are alight with black flame. The dark hair that falls across his brow. The muscle that ticks in his jaw as his gaze sweeps across my skin. 

I should push him away. There’s already pain in every piece of me. I don’t need even more of it in my heart. But I just can’t seem to do it. I can’t. 

His warm hand caresses my forehead. Sweat slicks across my skin beneath his fingertips. “All right, vampire?” 

I press my eyes closed. Tears spill from their corners and he brushes them away. I remember every time he’s said those words. The fight when we met. The Shadow Realm. 

I want him as much as I ever have. I need him now more than ever before. And I hate myself for it. 

I smash my fist against the bed. I give him the finger. The huff of his laugh is warm on my wet skin. 

“That’s my vampire. Now put that fight where it counts.”

The rich aroma of Ashen’s blood finds its way to me through all the terrifying scents that surround us when he drives the needle into his vein. I watch as he holds his arm aloft. The blood flows down the tube toward me. 

The second it passes from his body into mine, I feel it. An effervescence. A hum in my veins. Like stars exploding in my belly and hope igniting in my chest. 

Ashen takes my hand and I put my hurt aside. My sorrow and rage. The betrayal that burns like venom in my veins. I just want one good thing to hold onto, even if it’s only a memory. 

I squeeze his hand. He squeezes back. 

The Reaper leans in close, his lips next to my ear and his breath warm on my skin. His face rests against mine as Mr. Hassan presses the needle into my flesh. My shoulders shake with anguish and fear. 

“Stay with me, vampire,” he whispers. His words are just like acid. They dissolve all thought and reason. They bring both pain and possibility. 

The apothecary presses down on the plunger and my flesh dissolves into liquid. The suffering is more than I could ever bear. The world blackens. The Reaper chants in my ear, a soft lullaby. A spell. I don’t catch every word. But do catch some. Baltu. Live. Mamitu. An oath. 

I am consumed by pain and shadows. As the world fades into darkness, I think I hear something that could only be imagined. Something impossible. Something magical. Something lethal. Something a demon should never feel for a creature bound to the Living Realm. 

Arammu.

Love.

CHAPTER 12

The light is low when I wake. I’m facing the open window, the sounds of evening within the Khan el-Khalili market vibrant from the street below. A single oil lamp burns on a desk, the gentle flame casting a warm glow through the ornate green chimney. I can see the bubbles and imperfections in the glass as clearly as if it were right next to my face. My vision is back to normal. Maybe better than before. 

My veins buzz like they’re filled with a thunderstorm. I feel like I’m powering up with every breath. Energy surges in each beat of my heart. 

This is new. I feel new. 

And… weird. 

Kinda… wild. Feline. Animalistic. Like I could either tear something apart or fuck it into oblivion. 

I tamp down that strange sensation and touch my hand to my neck. The tracheostomy is gone. The skin is smooth and unblemished beneath my fingertips. I draw my hand away and turn it over to find my nails regrown, their tips smoothed into perfect, gentle curves. I breathe in the faint smell of silver and steel, and my pulse starts to climb until I detect the scent of Ediye and slip my hand beneath my pillow, grazing the handle of my kaiken. I know she must have put it there as a comfort I’d want to keep close. 

My hand pulls away from the blade and I feel my forehead. It’s cool and dry to the touch. There’s no more film of sweat. No more fever. No hum of pain in my head or needles scraping at my eyes. The burn in my throat is little more than a dull ache. Raw, but so much better than before. It’s a candle where there was once an inferno. I swallow, unsure that this could be real. 

The steady drum of another heart pulls my attention away from my own body. I look down to my side . Ashen sits next to my bed in the chair he dragged next to me during the procedure. He rests his head on his folded arms and part of one of mine. His face is turned toward me, his steady breath spilling warmth over my uncovered shoulder. He’s beautiful even in sleep. His dark hair falls across his forehead and skims his brows. Thick lashes fan beneath his closed eyes. His full lips are squished by his arm, making an adorable, tiny ‘O’. Half of me has an urge to smack it. The other half wants that mouth to do other very reckless, ill-advised things, and the mere thought sends a rush of feral heat to my core. 

I trap a sudden swell of need and contain it in my chest. I just watch for a while. I’ve never seen the demon sleep, he always woke before me in the short time we were together. And now, in this moment of solitude, I think it’s maybe the most angelic thing I’ve ever seen. I reach out a tentative hand and move the strands of hair that obscure his skin in a touch so gentle that he doesn’t even stir.

I smell lilacs before I notice the faint beat of another heart in the hall. I look to the door and find Davina standing in the shadows of the corridor, watching. I think I should say something but I don’t know what, or if I even can. I’m not sure if my voice is really back or not. And this might sound selfish, but I don’t want to spend my first words on her, even if I know deep down it’s not her fault. She looks at me for a long, silent moment, then gives a twitch of a fleeting and sorrowful smile before she gently closes the door and pads away down the hall. 

I have an urge to thank her. But, for some reason, also a much, much greater urge to kill her. Viciously. Like, a bathe-in-her-blood, cast-spells-from-her-bones kind of killing. I’m not sure why. 

No, scratch that. I am sure why. 

For re-existing. For taking what was mine. 

I shudder as a murderous urge slithers down my spine. More murderous than usual. By a lot. And that’s saying something, because, hello… vampire. 

Fuck, I’m feeling really weird. Not bad weird, more like maniacal weird. I’ve determined that my emotional state has distilled into two primal emotions:

A desire to fuck people up,

Or,

A desire to just… fuck… people. 

Specifically one person.

One person whose cognac eyes are now fused to mine with a legit note of suspicion and alarm. Which is probably wise, because right now my desires are balanced on the sharpened edge of a knife. 

Fuck it,

Or,

Fuck it up. 

Ashen sits up a little with his arm still resting against my side. He moves slowly, as though cornered by a wild beast. His eyes dart across my face. He’s assessing the threat. Now that he’s awake, the crackle in my veins is ten times stronger. My need ignites like a fuse. To do what, I’m not sure. And I don’t think I’m fully in control of the decision.

“Lu-”

I hiss. Oh fuck yeah, that felt good.

“Leucosia-”

I hiss again. 

“...vampire?” 

I narrow my eyes in a fierce glare. Ashen sits a bit straighter and glances over his shoulder toward the door. He must have heard it click closed when Davina left. Maybe he even knew she was here. Or worse, expected her. My mind spirals into a jealous rage and I hiss again, a deep, enraged, vicious hiss. Ashen’s eyes snap back to mine and his spine fuses as straight as a sword, his palms facing me in a placating gesture.

“Okaaay vampire…”

I sit up, moving with careful precision. My muscles feel taut with the power I once had. But there’s more. There’s a spark in my flesh. I sit straight and pay only passing attention to the blanket that falls away from my torso. I hold my arms out, expecting to see the light that I feel beneath my skin. Nothing looks different. It’s definitely there, though. And zipping through it is the charge of Ashen’s blood. It’s like I swallowed an electric current and captured the power in my veins. 

I look down at my body and run my hand over the spot where the feeding tube had been. There’s no pain. Not even a mark. I wonder how long I’ve been out, but I don’t want to ask. Those will not be my first spoken words. I’m saving those for something special. 

I’m still running my fingers across my cool, clean skin when I hear Ashen’s chair creak as though he’s trying to edge away. My head whips in his direction and I pin him with a fierce glare. He leans back a fraction, his hands raised toward me in a bid to invoke calm. I see him swallow and it finally registers in my head that I’m topless. His eyes haven’t left mine and that enrages me even more. He was supposed to like boobs. I even have a note about it. Why isn’t he fucking looking at my boobs? Though if he does, I might slap him. I haven’t decided. But either way, he’s a fucking asshole.  

I turn my torso fully toward him like a dare. I can see in his eyes that he has no idea what to make of me. Hell, I have no idea what to make of me. I tilt my head and my glare constricts into thin slits of brightening red light. There’s a cacophonous argument in my head of why-aren’t-you-looking, look-down-you-motherfucker, if-you-look-I-will-murder-you, and I’m not sure which voice is going to win. 

“All right, vampire?” Ashen asks with a note so thick with wariness that it hangs like a bright star in his voice. 

My head dips low like a tiger homing in on its prey. My fangs descend and venom floods my mouth. And then I see it, the quick flash of his eyes to my boobs. 

I launch off the bed and knock into him with every ounce of strength I’ve got. It’s like hitting a brick wall, but I’ve still got enough power to topple us both to the floor. Ashen falls on his back and I land with reclaimed vampiric grace to straddle him. His hands are still up in that dumbass, placating gesture. It makes me want to cut them off and chuck them across the room. He’s a Reaper, for fucksakes. He could kill me faster than I could blink. Well, almost. Maybe not today. But trying to mollify me is just pissing me off even more.

Ashen’s eyes dart down to my body again and I look down at myself, realizing that I’m fully naked. It’s either really convenient, or grounds for murder. 

I sit back on Ashen, glaring down at the Reaper who looks like a man standing at a crossroads without a map. He swallows again. The movement is delicious and I’m feeling ravenous for anything carnal. 

My eyes follow the pattern of the tattoos on his neck that dive beneath his collar. They make a slow procession down the buttons of his perfectly pressed black shirt, then back up the markings on one of his arms. I follow the lines of muscle beneath his sleeve. My gaze stalks across his shoulder, up his throat, along the angle of his jaw and cheekbone. When I meet his eyes again, the dim spark of a flame grows brighter within his pupils. 

His arousal stiffens beneath me. He knows I feel it. I can see it in his eyes, that look of desire so overwhelming that it hurts, burning you from within. Our gazes fuse together, connected by an unbreakable chain. My heart rams into its bone cage. 

We move in the same instant. One second I’m glaring down at Ashen, the next I’m wrapped in his arms, consumed by his kiss. I grip his hair with one hand and his shoulder with the other and draw him into me. His hands press into my flesh as they flow across my back. 

The kiss is feral. Bruising. Vicious with need. We devour one another. I tear his shirt open and the buttons ping and scatter across the floor. He sheds it like snake scales. I suck his bottom lip between my teeth and scrape my fangs across the delicate skin, drawing a thin thread of blood into my mouth. It’s a match that lights a fuse. 

Ferocious desire detonates in my veins and I dig my fingernails into his back. I smirk when I feel him tense and lean into the pain. The tone of my breathy laugh is husky and dark. It’s like smoke in a room filled with shadows and dim light. It doesn’t sound like me at all. But I like it. I dig my nails in deeper and Ashen growls, lifting us from the floor, kissing me harder, his need matching mine one heartbeat to the next. 

Ashen throws me down onto the bed and I give him a sinister smile as I run the tip of my tongue across the blood gathered beneath the nail of my index finger. Sparks ignite in his eyes as he climbs on top of me. He’s all predator, stalking up my body, his gaze soldered to mine and his expression ravenous. He hovers over me and my smile grows wider, darker. I lay my finger on my tongue and wrap my lips around it, sucking the last of his blood from my skin. He watches for a moment, transfixed. 

And then he descends. 

Ashen bites my neck where it connects with my shoulder, clamping down hard. I let out a squeak but I want more, I want it harder. I clutch his hair and keep his mouth on my skin as his bruising grip covers my thighs in fingerprints that will heal far too quickly.

The Reaper releases my neck to press a line of searing kisses down the center of my chest and onto the soft skin of one breast as he palms the other. He draws my nipple into his mouth, swirling his tongue around the hardened peak as he pinches the other between his fingers. I writhe and he pins me with his free hand, pressing down hard on my stomach. His leg traps one of my thighs. My other curls across his back like a vice. I keep squirming until he bites down and pulls, scraping my skin when he lets go. 

I hiss and release my leg from across Ashen’s body and aim to knee him in the head. He catches my thigh. I glare at him and a wicked grin flashes across his face. I want to eat him alive for it. 

“Now, now, vampire,” he purrs, pushing my leg down so it exposes the seam of my body. “Play nice.”

Fuck nice. I want to play dirty. 

I grab Ashen’s nape and pull his lips to mine. I rake my nails down his spine to feel him shiver beneath my touch. I break our kiss to suck on the skin of his throat, teasing him with the threat of my fangs. I drag them across his neck until they slice his skin and blood drips into my mouth. 

Ashen pulls away and gives me a dark, dangerous laugh as he pushes my shoulders into the mattress. He sits back on his heels and burns me with a sinful smile. 

“I said,” he growls, hooking a hand behind one of my knees and then the other, “play nice.”

In a swift and seamless motion, Ashen spreads my thighs apart in his grasp and lifts me to his mouth. He feasts on my flesh. He sucks and licks and kisses and devours. He growls and sends vibrations into my core. He pushes my legs open further and bruises my skin with his grip. 

“You have the sweetest taste,” he says when he breaks away to press kisses across the inside of my thigh. He lays one of my legs over his shoulder and pushes a finger between my folds, then another, working them in a slow but powerful motion, hooking them with every stroke like he’s beckoning me to come closer. I moan as my nerves catch fire with his touch. He kisses his way back to my center. “I love to hear the sounds you make, vampire. Almost as much love your delicious, perfect little pussy,” he says before his mouth descends to feast on my flesh. 

He continues his ministrations, slowing whenever he feels me tighten around his fingers, sucking and biting to hear me moan. I make nearly every sound except a word. Ashen takes me right to the edge and then denies me, time after time until I smash my fist against the bed and growl with frustration. He has the audacity to laugh right into my pussy and it drives me nearly mad with desire. But he does what I want, what I need. He pumps his fingers and rolls his tongue over my clit until I come in a blinding, star-filled orgasm, grinding against his face. 

My breath is still coursing past the residual burn of my throat in rapid inhalations when Ashen climbs my body with kisses and bites. He presses his lips to mine and I taste my arousal on his tongue. As the kiss deepens, I feel the silken tip of his erection press to my folds. But he waits. He waits for my invitation. And for a long moment, I deny him. He doesn’t grow impatient. He takes the time to explore my body. My mouth with his tongue. My flesh with his hands. He maps every muscle and ridge of bone that he can until I’m ready to let him in. 

And when I do, it doesn’t slake the need I have for him. He fills me with his length and I only want more. My flesh stretches around his girth with each stroke and I can’t get enough. Every thrust brings a starburst explosion of pleasure but there’s still a galaxy to explore. Ashen breaks our kiss and frames my face with his hands as he pushes deeper into me. “Ni mina titaan ina zae darisam,” he whispers, a quiet and gentle confession. I want to live in this heaven within you forever.

But I don’t want confessions that pull taut the wire wrapped around my heart. I don’t want words that sound like love. I want truth. And the only true thing right now is what I feel in my flesh and breath and bones. 

I hook my leg across Ashen’s back and flip us over in a swift motion without ever breaking our connection. I push his chest down with my palms and dig my nails into his skin, watching with predatory interest as he closes his eyes and absorbs both pleasure and pain. 

I spread my legs wider and roll my hips, taking him as deep as he’ll go, working his erection as he palms my breasts. My arousal colors the air with its scent. Sweat slicks the muscles beneath my hands. I chase my orgasm to a cliff edge and dive into the abyss, every muscle tightening and my back arching as I dig my nails deeper into Ashen’s skin. My core compresses around his erection and my pleasure detonates like a bomb. 

When the waves of the orgasm subside, I pause to open my eyes and look down at Ashen, my chest heaving with deep breaths as he sweeps locks of hair back from my shoulder. I feel him pulse within me but he still hasn’t come. He’s watching me not with fire, but with longing. Something dark and distant that I’ve pulled from his depths. 

I close my eyes, shutting him away. I roll my hips slowly and lean over him, bracing my hands above his shoulders by the pillow. The smell of blood drifts from the marks of my fingernails and I lean down to kiss one of the crimson crescent moons. 

 I open my eyes and look down at my hands, my fingers as tense as tiger claws. I may be still changing, becoming something new. I may yet need to evolve. 

But one thing I will always be is a vampire. The original vampire. 

And there is one thing about a vampire that you should never forget.

We adapt to what you need us to be in that moment, so that we can get exactly what we want from you. 

I halt my motion. My breath slows. I quiet everything, even my heart. 

I lean closer, blowing a thin stream of breath across Ashen’s skin. My lips graze his ear and I rake my fangs across the lobe. He shivers, his hands pressing into my back and flowing down the ridges of my ribs. He twitches within me, growing ever closer to an orgasm. 

I roll my hips once in a teasing motion and stop again. He growls with both pleasure and frustration. 

“Tell me, Reaper,” I say in his ear, my voice low and husky. It doesn’t sound like mine. It brings me both delight and rage. “How does it feel to be denied that which you thought you had earned?”

Ashen gives a dark huff of a laugh at my goading words and grasps my hips. I roll them once more and he moans. 

It happens so fast that his hands never even leave my sides. 

Hot blood cascades from his neck, spraying across my chest. I lean back to stare down at his face with a faint, menacing smile. I hold my faithful kaiken in my palm and smell the silver-infused steel, the leather of the handle warming beneath my touch. 

Ashen’s erection is still hard within me as I slip away. He gurgles a shuddering breath and his lips move. He tries to say something. I think it’s my name, but no sound comes out. 

I lean down and run my tongue along the slice in his throat, coating it in his effervescent taste. And then I press my lips to his, swirling his blood into his mouth before sitting back to survey my work. 

“I always thought betrayal tasted like copper. Tell me if I’m right when you get back from the other side.”

His eyes flash with a mix of hurt and rage, and everything else he feels that I don’t want to know. With another quick slash across his throat, I end his life with my blade. 

I climb off the bed and wipe my kaiken clean on his leg before it dissolves into cinders and ash. I watch until the last gray flake drifts into the still air, until all that’s left is the bloodstain on the sheets. 

When he’s gone, I turn a circle in the silent room, looking for towels or robes or clothes. I see my bag on a chair along the opposite wall. 

I take three steps into the room. 

I stop. 

Something’s not right. 

As quick as a snap of fingers, I fall into shadow, losing my mind to a vision of the night.

CHAPTER 13

I see Ashen, lying naked on a black stone altar. His eyes are closed. His chest doesn’t rise or fall with any breath. I don’t hear a heartbeat. And then, everything roars to life. His heart starts from silence, and then pounds harder and harder as breath enters and leaves his lungs. I want to go. I want to leave before he opens his eyes. Somehow, I push this image away. 

There’s a crackling sound, like electricity caught within my skull. It disappears as quickly as it comes and I blink, looking around a familiar room. Aglaope’s little stone cottage back on Anthemoessa. There are seashells tinkling like chimes in the window. The surf crashes against the rocks below the cliffs a short distance away. 

“What do you want?” her voice says behind me. I whip around to face her, but she’s not looking at me. Her long, black hair falls between her shoulders and a blade is clutched behind her back. She edges behind a table, closer to the door that leads to the sea. 

“I am here to reap your soul for the Crime of Sedition,” Ember says as she emerges from the shadows of a corridor. Her menacing smile is as sharp as her sword of silver and hellfire. “But you and I both know what you really did. Tell me where it is.” 

“Never,” Aglaope says as she throws her blade. It lodges to the hilt into Ember’s shoulder and Aglaope runs past me, headed for the cliffs. I know I’m there. I know what happens next.

The crackling sound snaps through my head again and the vision turns into something more like dreams. They’re fragmented. It’s like I’m watching them at an outdoor theater while sitting in heavy fog. 

But the fog gets thicker. The twilight grows darker. 

And then I’m in the Shadow Realm. 

I hear Ediye calling my name like she’s in the distance. Down the corridor. In the cell. Unreachable. I’m being dragged away across the stone floor toward the chamber at the end of the hall. Gallus waits for me there with his tray of tools, ready to begin. 

I panic and thrash my arms and legs. I feel a strong grip on my hands and pry my eyes open to fight back. But it’s Ediye, crouched next to me with a look of concern. 

“You’re okay, Lu. You’re safe,” she says as her eyes dart across my body, looking for wounds. I smell blood, none of it mine. And I smell urine. 

“I fucking pissed myself,” I whisper in my new, smoky voice. 

Ediye’s eyes go wide and I hear the sharp intake of breath from her surprise. For a second, she doesn’t move, then she clasps me in a fierce hug. 

“Your voice! You can talk, Lu. You can talk.” She keeps saying it over and over, her voice thin with the effort of holding back tears. She pulls away, her eyes glassy as she surveys my face. “Are you all right?” 

I nod, my hand drifting to my head as it hums in pain. It’s not the scrape of needles like before, but a buzzing sensation, like a swarm of angry hornets circling in my brain. I can’t say it’s a massive improvement from the needles. 

Ediye’s head tilts and her eyes narrow as I rub my head and sigh. She looks down at my naked body, then up at the bloodstained bed, then back at me. “Where’s Ashen?”

My hand falls from my face and I draw my lips between my teeth. My eyebrows climb my forehead. 

“You smell like sex.”

I give her a grimace of a smile. 

“You had sex with him.”

I nod, biting down on my bottom lip. 

“And then you killed him.” 

I nod again. 

Ediye seems caught in a moment of stasis. And then she bursts out laughing. “Of course you did. And that is just one of the reasons I love you,” she says as she clasps me in another tight hug. 

“I love you too,” I croak, squeezing hard in reply.

Ediye stands and offers me a hand. “Come on,” she says as we clasp each other’s forearms and she hauls me to my feet. “Let’s get you in the shower and you can tell me all about it.” 

When she’s sure I’m steady on my feet, Ediye whips the bedding off the mattress and tosses it onto the puddle on the floor. She finds an old robe in an armoire then guides me out of the bedroom and down the hall. I tell her about Ashen as she starts the water and waits for it to heat up. By the time she’s guided me into the stream and slid the curtain closed behind me, I’m onto the strange dream I had in the darkness. 

“First it was about Aglaope,” I say, skipping the part about Ashen on the altar. “It was so brief. It was the moment she encountered Ember on Anthemoessa. Ember said she was there to reap my sister for the Crime of Sedition, but then she alluded to something else. Something she seemed to be looking for. She asked where ‘it’ is, but I don’t have any idea what she meant.”

“Hmm. Okay,” Ediye’s voice says from the other side of the curtain. 

“Then there was something about Davina. It was… indistinct. Some parts were unclear. Something from long ago. She was a Scythe. She harvested a body. There was something…  unusual about it. And she knew she shouldn’t but she did it anyway. Something… dangerous. A betrayal. She broke a promise for a heavy price.” 

I sense it like an ambience in a room. It’s an impression. A feeling. The strongest emotions are there, but the images are hazy. They’re behind a curtain that I can’t sweep aside. I can only press my face to it, making out an incomplete picture through the weave of fabric that clings to my third eye. 

“And you saw all this when you took a piss on the floor?”

I snort a laugh as I froth shampoo in my hair. “Yeah, I guess.”

“What else?”

“Cassian.”

“Cassian?”

“Cassian.”

“That’s… weird. And unfortunate.” 

“Mmmhmm,” I murmur, though I’m not sure I really agree. He is part of this, whatever this is. Our weird band of misfits? Our… quest? To save the realms? Fuck, that sounds crazy. Cassian is the last vampire on Earth I’d peg for a quest, unless that quest involves debauchery and a significant quantity of wine. “He belongs with us, that much I know. I didn’t see him as clearly or how he fits, I’m just sure he does, somehow. We have to find him.” 

“Shouldn’t be difficult,” Ediye says as I rinse the shampoo from my hair. “He hardly ever leaves Rome.” 

“True,” I muse as I wring the water from my hair and slide conditioner through my locks. “Though if he’s gotten wind of Semyon and his mission to make hybrids, he might have gone underground. He’s one of the oldest left, so he’s gotta be on Semyon’s priority list.”

“I’m sure Ashen will be thrilled to meet him,” Ediye chimes from where she sits on the bathroom counter. I poke my head out of the curtain and give her the stink eye. “Does he know?”

“What, that I made Cassian into a vampire?”

“That too. But I was more talking about the leaving him at the altar and breaking his heart part.” Ediye smirks as my stink eye turns into a vampiric glare. I retreat back into the shower and snap the curtain closed to the sound of Ediye’s laughter. 

“It’s none of Ashen’s business anyway. In case you’ve forgotten, he betrayed me and landed us both in a fucking dungeon. For a month. And I’ve just killed him for the second time, so I’m sure he’ll give no shits about something that’s ancient history.”

“Yeah, well, he also did save you from a demon snake-“

“I saved myself! Bitch.”

“-and then rescued you with his fancy demon blood while spending hours whispering adorations in your ear and then hours more by your bedside, threatening anyone that so much as glanced at you. I believe the phrase ‘if you look at her for one second longer I’ll skewer your eyeballs and feed them to you like cake pops’ was used in reference to Cole at some point.”

I snort a laugh and try to cool a sudden flood of warmth that spreads within my chest. “That’s some interesting imagery. But it makes sense. The Master of War is very invested in the health and well-being of the Shadow Realm’s newest potential weapon.”

“Yeah… I don’t think it’s that.”

“I don’t care what it is. He’s a demon, I’m a vampire. I don’t belong in his realm and I’d rather die than go back. They’d throw me right back in that dungeon and pick up where they left off. And I’m definitely not falling for his shit again, end of story.” 

“So, I’m confused… is that why you had sex with him?”

I raise my chin and give a haughty shrug, not that Ediye can see it. “He’s hot as hell and I was horny. It was angry sex. One time deal.”

Ediye laughs like she’s got my number. “Oh vampire. You are so fucked.”

I scoff as I let the water slide through my hair to wash the conditioner away. “Why should I be the fucked one? He should be fucked. I fucketh him.”

“Oh you fuckethed him all right. But when Cassian finds out you’re still alive, he might be all up in his feelings about it. And I don’t think Ashen takes kindly to sharing.”

“Pfft. There’s nothing to share. I’m not a fucking whale carcass for two sharks to fight over. I’m the fucking orca that swims up all stealthy-like and kicks both their asses.”

“Yep. You’re alllllll sea panda.” 

I turn off the shower and whip the curtain open. “Sea pandas are apex predators, thankyouverymuch.”

Ediye laughs at my vicious scowl and holds the towel out for me. My glare softens as I realize how much light there is in her eyes. How much relief. To see her smile without a veneer of pain and worry bathes my heart in shimmering light. 

“Okay, sea panda. I’m just saying that you should be prepared, in case there are uncomfortable questions. And you might think you don’t belong to anyone, but others might think differently, and I’m starting to believe it really might have nothing to do with your potential to fuck some shit up among the realms.” Ediye leans forward as I wrap myself in the towel and burrow myself in its warmth. She gives me a kiss on the cheek and then smiles at me. “I know you belong to me.”

“I’ve always belonged to you.” 

Ediye winks and nods to the counter where my clothes lay folded. “Damn straight, bitch. Now you’ll have to excuse me. My little pet pissed on the floor and I’d better go clean it up.” 

I guffaw a smoky laugh and Ediye’s smile spreads before she leaves the room. When she’s gone, I get my shit together, feeling a lot less energetic than when I woke the first time, but a little better than when I came-to in my piss puddle on the floor. When I wipe down the mirror and really assess myself, I look the way I did before my encounter with Semyon and the torture of the Shadow Realm. But I’m different on the inside. I know it. I know without doubt that whatever Semyon started, I need to finish. I can’t go back. I’ll never be what I was. But maybe I can control what I can become. 

When I emerge to join the others, they’re all sitting around a dining table with a spread of Egyptian delicacies laid before them. There are kebabs and falafel, a plate of rolled mahshy piled high. For me there is no plate but a large ceramic mug and a matching teapot, and I can smell the blood from the other side of the room, spiced and sweetened just the way I like. 

Cole gives me a boyish smile around the food he’s stuffing into his face, all his Reapery manners from Bit Akalum clearly chucked out the window at the earliest opportunity. He’s properly shoveling it in. Eryx gives a little wave with a forkful of falafel. His wings drape behind him across the chair like iridescent knives. Davina sits on the other side between Cole and Mr. Hassan, and she neither smiles nor frowns. She just gives me an observant, unnerving, watchful look as she shifts her honey-colored locks away from her eyes with a delicate hand. Mr. Hassan absolutely beams as he fills my mug and beckons me to sit next to Ediye. 

My head buzzes with hornets taking flight but I manage to keep my shit together and sit without toppling over to piss myself in a group setting. I give Mr. Hassan a grateful smile that I then cast across the group. “Thank you all, for everything you did,” I say. My voice is still so husky and raw, but I’m here, able to speak. 

“Ediye says you passed out?” Eryx asks, his brow furrowed.

I nod. My eyes dart toward Davina, but I focus back on the angel. “I feel much better than before, but I don’t think it’s over. Whatever Semyon started has to be finished somehow, unfortunately.”

“I have something that might help in the meantime, azizati,” Mr. Hassan says, and he rises to shuffle over to a sideboard to retrieve a leather pouch. He sets it down next to my cup and withdraws a small vial of clear liquid. “It’s called statera elixir. It is used for young and powerful witches who have difficulty controlling their developing powers. You should take it when you wake in the mornings, but you can use it when you feel unwell in the day. It will not solve what has started within you, but it might help you to keep control of your gift, rather than it control you. There is enough in this pouch for several days.” 

“Thank you,” I say with a smile. The old apothecary pats my hand and sits back down, waving away my thanks. I take a vial in between my fingers and roll the liquid, watching as it coats the glass. “We need to find the others before Semyon does. We can’t have him making more hybrids or putting more of my kind through this.”

“Others?” Cole asks.

“Cassian and Valentina. They’re the two earliest generation vampires left. Semyon’s after the most ancient vampires he can find, something about us making better hybrids.”

Eryx’s feathers clink as he shifts on his seat. “How do we find them?” 

“Cassian is probably the easiest to start with. He hardly ever ventures from Rome. ”

“He has now, but he has not traveled far,” Mr. Hassan says, capturing everyone’s eyes. He looks at me with a faint smile. “When you were resting, your Reaper asked me to look into the whereabouts of both vampires.” 

“Not my Reaper,” I mutter into my mug. 

“I spoke to the apothecary of Rome,” he continues, undaunted. “She said Cassian has left for Ravello. He’s with a coven of witches.” 

Cole’s brows flick in acknowledgement but he doesn’t look up from his food. “And Valentina, any idea where she might be?” 

“Not yet, but I will continue searching. I will find a way to send you a message if I find her,” Mr. Hassan replies as he pushes a plate of basbousa in Davina’s direction. Our gazes connect for a fleeting glance before we both look down at our meals. 

Ediye knocks my elbow with a gentle tap. “Do you know Valentina, Lu? I don’t recall you mentioning her before.” 

“No, I’ve never met her. I’ve heard her name around here or there but she’s always kept a low profile. She’s the vampire that created Arne Larsen, the one that Semyon made into the hybrid with the huge dick,” I say, smiling when Eryx coughs around his falafel. “Cassian might know her. He used to like to keep up with the comings and goings of our kind.”

There’s a moment where we all look at one another in a silent agreement. We need to get to the others before Semyon does. 

“What about you?” Davina asks. Her voice isn’t what I expect. It’s quiet but assertive, like a gentle breeze that still cuts through a forest to find you. 

“What about me?” 

“You said you need to finish what was started. Can Cassian and Valentina help you?”

I look at Davina for a long moment as I consider her question. “Probably not, but I’d rather get to them first before Semyon has a chance. He’s already got a month head start on me,” I reply. I don’t back down from looking at her. I’m curious as to what her reaction will be. She must know what that month in the Shadow Realm meant for me. She’s seen at least a glimpse of what I’ve endured, and she’s been through her own brand of suffering there as a reaped soul. Her face is stoic but I think I see some kind of understanding in her eyes as she gives a single nod.  

“We’d better leave as soon as we can,” Ediye interjects, her weighted glance shifting between us. She shoves a few bites of basbousa into her mouth and washes it down with long gulps of water. The rest of us follow her lead and consume what we can of our meal as Mr. Hassan gives us directions to the coven’s stronghold in Ravello. Villa Datura on the outskirts of the town, nestled in the hills. Club Caelum, overlooking the Amalfi shores. 

We rise as one from our chairs, all except for Davina. Her gaze darts from Mr. Hassan to me, then the others, then back again. She lingers on the edge of her chair, unsure what she should do. 

Dammit. 

It just doesn't feel right to leave her here. That part of me that wants to grind her bones into spells is still there, but there’s a bigger part that can imagine she’s suffered her own torture. She’s still suffering. I guess we all are. We all have memories to suppress or grief to live, or love to lose and broken hearts to mend. We all struggle to find our place. Maybe we could make it easier on one another once in a while. The world would be better for it, I think.

Okay, I’ll totally caveat my sudden magnanimous streak by excluding Ashen. Obvious reasons, you know. 

But I do feel better when I say, “Come with us.” And I can see she feels better about it, too. She gives an unsure but relieved smile that she follows with a nod. 

Our group heads to the living room, Davina trailing a little further behind to observe from the edge of the room as Cole and Eryx shift the furniture to make room for Ediye to construct a portal. I watch for a moment as she lays pine needles and charred herbs and burnt bones in a pattern on the floor before going to collect our bags. I write a little note to Mr. Hassan that I rip from my journal, apologizing for fucking up his sheets. I leave it on the bed, running my hand across the surface like my skin can absorb memories I’m not sure about keeping. 

When I arrive back with the others, Ediye is chanting with her arms spread wide. The black vortex of galaxies spins at the summoning of her power and I look with admiration at my friend. 

“She’s both a healer and a traveler?” Davina asks as she stops beside me to watch a glittering black orb rise from the floor. I turn a proud smile in her direction and give a slight nod. “My mother was a traveler. There were so few in my time.” 

“Even fewer now,” I say. “Most were wiped out since the days when you must have been around.” I don’t elaborate, but it lingers in the air. The truth is, most of those witches fell on the blades of Reapers. They were killed for crimes that were fabricated for the sole purpose of  crushing their power and controlling their covens. And if it wasn’t the Reapers, it was the humans. Humankind’s fear of the unknown drove so many powerful witches to suffer and burn. 

Davina swallows and looks away before she disappears into the passageway that Ediye has created. Eryx and Cole follow after thanking Mr. Hassan and taking bags of leftovers from his hands with grateful smiles. Ediye gives the old man a hug and looks at me for a long moment with a knowing smile before passing through the shimmering black globe. 

“I don’t know how to thank you,” I say to the old man as we grasp each other’s arms. Tears gather in my eyes. I can see them glass the surface of his too. 

“Azizati. I already told you. Of all the immortal creatures, vampires are my favorite. And you most of all.” 

My heart blooms like a flower in my chest. I want to ask him why. But I also don’t. I don’t think I can live up to whatever he thinks of me. I just want to take his words and exist in them for a moment as though I deserve them.

“And your payment, for your services?”

“The Reaper took care of it.”

I roll my eyes. “Of course he did.”

The old apothecary smiles. “I will tell your Reaper where you went when he gets back,” Mr. Hassan says, patting my arm. 

I huff a laugh and point my gaze to the ceiling before leveling the old man with a long look. “Feel free to tell him anywhere else but Ravello. Literally anywhere. Reykjavik. Lima. The middle of the Sahara.” 

Mr. Hassan gives me a broad smile. He’s definitely going to give him Ravello. Probably our exact address. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s put a GPS tracking beacon on me, for fucksakes. Dropped pin, vampire is HERE. 

“Why?” I ask. 

“Why do you think?” 

“Because you’re a deranged old romantic, that’s why.” 

“Maybe a little.” 

“You do realize it’s his fault I was thrown into a dungeon and tortured, right?”

“Was it, azizati? Because he’s also the only reason you’re standing here,” he says. I want to say yes, of course it fucking was his fault, but I keep my mouth shut. The apothecary’s smile turns a little sorrowful. My heart cracks at the sight, and I try not to think about what the millennia have taken from him too. “Maybe your Reaper has made bad choices. Maybe he’s made the only choices he could. Maybe he’s trying to make better ones.” 

“That is... cryptic. And not overly helpful.”

The apothecary gives a bemused laugh and turns my shoulders toward the portal, giving me a gentle nudge toward the darkness. “Good luck, shakhs shabun. I will keep you in my thoughts.”

I smile over my shoulder, keeping Mr. Hassan in my gaze until the shadow of the orb consumes the space behind me and I step into the warm Italian night.

CHAPTER 14

“Why does your kind have so many clubs?” I ask as I pull at the dress that clings to my legs, wobbling just a little on my heels after the two bottles of wine I consumed at breakneck pace in Villa Datura. The witches of the Datura coven have been welcoming, sitting us down for drinks, setting us up in a guest house on the grounds, giving us clothes and casting a spell to hide Eryx’s wings for our jaunt to Club Caelum. They seemed pretty eager to point us in the direction of Cassian, which makes me think he’s already outstayed his welcome during his short residency. 

I am not surprised. 

Ediye laughs and loops her arm through mine as we teeter down the steep hills of Ravello. The still, shadowed air is filled with the scent of night blooming flowers and the sounds of humans speaking in animated Italian. “Maybe we witches just like to dance. Or maybe we like our alcohol. Maybe both.” 

“Can confirm. Both are true,” I say, pulling at my dress again. 

Ediye smacks my hand. “Stop fidgeting with it.” 

“It’s just so fucking tight.” 

“It’s supposed to be tight.” 

“It feels like it’s been painted on for Christ sakes.” My borrowed heels are a half-size too big, my borrowed dress at least two sizes too small. The front is low and the back much, much lower. It’s black and sparkly, barely covering my ass or the dagger that I’ve strapped as high on my thigh as my anatomy will allow. It’s definitely club appropriate. It can also function as a napkin. 

“You look hot. Tight is good.”

I roll my eyes. “Yours isn’t tight and you look fucking gorgeous,” I say, gesturing to her sparking turquoise dress. The neckline cuts low between Ediye’s breasts, her midnight skin on full display, glowing in the moonlight. Her dress is also short but looks decidedly more comfortable. 

“Yeah, well. It might be good to remind Cassian of what he’s missed all these centuries if you want to convince him to follow you, even if it’s for his own benefit.” 

“That is… that is an epically bad idea.” 

Ediye laughs and grips my arm tighter, pulling me into her side. She glances behind us at Eryx and Cole, Davina following in their wake. Ediye tosses them a bright smile before zeroing in on the lights of the Club Caelum, a blocky stone building that looms ahead above the sea and beneath the stars. 

“What’s that about?” I ask.

“What’s what about?”

“That.”

Ediye gives me an innocent look. 

“That. That look. That smile.” I repeat, gesturing to the angel and demon that follow several meters behind us. 

Ediye shrugs. “Nothing! Nothing. I was just checking that Eryx’s wings are still hidden.”

I snort a laugh. 

“What?” 

“Right. So it has nothing to do with you wanting to be part of a demon-angel man sandwich.”

Ediye guffaws an incredulous laugh that’s just a little too loud, giving her away. Her skin might be too dark for me to see her blush, but I can sense the rush of blood that floods the surface of her cheeks. “I do not,” she hisses.

“What would you even call that? A demwitchgelwich?”

Ediye can’t help but snicker. “No. The preferred term is a demglowstickelwitchelwich.”

We grin conspiratorially at one another and I grip Ediye a little tighter. Voices and laughter and music flow down the street like water, trickling away from the club. It feels like we’re part of the atmosphere here. It’s easy for the mortal world to seem like it passes around us sometimes. But hearing it so alive, like this, makes me feel as though we’re not so far beyond the reach of what makes life so precious. I smile a little wistfully and glance up at the star-riddled night as we walk on in silence.

“How are you feeling?” Ediye asks, her voice low and serious as she pats my hand. 

My smile fades and I glance over at her. “Kinda shit to be honest. I shouldn’t have had that second bottle,” I admit, tapping my palm to my chest, hiding a burp in my fist. My buzzing headache hasn’t stopped since I woke up on the floor at Mr. Hassan’s, and I figured it best not  to mix some unknown elixir with booze since my preference was the latter. So the pain ebbs and flows, but it’s persistent and uncomfortable. The rest of me isn’t quite right either. Inexplicably off. I thought wine would take my mind off it, or at the very least would give me a decent reason to feel like crap. The latter it shall be, I guess. 

“I meant about seeing Cassian,” Ediye says, though she looks me over with a worried glance. I think we were both hoping the procedure in Cairo would magically fix things. But that’s the funny thing about magic. Sometimes it’s not all that magical after all.  

“Yeah, that. Good point. I dunno, a bit weird I guess?” I’ve been trying to avoid thinking about it, actually, which was the other reason for downing so much wine. But Ediye doesn’t press for more, just hums and nods as we draw to a halt beneath the blue lights of the Datura coven’s bar. 

We wait for the others to catch up as we reach the entrance of Club Caelum, the doors flanked by two warlock bouncers. Aside from being a little on the big side, it’s not like the hulking warlocks look any different from the human patrons that wait in line or stumble as they leave, but I can sense the magic in them. It surrounds this place in a coating of spells so thick that the air almost shimmers. The staff have clearly been forewarned about our incoming visit and step back to let us pass. 

The music swells around us on the scents of humans and potions and alcohol. Sweat and breath linger in the air. Voices and heartbeats surround me. 

The space is dark, illuminated by the light show from the stage where a DJ performs. Ediye leads us through the boundary between the dancefloor and the high tables. A long bar flows like a curved wave to our left, the bartenders behind it lining up shots and shaking cocktails. We head for a set of stairs where another two bouncers guard a velvet rope that cordons off the VIP area. When they see us, they open the barrier and stand aside. 

My heart starts to climb my throat with every step we take up the stairs. It’s been a very, very long time since I’ve seen Cassian, but I can still picture every inch of his skin. I can almost feel my fingers trace the deep scar that slices through his left brow and another smaller one, straight like the blade that made it, that cuts into his upper lip. Beautiful remnants of bloody battles. 

A hot Roman warrior with tanned skin stretched over thick muscle? With big brown eyes that always looked like they were smiling, even when he was slashing guts and taking names? Yeah… We vampires notice that stuff. And we like it. So of course I was all in for that, back in the day. He was kinda psychotically hot.

I fell hard and fast. 

It was only a month after I met him that I gave Cassian the offer and he accepted. I made him immortal. And at first he was pretty great. Until he wasn’t. 

I really felt like I was catfished, you know? I was looking for a warrior to ride into battle at my side and instead I got the Tinder equivalent of a guy holding a fish. Okay, maybe that’s a little harsh… he did still kill some people. Fine, lots of people. But he was way more interested in rising through the political world, donning fancy clothes and going to fancy dinners and manipulating humans into doing his fancy-ass bidding. 

It was borrrrinnnng. 

I tried to convince myself it would get better once we were married and blood-mated. After all, Cassian did give me a pretty spectacular proposal that was very in-line with his tastes. We vampires do adore romantic gestures. I would have preferred something low-key and intimate, but, to his credit, he did put a lot of effort in. There were chariots of flowers. There were singers and children dancing down the street toward me like some kind of smelly little flashmob. He even made a play, for fucksakes, about a mythical woman that steals the soul of a simple soldier and yada, yada, yada, they live happily ever after, Leucosia will you marry me, THE END. 

…….

………Yeah, it was about as cringe as it sounds. 

But I said yes, of course. How can you not when a couple hundred people are watching you expectantly? And I was lonely, and I think we’ve firmly established that I do FUCKING STUPID SHIT when I’m lonely. 

Plus he was hot, and he treated me very well. He never did anything egregious such as, I dunno, getting me locked in a dungeon and tortured for a month. He loved me and I loved him. Or at least I thought I did. Maybe just not enough. 

So, I kinda… ran away. On my wedding day. 

Yeah… those winds of fear really caught my sail all right. Enough so that I made my way east through the Imperial Provinces, traveling further and further over the centuries until I eventually wound up in Japan where I fought alongside Tomoe Gozen. There was a lot I could distract myself with back then. There were a great many douchebags around, so it’s not like food was in short supply either. Hunting was good and war took my mind off of what a douchebag I had been to the man that wanted to marry me. 

Speaking of douchebags, I want my katana back from That Asshat Reaper Motherfucker. 

Anyway, I did eventually suck it up a little and apologize by letter, and we kept in touch infrequently after that. I know, I know, still not great. I was a coward. A couple times I even vaguely reconsidered going back. But I didn’t. I never saw Cassian again. And as far as he ever knew, the rumor was true. The last of the sirens had died at the stake three hundred years ago. 

So yeah, the look of shock on his beautiful face right now is definitely warranted. 

Cassian sets his wine glass onto a side table. Barely. His hand seems disconnected from his brain. He stands, rising from a long leather couch where he’s seated across from two witches. He moves slowly. So slowly. “Leucosia?..” 

“Hello, Cassian.” My smoky voice registers as foreign to his memory of what I should sound like. I can see it in the crease that forms between his brows. 

He glances at the older of the two witches, a stunning woman with long, silver-streaked chestnut hair that drapes in waves across her shoulders. She looks confident. In control. Powerful. 

The woman stands and walks toward us, extending her hand to me. I notice the subtle shift of her body into the empty space that connects me to Cassian. But her smile is welcoming and untroubled. 

“Benvenuta, Leucosia,” she says with a creamy Italian accent. Her voice is wonderfully decadent. “My name is Bianca, and this is my daughter, Gianna.”

“Gigi,” the younger witch corrects, leaning to the side so she can offer a warm grin that’s striking in its similarity to her mother’s.

I smile and extend my hand to Bianca. Her warm fingers curl around mine.

And before I even realize what’s happening, she whips a long steel pin from behind her back and stabs me in the heart. 

…The heart. 

…The fucking heart….

“What the fuck,” I say, aghast. She draws the pin across her tongue, tasting my blood as Ediye grabs my arm and pulls me back. I hear the burst of hellfire across Cole’s blade. I look down at the trail of blood that leaks from my chest but I can feel the wound already knitting together from within. When I look back up to Bianca, her eyes have filmed over with swirling gray clouds.

But like… come on. “That’s a shitty way to say hello.” 

“Sorry,” Gigi chimes with a cringe. “It’s the way that she sees.”

“My sincere apologies, vampira. We cannot be too careful these days,” Bianca says, her eyes clearing into a rich brown as she turns away to grab a napkin from a side table. She hands it to me with a benevolent smile, then casts her gaze over my shoulder to the others behind me. “Please, lower your weapons. I intended no harm.”

A doubtful puff of air escapes from my nose. “Find what you were looking for?” I ask, wiping my chest. 

Bianca’s smile broadens. “That and so much more. Please, join us for a drink.” She sweeps a graceful arm toward the seats, then looks in the direction of a small but well-stocked bar. “Franco, prendi del sangue per la vampira.”

Now that it seems clear that I pose no threat, Cassian closes the space between us and envelops me in a hug. It feels both familiar and different, welcoming yet reserved. His body is unchanged by time but his scent is more modern now. Cologne and deodorant have brought us a long way since Roman times. 

When he draws away, his smiling eyes take in my face. Again, that crease flickers between his brows. “You look different somehow,” he says, his English heavily accented with a more ancient quality than Bianca’s. 

“I’ve been through some stuff lately.”

Bianca’s laugh floats around us. “Stuff.” 

I guess she tasted a bit more than stuff. I meet her eyes but she only smiles. 

“You look the same,” I say when I turn my eyes back to Cassian. And it’s true, he does. His chocolate-colored hair is a little longer than I remember, but his eyes still smile and his tanned skin still glows. Cassian’s gaze darts behind me and I pull away to let him go. 

“Ediye, it’s a pleasure to see you again,” he says. The two exchange a warm greeting, kissing one another’s cheeks. We immortals tend to get around, and these two encountered each other centuries ago in Rome, before Ediye and I ever met. “Why am I not surprised you and Leucosia managed to find one another. Thick as thieves you are, I’m sure.”

“You’d be right,” Ediye replies with a smile. “Good to see you.”

The round of introductions extends next to Davina. I hear a stutter in the beat of Cassian’s heart when he takes her hand, but his greeting is delivered with effortless charm. To her credit, Davina stays reserved and unreadable. Pleasant, but not warm. Smart. I can’t fault her for wanting to give nothing away. 

Once the full round of intros are made, we sit on the buttery leather couches and chairs. Bianca moves to a wingback that’s the equivalent of the head of the table and I take her former spot across from Cassian. A waiter brings a tray of glasses and another bottle of wine, along with a tall glass of blood for me. My attention darts toward Eryx but he’s unperturbed, thank fuck. I don’t think we’d make a very good impression if he passed out cold right now. And something in me thinks an impression is important to Bianca. 

“Where is the other Reaper?” she asks. Her gaze points to me like a polished blade. I press my lips together and hide them behind the rim of my glass as my eyebrows climb toward my hairline with feigned innocence. 

“Other Reaper?” 

Bianca’s smile appears. It looks a little mischievous. “Your Reaper.”

“I don’t have a-”

“The one that saved you?”

“How-”

“The one to whom you are bloodfated?”

“Blood-what?”

“Tall. Dark hair. Well-dressed.”

“Blood-fated? I don’t know what you’re talking about-“

“Vampira,” she purrs. The word is drawn out, full of both delight and admonishment. My cheeks are burning hot with a crimson blush. So much for a good impression. My mouth is gaping open like I’m a fish that’s been plucked from the sea, drowning on air. “Bloodfated. The more you take, the more your fates intertwine. But I’d say they’re pretty intertwined already, considering you knew from the first time you met. It was in your spell, after all.”

“Wh-what? I... spell… what?” This is truly not how I expected this conversation to go. I am so fucking thrown off course. Sweat mists my hairline and my headache surges. 

“Saggiu Ashen hiu. Asallah libukkunu, assus martuktuk,” Bianca says, repeating my spell. 

But I don’t hear it in her voice. I hear it in mine. The way mine used to be. 

I blink and I’m there in the alley in Sanford, hovering over Ashen with my blood flowing into his wounded heart. 

I hear his shallow breath beneath me. The viscous feeling of failure twists through my veins. My hand lays on my stomach where Ashen’s had been as he pulled me from the fight. 

There was something that drew me to him. The reason I saved him. It was more than the camaraderie of battle. It was more than the injustice of a demon dying from a poison made of angel wings. 

It was him. 

It was a past that I could sense but not see. And it was a future that could be if I took a chance. If I accepted a great risk.

I blink and shake my head. Ediye squeezes my arm.

“Lu?..”

“I… I’m…” I glance down to my lap, momentarily grateful I didn’t piss myself this time. I turn my eyes to Bianca, trying to not look as panicky as I feel. I think I’m failing. Her smile broadens. Yep, I’m definitely fucking failing. “It’s not that way. That’s… bloodfated… that’s not a real thing. And I’m not fated to anyone,” I stammer out.

Bianca shrugs. “Perhaps. But worry not, vampira. I didn’t say you were fated to one another. I said your fates intertwine.”

Thank fuck.

“Though, more often than not, the former is also true.”

Christ sakes

“Yes, often love. Or death. Or both. Who knows? Fate is full of mystery.” 

Goddammit. 

“Bloodfated?” Eryx asks. He leans a little forward in his chair and I groan. His eyes twinkle when he meets my gaze. For real. The wrong balls got the glitter memo, because his eyeballs are properly sparkling. He’s fucking loving this. 

Bianca raises her glass and brings it to her smile. “A sacred bond of fate in blood, unbroken by distance and time. Two souls, drawn together by a shared essence. It is not unlike Aristophanes’ dialogue on love in Plato’s Symposium. Two halves of a whole, separated by the gods, searching for their missing piece. Except, in reality, it is much rarer than Plato supposed.”

“So rare it’s actually a myth,” Ediye says. 

Bianca looks at her and grins, but not without a hint of challenge. “For a powerful witch, I thought you would know better.”

“I’m sorry, what?” Eryx asks as his gaze shifts between us. “Mistoffelees? What does Cats have to do with this? I’m so confused.”

“Dio ci salvi tutti,” Bianca groans. Ediye properly chokes on her wine and spits it back into her glass. Gigi straight-up cackles. Cassian snickers until he looks at Davina, who watches him with a flat, assessing stare. “Not Mr. Mistoffelees. Aristophanes. The Athenian playwright. Let me guess - you’ve been an immortal for all of thirty seconds, sì? Modern education is so lacking. Gesù Cristo.”

Eryx sits back in his seat, visibly shrinking into the quilted leather. 

“Plato wrote the Symposium as a philosophical dialogue on love,” Bianca explains, gesturing with fluid grace as she animates her tale. “In Plato’s work, Aristophanes presents the idea that the gods were angered by humankind’s arrogance, and thus Zeus split our bodies and souls in two. We were left to look for our missing halves, bereft. Once reunited, both individuals would be struck by kinship and humor and love. We would be restored to our ancient nature. Healed. Due anime diventano una.”

“And you think Lu and Ashen were what… two souls that were split somehow? And reunited?” Eryx asks, leaning forward again.

“Who knows?” Bianca says with a shrug. “Two ancient creatures, who trace back as far as we can map immortal existence, restless in themselves and in the world. Both broken and alone, now bound by blood in a bond that surpasses the confines of reason or magic. Two fates spiraling closer together with every drop of life shared. It certainly seems like a myth breathed to life, does it not?” 

Bianca’s eyes land on me, passing right into my soul. Crystals of ice bloom beneath my skin.

I want to argue back and deny all her claims. I want to tell her that our bond died when Ashen did. I want to say that anything left behind was wrenched from my body when he watched as I was taken to the cage. It withered away in the dungeons of the Shadow Realm. I want to tell her how every needle and cut and burn and break had pulled our fates apart. How they had stolen from me, and anything left in a bond had to have died with everything they took.

But none of that would be the whole truth. 

We may have unspooled, but somewhere, somehow, we are still tied. Whether by hurt or vengeance or love or death, we are tied. 

I place my glass on the table. I sit back a little in my chair. I wanted the truth, and I got it. Part of it at least. I can feel it, as impossible as it could be. Ashen and me, our fates are bound, somehow. Whether those threads end at my destruction or his, or something else altogether, I don’t know. But we are part of a greater tapestry of lives on the brink of unraveling. I know that too. I feel the fates at the loom, spinning us into the mysteries of the realms.

“I need to find Valentina,” I say, not breaking my connection to Bianca. A smile lifts the corners of her lips. 

“Give me two days.” 

“We need to take Cassian with us too, before Semyon tracks him here.”

“Please do,” she says, her smile broadening as Cassian’s huff of irritation carries toward us. 

My head feels clearer. My veins fizz, filling with a tingling hum. I stand, giving a nod to Bianca. “Two days.”

“Two days.”

“Where are you going?” Ediye asks. She looks between us, confused.

“Downstairs, to have a drink and have some fun while I can,” I reply, offering her a hand. She takes it and stands, the others following our lead and rising from their seats. My legs feel steadier when I turn away and walk toward the stairs.  

I know the truth. 

The Reaper is back in the Living Realm. And he’s coming for me.

CHAPTER 15

The music vibrates through my chest. It flows through our little band of immortals like water, carrying us away on its waves. We have centuries of practice and decades of grace, after all. But when you’re a vampire in particular, dance has a music all its own. It fills me with heartbeats. The sound of muscles working and air passing through lungs. Feet tapping in percussion on the floor. Voices and laughter. Whispers of skin. Caresses. Kisses. The scents and sounds of desire.

With every note, I feel myself restored. I close my eyes and smile more than I’ve smiled in a while. I lose myself in the surge of sound. I dance until a thin film of sweat embraces my skin and glows in the flashing lights. I feel more like myself with every song.

After a while, I separate from the others, standing at the edge of the dancefloor to catch my breath and just watch for a moment. When I look toward the tables, I spot Davina sitting with Cassian, giving him a tentative smile as he leans forward in the throws of an animated tale. Something about that moment seems more than okay. I look away as though the weight of my gaze might break the spell. 

I’m watching the lights that frame the stage, smiling a little at the DJ mixing songs and beats I’ve never heard. I’m thinking about the notes my voice could add when I feel it. 

The hum that rises in my blood is just like the magic of music. It has a tempo. A melody. 

I smell ink. I smell unsmoked tobacco warmed by the sun. I hear one heartbeat just as slow and powerful as mine, the cadence of the pulse almost as familiar as my own.

“You were right,” a quiet voice says in my ear, just loud enough to carry over the music. Heat envelops my back. I resist the urge to lean into it and I close my eyes as a trace of a smile rises on my lips. My fingertips graze the dagger strapped to my thigh, but a hand flows down my arm, making a slow procession across my skin until it pulls my palm away from the blade. His fingers interlace with mine. 

“About what?” I ask as he steps closer, his chest pressing to my back. He pulls my hair from my shoulder, dragging his touch across the nape of my neck as he sweeps it to the side. 

“Betrayal,” Ashen says. His lips brush my throat. “It tasted like copper. But it smelled like you.” 

The lights cut through the darkness of the room and find me just like his words illuminate the shadows within my soul. Heat twists low in my belly. “Good to know. I wouldn’t want it to smell like another woman. That would be awkward. Oh wait-“

“Vampire…” I feel a low growl rumble through his chest and my smile broadens. Ashen keeps his voice steady despite the demon that stirs beneath the surface. “Come outside with me.”

Well. I guess he still likes to make demands. And thus I will still delight in telling him:

“No.”

“Please.”

“No, thank you.” 

Ashen sighs against my skin, igniting an electrical current through my flesh. He traces a finger down my exposed back. My heart riots like a thundercloud with every inch of skin that his touch consumes. 

We start to sway to the beat of the music, but it’s like we’re on a different dancefloor than everyone else. I think they’re missing the real music. The real music is slow. It’s sensual. It’s the rhythm of Ashen’s heartbeat against my spine when his hand draws our interlaced fingers to rest low on my stomach, pulling me closer. It’s in the cadence of his caress on my arm when I reach up behind me and run my fingers into his hair. Music is in his breath that heats my neck, in the warmth of his lips as they whisper across my skin. 

For a moment I just want to forget that we’re an executioner and a bounty, a soldier and a weapon. A hunter and the prey that won’t go down. Whichever one is which I’m not sure I know anymore. I don’t want to untangle it or even try to figure it out. I only want to believe we’re a man and a woman on a dancefloor, and nothing more. 

“Come outside with me,” Ashen says in my ear, this time soft. Seductive. 

“No,” I say just as softly, still swaying with him to the music. 

“You cannot avoid me forever.” 

“I can try.”

Ashen’s teeth graze the shell of my ear. My own words echo in my head in my husky, unfamiliar voice. I can try. But I don’t want to. Not yet. 

Ashen’s arms tighten around me. His fingers trace my jaw. His breath follows my pulse. A moan drifts past my lips. It’s so quiet that even I can barely hear it, but Ashen feels it in the vibration of my throat. I know it in the way his kiss turns to fire on my skin. My body melts into his in the music that swells around us. 

“Come with me, vampire.” 

I sigh, a little from his persistence, a little from his touch. “You don’t give up, do you?” 

“Neither do you. You are the most stubborn creature to ever exist among the realms.” 

“I’m surprised you’re only figuring that out now,” I say, and the whisper of Ashen’s laugh warms my skin. “I’m pretty sure I made myself clear, Reaper. I’d rather die than be dragged back down to the Shadow Realm.”

Ashen’s grip on my hand tightens as my other arm drifts back down to my side. “I have no intention of dragging you there.” 

“I mean every offense when I say this, Reaper. I don’t fucking believe you.”

“Hmm,” he hums against my neck. A flush of heat rushes to my core and blush colors my skin in reply. “How about I make you a deal? I promise not to take you or let anyone else take you from this club, unless you ask me to.”

I laugh, a genuine laugh that turns a little acidic as it fades. But Ashen seems undeterred. His fingers are still laced through mine. He rests his chin against my shoulder. 

I can’t say I’m making any moves to pry myself away from Ashen’s touch, but I’m not super keen on following him into the night either. The idea of us being just a man and a woman feels like it’s slipping away from me. It’s evaporating like fog in the sun. “You? A promise? You’ve broken nearly every one you’ve ever made to me,” I say, my voice too sweet and innocent for the hurt and malice that lurk beneath it. “Besides, Reaper, you should know by now. The only promises worth anything among immortals are paid in blood.”

Ashen’s free hand lays across my wrist, flowing up my arm, past my elbow. It’s slow and careful, as though he savors every second of the touch. My chest turns to fire when his warm palm drifts across my shoulder. Goosebumps follow his fingers like a comet tail as his hand slides across my collarbone and pauses above my heart. 

“Then I will pay with blood,” Ashen says, his lips grazing my ear with every word. He lifts his touch from my skin to turn his wrist toward my lips. 

I close my eyes. My throat burns with desire at the smell of the network of veins beneath his skin. But it’s not just that. It’s the suggestion. It’s the act of offering that compels me as much as the smell, or the taste, or the way I know it would feel to have his essence coursing through my body. It’s more than the power of secrets and time in his blood. It’s the magnetic pull of him, like we’re meant to find one another through any distance, any realm, any measure of time. 

Bloodfated, I hear Bianca say in my mind. The more you take, the more your fates intertwine. 

Those words settle like a hot ball of molten glass in my chest. It’s like they expand to fill every empty cavity, coating me with the truth from the inside out. And the truth is that this bloodfate is nothing but cruel. It shouldn’t be this way. I shouldn’t need something so sacred from the one person left to betray me. I’ve killed nearly everyone to sell me out across the millennia. Yet, the one that hurt me most deeply is here, with his arms wrapped around me, a Reaper holding his wrist out in an offer I can barely refuse. And I’m letting him. I can’t seem to stop.

No, it shouldn’t be this way. Not with this enemy. Not with the man who should never be mine. 

The kind of sorrow I feel when I think about these things, it’s like quicksand. It’s like a place I’m not supposed to be. Like a desert that pushes me away from the sea and consumes me. Dry and desiccating. Endless. Unwelcoming and unmerciful. It sucks me under and leaves nothing behind, coating my world in coarse grains until it drowns me, killing even the will to fight back. 

I slow my motion. One by one, my muscles solidify. In no more than a few beats of the music, I’m little different than stone. 

“What do you want,” I demand. My voice is low and strained. There’s no trace of amusement in it, no flirting or banter. The music continues on around us as though leaving us behind on a cold and empty shore. “What do you want,” I say again when he doesn’t answer. 

Ashen pulls away a little but keeps his lips close to my ear and my hand encased in his. I feel it tense around my fingers. His wrist still hovers in front of me in the offer of a promise. “To talk. Alone.”

I close my eyes for one deep breath, filling the bottom of my lungs in the hopes of distracting my heart with something real. “Fine,” I say as I push his offered wrist away. I turn my head enough that I know he’ll hear every word clearly, yet not enough to see his face. “But I don’t want your fragile vows.” 

Ashen’s fingers loosen around mine, but it’s me that finally lets go.

CHAPTER 16

I move away from Ashen but I know he’ll follow. I head toward the exit for the patio. My thoughts tell me I’ve won a small battle against myself, but my chest hurts as though I’ve already lost. 

I don’t look behind me as I pivot through the bodies on the dancefloor. Eryx’s eyes catch mine across the crowd. There’s a question in his gaze when it darts behind me and back again. My twitch of a smile and subtle nod seem to calm him. He gives me a nod in reply and watches but doesn’t follow. 

The night is cool and chills my skin when we pass the threshold and arrive on the empty patio. The air seems thinner in the absence of the sun. The stars are bright across the sea. I walk to the stone railing of the patio and look out across the cliffs that plunge into the midnight shore. 

Ashen comes to a stop next to me, leaning his arms on the stone. He’s close enough that I can feel his warmth but not near enough to touch. He doesn’t look at me but I can feel his attention on every little movement I make, from the way I press my hands together to keep from fidgeting with my dress to the way I sigh when the silence stretches on. 

“You got me where you want me, Reaper. So, talk,” I say. My voice sounds more weary than annoyed. I keep my eyes on the ocean as the fleeting memory of my home with my sisters floats up to haunt me. 

Ashen’s head dips a little. I glance over to see his gaze fall a bit lower on the shore. “I’m sorry, Lu.”

“For what, Reaper? What you’ve already done to me, or for whatever torture you’re still planning to inflict?”

A puff of air like the ghost of a bitter laugh escapes from Ashen. I feel him glance at me but I don’t return his gaze. “I am trying to help you. Your condition will not stabilize until you finish what Semyon started.”

I already feel that truth within me. My healing abilities may have returned, but my body and brain feel inconsistent at best. The visions I’ve had seem to almost come of their own will. I feel like there’s power within me that I’m not in control of. See also my bladder at times, apparently. 

Even knowing all this doesn’t mean I’m eager to play nice with Ashen. In fact, my ever-present, simmering rage is just starting to come to a boil. 

“Right, I’m sure you’re an expert now. Did Ember bring you the lab reports personally? Or did you watch on a hidden camera?” 

Ashen’s spine tenses. I can almost see each vertebra locking into place. 

“Did you know she came to participate, in the beginning? Until it became too grim for even her.”

Ashen is silent. A muscle ticks in his jaw as he looks at his hands. 

“What did you learn about my condition that you’re now such an expert in, Ashen? Did the shit that Gallus injected into me tell you something? Or what about the bones he broke? Did pulling my fingernails off one by one teach you what would fix me?” 

His heart hammers out heavier beats. I hear the tempo of his breath quicken.

I turn toward him, the red light of my eyes flowing across the stone until it locks to his face. My jaw is set like rock as we stare at one another. I glare through the hot tears that burn as they slide across my skin. I didn’t even realize they were there. 

Ashen straightens and faces me. Flame brightens in his eyes. “Lu-“

“How about-“ I choke on my words. Ashen takes a step forward and I take one back, throwing my hand out to stop him from coming closer. My voice is low and fierce when I finally wrestle it under control. “How about the time he peeled back the layers of my abdomen to see if the magic of Semyon’s serum meant I could finally carry a child, Ashen? How about that? What about when he and your sister took… When they…”

I press my lips together. My breath stutters in my chest. My gaze falls to the floor and I try to push every memory of those moments in the dungeon into a prison in my mind. I can’t relive anymore of what was done to me. What was put in, what was stripped out. What was stolen. 

“Lu…” 

Those two letters pass Ashen’s lips with so much rage and pain and sorrow. And yet, it feels like not enough. Not nearly enough. 

With a monumental amount of effort, I pull my sorrow back beneath the fury that lives under my skin. I wipe my eyes and take a deep breath. I turn back to the sea. I’d rather be haunted by the memories of my lost sisters than the horrors of this newest hell. “I will die before you put me back in that dungeon, Ashen. I will die before you use me as a weapon and do to the others what you did to me.”

“I am sorry, Lu, for what happened to you,” Ashen says. I look over at him. I can see how desperate he is to move closer, but he holds himself back. “I did not do those terrible things, Lu. I did not see or watch them. I did the only things I could to fix it.”

I let out a resentful laugh. “Ashen, you made me promise to do as you asked and then, when the time came, you said nothing. Literally nothing.”

“What do you mean?”

“In The Maqlu. You made me promise. If you asked me to run or leave you behind, you made me promise that I would. But you never asked me to do it. Not in the club. Not when you stood on the dais in the Shadow Realm and looked down on me. I trusted you, just like you asked. And then you let me down.”

“There was no time at The Maqlu, vampire,” Ashen says, ignoring my jabs. “And you could barely even stand in the Kur. We were surrounded.”

“I was surrounded. You were on the dais, looking down at me from on high.” 

“Do you really think I had any other option? You have no clue how powerful Eshkar and Imogen are, Lu. We were outnumbered, outmaneuvered. If I died, what hope would I have of saving you? Because your fate would have been the same either way.” Ashen’s voice is clipped with desperation and his own brand of anger. “There was no way you could run. There was nowhere to run to. The only solution was to endure.” 

I give a derisive snort as my rage climbs my throat and lands like bitter poison on my tongue. “Endure. That’s easy for you to say. You had to endure what, exactly, as I suffered immeasurable torture in your dungeon? Dinners and wine and dancing at Bit Akalum? The freedom of traveling to and from the Shadow Realm? The love of a woman you lost long ago who was returned to you as a prize for my capture?”

“She isn’t you,” he snarls, his voice booming into the night above us, the light in his eyes turning to black flame. He stalks a step toward me, then another. I plant my feet and refuse to move, even though the adrenaline surging through my veins screams at me to run. “I called in every favor. I cut every deal. I broke every rule. And worst of all, I knew that each moment that passed might mean I had already lost you. That each moment you endured in the cage might be your last.”

Ashen stops so close that I can feel my eyelashes shudder with the current of his breath. I press my molars together until I’m sure they’ll crack. My nails etch crescent imprints into my palms until I smell blood. 

“If you would go to those lengths just to see your weapon completed, then I pity you, Reaper. Because you went to all that effort and still you will lose your war. I’ll see to that. I would rather burn your realm into nothing but dust. I’d rather die than win your battles for the Shadow Realm, oh mighty Master of War.” 

Ashen’s hand snaps out and grabs my throat. Smoke billows from his back as his wings unfurl and consume the empty space behind him. Cinders and sparks rain across the stone. 

“So there is a demon in you after all,” I say, tilting my head up in an invitation to squeeze. “I had convinced myself once that you weren’t like the others of your realm. Prove me wrong for the last time, just in case I didn’t learn my lesson. Finish it, so I don’t have to do it myself.”

Ashen’s thumb follows the line of my jaw in a caress so slow and gentle it could almost be imagined. “Such an elemental force of nature you are, vampire. Acerbic. Brave. Far too reckless,” he says, his gaze following every angle of my face. 

“Stop wasting my time with your patronizing Reaperisms and kill me already.” 

“I will not harm you. And I will not let you harm yourself.” 

Ashen’s eyes brighten with determination. And then his expression takes on a fleeting wisp of apology. Before I even have time to react, his other hand crushes a delicate glass ampule to my chest. The liquid within the broken vial mixes with the blood of superficial cuts in both our skin and rolls between my breasts. 

“What the-”

“Sabbi Leucosia libbu amaru nanam. Batiltu iskakku shul libbu istu abatu ana simtim alaku.”   

A sharp breath cuts through the burn that still lingers in my throat. For a heartbeat we just glare at one another. “You fucker,” I seethe. 

Without breaking our tangled gaze, I whip the kaiken from the sheath at my thigh and try to bring it to my neck, but my arm shakes as though my wrist is held back by an invisible hand. I pour all my strength into the effort. I grit my teeth and growl as I try to force my knife closer. The blade doesn’t budge, not even a millimeter. But I already know it won’t, because I know his words and what they mean. 

The heart of Leucosia is a tempest. Stop the weapon of her heroic heart from destroying her own fate. 

Ashen has taken away my power to end my own life, the last option I have to ensure I won’t be dragged back down into the depths of hell. 

The purest rage funnels through my bleached knuckles and I turn my knife to Ashen, managing to swipe his shoulder with the dagger before he knocks it from my hand. His grip returns around my throat and he pushes me across the balcony until my back is up against the wall. My heart thunders beneath his other palm, the broken glass pressed deeper into my skin. 

“Excellent. At least I can still cut you.”

We stare one another down. Ashen’s breath spills heat across my skin. The cinders and smoke of his wings curl through the space behind him, obscuring the light of the stars in thick shadow. 

“I will not harm you,” he says again, his voice low and quiet. Black flame coils in his eyes. I feel their heat as they take in every angle of my face, brightening when they rest on my lips.

“You already did harm me. Again. Like, literally two seconds after you said you wouldn’t. Or has it escaped you that you’re still pressing glass into my chest, you fucking asshole?”

As if he really had forgotten, Ashen slowly lifts his palm from my heart. Shards of glass fall to the floor. Some linger, embedded in my skin. Ashen looks down with a crease between his brows and picks a splinter from my bloodied chest, then another, not bothering with the ones still stuck in his palm. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, his eyes not leaving my flesh as he pulls another fragment free. “I made the only choices I could for a chance to save you.” 

“Apologies don’t mean shit when you do unforgivable things like, I don’t know, convincing someone to trust you and then betraying them to have them locked in a fucking dungeon where they’re starved and tortured for a month.” 

“That was Eshkar’s doing, not mine,” Ashen says, his voice still quiet. His thumb presses to my jaw when I squirm as he pulls a long splinter free.

“Oh right, I forgot. My bad. You just stood there and watched that part, doing nothing. What you did do was rush to embrace another woman mere hours after fucking me in your car. And your house. Houses, actually, pardon me.” 

His gaze lifts and bounds between my eyes as he edges closer still. “Whatever you think you saw is not what you saw.” 

“What a surprise. The truth is lies. Reality and illusion are blurred. And the common denominator in all this fuckshit is you.”

We are immobilized in taut silence, my rage burning beneath my skin, my throat encased in Ashen’s steadying grip. Just like in his room when he pressed me to the wall, I think I can escape if I really want to. And part of me does want to run as far away from this place as I can get. An even more reckless part wants him to squeeze his hand until the world and all its suffering falls away. But more than I want to admit, a big part of me wants to stay right where I am, a sail in the winds of fear, tethered to his hand. 

Sorrow and desire consume the fight in my flesh, one cell at a time. No matter how hard I fight, my heart is still determined to rebel against my mind. 

“Why, Ashen?” I whisper. Wrathful tears gather in my eyes. They are drops of fury and loss and longing. “Why are you doing this? Tell me the honest truth, just once, if you tell me nothing true ever again.” 

The flame in Ashen’s eyes does not dim. But within the fire I see more than anger and frustration. I see despair. I see agony and suffering. He has endured fresh pain and trauma, and it still plagues him, haunting every breath. 

“Why do you think?” he asks, watching me for a reaction. I refuse to give one. Ashen breaks my gaze and leans close. Gooseflesh skitters across my neck and arms. Warmth blooms low in my belly as his lips brush my skin when he whispers in my ear. “Libbu isriq, ekimmu.” 

The words slither into my chest and coil beneath my bones. You have stolen my heart, vampire. 

“Then have it back,” I whisper.  “I cannot be your weapon.” 

“I didn’t claim you would be.” 

“You didn’t have to. You clearly want to take more power within the Shadow Realm.”

Ashen’s smile turns acidic as his gaze collides with mine. “Do you really believe that’s why?”

“Why else would you do it?”

“Why else indeed.” 

I huff, leveling him with a poisonous glare. “You either tell me nothing at all or you tell me nothing true. I don’t know why I’d expect you to change course now.” 

“You would only burn my words if I did.” Ashen’s eyes stay fused to mine for a moment longer before they return to my chest. We fall into silence as he pulls the fine splinters of glass from my skin with the precision of a surgeon and the patience of a lover. I glower at him but he doesn’t look at my face, his attention taken up with the pieces of the broken ampule still stuck in my flesh. 

I turn my gaze away when tears I can’t blink back crest over my lashes. One slips down my cheek and lands on my clavicle, lingering on the ridge of bone before sliding toward my heart. Ashen’s hand stills. His thumb presses the drop, stroking it across my skin until it dries.  

“Enough,” I whisper when he goes back to the tiny flecks that still dig into my skin. I try to push him off but he bats my hand away. 

A muscle ticks in Ashen’s jaw, his expression full of determination and resolve as he keeps his focus on the work of his hand. “It is not done yet,” he says, but I don’t know if he’s talking about the glass that pierces my skin, or the fate that pierces my heart.

CHAPTER 17

When Ashen finally lets me go, I storm away without another word, leaving him to the empty night where he belongs. After finding the others and enduring a little protest, I make my way back to Villa Datura on my own, though I’m very certain my solitude is just an illusion. Ashen is close enough that I can feel him, making sure I get back all right but keeping his distance. 

That feeling of being guarded doesn’t stop when I get to Villa Datura. It follows me as I make my way through the grounds and enter the guest house. I stop for a moment in the kitchen to find a bottle of wine, preparing to head to my room where I fully intend to plot my revenge while getting plastered. 

Naturally, fate has said a giant fuck you to that plan. 

I’ve been so lost in my irritation that it’s taken me a minute to notice a steady thud-thud-thud coming from the living room. I lean back to look past the corner, peering into the darkness. 

A set of amber eyes glows back at me. The rhythm of the thudding picks up speed. It’s a tail, wagging against the couch. 

Urtur. The giant jackal of House Urbigu. Here, in the Living Realm. On the sofa. Barely.

I lean back into the kitchen. I take a long sip straight out of the bottle. Fuck glasses, I think we’re past that now. 

I lean back again. 

Thud-thud-thud. 

After another long swig of wine, I take the bottle with me and stalk to my room. When I arrive, Ashen is already there, sitting on the edge of my bed. Of course.

“Fan-fucking-tastic. Get the fuck out.”

The hint of a smile pulls at Ashen’s lips. “I can’t.”

“Yes, you can. It’s called a door,” I say, pointing to it. “You get up, walk through it, and do not return.”

“There are no more available accommodations here in the guest house.”

“Then take the couch.” 

“Urtur snores.”

“Good. I hope he keeps you up all night. Maybe he’ll even have real rabies, not angel rabies, and then you can die a slow and painful death barking at your shadow. I will take great delight in witnessing your undignified, embarrassing demise.”

Ashen looks away as he tries to hide the smile that makes a fleeting pass across his lips. “You are so acerbic, vampire.”

I give Ashen a fierce glare that accomplishes nothing, aside from maybe increasing his amusement. “Still so gushing with the compliments I see. I’m touched. Now get the fuck out.” 

Ashen stands, and I think for a moment that I might have won this round. Which would be foolish, of course. Because someone clearly hates me. 

“There is a second snake. Her name is Zida,” Ashen says as he draws closer until he’s staring down at me. 

“So I’ve heard.”

“Zida is hunting you. I cannot leave you alone here, you will be too vulnerable. That’s why Urtur guards the front of the house.”

“I handled Ningish just fine on my own while feeling like shit, thankyouverymuch. And don’t even think about trying to take credit for my kill.”

A breath of a laugh passes through Ashen’s lips, but when he meets my eyes, his expression turns serious. The determination there sparks into flame. “Zida is faster. Smarter. Stealthier. She will be much harder to kill. When she comes, we need to be ready.”

Ashen turns away toward a dresser. He grasps something that leans against it in the shadows and faces me with my katana in his outstretched hand. 

“This is yours,” he says. His voice is quiet and low. I set my wine bottle at my feet and take the saya with both hands, closing my eyes when the weight settles in my palms where it belongs. “Please try not to kill me with it. I’m growing tired of resurrecting in the Shadow Realm. It is… deeply unpleasant.”

“If you don’t want me to do it, stop selling it to me so hard,” I say as I draw the sword to my chest. Ashen gives a faint smile that I don’t return. I watch him as though challenging it to fade away, but it doesn’t dissolve. It only increases the heat in his eyes as they linger on my lips. I realize his smile might have less to do with my words than the fact I can make them. My gaze falls away to the floor. “Thank you.”

We stand in silence for a long moment. I think about Zida and wonder how close she might be. How far back on our trail... 

Fuck. 

“Mr. Hassan-“

“I told him already. He is safe from the serpent,” Ashen says. He watches with acute interest as I nod and blow an unsteady breath between tense lips. With what looks like great effort, Ashen turns away, moving toward the bed. He grabs one of the pillows and places it on the floor beneath the closed window, laying his own sword and dagger next to it. 

“You’re not leaving, are you,” I say as he pulls a sheepskin rug from next to the empty hearth over to his makeshift bed. 

“No.” 

I huff and turn to the wardrobe, pulling out a long robe to drape it across my shoulders, and then I stalk toward the door with the katana in one hand, bottle of wine in the other. 

“Where are you going?” Ashen asks. His voice is the perfect combination of dismay, weariness, and irritation. It sounds delectable. 

“Drinking. Elsewhere.” 

“Vampire-“

“Relax, demon. I’d rather hang out with the dog in the dark and take a chance on reaper rabies for a while,” I say as I reach the door. I hear him stir when I reach the threshold but I don’t turn around. “I need to be alone.” 

 I wait for any fight to find me, but it doesn’t come. I shift though the door and into the hall, closing it behind me with a quiet snick.

I’m sitting on the couch with Urtur’s heavy head in my lap when Ediye rolls in with the others in tow. Turns out, jackals make pretty decent listeners for drunk and heartbroken, demon-bound vampires. I’ve sat here long enough now that I can’t feel my toes. 

“Did we… did we adopt a dog?” Ediye asks as she stops short and takes in the scene. Urtur’s tail swishes against the couch in reply.  

“Urtur, this is Ediye. Ediye, this is Urtur, demon jackal extraordinaire. Not sure how he’s managed to rock up here, but hey. He makes a good drinking companion. I’ve told him my sob story and he let me cry into his fur. It’s soft and smells like sulfur,” I say, wrapping my arms around Urtur’s massive black head and squeezing him in a hug. 

Thud-thud-thud.  

“Riiiiight,” Ediye says as she glances at the others. 

Cole grabs a glass from the kitchen island and pivots past Eryx and Ediye. “Pour me some wine and I’ll tell you about the time Urtur pissed on Ashen’s bed.” 

“Nooooo,” I gasp. Cole takes the plush armchair across from me and I lean forward to top up our drinks as the others make their way to their rooms. “Not the silky sex sheets.” 

A breath of a laugh tumbles from the demon. “Yeah. He got into Ashen’s room somehow, then found himself locked inside. Pissed all over the bed. Ashen was in a pretty shitty mood for a few days.” 

“He does love those sheets. Not that I blame him.” 

We smile at one another and fall into a moment of silence as I stroke Urtur’s smooth fur. “He’s in my room.” 

“Of course he is. What happened when you two went outside?” 

“He cursed me. Against myself,” I say, picking at bits of fluff caught in the jackal’s thick coat. My smile fades and I keep my gaze on the motion of my hand. “If he tries to drag me back to the Shadow Realm, I’ll have no way to stop him. I can’t take myself out of the equation anymore.” 

Cole sighs and takes a long moment before he responds. “I’m sorry, Lu. Even just seeing you both when we escaped… I understand why you would feel the need to have that option at your fingertips. For what it’s worth, I don’t think he intends to take you there. I think he’s just… afraid. Especially after what happened after you killed Ningish.”

“It’s still a shit move,” I say, taking a long sip of my wine.

“I know. But I think he was desperate. And he doesn’t know what to do. He’s a demon, after all. He doesn’t always do the right thing, even when he’s trying to.”

“The right thing,” I repeat, and when Cole meets my eyes I give him a teasing smile. “That’s just your former angel optimism talking.”  

“Nah. That’s long gone,” he says as he sinks deeper into his chair, closing his eyes and crossing his feet on the coffee table. 

I tilt my head as I watch him for a long moment. His face is as youthful and unchanging as always. It’s such a mask for everything he must have seen in his long immortal life. 

“Why did you really give up your wings?” I ask, and he opens his eyes and watches me back. I hear the thud of his heart, a heavy beat of sadness. 

“I lost someone I cared about a long time ago. I was supposed to protect him. It was my purpose. Loving him was an unexpected gift.” Cole looks down into his wine, swirling it against the glass. He lets go of a sigh before taking a sip. “I mourned him for a long time. I learned to live with grief. But I couldn’t find purpose again. It was like it always eluded me. So when this mission came up, I thought it would fill the void. At the very least, it would be a change. Maybe I still wanted to punish myself for failing to protect the one I loved.” 

I spread my fingers and sweep them up and down through Urtur’s fur, watching as Cole spins his glass. A brief smile flashes across his face as his gaze stays caught in the ruby liquid, and I know he must be remembering some moment with this man from long ago. “Did you find what you were looking for? With your mission?” 

Cole huffs a laugh. “Well, I found pain, that’s for sure. My time as a mortal was thankfully brief. There were some fun moments. Friends. Surfing. But a lot of terrible moments too. Like Eryx. Well, until that became a good thing, but that was a hard road for me to accept.” 

“You almost sound like the Shadow Realm is better than your time as a human.”

“It is,” he says, and his conviction surprises me. His eyes anchor onto mine. “There’s horror there. There is. You know it too. You’ve felt it. But there’s also potential. It could be something different. It just needs to heal and find its purpose again.” 

“How do you heal a place like that?” 

“With love, Lu. One soul at a time. One beast at a time,” Cole says, gesturing with his glass toward Urtur whose head still rests comfortably on my lap. Cole’s smile has an uncomfortable amount of wisdom in it for looking so youthful. “One demon at a time.” 

“I know where this is going. And first of all, he has loved before.” 

“Not like you. And I don’t think he was ever loved in return the way that you loved him.” 

“Christ, Cole,” I groan, running a hand down my face. I pull it away when I realize how much it smells like dog. “You have enough angel in you to be obsessed with shipping literally any couple no matter how fucked up they are, and enough demon in you to enjoy watching as they inevitably burst into flames and crash like a train wreck.”

Cole laughs. “Nah, Lu. I’m just telling you what I see. A demon tormented by love.”

I roll my eyes. I feel a blush burning its way up my neck and into my cheeks. Cole gives me a flicker of a smile and I look down into Urtur’s fur. “Neither of us knows that for sure. I mean, it’s not like we were even together that long.”

“You know as much as I do that a second of time can mean as much as a day or a week or even years.” 

Fuck. I do know that, but I scowl at Cole anyway. “We don’t even know if this is all some great play for power. He doesn’t actually tell me how he feels. He never has. So whatever love you think you see in him could just as well be an illusion.” 

“Come on, Lu. You kill him multiple times and yet he still comes back for you. He’s running around the Living Realm when he should probably be planning a war, but instead he’s threatening to turn people’s eyes into cake pops just because he’s worried about you. He could have brought you back to the Shadow Realm ten times over already, and yet he willingly hangs out with all kinds of immortals that pretty much despise him just to stay close to you. I mean, jeez, he even talks to Eryx, who’s technically his mortal enemy.” 

“I don’t think threatening to rip Eryx’s wings off to feed them to Urtur counts as talking,” I say. Urtur’s tail swishes on the couch, and I’m not sure if it’s because I said his name or because he wants to snack on angel wings. “There is no proof that he does love me or anyone else except himself. And I’m not going to forgive him just because it would be good for the Shadow Realm. I owe him and his realm nothing. No offense.”  

“Lu,” Cole says, drawing my name out long. He leans forward in his chair, resting his forearms on his knees. His eyes burrow right into me with his penetrating gaze. “I’m not saying any of this for his benefit or for the Shadow Realm. I’m saying it because I see how you’ve taken on the job of torturing yourself now. You are angry, and hurt, and you have every right to be. But I also saw the way you looked at Ashen when he burst into that room in Cairo. You wanted him there and yet you were angry with yourself for accepting what he offered. I don’t mean the blood, but the care and support. Am I right?”

I swallow a tightness that closes around my throat. I look away to the shadows in the corner of the room. I nod once. 

“I get it, Lu. When Eryx first found me, I wanted nothing to do with his forgiveness. I didn’t want to feel his love, or my own. I was too angry with myself. I was too worried about making another mistake or about what I could lose. With time, I learned to give myself permission to feel these things.” Cole drains his glass and stands, crossing around behind my couch. He stops on his way to the kitchen and lays a hand on my shoulder, leaning closer to my ear. “You can give yourself permission to still feel love for him too. You don’t have to punish yourself for it. You don’t have to punish yourself for accepting it either. It’s okay to feel it all.” 

I don’t turn to look at Cole. I don’t want him to see the tears that flood my eyes. But I put my hand on his and squeeze. I give a little nod before I look down into my wine, the base of the glass nearly hidden in the depths of Urtur’s fur. 

Cole gives a kiss to the top of my head before he walks away. And I sit for a long time in the dark with the jackal, think about his words, about how to heal a broken realm. How to heal a broken soul, a broken heart. It happens one moment of love at a time. 

If only I could let it heal me too.

CHAPTER 18

My head is buzzing. Hornets swarm within the confines of my skull. 

I think I’m blinking but I can’t see beyond a white squall. I’m in a blizzard. Snow swirls across my skin. It’s so cold here. I’m lost and it’s so cold and white. 

“Stop hovering. You’ll freak her out.”

“She is already freaked out, witch.” 

“Well, you’ll freak her out more being a scary demon with smoke wings and fire eyes. Just chill the fuck out. Take her hand. No, her hand, not her arm, dumbass.”

“What difference does it-” 

“Let go,” Ediye hisses in a fierce whisper as I start to thrash and twist. “That’s where they grabbed her to take her away.” 

There’s a silent pause. I feel a band of warmth leave my arm and the fight dissolves from my limbs. My mind feels cleaved in two. One half is conscious but unable to move, the other is trapped somewhere frightening and far away. 

“You want to help for real? Learn how to do it right. Take her hand. Talk to her calmly.” 

I feel a warm palm close around mine. It might be the only thing keeping me here on Earth. 

“Vampire. Wake up…” Something touches my face and it feels wet. My skin or the hand, I don’t know. I feel wet everywhere. I groan and hear a whispered instruction from Ediye but can’t make out the words. When Ashen speaks again, his worry is buried beneath a quieter voice. “Lu, you are safe here. Wake up.” 

I press my eyes shut. The buzzing seems to subside enough that when I open them again, I can see. But I’m not really a fan of what my eyes take in. 

On the plus side, I haven’t pissed myself. 

On the negative side, I’ve redecorated the bathroom. With my blood. 

My kaiken lies on the floor next to me. My body is covered with sweat and dark crimson spatter. I’m shaking with a deep sense of cold. I’m pretty sure my marrow has been sucked clean and replaced with snow. My fingertips ache. I still feel half in a blizzard, half here on the bathroom tiles. 

I’m really fucking confused. I was in bed?.. I think?.. That’s the last thing I remember. I got into bed and Ashen was on the floor by the window, watching as I gave him one last, suspicious, somewhat unfocused drunken glare before I pulled the blanket to my chin and turned my back on him. And now Ashen is kneeling next to me with his hand around mine, with Ediye squatting on my other side. They both look stern. Worried. 

“What the fuuuuck,” I whisper. My voice is extra hoarse, my throat extra sore. My tongue feels too thick and pasty in my mouth. I suddenly feel very tired, like I’ve been running instead of sleeping. 

Ediye stands and grabs a hand towel. I hear the water run in the sink. Ashen stays by my side. When it’s ready, he takes the damp towel from Ediye and wipes my skin with gentle strokes. I focus on his face, his eyes following the movement of his hand as it trails down my cheek and across my neck. He must feel me watching and meets my gaze. He tries to give a reassuring smile but there’s a crease between his brows that looks too concerned to give me any kind of relief.

My attention drifts up to the mirror. Chevrons and lines and triangles of ancient Sumerian drip across its polished surface. “I don’t remember this from any issue of Martha Stewart Living magazine,” I say, my gaze transfixed on the text that spans the width of the mirror and a wide section of the formerly white plaster wall. Ashen’s eyes narrow in my peripheral vision and I sense his confusion.

“Last year’s October edition. Spooky Season On A Budget, how to decorate with your own blood,” Ediye says. 

“Right. Nailed it. Bianca will be thrilled.” 

Ashen grumbles something incoherent that sounds an awful lot like haramenzen, Sumerian for troublemakers. I meet Ediye’s eyes and she gives me a fleeting smile as Ashen’s arm slips beneath my neck and he lifts me from the cold tile floor, wrapping a towel over my shoulders. When I’m up and steady on my feet I turn to the mirror. 

“Gasaan tiildibba me zi ab. Dul susi giskasilim tilla. Nigkulli duma galu barama niingar,” I whisper, reading the first line of text across the mirror. “The first lines of my spell in Sanford.” 

“Queen that gives life to the dying. The weapon of sweet voice. My music let no man make,” Ashen says. I meet his eyes through the reflection. The scrawled text of blood is like a mask over our faces.

“Umunzid kian utudza angim sunutega. Gasaan utud muszid kesdi. En utud sag men mama,” Ediye says, reading the next line down. Combined with the first line, the text repeats, over and over. “A true form, designed by heaven and earth thou wast created, like heaven intangible. Offspring of a queen, clad upon by a true form. Offspring of a high-priest, whose head is crowned.” 

“What does that mean?” Ashen asks, reading the cuneiform as though a hidden message might jump from the bloody text. They both look at me in the mirror, but I can only shrug.

“I don’t know. I don’t remember anything,” I say, trying to pull a memory from the dream that must have drawn me from my room and compelled me here. But there’s nothing, only the white blizzard from the hazy moments just before I woke. My gaze homes in on Ashen. “Did you hear anything?” 

He shakes his head, his troubled expression falling away from mine. “No. I woke and you were gone. I came out of the room to rouse the others and heard you talking in the bathroom. You were repeating the lines of the spell.” Ashen’s jaw hardens. When his eyes lift from the shadows they burn with flame. He looks at me for only a heartbeat before his gaze slides to Ediye. “How is this possible? I cast a spell tonight that should have kept Lu from harming herself.” 

Ediye’s expression darkens as she holds the demon’s stare. “Harm was not her intent. Her intent was to send a message.” 

Ashen’s gaze meets mine again and I can see that Ediye’s words only spark more worry. And irritation. “To whom? And about what?”

“I don’t know, but we should have Bianca look at this in the morning,” Ediye says, turning to me. “Perhaps she can decipher whatever you were trying to convey. She seemed like she saw something in your blood at the club that was connected to your spell, so maybe she can lend some insight here too.”

“Yeah. Can’t wait. It was so fun the last time,” I reply with a note of heavy sarcasm as I lock eyes with Ediye. My hand drifts to my damp tank top and presses to my heart, which feels like it has taken more than its fair share of abuse lately.  

Ashen’s eyes narrow, and I can tell he’s trying to make sense of our exchange. Whatever conclusions he’s drawn only seem to sour his mood even further. He’s a demon, so it’s not like it’s hard to do. “Get her cleaned up, witch,” he says, his voice gruff as he gently pushes me in Ediye’s direction. “She needs to rest.” 

“First of all, I’m right here. Don’t talk around me like I’m not,” I say, shrugging off his hand as I level him with a glare. He frowns and the crease deepens between his brows. Okay, fine, I’ll admit he does have a point about cleanliness and rest. I feel both gross and bone tired. “Secondly, I slipped right out from beneath your watch, so don’t go getting pissy with anyone but yourself. Especially not Ediye.”

“I am precisely the person I am angry with, vampire,” Ashen says, taking a step toward me as his glowing eyes warm my skin. Ferocious anger brews within his gaze. He bends and picks up my kaiken from the floor, glaring at the blood that stains the blade. “It will not happen again.”

Ashen looks back to me, a muscle jumping in his jaw as he surveys my face, his hard stare lingering on my lips. I have an urge to make a quip about his motivations, but I manage to keep my mouth clamped shut. I do still give him a fierce stare, however, that only brightens when his gaze connects with mine. 

“Give us some room, Reaper,” Ediye says, turning on the shower. Ashen holds my glare but acknowledges her words with a curt nod. He stays unmoving for a moment longer than what seems normal, then turns and leaves, stalking down the hall to my room. 

“This has been a weird night,” I whisper through a heavy sigh, dropping the towel on the counter and stripping off my soaked and bloodied tank top and shorts. 

“Yeah, there have been a lot of weird days and nights lately,” Ediye replies as I step into the shower. She closes the curtain behind me but I can sense her lingering on the other side. “Your Reaper was pretty spooked to find you in here, writing up the walls.” 

“Not my Reaper, Ediye,” I say as I watch the water cleanse the blood from the slits in my fingers, the deeper cuts still raw and open. 

There’s a weighty pause of silence. “You’re never going to convince yourself of that, you know.” 

I sigh. I wish she was wrong. 

Ediye leaves me to my thoughts in the hot stream of water to retrieve another set of night clothes, and leaves them on the counter with a vial of statera elixir before heading back to her room. When I’m dried off and my damp hair is twisted into a bun, I pad through the dark hallway back to my room. 

The door is ajar when I get there. The Reaper paces by the window, lost in thought, a stream of smoke and cinders drifting in his wake. He stills when he hears the door close and turns in my direction. We stand watching one another for a long moment, unmoving. 

“I’m sorry,” he finally says. 

“It wasn’t your fault.” Though I kind of wish it was. Part of me would like to lay more blame at his feet. But he was there with me, on the floor, with my hand in his. He didn’t have to be. And as much as I know I shouldn’t want to be near him, part of me still does. I look at him now, standing by the window, and it doesn’t take preternatural senses to see the pain and guilt in Ashen, even from this distance, even in the dark.  

Ashen keeps the flame within his eyes trained on the floor. “I will not let it happen again.”

“You might not have a choice.” 

“I should have stayed awake. Or stayed by the door,” Ashen says quietly as he meets my eyes. “Maybe a different choice could have led to a different conclusion.”

“It’s not that bad. It’s just a few cuts and some redecoration.” 

“That is not how it felt on the other side.” 

I tilt my head, considering his words.

Not how it felt. 

Ashen never talks about how something feels. It’s always how it is, how it was. But not the emotion it leaves behind. I’m the one who is left defenseless as you dismantle my walls, stone by stone. But he didn’t tell me he was afraid, or hopeful. You have stolen my heart, vampire. But he never said he loved me. 

Maybe that’s how I fell so easily into the darkness of the Shadow Realm. I filled in the blanks. Yet, right now, this is different. And it’s the second time tonight. He’s angry at himself and said as much, and now there’s something else.

“How did it feel? On the other side?” My voice is quiet, full of weariness and the anticipation of being left to fill in those blanks once more. 

Ashen looks away into the comfort of darkness for a long moment. I think he’s not going to answer, but then when his gaze returns to me, his jaw tightens. 

“Like diving into deep water and drowning in it. Like helplessness.” 

Silence invades the space between us once more. We watch one another from our bastions of shadows, neither of us wanting to move or break whatever spell this moment is. 

Slowly, the sparks dim and the smoke recedes. Ashen moves to the bed and draws the covers back, gesturing for me to get in. I don’t have the energy to fight every suggestion tonight. Between a restless sleep, lingering alcohol, emotional disarray and a scalding hot shower, I’m willing to trade a truce for some rest. So I climb into the bed and lie down without argument, almost sighing when the cover is draped over my body. Ashen settles next to me but stays above the covers. His hand folds across my wrist and he draws it up, inspecting my fingers in a shaft of moonlight that filters through the slit in the curtains. 

“Unhealed,” he observes. The cuts are still open and sore, but no longer bleeding.

“It’s the silver in the kaiken. It’ll take a little longer.” 

My pulse thrums with heavy beats as Ashen takes time to look at every notch and slice. One of his thumbs follows the path of the heart line on my palm, so slow that maybe he thinks I won’t notice. But I do. 

“You can take my blood to heal faster,” he says in a voice that’s low and almost hopeful. 

I don’t answer, but I don’t reject him outright either. My heart leads my mind to exactly where it shouldn’t go, and I think about what it would be like if we had mated. Taking his blood would be natural. Normal. Something as simple as this would barely be a question, and I wouldn’t hesitate to take it. But we’re not mates, and every drop I do take brings me one step closer to needing it. And it’s a need that is one-sided. I’m a vampire, it’s not like it should be a surprise that someone’s blood might call to me. I just don’t think what little blood I gave to Ashen during that fight when we first met has the same effect on him.

“I can’t,” I finally say, but I don’t pull my hand away. “Besides, it’ll be much better by morning. I need to hunt tomorrow anyway. For now, I just need rest.” 

“You just need rest,” he echoes. The shadows consume his quiet words, and all that’s left for a long moment is breath and heartbeats. Ashen turns my hand over and brings it to his lips, pressing a lingering kiss to my knuckles. My bones seem to heat with his touch. “Sleep well, vampire. No more wandering away.”

With the heavy notes in his voice, I don’t think he means just sleepwalking. He’s talking about running. From him. It feels like this is something he wants for himself, not for his greater goal or for the glory of his realm. It’s tempting to believe, even after everything he’s done to show that my belief in him is naive and misplaced. But the thought still fills my chest with warmth, no matter if I want it to or not. 

I give myself permission to feel just a little bit. Only the anchoring warmth of his touch in this moment of uncertainty about what’s happening to me. So I let his hand close around mine. I let him lay his arm across my ribs. I can accept this moment of offered comfort so I can rest. 

I take off some of the armor around my heart, and I fall asleep with Ashen’s arm draped across my body and my hand encased in his.

CHAPTER 19

There’s dim light on the other side of my closed eyelids when I wake. And I don’t really want to come back to consciousness just yet. I’m deliciously comfortable. And warm. I feel rested. Not the kind of rested where I’ve spent my energy healing. I’m talking about properly rested. And somehow… safe. 

It’s that realization that kicks the first domino of thoughts down, striking the rest into motion. The bathroom. The blizzard. The blood. 

The Reaper. 

There’s a steady heartbeat beneath my ear. 

There’s a heavy arm laying across my back. 

And skin. A lot of warm skin. A cadence of breath that stirs the hair that’s fallen loose around my shoulders. 

And there’s morning wood. Morning. Wood. Trapped. Against my stomach. 

Fuck. My. Life. 

I am unapologetically draped over the Reaper like a fucking vampire skin blanket. Who the hell knows where the covers have gone. I probably ripped them off to get closer to him. And he was probably awake when I did it too. I bet he enjoyed every single second. My cheek is resting against Ashen’s bare chest and I definitely remember him having a shirt on last night when he laid down next to me. So let’s just assume the worst, shall we? I bet I ripped that off too. I probably tore that fucker right off with my teeth. 

Fuck. 

Ashen’s breathing is deep and even. He hasn’t stirred. So maybe, maybe, if I’m lucky, I can roll off him before my embarrassment kills me. 

“Good morning, sunshine.”

Fuuuuuuck. 

And there it is. I am officially deceased. I might look alive on the outside, as my blush will tell you, but my insides have died and dissolved into a puddle of scum. 

Even worse, I haven’t even fucking moved. And now it seems I can’t. I’m frozen in place.

“This is a welcome surprise,” Ashen says, amusement laced through his voice. “Though I should likely be worried for my life, given how proximity to you has ended for me lately.” 

I finally peel my face from Ashen’s chest and brush some of the hair from my eyes. I take a deep breath before shifting a fierce glare in his direction that clearly states this is your fault, motherfucker. 

And goddamn, but he’s so beautiful, even in the morning, even being squished by a vampire for however many hours it’s been. It’s so… unfair. He’s legit angelic, and I’m one hundred percent certain I have leftover mascara smeared beneath my lashes. But no, not Ashen. He’s in tip-top shape, only made worse by the shit-eating grin that he’s barely even trying to contain. The gold flecks in his eyes seem to dance with delight. He looks completely at ease, one arm beneath his pillow, the other still draped across my back. 

His grip around me tightens, just enough for me to notice. My glare intensifies. 

“Where is your shirt?”

“You requested I remove it. I merely complied,” he says. My eyes narrow. His brighten. We stare.

“Now I’m requesting for you to put it the fuck back on.” 

There’s a heartbeat of silence. 

“I cannot.” 

I suppress a growl. “Why not?” 

“You are in my way.” 

I try to slide off Ashen’s chest. My shirt must’ve ridden up as I slept and now my abs are flush against his. Our skin sticks and pulls against one another’s in the rising heat of the Italian morning. Ashen’s hold across my back grows a little more solid.  

Asshat Reaper Motherfucker. 

My glare brightens. Ashen’s smile grows. He’s clearly loving that he thinks he’s winning some kind of battle. But I’m a siren, for fucksakes. No one bests me out of a game of desire. Attraction and Annihilation and all that. I think it’s about time I start playing to win. But that means I’m supposed to have the upper hand. And right now I feel like I… don’t. 

I need to get my shit together, and fast. Real fast. 

I slide my other arm from where it rests against the length of his ribs and fold my hands beneath my chin to rest against his chest. I peer into the depths of Ashen’s eyes, trying to pull anything out of them that might be true. Right now, all I see is a shitload of self-satisfaction.  

“You look pretty pleased with yourself,” I say, fighting to keep my expression blank even as my irritation scratches beneath my skin. 

“So I should be. You did not try to wander again. Quite the contrary, actually. You seemed more than content to stay put.” Ashen’s smile broadens just a little when my eyes narrow back into a glare. He thinks he’s knocked me off balance. He knows he can get under my skin. So it’s time to even the scales, because there’s definitely a way to get under his. 

With a violent push of my hands against his chest, I twist my hips beneath me and sit up, straddling the demon and trapping his thick erection beneath me. And just like that he looks… rattled. 

Excellent. 

“For a Master of War, you certainly seem overly pleased with winning small battles,” I say, looking down at Ashen. 

“Winning any battle against you feels like an achievement,” he replies, and though his words are as smooth and polished as glass, I still catch the gleam of mistrust in his face. The last time we were in this position I did slash his throat, after all. A little mistrust is probably warranted.

I give Ashen a wicked smile. His eyes narrow a fraction as I lift my hands from his chest. I grasp the hem of my shirt and pull it up, my movement agonizingly slow. I peel it off, my hair flowing with it for a moment to fall back across my shoulders. He takes in the sight of my breasts and I hear his breath hitch, his blood whoosh. His hands travel up my legs to my hips, then the smooth skin of my sides. The ache I feel to have him fill me, to feel my body stretch and mold to his, and it’s almost more than I can bear. Almost.

I toss the shirt off the bed and look down at Ashen, feeling his pulse surge through the blood vessels trapped beneath my thighs. His length throbs beneath me as he takes in my bare skin. Only my thin sleep shorts and his boxers separate us now. 

“Don’t get used to it,” I whisper as I lean closer to Ashen. His hands caress my skin, his movement slow and careful. The fire burns in his eyes. “You will lose more battles than you win. This one included.”

With another swift motion, I’m off the bed and on my feet, walking away. The abrupt separation from his warmth physically hurts. The desire for what I could have had gnaws and twists low in my belly. But I shove that feeling aside as I toss Ashen a devilish grin over my shoulder. I catch a glimpse of the naked longing on his face, and it looks as fierce and pained as it feels within me. 

“You said last night that Zida is hunting me,” I say, shifting gears to rattle him a little more as I pull a vial of elixir from my bag and gulp it down. I retrieve a bra next and put it on, my back still to the Reaper. I strip off my sleep shorts and replace them with the nicest pair of panties I can find in the limited selection of clothes. Ashen doesn’t answer for a long moment, but I can feel him watching. 

“That is correct.” His gaze is still molten when I glance in his direction. He sits up as I walk to the wardrobe and flip through the shirts on the hangers until I find something white. 

I watch Ashen with a guarded expression as I slip the shirt over my shoulders and button it up. He looks about ready to rip it right off, but sits unmoving on the bed. “Did you send her to hunt me down? And Ningish?” 

Ashen’s expression hardens, all that desire dissipating as though I just doused him with cold water. 

“Of course not. No.”

I turn to face Ashen fully. I take my time threading buttons through their holes. “Who.”

“Eshkar,” he says, and I see no traces of a lie in his eyes. Then again, I haven’t in the past, and I’m still thoroughly unsure if that’s what landed me up shit creek before.

“You might not have been the one to send them, but you used it to your advantage. You followed Ningish to me. It’s how you found me so quickly the first time.” I put my hands on my hips and watch Ashen carefully. 

“Yes. There was another portal not far from the one you took. He was able to pick up your trace quickly.” Ashen’s features are softer in the morning light despite the topic of demon snakes and dungeon escapes. But his eyes still flame. I look away before I can see anything in them that will pull too tight around my heart. 

My gaze strays down to the tattoos that cover his chest, the geometric face of a jackal looking back at me. My eyes snag on the scrolling script beneath its muzzle. Shalasu Ningsisa, it says. Merciful Justice. I look back up to Ashen’s face and a derisive smile lifts the corners of my lips. Merciful Justice. What a crock of horse shit. Maybe the Shadow Realm started off that way millennia ago, I don’t know. But there’s certainly no mercy there now. 

I turn away before the red light of rage can filter into my eyes. I rummage through the shelves of the wardrobe until I find a pair of jean shorts. “I’m sure your realm is missing their Master of War. Don’t you have minions to do your bidding to drag me back there? Although, maybe you don’t need minions, do you. No need to waste precious resources when you can just lure me to my own demise. Or so you think.” I hear the bed creak but I don’t look over. “That’s what you’re doing, isn’t it? You must think so little of me if you think I’ll just walk myself right into your fucking dungeon.” 

I feel my anger swelling with every thought that tumbles out of my mouth. I’m shimmying into my shorts when I hear Ashen’s quiet footfalls on the rug. Fuck these are really tight. And short. Basically ass shorts. It’s not even warm out, why the fuck did I pick these?

I manage to get my shorts up and zipped, barely, when Ashen stops next to me. I glare up at him, and he down at me. His expression is the perfect balance of fury and desire. 

“You know a fraction of what you think you know, vampire, and most everything else you think is wrong,” he says, the scent of his inked skin filling the space between us. 

“That’s super reassuring, Reaper. I think I’ll place all my trust in you right now. Please, carry me away.” 

Ashen’s chest rises and falls with a long, steadying breath. A muscle ticks in his cheek. “I am not here to harm you.” 

I move a step closer, setting my jaw as I glare up at him. We stand in fierce and heavy silence for a moment that feels longer than it is. “Prove it,” I say, and then I turn on my heel and storm from the room, slamming the door on my way out. 

My smile erupts as I stalk down the hall. 

There’s nothing a predator like Ashen enjoys more than a challenge. And there is nothing to stoke the fire of desire more than a gust of denial. Coming so close to what you want only to have it pulled just beyond your reach?.. Tell me it doesn’t make you want it that much more.

Yes, this is a game I can definitely play.

CHAPTER 20

I enter the kitchen just as Cassian is pouring himself a cup of coffee. He glances up at me and smiles as he adds in some blood. “Morning, zanne dolci.” 

I snort a laugh and head to the cupboards, rummaging until I find a blender on a high shelf. I pull it down and give the jug a rinse. “Sleep okay?” 

“Better than you, from what I heard. You always did like to meander in the night,” he says, blowing steam across his mug as he watches me set up the blender with a bemused expression. I know he can sense the subtle blush that warms my cheeks. “Davina is at the main house, she will bring Bianca back with her soon to take a look at the script you seem to have painted in the bathroom.” 

I turn to the fridge to grab the butter, unwrapping the foil to plop the whole thing in a bowl. I place the dish in the microwave and hit it for two minutes. “Where are the others?”

Cassian nods toward the window that looks over the gardens. Cole sits off to the side in the shade, reading today’s copy of Corriere della Sera with a selection of other newspapers spread across the table before him. Eryx and Ediye are on the lawn in the sun, tossing a frisbee back and forth as Urtur bounds between them, his tongue lolling.

I stand and watch them for a long moment. Cassian joins by my side, and I smell the nuances in his scent, the new and the unfamiliar. The sage and anise in his cologne. The fainter, ancient smell of his skin, like quince and myrrh.

We don’t talk for a long moment. I think we’re both lost in how much there is to say, and how hard it is to say it. Maybe it will never be said. But it feels good to have this loop of time in my hands again, like I might be able to one day close the broken chain. 

“It’s good to see you again,” I say, glancing at him. His kind eyes smile back at me when he nods, but I can see there’s old pain and new awkwardness and questions beneath their warm brown hue. 

I take a deep breath and I want to say something about being sorry, so sorry for the hurt I caused him all those years ago. I treated him so unfairly, and I know the letters weren’t enough. Maybe it helped him to believe I’d died three hundred years ago. Maybe being back from the dead is worse than thinking I was gone forever.

Before I can turn to start to saying something, anything, Cassian smiles and moves toward the island. 

“So a Reaper, hmm? You always did have an affinity for trouble.” 

“Yourself included,” I say with a warm smile over my shoulder as I take the coffee pot and bring it over to the blender. 

“Ediye told me some of what happened to you both in his realm. Are you okay?” 

I turn and lean against the counter. We watch each other for a long moment. The smile dissolves from his eyes, replaced with worry. “No. But I will be, in time. And I will do everything I can to keep the same thing from happening to you.” 

“One thing you never did run from was a fight. I believe you.” 

I don’t let myself cringe at that not-so-subtle and much deserved blow that lies beneath the compliment. I just give Cassian a slight nod before I turn back to pouring coffee in the blender, leaving all but a fraction of a cup behind in the pot. 

“What are you up to?” Cassian asks, his voice wary. 

I toss him a smile over my shoulder as I hear the door close down the hall. “Warfare,” I say quietly as my smile turns wicked. 

He laughs and rolls his eyes, bringing his mug up to his lips. “You haven’t changed a bit.” 

We smile at one another as Ashen enters the kitchen. He’s in his unfailing black ensemble, down to his polished black shoes. We couldn’t look more mismatched if we tried, me in a flowy white shirt and skin-tight, uber short jean cut-offs and him looking like he’s stepped out of the pages of a mafia romance novel with his expensive clothes and fancy new knuckle tattoos.

“Good morning,” he says to Cassian, his voice low and gruff. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he’s a little jealous. 

“Reaper. I hope my maker didn’t keep you up all night with her nocturnal meanderings,” he says, winking at me behind Ashen’s back as he heads to the bread box and pulls two slices of bread out, putting them into the toaster. 

“Vampires and sleep do not mix well for various reasons, it seems,” he says, letting the innuendo hang as a heavy note in his voice as he heads to the fridge. 

I drift through the scent of melting butter to slip my way past Ashen’s broad frame and grab the coffee cream and a bag of blood. “You sound as though you’re an expert. You must have spent so many nights with my kind.”

“A few,” he says. I don’t have to look up to see the cryptic smile that I hear in his voice. Cheeky fucker. 

The microwave dings and my glee quickly erases my own jealous thoughts that bloom like poisonous flowers. I virtually skip over to the blender, dumping in some cream and then the bag of blood. I take my time, watching as Ashen rummages through the fridge, coming up empty handed. He closes it as the toast pops and he turns, coming face-to-face with me, my arm outstretched, my hand curled around the microwave handle. His eyes narrow and I know he can smell it now, above the scent of warm toast. 

Melted butter. 

Oh how this man loves butter, such a simple little pleasure. 

Denied. 

He glares at me as I pull the handle of the microwave and retrieve my bowl with a saccharine smile. I retreat to the blender further down the counter and hold his stare as I dump the entire contents into the jug. 

“What in the hell are you making?” Cassian asks. His lips curl into a grimace as he watches me place the lid on the jug and set it to pulse. 

“Bulletproof bloffee,” I reply, not taking my eyes from Ashen. He folds his arms across his chest and leans against the counter, watching as I turn on the blender. 

“Right.” Cassian slides off his stool, mug in hand. “That sounds truly awful. I’m going outside to wait for Bianca and Davina. Ciao.”

Neither of us moves as he leaves the room. I keep my sweet smile pinned on Ashen as I pour my concoction into a large mug, my doe eyes at their most innocent when I take my first sip. Cassian’s right, it’s a bit rank. Greasy coffee is just fucking weird and I have no idea where humans come up with these gross combinations. But there is no fucking way my face is going to say anything aside from that this is the most delightful drink I’ve ever had. 

“Problem, Reaper?”

Ashen pushes away from the counter and takes a step forward, his dry toast forgotten. He levels me with a dangerous look. I have the sudden urge to hop on the counter and let him fuck me senseless. And then kill him with his unused butter knife. 

This isn’t how it’s supposed to work. He’s supposed to be the one overcome with desire and I’m supposed to pull his little strings until he dances right into my trap. Whatever trap that is, I haven’t decided yet. Probably more stabbing, that’s pretty fun. Regardless, that murderous look he’s giving me flips the vampire switch and makes me want to start a more dangerous game much faster than I can play it. 

I hop on the counter anyway. Surely there’s no harm in that. Sitting is innocent enough, even if I let my thighs drift open as my legs dangle off the edge. I can at least live this part of my sudden little fantasy. 

“Something seems amiss. Can I help you find it?” I ask, taking a sip of my bloffee as he prowls closer.

Ashen halts in front of me. He pulls the mug from my hand and raises it to his lips, sniffing it before he takes a tiny sip. He makes a face of disgust before passing it back. “That is fucking atrocious.” 

“Then go get your own. I saved you some,” I say, nodding to the coffee pot. There’s probably no more than two mouthfuls left.

Ashen glances at the pot and turns his molten gaze back to me, taking a step closer. His waist brushes my knees and he lays his hands on the edge of the counter, caging me in. A sinful smile tugs at his lips as he lets his eyes rest on my mouth. “Don’t you remember what happened the last time you didn't play nice?”

I take a sip of my coffee and reach out, tracing a finger across Ashen’s throat. “Don’t you?”

We stare at one another in silence, Ashen leaning a little closer as his eyes follow the curve of my lips. I feel their heat. I see the rise and fall of his chest. I smell his familiar scent, ink and unsmoked tobacco and mint drifting through the space between us. 

A thread of venom lands on my tongue and I swallow it past the raspy burn in my throat. Ashen could lean a little closer, just a few more inches, and our lips would press together. The kiss would be fierce with all this longing that churns in my chest. Or I could tear his neck apart with my teeth, take all the blood I can drink and stab him right in the heart, sending him back to the Shadow Realm. I could paint the kitchen in the color of his life until his flesh turns to ash. Or I could let him rip my clothes off and spread my legs and feast on me, right here on the cold tiles of the kitchen island. 

“There is a war in your eyes, vampire,” Ashen whispers, pulling the mug from my fingers and setting it down on the counter. “I wonder what is going through that terrifying mind of yours.” 

“Whether or not to kill you,” I say. 

Ashen laughs. That sound… I’d forgotten how warm and precious and rare it is. It transforms his face. He’s always beautiful, but when he laughs he’s radiant. Otherworldly and magnificent. All that seriousness and buried sorrow disappear, if only for a moment. 

“I have no doubts that killing is on your mind. But something else is too, I think.”

“You’re right,” I say, nodding, my glare hard and serious. “How to kill you. That’s also on my mind.” 

Ashen laughs again, his eyes crinkling at the corners. He leans a little closer. “You forget how expressive your face is, vampire.”

“Right, a major disadvantage I hear. I guess I’ll have to work on that, as someone so kindly suggested to me once.” 

We are caught in a moment of silence just looking at one another, our next words and our unmade moves lingering on the edge of a blade. I might be the one with the expressive face, but the hidden language within a body whispers to a vampire. I can hear the tempo of Ashen’s blood pumping faster in his veins. I see the color rise on his cheeks. I don’t miss the faintest trace of vanilla infusing his scent, or the way his pupils expand as his eyes bound between mine. 

Ashen moves a little closer. His eyes stray to my lips. His fingers graze my thigh as his body pushes against mine, my legs falling open to make room for him. 

“The other Reaper, I assume,” Bianca’s voice says with a hint of amusement. Ashen lets out a long breath and backs away from me, turning to face her as she approaches. My heart thuds erratically in my chest, the poor, broken thing. And there’s only more abuse to come. I can already tell by the way Bianca holds one hand behind her back. 

Davina enters the kitchen behind Bianca, followed by Cassian. Davina’s gaze travels from me to Ashen, then rests on the witch as though she’s the only safe place to look. Any trace of Ashen’s former levity has definitely disappeared in what feels like the most awkward moment in history. And when you’ve been alive for five thousand years, that’s really saying something. 

“Buon giorno,” Ashen says, giving Bianca a polite bow of his head. “Sono Ashen, di Casa Urbigu.” 

Bianca’s smile broadens at Ashen’s Italian greeting, but there’s a tightness to it. As the leader of a powerful coven with an ancient and dangerous Reaper in her safe haven, I don’t blame her. “Welcome, Ashen. I hope you find our coven in order during your visit.” 

Ashen only replies with a nod. All the light and radiance I saw in him just moments ago is shuttered away. It’s not only a little sad to see it disappear, but frightening. It leaves me feeling cold. I’m not sure which man is the true Ashen - the one who teases and laughs, or the one who is remote and full of darkness. It’s so easy to convince myself to see what I want that I don’t even know what’s real. 

I’m still watching Ashen and trying to figure him out when Bianca stops at the end of the island. I feel her waiting eyes on me and I hop down from the counter with a sigh. 

“Ciao, vampira. I hear you have redecorated my bathroom,” she says with her ever-present grin. She doesn’t seem troubled by the fact that I bloodied up her white plaster walls. If anything, she seems a bit apologetic. I can take a guess as to why. 

“Yes, I’m sorry about that. Would you like to see it?” 

Bianca’s smile widens. “That won’t be necessary.”

Fuck. 

Quick as a snake, she strikes me in the chest with her needle, piercing my heart. 

“Goddamn,” I wheeze, clutching a hand to the blood that stains my shirt. I lean against the counter and Ashen pulls me back, stepping between me and Bianca. Black smoke curls across the tiles. 

“Explain yourself, witch,” he seethes at her, but she’s busy tasting the needle with a languid stroke of her tongue. Her eyes turn gray with diaphanous clouds. 

“She’s a Seer,” I grit out as my breath comes in pants. Ashen looks at me from over his shoulder. His eyes already blaze with flame when they dart down to the blood seeping through my shirt. “It’s how she sees.”

“I am not the only one, am I, vampira?” Bianca’s eyes have cleared and she watches me over Ashen’s shoulder. Her smile is filled with secrets. “You have seen when you didn’t know you could.”

I barely have time for the question to form in my skin when she repeats the first words of my spell. 

“Gasaan tiildibba me zi ab.”

Queen who gives life to the dying. 

I blink and when I open my eyes, I’m no longer in the kitchen. 

I’m in the blizzard. 

I’m standing in a break between the trees. Maybe a crossroad of old paths, maybe a small clearing, it’s hard to tell. There’s snow flying around me in a bitter wind. It clings to the leafless tree branches and the evergreen boughs. It skitters across my exposed skin. I look down and it’s almost to my knees. 

I know I’m not alone here. 

I know I’ve run because I had no choice. 

My lungs burn. The tip of my katana disappears into the bank of snow to my side. My grip on the handle tightens. My palm is sweaty but my face feels cold, like I’ve been out here for a while. 

I smell pine needles. Woodsmoke clings to my hair as it whips across my face. I smell unsmoked tobacco and ink, the scent of Ashen. And something else. Something musky. An undertone of sulfur. 

Shit.

The snow in front of me moves in a fast-approaching serpentine. I back up. I raise my sword. 

No more running. 

A gaping pink maw bursts from the crystalline bank. A body of white scales trails behind. 

I fall back in the snow just as Zida’s fangs aim to strike me in the chest. I press my eyes closed, preparing for the fatal hit. 

When I open them again, the sky above is a brilliant, crystalline blue. I hear the sea. It laps at my bare toes. I can taste it on my lips. I press my fingers into the ground and feel warm sand, not snow. 

I sit up, confused and soaking wet, a thin linen gown stuck to my skin. My hair is longer, down to my waist and encrusted in wet sand. I look down at the thin thread of the beach and the sharp rock that spears through the water. I know this island well. I know these cliffs. 

Anthemoessa. The island of the sirens. 

I look back out to sea. There’s a ship drifting toward the horizon. Its sail unfurls to catch the wind. Oars that have rowed it away from the island slide from the surface of the sea as the boat picks up speed. I rise to my feet, unsteady, as though the hard ground should be moving with the waves. 

I take a few steps into the surf. Panic fills my chest as quickly as the water rises around my legs. 

They’re leaving me here. I don’t know where I’m supposed to be, but I’m not supposed to be alone. 

I see a man and woman watching me from the deck as the ship slides away into the distance. I feel my memories slipping away with them. It hurts so much in my chest that I’m sure my heart has cleaved in half. 

“Ummum,” I whisper, pulling up my dress as it slows me down. I raise my knees with every step deeper into the water. “Ummum! Batiltu!” 

Mother!.. Wait!..

I call to them, and call and call and call. But they don’t answer. They only watch. 

I wade through the water until I’m swimming, but the waves keep dragging me back to shore. Sooner than seems possible, the ship fades into the setting sun. 

Desperate tears mix with the salt water on my skin as the sea pulls me onto the beach. I cry into the sand, my throat burning. Everything I knew is pulling from me like threads unraveling from tattered cloth. I hold my head in my hands as though I can trap myself between my palms. I weep as it all disappears, even the betrayal of being left behind. The ship sails away with everything but my name. 

And then I hear a voice. The sweetest, kindest voice I’ve ever heard. 

“Akhatu,” the woman says. Sister. Her dry hand lands on my shoulder. I look up into Aglaope’s smiling face. “Do not fear, my love. I will look after you.”

The instant she lifts her hand from me, the vision disappears. 

There’s a lot of yelling here in the kitchen. My head is swarming with those fucking hornets. I press my temples between my palms and a pained noise escapes through my lips. It goes unnoticed beneath Ashen’s furious tirade. 

“I don’t know what you’ve done, witch, but you will fix her or I will strip your spine from your throat-“

“Back up, Reaper,” Cassian says. His voice is tight with urgency but I can’t see him through thick smoke and hissing sparks of Ashen’s wings. 

“-I swear I will pull it from your skull with my bare hands-“

“Back the fuck up-“

“-you have exactly three seconds-“

“She is fine,” Bianca interjects, the amusement so thick in her voice that she nearly laughs. “See for yourself.”

Smoke and cinders dissipate and Ashen looks over his shoulder at me. Cassian stands between Ashen and Bianca, his gladius raised with the tip of the sword pointed at Ashen’s neck. Bianca looks thoroughly entertained. 

Ashen turns to me fully and strides close enough to take my jaw in a gentle hand. His fiery gaze strikes so deep into my eyes that he might leave a piece of himself behind. His voice is low and strained when he speaks. “All right, vampire?” 

I give a single nod, though my head and my chest still hum with pain. 

“Not to worry, Reaper. I was just helping her to remember what she saw.” Bianca shifts her gaze to me over his shoulder. Her smile broadens. “I did not take that which you covet.” 

I take a step back from Ashen’s touch. When I turn my gaze to him he looks desperate for me to stay within reach. I don’t move further away, but I don’t come closer either. 

“What was that, what I saw?” I ask, turning my attention back to Bianca. 

“Your words on the wall, they aren’t just spells. They aren’t just magic. They are the past and future colliding. Your history. And your destiny.” 

“What does it mean?”

Bianca’s smile turns a little sorrowful as she watches me. “That the threads of fate are pulling tight, bringing the mystery into view.”

I don't know what’s happening to me. Who I am, what this all means. The ancient past makes even less sense than the future. And the way Ashen looks at me, as though I’m both his undoing and salvation, makes me think the present might be the worst of all.

CHAPTER 21

I spend most of the day alone once Bianca leaves. I’m not really in a sociable mood. Plus, I’m hungry. Like, really hungry, which has become hangry. I take all that hanger out on the bathroom, scrubbing my bloody, confusing message from the mirror until it’s streak-free and gleaming. 

I move on to tackle the wall with every cleaning product I can find. The smell of chemicals and fake fragrances burns my nostrils but it reminds me of Sanford, of the simple life I once had cleaning rooms at the Swan and playing Scrabble with Andy and cribbage with Peter and marveling at Bian’s ferocity. It makes me a little homesick, actually. They must be worried. I took off with some strange, broody, tattooed dude and haven’t come back. As far as they’re concerned, I’ve probably been murdered and left in some shallow grave somewhere, leaving a room of meager belongings behind. Even my epic Rocket Appartmento espresso machine is still there. Damn it. 

These thoughts consume me so thoroughly that I don’t notice Ashen at the door until I turn to grab the spray from the counter. I catch sight of him in the now pristine mirror and startle a little, which he seems to find endearing, judging by that warmth in his face. I level him with a glare and turn back to the wall. 

“Creeping again?”

“Bianca stopped by,” Ashen says. He takes a step into the bathroom and lays a strip of paper on the counter. “She found Valentina. We should leave tomorrow.”

I lean backwards and read Bianca’s flowery script. “Magura?.. Seriously?.. Fuck.”

Ashen nods and I turn back to the wall and scrub it with renewed vigor. “When was the last time you were in Romania?”

“You already know the answer. When your idiot Reaper friends stole Vlad’s soul.”

There’s a long beat of silence where the only sound is the hard brush scraping at the wall. “Vlad was out of control,” Ashen says in a low and serious voice. “He was drawing attention to himself, killing far more than he needed to. You know as much as I do that he had to be stopped.” 

My hand falls away from the wall and I turn slowly, red light consuming my pupils as I catch my own reflection. I cast my gaze to Ashen in the mirror. 

“Were you there?” 

“No, Lu. I wasn’t there and I wasn’t part of the decision to reap Vlad’s soul.” 

We stare at one another for a long moment as I look for the truth in his eyes. I guess it shouldn’t matter anymore, it was so long ago. The Reapers that ambushed Vlad on that cold day in January have long since moved on to other prey, and Vlad’s spirit has been in their realm ever since. Somewhere.

I turn back to my task, glaring at the bloodstained plaster. “You sure are good at telling me all the things you didn’t do, Reaper,” I say, my gaze darting to meet his in the mirror. “I wonder if you’ll ever tell me about the awful things you did.”

The silence stretches on between us. I scrub and scrub until I’m sure that Ashen is gone, and even then I keep going until the sun starts setting and my fingers are raw. 

I eventually make it to the kitchen for a pre-hunt snack when I give up on those walls. I don’t think I can take another bland glass of rice cake blood, so I tinker in the cabinets until I find some Campari. I peel and chop a few oranges, chucking them with a bag of blood into the blender, humming to myself to the beat that I pulse. It isn’t until the bloody orange is mixed into a pulpy red froth that I realize I’m not alone. Davina watches with an attentive, curious gaze as I pour the mixture into the Campari and ice cubes waiting at the bottom of a tall glass. 

“Hey,” I say. My voice comes out a little tentative even though I try to sound super chill and easygoing. “Want one?”

Davina’s nose crinkles with suspicion. “What is it?”

“Alcohol. My take on a drink called a Garibaldi. I shall call this version a Garibloody Cocktail,” I say with a theatrical flourish of my hands around the glass. Davina’s suspicion seems to only intensify. My jazz hands flutter out like I’m the worst magician of all time as I clear my throat and try to be less weird. “I can make you a traditional version if you like. Minus the gore, of course.”

Davina thinks on this for a moment. She lifts one shoulder. “That would be nice, thanks.” 

I give her a swift smile and pour the leftover bloody juice into another tall glass, then rinse the jug in the sink. Silence stretches on over the sound of running water. Normally, I’d delight in a bit of awkwardness, but this time it’s just really lacking in the delight part. 

“This must be very strange but exciting, so many different things to see and try for the first time,” I say, cringing a little as the words spill out of my mouth. 

“I suppose,” she replies, clearly unconvinced. I feel my skin heat and resist the urge to climb into the freezer as I fish out more ice cubes. Okay, maybe that was a lame opener, but what the fuck am I supposed to say to her? It’s not like we’re gonna braid each other’s hair and argue about which movie Tom Cruise runs most aggressively in.

There are a few more long moments of silence as I pour a couple of shots of Campari into a glass. Then I add a splash more. Okay maybe one more shot. Then I top up my own with more liquor. Don’t judge me, I need it. If I’m destined to have an awkward conversation, I might as well fuel it with booze. 

I grab some oranges and another knife and cutting board, passing them to Davina across the island. Putting her to work seems like a viable solution for diverting her attention away from me and my sudden inability to make small talk. Not that it really works. Her eyes keep darting up to mine as she slices the fruit with a deft hand. When she’s done, I blend it and fill her glass, handing it to her with a metal straw. 

So what if I get a little satisfaction when she doesn’t stir it and coughs around a solid hit of straight Campari? 

“Good?” I ask with an innocent smile. 

“Uhh… yeah…”

I stir my drink and my grin widens just a bit before I take another sip. This woman is no idiot. She clocks it and gives a little smile, looking into her glass as she follows my lead before trying it again. 

“So I’m going to assume you were looking for me specifically. Am I right?” I ask, holding her gaze as I step back and lean against the counter. Davina’s face turns stoic once more and she nods. “What can I do for you?”

“I owe you an apology.”

I already know I’m going to need a lot more liquor for this conversation. I take another long sip before I turn away and top up my glass. “Only as much as I owe one to you.”

Davina’s head tilts and she looks genuinely confused. “Why? What for?” 

I sigh. Might as well just go for it. Balls to the wall, or something. “Because I had sex with Ashen in Cairo before I killed him. To be fair, I wasn’t really in my right mind. Not that it’s an excuse. I shouldn’t have fucked with your man.” 

Davina looks down, her confusion deepening, though I see the spray of crimson blush beneath her faint freckles. Her heart rate is climbing and an undercurrent of overripe cherries filters into her scent. “He is not my man. You have every right.”

“That’s not how it looked in the Shadow Realm,” I say, pinning her in place with a steady stare, though she doesn’t balk. 

“I do not believe much about the Shadow Realm looks the way it is. It is full of tricks and illusions,” Davina replies as she shifts her attention to the metal straw and stirs her cocktail. I guess I can’t disagree with her there. The place is a little fucked up. “Ashen was shocked to see me again, and when I was brought back, he was the first thing I recognized that was real. For so long I was a specter trapped in nightmares. I ran to embrace the first safety I saw. But Lu, even though he showed me kindness in that moment, he will never forgive me for what I did. And had I known what was going on, that you were together, I would not have run to him like that.”

I have many questions about that forgiveness part, but I bank them for later as I let out a puff of a laugh and look away. “Well, we aren’t together. He made a choice and he didn’t choose me.”

“That’s not true-“

“He watched as I was dragged away to be tortured down there. He knew what would happen to me, Davina. I appreciate your apology, but it’s unnecessary. You weren’t at fault for anything.”

My drink disappears down my throat in a few solid gulps and I set the glass down with a thunk. I’ve gotta get the fuck out of here. Otherwise, memories will stack up on one another in a tower that will only smother me when it falls. 

“Did you know he wept?” Davina asks just as I’m about to leave the room. I stop with my back turned to her. “I have seen him angry and enraged. But never distraught. He held himself together until we got to his room in House Urbigu. And then he transformed, like a beast in a cage. He was frantic, pacing. Destroyed his chambers, tore everything apart until he fell to his knees with his head in his hands, crying.”

“Guilt does funny things to people, Davina.” 

“Not Ashen,” she says. Her voice is so sure and absolute that I look over my shoulder at her. Her face is just as serious and unwavering as her words. “He has centuries of experience with guilt. Rage and regret are as integral to Ashen’s being as bones and blood.” 

I try to quell the jealous thoughts that climb up my body to pull me under water. The way she knows him, this hidden history they share. Even the admission that she was there in his room, as though she was meant to be there. She was the one to watch him fall apart. 

I push all that jealousy down. I know it only means I feel like I’m owed something that doesn’t belong to me. 

All that’s left behind is a weary, bitter kind of hurt. 

A sardonic smile creeps through my lips as I take a step toward Davina. “What, you’re going to say it’s love that broke him? That’s horseshit. If he loved me, he would have fought for me.”

For the first time, I see a flash of flame in Davina, a dark amber spark buried deep in her pupils. “He did, in the only way he knew he could win.”

My smile slips away. I sweep my gaze across her face, cataloging the details of her pulse, her smell, the flush in her skin. I wait for any of it to change as I take another step closer. “And what do you have to gain from saying all this?” 

A flicker of confusion brightens the light in her eyes. “Gain?”

“As far as I can discern, every Reaper in the Shadow Realm is driven by what they can get out of a situation. They’ll fuck over anyone to get what they want. And you’re one of them now. So what’s in it for you?” 

Davina and I look at one another for a long moment. I can almost feel her stitched into this tapestry that binds us all. If I could just peer beneath her skin, I might be able to see every knot and intersection. But where it all ends, I don’t know. 

I give up waiting for an answer, and I don’t want to ask again. I just want to slake my thirst and sit somewhere alone with my thoughts. Perhaps wallow a little, but I think it’s deserved. So I back up a step and turn away. 

“I owe him,” Davina says. I give her a suspicious look over my shoulder and her features soften into something that looks a bit too much like pity. “Not a favor or a debt he seeks to claim, but for the harm I caused. I want him to be happy. And I owe it to you.”

“You didn’t do anything to me. You owe me nothing.”

“You’re wrong.” Davina says it with such conviction that I tilt my head. I can feel my brows pull together. I hear her pulse stutter as adrenaline kicks into her veins. 

“What do you mean-”

“Hey, LuLu, Davina,” Eryx chimes as he enters the kitchen, his feathers clinking as he folds his wings tight across his back. He nods toward Davina’s drink before opening the fridge. “Looks nice.”

Davina sets her mostly full glass on the counter and steps away. “Please finish mine, if you like. I should go.” 

With a quick nod, she backs away. I watch as she disappears around the corner, heading down the hall toward her room. Eryx enthusiastically takes up her offer and finishes the drink as he pulls an assortment of cheese and fruit from the fridge. I don’t really think I can manage much small talk given how stellar this conversation with Davina has been, so I retreat to my room and then slip away into town unseen. 

I try to leave my thoughts of Davina and Ashen and all the others behind me with every step I take toward the lights of Ravello. I even try to shed every way I’ve changed. I just want to be the one thing I know that I still am. The one thing I’m best at being.

A solitary vampire, hunting in the night.

CHAPTER 22

I’m actually pretty excited to be on the hunt for a douchebag to eat. It’s been a while since I stalked some prey. Even Jessie Fucking Bates didn’t really count, seeing as how he was already subdued when I finally got to kill him. And handless. I haven’t used my song to snare my prey since that Civic driver with the stupid muffler that I found that first night at the Reaper’s estate. My throat burns with the thought, and it’s more sore than usual with the hunger creeping around in my gut. 

I sit for a while at a cafe and watch the people of Ravello until I find a worthy candidate. Truthfully, it doesn’t usually take long to find a douchebag. They abound on this earth like a fucking plague. Tonight is no exception. This one is apparently named Alberto, as his friends chime when he regales them with some bullshit story about a girl that sucked him off before he ghosted her. He goes on and on about women that were ‘too fat,’ ‘too loud,’ ‘too crazy,’ or ‘too shit in bed’. In other words, all lies and he probably has a tiny, smelly, crooked dick. Maybe I’ll check once I’ve torn his throat out. Fucking wanker. 

Eventually, he separates off from his friends to head home, and I follow in the shadows. We pass through the Piazza Duomo, heading east on the stone square. There aren’t many people out tonight, and by the time we reach Via Giovanni Boccaccio, the street is empty and dark. 

I’m feeling a bit dramatic, a bit excited. Even a little afraid, to be honest. I haven’t sung at all since before Semyon. So, I think it’s fitting to pick something bold. We need to bring out the big guns for such a momentous occasion. And there’s no singer with bigger guns than Céline Dion.

I start humming the melody for Ashes. A few soft notes. C minor. The lower tones in the song before the crescendo. The sound of my humming startles Alberto and he glances back at me as he walks, giving a flash of a smile when he seems to find me unthreatening. He turns to the road ahead and starts into the tunnel. 

That… that’s not right… he should already be falling under my spell. Even a little hum should ignite the magic that will pull him into my grasp.

I try to shake it off as I enter the tunnel after him. I clear my throat. I swallow the uneasy feeling that’s stirring the bile in my stomach. I let him get a few steps ahead and start again. The tunnel will make my voice sound that much richer and more beautiful. After all, everyone loves a bit of cathedral-like reverb. 

I start again, quietly, from the beginning, singing the lyrics this time. 

What's left to say?

These prayers ain't working anymore

Every word shot down in flames

Alberto’s steps slow a little. Yes. 

What's left to do with these broken pieces on the floor?

I'm losing my voice calling on you 

A little bit slower...

'Cause I've been shaking

I've been bending backwards ‘till I'm broke

 Watching all these dreams go up in smoke

Alberto’s steps hitch and his head tilts... 

I take a deep breath. I put everything into my voice. It’s clear and warm and haunting. All that emotion pours into the darkness around us. 

Let beauty come out of ashes

Let beauty come out of ashes

And when I pray to God all I ask is

Can beauty come out of ashes?

Alberto stops and slowly turns in my direction. I feel a sudden swell of relief. My voice might not be the same as it once was, but the magic is still there. Thank the gods, wherever they are. It’s still there. 

“Questo è il primo…” he says, a smile pulling at the corners of his lips. 

No… 

No no no… 

It’s impossible… 

Alberto’s eyes rake across my body with a predatory gleam. “Non ho mai avuto una ragazza che mi facesse una serenata prima.”

No…

…It didn’t work.

Alberto takes a step in my direction. He’s all swagger and confidence. “What’s your name?” he asks in heavily accented English. 

I feel like my bones have fused into stone. Alberto should be under my control. He should be trapped in a dream. Instead it’s me, trapped in a nightmare. 

My throat burns with anger and hunger and fear and sorrow. It burns in the effort it took to sing. My eyes fill with unshed tears that sting, begging to fall. 

Alberto takes another step in my direction before stopping abruptly, his gaze caught on something behind me in the night. Even in the darkness I can see him turn pale. He pivots on his heel and walks away as quickly as his legs can carry him, then disappears down the tunnel. 

My shoulders shake as I watch him go. The tears cool in the night air as they slide down my cheeks. I try so hard to swallow all this shock and grief back down into a heart that seems saturated with loss. I drop my face into my hands and wish for this to be nothing more than a terrifying illusion. But it’s not. I know it’s not. 

I hear footsteps approach. A set of strong arms fold around me from behind and Ashen pulls me into his embrace. 

“Shh, my vampire,” he whispers in my ear. It only makes me weep that much more. Ashen tightens his hold and presses a lingering kiss to my temple. “Don’t cry, my Lu.” 

“It didn’t work...” My entire being feels like it’s been shredded into a thin strip. I don’t think I recognize myself on the inside anymore. Ashen’s steadying grasp only makes me question what little I think I know. 

“It did. You just ensnared the wrong man.” 

Ashen lets go just enough to turn me to face him, pulling me against his chest. He holds me there for a long while, wrapped in his warmth. I cry into that pristine shirt, into the smell of unsmoked tobacco, into a heartbeat that soothes me, even when I don’t want it to. After a time that seems so long that the minutes feel eternal, Ashen’s fingers thread into my hair and he pulls away, looking into my eyes.

“Stop,” I whisper. Fat tears are still rolling across my skin. He brushes one of them away. 

“Stop what?”

“Just stop,” I say. I don’t know whether I’m talking to Ashen or myself. It felt like a game only this morning. But I can’t play and win like this. My gaze falls away from him but I don’t move from his touch. “Stop making me want to feel for you what I shouldn’t.” 

Ashen sweeps stray locks of hair from my cheek and holds my face in his palms. I meet his gaze for only an instant and regret it as soon as I do. I’m not the only one hurting. It’s all laid bare in his eyes. “Feel what, vampire?” 

“Don’t.” I pull from his grasp and keep my eyes down on the stone beneath my feet. I don’t want to be so vulnerable out here in the open. I feel like a tiger without claws. A snake without fangs. My legs feel leaden when I back away and skirt around him to slip into the solitude of night.

“I will tell you one more thing I did not do, vampire,” Ashen calls after me. There’s a note of anguish so pained in his voice that I stop moving. The silence between us stretches long enough that I turn to look at Ashen where he stands shrouded in the shadows of the tunnel. But I can still see him clearly. I see the tension in his jaw, the way his brows knit together. I see how hard it is for him to gather a breath. “One more thing I did not do, it was the worst thing.” 

My heart plummets. Fingers of ice trace my spine. I don’t think I can handle some deadly admission right now. But I guess that makes it the perfect time to strike. I steel myself for something awful but my voice comes out weary rather than strong. “What?”

Ashen comes forward from the shadows. Every step is careful, like I might run, or combust, or simply disappear. “I never told you how I felt. You asked me, in your ways, and I never answered.” 

He stops in front of me. The light of a nearby streetlamp casts his face in a haunting glow. 

Ashen’s eyes search mine, probably finding all the evidence of fear and distrust and confusion that lurk within them. Centuries of loneliness seem to surface in Ashen when he finds it, and he takes a steadying breath. “I never told you how the lifetimes I have spent taking souls have eroded my own. I did not tell you about everything I have lost over decades of time. I should have told you then, how every moment spent with you brought me out of the shadows. How being with you was like landing on a paradise shore after swimming through a sea of grief. How being apart from you is like being cast into a cold and merciless darkness.” Ashen’s fingers trace my cheek and I close my eyes. I want to lean into his touch. I want to fall into his words. I fight myself with every heartbeat. “I tried to stay away and could not. I tried to push you away and failed. I tried to protect you and failed at that too.”

Ashen steps closer. His palms warm my cheeks. His breath heats my skin. He places a gentle, careful kiss to one closed eye, then the other.  

“Look at me, Lu. Please,” he whispers. And I do. He looks back at me with such determination and longing that I know without any doubt that what I see is true. “The worst thing was that I never told you I love you, Lu. I should have told you when you trusted me with your voice for the first time. Or when we sat in the desert at Saqqara. Or when we stood beneath your name in the library. Even when I held you as we passed into the Shadow Realm. I should have said it over and over until I was sure you would never doubt it. You would have known I was coming for you. That no matter what happened, I would find a way to get you out. That I would give up anything for you.”   

I can’t move, or think, or even breathe. There’s so much longing in Ashen’s face. The time we’ve had together has been so little and not enough. It’s been tarnished like copper left to weather the elements, unprotected and uncared for. And that’s the trouble with love. As strong as it is, love is dangerous, corruptible. Love can be a poison just as lethal as anger or sorrow. 

And I’m afraid. 

“I can’t,” I whisper. “I’m losing who I am. I can’t feel this.”

“But I can,” Ashen says. His determination is unblemished by my honesty. If anything, it’s all the brighter for it. “I will help you find yourself again, Lu. I have enough love for both of us, until you are ready to change your mind.” 

“What if I don’t?” 

Ashen leans closer. The smooth pads of his thumbs follow my cheekbones so carefully that I think I could count every loop and swirl in their prints. “I have immortal time. I know a thing or two about waiting.” 

I look into Ashen’s eyes and it takes just a moment to think it could be this easy. If I just let myself go. I could let him look after me. For a moment. An hour. One night. 

I hear the chambers of Ashen’s heart pump beneath his bones. He draws me closer until my chest touches his, until I am warmed by his molten longing as it melts my walls away. Sparks swirl in Ashen’s eyes as they follow mine. “I love you, my vampire. No matter how you change, or what you lose, or what you gain. You are my Lu, always.”

The cannons, the ramparts, the blocks of stone that keep my heart out of my mind... they crumble away. 

When our lips finally meet, this kiss is different. Stripped to something pure. It’s not just a wave of desire that breaches a dam to sweep you away. This is what it feels like when you have nothing left and you still risk yourself. When someone shelters your dimming flame in their hands. This kiss is love. I might decide I don’t want it. I might let it linger in a dark corner of my heart and hope that it withers and dies. But it’s there, whether or not I give it permission to exist. 

Our tongues caress one another’s in this drugging kiss. I taste mint and vanilla. I taste the venom of desire. I trace the lines of tattoos across Ashen’s neck and pull him closer. His arms snake across my back and one of his calloused palms finds my bare skin beneath my sweater. Ashen sighs into my mouth as though his hands have missed my flesh. He raises me up in his arms and I hold his face between my hands. 

Ashen pulls away to press kisses along my neck. “Let’s go back to the villa, vampire,” he whispers into my skin. 

I shake my head and he places a lingering kiss on my jaw as though he disagrees. My voice comes out forlorn, like I suddenly don’t know how to solve the simplest problem before me. “I’m hungry.” 

Ashen sweeps my hair aside and traces my pulse. “I know. You can feed from me.” 

A ghost of a dark laugh leaves my lips and Ashen grips me tighter in his embrace. It’s so tempting after the hunt I’ve had. Maybe it makes me weak, but I don’t think this is an offer I can refuse. “You do meet the douchebag criteria,” I say, letting out a breath through a brittle smile when Ashen nips at the skin of my throat. I try not to sigh when his lips soothe the bite. “If this is your plan to get me to fall in love with you, it won’t work.” 

I feel Ashen’s smile in his kiss as it carves a slow path back to my mouth. “My only plan is to make you feel every truth in my words. To bury myself in you and watch you come with my blood on your tongue and my name on your lips.”

My smile fades into desire as Ashen sets me down and shifts the hair from my face. He looks into my eyes with bottomless hunger and burning heat. 

“When you fall in love-“ 

“-if-“

“When you fall in love, vampire, it won’t be because of blood or magic. It will be a choice.” 

“What if I don’t choose you?” 

“Maybe you won’t. But I have to believe you will, vampire. Just as I have chosen you,” he says, breathing me in, warming my skin with his touch. I close my eyes and time slows, pulling the threads of pain from my heart and stitching it back together with brighter silk. “Sometimes, even demons have to have faith in love, my vampire. And I have faith in you.”

CHAPTER 23

The darkness of the room is it’s own realm. And in this realm, Ashen is a different man. The power and shadows and decades of dark history are still there. But he seems unguarded. Though there are moments where he fights himself to keep hold of his defenses, he lets them down, one bridge at a time. 

When the door closes behind him and the world is shut away, Ashen spends a long moment just watching me. I must look like the wreck that I feel like on the inside. Like a wick that’s almost burned out. But he watches me like he’s found something wild and rare and precious. Looking at myself reflected in his eyes, I don’t feel so damaged. I feel like what I have been for a long time. Unique. 

The Reaper moves toward me with slow steps. Maybe he expects me to back away the nearer he comes. I guess I have done that a lot lately. But this time, I stay firmly rooted in place. 

When he stops in front of me, Ashen’s eyes alight with a gentle fire. It doesn’t blaze the way it often does. It doesn’t turn black like when he’s enraged. It’s like a flame that’s been burning a long time, lapping at the air with gentle strokes. 

Ashen’s hands come to my face and I feel the relief in his touch. I lean a little into his palm and close my eyes. It’s such a simple thing, a touch, but just as vital as air or water. My brain tries to shout at me to not give in, but in the end it’s not Ashen it surrenders to. It’s my own wounded heart, steeped in poison, that wins the war. It has a will to survive that even reason can’t contain. 

“Ki murangen, naga ekimmu,” he whispers. I love you, my vampire. His breath floods my skin with tingling heat. His lips press to mine. I feel his words in his touch and I know he means them. I know it, beyond hope or faith. Maybe there are other things he wants that matter as much as I do, I can’t be sure. But his love, whether made of copper or glass, it’s real. 

The kiss deepens and Ashen grasps the hem of my sweater, dragging it up my body and letting his fingers trace my skin. I break away and he lifts it over my head. My hands grip his arms as he reaches behind my back and unclasps my bra. He pulls the straps down slowly, first one shoulder, then the other, until it falls from my arms and drops to the floor. 

I undo the buttons of Ashen’s shirt as our tongues sweep and explore one another’s. His hands touch every bit of exposed skin he can. They trace the lines of my ribs and the slope of my shoulders. They follow the foothills of my spine. They sweep across my breasts and trace slow circles around my tight nipples. When the last button is released, I push Ashen’s shirt from his shoulders and press my touch into every muscle as the fabric falls from his skin. 

Ashen breaks away to trace his lips down my neck, kisses and little bites following my collarbone. He carves a path downward until he pulls my breast into his mouth, sucking hard on my flesh. My fingers lace into the soft, short hair at the back of his head and I trace his scalp with my nails. His moan echoes through the cavern of my chest as he circles my nipple with his tongue. When he moves to the other side, he drops to one knee and pulls my body into him, his hands splayed across the cool skin of my back. 

With his palms still pressed across my spine, Ashen kisses his way to the center of my chest, then starts a slow path down the center of my body. He follows the line that traces down my stomach. He kisses my belly button as he unzips my jeans and pulls them down. He slows as he goes lower and then stops at the soft ridge of flesh just above the line of my panties. 

And then he goes preternaturally still.

The tempo of his thumping heart picks up speed. His shoulders feel hot beneath my hands. Smoke coats the floor as the whole world seems to still. 

Ashen presses his forehead to my stomach. When he wraps his arms across the back of my legs and holds me close, his grip hardens like hot stone. 

“Reaper?..” 

His grip tightens. Smoke erupts behind him like a pyroclastic cloud. Sparks crackle within the billowing shadows. 

Something’s not right. 

“Ashen?..”

Ashen inhales slowly, and exhales even slower. It’s as though he’s trying to pull the demon back beneath the surface of the man. “I am so sorry, my Lu. I am.” His voice is so thin and strained. I’ve never heard him like this. 

I know there’s a lot to be sorry for. Part of me still wants to find a place to put all my blame for everything I’ve suffered, and he’s an easy target. But maybe not everything was his fault. Sometimes, I wonder if just knowing one another is all it took to suck us both into a whirlpool of scalding water. It was never going to be enough to swim for our lives. We were both fated to burn. 

“For what?” 

Ashen doesn’t answer me with words. He just grips me tighter, pressing his forehead to my flesh. I smell hints of sulfur and salt. A note of sour citrus. These are fear, and rage. This is sorrow. 

He stays locked to me for a long, immobile moment. His breathing is off. His body is too hot, his grip too tight. I don’t know what to make of him. He doesn’t let up. And then something wet glides down my skin. Oh my God. “Ashen?”

I lay my hands on his face and sweep my thumbs beneath his eyes, streaking a hot tear across his cheek. “Ashen.”

I push him away enough that I can drop to my knees and hold his face between my palms. He keeps his gaze trained on the shadows beneath us. “What is it?” I ask. “What’s wrong?”

Ashen shakes his head. 

“Don’t hide from me now,” I whisper. “Look at me.”

He drags his gaze from the floor and his glassy eyes meet mine. The heartbreak in their depths is the kind of grief that never lets go. 

“Talk to me, Ashen.” 

“You said Gallus…” Ashen takes a strained breath as rage surges against the sorrow and sparks rain across the floor. “You said he cut you open. To see if you could carry a child.”

The memory of that torture is as multifaceted as light fracturing in a prism. The pain of the scalpel. The tang of my blood in the air, burning my own throat with hunger. The feeling of every layer as it was stripped away. Not just skin and muscle and organs, but time and hope and dreams that had long abandoned me. The pain of memory, of how desperately I wanted a child in my early years that I tried everything, everything to force my body to comply. There was the pain of epiphany, that maybe if they were bothering to look, something might have changed. And then the desperate hope that nothing had. 

I swallow a thick knot that tightens in my throat. “Yes.”

“You said they stole. Stole from you,” Ashen says, his rage so burning hot that I almost have to lift my palms from his skin. 

I nod as a tear slips from the corner of my eye. I feel like there’s not enough air in the room. I can barely manage a single word, but it finally comes in a stretched whisper. “Yes.” 

“Stole what, Lu? Were you pregnant?”

I shake my head. It’s with a deep sense of both gratitude and fury to the fates when I tell him, “No, I was not pregnant.” 

Maybe it was a chance that might have been, if I’m changing in the most fundamental ways. The curse all vampires suffer, to never conceive, not even a half-breed. Maybe it could have been lifted. But the Shadow Realm stole even that chance from me. 

“I never will be pregnant, even if I become something new. Gallus and Ember…”

My chest feels tight and my tongue too thick. Pulsing heartbeats echo in my ears. A line of sweat beads across my hairline. Ashen looks at me with fear in his eyes, real fear, either for what I’ve already told him or what I’ve left unsaid. I swallow and try again. 

“They took… they stole from me...”

Christ I just can’t do it. I feel like I’ve been poisoned by memory and imagination. It’s like a film that coats everything you see, that terrible moment when fears you never even knew you had suddenly unspool before you. Terror that makes your stomach twist until you feel the sickness climb your throat. Your mind throws images at you of what could have been. You see yourself in the warmth of the summer sun, cradling your dream in your arms, and then you watch them rip it away. 

I can only shake my head. My gaze drifts into the dark recesses of the room. Ashen lets out a long, shuddering breath. He bends his head. Wings of smoke unfurl to become curtains of sparks and shadow, a beautiful shroud that curls around us. They ripple like a funeral veil drifting in the wind. It’s sorrowful. Haunting. 

“I’m sorry, Lu. I hadn’t realized until this moment it could be a possibility, not until I kissed your flesh and remembered your words. All the timing suddenly lined up and came together in a terrible nightmare, as though what you endured was not already more than anyone should ever bear.” 

Ashen drags a hand through his hair. His shoulders fall. For the first time, he looks like a man I could break. But I can see he’s already as shattered as me. For as many times lately as I’ve wished I could crush him into dust, I find I don’t want to. I don’t want to fix him either. I just want to exist with someone that knows what this feels like.

Ashen takes one of my hands, turning it over in his palm to trace the lines with his thumb. “What you’re going through… I endured a similar loss once, long ago.” 

“You had a child?” 

There’s a long beat of silence as the thick smoke drifts around us, heavy as a blanket. “Almost.”

The bones of my chest feel like they’ve caved in. There’s bitterness and sorrow and guilt in the air between us, but a kind of shared grief that ties us together. “I’m so sorry, Ashen. So very sorry.” 

Some of those layers of time that accumulate like thick sediment in Ashen’s eyes seem scraped away when he looks at me. And not just at me, but into me, right into my soul like he can see its shape and color. His grip tightens around my hand. “I know I have not given you reason to trust in my promises, my Lu. But I swear to you, I swear, I will do everything in my power to give you your vengeance. If you want to burn every realm, I will hand you the match and stand with you until the last cinders fall. I will pay for this promise with my life if I have to.”

I try to smile but it doesn’t feel quite right in my skin. “That’s kind of a genius plan. If I kill off all the realms, you’ll be the only one left to love.” 

“It does have some upsides, as long as you spare me.”

There’s a long and silent moment before we pull one another into an embrace. My body drinks in his warmth. His anger cools beneath my skin. I watch over Ashen’s shoulder as I trail my fingers through the smoke billowing from his back. Glittering sparks follow my hand and Ashen holds me tighter, as though there’s some relief in the touch. “Take us away,” I whisper as his fingertips follow the ridges of my spine. “Make us forget. Close out the rest of the world until there’s no past and future, just us in this room. Just for one night.”

We sway gently, two trees whose trunks have twined together in decades of weathered storms. “All right, my vampire,” he says. When the moment seems ready, Ashen raises us both from our knees. His wings still curl around us in a thick black fog, as though the realms have long disappeared and we stand in our own dimension. “But I cannot promise that one night will be enough.”

And when Ashen sweeps me up in his arms and I twine my legs across his back, the gentle spray of sparks raining down my skin, I know he’s right. One night won’t be enough. When he lays me on the bed and kisses and strokes every inch of my body, whispering adorations in ancient languages, I know a week trapped in this room wouldn’t be enough. When he drags my panties down my legs and kisses his way back to my core to feast on me, and the world and time drifts away as I come apart, I know that a year trapped here would be far too little. And when he pushes into me, looking into my eyes with unguarded warmth as my body welcomes his inside, I know what he’s already figured out. There will never be enough time without the world.

CHAPTER 24

It's still dark when I wake up and reach for Ashen, but his place is empty in the bed. I hear his heartbeat in the room, though. I smell his skin, his warm ink. But something else too. Another heartbeat, the scent of another man. And blood. 

I push my hair from my face and sit up as I turn on the bedside lamp, my gaze colliding with the terrified eyes of a human. 

Alberto. 

“What the fuck?”

I clutch the sheets to my naked body as Ashen drops the man on the floor. Alberto’s form crumples as though already lifeless, but he whimpers when his head hits the rug. Ashen’s dagger is lodged into the back of his neck with expert precision. Alberto is conscious, but completely paralyzed. 

“What the… what are you, a fucking cat bringing home birds now?”

Ashen lifts a shoulder. “I thought you’d be hungry.”

“So you went and got me takeout?.. And severed his spinal cord?..”

Ashen looks down at the crying man with about as much interest as if he were looking at a bug or a rock. “You said once that things got messy when you didn’t sing. I just thought I would make it a little… cleaner for you.”

“How the hell did you even find him?”

“I took Urtur. He was happy to oblige. The jackal has a fondness for you, it seems.”

My heart swells in my chest as I watch Ashen stare down at Alberto. No one has brought me a meal like this before. Not when I was with other vampires, not even in the days when I was first with my sisters on Anthemoessa, unsure of what I was or how to feed. Even Ediye, she brought me bowls and jugs of blood to nurse me back to health. She didn’t haul in actual douchebags. In so many centuries, no one has ever brought me prey the way that Ashen just did. 

The Reaper senses my stasis and turns his gaze to me. “What?”

“That’s very thoughtful,” I say, and Ashen gives me an endearingly warm smile. I glance back down at the man on the floor and clutch the sheet a little higher to my chest. Alberto is looking up at me with his tear-streaked face, sniveling his pleas for help and mercy. 

Ashen’s smile disappears as he realizes what the problem is. He mutters something about poking out eyes as he picks Alberto up enough to face him in the other direction. “He has a weird dick,” Ashen grumbles, and I let out a shocked laugh. 

“You looked at his dick?”

“I had no choice. He pissed and shit himself and I was not about to bring him back to you like that. So I rinsed him off and got him changed.” Ashen glares down at Alberto with a repulsed sneer and turns his gaze back to me. “Small. Hooks to the left.”

I smack the bed with my open palm. “I knew it.” 

We grin at one another. Now that Alberto isn’t looking up at me with fat tears in his eyes, I let the blanket fall away from my chest. Ashen’s gaze drifts down to my breasts and his pupils spark into flame. 

“Vampire,” Ashen purrs, his voice low and dangerous as he prowls toward me. 

A slow smile spreads across my face as I take in the wicked gleam in his eyes. “Reaper.”

Ashen uncovers one of my ankles and runs his fingers up my calf, gripping it to pull me closer. “Go and eat your little bird so I can lick you clean.”

“You are terrible. And insatiable.” I squeal in a fit of giggles as Ashen leans down and nips a ticklish spot near my knee. He runs his nose along the inside of my thigh, climbing higher until he presses a kiss to the soft skin at the top of my leg. Alberto cries out louder from the floor in a desperate plea for help that will never come. 

“Go,” Ashen whispers, wrapping his arm around my leg and tugging me down the bed. “I don’t want to listen to his whimpering. Only yours.” He pulls me to my feet and holds my robe open, waiting for me to slip my arms into the sleeves before tying the belt. When he’s done, he places a lingering kiss on my cheek and then turns away, climbing onto the bed and settling a book across his lap. 

I watch him for a long moment. He quickly becomes absorbed in the text, and presses his fingers to his bottom lip as he loses himself in thought. I think he doesn’t notice me watching until I see a little smile lift the corners of his mouth. “Go, vampire. Before I think of a way to punish you for taking so long to come back to bed.”

He glances over the edge of his book, and when our eyes meet, his features soften with warmth in the dim light. There’s not just love and affection there, but a bit of pride. Like he did something worthwhile by heading into the night and bringing this gift back for me. I give him a fleeting smile and turn away before he can read too much from my skin. 

I kneel down next to Alberto. My fangs descend at the sound of his quiet sobs. Sweet venom coats my tongue.

“Hush now, little bird,” I whisper into his ear. He whines and begs until I place a gentle palm across his mouth, but there’s no real fight left in him. He’s like a deer that’s been outrun. He knows he’ll die, even if he’s not quite ready. “If you find your way to the afterlife, just remember. The only thing that made you special was that he brought you here for me.” 

Alberto’s final pleas for mercy vibrate against my palm as my fangs slide into his skin. I pierce his jugular and sigh as his blood rushes down my throat. I suck in long draws of his juicy sweet life. It doesn’t feel like Ashen’s blood, not even close. Nothing does. But my hunger fades and the burn in my throat recedes. 

Alberto gradually goes quiet and soon slips from consciousness as his heart slows. The last beats pump his life into my mouth and I still hang on, sucking all the drops I can from his paling, cooling flesh. When I’m done, I pull the blade from his spine and wipe it on his shirt. I turn toward the bed and find Ashen watching me. 

“Better?” Ashen says. I nod. His eyes track my every move as he closes his book and lays it on the side table. 

I hold both Ashen’s blade and his gaze as I pull the tie from my robe and let it drift from my shoulders to fall to the floor. Ashen’s pupils turn bright with sparks as I climb onto the bed and stalk toward him. I crawl up his body until I’m straddling his stomach and his warm palms heat my thighs. 

“You look a little nervous, Reaper,” I say through a wicked smile as I draw his blade up to his chest and edge the tip of it beneath one of the black buttons of his shirt. His gaze darts down and back up to my eyes again. When I raise the tip of the knife, the button snaps free of the fabric, pinging into the shadows. 

“So I should be,” he replies. 

I nick the next button and it hits the headboard before skittering across the floor. “I’m sure you’ll be more watchful this time,” I say as I strip another button from its threads. “I think I got you good in Cairo, but I’m pretty sure you let me and Ediye kill you before that.” 

“I thought if I did that you would get some of your anger out of your system. I was hoping it would get old.” 

“It never gets old.” 

Another button flies into the shadows, then another, and another, until they’re all gone. I use the tip of Ashen’s blade to push the edges of his shirt open, raking it over his skin just enough to make him shiver but not enough to make him bleed. I draw the tip back across his chest and let the dagger hover over the tattooed lines of the jackal’s face. I can imagine pushing the blade between his bones and striking his heart. Life could change forever, if I went about it the right way. I could leave my mark and wear a scar of my own. He would be mine, for real. For immortal time. And I would be his. 

I flip the knife and offer it to him by the handle. 

Not tonight. Maybe not ever. 

Ashen takes the blade but watches me closely. I see the most subtle brightening of flame in his eyes. Relief settles into my breath as he sets the dagger on the side table and runs his hands up my sides. But the engine has definitely sparked to life. He knows I was thinking of mating, if only for a moment. And he might leave it alone for now, but I doubt he’ll leave it for good. 

So I guess I’ll just need to distract him. 

I move down to Ashen’s legs and undo his belt, then the hook and zipper. He lifts his hips and I pull the last of his clothes off to drop them on the floor. Ashen’s breath hitches as I climb back up his legs and take the base of his erection in a firm grip. The silken tip glistens with precum and I glide my tongue across it, watching as he closes his eyes and tilts his head back. 

I suck hard on the tip and slide him into my mouth, just enough to make him shudder. I roll my tongue over the crown as I start slowly working the base of his cock with my hand. I take him deeper with each stroke until he hits the back of my throat. He moans and threads his fingers through my hair, guiding my tempo. I swirl my tongue across the underside of his tip and then suck him in hard, over and over. Ashen’s grip tightens on my hair and my eyes water, but I love it, the feeling of my lips bruised and swollen around his length, the way I’m driving him into madness. I tease him, pushing him close to the edge and then slowing my rhythm when I feel him nearly ready to explode. When I rake my fingernails over his balls he growls and drives deeper into my throat. 

“Vampire,” he hisses. “The things I am going to do to you.” 

I let him free of my mouth and drag his hard length down my chin, down my throat, down the center of my chest and across my breast. I skim the tip of his erection around my hardened nipple. “You’re not allowed to make promises, Reaper.”

“I will keep them,” he says, breathing hard as he holds his wrist out to me. He wiggles his fingers. “Drink and I will tell you what they are.” 

I watch his wrist and try to quell the rising sense of need as I run my tongue in a languid stroke across the tip of his sex. “If I don’t, are you going to do them anyway?”

“Definitely,” he says, moaning as I suck his length back into my mouth. “But I like it when you drink.”

“Hmmm,” I say, letting the sound vibrate through his cock until I pull away. “You didn’t specify what I should be drinking, exactly.” I give Ashen a wicked smile before taking him as deep as he’ll go, working my mouth over his length and scraping my nails across his balls as he says my name like a desperate prayer, over and over. His cock thickens and pulses and his cum shoots down my throat. Even this sets something off inside me. Not the same as his blood, but I feel him. With everything I take, he becomes more a part of me, and I wonder if he feels the same about everything I give. 

When I’ve swallowed the last pulses from his sex, I let Ashen go and he pulls me up onto his chest, wrapping his strength around my back. I think for a moment that’s it, we’ll rest and maybe I’ll go back to sleep in this warmth with a full belly and a body on the floor. Which, as if. We’re immortals. We have next-level stamina. Ashen rolls us over and pins my wrists above my head and I know he has every intention of keeping his word. 

“You said something about things you were going to do?.. To me?..” I ask. One side of Ashen’s mouth kicks up in a sinful smile and his eyes rake over my face. I bite down on my grin and give him my best innocent doe eyes. His pupils flare with fire in response. “You look like you might gobble me right up, you heathenous creature.”

Ashen’s smile flashes and he kisses down my breastbone, sweeping his tongue across my flesh until he pulls my nipple into his mouth. My back arches and his grip on my wrists tightens. 

“That is exactly what I am going to do,” he says when he lets go. “Then I am going to bury myself so deep inside you that you won’t know where I end and you begin. And when I have made you climax so many times that my cum is running in rivulets down your legs, I am going to flip you over and fit my cock inside that tight little ass and fuck you until I’ve filled you up.”

I gasp in mock horror and try not to giggle as I squirm. “Filthy demon. Unhand me. The power of Christ compels you.” 

“No one is listening but me, vampire.” Ashen lets go of my wrists but clamps his hand around my throat, keeping me in place as he kisses his way down my stomach. “There won’t be a moment between now and sunrise when one part of me isn’t inside a part of you.”

“Salacious. Release me from your clutches, for I am a pious and holy damsel.” 

Ashen stills, giving a pointed look toward the body on the floor and then back to me before nipping the soft flesh next to my belly button. I squeal and laugh, and a rumbling growl of desire tumbles from his chest. “And you will drink my blood as you ride my cock, moaning my name.”

“So demanding.”

“The demands haven’t even begun, my vampire,” he says as he nudges my thighs open and uses his free hand to pin one of my knees to the mattress. He drags his tongue across my pussy and circles my clit. “Besides, you love my demands. I can taste it on you.” 

My marrow turns to lava. My back arches as he devours my flesh. I twist and writhe but Ashen keeps me pinned with a strong grip on my throat. He scrapes his teeth over my clit and pushes his tongue into my opening and swirls and sucks and feasts on me. 

“Are you going to behave yourself this time?” he asks when he pulls away. His gaze rakes up my body and he watches my eyes with the acuity of a predator as he pushes a finger into me and then another. 

I don’t say anything as he slides his fingers in and out with beckoning strokes. Ashen’s expression darkens. A wicked smile flashes across his lips. He keeps his eyes on mine as he takes my clit between his teeth and bites. I squeak and then gasp as he sucks away the edge of pain, leaving only pleasure behind. 

“I asked you a question,” he demands, increasing the rhythm and stroking deeper with his two fingers.

“I don’t know how to be good,” I say, my voice breathless. I don’t take my eyes from Ashen’s as he looks up at me from between my legs. The desire and approval I see in his expression is magnetic. 

“That’s my vampire. Now I want you to grind that sweet pussy on my face and ride my hand until you come undone.”

My heart feels like it’s imploding and exploding at the same time. 

Ashen descends on me like a starving man. He pumps his fingers into my pussy. He laps the flat of his tongue through my folds and drinks my arousal. He circles my clit and every once in a while he bites, but always kisses the pain away. And then he sucks on that sensitive, swollen bundle of nerves, not letting go as I come. My hips buck from the mattress and he keeps my throat pinned down. He wrings every second out of my orgasm until I’m panting and boneless. 

But true to his word, no sooner has he removed his fingers than his cock is sliding in. He brings his glistening fingers up to my mouth. 

“Lick it off,” he demands as he pistons in and out with long, steady strokes. 

“I’ll do you one better,” I reply with a devious grin before I suck his fingers into my mouth and bite him with my fangs. Ashen hisses in both pain and pleasure and I hold on, clamping down and drawing in his blood. 

Ashen rails into me with punishing thrusts. His palm is still hot around my throat and his grip tightens. I feel the tension straining into my skin, constricting my air. I smile around his fingers and press my teeth in a little harder. I drink in my sweet arousal and honeyed venom and his smoky skin and coppery, tingling blood and I feel all my pain and loss fall away. 

The whole realm seems to shift in his grip and in mine. There’s only this man and this feeling and this taste. There’s only the way he looks at me. There’s only his hand around my throat and my body stretching around his. My trust in my heart. My trust in his. How I ended up here I just don’t know. But in the absence of noise and thought, of sorrow and pain, there is only what I want. What I really, truly want. And right now I want only this, to feel Ashen in every part of me. In my body. In my veins. In my soul. 

Ashen pulls his fingers from my mouth. My fangs rake through his skin, tearing it open in twin, clean lines, razor points gliding across his joints and one slicing through his nail. He growls but I know he likes it, he likes a bit of pain and punishment, he likes seeing his blood fill my mouth. I can tell by the way his body nearly vibrates with need. The way the ridges of his abs ripple. He slides to the very tip of his erection and slams into me. 

“Hold out your tongue for me,” Ashen says, his voice like gravel, his hand as hot as a brand across my neck. 

My skin is slick with sweat. I’m so close to coming undone that I can barely think or even process the strained demand that’s just passed through his lips. I let out a shuddering moan as I swallow the blood in my mouth. 

“Pay attention, vampire.” The sound of his command is as thick and sweet as melted caramel. He thrusts into me with every word when he repeats his command. “Hold. Out. Your. Tongue.”

I’m too close to the edge of a chasm of pleasure to jab back against his demands, because he’s right, I love them. I fucking love them. So I do it. I hold out my tongue. 

“That’s my vampire,” he says indulgently, and holds his torn fingers above my mouth. His hot blood drips down his skin in streams and tributaries and coats my tastebuds, slipping down my throat in a thread of fizzing heat. His strokes are long and steady and deep as he watches, riveted. I let out a whimpering cry as my muscles clench around his girth. “Now say my name and come.” 

And holy shit, his words, his blood, his name passing my lips until I can’t even speak, his thick cock pushing as deep as he can go, just like he promised, and I lose myself, utterly and completely. I come in a blinding rush as bright and searing as an exploding star. It singes my veins and melts my bones and wipes my mind clean of everything except the feeling of my body gripping Ashen’s as he spills into me. I hear nothing but the sound of his desperate roar as he follows me into the abyss. 

We collapse into one another, Ashen’s chest against mine, both of us breathing heavily, and my heart might tear itself out of my chest just to get closer to him. It’s pounding at my bones and in my ears and through my brain, taking over my thoughts in a gripping rhythm that tries to reconcile itself with the tempo of Ashen’s pulse. I can’t think of anything else, just the tingling, bubbling sensation beneath my skin and that thrumming whoosh of blood. 

“I have felt your presence in me from the moment your blood first mixed with mine,” Ashen confesses, slowly, carefully, his breath still ragged across my skin. It’s like a voice in a dream, words that don’t make sense, my brain struggling to find a way out of this fog. His hand releases from my throat so he can brace himself on his arm and look down at me, watching as the words seep in and infiltrate my thoughts. He’s still inside me, still hard. My heart still rages, my flesh still tingles. Ashen looks into my eyes as though searching for me. I blink and notice only now that my pupils have been glowing in their bright vampire gleam, the red light reflecting in the sheen of sweat on Ashen’s face. 

“I still feel you, when you feed from me. Like you awaken in my veins.” His other hand trails down my shoulder, flowing across my bicep, leaving a sticky trail of blood from his wounded fingers. He’s still focused on my eyes and every movement, every word, seems carefully constructed. “I know you must feel me in yours.”

Yes. I pull my bottom lip into my mouth and run my tongue across the blood smeared on my skin. I close my eyes. Even those few drops are like swallowing sparks. I nod and open my eyes.

Ashen’s hand passes my wrist then curls around my fist. “It has already started, vampire,” he says, his eyes still on mine, the look in them almost remorseful, pleading. He uncurls my hand from my grip around the handle of his dagger. I draw in a sharp breath and look over at my fingers that open like a flower to relinquish the blade. 

The blade I took from the side table without even thinking. 

The blade I would have used not to kill, but to mate. 

I look back to Ashen in confusion and shock, and he keeps his eyes on mine as he tosses the dagger across the room. “It has already started. But we won’t finish it tonight. We will only finish it when you know what you’re choosing.” 

I open my mouth to say something… about how this could still be a choice if it’s already started, or how I can decide anything if my body and my heart just do it before my brain can catch up, or just… anything. But nothing comes out. 

“You will still have your choice,” Ashen says, and it comes out like a vow. It comes out sounding true, and Ashen traces his fingers across my cheekbone as though imprinting a promise into my skin. And with the knife lying somewhere in the shadows, I feel a little current of relief in this river of confusion. I watch him for a long moment, still coming back to myself from this fog of desire. 

“What if I don’t choose you?” I ask. I try to find strength in it, but my voice comes out husky and rough, little more than a whisper. Ashen’s bloody hand paints a streak across my ribs as he raises it up to brace his weight on both forearms. His fingers trace a crimson line across my lips and he watches with flaming eyes as my tongue runs through that spicy sweetness. 

“Maybe you won’t. Maybe you will kill me instead. But I will come back. I will keep coming back for you,” Ashen says, and slides within me, slowly gliding out to the tip of his erection and then back in as far as my body will take him. The fire in his eyes grows brighter when I moan and rake my fingernails up his back. His strokes start at a languid pace and I can already feel my desire twisting low in my core. “But you should know a secret, my vampire.”

I trap a fleeting breath in my chest. I try to keep my words steady, even though the rest of me is melting away. “What’s that?” 

Ashen’s motion grows more powerful. The thrusts grow stronger and I know the pleasure will only build, and build, and build until it consumes me. 

“I never said I’d make it easy to choose anything but me.”

CHAPTER 25

Everything he promises he’ll do, he does. And then some. 

I ride his cock and drink from his neck and say his name as he grips my breasts. 

I swallow his length as he grasps my hair and growls my name in a desperate chant. 

We fuck until I’m so filled with his cum and my arousal that it drips down my legs. 

Then he flips me over and pushes slowly into my ass, his body shuddering, just the crown of his cock at first in languid strokes.

“I’m not made of glass, Reaper. I can take it,” I say over my shoulder with a wicked smile as Ashen’s hand sweeps up my spine. He shudders again with my words. 

“I want to take my time with you,” he says, pushing in inch by inch until he gradually fits his length inside. He waits for a long moment, both of us breathing hard and slick with sweat. He slides back out to half his length and pushes in again, waiting. “Christ,” he whispers, his hand tracing the line of my hip and down my pelvis and through my short, soft curls until he reaches my clit.  

“I thought you said no deities were listening,” I whisper as his fingers dip into my pussy to come back to my clit again. He pulls out, slow again, all the way this time. I think for a minute that he might break his word, but his fingers slide back into my opening just as he leaves my ass. He leans his head on my back and his breath spills across my skin in a stuttering cadence like he can barely hold himself together. 

“I was wrong,” Ashen says as he presses in, taking his time to savor the way my rim grips the head of his cock. He slides all the way in until his hips are flush with my ass and then starts a slow and languid pace of thrusts. “There is one deity here. You’re a fucking goddess, sent to destroy me.” 

And just as he promises, he takes his time. He starts a rhythmic pace that builds and builds and before long he’s pumping into me, his balls slapping my pussy as his fingers circle my clit. “You are so tight, my goddess. So fucking tight,” he whispers, over and over next to my ear as my back arches and I come, moaning his name. He spills into me, and we rest for a while only to start again, and again, until dawn lightens the sky. 

Everyone is still asleep when we head down the hall to the bathroom to shower together. My legs are sticky, my body boneless and sore in the best ways, my flesh tingling beneath my skin from the blood I’ve taken from Ashen. And still when we’re in the shower we fuck once more, my legs wrapped around Ashen as he pushes my back against the cool and soothing tile and I suck the gel of blood from his fingers that softens in the warm water. One last, blinding orgasm in a night that I wish would never end. 

We bandage his torn fingers then go back to the room, stepping around the cold corpse on the floor, and climb onto the sheets that smell like sex and promises. I lie on Ashen’s chest, my head tucked beneath his chin. He draws the blankets up and wraps his arm across my back, slowly running his fingers through my hair, the sound and feel of his touch as melodious as a lullaby. 

“I love you, Lu. My beautiful, otherworldly, magical goddess Lu,” he whispers. 

Love. He says it so easily, like it’s both a privilege and a relief. Like tossing an injured bird to the sky and watching it disappear into the distance, healed and wild and free. And though I can’t say it back, he doesn’t seem to mind. Even just knowing he’s content with waiting draws a little more of the venom from my heart. Like I once said, our blood is liquid patience. And while he waits, I can still say the things that mean as much as love to me. 

“Don’t go, if you can’t sleep. I don’t want to wake up alone,” I confess, my voice tired and sluggish. Everything I don’t want to give a voice to, about nightmares and fear, about trust and comfort, hangs in the air.  

Ashen’s arm tightens across my back. He breathes a kiss into my hair. “I will be right here when you wake,” he whispers. 

And then I fall into a deep, dreamless sleep. 

I wake up to the sound of a whisper in my ear and the tickle of my hair moving across my neck with Ashen’s breath. 

“Vampire. Time to get up.”

Ashen’s quiet request makes me want to do exactly the opposite. I wriggle in closer, sucking up his warmth as it radiates through my back. 

“…No.”

“It’s almost noon.”

“Don’t care.” 

“The others are making lunch.”

“I’m on a douchebag-only diet and they don’t cater to my tastes.”

“They will be wondering where we are.”

I scoff at that one and pull Ashen’s arm tighter across my stomach, still refusing to open my eyes. “They know exactly where we are.” 

I burrow myself further under the covers and Ashen tries to give them a gentle tug, but my death grip on the edge of the blanket is unrelenting. I keep it pulled to my neck as I roll over and face him. 

Ashen is the first thing I see when I open my eyes, and I realize in that moment that I could wake up next to him every day for a thousand years and it would still feel like an electric shock just to look at him. Those dark lashes and the unguarded warmth in his cognac eyes. The radiance of his skin and the luster of his short, dark hair in the morning light. Those lines and lines of black tattoos that flow down his neck and shoulders and disappear beneath the blanket. 

Wrapped in his scent and his touch and his attentive gaze, I feel like some of the hurt and worry and anger I’ve been carrying like a noose around my neck has been set aside, at least for a little while. Like I stumbled into some healing waters and emerged a little more at peace on the opposite shore. 

That’s what being in love can do, stupid, a little whisper chirps inside my head. 

No, that’s what a good dicking can do, moron, I say back. 

It wasn’t just sex and you know it. You wouldn’t have let him close if you didn’t feel something for him. 

Shut the fuck up. You don’t even have a proper voice anymore, I snap to that persistent little whisper, and that thought jabs at my heart like a hot needle. 

So why take one more thing away from yourself when so much was taken already?

….

….

Touché, you bitch. 

Ashen’s gaze follows the angles of my face before coming back to my eyes. He smiles and it looks way too intuitive for my liking. “Do you ever just wake up peacefully, or do you always start your day with some kind of battle? I do wonder if the war ever subsides in your thoughts.”

I narrow my eyes. His smile grows a little wider. 

“What were you thinking just now?”

“I’m not telling you.”

Ashen shifts subtly so that he’s a little more over me, his weight pressing my shoulder to the mattress. He kisses my neck and his breath sends a rush of gooseflesh across my chest. “What if I demand that you tell me? You seem to like my demands.”

I suppress a shudder of desire. “I think it’s time to get up,” I grumble, and squirm out from beneath Ashen, his hand trailing after me. 

“All right, vampire,” he says as I head toward the wardrobe. I can hear the smug smile ringing in his voice. “Pass me my dagger when you have a moment, will you? You know, the one that I pulled from your hand? Perhaps we can discuss what you intended to do with it another time.”

I stiffen and turn enough to give Ashen the evil eye over my shoulder. He gives the most infuriating, teasing, adorable grin in reply. I spot the dagger a few feet away and retrieve it from the floor, flipping it end over end in my hand as I turn my gaze back to Ashen. 

“Vampire...” he says in a low warning, though the smile still tugs at his lips. 

The dagger flies from my hand and smacks into the headboard with a twang. Ashen looks at the blade next to his head and back to me, his smile growing wide. 

“I missed,” I say, trying to toss him a glare as fierce as the dagger he pulls from the split wood. 

“No, you didn’t.” 

“I can try again.”

Ashen laughs. God almighty, that sound. It’s like a punch to the chest every time I hear it. But in a good way. Like, a nice punch. Okay yeah, that might not make much sense at first. It’s just that it’s not a warm hug, not like wrapping a blanket around yourself and sitting in a bay window to watch the snow falling outside as you sip hot chocolate. It’s a shock. It’s unexpected. It steals my breath and grabs hold of me. I feel the impression of it beneath my bones when it’s gone. 

But why is that? 

Is it because it’s so infrequent? Demon reapers aren’t really known to be blessed with easy laughter, I guess. Is it because it’s hard-earned, and I’m the one that coaxed it to life? Or is it just him? Is it that it makes me happy to see and hear the way he transforms when he lets himself go?

You idiot, it’s because you’re falling in lo-

Shut the fuck up, woman. 

Ashen’s smile grows as he looks down at the dagger. “I have seen you throw blades accurately with your peripheral vision. You never miss.” His eyes slide to mine and he gives me a dark, cocky smile. I can’t decide if I want to smack his face or sit on it. “Does that mean I’m growing on you?” 

I try not to blush and turn away as I slip on my robe. “Maybe. In the way that barnacles grow on whales, or fleas infest dogs, or-“

“-don’t say those weird wasps-“

“-or those wasps that lay eggs on spiders and then mind-control them into spinning crazy webs before they suck out all their spider juices and kill them. Yeah, you’re definitely growing on me like one of those.”

He’s on me before I even finish my sentence, sweeping me up with one solid arm around my middle to throw us both down onto the bed.

“You, vampire, are in imminent danger,” Ashen growls as he cages me between his limbs. He tries to look serious but I can see the warmth radiate from his eyes. 

“Why? Can you lay eggs?” 

I dissolve into giggles as Ashen digs his fingers into my sides in an unrelenting tickle until I beg him to stop. We watch one another with fading smiles as the laughter dies away and I catch my breath. 

This is the lightest I’ve felt in days. The most unburdened. I know when we leave this room that reality will creep back in, but for this moment, I feel like the broken edges of my heart are a little less sharp. 

Ashen sweeps locks of hair from my cheeks and searches my face. That light is still there in his eyes, even as his smile fades to all but the faintest trace. His hand drifts down my neck and lays over my pulse. “Do you love me yet, vampire?”

I let out an incredulous bark of a laugh. “One hundred percent NO.”

Ashen’s expression only seems to warm further despite my response. “Are you sure?”

“Did you really think I’d fall in love with you because of one night? I don’t care how mind-blowing the sex was, that’s not gonna happen.”

That cocky grin reappears on Ashen’s lips. “Mind-blowing?”

I roll my eyes and his smile only grows cockier, which I didn’t think would be possible. “Wipe that smug grin off your face. You know it was, Reaper. But the point remains: one night doesn’t change anything.”

“But it can, if you let it. The most monumental changes in life seem to happen in an instant,” Ashen says. His deep voice is quieter as his gaze wanders down to my lips and his smile dissolves. His fingers caress the line of my pulse. “Decades of time pass without change. One day bleeds into the next. They flow as a slow procession of memory and regret that becomes static and unchanging, until life is just existing. And suddenly you find yourself in an alley, face-to-face with a beautiful, brazen, bold vampire and she infuses your world with color and light. One breath of time, and you realize you have been living in monochrome and shadow. One night was all it took to change my life.” 

My heart hammers at my bones and I know that Ashen can feel it beneath his palm. We watch one another and all his longing, his desire, his need, it’s unfiltered in his eyes. But there’s something in him that I haven’t seen before last night. A lightness. And determination. 

My head finally kicks into gear. I swallow a thick knot and resurrect the hurt that still lives like a creature trapped in my chest. “An instant is all it takes to break a heart. And it takes time to repair something shattered. If it’s even worth fixing at all.”

Ashen leans closer, his eyes not leaving mine until he presses a lingering kiss on my lips. “I told you, my vampire. I have immortal time,” he says when he pulls away. 

“Time is not enough.”

“Then tell me what is.”

“Your secrets. Truth.”

Ashen takes a deep breath as though steeling himself. “Anything you ask, it’s yours.”

I pull his hand from the bed and run my fingers over the gold and black tattoos on his knuckles. “Why is the Master of War here in the Living Realm? Alone?”

“To find you and bring you back,” he says, without pretense or delay or any emotion at all. We stare at one another as he assesses my reaction. “You are not surprised.”

“No. I figured that was why you were here. I told you as much at Club Caelum.” I don’t let go of his hand, though the admission still twists a needle of pain in my guts. I want him to know that his honesty is worth the effort.  

“I did not say I would do that.”

“But you could, once we finish what Semyon started.” 

“I could have already, if that’s what I had wanted,” Ashen says, and my brows quirk in a question. “The human scientist that you attacked in the dungeon? You didn’t kill him. The Council believes it was Cole that freed you on his own. They have no knowledge of Dr. Keller’s involvement. But he also has no allegiance to you, all things considered. He will do what it takes to survive, and he is still in the Shadow Realm, still analyzing the sample and working on serums. They are confident he can find a solution to finish the process of your transformation. My only mission from the Council was to bring you back alive, and I convinced them that going alone would give us a better chance of success.”

“If they wanted me alive, why send the snakes?”

“Ningish was supposed to retrieve, not kill. And now that he is dead, Zida will want revenge over any mission. She will be coming to finish you.” 

“And how do I know you haven’t decided to extend your mission so you could flush out Cole, or Eryx, or the plans of the Realm of Light?”

Ashen thinks about it for a long moment, watching me. “That would be a logical assumption. But that is not why I stay, and for that the only thing I can say is you will need to trust me.” 

I don’t respond to that, and it doesn’t look like Ashen expects me to. He just watches, observes. Learns. The silence stretches on until his keen watchfulness becomes a little unnerving. 

“What do you expect to happen if you show up to the Council empty-handed?” I ask in a quiet voice. It worries me, and though I might not want to admit it, I’m nervous about what they would do to him. 

“I don’t know,” Ashen says, and looks away as he twirls a lock of my hair around his finger. The spiral curls around his skin and uncurls again, over and over as his thoughts drift away from me. “I don’t know.” 

I raise my hand and lay it on his face. For a moment I wonder if I should. But then he leans into my palm and brings his eyes back to me, and it feels right to be trapped by his gaze. “Thank you.”

A wisp of surprise flashes through Ashen’s expression. “For what?”

“For telling me these things.” 

He smiles. I smile back. I raise my other hand to Ashen’s face and draw him down to me, kissing him long and deep. Our tongues make languid passes, our breath mixes with a sweet current of air. It doesn’t take long for the heat to build in the pit of longing that seems bottomless between us. Just a few more moments in this room, alone without the rest of the world. That’s all I want. 

Naturally, that’s what the world wants to deny me. 

A knock sounds at the door and our kiss breaks off abruptly, as though we’re both surprised that reality would find us once more. 

“Listen up, sex fiends,” Ediye says from the other side of the door. I groan and drag a hand down my face as Ashen puffs a laugh. “Everything is ready to go for Romania. But we can’t get close to Magura by portal. Valentina has the whole area locked down with layers of spells. We’ll portal to Câmpulung to rent vehicles and drive there. So, finish banging so we can get on the road.”

I snort a laugh. “Yes, darling,” I call back to her. 

“And by banging I mean once, not six times.”

“Christ,” I whisper. 

“And don’t forget the body on the floor. The Scythe wants to harvest the good stuff before it starts disintegrating.” 

“How did you-” 

But Ediye is already dancing down the hall. I can hear her smug little feet. “Once! Not six!” she calls out, and I press my fingertips into my cheeks as I let out a long sigh. 

“God I love her, but she’s the worst,” I say as I start to squirm from under Ashen. He catches my waist and leans in to drag his lips across my neck. “What are you doing? You heard the woman, we’ve got to get going.”

“I did hear the woman. She said ‘once’. I know better than to disobey her direct orders,” he says through kisses as his hand slips beneath my robe.

I laugh but I’m already gripping Ashen’s bare shoulders and trailing my fingers across his back. I press my lips to his throat as his palm slides down, sweeping over my breasts, flowing down my stomach until he reaches my center. 

“Vampire,” he purrs, finding my entrance already so slick with arousal. He circles my clit in a light, teasing caress. “So wet for me, always.”

“Just like you’re so hard for me, always,” I say as I wrap my hand around his length. He moans as I stroke his shaft. 

“Painfully so, and more often than I care to admit.”

Ashen claims my mouth in a bruising kiss as we touch and tease one another. I lose myself to his warmth and the desire that coils low in my belly. Romania, portals, cars, it all disappears until all that exists is Ashen’s hands and his mouth and this need, this need that never abates. 

Ashen breaks the kiss and rests his forehead against mine, his breath coming in a ragged cadence. “If we were smart, we would do this in the shower to appease both Ediye and the Scythe with our time management skills.”

“Agreed,” I say, breathless and desperate. “But I can’t wait that long.” 

“Thank fuck for that.” Ashen slides into me and we both gasp as my body envelops his warmth. His fingers still circle my clit as he thrusts into me, driving in deep and hard. I rake my teeth across his shoulder in gentle, fangless bites until Ashen’s hand lays on my cheek, gently guiding my mouth closer to his neck. “Take more,” he whispers.

I let out the breath of a laugh across his skin. “The more I take, the more I want.”

“I know.”

“You aren’t playing fair.”

“I never said I would.” 

I angle my head to catch his gaze. He smiles, and though he’s teasing, he’s also being honest. And if I’m being honest with myself, I do want more. Nothing tastes the same, or feels the same. I don’t know if it’s the magic of bloodfate, or centuries of loneliness catching up with me, or a reckless desire to seize the things that I want even though they might be bad for me. But when my fangs draw down, I know I won’t decline. I can’t. 

I place a kiss to Ashen’s neck before my teeth slide into his skin. I pierce just deep enough to take from him safely, and then draw in a mouthful of blood. The electric energy courses down my throat, this taste that’s so distinctly Ashen’s. It’s a delicate sweetness, a warm spiciness, a rich saltiness with undertones of copper. It fizzes like popping candy and it heats me from within, charging through my veins like lightning. 

Ashen’s hand threads into my hair, holding me to his neck as I take another pull of his blood. His motion steadies to a more rhythmic pace, less thrusting but somehow more powerful. “Christ,” he hisses, the sound of his voice vibrating against my lips. “Why does it feel like this?”

I pull away and feel my brows draw together as I look into his eyes. “Like what?”

“Like you live in my veins. Like all the power of the realms is siphoning into me. Like I can feel your history, alive and vibrant, just beneath my skin,” he whispers as he sweeps away the hair stuck to the sweat misting my temples. His cognac eyes look achingly hopeful. “Is this what it would feel like?”

I’m still so caught up in what he describes that it takes a moment before I can respond. “What?”

“Is this what it would feel like if we were mated?”

I shake my head, ever so slightly. “I… I don’t know,” I whisper, and my heart fills with another kind of venom. Not anger or sorrow, or rage or loneliness or envy. It’s the painful sting of compassion. I suddenly understand how little has been truly good in Ashen’s life. The way he looks at me, like all his power and strength is resting in my answer, it’s as clear as polished glass. All this man has ever truly known is darkness and loss. What Ember once said is true. He’s looking for the light, and he’s hoping that I’m it. 

“I don’t know, Ashen,” I say again, folding my arms across his back to draw him closer as I chase the release that’s slowly building in my center with every wave of motion. “Maybe one day we’ll find out.”

CHAPTER 26

I had hoped the world would leave us be, at least for a little while. But when we step back outside the bedroom, it brings concrete questions to answer and problems to solve. Small things, like what to pack for the unseasonably cold weather in Romania when we’re limited by what the Datura Coven has to offer. Medium things, like what kind of vehicle we can rent that will comfortably fit an oversized demon jackal. Big things, like that the fuck I’m doing with my life Oh My God. 

I’m not falling for him I’m not falling for him I’m not falling for him. 

I have to chant this on average every three minutes and twenty-six seconds. And I’ve worked out that precise number in an effort to distract myself. Because every time Ediye gives me a knowing little grin, or Eryx gives me glitterball eyes, or Ashen finds some way to graze my fingers with his or let his touch linger on my back, I feel like I’m melting. Like all my emotions are pasted all over me. Which they probably are, and I’m betting not even limited to my super expressive face but on my arms and hands and clothes and fuck…. I’m not falling for him. 

One night changes nothing. He needed it, I needed it, we’re consenting adults that both deserved to have some fun. 

And we did. We had lots of fun. In various positions and across many hours. And now I feel so much better, I really do. Even despite what happened when I tried to sing, which stings my eyes with tears when I really think about it. I know I’ll have to come to terms with that, somehow. But whenever I feel like it will overwhelm me, Ashen is right there as though he knows where my thoughts have wandered off to. He checks in with me and distracts me and is just… kind. And the blame I’ve placed on him seems further in the distance of time than it really is, but that’s where it seems to belong. 

Don’t get me wrong, this is still highly confusing as I thought I’d made my mind up to fuck him over as thoroughly as possible. And I still can’t say I trust him completely. Facts are facts. He might have a point about us being surrounded in the Shadow Realm, but I’m still not thrilled about how he stood by and watched it all unfold. And he technically cursed me, I’m still pissed about that too. Also, I do think there could be other motivators behind his actions, and maybe it’s easy for us both to forget about them and focus on just one thing in the Living Realm, like the rest of his responsibilities stop existing while he’s here. Just the same as I felt about pushing away the outside world when we were alone in my room. 

As much as he’s been sweet and kind and he’s hot as fuck, he’s still a demon on a mission of which I am the center. Which is bad. Super bad. 

Not falling. No. 

These thoughts and worries and hopes and fears are still swirling within me as Ediye forms the portal that will take us to the outskirts of Câmpulung. 

We stand as a group in the courtyard of the villa, some of the coven members lined behind a smiling Bianca, including Gigi, who it turns out is the Scythe who took Alberto’s body from the room when Ashen and I finally left to shower (and fuck one last time, despite Ediye’s explicit orders). Her bright green eyes stand out from her warm, tanned skin, her long chestnut hair flowing in waves down to her mid-back. She pulls away from the pack of witches to place a kiss on each of Davina’s cheeks. 

“It was so lovely to meet another Scythe,” the woman says. 

“Thank you, Gianna. Likewise. That was long ago for me, however,” Davina replies. 

“Please. It’s Gigi. And once a Scythe, always a Scythe,” Gigi says, her smile broad and brilliant in the bright afternoon sun. “Safe travels, Davina.” 

Davina waves a brief goodbye to the other coven members, who smile with warmth and a little sadness as they watch her pass through the portal. I realize for the first time that this must have been a place of familiarity and comfort for Davina, to be among her people even if they weren’t her clan, and it pangs in my heart as I watch her disappear from view. 

Cassian is the next up, and gives a warm parting embrace to Bianca and those standing close to her. Eryx, Cole and Ediye follow in quick succession. Ashen goes next with Urtur trailing close to his heel, and he turns back before passing through the vortex to give me a worried glance, as though I might not follow. I give him a brief smile and he gives a nod in return, and with one last darting look to Bianca he passes into the darkness of the deepest space. 

“Thank you very much for your hospitality,” I say to Bianca as I step forward. “I’m sorry again about the mess I made in your bathroom.” 

Bianca smiles, amusement dancing in her eyes. “It’s no trouble, vampira. I do love a little entertainment.”

We kiss one another’s cheeks and I step away, waving to the others that I haven’t gotten to know before closing in on the portal. 

“Vampira,” Bianca calls just before I step into the darkness. I stop and turn with a question in my eyes. “Don’t forget. Gasaan tiildibba me zi ab. You already knew.”

The first line of my spell. Queen that gives life to the dying. I blink and for just a moment I’m there, back in Sanford, hovering over Ashen as my blood flows into his wound. The look he’d given me just before that, one of resignation, it’s as fresh in my mind as though I’ve just seen it. 

I blink again and I’m back, standing in front of the portal with my head turned to the smiling witch. My skull buzzes with the start of a hornet headache and I rub my temple. 

Bianca smiles. The look she’s giving me is a little sympathetic. “Good luck, vampira. You’re going to need it.” 

Well, that’s fucking reassuring, I think, despite giving a polite nod in reply. I face forward and step into the portal, disappearing into the image of the cosmos and the mysteries of space and time. 

When I arrive with the others in the Romanian countryside, my headache is spiking as though the hornets have multiplied and decided the space in my skull is far too small. And they are pissed about it. 

I knock back some of the elixir and lean in the shadow of a tree, surveying the landscape around us. There’s a thin layer of snow on the ground but the sun is bright, reflecting on the powdered surface like glittering jewels. I close my eyes and wait for the pain to subside as I take another sip. 

“You okay?” Cole asks as he stops next to me, watching as the others exchange bags and run through last minute details. I look up and smile. 

“Yeah. I think so.” 

“Not working as well anymore, is it,” he says as he nods at the vial in my hand. I take another sip before turning my gaze across the snow-dusted hills. 

“No.”

Cole sighs and leans against the tree. The warmth of his shoulder filters through my sweater and heats my skin. We fall into silence as we watch the others laugh and chat. Eryx’s wings shimmer in the bright light, as shining and beautiful as the soul that owns them. Ediye’s tall, graceful frame absorbs the ebb and flow of conversation as she sways with laughter. Cassian is still the same as I ever knew him, kind eyes that dance with mirth as he tells some animated story that makes even Davina crack a smile. Ashen bends to run a hand through Urtur’s midnight fur as the jackal noses the snow. He looks over his shoulder and shoots me a glance that quickly morphs into concern when the pain on my face registers. I smile and he moves to stand but I shake my head before leaning back to drink the final sips of smoky liquid. 

“You won’t turn out like Arne,” Cole says.

I glance over at him, startled. I realize then that it wasn’t at the forefront of my thoughts, but that particular worry has been lingering behind them like an ever-present cloud that blots out the warmth of the sun. “How do you know?”

“I don’t know. I just do.” 

We look at one another for a long moment before I lean my head on his shoulder and wrap my hand around his arm. For a moment he seems to tense before he lays his palm over mine. “You’re a good man, Cole. Thank you.” 

Cole lets out a breath that feels like relief, like he’s been carrying it around in his lungs for too long. Maybe he just needs to be told more often. “You’re welcome, Lu,” he whispers, and his voice sounds tight as his grip tightens on my hand. He clears his throat and pushes away from the tree. “I’ll take Cassian and Ediye to get the vehicles. Will you be okay here?”

“Yeah,” I say as I squeeze his arm and then let go. “I’ll be just fine.”

Cole gives me a little smile over his shoulder as he shoves his hands into his pockets and walks toward Ediye and Cassian. They start in the direction of Câmpulung, Davina electing to walk with them. Eryx and Ashen stay with me and we find a fallen log to sit on and spend time chatting as we watch the jackal roll in the snow. 

When the others return with two sedans and an Opel van, we load up our things and depart in a convoy. Cole, Eryx, and Ediye lead the way, followed by Cassian and Davina in the second car. Ashen wrangles Urtur into the back of the van with a little protest from the demon beast who’d rather explore the novelty of snow, and we take up the rear of the convoy. 

We drive for a while without conversation. It’s a comfortable kind of almost-silence, with just the radio playing and the occasional yip from Urtur as he dreams about whatever demon jackals dream of. Shadowy little mice or Romanian snow or frisbee in Ravello, I guess. The quiet lets me lose myself to thoughts and memories as we pass small towns and wide fields, rolling hills and snow-dusted mountains. The terrain becomes more and more familiar as we make our way toward Bran, where Vlad’s castle is now a tourist attraction for those who are interested in the bloody history of the man I made into the world’s most infamous vampire. Something that you humans think of as legend, despite the fact it’s true. I guess we immortals are better off for your unwillingness to believe in us. Even though we believe in you. 

We turn off before we make it to Bran and head northwest toward Magura. The narrow dirt road climbs toward the Piatra Craiului mountains in a winding path of sharp turns. Urtur jostles awake as we bump along the uneven surface, whining when his head smacks the roof of the van over a particularly nasty hump. We’re still making good time despite the sections of potholes and channels where water has slid down from the mountains and carved veins into the surface of the road. 

“I know it’s not the same, but it still sounds beautiful, Lu,” Ashen says quietly as he steers us along after the others, snapping me out of thoughts of Vlad.  

“Huh?” 

“Your voice.”

I didn’t realize I’d been humming to the song on the radio, something Romanian that I’ve never heard before but with a catchy melody that’s easy to pick up. We meet eyes long enough for Ashen to see my little smile of thanks. I turn my gaze to the countryside that stretches down from the edge of the road. 

“How much elixir do you have left?” he asks, and though he tries to keep his voice measured, I can still hear the worry in it. 

I fidget with the grip on my katana to stop from rubbing my temple in a futile attempt to dampen the stinging pain in my head. “Probably not enough.”

“As soon as we find Valentina, we will find a way to fix it,” Ashen says. I see him glance my way in my peripheral vision, but I keep my eyes on the road ahead.

“I don’t think it’s going to be that simple, Ashen.” 

I say nothing for a long moment as I watch the tail lights of Cassian’s car disappear around a bend ahead, then reappear once we round the curve. “It’s not like we can just rock up to some genetics lab and order them to figure it out.”

“No. But we can find Semyon and take the serum from him.” 

I don’t say anything in reply. I still don’t trust Ashen enough to tell him everything. Not about Semyon’s serum or how he would be able to control me with it through his power as the Alpha. Not about what I know I’ll need to do to beat him without that power shifting to the next werewolf in line. No, I won’t be saying anything about that. So while I might lean into Ashen’s touch as he reaches across the center console to run his fingers through my hair, my thoughts drift further away, locked far beyond his reach. 

I look ahead to the two cars in front of us and shift my thoughts to the immortals inside as we weave up the mountainside. “Davina was a Scythe?”

Ashen tenses at the sudden change of topic that I hope will draw him away from other thoughts. I give him a sharp little glance to remind him that he agreed to give me his secrets, and though I can tell he doesn’t rejoice in discussing Davina, he’ll do it anyway. “Yes. She was a Scythe.”

“What happened? Why was she reaped?”

Ashen lets out a steadying breath. His grip tightens on the steering wheel, the cushioned plastic protesting under his palms. “She harvested a body she shouldn’t have.” 

“A Reaper?” 

Ashen shakes his head. “No. Much worse.”

“An angel? That wouldn’t go down well I guess.”

There’s a long moment of silence. “No, Lu. Not an angel.” I look at Ashen for a long moment until I grow impatient and smack his arm. He glowers at me and I can see the fight within himself to give this secret up. “A demigod.”

“A what?”

Ashen’s eyes darken. He nods. 

“A demigod?.. Seriously?”

Ashen nods again and his brow furrows. “Yes.”

“And Davina harvested this demigod? Who killed it? How? What was it? I’ve never heard of such a thing. Why?”

“Only the Shadow Realm and the Realm of Light were supposed to know. It was a closely guarded secret, by decree of the gods. It has been centuries since the last demigod passed. They were more fragile than other creatures, more mortal, even though they carried some of the powers of their ancestors. Both angels and demons were duty-bound to protect knowledge of their existence from all others.”

My gaze sweeps across the landscape as I try to process Ashen’s words. “So did she just happen upon the body, or did she know what she was doing? Were you the one who told her what it was?”

“Yes. I was the one who told her about his existence. I was in love with her. I thought I could trust her. But she was more bent on revenge for the death of her parents than I thought, and she used the information to strike a deal with a vampire who wanted the bone ground to dust and the ashes of the heart. In exchange, the vampire would capture Barbossa Sarno for Davina.”

“What? Bobby Sarno? She knew Bobby?” 

Ashen gives a grim nod and a heavy sigh. “You are not the only one Bobby Sarno crossed.” 

I snort a laugh and watch as the two cars ahead take a snaking curve at speed, throwing gravel down the steep drop on the right. “Understatement of the millennia. I’m sure there was a long waiting list for those of us that wanted Sarno dead. Who was the vampire?”

“Davina refused to tell me. She only said that the vampire had killed the demigod and would ambush Sarno’s merchant ship in exchange for the harvest. The vampire would then hold Sarno and get a message to Davina so she could portal to the location and kill him herself.”

A sharp breath catches in my lungs. 

My heart stops behind its cage of bone. 

And I owe it to you, Davina had said in Ravello. 

My reply echoes in memory: You didn’t do anything to me. You owe me nothing.

I remember the conviction in her voice when she spoke her next words. 

You’re wrong. 

And my sister’s voice as we stood on the cliff in Anthemoessa, before she pushed me into the safety of the sea. 

Find Barbossa Sarno, from the ship. Get a spell. Take the weapon and get revenge. 

“Aglaope,” I whisper as a cold chill spiders through my skin. 

I turn to face Ashen. He looks at me. His eyes grow wide. 

Ashen’s gaze is still fused to mine when it happens. He doesn’t see what I do, what’s just next to his window. 

The pointed edge of an armored personnel carrier, the metal catching the light of the sun. 

One last lucid thought screams in my mind until it’s crushed in the litany of twisting metal and shattering glass. Bianca was right. 

I already knew. 

CHAPTER 27

I feel my sister’s hand on my wet shoulder. She presses grains of sand into my damp skin as she smiles down at me. The roar of the ocean surges, water pounding at the beach and the cliffs that jut from the sea. 

Do not worry, my love. I will look after you.

I peel my eyes open. 

The ocean is the blood rushing through my ears. The grains of sand are the grit of glass that peppers my shoulder and face. Gasoline and engine oil, coolant and blood fill the battered van with stinging scents. Urtur whines over the hiss of steam and the dinging of the dashboard electronics and the groan of the dying engine. 

I look down at my body. I’m covered in blood and debris. Everything hurts. My head. My hand. One of my fingers is bent the wrong way. Broken ribs grate against their shattered points. A deep slice on my thigh screams as I shift to look at the driver’s seat. 

Ashen’s head is tilted forward, chin to chest. Blood runs down his face in rivulets and taps on his leg in thick drops. I hear the rumble of a punctured lung and the swirl of internal bleeding. He’s unconscious and badly injured, but alive. 

There’s a noise from the back of the van. I can already sense and smell the damage when I look back at Urtur. 

The jackal’s amber eyes meet mine and I hear the swish of his tail, even as he whines. He pants in stuttering, shallow breaths. I can smell blood on his breath. The marrow of broken bones. Bile from a punctured liver. Urtur cries again and lays his head down, his body quivering with shock. 

My fingers fumble with the button for the seat belt until it finally releases. I grit my teeth through the pain and shift, turning back toward Urtur. He whines as I drag myself out of my seat. My broken ribs are starting to knit back together, but not enough to stop from digging into my lungs with every breath. 

“Hey, buddy,” I whisper. I kneel on the floor of the van next to where Urtur’s head is jammed between the seats. My hand flows across his silken, sulfur-scented fur. He cries, but it’s weaker now. Every breath is shallower than the last, every heartbeat fainter. 

“It’s okay,” I whisper. I wrap my hands around Urtur’s neck. Tears slide across my skin. Urtur’s whines fade. I feel him slipping away in my grasp. His body slackens. “It’s going to be okay.”

Only a few last whispers of breath are left, and then Urtur is gone. I watch, and wait, and at first nothing happens, but finally the first flakes of ash lift from his body and I bend my head with relief. He’s going back to the Shadow Realm. 

But my relief doesn’t last long.

“LuLu…” a voice calls from higher up the hill we’ve just rolled down. 

Fuck.

I scramble over Urtur’s disintegrating body and look out a hole in the cracked glass. 

Shit shit. 

Ashen groans as he stirs in the front seat. 

“Lu.” His voice is weak and slow, like he’s fighting to hold onto the consciousness he’s just claimed. I watch as he shifts his head to look at the empty passenger seat. His voice comes out stronger with rising panic. “Lu?.. Lu-” 

I don’t answer as I climb back into the seat next to him. He winces in pain as he tries to move, and when I land next to him I can see that his left shoulder droops down, the bone dislocated. It’s one of many injuries to that side of his body, and his heart sings to me with a steady beat of alarm. 

“All right, vampire?” he asks. Ashen’s eyes roam over me with concern as he scans the cuts across my face and the blood seeping through my shirt. He reaches up to brush away the pebbles of tempered glass still stuck to my cheek. I lean back, just out of reach.

“Lucky LuLu,” Ember sings. She’s getting closer, picking her way down the steep embankment. “Time to go back to the Shadow Realm, Lu.”

Ashen eyes meet mine and time stops. 

I see fear. Real fear. 

“How did she know?” I whisper. Hot, fierce tears gather in my eyes. 

I should already be out of here but I can’t move. My lips tremble. My hands shake with shock.

Only one truth exists. It’s the pain that scours every inch of me, body and soul. 

Ember pushed us off the hill knowing Ashen would only need to die to resurrect unharmed in the Shadow Realm. And me, a vampire, I could be mangled and still survive. 

Especially if I had taken enough blood in advance. Alberto’s blood. 

And Ashen’s. The blood he brought for me. And the blood he kept pushing me to take. 

“How did she know where we would be?” My voice cuts as sharp as shattered glass this time. My eyes burn. My heart turns to cinders and sinks through my chest. 

“Lu, I-“

“What have you done?”

There is rage in my eyes as they burrow into the layers of hurt and sorrow that surface in his. 

Ashen holds my gaze. Resignation claims the building fire in his eyes and snuffs it out. 

He reaches across the console and pushes my katana toward me. We look at one another as the sound of breaking branches draws closer and Ember calls my name. 

“There is still Angelwing on the blade,” Ashen says. I glance down at the sword and back to him. My face must say a thousand things, none of them good, all of them about fear and confusion, about loss and rage and despair. Ashen lays his hand over mine and squeezes as I grip the sword with blanched knuckles. “Keep your word and run, vampire.”

I don’t press my lips to Ashen’s in a last kiss. I don’t say any kind words. I just give him a final, venomous look before I turn away, blade in hand. I hold onto the determination in my mind, the hurt in my heart. 

“Vampire,” Ashen says as I grip the edges of the broken window. I stop against my better judgment, but I don’t turn around. “I love you, Lu.”

His words catch in my chest and land as cold as ice. 

“Right,” I say, without looking back. “Just not enough.” 

I push my sword out the window and follow it. I land on the ground with a dull thud that radiates pain through my broken bones. With the angle and the twisted vehicle between us, Ember can’t see me, though I’m sure she won’t be far behind. I’ll leave a trail of blood and footprints in the snow. No matter how quick I am, she’ll catch up. 

I keep low as I roll and scramble across a rocky outcrop. It gives enough cover that I can slip further down the hillside toward a clutch of evergreens. When I reach them, I squat low and look back up toward the van. A path of shattered trees and scarred earth flows down from the road to where the broken heap of metal rests, hissing in the snow. 

“I grow weary of cleaning up your messes, little brother,” Ember says. She’s at the driver’s side of the van. I can’t see her from where I am. I can’t see Ashen either, I can only hear his ragged exhalation. “I will be back for you.”

I turn and run. 

I scramble over rocks and between trees. Their branches pull at my clothes and skin. I stagger through a shallow creek and slip on patches of ice hidden by snow. 

“You might as well stop, LuLu. I’m only going to catch up,” Ember calls. She’s already closer than I thought she’d be. 

I follow a game trail and burst into a small clearing. I make it to the far side before I turn and unsheathe my sword, dropping the saya in the snow. 

She’s right. I might as well stop. My body is still too broken to keep going. 

It feels like an eternity waiting for Ember, even though she’s not that far behind. That stupid saying rings through my mind on repeat: a watched pot never boils. I feel like I spend a thousand years watching the crack of shadows between the trees for Ember to finally appear. 

But, of course, she does. She saunters into the clearing like she has all the time in the world.

Ember’s hair is scraped back in a high ponytail, her makeup unblemished by the crash or the effort of climbing down the hillside after me. 

“I don’t suppose you’ll make this easy on me, will you, LuLu?”

I raise my sword and shake my head. 

Ember smiles, withdrawing a set of twin short swords strapped across her back.

“I didn’t think so.”

She surges ahead and I meet her in the clearing, swinging my sword against her uncompromised strength. She strikes fast and hard. I fend off her attack but can’t land a blow. Ember is quick. She’s skilled. And unlike me, she’s uninjured. She lands two strikes in rapid succession, both to my left arm. The cuts are deep enough to force me back. 

“Oops,” she says with a menacing smile. “Sorry about that.”

I say nothing, but my glare intensifies. So does her grin in reply. 

She comes at me again. Flashes of sunlight glare off our blades. A hot lick of pain courses through my skin as she strikes my arm a third time. The smell of snow and blood and pine fills my nostrils. If I could just land a cut, that’s all it would take to bring her down. But Ember meets every swing and parries every attack. 

I finally manage to kick out and get her in the hand. One of Ember’s blades pinwheels behind her. A dark and menacing laugh is the only warning I get before she comes at me with renewed ferocity. 

Ember uses her strength to hack at me in an attack that’s both brutal and graceful. She’s relentless. Her sword hits mine again and again. She twists out of reach only to hit my blade with punishing strikes. It’s all I can do to stay upright. But maybe that’s the problem. I need to try something else. So I drop to the snow to kick her legs from underneath her. 

It’s like slow motion, watching my mistake unfold. 

Ember jumps up beyond reach but comes back down with her weight in her blade. The polished steel slides through the back of my ankle. My Achilles tendon snaps with an audible pop. Blinding pain follows and I cry out in fury. 

“Well, well. You got your voice back. How interesting.” 

Ember kicks my hand and the sword lands just beyond my grasp. She kneels close enough for me to feel the heat radiating from her body, but far enough that she’s just out of reach. 

I’m looking up at her, red rage in my eyes, black flame in hers, wispy smoke curling from her back. Tendrils of sparks unfurl behind her. “I will cut you to ribbons if I have to, Leucosia. Whether in one piece or twenty, we are going back to the Shadow Realm.”

One moment a malicious smile is spread across her lips. And the next her hot blood sprays across my face. 

“Not today,” Cassian says beyond the shadow of Ember’s wings. Ember and I both look down to the short sword she had dropped in the snow, its bloody point sticking out just beneath her clavicle. She takes a shuddering breath and our eyes meet. 

I smile. 

“Get fucked, Ember,” I say, and with a vicious hiss I punch her in the face with all the fury I can channel into my fist. 

Ember falls to the ground unconscious. 

“Stai bene, zanne dolci?” Cassian asks as he comes to my side. He gives me his familiar lopsided grin, those kind warm eyes smiling down at me.

I slump down, exhausted and bloodied and broken, but victorious. A victory that somehow still feels like a loss. 

My throat closes tight with thoughts of what could have happened. She would have brought me back, just like she said. She would have thrown me into that dungeon. There would have been no second chance to escape, the Shadow Realm would have made sure of that. These thoughts are rolling away like debris in a tidal wave as Cassian loops my arm over his shoulder and I pull him into a fierce hug. “Thank you, Cassian. Thank you so much.” 

“It’s all right,” he says. “You’ll be okay.” He grips me tighter as I lose a piece of myself in his kindness.

The accident. The pain. The fight. The fear. 

The taste of copper on my tongue. 

I’m such a fucking fool. 

I shake with the effort to keep from crying or yelling or fucking screaming or full-on sobbing. It’s fury like I’ve never felt. Not just with Ashen, but with myself. I wanted my heart to prove my head wrong. I wanted it to be okay to forgive, to love. And where did that land me? At the bottom of a hill, in a twisted hunk of metal, cut to shreds. 

“Why? Why do I keep doing this to myself? I was falling for him. Again. What the fuck is wrong with me?” I whisper. I know that sounds so full of self-pity, and that I’ve got myself to blame as much as anyone else, but Cassian still holds on tighter anyway. He shares his warmth and his quiet countenance. It’s a balm in the cold of the snow and the unknown. 

“Nothing is wrong with you, Lu. Your heart is full of courage, and to love is an act of bravery.” 

“How can you say that? I ran away from you. And we were good for each other.”

Cassian laughs and holds on tighter. “No, we weren’t, tesoro. We wanted different things. We just tried hard to not believe it for too long, even if we loved each other.” Cassian lets go enough to place a chaste kiss on my cheek. He gives me a long look, like he’s trying to share his strength and hope. “You did not run away from me. You ran to yourself. Now come on. Let’s get out of here.” Cassian holds my arm in his grasp and raises us both from the frozen ground. 

When I’m steady on my good foot we start our trek across the clearing. It doesn’t take us long before we find a rhythm, and Cassian navigates us around roots and rocks with patience and precision. I know it’s going to be a long journey back up the hill. 

I just don’t realize how little time we’ll have. 

A sudden crunch.

Slick metal, sliding through flesh. 

The flood of blood into a lung.

A wail shatters the quiet of the meadow. It takes me a moment to realize it’s coming from me. 

Cassian drops his hold on my arm and I fall to the snow. He watches as the katana slides back from his flesh before he falls to his knees next to me. 

No…

“Word of advice, vampire. Make sure your enemy is dead before you turn your back,” Ember says as she flicks the sword, spraying thick, dark blood across the snow.

Cassian slams down on his side. His lungs pump his breath into the cold air. I roll him onto his back and we lock eyes. He mouths the words I’m sorry as bloody foam gathers in his mouth. 

No. No no. 

I bite into my arm and tear his shirt open, even as he shakes his head and tries to give a reassuring smile. He catches my wrist before I can drip blood into the wound. Tears blur my vision as I meet his eyes. 

“No, Leucosia. Andrà tutto bene.” he whispers. His body starts to shake. His throat strains as he struggles to take a breath. “Thank you, for all these years. Ti devo la vita.”

I shake my head. I grab his hand and squeeze. “I don’t want you to go.”

Cassian gives a failing smile before his body convulses. His hand is like an iron vice around mine, but I refuse to cry out.

“You’re a good man, Cassian. You’re a good man.” I tell him again and again, until he gives a rattling exhalation and dies in my hands. And still I grip his palm in mine, even when it goes slack and his arm is heavy in my grasp. I hold on until the last faint beats of his heart pass into oblivion. 

“Very interesting,” Ember muses as her gaze flows from the hilt of my blade to the tip. Her eyes slide to mine. “Angelwing. Well, one last vampire in the world is no great loss, I suppose, though it would have been nice to drag him to the Shadow Realm with us.”

I vibrate with rage. 

Ember leans a little closer. Her blood hisses when it drips onto the snow. “Are you done? I would rather like to get going. We have much to accomplish together.”

I’m going to fight with every breath. I’m going to make every second of this as hard on her as I can. If it’s going to be misery for me, you’d better fucking believe I’m going to make it misery for her too. 

A poisonous smile spreads across Ember’s face as she extends her arm, her hand spread like a claw that’s coming for my hair. 

A flash of light burns my eyes. For an instant I wonder if it’s the pain I'm expecting to feel. 

And then a scream. 

“Embrace your end, demon. For these are your last breaths in any realm,” a deep, familiar voice booms above the blinding light. Ember is still screaming when I shield my eyes and look into the light. 

Blood pours from her severed arm. Ember’s hand lies in the snow, curled up at me like a dying spider. 

The angel of Saqqara looms over Ember. She tries to swing the katana toward him, but doesn’t even have a chance to connect with the angel’s glowing blade. He swings his massive sword in a sharp arc and it cuts a swath across Ember’s stomach. Her viscera tumble from her abdomen and she screeches, falling to her knees in the snow. The angel’s blade makes a return pass, and Ember’s head flies from her shoulders, that awful shriek falling into blessed silence. 

I’m unable to move as I watch Ember’s body twitch and jerk. Blood saturates the snow, creeping ever further as it consumes the pristine powder. It’s… deeply satisfying. 

The angel moves to stand before me, obstructing my view of the gory scene with his shimmering wings spread wide behind him. He extends his hand to me. 

“Come with me to the Realm of Light. We have much to discuss, Leucosia.”

CHAPTER 28

The angel of Saqqara is bigger than I remembered. Too tall. Like, freakishly tall. Also insanely beautiful. Without his weird white shroud, I can actually see his features. Dark skin, emerald eyes. Sharp cheekbones, full lips. He’s a study in contrasts, every aspect of his being in perfect balance. Even the expression on his face holds a harmony of conflicting emotions, the glint of satisfaction in his eyes paired with the gleam of his fury. 

“How do you know my name?” I ask. 

“What a pertinent question,” the angel says with a smile of both approval and malice as he sheathes his sword. “Come with me and you shall have your answer.”

“The last time I saw you, you sliced my cheek like Hannibal Lecter looking for a fucking snack. While I appreciate your intervention, I’m not super stoked about going anywhere with you.”  

“You are correct, I did. My most sincere apologies,” he says with a little bow, though he doesn’t sound sincere at all. 

My only reply is to narrow my eyes. 

“I can assure you, it will not happen again.”

My brows tilt with doubt. 

“You do not have much of a choice.”

That I actually believe. There’s no question who holds the power here. 

I heave a heavy sigh and throw my arm out in a gesture of reluctant consent. He smiles at my fierce glare as he turns away to retrieve my sword and the saya from the snow. 

“My name is Aloros. I am from House Esagila, the jewel of the City of Anur,” he tosses over his shoulder, as though he’s feeding scraps to a grateful stray. I roll my eyes but he doesn’t see. “House Esagila is one of the most powerful houses in the Realm of Light. You will behold our ziggurat and weep at its beauty. There is no other temple as grand in all the Realm.”

“Was it your house where a traitor came from to give their wings for Angelwing poison, or did they come from somewhere else?”

Aloros turns and narrows his eyes at me as he tries not to scowl. “I’m not at liberty to discuss that with a dark-souled vampire.”

“So it’s a yes then.” 

His scowl deepens and I give him a saccharine smile. The angel strides toward me and sheathes my sword before tossing the strap over his shoulder. “His name is Leander. The last he was seen was a year ago, in Jerusalem.”

“Let me guess. He was with the witch Mila Karras. She was working with Bobby Sarno and his father to bring the pieces together for the hybrid, wasn’t she.”

Aloros gives a grim nod as he comes to a halt in front of me. His frown softens as his eyes flow down my bleeding arm and my ankle. He offers me a hand but I look around him to where Cassian’s lifeless body lies in the snow. 

“I need to get a message to my companions,” I say with a stinging knot in my throat. Aloros follows my gaze and looks back to me, his hand still extended for me to take. 

“We can do so later if you wish. The demon was likely not alone. We need to go now.”

I keep my eyes locked to Cassian, even when I nod and take the angel’s hand. He sweeps me from my feet and clutches me to his chest as his wings beat, stirring the snow across our silent battlefield in crystalline swirls. And still I look at Cassian, until we fly over the forest and the tops of the pines obstruct our view. 

“He died with honor. A true soldier,” Aloros says as we glide through the cold air that bites at my skin. I don’t say anything in reply, because it doesn’t feel like enough. 

We head southeast, and it’s only a short distance before we’re sweeping low to the ground. A slab of gray and white stone reaches for the sky, the yawning black mouth of a cave beckoning to us in silent scream. I know this cave. Pestera Liliecilor.

“Cave of the Bats? Seriously?” I say as he sets us down close to the cavern entrance.

“Yes. We were fortunate that a portal was so close to where you crashed. Divine blessings, do you not agree?” 

A sinking sense of dread settles into my stomach as the angel carries me into the pit of darkness. “Considering how the fates have been fucking with my life lately? No. I don’t.” 

Aloros is undaunted as he strides into the shadows. His skin glows with warm light, illuminating our path. “Have faith, vampire.” 

We fall into silence as Aloros sets me on my good foot. We stand in the chamber, the damp smell of cold rock and moist earth and guano stinging my nose. Bats hibernate among the rock above us, some stirring and squeaking with the intrusion of light. 

“If I get rabies from these fucking sky mice, I will cut you,” I say, glaring up at the angel. “Likewise if your kind gives me angel rabies. You’re the first person I’ll bite when I’m foaming at the mouth.” 

Aloros looks down at me with a combination of confusion and disgust. “You are an odd creature,” he says. 

I sigh with dismay. Why is it that the Reaper is the only one aside from Ediye to really get me? “Whatever, anunnaki. Let’s get on with it so I can commence weeping at your ziggurat.” 

The angel’s gaze lingers on me for a moment longer before he starts to chant. 

“Sagzu galam gen galu nupade,” Aloros says, spreading his arms wide to embrace the darkness. Thy heart is profound and undiscovered. His voice resonates through the chamber of the cave. Bats chatter around us. “Anshar. ati, me peta babka.” 

Foremost of the heavens. Gatekeeper, open your gate for me. 

Blue glyphs flare to life on the cavern walls surrounding us, warming the light gray stone. Aloros’ deadly wings shimmer as though catching starlight. A column of light appears before us and the angel sweeps me up in his arms once more. 

“This is demeaning,” I grumble as I hook my good arm behind his neck.

“I agree,” he says. “Carrying a dark-souled creature into the City of Anur is… distasteful.” 

I roll my eyes. “That’s not what I meant.” 

Aloros narrows his eyes without even a hint of teasing amusement and I sigh as we step into the light.

Sparks rain down on us as we stand in the column that pulses its energy like a heartbeat. Pressure builds in my head until I feel like all the light is collecting in my head, until the world stops spinning through the universe. Every spark of light that surrounds us stops, suspended in time. And then it bursts and all falls away, and we’re standing in the Realm of Light.

Aloros sets me down on the dais we arrive on, facing a tall, polished marble gate. The doors are open but guarded by angels in white armor. Above the pointed archway is the word Esagila in filaments of shimmering gold light. 

I hear laughter and music behind us and look over my shoulder. The amusement park stands in the distance, and I realize this must be the edge of the quarter of Anur dedicated to the House of Virtues. The vibe of the amusement park carries through the streets; there’s music and laughter and greetings of welcome as people pass by. Brightly colored flags and pots overflowing with flowers hang between the buildings. Children and pets and even a very rambunctious donkey run through the street in a game of tag. It looks way more fun than the austere entrance to House Esagila. I heave a heavy sigh and turn back toward the gates.

I’m eager to get whatever this is over with, so I start to limp ahead and make for the entrance, but Aloros grabs my arm and steers me toward a clothing shop instead. 

“You will not enter the ziggurat looking like you lost a fight with a demon, even if it is true,” he says, leaving no room for argument. 

We enter the small clothing establishment. An older, jovial woman with curly hair and a wide smile ushers us into the back of the shop. Aloros sits me down on a bench as Mariam the shop owner gathers a basin of water and a stack of clean towels. She peels off my bloody clothes as Aloros searches the racks, then cleans my healing wounds until every last drop of blood is swept clean from my raw skin. 

Fortunately, as with the Shadow Realm, money isn’t really a thing in this realm. Which is good, since I have literally nothing on me but the clothes I came with and the katana slung over the angel’s hulking shoulder.

Not that I would pay a single cent for the monstrosity that Aloros picks out for me. 

It’s a gauzy, formless white dress with barely-discernible sleeves and a drawstring closure at the neck. It flows in a billowing mass of fabric all the way to my feet. I limp out of the dressing room with a flat glare and come face-to-face with Aloros, who has changed from his blood-spattered white getup into an oversized white tunic and linen pants. 

“Are we going skydiving?” I ask, flapping my arms.

Aloros narrows his eyes.   

“I look like I got confused trying to paint a room and put a drop cloth on myself rather than the floor.” 

Aloros tilts his head and scowls. 

“At least I have a tissue ready to wipe my tears when I weep at the ziggurat.”

Aloros rolls his eyes and heaves a dramatic sigh. “Come, lesser being. You look nearly appropriate for House Esagila and I am eager to part with you.”

Aloros offers his arm to help keep me steady on my healing leg, and we take our time to walk out of the shop and past the guards of the gate. I can see why he chose these clothes once we’re in the heart of House Esagila. It has a very different vibe from the House of Virtues. It’s much more serene and ethereal. There’s no laughter or raucous games of tag or clattering rides. Everything is white and gold, graceful and quiet. This seems much more like the boring, peaceful Realm of Light of my imagination. 

We follow a few silent, narrow streets, taking a turn to the left where the road ends at a spectacular garden of groomed trees and vibrant blooms. The ziggurat looms beyond, the sun gleaming off the polished gold on the peak of the structure. Up this close, I can see inscriptions that flow across the hewn rock of the temple, each inlaid with light. 

“Behold. The Ziggurat of House Esagila,” Aloros says as we stop at the edge of the garden and take in the imposing structure. He folds his arms across the thick wall of muscle that spans his chest and looks with pride at the temple, as though he designed it himself. 

We stand for a long moment in silence. A loooong moment. 

I fidget and clear my throat. 

“So when is the weeping supposed to start, exactly?” I ask when Aloros looks down at me. An irritated crease forms between his brows. “Is it now?.. Or-“

The angel interrupts me with a huff. “Follow me, lesser being.”

A devious smile creeps across my face and I limp after him down the path through the garden. We pass through the gate of the fortified wall and up a short stone ramp that leads to the entrance of the temple. 

The interior of the ziggurat is not what I expect. Though the outside is imposing stone, the inside is full of natural light, as though the stone is an illusion and the walls are made of glass. I can see the amusement park to our left beyond the canyon, the city behind us, the fields that stretch to the horizon straight ahead. The polished floor reflects the light like water, and every step we take is a bright burst of color beneath our feet. 

Aloros leads us to a wide stairway in the center of the massive room, and we follow it up three flights to a corridor. The hallway reaches to the roof of the structure where a shimmering ceiling glows in the distant height. It reminds me of diving into deep water and looking up at the surface of the sea. 

Doors of light line either side, stretching halfway up the wall. I can feel the hum of power that surrounds us. It fills me with both dread and awe. My heart quickens as I wonder for the first time if I might become a prisoner once more. 

“What is this place? What’s the purpose of this temple?” I ask, casting a wary glance to either side.

“The ziggurat performs many functions for our kind,” Aloros replies as we drift past the rows of closed doors. “It houses gateways to the Living Realm. It provides space for reflection and contemplation. It shows us the good and evil in humanity and in those beings of the in-between.” 

Aloros stops at the door at the end of the corridor. He grasps the gold handle and light snakes across the surface of the smoked glass. Hidden gears whirl within. Bolt by bolt, the locks release. “We have even welcomed our enemy here. We have built our plans here. Plans to end the tyranny that plagues the three realms.”

Aloros pushes open the door to reveal the room. It’s empty aside from a low marble altar, upon which a body lies prone. My lungs close around my breath and refuse to let it go.

“Your demon will fulfill his pledge to seize the power of the Shadow Realm. And when he does, we will give him what he came here to barter for.” 

I stagger into the room and fall to my knees at the altar. My hand shakes as I caress the cool skin of a familiar cheek. It might be a little late, but just like Aloros promised, I weep. 

“Aglaope of Anthemoessa will live again.”

CHAPTER 29

She looks just as she did from my memory, not as she must have been in the Shadow Realm. Long, straight black hair that falls like glossy silk across her shoulders. Olive skin, so cool beneath my touch. The sharp features of her proud and intimidating beauty are just the same as centuries ago. I take her hand and raise it to my lips, laying a kiss to the network of silent veins beneath her skin. 

“How?” I ask. There are a thousand questions vying for attention in my mind, but it’s the only one I can get out. “How is she here?”

“Your demon, of course,” Aloros says, rounding the altar to stop on the other side so he can observe my tear-streaked face. “It caused quite the stir within House Esagila when he showed up carrying a soul into the Realm of Light, as one might imagine.”

My gaze bounces between my sister and Aloros, questions heavy in my expression. 

“He… what?” 

Aloros gives me a pitying look. “A wretched picture he made, still soaking wet from swimming through the Bay of Souls to retrieve Aglaope of Anthemoessa. He was a steaming mess. His demon blood smoldered beneath his skin here in our realm.” Aloros crinkles his nose. “It would have been distasteful, if it were not such a fascinating turn of events. If he did not need to fulfill his purpose in the Shadow Realm, he surely would have been offered ascension to the Realm of Light for such an act of selfless love.”

My mouth gapes like a drowning fish. I look over the body of my sister like I’m seeing her for the very first time. But really, it’s not her I think I’m seeing anew. I turn my gaze back up to Aloros with something that feels like desperate confusion in my skin. 

“Why? Why would he bring her here?”

Aloros looks at me with a faint smile and a softness in his eyes, the first true moment of empathy I’ve seen from him. “He explained all that happened with the werewolf, that your transformation had started but was not complete. He was determined to free you before the Shadow Realm could finish the process and asked for us to offer safe haven and protection if you chose to remain in our realm. But he did not want you to be alone here if you wished to stay. He said there was little you would want more than for Aglaope of Anthemoessa to be restored. And the witch, Ediye. She is granted passage to House Esagila at will.”

My heart is erupting from my chest in furious beats. My head swirls as though my brain is scouring my skull. 

“In exchange for what?” I ask, squinting up at him through my pain. 

“Ashen of House Urbigu agreed to take up the position of Master of War, offered by his Council. And now he will use his new power and access to take control of the Shadow Realm. He will destroy Eshkar and the Witch Reaper Imogen, and then will instill a new order and fight alongside us to end the tyranny that seeks to undo the three realms.” 

I press my fingers to my temples and try to squeeze the pain from my head. “Tyranny?..”

Aloros looks down at my sister for a long moment before turning his serious expression back to me. “We forget our purpose. The Shadow Realm, to deliver merciful justice. The Realm of Light, to deliver rightful salvation. The Living Realm, to challenge the soul and offer the hope of another path. Some of us succumb to whispers of what we could take from one another. And all the while the Nephilim ready to take from us all. Unless we unite. Unless we fight back. A war is coming, and it is not the one you think.”

I stare at Aloros for a long moment as I process every word. It feels like the veil of the universe is being pulled from my eyes, but I can’t make sense of anything I see. Confusion ignites the hurt that still lives within me, those memories of betrayal that stack up like blocks to keep me submerged in a hurt that never ends. “So you need to unite the realms to fight the… Nephilim… and you think the Reaper will keep his word to you? That he won’t betray you when he takes control of the Shadow Realm?.. ”

Aloros laughs. “Yes, vampire. I believe he will keep his word, but not because of me. He is unique among his kind. And he is… motivated.” 

I look down at my trembling hands and try to make sense of this madness. I don’t think I’ve ever felt more upside down in my life. Aglaope, lying before me as beautiful and serene as I remember her from centuries ago… The Reaper, who brought her here and then struck an impossible deal with his enemy… And an angel who’s now laughing at my naïveté, his razor sharp plumage scraping across the floor as he rounds the altar to stop at my side. 

“The demon says that you have become part Seer. Yet, it seems you have chosen blindness. Let me help you witness what you have missed,” Aloros says as he lays a hand on my forehead. In the sudden warmth of his touch, I am transported.

Time seems to unravel in the filaments of light that possess my vision. Every conversation, every whispered admission between the demon and me seems to unspool and dance around me. They are distilled until they are as clear and powerful as poison. 

You know only a fraction of what you think you know, vampire.

I love you, my vampire. No matter how you change, or what you lose, or what you gain. 

I have faith in you.

I blink and I see Ashen in the Shadow Realm, lying naked on a black stone altar in a cavernous room lit only by torches, just like my last vision of him that I tried to push away. He opens his eyes and blinks twice as though confused, then jolts upright, cursing with some kind of urgency. He’s about to get off the altar when Ember steps out of the shadows and tosses him a black silk robe. She’s flanked by three other reapers with their swords drawn. 

“Hello, dear brother.”

He says nothing, only watches her with suspicion as he pushes his arms though the long sleeves of the robe. 

“Seems like your vampire is in a bit of a pickle. Semyon Abdulov has taken her.” 

Ashen draws in a sharp breath and surges forward off the altar. “I have to get her out-“

“Let me tell you exactly what you will do next,” Ember says with a menacing smile as the others press in closer to Ashen. “And you will do everything I say, or I will make Leucosia suffer, and I will start by forcing her to watch as you die an everlasting death.” 

I hear that crackling sound, louder than ever before. It splits my mind apart as the vision changes. 

Now I see Ashen standing at the edge of the Bay of Souls. Black water laps across shimmering onyx stones toward his bare toes. His naked chest rises and falls with deep, heavy breaths as he looks out upon the water. The waves move unnaturally, as though something menacing swims just below the oily surface. 

Every muscle seems to tense as Ashen takes his first step into the sea. It looks like the mere touch of the waves sends a shock of pain through his body. His brows draw together. His hands fold into tight fists. His jaw looks ready to crack his teeth. Despite the obvious discomfort, Ashen keeps his gaze fused to a set of small islands in the distance and takes another step, then another. Each one seems worse than the last. By the fifth, he looks ready to drop to his knees and succumb to whatever torment laps at his body. But still he keeps his eyes trained to the islands. He presses on and coasts forward into the water, starting to swim. A terrible sound of anguish passes through his gritted teeth as he surges on. With each stroke and kick, Ashen suffers in an invisible torture. He suffers.

I see him next in the broken van at the bottom of the hill. I hear his heart beating. I know its normal cadence and this pace is too fast. His breath spills visible clouds into the cold air. He’s rolling up the sleeve of his shirt. 

“Ana nurika nami azziz. Ana elleti tiparika azziz,” he whispers, and a hidden tattoo burns to life into his flesh. 

To the brilliant light I call. To the shining light I call.

A few labored breaths later, a star appears outside the window of the van, no bigger than a pinprick but brighter than the sun. It expands and consumes the empty air, filling it with a hum of power encased in glowing filaments of light. It grows to an orb and Ashen shields his eyes as it bursts and sparks of color rain down on the snow. 

Aloros steps forward from the glittering debris.  

“You summoned, demon?”

Ashen breathes heavily. His movement is slow when he turns his head to watch as the angel opens the warped door with a powerful jerk of his hand. Aloros takes a long moment to survey Ashen’s injuries with his shimmering green eyes.

“The vampire,” Ashen says. His voice is weak and slow. “We were ambushed. My sister pursues her. She means to bring Leucosia back to the Shadow Realm.”

Ashen points in the direction of the passenger window and the angel straightens to look over the crushed roof of the van. 

“Do you have a portal nearby?” Ashen asks. 

“Yes.”

“Bring her to your realm and let her choose where she wishes to go from there,” Ashen says. 

“And your sister?”

Ashen’s expression turns venomous. “Kill her. It might be the only chance we get.” 

Aloros looks down the length of Ashen’s body as the Reaper tries to suppress a rumbling cough. “What of you? You swore your allegiance to House Esagila.”

“I am not long for this land. I will keep my word when I return to the Shadow Realm.”

Aloros looks at Ashen for a long moment and then gives a solemn nod. His wings unfurl. 

With a single snap of motion he propels himself into the sky and my mind back into the Realm of Light. 

I fall forward, panting as I press my forehead to the cold marble floor. I squeeze my eyes shut and try to swallow the painful knot that grips my throat. 

Everything Ashen said was true. 

My awful words come back to me. You’re good at telling me everything you didn’t do. 

He never told me everything he did. 

Deals with angels. 

Saving my sister. 

Protecting me. 

He sacrificed his choices so I would have mine. 

I could have given him my blood to heal him in the van, but instead I left him to die. I thought the worst of him. I believed he betrayed me. Again. Because he’s the villain in every immortal’s story. Especially mine.

This demon, who lives surrounded by regret and anger and sorrow, who shouldn’t even be able to feel the way he feels about me. But he does.

He told me he loved me and I said it wasn’t enough.

And still he used his last moments to save me. 

My body shudders with emotion. My fists fold so tight my fingers could snap. 

“You have suffered long enough in the bitter darkness,” Aloros says, his voice suddenly so warm and kind as his hand lays on my back. “Perhaps you should open your eyes.” 

I blink and struggle to lift my gaze from the floor. I see the angel kneeling next to me, pointing behind us with his long, graceful fingers. 

My arms are weak when I push myself up. I feel broken inside, like I’m made of shattered clockwork as I turn to follow the line of his finger. 

“All right, vampire?”

Some kind of sound escapes from my mouth that I’ve never made before. I clamp my hand across my lips. It’s as though the despair has fled my body like a malevolent spirit pushed out by the light. 

Ashen stands by the open door, clutching his network of broken ribs. The agony of being in the Realm of Light is written all over his face. Smoke billows from his shoulders, almost obscuring Eryx who stands just behind him. 

I rise to my feet.

For all the times he’s asked me that question, this is the first time that I shake my head. “No,” I manage in a whisper. “I’m not.”

Ashen’s gaze lingers on my face and follows the tears that streak down my cheeks. “I suppose I’m not surprised,” he says as his eyes continue down my body, right to my toes, then back up again. “You clearly fought a fitted sheet and lost.”  

A laugh that’s as much as a cry bursts from my chest. In an instant I’m running. 

Ashen grunts as I crash into him a little harder than intended, but he wraps his arms around me nonetheless and holds on tight. His hand laces into my hair and clutches my face to his burning, beating heart. 

“My Lu,” he whispers as he buries his face in the crook of my neck. “I thought I would never again hold you in my arms.”

My grip tightens across Ashen’s back. He takes a deep breath of relief and I never want to let go, even though it burns to hold his body to mine. It feels like fire has come alive beneath his skin. My shoulders shake as everything I’ve been trying to hold in comes crashing down on them like a heavy wave. But for the first time in a long time, I’m not drowning. I’m lifted from this sea by Ashen’s embrace. 

I pull away and keep my eyes on Ashen’s as I run my hands up his arms and over his shoulders and up to his face, drawing his lips down to mine. The kiss is like a fever quenched by cool water. Ashen’s tongue runs across the seam of my lips and I open for him, kissing him deeply, hoping I can take his pain away. His hands flow in a slow procession down my neck and across my shoulders, resting their heat on my spine. When the kiss slows and we break away he still holds on, as though I’m keeping him tethered to the world in the midst of a dream.

“How are you here?” I whisper. 

“Ediye fixed me up enough for the journey. She and the others continued on to Valentina’s stronghold. I had to know you were safe. I had to see it for myself.” Ashen pulls away and lays his hand on my face, brushing tears away from my skin. His own eyes shine in the light that surrounds us. “I will always come for you. No matter how long it takes me or who stands in my way. No matter the realm. I love you, my Lu.”

Ashen’s lips meet mine once more, and I know it in every touch. It is no illusion. This love is truth. It might shine as bright as copper in the sun, but it tastes like mint and ink.

CHAPTER 30

We stir up a lot of interest as we follow Aloros through the streets of House Esagila. A vampire and a demon on our own are enough to cause people to stop and look, but walking hand-in-hand? That’s not just a novelty, that’s a historic moment. 

We end up with a little group following us, adding more angels and souls to our procession as we go. Ashen doesn’t seem too pleased about it either. He grumbles about their nearness and pulls me closer as he tosses an occasional glare over his shoulder, not that they can really see his face through the smoke that drifts in his wake. 

When we finally pass through the gates of House Esagila and arrive at the dais, our crowd of onlookers fans out and watches as demon and angel face one another. 

“Thank you for your help,” Ashen says. His words are clear but the pain of this place is heavy in them. His skin is covered with a sheen of sweat. His hair is darkened with it. 

“Do not trouble yourself, demon. Just keep your word,” Aloros replies. Ashen gives him a nod and the angel’s eyes shift to mine. He holds out my katana and a small leather pouch. “Your sword, vampire. And elixir. Your demon had me procure this, in the event you decided to stay.”

“Which you should,” Ashen interjects. “As much as it pains me to say this, it would be safer for you here.”

I sigh and slide my glare in his direction. We’ve already discussed this three times since leaving the ziggurat and my sister behind. “No. I’m not staying.”

Ashen says nothing as he rolls his eyes, but I feel his grip tighten on my hand nonetheless. As much as he doesn’t like it, I know he’s relieved to keep me close. 

“Thank you,” I say to Aloros. I look at him for a long moment before dropping Ashen’s hand to wrap my arms around the angel in an unexpected hug. To my surprise, he returns the gesture, and it feels warm despite being a little stiff. 

“Safe travels, lesser being,” he says as he pulls away. I huff a laugh before turning to step onto the dais with Eryx and Ashen. With a last final look, we are absorbed by light and transported to the Living Realm. 

The cavern is cold and dark when we return. There are no more glyphs shedding warm light on the walls. But Eryx illuminates our way with his glowing skin, and we walk silently into the late afternoon sun. 

“I’ll fly to Valentina’s and take one of the vehicles back,” Eryx says. 

“We will wait in that cabin,” Ashen replies, pointing toward a cottage nestled in the snow-covered trees. It looks in decent shape from the outside, even though there’s a board nailed across the door. 

Eryx nods with a smile before taking off into the sky, heading north over the forest. Ashen and I continue up the hill toward the cabin. Though he seems relieved without the burn of the Realm of Light in his veins, Ashen still clutches his ribs and our progress is slow. 

It doesn’t take much to break into the old cabin, which seems in good condition despite the musty smell of dust and moth balls. There’s a scuffed blue table in the small kitchen, and an armchair and couch next to a stone fireplace. I place some kindling into the hearth and Ashen lights it with his sword before he settles into the chair with a heavy sigh of pain. 

I fiddle with the fire for a while as I steal long glances at the weary demon. He sits with his eyes closed and his head tipped back. His arm is wrapped across his middle. Every breath looks painful but he seems more at ease somehow, as though the pain replaces a weight that was becoming too heavy to bear. 

There’s so much I need to say to him and everything I think of feels lame or underwhelming. ‘I’m sorry’ is woefully insufficient. ‘I love you’ feels like the timing is off. ‘Hey, now that I know for sure you’re not an asshole, guess what? I do actually love you but I did before too and I just think now is a good time to tell you’… holy fuck that just sounds so dumb. 

“Are you going to come over here, vampire, or are you going to war with yourself all evening?” Ashen says. His eyes are still closed as he speaks but he cracks one open to gauge my reaction. I feel a traitorous blush burn in my cheeks. “I can nearly hear your thoughts.” 

I rise to my feet, the ridiculous dress fanning out and engulfing my body. I glide toward him like a giant marshmallow. “Oh yeah? And what do you think you hear?”

Ashen extends his free hand in an invitation to sit on his lap. I straddle one of his legs and he wraps his warm palm around my arm. “Probably something like ‘I was wrong about you, Reaper’, versus ‘I won’t tell him that because I’m a vampire and vampires are never wrong’,” he says, mimicking my voice. 

I scoff as I run my hands across Ashen’s chest, following the lines of muscle beneath his shirt. He shivers at the contact and closes his eyes. “What else?”

“Hmm… ‘I adore you, Reaper’, versus ‘You’re an asshole for not telling me about my sister’.”

I pause the motion of my hands and wait until he opens his eyes. “Why didn’t you?” I ask. 

Ashen’s gaze flows across my features and I feel the tingle in my skin everywhere it touches. “I wanted you to choose what was best for you, not because of something you thought I held over you. I had no intention of manipulating your actions with someone you loved.”

I look at Ashen for a long moment before leaning down to press a lingering kiss to his cheek. “Thank you,” I whisper. “I saw how you suffered, swimming in the Bay of Souls. You didn’t have to do that.”

“I wanted you to have someone with you. I couldn’t bear the thought of you being alone,” he says as his hand slowly drifts down my arm and up again. 

I rest my face against Ashen’s neck and sigh, feeling his steady pulse against my skin. I know I haven’t said enough of what I should, but somehow just touching one another means more than words ever could. 

“Do you love me yet, vampire?” Ashen asks, his tone both playful and serious. I push up to look at him and he winces at the sudden movement, gripping his side as he tries to shift to a more comfortable position. 

I ignore his question and grasp the edge of his shirt, starting to pull it up his body. “Let me see.”

“It will be fine.”

“Sure sounds like it, yeah. Stop being a baby and let me see.”

Ashen glares at me and then rolls his eyes, leaning forward so I can take the shirt off. I run my hands across his side and press the tips of my fingers into the flesh that’s already covered in dark bruises. I can feel the shattered points of bone and count five broken ribs.

“Ashen,” I say, drawing out his name as I lay a hand to his face. 

“It will be fine in a few days. It will heal in Reaper speed.” 

I scoff. “Maybe, but vampire speed is better. I can help.”

He shifts again, unable to alleviate the discomfort. He doesn’t answer, just looks at me with a furrowed brow. 

“You’re not the only one with magic in their veins.” I push up my billowing sleeve and draw my wrist to my lips as my fangs descend. I keep my eyes fused to Ashen’s as I bite down. There’s curiosity in the look he gives me, and a little worry for the unknown, and a lot of pain. I hold my arm out for him as a long thread of thick blood curls down my skin. He looks from the twin punctures to my face and back again. “Drink, Ashen.”

The Reaper takes my hand and lifts my arm. In the stillness of this cabin, the air between us seems alive with an electric charge. Ashen’s gaze is soldered to mine as though we’re chained together by this moment of time. 

Ashen catches the thick channel of blood on his tongue before it can drip onto my dress. He laps it up my skin and smears it across his lips. My heart hammers my ribs as he draws closer to my wrist. 

When he finally seals his lips over the wound and draws in a deep pull of blood, the effect on my body is instantaneous. It ignites my desire like a fuse. And I can sense the relief in him. I can hear the pins of bone slowly start to stitch back together as Ashen closes his eyes and sighs. 

“How does it taste?” I whisper. My lungs pump with shallow breaths. Intense need coils low in my belly. I feel my arousal dampen the fabric of Ashen’s pants as I try to stop myself from grinding against his leg. 

Ashen takes another long pull of blood and the pleasure of it wraps around my bones. A stuttering breath shudders past my lips. 

Ashen opens his eyes and they burn with the brightest flame. “It tastes like heaven, vampire,” he whispers. 

For a moment, we are both so still we might have fused into stone. We don’t blink or even breathe. And then in a swift motion he locks an arm around my back and rises from the chair, his lips sealing around the wound once more. 

I feel like my bones are melting, like my flesh is dissolving beneath his touch. Ashen sets me on the edge of the table and presses his body between my legs as he pulls more blood from my arm. It fuels the feeling of his effervescence, as though the more he takes connects him to the part of him that lives within me. All his power and history, all that loss and longing. He’s alive in my veins. 

Ashen takes another long pull of blood and then lets go, his gaze bouncing between my eyes as if he’s just discovered a world he never knew. We look at one another for a long moment, both of us consumed by pumping, heavy breaths and raging hearts. And then he leans forward and claims my lips with a kiss as deep and unfathomable as the sea. I taste my blood. I’m surrounded by his intoxicating scent. I feel his pulse hammer against my chest. 

Ashen’s hands find the drawstring behind my neck and he loosens the tie. The neckline gapes open and he pulls it down my shoulders, past my braless chest, down to my waist. I let out a gentle moan as he runs his fingers across my skin, lingering over my tight nipples. “I think I am starting to see the merits of this hideous dress,” he says. 

“Wait ‘till you get a little lower.” 

Ashen pauses for a moment before drawing his hand down until he reaches the slick wetness of my opening. He coats his fingers in my arousal before painting circles over my clit. “Vampire,” he says in a low, chastising voice. “No underwear in the Realm of Light? That seems salacious, even for a vampire. I certainly hope you weren’t looking to fuck an angel.” 

A devious laugh escapes my lips. It turns to a moan as he pinches my clit. “Would that bother you?” 

Ashen growls as his fingers dive into my opening and I clench around him. “Yes, it would. Very much. You are mine, vampire. And I don’t share with anyone, especially anunnaki.”

“Good,” I reply. My voice is airy and breathless as he pumps and curves his fingers and strokes my flesh, sending rippling waves of pleasure through my core. “Because I only want you. Only ever you.”  

Ashen pauses his motion and we lock eyes. It’s the most of everything in his expression. The most peace. The most desire. The most longing. It breaks and remakes my heart. I feel as though we’re two shattered pieces stitching together, just like the ancient myths of humans said. And it’s not a simple process. Some stitches are crooked. Some have to be pulled out and stitched again. There is pain and progress and blame and beauty. There are deep shadows and pools of light. And I know now. I know I want it all.

I reach between us and undo Ashen’s belt, not taking my eyes from his as I lower his zipper and release his length. He pushes up the layers of my dress and I guide him to my opening, sighing as he slides inside. I bite into my wrist again where the punctures are already closing. “Drink it,” I plead as he pushes in as deep as he can go. “I want to feel what it’s like.”

Ashen takes my arm as he glides out to the tip of his erection. He seals his lips over the bite and watches my eyes as his tongue sweeps across the twin holes. And then he thrusts back in as he pulls in a mouthful of blood. 

I cry out with pleasure, nearly on the brink of tears with the overwhelming ecstasy of it. He moans against my skin as he does it again, and again. I writhe beneath him and he hooks one of my legs over his shoulder, burying himself in me. I whisper his name as he propels us closer to the cliff edge. 

“I feel you,” Ashen says when he lets go, running his hand up my thigh and then to my breast as he continues the rhythm of his thrusts. “I taste everything you hide from me. Even if you can’t say it, I know it.” 

I don’t utter a word in reply, but I feel all those unsaid emotions knot in my throat. I keep my eyes on his when I nod and push my wrist toward his lips once more. It’s my admission, and he understands. As Ashen drinks and we come together in a brilliant, blinding rush of pleasure, he knows. 

Even if my words are still a half step behind, he’s won my heart.

CHAPTER 31

Ediye is the one who drives back for us. It’s dark by the time she arrives and climbs the snow-covered path to knock on the cottage door. She looks so relieved and yet so lost when I pull her into an embrace. It burns in my heart to know how they would have found Cassian, lying in the snow like an afterthought near the body of the one that killed him. 

“It was my blade,” I whisper as we hold onto one another.

“But it wasn’t your hand,” she says, and grips me tighter. We stand like that for a long moment before I feel Ashen’s palm on my back. 

“We should go,” he says. His voice is the perfect balance of firmness with kindness. “Have you seen any other Reapers?” he asks Ediye as she and I separate. 

“Yes. We killed two, Valentina captured one more. She managed to get out of the demon that they had followed Semyon to the area and figured we were getting close. They were tipped off with confirmation by a witch in Câmpulung when we rented the vehicles.” 

Ashen’s brow furrows as he closes the door behind us and we follow Ediye toward the car. “Did she kill the last Reaper?” 

“She did. None of them were everlasting deaths, though. She didn’t have the means. Valentina’s got quite the security set-up, but we definitely shouldn’t linger. Not with Semyon in the area too. Do you think the Reapers we killed will come back with more?” 

Ashen is silent for a long moment as we approach the car. He opens the passenger door for me and then slips in behind me to the middle seat. “Maybe not with more,” he says when Ediye is settled behind the wheel. “They were loyal to Ember as she tried to gain more power and influence in the Council. Perhaps with Ember gone, they will be dissuaded from trying again, but there is no guarantee. But you’re right,” he says as he reaches forward to touch my arm, as though I might not be real. “We should not linger there.”

We fall into heavy silence as Ediye starts to drive us into the night. We follow the winding mountain roads and every so often the fear climbs my spine that we’ll be pushed off the path once more. Every time we see another set of headlights I tense, but Ashen’s hand stays at my elbow in a reassuring grip. It doesn’t go unnoticed by Ediye, who catches my eye in the light from the dashboard and smiles. I smile back, a lightness twining with the loss and settling into my chest.

“Davina,” I say to Ediye as we pass into the first significant magical barrier I can feel. We must be getting closer to the stronghold now. “Is she okay? She and Cassian… they seemed to be growing closer.” 

Ediye glances at me with a doubtful frown. “I don’t know. She made herself pretty scarce when we got there. She held herself together, but she’s definitely upset.” 

I nod with a worried sigh. “We realized just before the crash that Davina knew Aglaope, and she had a vendetta against Bobby Sarno. He was the connection between them,” I say as I turn my gaze to the dark road ahead. 

“That and a demigod,” Ashen adds, and I’m relieved he offers the information without putting me in the position of keeping that secret from my best friend. I look back at him and offer a faint and grateful smile, and he squeezes my arm in reply.

Ediye glances over with a furrowed brow. “A demigod? I thought that was just human mythology.” 

“Apparently not,” I say. “Aglaope was up to something. And she’s in the Realm of Light now, waiting on resurrection of sorts.” 

“What? How the fuck did her soul get there?” 

I hook my thumb back toward Ashen as Ediye glances at me. “Aglaope wanted the demigod’s heart and bones harvested by a Scythe and offered to capture Sarno as payment if Davina harvested the body. It’s why Davina was reaped in the first place.” 

“Who reaped her?” 

It flashes at me like headlights between the trees. In an instant, I see it all. One blink to the next. 

I smell the horses, the manure in the stalls and the scent of the hay. I hear the birds outside and I feel the warmth of the sun that filters through the open door and lights the dust motes like tiny stars. 

I hear their argument as though I’m right there in the stables with them. The way Davina admitted what she’d done. How Ashen begged her to run but she refused. 

“If you let me go, they will know that you were the one who told me. What I did was wrong, I know that,” I hear her say. I see the tears streaming down her face as though she’s standing right before me. “It has to be you.”

“You cannot ask this of me. You must run,” Ashen says. His voice is desperate and angry. His heart pounds at his bones with worry and rage. I can smell it in his scent. “Just go, Davina.”

And then a blinding hit of magic. 

Ashen has no control over the blade in his hand. His arm moves under Davina’s control until it faces her heart. 

“I wish it could be different,” she whispers. Fat tears roll down her skin as Ashen shakes his head. She plunges forward onto his blade before he can even say a word. 

I feel it, the way he does, as though I’m right inside him. I feel what it’s like to reap a soul. How the energy washes through him. The presence of the spirit. Their fear and sorrow. And suddenly I understand. 

I snap out of the vision, knowing every detail of what happened. And my heart shatters for this dark and quiet man who casts his gaze out the window, not wanting to meet my eyes.

As Davina’s spirit passed through his palm and into the Shadow Realm, it was cleaved away from another soul. 

The one he didn’t know about, not until the moment it slipped through Ashen’s hand like water and dissolved into the world as though it was never more than a dream.

The one growing inside her. The child he almost had. 

I hit the button for the seatbelt and climb into the back seat, right onto Ashen’s lap. I wrap my arms around his neck and I hold on tight. And after a moment, he lets go of his regret and guilt enough to feel the comfort of being held. He embraces me like a lifeboat in a storm. I run my fingers through his hair as I hold his head to my neck and I keep him there. I know there aren’t words that will take away the pain he still feels, but if his grief refuses to let go, so can I. So I hold on. I hold on until we make it there. 

When we arrive close to Valentina’s sprawling stone estate, I can feel the magic pulsing around us. Ediye was right, there are layers of spells so thick that we’d never get close with a portal. The energy hums and builds as we get to a thick stone wall. The gate opens, the magic visible as it lifts from the roadway to let us pass. 

We follow a cobblestone driveway that circles around the stone fountain of an angel, weathered by time and harsh seasons. The house isn’t so much a house as a small castle, with round towers flanking an arched oak door that opens as the vehicle stops. 

A woman steps out of the house with a tight smile, her long black hair fluttering down to her waist in loose curls. She wears an ornate, embroidered jacket over black leather pants and ankle boots. Her delicate hand rests on the arm of a beautiful man with wavy blond hair and an equally pristine and dramatic maroon suit. They stay on the top step of the landing as we approach, their smiles growing a bit more welcoming, if not a little amused at my stupid dress. 

“Greetings, friends. I am Valentina, and this is my mate, Florin,” she says, gesturing toward the human who bows his head. My eyebrows twitch in interest. I’ve not heard of a human staying a human once mated to a vampire. Usually they’re turned first, since they’re so much more fragile than we are. But who knows what kind of ‘toying with mated death’ kink they’re into. Or maybe Valentina’s just bored of immortality, who knows? It’s odd, but then with all her ultra-reclusive secrecy, so is she, even among our kind. 

“Pleased to finally meet you,” I say, ascending the steps to shake her extended hand. “I’m Leucosia, and this is Ashen of House Urbigu.” 

Valentina’s smile broadens. “I’m excited to meet the last of the original sirens. It’s an honor to host you at our house. Please, come in.” 

The couple turns and we follow them inside the foyer. The high walls are lined with ancient armor and tapestries, the floor with worn Persian rugs. Valentina brims with pride as she explains the layout of the house. We progress down a corridor past a formal sitting room and library toward a warmer, more welcoming living room where Cole and Eryx sit next to a fire, drinking red wine over a game of chess. They both look relieved to see us as they rise to greet us warmly, but I can feel the weight of the day resting in all of us. So we don’t linger. Florin and Ediye remain in the living room as Ashen and I continue on with Valentina toward the bedrooms. 

“I’m sure you probably know already that we can’t stay here long,” I say to Valentina as we follow her up the spiraling stairs of a tower. “I’m sorry to bring more trouble to your door, but I can assure you, it was already on its way. They need the oldest of us to make hybrids.” 

Valentina looks over her shoulder at me and smiles. She looks like the kind of vampire you’d imagine from a movie. She’s graceful yet severe. Beautiful and mysterious and unsettling. “Don’t apologize. My home has weathered attacks before. We are well protected.” 

“Not if a contingent of Reapers descends at the same time as a pack of werewolves,” I say. I see her smile falter a fraction before she turns her attention ahead. “We need to discuss our next moves and be ready to leave as soon as possible. If Semyon is already in the area, we don’t have the upper hand. We’re going to have to find a way to get out and regroup with something he won’t expect.” 

We arrive at a landing and stop next to a door. Valentina turns and looks at us both with that tight smile. I feel the dismay of needing to wrench her away from a place she’s obviously fond of, but no amount of security will really be enough. I wonder for a moment if I can pull some kind of vampire seniority over her, but then I’m dressed like a parachute and I smell like sex and blood, so… probably not. 

“Let’s discuss it more in the morning. For now, I’m sure you need to rest,” she says as she pushes the door open to a large bedroom suite. And honestly, she’s right. I’m fucking exhausted. Valentina takes in my expression of longing when I look at that plush bed with its one thousand pillows and her smile warms. “There are clothes in the wardrobe, please help yourselves to whatever you need. We will talk more tomorrow.”

Ashen and I slip into the room and the weariness hits me even harder when the door is closed behind us. We stand in silence for a moment before setting down our limited possessions, our weapons next to the bed and my pouch of elixir on one of the side tables. My headache is starting to spike with the exhaustion, so I take a vial with me as I search the wardrobe and pull out a black satin and lace nightgown with thin spaghetti straps. I throw my angel’s dress into the fire and watch it roar into flame before climbing onto the massive bed. Ashen is showering in the ensuite as I lay down, and he hums an unfamiliar tune in his deep, rich voice. Something haunting in a dark melody of minor notes. Maybe something he heard once in Bit Akalum. Maybe a Reaper lullaby. 

I close my eyes and fall asleep.

CHAPTER 32

I have strange dreams about snow and snakes and incantations. Sometimes I know I’m dreaming and I come so close to waking that I feel Ashen’s grip tighten around me. I hear him whisper in my ear but only once do I make out the words. 

Rest now, vampire. The only real dream is the one that sleeps in my arms.

Eventually, my dreams change. 

I’m wandering down the road outside House Urbigu in the Shadow Realm. The fog seems heavier than before. Like I could push it. Manipulate it. Maybe even lift it. Peel it back like orange skin. I wonder what would be beneath. Horror, probably. Suffering. No other place knows such darkness, and I’m guessing it has much more to offer than what I’ve seen. But I wonder if it could be different. If the fog was stripped away, if everything was exposed to the sun, what would it be like? 

I keep walking down the road. I see no souls or reapers. The silence has a presence to it. I don’t like it. It’s thick, like the fog. 

I start humming to myself to fill the void of sound. My voice sounds different from the way it’s been since Cairo. More like the way it used to be, but somehow richer. Darker. It feels like it pushes into the fog, reaching for something. 

I hear a sound in the distance. I halt and go quiet. It’s a chanting refrain that grows louder with every beat of my heart, surrounding me from the gray, limitless depths of the mist. 

It’s my own voice, calling back to me. 

Do it now. It is time. 

There’s a pull to these whispered words that snaps my eyes open and I feel wide awake, buzzing with a current beneath my skin. I shift my gaze to the clock hanging across the room. It’s just after three in the morning. 

I lie still. The minutes flow on and on. That voice keeps whispering with every tick of the second hand. 

Do. It. Now. 

It. Is. Time. 

I’ve been trying to push these thoughts down but I can’t seem to. There’s an urgency that keeps me blinking in the dark, keeps my muscles stiff beneath Ashen’s heavy arm. It’s like the longer I fight to ignore it, the more insistent my own voice becomes. 

“Are you going to lie awake all night, or are you going to talk to me?” Ashen’s whisper teases in the dark. I press my eyes closed and exhale slowly through my nose before I roll over to face him. 

“How did you know I was awake?”

He scoffs, his breath flooding my face with sweet warmth. “You think I don’t know the cadence of your sleeping heart? Or the slow rise and fall of your breath when you dream?”

I smile into the shadows, but it’s fleeting. That urgent whisper is growing louder in my head. 

Don’t waste another moment. Do it now. 

“What is it?” Ashen asks. The concern thickens in his voice. He sweeps some hair away from my face and lets his hand trail down my neck. My pulse thrums against his fingers as nerves knot my insides like rope. “Lu?.. What’s wrong?”

I sit up and swing my leg over Ashen’s body so that I’m straddling his waist. His warm palms land on my thighs and the skin beneath the satin of my nightgown pebbles with gooseflesh. My heart is jumping in my chest and I bet he can hear it, which only makes the blush already climbing through my skin even brighter. Just as I start to thank all holy fucks that the lights are off, Ashen whacks the switch for the lamp on the nightstand and I drag my hands down my face with a dramatic sigh. 

I lean forward and switch the light off. 

Ashen turns it back on. 

I hiss but it sounds desperate rather than fierce. I move to hit it again or maybe smash the lamp right off the nightstand but Ashen catches my wrist. When I try to swipe it with my other arm he catches that one too. 

“Vampire,” he says through an uncertain laugh. “What has gotten into you?” 

“Lights off, Reaper.” 

“No. You’re blushing and I like it.” 

I hiss and he laughs again, melting some of my frustration with that warm, rich sound. 

“Quit deflecting your energy on the lamp. It’s done nothing to earn your ire. Tell me what’s going on.”

I take a deep breath and try to gather my wits. Cassian’s voice is in my head now too. To love is an act of bravery. The courage he seemed to think lives in my heart has definitely jumped out the little window and run away to live a long and happy life without me in the Romanian countryside. 

“You’re vibrating,” Ashen says. The concern is starting to ratchet up again in his voice. His gaze travels over my shoulders and sure enough, I’m actually shaking. I’ve fought more battles than I even care to count, and here I am, quivering in his grip like a lost little mouse. Christ. I almost roll my eyes at myself. “Lu, what in the hell-” 

“I want to mate,” I blurt out. So fucking eloquent. I just chucked it right out there into the night. 

And now there’s silence. 

“With you,” I clarify. “Like, right now.” 

More silence. 

Dear God. Someone please kill me. The blush is burning so hot now that I’m pretty sure my skin has caught fire. You know what? I wish it was true. I wish vampires were allergic to sunlight. Fuck rocking a tan, I’d like to go outside right now and wait until morning and then burn like an overcooked burger on a grill. 

I groan, my body deflating like a sad balloon at a run-down carnival as I try to crawl off Ashen and find a place to die of embarrassment, but his grip tightens on my wrists. 

“Lu,” he says, drawing my name out long. I can hear the surprise in just those two letters. His voice is barely more than a whisper. “Are you serious?”

“No, not serious, just a terrible joke, epically bad timing-” 

“Lu-” 

“Go back to sleep, this is all a horrible dream-”

“Lu-”

“Just a half-hybrid spell, nothing to worry about, it’s only a pitiful mirage-”

In less than a heartbeat, I’m flipped onto my back. Ashen’s lips are on mine. His tongue slips into my mouth and his hands flow down my sides and he devours all my words with his touch. He kisses me deeply until the tension eases enough in my body that he seems confident I won’t continue trying to dig myself out of whatever grave I’ve just created. 

Not that it stops me. 

“Let’s just not-”

Ashen’s hand folds over my mouth. “Stop… talking…” he says, his eyes bouncing between mine. Sparks ignite within his pupils. The scent of unsmoked tobacco and ink floods my nostrils from the edge of his hand. “You want to mate with me?”

He doesn’t let his hand off my mouth, so I take a minute before I finally give a shaky nod. 

“Not while you are swept away by a moment? You actually want this? With me?” 

I nod again. I feel tears sting at my eyes but I force them away. 

“Lu,” he says, and his face absolutely transforms with my name on his tongue. The smile reaches his eyes, crinkling their edges. His skin is vibrant in the dim light. His pupils shine. He looks… happy. I realize I’ve never seen him look truly happy before, not like this. Not ever. 

It all slips into place, like a tightened stitch that brings a tapestry into view. 

Every smile that he’s tried to contain, every shy look he’s turned away… He never thought he truly deserved something like this. For all his talk about making it hard to choose anything but him, or that the process had already begun, he didn’t actually believe it would happen. He was going to spend his immortal life reaching for something he never thought he’d grasp. 

I curl my fingers around Ashen’s hand and pull it down from my mouth.

“Ask me,” I whisper. “Ask me what you’ve been asking me.”

Ashen’s eyes linger on my mouth. I see his throat bob as he swallows. It’s not just a thinly veiled joke this time, and he knows it. I can hear it in his heartbeat. 

“Do you love me yet, vampire?” he asks, and his eyes find mine.

A smile spreads on my lips, so faint at first, but every tiny change in my face is captured in Ashen’s eyes. If I thought I’d seen happiness in him just a few seconds ago, it’s nothing like what I see when I say it out loud. “Yes, Ashen. No matter how hard I tried, I never stopped. I love you. And I choose you.”

Ashen holds my gaze for only a moment before his forehead drops to my shoulder and his body tenses, and I know he’s trying not to be swept away by everything he feels. I caress his back and press kisses to the side of his face. I hold him close to me and whisper it again. I choose you, Ashen. I choose you. 

Ashen takes a deep breath as though rising for air from the deepest darkness of the sea, and then he dives back in, pulling me with him. His mouth is on mine. His hands touch every inch of flesh they can. He breaks away to kiss my jaw and my neck and my shoulder and then back up again. And he says the things he feels. He whispers about love, and relief, and even joy. 

After a while we just embrace and lie wrapped in one another. My thoughts are drawn back to what Ashen said about decades passing in the shadow of regret and sorrow. How the days had bled together into a colorless wash. For me, those years in hiding were more about loneliness and the hollow, futile effort of trying to forget everything I’d given up to survive. Though we were walking separate paths, each step we both took was just another day of existing, not living. And then we arrived at the same destination and found something unexpected. Something imperfect. But despite its flaws, this is ours. Our own little realm where we choose one another. And I want to belong to Ashen as much as he belongs to me. I don’t want to give up more of the things I love when I have control over the choice. 

Ashen pulls back and looks in my eyes. Those sparks are still there and the radiance remains in his skin, but I see the hint of nerves in him too. I smell it in the sharp note of citrus and the quicker beat of his heart. “How do we do this?” he asks, stroking the hair from my face.

“Very carefully,” I say, and I push his shoulder so that he rolls onto his back. He’s only wearing pajama bottoms and I tug them down, discarding them on the floor. He’s already hard and I grasp his erection, starting to stroke him slowly. “There is no going back. We’ll be bound by life and death. If one of us dies, so does the other. Are you sure about this?”

Ashen’s eyes don’t leave mine. “More than anything, vampire.” 

I keep our gazes locked as I straddle him once more, running the tip of his erection across my center and then rolling it over my clit before going back again. Ashen moans as I coat the crown of his cock in my arousal and then draw more circles across my swollen clit. His hands slide over the satin nightgown and cup my breasts as I continue my motion, gripping the base of his length with a firm hand. I’ve heard how strong mating is meant to feel, so I don’t wait longer than a few more passes before I slide him into me, shuddering as I lower my body over his girth. 

“The dagger,” I say, darting my glowing red eyes to his blade on the nightstand as I roll my hips in a slow and steady rhythm. He reaches over and passes it to me by the handle. 

I don’t slow my motion as I bite into the wrist that holds his knife, hitting deep to keep a good flow of my thick blood. It runs down my arm in a steady stream as soon as I pull away. 

“Drink three long pulls,” I say as I hold my wrist for Ashen to take. “Imagine something you want me to know about us. A secret or something you want me to see through your eyes. Keep that moment in your mind. And then expect pain.”

Ashen nods and takes my wrist, sealing his lips across the bite. Blood drips down onto his tattoos in fat drops. 

I grip his shoulder as he takes the first pull. I feel his presence surge in my veins. 

He takes the next drink. My hand grips tighter to the dagger as pleasure consumes me. It’s eating through my flesh like wildfire. I spread my legs wider, trying to take him even deeper as I roll my hips. 

Ashen grips my arm. His chest surges with ragged breaths. He closes his eyes and drinks a third time. 

I pull my wrist from his mouth. 

And then I stab him in the chest. 

My senses pick up every nuanced sound. Every crunch of sinew and slip of splitting flesh. Every muscle that tenses with pleasure and pain. 

I guide the dagger in until the tip pierces his heart and then I whip it back out. I lean down and press my lips over the wound and I drink straight from his heart. 

It only takes an instant for me to see what he wanted to show me. 

I wake in the alley in Sanford. 

The vampire’s prey lies nearby. 

My head throbs. I sit up and place my hand against my temple, then against my chest. It burns. When I look down, the tattoos on my chest are marred by a red slash. Confusion weighs on me as thick as the mist of the werewolves. They are gone now. And she’s gone. 

My sword lies next to my hand but I don’t pick it up. I run through everything that happened. I remember seeing the vampire pull her prey into the alley and prepare to bite. I remember the look of panic on her face when I spun her around. Her eyes grew so large and round with the sight of me that I almost laughed. 

Her shoulder was pleasantly cool beneath my palm. She refused to speak, but she didn’t have to. Her bright hazel eyes, those plump lips. Her features, delicate yet strong. Modern yet ancient. So beautiful. She conveyed every thought and challenge, every fear with just a look.

I remember the fight with the wolves. She was fearless. She was having… fun. There was a spark in her eye when she turned to me and smiled with blood on her fangs. And she was strong. Fast. Fluid and graceful. More skilled in fighting than any of her kind that I’ve seen in the last centuries. 

I remember the bite she suffered to her arm. I pulled her from the battle. Her stomach was so cool beneath my palm and I didn’t want to let her go. I shouldn’t have given it another thought to see a vampire die in the jaws of the werewolves, as long as they did not take her away alive to make another monstrosity. But indifference isn’t what I felt. It felt wrong to let them have her. I couldn’t let her fall. 

I took her arm when the fight was done. There was pain on her face… and then there was alarm.

The path of the shewolf’s blade still burns in my back and all the way through my chest to where it slipped through the other side. 

Angelwing poison. Pain like I have never known. The feeling of an impending, everlasting death. I remember knowing the vampire would leave me behind to die, just like any immortal would when faced with a Reaper.

Except she didn’t. 

It’s coming back to me from a haze. The way she looked at me, as though she felt like it was the right thing to do. So brave and reckless. She bit into her arm, I remember that. The way her thick blood dripped into my wound. Her ancient power warming my chest. The feeling of her, alive in my veins. And her words. Her spell. 

Her voice. That otherworldly, enchanted, haunting voice.

I remember now. 

It was Leucosia of Anthemoessa.

It shouldn’t be possible, but it’s true.

I grasp my sword and struggle to my feet. The fire comes to life on my blade just as the human prey begins to stir. 

I will find her.  And I will protect her. 

I need to know why she saved me. The last of the original sirens, the rarest immortal. 

I need to know if she felt the way I did, if only for a moment. 

I gasp as my blood drips down the dagger in my palm and into Ashen’s wound, starting to seal the injury I’ve just inflicted. “You knew. From the first night, you knew who I was.” 

Ashen nods. I can see on his face that the pain has begun to lessen as his chest slowly closes. 

“Why didn’t you tell me when you dragged me out to the church gardens the next day? Or any of the days after that?” 

Ashen pulls the dagger from my hand and looks at the mixture of our blood on the blade. My heart thuds a few nervous beats against my bones. “I wanted you to be able to trust me enough to tell me yourself.” 

I slow my motion and just look at him for a long moment. The sparks in his eyes grow brighter as he threads his hand into my hair and draws me down into a kiss. Our blood mixes in my mouth and sets a tingling current through my veins. Without breaking our connection, he rolls us over and rises to his knees, thrusting into me with powerful strokes. 

I pass him the dagger. He offers his wrist. My heart thrums in my ears as I place a kiss above his veins before I bite deep into his flesh. 

I pull once as he pistons into me and growls with desire.

I drink again and he comes alive in every cell. 

One last, deep drink and I let go. He hesitates and I see a flash of fear in Ashen’s eyes. 

“Now, Ashen. I’ll tell you when to stop.”

He pushes the blade into my chest and I can’t help but cry out in pain. But the pleasure is just as deep and consuming. 

Ashen’s rhythm falters and the blade halts. 

“Don’t stop,” I whisper, gripping onto his waist. He thrusts into me and I moan, trying to keep still beneath him. I place my other hand over the fist that grips the handle of the blade. “Deeper, Ashen.” 

He pushes the blade in further. I pant short breaths and dig my nails into his waist and I keep hold of the moment I want to show him. It’s the first time he gave me his blood in Saqqara, how I almost leaned forward to kiss him when he held my face in his hand with a look of warmth and pride. I want him to know what it meant to me. I want him to see it through my eyes. 

He pushes the dagger in and finally I feel it touch my heart. 

“Pull it out and drink,” I grit out as I let go of Ashen’s hand. 

And he does. He presses his lips to my chest and takes a deep pull of blood from my heart. And then he leans back to drip his own into the wound, the same as I did for him. 

Except this time, when his blood touches mine, the effect is shattering. It’s annihilation. 

All my centuries of living twist open and Ashen is woven into the fabric of my history. And all the many directions the future could lead, he is part of me, in every possibility, in every success and failure. The fates have found our two threads and snipped us from the loom, tying them together to weave another picture. We are twined, shadow and light. 

Darkness might still live within both of us, but I can love it as much as all the sparks of stars that suddenly surround us, rising from the floor, rushing from the hidden corners of the room, falling from the ceiling like glittering rain. 

And those stars, they don’t just rain around us. They come alive beneath my skin. Every stroke that Ashen takes within me, I feel them in my flesh, filling me with light. 

I lace my fingers with Ashen’s and hold our hands aloft, watching the tiny detonations of multicolored stars that consume us. We look from our joined fingers to one another and Ashen pulls my hand above my head as he leans down to kiss me with a warmth that burrows right into my soul. 

With a gradual build of need, Ashen’s pace begins to quicken. His thrusts grow more powerful. He breaks our kiss to offer his free wrist. My fangs slide into his flesh as he presses his lips to the healing wound of my heart. We drink from one another and those sparks ignite even the tiniest veins and capillaries, spidering from my chest. Pleasure coils and knots around me as it steals my breath. 

I moan into Ashen’s skin. He squeezes my hand, pressing it into the pillows above my head. He thrusts harder, and deeper, and I lift my hips to take him even deeper still, as far as he can go. My body grips his sex and I’m filled with his girth, stretching and forming around him. 

I take a long pull of blood and the pleasure grips my center, clenching around Ashen as he pistons into me. He lets go of my chest and his moan of desire resonates through my lungs. The strain of holding back shapes Ashen’s face with a tortured kind of beauty that steals my breath. We crawl closer to the cliff edge, both of us grasping every second of pleasure and pain from this moment. 

“More,” I whisper. I sound both desperate and demanding. Ashen meets my eyes as my blood-stained lips hover over his wrist. “Take more. Give more. I want everything. I want to be filled with you.” 

A dark smile passes over Ashen’s bloodied face. I’ve never seen anything I’ve wanted more, and I have it. He is mine. 

Ashen slides to the tip of his erection and thrusts into me hard. I cry out, so close to the edge of oblivion that I have to cling on. “My vampire. You know I will never deny you.” 

He pushes his wrist to my lips and seals his mouth to the hole in my chest and we draw deeply from one another. And then he thrusts, again and again and again until ecstasy overtakes me, until sparks devour every inch of my flesh. The light of our bond consumes me, body and soul. It blankets every valve and chamber of my heart as I come apart. My muscles grip around Ashen as he thickens and spills into me. The orgasm sets off pinpoints of light at the edges of my vision, and it just keeps coming and coming in waves unlike anything I’ve felt before.  

The sparks of transformation burn so brightly I can smell them before they fall away around us. The elements of life. Stardust, bursting into flame.

My elemental vampire, I hear from memory. 

Time unravels around me. I understand now that the endless loops of it live within our every cell. We can sense the future. We can feel the brush of destiny against our skin. The past is an echo in our veins. And the present is the prism through which our histories and hopes collide. 

I realize it now. Ashen and I both knew. We might not have been aware, but we knew that our threads were tied. 

Bianca was right. 

Bloodfate is true. We were always meant to come together, even if it took decades of loneliness or centuries of suffering. We were meant to end up exactly where we are.   

“Vampire,” Ashen whispers, his length still hard within me as he glides in and out with slow, gentle strokes. “Look at me.” 

I open my eyes, not even aware I’d closed them. A blood red fire consumes Ashen’s pupils. But it’s different. The fire looks like liquid as much as it does flame. His eyes bound between mine as he hovers over me. The expression on his face is something I’ve never seen in him. It’s wonder. Awe.

“What do you see?” I ask as I lay my palm against Ashen’s cheek. 

“Cinders, faint beneath the red light of your eyes.” He leans down and presses a lingering kiss on my cheekbone and then the other. “So beautiful.”

I say nothing about the change I see in him as I let my fingers trace the contours of Ashen’s face. My touch traces the line of his jaw, dropping down to follow his jugular, then the hard cliff of his collarbone. I sense the ridges of his sternum beneath ink and muscle as I make my way to the freshly healed scar above his heart. 

“You don’t just have the marks of your house anymore. You have mine too,” I say, wiping the sticky blood from the entry wound. My brows draw together as the scar is revealed beneath my thumb.

“What is it?” Ashen asks, dipping his head to follow my gaze.

“I… I’ve never seen a mated mark like this.”

I swipe more of the blood from the wound. A gold and black tattoo emerges in its wake. It’s a vertical line that tapers to a fine point at the bottom. Sweeping away from either side of the staff are the images of two lion heads, each facing outward. 

“The Mace of Nergal. The symbol of peace and war. Life… and death,” I whisper, tracing my finger across the face of each lion. 

Ashen’s brow furrows as he meets my eyes and then looks down to my chest. He licks his thumb and uses it to wipe away our mixed blood from the mark on my skin. Like his, it’s a dark shade of shimmering gold but with blue the color of lapis lazuli. It’s also a staff, but at the top is a blue crescent moon cradling an eight-pointed gold star. 

“The Scepter of Ereshkigal. The power to command light and shadow,” Ashen says. His eyes raise to mine as he lays his hand over my heart. I feel him in every beat that drums beneath his palm. “What does this mean?” 

“I don’t know. Probably something we should be worried about, given our track record,” I say. I keep my eyes on Ashen’s as I flip him onto his back and press my hands into the wall of muscle across his chest. “But tonight, you’re going to fuck those worries right out of my head.” 

Ashen gives me a wicked grin. I raise my arm to my lips and bite into the marks on my wrist that are already nearly healed. 

“You know I can’t deny you anything, my vampire.”

CHAPTER 33

I wipe a towel across the bathroom mirror and look at myself for a long moment in the muted light of a storming dawn. I’ve been shafted of a fucking hairdryer yet again, and outside of our room the castle will be cold as fuck with the fierce snow squall brewing outside. 

I lean forward and look at my new chest ink. It’s pretty badass, I have to admit. The gold and blue details shimmer as though lit from within. Out of the two of us, I definitely got the cooler tattoo, and I can’t wait to push Ashen’s buttons with it. Like I told him, I’ve never seen mated marks like ours, but then I seriously doubt a vampire and a demon of the Shadow Realm have ever mated before. Immortal enemies, questionable morals, mutual distrust… basically all the things that typically don’t make for sustainable relationships. Ashen and I didn’t get that memo, I guess. Thank fuck. 

I know there’s probably more to our odd markings than just our unusual union. And yeah, I realize I’m simplifying things for the sake of my sanity. But, like, come on. I’ve had a pretty shit go of things recently. It’s been a roller coaster, and aside from the interlude with Eryx at the amusement park, not of the fun variety. So wouldn’t you just go with it for a bit? I mean, what am I really able to change about fate or destiny if those greater forces are at play? I’m just one person. I might as well hang on and see where this takes me. 

Unsurprisingly, my c’est la vie approach is not really Ashen’s cup of tea. 

I step out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around my hair to find Ashen sitting in the center of the bed surrounded by dusty, leather-bound books and smelly sheafs of parchment. 

“I see you found the library,” I say as Ashen looks up from the book that lies open in his lap. His eyes dart down to the mark on my chest and they narrow just a fraction before meeting mine again. 

“Yes... Valentina has quite the collection,” he says, his voice distant with thought as he turns his gaze back down to the pages in his hands. 

I pull a gray merino sweater and jeans from the wardrobe. “I guess she would. It’s not like she gets out and about much. Gotta have something to entertain herself with, aside from her little human plaything.” I pull on my clothes and then turn back to the bed, picking up a volume on Sumerian mythology. It’s not a human text attempting to interpret early civilization, but one of our own, a record of city states made by immortals who were actually there. “Find anything?” 

Ashen takes in a deep breath and sighs. “Nothing that we don’t already know about the meaning of the symbols, no. There’s no record of them appearing on any immortals or what that could possibly mean.” 

I feel the frustration in him for coming up empty. His emotions are like a ripple beneath my skin. It’s like water finding the boundaries of a lake and drifting back toward you with tales of the opposite shore. 

I climb the edge of the bed and pull the book from Ashen’s fingers, placing it face down next to us. “It’s okay,” I say, crawling into his lap. His brows twitch with suspicion as I trail my fingers down his shirt to where his new tattoo lies beneath the dark blue cotton. “I know you’re jealous since my mark is so much cooler than yours. Fear not, mighty Reaper. Modern human technology will save you. We can take you to get it lasered.” 

Ashen rolls his eyes and huffs a laugh. 

“Or maybe we can book you with a tattoo artist and they can blast over it. Add a couple circles down at the bottom, a curve at the top, a few lines here and there… wouldn’t take much to make it look like a dick and balls.”

“Christ,” he groans.  

“No, no, I know. I’ve got it,” I say as I squirm away to swipe his dagger from the nightstand before straddling him once more. “I’ll stab you again. I bet that will work.” Ashen tries to grab the blade from my hand as I wave it around just out of his reach. “Just… hold… still… you don’t want it to end up looking like Alberto’s dick…” 

“I am already questioning my life choices,” he says as he yanks the blade from my hand and tosses it across the room. I smile and lay my hands to Ashen’s face and press a kiss to his lips. When I pull away and look into his cognac gaze, I know he feels me as much as I feel him. I see the worry and frustration soften in his eyes as he locks his arms around my back. 

“Did you see Valentina when you went to get the books?” I ask, running my fingers over the mark beneath his shirt.

Ashen shakes his head. “No. Nor Florin. But we should find them and make our plans to leave here safely.” 

I nod and press one last, lingering kiss to Ashen’s lips before we leave the bed and the books behind. 

Our mission is largely futile. We find Florin downstairs in an office, hovering over some paperwork. According to Valentina’s mate, the vampire left for Câmpulung last night after we were settled to hunt down the witch that sold us out to Ember’s group. Ashen lets out an irritated sigh at the news that she won’t be back until noon, maybe later with the snow that’s been falling all morning in heavy, wet flakes.

We leave Florin to his work and drift through the house like wraiths, checking out some of the rooms as we go. It reminds me of when I was first getting to know Ashen and he was poking around the Swan Hotel, scoping out security cameras and testing emergency doors. I smile to myself at the memory of him reporting back to me at the end of every day about his findings on the Swan and the town of Sanford. I brush my fingers along my mated mark that’s hidden beneath the strands of soft wool, thinking how those days seem like a lifetime ago.

After a few hours in the library, we eventually give up the pursuit of knowledge to fuck against a bookcase (because, why not), then make our way to the living room where the others have congregated. Eryx and Cole sit next to the fire around another game of chess. Davina sits in a wingback chair near a tall window with a book in her lap. She glances up at us as we enter, the light of the window highlighting the dark circles beneath her eyes and red rims above her lashes. She holds my gaze for just a moment before a sorrowful smile fleets across her lips, then turns her attention back to her book. 

I hear the sound of ice colliding in a shaker and look to a small bar at the other end of the room. Ediye is there, mixing drinks. If she can’t make potions, she makes cocktails. I smile and head toward her, both eager to tell her everything that happened last night and too nervous to actually say a word about it.

“Hey babe,” she says as she hears me approach. “You okay?” 

I nod and give her a kiss on the cheek as she pours a drink into a coupe glass and taps a tiny spoonful of edible glitter across the top. “What have you made this time?” 

Ediye’s smile widens as she passes it to me to try. “Well, it doesn’t have any blood, but it still reminds me of you, so I’m calling it The Siren. Calvados, cognac, lemon juice and maple syrup.” 

I take a little sip. It’s sweet but packs a punch. “It’s fucking delicious.”

Ediye beams with the success of finding a new concoction. “Take it. I’ll make another.” 

I move to the couch where Ashen has settled himself with a glass of Eryx and Cole’s wine. As I sit to his right, his arm drapes over the back of the couch behind me and his hand rests on my shoulder as though this is the most natural thing in the world. It’s such a small thing, and yet it means as much to me as last night did. To not be hidden. To be loved among others. It’s been so long that it feels unfamiliar. Ediye sees it too. Maybe she doesn’t know the extent of things, or maybe she does. But the way she smiles, despite everything else that’s happening around us, I know she’s happy for me. 

Valentina enters the room just as Eryx and Cole join us at the sofas for a game of whist. She seems serene on the surface but stressed beneath, like her heart is a little too erratic and her breath comes too fast. She glances from Ashen to me with her tight smile and I try not to sigh with dismay. Immortals always make assumptions about the Reaper in their midst. I know I have. And I can almost feel the stone walls of his fortress rebuilding around him. 

I thread my fingers through Ashen’s where they rest by my neck and fidget with his hand, keeping his thoughts away from the lack of sincerity in Valentina’s smile when she tops up his glass of wine. 

“I apologize for leaving abruptly last night,” Valentina says, keeping her eyes on me as her smile warms. “I felt it best to take care of the rogue witch in Câmpulung immediately. I value our safety here, particularly when we have guests.” 

I take a sip of my drink and keep my unblinking gaze locked to Valentina’s until she balks and looks down at the next glass she fills. “That’s kind of you to go to the effort, but we have other problems closing in around us if Semyon Abdulov is in the area. He has a pack of significant size and strength, and he’s coming for the both of us.” 

Valentina gives me a look that fills in all the gaps between her words. “Werewolves are a threat my home has weathered before. We have nothing to worry about here. There are layers of enchantments and I’ve recruited the best of the local covens to protect the perimeter. They can’t get through.” 

“Semyon is not just your average werewolf,” I say as I level her with a fierce stare, fighting to keep the aggressive red gleam from my eyes. “He’s been amassing allies beyond just werewolves. He’s in league with shapeshifting witches. With angels. He’s successfully made hybrids. He burned my voice right out of my throat. And he’s not even our only problem if we have a faction of rogue Reapers on our tail. We need to get out of here and find a safe place where we can regroup and plan how we can gain the upper hand.” 

Valentina gives me a hard look and sighs. She’s really hell-bent on making a stand in this castle of a home. And I get it, running is hard. Once you start, you might never stop. But it’s worth it to take the chance. I feel like an authority on the merits of doing whatever it takes to not get caught. 

Ashen squeezes my fingers as I take a long sip of my cocktail. “I think it’s wise to take my wife’s advice.”

I snort my drink right up my nose. Jesus H. Christ it burns like someone fired napalm up there. 

“Par… pardon me?” Ediye says, her voice saccharine as a grin erupts on her face. I narrow my watering eyes at her as I try to control a sputtering cough. My cheeks burn as hot as lava. “Did… did you just say wife?”

All thoughts of Semyon and werewolves and deranged angels and hybrids with giant dicks flee from my mind as I turn my glare toward Ashen.

“Your what? I’m not your wife.” 

“No?” he asks with feigned innocence. 

“No. Do you recall a wedding ceremony? Because I don’t, and I’m a vampire. I remember fucking ev-er-y-thing. And we vampires are melodramatic creatures that take shit like romantic betrothals seriously,” I say as I flick him hard, right on the nipple. “So no, Reaper. I am not your fucking wife.” 

Ashen scoffs as he rubs his chest. “What then, my girlfriend? That sounds ridiculous.” 

“We’re not-” 

“Life partner? That’s even worse.” 

“Ashen-” I hiss.

“What, vampire, I’m merely abiding by your own rules.” 

“Ashen-”

“You said in the restaurant that ‘mating’ was very ‘last century’. Is ‘spouse’ more appropriate? I’m unfamiliar with modern vampire relationship nomenclature.” 

“That was in reference to sex with Andy Cartwright, not mates.”

Ediye barks a laugh. “You had sex with Andy Cartwright?”

“Oh my God no. What the fuck?” 

“Regardless of the preferred terminology, this delightful creature and I are mated,” Ashen says as I drag a hand down my face. I feel an overwhelming wave of his smug satisfaction pull at the fibers beneath my skin as Ediye gloats with a chorus of I knew it, totally called that and magics up a mini firework display above the coffee table. 

“Fucksakes. You’re as subtle as a brick,” I whisper in his ear over the crackle of the tiny light display. I try to smile in thanks to Cole for his warm congratulations as Eryx happy-claps next to him with glitterball eyes.

“Payback is such a bitch, isn’t it, vampire,” he whispers back before placing a kiss on my cheekbone.

“Payback for what?”

“Trying to make my mated mark into a dick is probably a good place to start.”

I snort a laugh that dies quickly as Davina crosses my mind. I try to keep my cringe on the inside as I look toward her, but she returns my gaze with a brief and gentle smile. I can see the pain still etched in her face from our loss of Cassian yesterday, but this at least seems more like a weight lifted than one further burdening her shoulders. Part of me wishes I could pull her away and ask her a thousand questions about Aglaope and the body she harvested, but I shelve it for now. She’s clearly suffering enough that centuries old wounds don’t need to be opened, at least not tonight. 

“Congratulations on your union,” Valentina says, pulling my thoughts away from Davina as she bows her head. “We should celebrate at dinner.” 

Florin enters the living room and casts a welcoming smile to us all. “Did I hear ‘celebrate’? We’ll bring out the Château Margaux from the cellar if so.”

“I appreciate the gesture, but we need to leave.” Ashen’s voice is polite but firm, with no room for argument. “We need to do it as soon as possible. If Semyon is already here, we are not safe.” 

Thoughts of everything we need to do to get out of here kick off a headache that climbs from the base of my neck, spidering though my skull and scuttling toward my eyes. It bursts into my face and I press my fingertips to the center of my forehead. 

“Elixir?” Ashen whispers. I nod, realizing I forgot to take it this morning. Maybe it was the process of mating and the quantity of blood that I took, but I felt better than usual when I woke up. It must have slipped my mind. 

I down my cocktail and tap my pockets, looking for a vial. Valentina takes my empty glass from my hand before I can set it on the coffee table. 

My fingers graze hers. 

In an instant of touch I see. I see who she really is. 

Valentina turns away with my glass, unaware of my ability. 

Ediye meets my eyes. I speak to her with no more than a look. By the time I turn my gaze to Ashen, he’s already laying the handle of his dagger in my palm. 

The blade flies from my hand and Valentina falls to the floor. In the moment of her death, the illusion slips away. 

She transforms into Mila Karras, the shapeshifting witch.

CHAPTER 34

Ediye’s eyes swirl with darkness as she hits Florin with her blades of stars, trapping his shoulders to the wall. He cries out in frustration as much as pain. The illusion has slipped from his features too. His blond hair turns short and red, a spray of freckles appears across his nose. Bright blue, angry eyes dart from one person to the next. He’s beautiful. Angelically beautiful. 

“Leander,” Cole whispers. His hands fold into tight fists at his sides. “So this is where you’ve been hiding.”

Leander huffs a derisive laugh, then turns his head and spits blood onto the carpet. “Not hiding. Creating. Saving. Ensuring the future of the Realm of Light.”

“By trying to start a war among realms,” Ashen says. “By handing the Living Realm to a pack of werewolves that has no business ruling anyone, and having them pay for it by destroying the Shadow Realm.” 

“You say that as though your own Council has not been plotting for centuries to crush the Realm of Light. It’s why our elders sent him in the first place,” Leander replies, tossing a nod in Cole’s direction. “He was meant to flush out Eshkar and Imogen’s plans for war.” 

Cole leans forward toward the fallen angel, smoke cascading from his shoulders. “I gave my wings to stop war, not to start it. You gave yours for poison.” 

“Do you really think my purpose was not as noble as yours? We have too many souls in the Realm of Light as it is. Too many make it through. We must close our gates and protect the ancient ones we have, the ones that deserve a place among the anunnaki.” 

“There are souls in the Shadow Realm that need protection too.” 

Leander laughs like Cole has just said the most hilarious words ever spoken. He laughs and laughs until tears gather at the corners of his eyes. And honestly, I can’t blame him. I nearly cackle myself. The thought of the Shadow Realm protecting anyone is ludicrous. And it doesn’t take the power of a seer to anticipate everything Leander says in counterargument. 

“Protection? In the Shadow Realm? You have seen how they treat their souls. The wreckage of humanity, drifting in anguish, filling the Bay of Souls until they can make it into your Black Sea to brave whatever horrors lurk in the lightless depths. The souls of immortals forced into servitude until they wear out their usefulness, running amok like wild animals, hunted for sport.” I feel Ashen stiffen behind me, and Leander catches it too, his gaze flicking between the Reapers. “Oh yes, I’ve heard of the games the Reapers play. The pits. The gauntlet. The hunts. Imogen does love a resurrection in the name of sport. Merciful Justice is not so merciful in the real world, is it. Do you really think the Shadow Realm deserves clemency for your barbarism?” 

The breath catches in my lungs at the conjuring of horrors I haven’t even imagined. 

Ashen’s always said there are worse things in the fog than what I could see. I never doubted it, but it's not like I tried to imagine it either. Even trapped in their torture chambers, I somehow knew that there was more. More suffering. More injustice. More hopelessness and pain. 

I swallow down a knot in my throat as I meet Ediye’s eyes. I know she must be thinking the same thing, that this is just a hint of what really goes on in the Shadow Realm. Our gazes unlock and I turn my attention back to the fallen angel. 

“I have seen it, the barbarism of the Shadow Realm,” I say as I take a step toward Leander. His clear blue eyes fix onto mine. “I have lived it. I have suffered it. Survived it.” 

“And you could stop it,” he whispers. “You could stop the Shadow Realm from ever harming another soul. All you have to do is finish what Semyon started. Become the best of the hybrids. Take down the Realm of the Reapers.” 

I tilt my head, narrowing my eyes at him. My nostrils flare as I take in the scent of the blood seeping from his shoulders. “Don’t you think this is what the Nephilim want, for us to be at each other’s throats so they can take whatever it is they want from us while we’re busy with our short-sighted war?”

Leander scoffs. “Nephilim? They are nothing more than myth. There is only the merciless injustice of the Shadow Realm. There is only the Realm of Light that lets in too many for far too little. There is only the Living Realm that the humans don’t deserve. Let humankind shed their mortal souls under the rule of the immortals. Let them infest their own realm. Since they try so hard to kill their domain, let them fill it with their dead.”

I take another step toward him. My heart pounds in my throat. We stare at one another and I see the hope in his eyes, just as he sees the hate in mine. The hate for the way things are. For what is done to everyone caught beneath corrupted powers they can’t control. Powers most don’t even know exist.

I lean in close, our faces so near to one another’s that I smell his skin, that faint cinnamon scent of his former realm. “How does one of me take on all of them?” I whisper. 

A hint of a smile passes over his lips. “Not one. Many, under Semyon’s leadership but your command. You have the knowledge of how to get there and where to go in their realm.” 

Our eyes stay locked for a long moment. It might seem like there’s silence in the room, but there’s not. There are beating hearts and shallow breaths and muscle fibers that tense around bones. There’s the subtle crackle of Ediye’s magic, the clink of Eryx’s feathers as they shift behind him. There’s even the sound of sparks flaring and dying within wings of smoke.

I lean in until my lips are next to Leander’s ear. Sweet venom drips onto my tongue. “If I burn the Shadow Realm, it will be on my terms, by my control. Not Abdulov’s. Not yours. Mine.” I pull away just enough to meet his eyes and watch his smile falter. “Tell me where Valentina is.” 

Leander’s lips thin as his jaw clamps tight. I back up a step, letting my gaze flow across the angles of his face, savoring every detail. The red gleam in my eyes reflects in the white surface of his.

“Fine. I’ll see for myself.” 

I thrust my palm against his forehead and I violate his mind. 

One blink and I’m in a windowless stone hallway. The ceiling is curved. There are utility lights along the wall. Electricity hums within the insulated cables that flow toward a door at the end of the hall. I know it’s locked with more than just iron. I can sense the magic from the other end of the corridor. The spells are like the ones at the doors of The Maqlu. Familial magic, shared among kin. Karras and the Sarnos. 

I know that Valentina is there behind the door. Florin too. But something else. I try to walk toward the door but Leander holds me back. He may be human now, but his mind is still powerful, and I’m inexperienced and untrained with this new gift of seeing. 

I grit my teeth and push. I push and push and manage a small step. I bend my knees and try to shoulder through the unseen force that holds me back. I take one more step and then I hit a force that flashes with bright light so strong that it throws me to the floor. 

My head hits the dirt and I’m suddenly somewhere else. 

I stand and face a golden wall. On the wall is a series of rings, one inside the next, with a round polished sphere of lapis lazuli in the center. Each line shifts in opposite directions, like some kind of lock or clockwork. Tick, tick, tick. The lines click along. 

I take a step closer and letters flare to life in each ring, illuminated with golden light. But these glyphs are markings in a language I’ve never seen. 

“Show me what this means,” I demand. 

“No.” Leander’s voice seems to surround me, but I hear the struggle it takes for him to answer. 

I try to look at each line and remember the shape and form of every symbol. I try to burn them into my memory. I know this is important and Leander doesn’t want me to see. I edge toward it, reaching my hand out for the stone of lapis lazuli. The ticking grows louder, and louder, and louder until finally my fingers graze the cool blue gem. A final tick reverberates so loudly in my head that I close my eyes and press my hands over my ears and scream.

The sound of a crack splits through my mind. For a moment I think my head has been cut wide open. My brain is surely leaking all over the floor. 

“Lu,” Ediye says. I open my eyes and look at her. There’s worry and fear on her face and I blink, trying to clear the pain from my mind. My hand is still on Leander’s forehead and I take it away. The instant I do, his head bobs down and his body slumps against the shards of stars that hold him to the wall. 

Blood drips from the corners of Leander’s open eyes in bright red tears. His pupils are dilated. The image of a crescent moon cradling an eight pointed star is carved into his forehead, black veins spidering away from the mark before they disappear beneath his skin. 

I killed him. 

I killed him with my mind. My touch. Nothing else.

…

…..

Holy shit holy shit holy shit holy shit. 

Okay, don’t freak out. Do. Not. Freak. Out.

That was totally badass but also terrifying and oh my GOD don’t freak out. 

“You’re freaking out,” Ediye says. 

“I know! I know I know I know,” I say, flapping my hands as though magic might pour out of them. “I killed him!” 

“You’re a vampire, you’ve killed lots of people. He deserved it too. Definitely a douchebag.” 

“But not with my mind, Ediye.” 

She shrugs. “Well, I mean, kind of. Singing, mind control, tomato, to-mah-to.” 

“Fuuuuuck. Fuck shitting fuck. This is not good.” 

“Are you kidding? This is awesome,” she says, laying a hand on my arm. I rip it away. 

“No. Don’t touch me. I don’t want to hurt you.” 

Ediye laughs as though this is all totally normal. My eyes dart around to the others who all look wary, except for Ashen who just looks worried as fuck. I can feel it from him, humming beneath my skin. 

“You hurt Leander because you wanted to,” Ediye says with a reassuring smile as she places her hand back on my arm and squeezes. “I know you don’t want to hurt me. I trust you, Lu.” 

I open my mouth to tell her I that I don’t trust myself, but then I hear it. A sound in the distance. It’s so faint that I think I might have imagined it. 

I scramble past the others, over to the window. I unlatch it and push the pane open as I look into the snowstorm, peering out toward the mountains and forests beyond the fortified wall of Valentina’s home. The sun is nothing more than a cold orb of muted yellow light looking down on me like an indifferent eye.

The wind batters the pane of glass in my hand. The flakes of snow whip at my face. 

And then I hear it. 

The howl of wolves in the woods.

I don’t bother shutting the window when I turn to the others and stride across the room. 

“We need to get our weapons and find Valentina. She’s in the catacombs beneath the house,” I say, casting a final glance to the fallen angel impaled against the wall as I pass. 

“The werewolves are already here.”

CHAPTER 35

Ashen and I rush up the stairs to grab our swords with little more than a handful of practical words between us, but the silence is replaced with heavy, worried glances. It only takes a few minutes to grab what we need and reconvene in the foyer with the others, but I wish we could just stop, if only for a moment. I just want to talk. It might be the last chance. 

Everyone is ready when we arrive. Davina is the only one that came unarmed, but she pulls a medieval pike with a gleaming, sharpened silver blade down from a display on the wall. She taps the long handle against her palm, testing the weight, and meets my eyes with a determined smile. 

“This will do,” she says.

I return her smile with a single nod. “Let’s go.” 

I lead the others toward the back of the house, down a corridor, into the library. We stop at a tapestry of a hunt that takes up a huge section of the stone wall, right down to the floor. The main figure astride a white horse is Vlad, leading a group of friends in the chase after a majestic stag. One woman is among them at the bottom right of the scene, looking meek and pious as she keeps company with a hunting dog. 

“Hey guys, check it out. Photobomb,” I say, standing next to the woman and pointing from the image of myself in thread to my chest and back again. 

“Ha! No way,” Ediye says with a laugh. 

“I remember that hunt. I totally killed that stag. Vlad was so loaded he fell off his horse.” I take one last look before I pull the whole thing down from the wall to reveal an iron door hidden behind it, yanking at the fabric despite Eryx’s dramatic gasp and protest about it being some priceless historical work of art. “Whatever, Mr. Art Historian Angel. You didn’t even know the difference between Mistoffelees and Aristophanes two days ago, so, I love you dearly, but shut the fuck up.” 

Ediye cackles and takes aim at the handle of the door with her outstretched hands, killing the spell that seals it with a blast of her more powerful magic. We step onto the landing of a tight spiral staircase that descends below the fortress. I flick on a light switch to my right and caged utility lights burn and hum.

“She’s down here,” I say as Ashen steps to my side. The flame roars to life across his blade. 

“Keep your promise, vampire. If I tell you to run, run.” 

There’s a moment where everything and everyone else stops existing. A moment where Ashen looks into my eyes with that liquid crimson flame and I feel my mark sing to his. I reach out to his chest and run my fingers across it, feeling the heat of it tingle in my skin. I live there, I think to myself, and a sense of peace washes over me. I’ll always live there, and he’ll live within me, and we’ll never die alone. After all these centuries of loneliness, I finally belong to someone, and he belongs to me. 

And fuck if I’m going to run and not fight for it. 

A slow smile spreads on my face. Ashen rolls his eyes. 

“You’re not going to run, are you.” 

I shake my head.

“Figures. Just… try not to stab me today, would you? It’s getting old.” 

“It never gets old,” I say, and Ashen smiles before stealing a heated kiss from my lips. When he pulls back he looks at me for one last, long moment, then leads the way down the stairs. 

We head deeper into the bowels of the building, the humidity rising around us. I smell the sweaty rock and the damp dirt of the floor as we reach the catacombs. The stairway opens to a small room and a long hallway, the one from my vision within Leander’s mind. 

“She’s there. So is Florin. I know it,” I say as Ashen turns back to me with a dark look of concern. He shifts his gaze to Ediye and nods. 

I watch as Ediye’s steps into the mouth of the corridor. She pulls a sachet from her pocket and pours some of the contents into her hand, then faces the door. “Akbuus gallaai,” she whispers into the powder, then blows it toward the hallway. A wave of her voice cascades off her hand, blasting the door off its hinges and into the next room. She turns back to me and smiles.

“Badass bitch,” I say, and she winks before striding down the hall with the rest of us following her lead. 

The dust is still clouding the end of the hallway when we step onto the fallen door and into a cavernous room. 

“Holy fucking shit,” Cole whispers as he stops next to me. “Did you see this in Leander’s mind?” 

I swallow a thick knot of dread in my throat. “No. He wouldn’t let me in this far.” 

“I can see why,” Cole replies, and takes a step forward. To our immediate left is a small, open medical suite. There’s a metal exam table with silver shackles lying open on its polished surface. Behind it are shelves stocked with vials of serum and syringes. To our right are security glass cells that house rows and rows of people. People who look as shocked by our presence as we are of theirs. Some of them pound on the glass. Some pace by their locked glass doors. The occasional one sits on their cot and draws their knees to their chest, regarding us with suspicion and fear. 

One is familiar. She presses her hands to the glass with tears in her eyes. 

Valentina. 

We rush to her cell. There are tiny holes in her door for communication through the glass and she presses her face to them.

“Help me, please. Please. I need you to get him out, please,” she says as the tears flow across her skin. She points to a cell that’s behind hers where a man stands not next to the door, but next to the transparent wall that divides them. Florin. 

“How? Where are the keys?” Cole asks as Ashen moves to Florin’s door. He tries the thick, bolted handle before he starts smashing it with the butt of his sword. It’s not giving way. 

“I don’t know. There’s some kind of control panel that opens them. Please, we have to get out before the werewolves return.” 

“Are you a hybrid?” I ask. 

Valentina looks at me with desperation and guilt in her face. She seems so much warmer and more vulnerable than the version that Mila tried to imitate, and my heart breaks for her, stuck in this prison next to her mate. 

“No. But Abdulov… he used me to make them. He forced me to turn them all into vampires. And then he made them into hybrids,” she says as she gestures down the row of people in cells that span the length of the room and three deep. There are at least thirty cells, potentially more if there are other chambers beneath the house. I turn my eyes back to Valentina’s. Her shoulders shake with helplessness and regret. “I didn’t want to do it. I didn’t. But he threatened Florin. He… he used the witch to torture him with magic. We tried but we couldn’t hold out.” 

“It’s all right, Valentina. We’ll find a way to free you.” I glance over at Ashen who continues to smash at the door with no discernible progress. “Ediye, do you have anything?” 

“I just might,” she says, and I see the spark of an idea alight in her eyes. “Eryx, how much heat can your feathers take?” 

Eryx shrugs and looks over his shoulder, fanning out his wings. The sound of clinking wind chimes fills the silence behind him as his plumage shifts and settles. “I dunno. But we can find out.” 

“Press the tip of your wing to the glass and let’s see if this works,” Ediye says. Eryx does as she asks, the edges of his feathers scraping along the glass. 

“Hula zuba u itaatuuka. Qu turkunu liteli sa me.”

Eryx’s long primary feathers begin to glow, first a dark red, then a brighter orange like the dawn, then yellow and finally white. At first nothing happens, but then I see it. The glass begins to bubble and drip. 

“Valentina,” I say over the Ediye’s chants. She meets my eyes. “You can spellcast, can’t you. That's why they came for you.”

Valentina nods. 

“Follow Ediye’s words. Use her spell from your side. We need to speed things up. I’ll work on Florin’s door.” 

Valentina nods again. She closes her eyes and begins chanting. The glass drips in thick globs as the feathers melt further into the surface, piercing through to the other side. 

I run to Ashen, who hits the lock with relentless blows. There are dents but it still doesn’t give. I grasp his arm and point to where the vampire and witch and angel work together on Valentina’s door. 

“We need Aloros,” I say. “The rest are hybrids. If they know we’re here-“

“Then so does Semyon,” he finishes, a look of dismay fleeting across his face. He pushes me behind him and shields me with his wings of smoke. He rolls up his sleeve, chanting the summoning spell that burns his hidden tattoo to life. 

Just like in my vision from the crash, a pinprick of light forms before us. I watch through the smoke as it grows into a brilliant orb. It pulses and expands until it’s as taller than Ashen, then bursts into glittering sparks. Aloros steps forward from the falling light. 

“Demon. While it amuses me that you require my aid, it is becoming more frequent than I anticipated,” Aloros says with a hint of a smug smile. He casts his gaze around the room, a crease appearing between his brows. He looks at Eryx and Ediye and their efforts to free Valentina, then back to Ashen. 

“Less talk, more help,” Ashen orders. 

Aloros doesn’t delay and unfurls his wings, pointing the tips of his primary feathers to the glass. He looks at me and nods. 

I close my eyes. I hold my hand toward where the feathers meet the glass. I take up Ediye’s spell. 

The heat builds within me. I feel my mated mark like a beacon of light and I channel everything through it. A wind picks up at my feet. I open my eyes and watch as the angel’s feathers begin to glow, bubbling the security glass. It’s working, but not fast enough. 

I keep chanting but I look to Ashen whose gaze is soldered to mine, darting my eyes down to his sword, then to where the glass is beginning to melt. He nods. The flame comes to life on his blade. 

Ashen plunges his sword into the melting hole, careful to avoid damaging the angel’s feathers. It takes no more than a breath of time and the entire wall of glass shatters and falls to the floor. Florin is free. 

“Cole! Add your sword!” Ashen yells above the chanting and a wind of magic that’s picked up in the chamber. Cole does the same, plunging his hellfire blade into the hole of dripping glass. Again it shatters, and the glass isn’t even done falling before Valentina is running to Florin. They crash into one another in a desperate embrace, both shaking with cries of relief. 

“Thank you,” Valentina says as she meets all of our eyes over Florin’s shoulder. 

Aloros steps forward, curling his wing around his body to inspect it for damage. The glow is receding, already turning to a deep orange. The structure of the feathers appears undamaged and he doesn’t seem bothered. If anything, he almost looks bored, but I see the way his eyes dart down the chamber. “What about the other prisoners?”

“All hybrids,” Ashen replies. “We need to keep them here for now, until we can figure out how to deal with them safely.” 

Aloros nods, then turns toward Valentina and Florin as they part from their embrace. “I will take you both to safety.” 

Valentina takes a step toward the angel. Her eyes flare with red light. “Take Florin. They invaded my home. They imprisoned and tortured us. I want vengeance.”

Aloros sighs and looks down at me as if to say this is why I call you ‘lesser being’. I shrug. 

“Fine. Come, human. I will take you to the apothecary of Bucharest. She can be trusted. We will remain there, if you survive.”

Valentina and Florin nod before they embrace one last time and share a passionate kiss. They separate with tears and words of longing and hope, and then Florin follows the angel who strides toward the broken door. 

Valentina watches until they disappear from view, then turns her tear-streaked face to me. The red gleam still glows in her eyes. “You’re Leucosia, aren’t you?”

I nod. “Yes. I’d say it’s good to meet you, but the circumstances are a bit shit,” I say, gesturing around us. 

“Abdulov wants you. He’ll be coming for you.” 

“Yeah,” I say, withdrawing my katana from the saya at my back. “I’m hoping he does.” 

“So now what?” Valentina asks as she looks at each of us. Cole passes her a blade just as an electric clink echoes through the room. 

I hear the sound of twenty eight bolts slide open at once. 

“Now we fucking run.”

CHAPTER 36

I scramble to the medical suite, taking a handful of vials and syringes off the shelves before Ashen grabs my arm and pulls me toward the corridor. I hear glass doors opening behind us and running footsteps. We follow the others down the hallway, running as fast as we can go to catch up. 

When Ediye makes it to the far end she turns to face us, a wind picking up around to lift her black hair from her shoulders. She raises her palms and starts to chant. I glance over my shoulder as we run, stones falling behind us to block the path to the chamber. By the time we reach the end, the roof of the corridor collapses, sending chips of rock skittering against our heels as we come to a stop. 

“Is there another way out of their chamber?” Ediye asks as Ashen pulls some of the vials and syringes from my hand to put them in his shirt pocket. I stuff the rest in my jeans. 

“Yes,” Valentina says. “There’s another door on the far side. It leads to the woods.” 

“Then let’s go, before we’re surrounded.” 

We run up the stairs by twos, our weapons in our hands and our hearts raging. Eryx is the first to burst through the door and into the library, but he comes to a halt as he bends backwards, forcing the rest of us to stop on the landing. A sword of fire sweeps over his chest, narrowly missing his skin. A Reaper stands on the other side of the door, his sword swinging around for a return strike. 

Eryx rights himself and meets the next blow with a flash of light across his own silver sword. The angel strikes back hard, pushing the demon further into the room. The clash of metal echoes through the library, crashing up to the stained glass windows and the high ceiling. Eryx’s wings spread wide and he draws them back before sweeping them to his front, knocking the sword from the demon’s hand. He slices the Reaper across the chest and neck with his feathers. The demon is already falling to his knees when Eryx plunges his sword into his heart, hot blood spilling onto the tapestry that lies beneath their feet. 

“Your boyfriend is a badass,” I say. 

“I know,” Ediye and Cole answer in unison. 

I raise my eyebrows at them as they share a brief but wicked smile. “Oh, so it’s like that now, is it?” 

Ediye’s smile grows wide. “Yeah, it’s like that.”

“You’ve been holding out on details.” 

“Maybe another day,” she says as a second demon enters the room with her sword drawn. She rushes toward us, meeting Cole’s blade this time. I recognize this one just as I did the last. They were both with Ember in the resurrection room in my vision of Ashen in the Shadow Realm. 

Ediye adds her gifts to the fight, hitting the demon with an orb of energy that the Reaper manages to deflect with her sword, but it gives Cole the distraction he needs to land a blow to her shoulder. Cole and Ediye fight together in a fluid dance of spells and fire, blasts of black spheres illuminated with bright flame. They push the Reaper back into the hallway and together they give her an everlasting death of magic and metal. 

As soon as the demon falls, Cole and Ediye look at one another for a heartbeat before diving into a passionate kiss. My heart nearly bursts with love watching my soulmate as she’s swept up into Cole’s arms, Eryx joining them to wrap his embrace around them both. I look at Ashen and he smiles down at me, and I know he feels the love that illuminates my soul through our bond. 

“Come on, vampire. Let’s get out of here so you can get all those highly descriptive details that I am sure you are eager to hear from Ediye.” 

I let out a laugh as he lays his arm across my shoulder, pulling me in to press a warm kiss to my cheek. Life is everything in this brief moment. Love and fear and hope. Happiness on the edge of death. I feel… enriched. If I could just make this one moment last forever, I’d have all the magic of life right in my hand. 

Ashen’s palm drifts down to my back and he pushes me along, Davina and Valentina following behind us. Eryx leads the way down the hall after the trio breaks apart, and we head toward the main entrance of the house. Valentina explains the layout of the catacombs as we go, where the hybrids will come out in the woods, where the strongest and weakest points are in the land that surrounds us. 

“I don’t think it’s worth trying the roads,” she says. “With this snowstorm, we’re just as likely to get stuck or slide off the road in our urgency to get away. Chances are strong that either Semyon or the demons already have it covered, unless they’re too busy fighting one another.” 

“I recognized the two that we killed in the library. It looks like the ones that are after us are those that were loyal to Ember. How many did she have in her Mean Girls club?” I ask Ashen. 

“I’m not entirely sure. Twelve that I know of, but there could be more.”

“And we’ve killed five in total now over the last two days. That’s not great.” I look up at Ashen as we stop in the foyer. Valentina pulls a pair of swords from a hidden cupboard and hands her borrowed blade back to Cole.

“If we can make it through the woods and over the mountain, there’s a coven of witches with a stronghold on the other side,” Valentina says as she runs her gaze across the silver gladius in her hand. She smiles fondly at it as though she’s looking at an old friend. “I have a good relationship with them. They are powerful and would give us the numbers to fight back. The hybrids will be coming out on the far side of the house, further down the hill. We have a small time advantage if we go now.” 

I nod and turn to the angel among us. “Eryx, can you fly ahead to warn them?” 

His gaze darts to Cole and Ediye. I know he doesn’t want to leave them, but he sheathes his sword and gives me a troubled smile. “Yeah. I can do that.” 

“Then let’s get out of here. We won’t have much time. And whatever happens,” I say, holding Valentina’s gaze so there can’t be any doubt, “Semyon Abdulov is mine.”

Valentina nods and we file out the front door, sticking close to the house before crossing the snow-covered lawn to a small side entrance in the stone wall. The snow is thick and whipped into deep drifts where the wind has scraped across the land, but we keep a fast pace, running wherever we can. We barely make it to the treeline before a wretched howling drifts toward us from the forests on the far side of the house. It sounds more like a wraith than a wolf, like a soul being torn apart to make something new.

“Hybrids,” Valentina says when I glance at her with a questioning look. “They’re free of the catacombs.” 

I take a deep breath and we surge ahead through the woods, climbing over rocks and fallen trees and pushing through deep drifts of snow. Sometimes there are clearings and sometimes the forest is so thick that we have to break the branches with our swords to keep moving forward. Though the blowing snow is quickly filling in our footprints, we’ll still be easy to follow. 

Not that we need to worry about that.

The first attack comes from the werewolves that pour down the hill in front of us like a wave of fur and teeth. Their mist flows ahead of them through the trees, coating the landscape and obscuring the drifts of snow beneath our feet. I ready my sword and look for Semyon. 

Valentina stalks ahead to meet them. She spins with her blades and cuts the first down with a sweep across the wolf’s neck. She’s already killed her second wolf by the time Ashen and Cole each slay their first. 

“She’s great,” I say as Ediye steps to my side and we watch Valentina eviscerate another werewolf. She hisses into its face as she drags her blade through its abdomen, spilling steaming guts onto the snow. 

Davina joins my other side and readies her pike as Ediye forms a ball of magic in her palm and fires it off into the pack. Two werewolves are knocked off course by the orb and only one gets up. 

We press ahead and join the others in the fight, forming a loose circle as the wolves close in around us. The smell of blood and bile and piss and spilled guts and all the other scents of battle whip in the wind. I hiss and cut and stab. I steal glances at Ashen, his face stern with concentration as he swings his sword in graceful arcs. I look at Davina who’s surprisingly pretty handy with that pike. She’s got a great aim for eyeballs. Cole and Ediye fight together in their seamless, elegant dance, just like they did in the house. And normally, I’d be all over this shit. Killing werewolves, battling with my friends, hissing… but the unknown of the hybrids and the absence of Semyon and the whereabouts of the other Reapers are problems that have me too anxious to enjoy the fun.

Turns out, those become the least of my worries. 

Another player is ready to enter the game.

CHAPTER 37

The snow bursts from the ground to the left of our battlefield. A massive white shape sails into the air like a deadly whip. Smooth scales shift and glisten through the chaos of the storm. 

Everyone scatters, no matter what side they’re on. No one wants to be caught beneath the body twisting and falling through the squall. 

The snake strikes a wolf closing in on me with her fangs and he whines, dropping to the ground in a shaking heap of fur. 

Zida lands on the bloodstained snow and locks her silver eyes on me.

A flash of metal catches my attention. A dagger strikes Zida in the side and she turns toward Ashen with a vicious hiss. 

I meet Ashen’s eyes for just a moment, but I see his desperation. I feel it in my chest. 

“Lu! Run!”

The serpent faces Ashen and he raises his sword to take her on, but there are more werewolves coming down the hill and the howl of hybrids closing the distance below us. He can’t fight them all and win. Not with her in this battle too. 

I take off down the hill. 

“Zida!” I call over my shoulder. I run as fast as I can. I’ve got to draw her away from him. “Come and get me!” 

I hear Ediye’s magic blast snow and trees behind me, and I know that Zida is following. 

I keep running. I don’t look back. There’s a game trail that veers to the left and I take that for a distance before I reach a wide clearing. Even though the trail ends, I don’t stop. I race across the open space and back into the cover of the trees. I pass through another two meadows before I can’t hear or feel her behind me anymore. Even then, I keep running down the hill, using gravity to propel me through the woods.

I reach a small clearing filled with deep snow and stop abruptly in the center. 

I know this place. 

The smell of pine needles. The sting of snow on my sweaty face. Woodsmoke and Ashen’s scent, clinging to my hair as it whips across my face. 

The feeling that I’m not alone. 

I bend my knees and ready my blade. 

Snow ripples in a serpentine as the snake whips toward me beneath its cover. She bursts from the powder, her mouth gaping, fangs dripping, her venom spitting at me with fury. 

I roll to my right and come up with my blade braced across my shoulder. The toe of my sword slices through her scales as her momentum carries her body past mine. 

Zida drops to the snow in a writhing mass, hissing in pain and rage. Steam billows from her hot blood as it melts the snow.

I stand and watch her, my chest heaving with pumping breaths. Her writhing subsides until just the end of her tail swishes in the snow. I look down at the sword in my hand and back to the snake. 

“This is either really dumb, or really fucking smart,” I say out loud as I sheathe my sword and approach the demon beast. I bite into my wrist and she keeps her eye on me as I draw close. Her pink tongue flicks and she hisses when I touch her glistening scales. “Shut up now, snake. I’m trying to help.” 

I place my hand on her again and drip my blood into the wound. 

“Gasaan tiildibba me zi ab.”

Queen who gives life to the dying. 

“Itti memes sa zumri uri u musaati sa qate uri lissahitma,” I whisper, closing my eyes as I drip more of my blood along Zida’s wound. 

With the blood of my body and the cleansing blood of my hand, may it be taken away. 

“Sharuuh laani epsis lukur dusangu.”

Powerful is the figure who makes an enemy into a friend. 

I repeat the lines of the incantation, working my way down Zida’s body until I get to the end of the long slice. I finish just as the sound of howling hybrids flows toward us from the cover of the woods. 

I look down at the snake and I know she’s looking at me. Her tongue flicks. The split fibers of her flesh are knitting back together.

“Sorry about your brother. My bad.” 

The snake gives me a lethargic hiss. 

“Right. It was worth a shot. You’re welcome, by the way,” I say with a salute before taking off through a break between the trees, leaving Zida to heal in solitude. 

I start running up the mountain, trying to veer back toward where the others should still be in the thick of the fight. It’s slower going, which I guess is no surprise. The snow, the mountain, the exertion of the battle and the effort to heal the snake… it all takes a toll. I go slower on the way up but I still make decent time getting past two clearings. I manage to make it to the first meadow I crossed on my way down before I finally find what I was looking for. 

Semyon Abdulov stands between me and the mountain. 

“Koroleva piyavok,” he says as a smile spreads across his face. His dark, slicked-back hair and his charcoal wool coat look untouched by the elements. “You seem a little worn out. I have something that might help.” 

I unsheathe my sword. “Douchebag. I bet you do. It’s running through your veins.” 

Semyon laughs. “Well, what a surprise. You got your voice back. That must have been fun.” 

“You bet,” I say as my grip tightens around the handle of my katana. “I can show you, if you like. I know how fond you are of medical experimentation.” 

He laughs again, his icy Alpha eyes glowing bright in the swirling snow between us. Two more of his pack materialize from the trees behind him in their wolven form. “I’ve got other plans for our reunion, koroleva piyavok. But you could make it easier for the both of us by just coming with me.”

I bend my knees and raise my sword. “Hard pass, motherfucker.” 

Semyon’s eyes grow brighter. “Suit yourself.”

The wolves surge past him as the mist cascades across the field toward me. But I hear another sound too, coming from my left. Hybrids, crashing through the woods toward us. 

Shit.

I keep my focus on the wolves closest to me. They attack with better coordination than the pack members further up the hill. They take turns snapping at me. They jump beyond the reach of my blade and come back hard. One grazes my calf and tears my jeans but misses the skin. I manage to catch it in the leg as it darts away. I take the chance to press on after the other wolf in an aggressive attack. No sooner do I kill them both than two more make it down the hill to take their place. But I keep my eyes on my prize across the field. Semyon Abdulov. 

The first of the hybrids break through the trees. It’s a pick your own freakshow, inbred carnival kind of situation. Some are in their human-slash-vampire form, which isn’t so bad. Some run on all fours like a wolf, but with humanlike aspects too, like patches of missing fur where human skin shines through or blended facial features. They are straight-up hideous. Regardless of where they lean on the yuck spectrum, all of them set their sights on me, and it’s not giving me loads of confidence about this completing the transformation business.  

I’m massively outnumbered. 

I’m betting on a plan that might turn me into a freak.

I’m definitely super fucked. 

Just as I’m about to rush at Semyon in some final Hail Mary play for the Alpha, a whirling blade misses my face and lodges into one of the werewolves dancing around my sword. 

I glance to my right. It’s a member of Ember’s Mean Girl demon club. He meets my eyes, and I’m not sure if he meant to hit me or the wolf. 

Fuck it, I think. I’m already up shit creek.

“Don’t let them bite you!” I yell to the unfamiliar Reaper as three more join behind him. “Their venom is Angelwing!” 

He narrows his glare at me before he throws another blade, hitting a hybrid in the eye as it starts the rush across the field. It doesn’t bring the beast down, but it slows it a little. I watch as the hybrid claws the knife from its eye and I’d be willing to bet that shit’s going to heal itself. 

I cringe. They are definitely tougher than werewolves. This is super not good. 

I refocus on my goal and cut down the next werewolf that stands between me and my target, glaring at Semyon as he draws a silver longsword from beneath his coat. More werewolves pour toward me and I cut them down as the Reapers meet the first of the hybrids in the snow. 

A glittering black orb of magic cuts through the wind and strikes down one of the wolves in my path. Another hits a hybrid in the distance. Cole bursts out of the woods with Ediye on his heels and they rush into the battle. 

When I look back at Semyon, he raises his sword. But I see a flash of fear in his eyes. His body can’t hide it from me. 

And finally there’s a clear break between us. It’s like a single shaft of sunlight that cuts through the clouds. 

I run toward him as fast as I can. His hand tightens around his sword. He’ll hit me hard if I make it there first. I already know how much strength he has in his human form. I saw it in the brickworks. 

But what he doesn’t have is a demon mate with the element of surprise. 

Ashen lodges his blade into Semyon’s spine, just high enough to paralyze his limbs but not high enough to risk instant death. He holds onto Semyon’s arm as the Alpha’s legs go limp and lowers him to the ground. Semyon’s eyes are wide with shock and it sends the wolves and hybrids into a frenzy of howling and whining and growling. 

“What is it your girlfriend so eloquently said in Sanford right before I ripped out her fucking throat?” I ask with a smile of fangs as I squat down next to him. “Ah, right. I remember. Distraction yields destruction. I’m assuming that was your girlfriend, anyway. The one with the obsidian blade, high ranking pack member, kinda pretentious like you? Am I right?” 

Semyon glares back at me as Ashen hands me the vials of serum and I draw a syringe from my back pocket. 

I take the first serum and uncap the needle, drawing out enough liquid that I can smell it. I toss it behind me. “Nope, already had that.” 

Semyon glares at me before spitting in the snow next to my knees. “Fucking koroleva piyavok.”

“So gross,” I say as I withdraw golden serum from another vial and then bring the scent to my nose. “You know what else is gross? Angel blood. And this definitely smells like angel blood. So I’ll take a pass. It probably wouldn’t sit well in my system anyway, considering my latest relationship status.” 

I smash the vial on top of Semyon’s head. The golden liquid drips down his skin as the Alpha swears in Russian. His eyes are filled with fury as he homes his glare on me. I give him a sad pout.

“Oh no. It was the only one I saw like it on the shelves. That wasn’t limited edition, was it? My bad. Now hold this, would you?” I stab the empty syringe into Semyon’s paralyzed leg and take out a fresh one, drawing enough liquid from the next vial to smell it. “Ah, now this is the one.” 

“What are you doing?” Semyon asks through panting breaths as he watches me. That fear is back in his eyes. Ashen cuts down a werewolf that tries to attack from behind us, the dog’s head rolling past us on the snow. 

“I guess you could say I’m finishing what you started, except I’m choosing sides. Mine. But timing is everything, don’t you think?” I fill the syringe and pocket the vial, then press the plunger enough to rid the fluid of bubbles. Ashen kills another wolf as I lean in close to Semyon’s ear. “Now hold still, little pup. Let this koroleva piyavok show you how it’s done.” 

I tear into the Alpha’s throat and my venom floods his veins as I pull and pull and pull in the blood. It tastes like werewolf blood always does to me. Smoky. Musty. But I know he’s ancient, and powerful. I taste that there too. 

Semyon’s heart slows. His breathing shallows beneath my palm. I feel his jaw slacken next to my face. In the moments before his death, I draw my fangs away. 

I look up at Ashen. 

“I love you,” I say. 

He smiles. The way he looks in this moment, with that dark hair wet from sweat and snow, those tattoos that climb up his neck, the radiance in his skin, it will be one of those memories that’s a beacon in darkness when so many sorrowful years try to pull me beneath the sea of time. 

“I love you too, my Lu. Always,” he says. 

I thrust the needle into my jugular and press the plunger down. The moment I feel it start to burn through my veins, I rip out Semyon’s throat.  

I was right, timing is everything.

I just wasn’t fast enough.

CHAPTER 38

The only way to control a pack of werewolves is to be the Alpha. 

And the only way for an Alpha to become an Alpha is either to inherit the position or to kill for it. Until the Alpha’s dying breath leaves their body, their thoughts and their rules are obeyed. Only then does the power shift to the next in line.

But you have to be a werewolf first. 

Or a hybrid.

I feel Semyon’s orders scuttle into my brain as my transformation spiders through my veins. 

Take the vampires alive. 

Kill the rest.

Only it’s too late for him. There’s no coming back from the damage I inflicted before I injected the serum into my neck. Semyon’s last breath shudders through his throat as I grip his flesh between my teeth. 

But it’s just a fraction of time too long to stop the hybrid that clamps down on Ashen’s shoulder. 

Semyon’s last, rattling breath is muted by my scream. 

Everything around us stops. 

The hybrid releases Ashen’s shoulder as though she’s just bitten hot iron. 

The werewolves that are closing in around us go still, their glowing eyes blinking at us in the wind and snow. They watch us for a long moment before they point their muzzles to the sky and howl. The hybrids add their wraithish calls into the storm. 

I feel all their thoughts at my command. 

And it hurts. Like there’s not enough space for them in my head. Like all my blood is turning from liquid to solid. All my muscles are growing stiff. All my joints are made of points of glass sharp enough to cut the bone they bind together. I claw at consciousness as the battlefield spins around me. Every move I make to crawl toward Ashen is agony. But all I care about is getting to where he kneels with his hand over his torn shoulder, panting in the snow.

I raise my wrist to my lips, shuddering with a sudden feeling of ice beneath my skin. I bite down as I drag myself closer to Ashen. My teeth quiver within my flesh as I watch him fall to his back.

“All right, vampire?” he whispers through rapid, painful breaths. He reaches for me as I draw near. I know he can feel the panic that burns the mark on my chest, just like I can feel his sorrow and resignation. My shoulders quake but I refuse to answer when I pull my wrist away. 

“Gasaan… tiildibba me… zi ab…” I say, shivering, so cold, freezing cold in every cell. I hold my arm above his wound as blood drips into the marred skin. “Tirrama salutti… sa kassapti sa… ruhi ipusu… supii arkis ups…” 

Ashen’s color is draining away before my eyes. I hear his heart pounding the venom through his veins. He raises his hand to my cheek. It’s so much colder than it should be. “My Lu. I’m sorry, my vampire. I’m so sorry. You were so brave.” 

I feel every tear that flows across my skin. This can’t be all we have. It can’t be all we get. After all we’ve suffered, apart and together. This can’t be it. 

“No, Ashen. I… can do this… Itti memes sa zu… sa sumri… Ittis memes sa…” 

“Lu,” he whispers as I falter on the spell. The fire in Ashen’s eyes is dimming. Bursting blood vessels color the whites red. A cough rattles in his chest and he pulls me down for a last embrace. “There is no great risk left to take. We have taken them all.” 

I lay my ear to his chest and shudder within Ashen’s embrace. His heart sings its last desperate song to me in a broken, stuttering rhythm.  

No great risk left to take.

I gasp for air. Ashen’s arms have no strength left to hold on as I push myself up from his chest. “I love you, Ashen,” I say. I look in his eyes as my tears drip down onto his shirt. 

Timing is everything.

Before he can take another breath, I draw my kaiken from my thigh and slide it across his throat in the deepest cut I can manage with my waning strength. 

Ashen’s eyes go wide, his expression desperate. 

“I’m sorry,” I whisper. I drop my blade and lay one hand to his face, the other to his chest where his mark is losing heat beneath my palm. “I’m sorry. I’m right here, Ashen. Everything is okay.” 

Ashen passes away with the sound of my voice in his ears, the feel of my hand on his skin. I send my love with him as I press my hand to his chest and watch his eyes dim. 

His last breath flows across his lips as I send him to death with a kiss. 

I don’t blink. 

I don’t move as Ediye crashes down next to my side and grips my shoulders, calling my name. 

I only wait. 

And then the first gray flake lifts from Ashen’s skin. 

I let out an anguished cry of relief. Sparks and ash swirl with the snow and drift toward the sky. I cradle my face in my hands as Ediye wraps her arms around me. 

“You did it, Lu. He’s going back. You did it,” she whispers in my ear as she squeezes me tight. “He’s all right, Lu… Lu?.. Lu!” 

Ediye’s voice grows faint as though she’s drifting away down a tunnel. I close my eyes as she lays me on my back in the snow. I find the minds of the hybrids and wolves and whisper my wishes to them. Akaassi kunusi, akammi kunusi anna naga. I whisper it as many times as I can before I can’t keep hold of the words anymore. 

“No, Lu… You’re my best friend. You’re my soulmate. Please, please stay,” Ediye begs. I feel her hand on my face and open my eyes. Tears slide down her skin, but she tries to stay strong, even though she knows I see every tremble in her lip. 

“Thought… it would… work…” My brief smile is swept clean by a wave of pain. My body shudders. “Love you…”

Hard to breathe. I’m scared. So scared. 

A sob breaks through as Ediye’s armor crumbles. “I love you, Lu. I love you. Do you hear me, Lu? Lu-” 

I do. My name. A scream. 

The last thing I hear. 

Tick, tick, tick. 

I open my eyes, blinking into the dim light. I press my hands onto the stone by my sides and rise from the floor. There’s a black wall in front of me of polished obsidian. Rings within rings click in opposite directions. In the center is a gleaming sphere of black tourmaline. 

Just like when I was in Leander’s mind, I take a step closer. Silver glyphs flare to life along the rings. It’s the same language as before, but different words. 

The ticking grows louder in my head as I take another step closer to the wall. A ribbon of whispering voices twists around me in an invisible knot. I reach for the orb at the center of the rings and touch my fingertip to its cool, slick surface. 

I’m hit with a wall of sound, a final tick that’s like a crash through my skull. 

My lungs suck in a breath that fills every spongy crevice of their chambers. It feels like I’ve never breathed before. 

I twist and writhe but there’s pressure on my shoulders that keeps me down. I thrash my legs and open my eyes.

“Just breathe, Lu. Go slow. You’re safe,” Ashen says. His hands are warm on my skin. 

“Ash…en?..” 

A smile blooms across his face as he watches my confused expression and the way I gulp in air like I’m drowning. His eyes look glassy as he nods. My gaze darts to the room around us but keeps coming back to him. I’m afraid he’ll disappear. 

“R-re…al... Real?”

He lets out a breath of a laugh. “Yes,” he says, touching the mark on my chest. It tingles and warms. It’s an anchor, the only thing still tethering my battered soul to my bones. “This is real, my vampire. My reckless, brave, brilliant vampire. You are in the Resurrection Chamber in the Shadow Realm.” 

A whole new wave of panic hits me like a gale. I try to scramble to my feet but Ashen holds me in place. 

“Slowly, Lu. You are safe. I promise you.” 

I’m shaking violently when Ashen pulls me to his chest. He wraps his arms around me and folds the edges of his black robe across my back, trying to cover every inch of exposed skin that he can. 

“I-I was w-wrong,” I whisper into his shoulder through chattering teeth. 

“About what?”

“K-killing you. It g-got old.”

Ashen laughs and grips me tighter. “Finally,” he says, and I fall to pieces that he tries to keep together in his embrace. 

I let it all go. The fear and adrenaline of battle. The triumph and sorrow of winning and losing everything in a single moment. The panic and despair and shock. Ediye’s heart-splitting scream that still rings in my ears. 

I feel like I’m being carried away in a strong current and I grasp onto whatever I can that will get me through this place. Love. Hope. Relief and possibility. The same things that Ashen feels, their essence rippling beneath my skin. He pulls away, holding my face in his hands. 

“Are you okay?” Ashen asks, surveying my face and looking for anything different.

“Still cold,” I say. “But better. Like… balance. I feel like… more. I just don’t know how.” 

It’s the truth, I do feel better. There’s no lingering whisper of a headache or residual burn in my throat or strange surge of power that feels like light is ready to consume me whenever it sees fit. Everything feels under my control, it’s just I'm not yet sure what that everything is. 

But in this moment, I don’t even care. All that matters right now is that I’m here, and Ashen is here, and Ediye and the others will know by now that we at least made it this far. So we just spend a moment looking at each other. Ashen’s warm hand sweeps hair away from my face like I know he likes to do, and he follows the motion of his hand, lost in thought.

“I tried to tell myself how grateful I was that we had the days we had. I didn’t want you to feel afraid,” he whispers, still watching the progress of his hand through my strands of hair. “But in my heart it was not enough. I wanted more time. To be chosen the way you chose me, even if I’m not worthy of it, I wanted to keep it. After so many centuries feeling the presence of darkness in every step, the moments of light with you left me desperate for more. To watch you resurrecting next to me, to know I would have more time, even if measured only in moments… It is a happiness I have never known.”

My heart melts right through my chest, as hot and bright as liquid gold. I run my fingers across Ashen’s mark. It hums with life beneath my skin. “I want to kiss you.” 

“Then kiss me.” 

“But I’m some kind of hybrid now. What if I got it wrong? Maybe I’ve got Angelwing in my venom now. What if I kill you?” 

Ashen’s eyes dance in the torchlight. Sparks ignite in his pupils. “Then our time truly will be measured in only moments, because I will give my life for that kiss.”

Before I can second guess it, Ashen’s lips press to mine and his tongue slips into my mouth. My heart pounds its way up my throat. He caresses the sharp edges of my teeth with his tongue and it draws a drop of venom into our kiss. I taste the sweet, honeyed nectar, the way my venom always tastes. I smell nothing different. No Angelwing. No scent of werewolf. Just me. 

I break our kiss and look into Ashen’s eyes and I know he can feel my relief when I smile. Just like I can feel his desire for more, an overwhelming, insatiable need to take whatever he can claim. 

I wrap my arms around his neck and we dive back into a kiss that has no more tentative softness. This is a bruising, desperate crash of a kiss. I taste a drop of blood when my teeth catch my lip. Venom coats my tongue when it slides over Ashen’s. I clasp fistfuls of his black silk robe and pull him down with me onto the stone altar.

“Have you ever fucked in the Resurrection Chamber before?” I ask with breathless need as his hands flow over my breasts and down my sides to grip my hips. 

“No,” he says, nipping at my shoulder. “And someone could be down here any moment.” 

I grasp the back of Ashen’s neck and catch his eyes, not letting go as I grip his hard length and center it between my legs. I give him a dark and sinful smile. “Then you’d better make it quick, Reaper.”

He flashes a wicked grin before he thrusts into me. I grit my teeth and stifle a gasp. Every stroke hits harder, deeper. My center grips his thickness like I’m pulling him in. He slides from the crown to the hilt of his cock with every thrust, devouring me with the kiss of a starving man, like he’s consuming my very soul. 

My hands slip beneath Ashen’s robe and fan across his chest, pressing into the tense muscle of his shoulders. I trace the mist of sweat down his spine and grip his ass. He moans onto my tongue as he lifts my hips and cants them to drive against me in a way that has me breaking away to cry out with pleasure. 

“Shhh, vampire,” Ashen whispers as his hand folds over my mouth. He keeps it there as a dark smile claims one corner of his lips. His eyes never leave mine as his free hand flows down my thigh, pressing heat into my flesh before lifting my leg and folding it behind his back. He continues to hit the same spot, again and again, every stroke pushing me closer to a blinding orgasm. I cry out, the sound muffled by his palm. “If only we had more time, I would drink from you in every way I could. But you’re going to need to come for me.”

My lips vibrate against his palm in a needy whimper and I tilt my head back, drawing his hand away from my mouth. I drag it down and fold his fingers across my throat. He grips it gently. 

“Harder,” I whisper as my nails drag down his back. 

Ashen’s eyes are bright with crimson flame as he thrusts in punishing strokes and increases the pressure around my neck. His voice comes out as little more than a hiss between his clenched teeth. “God save my soul. I wish you understood the power you have over me.”

I smile and it must look so sinful on my lips, because his eyes flare with sparks and I feel their heat as though they’re raining down on my skin. “No one is listening but me, Reaper. Now squeeze like a proper demon and give me every last drop you’ve got.” 

He pauses just long enough for me to wonder if I’ve broken him. I cackle a wicked laugh and dig my fingernails deeper into his skin, getting ready to hold on for the ride.

“Oh, vampire. You are in imminent danger.” 

“Of being fucked blind, I hope.” 

“You have no idea.” 

There are no more words after that. 

Ashen slams into me. I’m surrounded by the sound of our skin slapping, of desperate grunts, of my back sliding up and down against the stone. I smell the paraffin on the torches and Ashen’s scent, ink and tobacco dried in the sun. I smell my arousal and our sweat and the damp rock walls of the humid subterranean room. But all I see is him. I don’t take my eyes from his, not even as he squeezes tighter and tighter and the edges of my vision blackens. 

My back arches off the stone as a shattering orgasm tears through me, burning every nerve, twisting every muscle into knots. My pussy throbs around his length as my body grips onto his. A growl slips between Ashen’s teeth and his hand tightens around my throat. I feel his cock thicken and pulse as he spills into me, his body shuddering. It feels as though it’ll never end, and I don’t want it to. These waves of pleasure that we ride together, the feeling of him sliding within me as we come apart together, the feeling of being filled with him. If only I could trap time, I would live right here forever. 

After longer than seems possible, Ashen’s strokes begin to slow and he gradually lifts the pressure from around my neck until he takes his hand away to kiss the bruises left behind. My vision clears with every restorative breath I take.

“You said killing me got old, but you are very clearly still trying,” Ashen says, his voice as rich as honey as he kisses the shell of my ear. I giggle as he nips at my ear lobe and I wrap my arms across his back, drawing him down to me. We lie for that for a moment as we recover our breath, but when he lifts his lips away from my ear to lay a kiss on my mouth I hear it. 

A noise. Footsteps, growing closer to the room. 

“Company,” I whisper, and Ashen meets my eyes for only an instant before he’s sliding out of me to grab a robe from a hook on the wall. 

“You will be safe,” Ashen says as he holds it open for me to slide my arms in. There’s too much urgency in his voice for me to be overwhelmed with reassurance. “Just take my lead. Do everything I say.” 

Nerves suddenly wipe out the pleasure I took just moments ago, even though I feel his cum and my arousal drip down my inner thighs as a slick reminder of what we just shared. Ashen ties the belt of the robe and catches my hand as the footsteps draw closer to the door. 

“Trust me,” he begs as he squeezes my hand between both of his. “It’s going to be hard. It’s going to be really hard. But I have faith in you. I love you, my Lu. Do not forget it.” 

The latch of the door clicks. 

Ashen drops my hand. The flame in his eyes snuffs out as he stands straighter and looks down at me with cold indifference. 

That switch is flipped. The one where the man I know becomes the one I don’t. And I’m suddenly unsure which one is real. 

A sluice of dread drips down my spine. 

I can’t feel him. I can’t feel him beneath my skin.

Two Reapers enter the room, dressed in black uniforms that seem more formal than the guards I’ve seen before. 

“Bring my armor,” Ashen says to them over his shoulder, his hard stare not leaving mine. “Summon the Council. Tell Eshkar and Imogen to meet us in the Kur.” 

“Sir?” 

“Tell them the Master of War has returned with their prize. The finished weapon that will win our war against the Realm of Light.”

CHAPTER 39

I watch in silence as Ashen changes into a tunic and black leathers. He straps matte black armor across his chest and shoulders. I notice gold designs carved into the edges and recognize the pattern of vines and leaves from the gilt edges of my journal that’s somewhere back in Romania. I flick my eyes to Ashen’s but I feel nothing but remoteness in his gaze. My heart shrinks behind my ribs. 

I’m not given clothes. Not even shoes. I just stand and watch, naked beneath my silk robe. 

When Ashen is ready, he grasps hold of my upper arm and leads the way through the door. The two soldiers cast wary glances in my direction as we pass them, but they keep quiet as they fall in line behind us. We climb the black stairs with nothing more than the sound of footsteps and armor echoing off the stone. 

We ascend two flights before we reach an empty black room with windows framing a tall set of double mahogany doors. The souls chained to the long iron handles start to pull them open when they see us. 

Both of them look at me. Into me.

Leucosia of Anthemoessa, a whisper says in my mind. Weapon of sweet voice.

It’s coming from the soul on the right. A woman. I can tell, even though they are little more than nearly featureless, formless specters. 

She was a witch. A witch from Brazil. Izabel. Izabel Sousa. Coven Tecoma. Crime of Sedition. Reaped by Nuri of House- 

“Vampire,” Ashen says, but there’s no warmth or familiarity in his voice. It’s cold and distant, but confused. It’s only then that I realize I’ve been mumbling, rattling off the details of this soul I’ve never met before. 

I blink up at Ashen and he looks thoroughly weirded out by whatever he sees. “Am I changing into a dog?” 

A crease flickers between Ashen’s brows as he stares down at me. “No. But your eye color briefly changed.” 

I’d be willing to take a guess it changed to the icy blue shade of an Alpha, which gives me a little hope that the spell I cast during my last breaths in the Living Realm, one to bind the werewolves and hybrids to me even beyond death, might just have worked. 

I don’t wait for Ashen to pull me along before I stride ahead, trying not to look too long at the souls that haven’t taken their eyes from me. 

The thick fog. The dim twilight. The gas lanterns. The black carriage that rolls to a stop at the end of the path before us, pulled by the necks of souls. Nothing has changed in the Shadow Realm, it seems. 

We start to descend the steps of the building when a keening cry finds us from the depths of the fog. Another calls back to it. Yet another replies, and the three Reapers around me draw their blades. 

I hear the distant slap of palms and bare feet on the road in the darkness. The sound of crawlers. 

“A pack at this hour?” one of the soldiers says as Ashen’s arm comes out before me, pushing us all back. I glance up at him and I know by the look on his face that my eyes have changed again.  

“They are drawn to her. Get back in the building.” 

“No.” 

“Vampire-”  

I grab his arm and press my other palm to his forehead before he can wrap his hand around mine. I take hold of his thoughts with my mind, not enough to hurt him like I did with Leander, but enough to force him to step back. Let me do this, I whisper into his thoughts, and I let go before I can hear anything in return. 

He looks at me, stunned and a little disoriented, and I use his distraction to step away. I walk down the steps toward the approaching wave of crawlers whose decaying bodies are still obscured by the fog. 

I cling onto hope as I take one last, heavy step toward the mist. I hold to the image of something I remember from my first time here in the Shadow Realm. Something that’s stuck in my mind like a thorn from when we walked home from Bit Akalum. The moment the crawlers mounted their attack. 

The soul looked at me. 

But it came for Ashen. 

I hear them. I hear their fractured, sorrowful thoughts in my mind. 

I take a deep breath. It fills every crevice of my lungs. 

The first notes of my song soar into the darkness just as the crawlers gallop up the path. I’ve chosen something just for them, these ancient, lost souls that are hunted and hated in the only realm that will take them. I sing them the Song of Seikilos. The song Seikilos had carved into the gravestone for his wife. 

While you live, shine

Have no grief at all

Life exists only for a short while

And time demands its toll.

The crawlers lurch to a halt. Their eyes bore into me. Their fragmented thoughts ripple in my mind. 

I take a step toward the closest one and reach out a tentative hand. It’s so far gone that I can’t tell what it once was until I lay my palm on its shoulder. All I can smell is decay and sorrow, and the faint trace of sulfur that clings to its wisps of white hair.

I close my eyes and see flashes of forest and patches of sunlight. Silver fur and glowing amber eyes reflecting on the surface of a glassy mountain lake. It was a werewolf once. 

I lift my hand and we look at one another, the creature breathing hard and sniffing as though testing my scent. 

“Go,” I whisper, and with just one blink they all turn and run back into the fog, all except the one I just touched. It backs away off the path as I pass by with slow steps. Its eyes never leave mine, not even as the Reapers walk by so close that the tip of Ashen’s sheathed sword brushes the creature’s leg. 

I step up into the carriage and the Reapers join me, then we lumber on ahead into the fog. When I push the curtains back and look out the window, the crawler is still watching us, following next to the carriage for a distance down the road until we lose it in the ubiquitous fog. 

I turn to face forward and meet Ashen’s assessing stare. “Well,” I say as I cross my arms across my chest. “That was interesting.” 

Ashen’s eyes narrow at me but he says nothing before he turns his gaze away. I still don’t feel him beneath my skin. Those fingers of dread scratch at my spine. 

The carriage takes us through the twilight shadows, and eventually the fog lifts a little as we reach the Bay of Souls. I look out across the oily black water, remembering the vision of Ashen swimming to the islands in the distance and Leander’s words about the depths beyond. When I glance at Ashen the muscle in his jaw is ticking, his gaze caught on the sea. His eyes flick to mine only once. 

We roll along through the gates and stop at the entrance to the Kur. The soldiers are the first to disembark from the carriage, followed by Ashen. I slip my hand into his upturned palm and his fingers curl around mine as he helps me down. A subtle squeeze of pressure envelops my bones before he withdraws the warmth of his touch. 

I have faith in you. I hold onto those words he said in the Resurrection Chamber as though they’re the only thing that will keep me from drowning in the fear crawling up my throat. I love you, my Lu. Do not forget it. 

I take a deep breath as we walk into the imposing building. The feeling of dread fights with every effort I mount to keep calm. I glance toward the cauldrons where I made my escape with Cole and Ediye. My gaze catches on the spot where Ashen fell, hit by the blade I threw. I remember the way his hot blood coated the floor and the desperate sound of my name on his lips. 

When we finally reach the other end of the building, the grand hall is filled with Reapers that stand lining either side of the tall room, creating an aisle that leads to the dais. I see a few familiar faces from Bit Akalum, including Imani and Tessa, and several others that watched Ashen and I dance with predatory desire in their eyes.  

Imogen and Eshkar stand on the dais, looking much like they did the last time I saw them with ornate black robes draped over their shoulders. They’re flanked by twelve unfamiliar Reapers in equally formal attire. The Council, I assume. 

Several guards stand along the edges of the dais, all of them watching me with dim flame in their eyes. I hear a sound behind us and look over my shoulder as soldiers in black armor close the gap of the aisle. I swallow a feeling of dread that’s as thick as a mace in my throat. No getting away this time, I guess. 

“Master of War,” Eshkar says, stepping forward. The blunt end of his long spear thunks on the stone. “I placed other irons in the fire, and yet you are the one to return victorious, and your sister not at all.” 

“I am the only one you needed.”  

Eshkar lets out a huff of a laugh. “Yes. So it seems.” Eshkar’s eyes cut to me. “You bring us the vampire.” 

“The hybrid,” Ashen corrects, taking a step toward the dais. “The weapon. Completed.” 

“So your soldiers claim. How?” 

“When the damage was corrected in her throat, her condition became more stable. She has since taken the wolf serum, and now has control over the hybrids as well as Semyon Abdulov’s pack of werewolves.” 

Imogen takes a step forward, her gaze flowing down my robe, all the way to my bare feet. “How is this possible? How is she not attacking us?” 

“I mated with her,” Ashen says, and my cheeks flush as hushed whispers swell around us. Eshkar raises a hand to calm the audience down. “I control her through blood and a shared mark. She is not mixed with anunnaki, but with me.” 

I choke down an incredulous laugh as that cold wave of fear grips my spine. Fuck. Shit. Shit-fuck. I might have made the biggest mistake. The dumbest. One I can never worm my way out of. Fuck shit fuck. What if I filled in the gaps again? I might have just bound my life to my greatest enemy. The one who’s delivering me like a priced stag to a waiting bow. Oh man. That wind of fear is blowing hard, and all my sails are ready to speed me to the opposite end of wherever the fuck this is.

Just trust me. It will be hard. Really hard.

I try not to fidget under my crumbling confidence and the weight of the entire Council’s gaze. 

“Bring her up here,” Eshkar says, and the glint of triumph shines in his eyes as he stares right into me. 

I glance at Ashen. He gives me a nod and nothing more. Not even a glimmer of sparks in his eyes. 

I look ahead. 

I take a deep breath. I give myself nothing more than that breath and the heartbeats it contains. And then I make a choice. 

It’s not him I need to trust this time. It’s me. 

I need to believe that everything I’ve seen and felt is real. I know what I saw in the man that I chose. What’s in my own heart. I know that the love I feel is not an illusion. And I know what I am capable of, on my own, without anyone else.  

Ashen takes my arm in a firm grip and we ascend the steps of the dais, drawing to a halt in front of Eshkar and Imogen. They both look me over as though I’m a sculpture in a museum, something pretty yet underwhelming. 

“Imogen, if you will,” Eshkar says as he gestures toward me with a graceful swish of his hand. 

Imogen drifts forward and her eyes light with bright green flame. Her long red waves lift from her shoulders in a gentle breeze. She offers her upturned hand for me to take, the tattoo on her palm glowing with golden light. “Take my hand, young one,” she says, her voice so sweet through her menacing smile. 

I don’t take my eyes from hers as I slip my hand into her palm. 

I blink and we’re standing just the same way as a second ago, but we’re in the living room of the Reaper cottage that I arrived in with Ediye and Cole after our escape. 

“Your home,” I say. 

Imogen smiles. “Yes. Do you like it?” 

I don’t answer as my gaze flows across the space before returning to her. Imogen’s smile widens. 

“Does Ashen of House Urbigu speak the truth?” 

“Yes. My transformation is complete. And we are mated.” 

Imogen’s smile turns benevolent. She reaches up and brushes hair from my face in a motherly gesture. I feel a trace of magic within her fingertips. It ignites an ache in my chest for a mother I’m not sure I ever knew. For one that left me on a beach, as a creature on an island with nothing but a name.

I smell the sea. I hear the crashing waves. 

I fight that memory away and watch as Imogen’s eyes flare a brighter green. 

“I can help you find out why they left you on Anthemoessa. I can help you find your past,” Imogen whispers. 

The hurt of that betrayal burns so hot in my heart. I still feel the waves pulling me back to shore. My desperate voice is caught in my throat as I scream after them, salt water flooding my mouth until I have no choice but to land like broken driftwood on the shore. 

I feel Aglaope’s hand on my shoulder. And I hold onto her love. I hold onto all the love I have now, the real love, this family that wouldn’t leave me behind on the shore. That would fight any battle at my side. 

Tears sting in my eyes. One slips down my cheek. Imogen pulls me a step closer. 

“You belong among us. You can help us win the fight against the Realm of Light. You can stop them from ending us and throwing the Living Realm into chaos. Your friends, your kind, they will die there if we don’t stop them. And in return for your help, we can give you what you are looking for. A family.” 

Another tear falls, and then another. Imogen keeps hold of my hand as she reels me into an embrace with her other arm.

She hugs me because I adapted to what she wanted me to be. 

So I could get exactly what I wanted from her. 

Proximity. 

I fold my free arm around Imogen, returning her embrace. And then I drive my fangs into her throat. 

Imogen squeals as I suck in her essence. Her thoughts. Her soul. I stay latched on, my hand gripped to hers as we fall together to our knees. She beats against my arm with her free fist, but her strength wanes until she’s limp and boneless in my grasp. 

“I already have a family,” I whisper as her dying eyes stay fused to mine. 

I let go of her hand. 

When I blink, I’m back on the dais. Imogen falls lifeless to my feet. I look up at Eshkar and smile. 

The briefest moment of silent shock dissolves into chaos around us. Ashen commands for his soldiers to take the Council. Guards surge toward me as others push Eshkar back to safety. One grabs my arm and I smack my hand to his forehead. I send his mind into an unlit room, stealing his sword before he wanders away with his hands outstretched as though he’s feeling his way in the dark. 

I hear Ashen behind me, cutting down anyone that’s getting too close, fighting off the Council’s guards and those soldiers that don’t follow his command. I fell one guard and then another with my stolen sword as the confusion crescendoes around us. The shouting and swearing, the sound of blades slicing through bone and splitting flesh, the slick wet squish of blood and bodies beneath feet. It’s a symphony. And all I have eyes for is Eshkar. 

I drop my sword. I don’t need it anymore. 

“Gassan tiildibba me zi ab. Alsi kunusi,”  I say, raising my arms. My voice rings above the chaos in layers of sound. It ripples the cascade of smoke that climbs the wall behind the dais. It shatters the windows high above the fog, raining glass across the room. 

Queen that gives life to the dying.

I have called upon you.

Eshkar readies his spear and rushes toward me, but I don’t move. 

He takes only two steps. 

Zida strikes in a blur of white scales as she bursts from the shadows then coils back to the edge of the dais. She readies to strike again as Eshkar looks down to his chest, a line of poison mixing with the blood that streams from the hole next to his heart. He looks back up to me, and the only thing I see is the shock and rage and fear in his eyes. 

I don’t look away from Eshkar, not as Zida attacks the remaining Council, not as Urtur runs across the dais to my right, picking off guards. Not as someone screams about crawlers rushing from the other end of the hall. I keep my eyes on Eshkar as Ashen passes by me and pulls the spear from Eshkar’s hand before he beheads him with a single sweep of his hellfire sword. Even as Eshkar’s head rolls across the dais and comes to a stop in a pool of blood, still my eyes are fused with his. 

“Enough!” Ashen booms as he hits the end of the spear into the dais with a deafening thud. He glares across the room before he walks over to Eshkar’s head and picks it up by the hair, holding the face toward the audience of guards and soldiers and Reapers. The crawlers hem the crowd in from escaping. Souls gather at the edges of the room, drifting listlessly as though they’re not sure where to go. Even the hyenas roam within the shadows, their eyes on me. 

The dead lie scattered around us. Some are everlasting deaths, other bodies lifting away in sparks and gray flakes. Ashen looks over at the two soldiers that rode in the carriage with us and orders them to take reinforcements to the Resurrection Chambers, and they scurry off down the hall. 

Ashen turns his attention back to the crowd. “Eshkar and Imogen are dead. The Council is dead.” I glance over my shoulder as Zida coils restlessly behind me. The Council members lie scattered across the dais in slick pools of blood. “We were led by corruption. We were led into seeking a conflict that no realm could win. We were led away from our true purpose, to deliver the justice of souls. Merciful justice. Not savagery. Not barbarism. Not torture. Justice.” 

Ashen throws Eshkar’s head into the crowd. A few of the Reapers gasp and whisper as it rolls among them. “I have control of the Shadow Realm now. And I tell you now, as your ruler, the real enemy is out there, waiting to take advantage of our distraction. And we almost gave them what they wanted.”

Ashen’s gaze flows over the crowd before he sheathes his sword. He turns and walks over to Eshkar’s body and kneels down, pulling a chain from around the bloody stump of his neck. A filigree gold square emerges from beneath the stained robes. It’s encrusted with dark red rubies and polished tourmaline. 

Ashen looks at the square for a long moment before he stands and walks to the front of the dais, the chain in one hand, the spear in the other. When he’s in front of me, he stops and turns in my direction. 

And I feel him beneath my skin. 

So much pride. So much love. But fear too. I don’t know if it’s fear for me, or of me. 

“All right, vampire?” he whispers. I nod, a brief smile fleeting across my lips. The warmth in his eyes offsets his fearsome appearance with that matte black armor and the spatter of blood across his face. “Thank you, my Lu.” 

“For what?” I whisper back over the sound of Zida’s shifting scales. 

Ashen smiles. He takes a step closer, just out of reach. “For trusting me.”

My heart hammers my bones. I want so much to touch him, but I feel so many eyes watching us and it keeps my hands hidden within the long sleeves of my robe. I just smile again, trying not to let my gaze drift toward the crowd of demons that stare up at us. 

“I promised you something,” Ashen says. “And it’s time for you to decide what you want.” 

My brows furrow with confusion. 

“I swore that if you wanted to burn all the realms, I would hand you the match.” Ashen holds the necklace up by the bloody chain, the square twirling at the end. “This is the match.” 

I look from the spinning square of gold to Ashen’s eyes. “I don’t understand,” I whisper. 

“This key opens all the corridors to the Shadow Realm. All the gateways. You could let the hybrids and werewolves in,” he says, his voice so low that only I can hear him. “You have the most powerful Reapers here, rounded up at your feet. You could sweep this land clean of every demon. You could burn it to the ground, and I will hunt them by your side until the last Reaper dies at your hand.” 

I swallow a shallow breath. 

I can’t deny it. I’ve wanted this. I’ve thought of it so many times. In moments of the deepest darkness, this is what I wished for. These fantasies of vengeance were my raft when this realm cut me and broke me and stole from me. I wished for this place to burn. 

Ashen sees the war in my mind. His eyes never leave mine as he gives me a gentle smile and takes a step back. 

“The choice is yours, my Lu. My love. It’s match,” he says as he raises the chain in my direction, “or mercy.” 

Ashen raises the spear, and I follow its long silver staff to the point that tapers toward the ceiling. 

I look at Ashen, his expression so patient, as though he would force this whole realm to wait in silence for as long as it takes for me to decide. 

I close my eyes and take one deep breath in. I let it out through pursed lips, feeling every heartbeat that passes through it. 

I open my eyes. 

“Mercy,” I say. 

Ashen lowers the chain and takes a step forward, then another. He stops in front of me and pushes the shaft of the spear into my open hand. I take the cool metal in my grasp and he gives me a reassuring smile as he curls his fingers around mine. 

“Reapers and souls. Beasts and creatures of the darkness,” Ashen says, his voice carrying through the hall as his eyes stay fused to mine. “In my first act as ruler of the Shadow Realm, I relinquish my power and command to Leucosia of Anthemoessa.” 

Ashen lets go of my hand. He draws his sword from its scabbard and lowers his eyes from mine. And then he bends his head and drops to one knee at my feet. 

“Demons of the Shadow Realm,” he says. His voice cuts through the silence, as sharp and deadly as a blade.

“Bow before your Queen.”

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thank you so very much for continuing to follow Lu and Ashen’s story with A Heart Of Bitter Poison! I really appreciate that you took the time to read Poison, and I hope you loved it. Please consider leaving a review; not only will it help me to reach more readers, but it will also bring some sunshine to my day! I read every single one, and the feedback I receive truly does help to keep me going, especially during a difficult book like this one was for me.

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Writing this book was a wonderful experience. It was incredibly challenging this go around. Poison pushed me far outside of my comfort zone as a writer. I still remain a pantser, which means I don’t plot my stories in advance. That can be rather… terrifying…sometimes. With Poison, I found I had to really revisit ideas I had for the story in ways that I normally wouldn’t. Many thoughts I had early on needed to be molded and shaped in ways I hadn’t expected, but I am so pleased with the outcome. My main priority was really doing Lu and Ashen justice, helping them grow and heal both individually and together. I hope I achieved that for you as the reader.

I owe so much gratitude to friends and family for helping to lift me up and push me forward. Thank you so much to my readers, so many of whom have turned into wonderful friends. I cherish your support and your SCREAMING IN ALL CAPS and your notes and videos and pics and RECIPES FOR DRINKS… oh my God, it just amazes me. Nessa, Vanessa Rose, Leigh, Natalia, Natalie, ARLEY (screaming at you because we scream), Nyx, Kels, Jessie, Lin (you make me LAUGH), Lina (the one-woman indie hype club!), Ginny, Kerri, Laura, Sedona, Jessie, Maci (those amazing edits, THANK YOU!), Hannah (the drinks!), and BELLA, my sweet friend Bella who always hits me in the feels.

Special thanks to Stephanie Fournet, one of my all time favorite authors who I’m lucky enough to count as a friend. Your ongoing support and encouragement has meant so much to me. (If you haven’t checked out Stephanie’s work, please RUN AND DO SO. You will not be disappointed. Dream House is her latest and I LOVED IT.)

Thank you to my wonderful friend Sanja for all your love and kindness, the laughs and the rides, the cider and the long talks and for always letting me stop to pick up snakes HA. Regan, thank you for always being such an unfailing support and such a wonderful friend, you always know just what to say and I will forever toast all margaritas to you. April - girl, we have venting down to a SCIENCE haha. And Mary, I’m so happy you’re back and we get to hang out again - I feel so lucky to have you in my life (even when you wreck me with Sirens). I love you all so much and I’m so honored to be your friend.

Thank you to my family. Again, I hope you’re not reading this. Extra this time. Especially my son, Hayden. Just… just never read this book. Never never never. But I still hope I make you proud.

Last but certainly not least, thank you so much to my amazing husband Daniel. This book would not have been possible without you. You were my sounding board, my cheerleader, my everything. You read my reviews when I couldn’t bear it, you brought me coffee and wine (fortunately not both at the same time, yikes), you helped me carve out the time to write and edit, and you told me every single day how proud you are. I don’t think I could have kept forging on if you hadn’t been there to offer your hand and push me along. I love you so much.

Much love,

Brynne xx

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Brynne is a fan of velociraptors, the Alien movies (well, most of them), red wine, and wild adventures. She can relate nearly anything you say to a line from the movie Hot Fuzz. She has been trying unsuccessfully for years to convince her husband that they should acquire a pet mink to add to their menagerie of animals (what could possibly go wrong with that plan?!). Brynne has been everything from an archaeologist to a waitress, a deep-sea core analyst to an advertising account executive. For the last several years, she has been working in the field of neuroscience clinical research. Brynne has been writing since childhood and has published a non-fiction book under her real name, but she won’t tell you what that is unless you provide a live, fully-trained velociraptor. When not busy at her day job or writing, Brynne can be found working with her husband and their son on their family farm in Nova Scotia, Canada, or enjoying her other passions which include riding horses, reading, riding her motorcycle, and spending time with family and friends around a bottle of wine. A Heart Of Bitter Poison is her third novel and she is thrilled that you took the time to read it.

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