Bound: A Vampire Romance (Marked by Night Book 2)

by Sara Thorn

  “You know,” I said as I stood naked before him and reached for the blue camisole, “it surprises me that you would let Dregon sit at your table and call you a fool.”

  Athan scoffed. “He is all talk, nothing more than a coward at heart. He says things sometimes to make himself feel bigger than he is, and when he does, I know him back down into place. Nothing more than that.”

  I laughed under my breath and hoped that it was just enough for him to hear me snickering.

  “Did something about that amuse you?” he asked condescendingly.

  “Only the fact that he has proven you to be the very fool he accuses you of.”

  “What did you say?” Athan stepped quickly in front of me, and for a moment, it caught me off guard and scared me.

  I mustered up the courage to keep speaking, and as I did, I looked to see if I could make out the outline of a key in Athan’s pockets.

  “He has no loyalty to you or your rule,” I said, making sure that my eyes didn’t linger in any one spot for too long so that I wouldn’t raise suspicion. “He intends to betray you and steal rule for himself once you have laid down the infrastructure. He laughs as you do all of the heavy lifting, and he waits for the moment when he will swoop in and take it from you.”

  “Stupid girl,” Athan mocked. “You have no idea what you’re talking about. Dregon has no followers, he follows me.”

  “Not true,” I said. “Dregon told me all about his plans while I was with him. It’s funny what a bit of enticement can do to loosen a tongue. He has plenty of his own followers hidden amidst your men.”

  I could tell that Athan was getting at least a little bit rattled and was entertaining the possibility that I might have been right.

  “And if what you’re telling me is true,” he said, “why would you be helping me by giving me this information? You’d just as soon rather see me fall than be victorious.”

  “True,” I said. “But I would also rather be protected by a ruler who won’t touch me than by one who would crack my skull at a moment’s notice.”

  Athan looked convinced by that. He also appeared troubled, which meant that I had succeeded in planting enough suspicion in his mind that he couldn’t ignore it.

  “Stay here,” he said as he walked toward the bedroom door.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To determine if what you say is accurate. If it isn’t,” Athan called from over his shoulder just before he walked through the doorway, “then you will pay for it by watching me squeeze the life out of my dear brother tonight.”

  Athan left, and I knew that I had to get Cassius out of here now, not only because this was my one and only chance at keeping Athan distracted, but also because I knew that if Dregon were able to convince Athan that I was lying, Cassius would be tortured as a punishment to me.

  I hadn’t seen the shape of a key in Athan’s pockets, so I frantically began to search his bedroom. If he didn’t have it on his person, then I could think of no better place for it to be than in his bedroom, which, up until now, he had never let me stay in alone. I searched in all the drawers of the nightstands, in the closet, and even between the sheets and mattress on the bed. I turned the entire room upside-down as quickly as possible but started to get hysterical when the key was nowhere to be found. Then my eyes caught sight of the bar at the edge of the room, one of Athan’s favorite features considering he started his day with a glass of whiskey and ended it with wine.

  I lifted all the glasses and liquor bottles, hoping to find the key tucked beneath one of them, but there was nothing there. It wasn’t until I picked up the brandy bottle that I heard a tiny clinking sound inside the glass. I held it up to my face, and there, hidden within the copper-colored liquid, was the key. I emptied the contents of the bottle onto the floor and held my hand beneath the mouth of the bottle as the key fell out into my palm. And with it fell two smaller keys—the shackles. Then I ran as fast as my legs would carry me toward the locked door, which Cassius was behind.

  Chapter Eight

  “Cassius,” I quietly called as I pushed open the door, leaving the key still stuck in the lock.

  “Mara? What are you doing here?” he said as he looked up at me weakly. His dark eyes looked clouded over, and I didn’t know what was wrong with him, aside from having been affixed to a wall for days.

  I quickly fumbled with the tiny keys to unlock the shackles at his ankles first, then the cuffs at his wrists. Cassius buckled to the ground as I tried to support the weight of his falling body.

  “Where’s Athan?” he asked.

  “With Dregon,” I answered. “But we haven’t got much time. Can you walk?”

  Cassius nodded and heaved himself to his feet but not without great effort. I could see his limbs try awkwardly to remember what it was like to move again. There was no way we would make it far like this. I had to get him out of Athan’s stronghold at least and up into what would hopefully be daylight. I pulled him up onto my shoulders as tightly as I could and tried to support his weight as we walked jaggedly out of the room. I stopped to peek around every corner as we made our way slowly through the corridors.

  The way out was just past the great room, and I had hoped that Athan and Dregon were not in there. To my relief, I heard their voices coming from outside Dregon’s room. Athan must have gone in there to confront him about what I had told him, and from the sounds of it, they were still in deep conversation. I moved as quickly as I could, which wasn’t that fast, considering having to carry the brunt of Cassius's weight against my body. As we slid past the great room, I thought about Quinn inside there, trapped and burning in iron chains. For a moment, I started to veer toward the great room to get him too and bring him with us. But then I heard Dregon’s door open from down the hallway and knew that we didn’t have time.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered to Quinn under my breath, knowing that he would not hear me. I would come back for him as soon as I could, but right now, I needed to get Cassius away from Athan before he killed him.

  I pulled on the last bits of energy and strength that I had and tried to run up through the winding tunnels with Cassius half-dragging alongside me. I ignored the burning in my muscles and the occasional groans that he uttered as he struggled to keep moving with me. I heard a commotion from the areas behind me and knew that Athan must have figured out what I had done. I had to move faster, or we would never see another day alive.

  When I saw the opening ahead, my heart pounded, and I made one last, final push toward our escape. As soon as we got out onto the surface, I could see that it was nighttime, and there was no daylight to help protect us from Athan’s chase. I scrambled toward the forest line and slipped between the trees just as I heard some of Athan’s men break onto the surface. I ran silently through the trees and scanned the wilderness to see if I could find any place for us to hide. As if on cue, something fluttered on a branch of a nearby tree, and I saw that the ancient-looking tree had an opening in its trunk that looked like a hidden alcove.

  It was big enough for both of us to fit inside, so I pushed Cassius into the space and then hurried to cover the opening with branches until it looked like a bush growing near the base of the trunk. If we were found, if one of the vampires managed to hear my heartbeat or smell my skin, then we would be killed. There was nothing to do but wait inside the dark silence and hope that there were too many other things in the woods to draw their attention than me.

  After hours of motionless waiting, I no longer heard any sign of Athan’s vampires in the forest. I also didn’t hear any sign of Cassius beside me, although I could feel he was there. I parted a few of the branches at the opening, just enough to let some of the moonlight in so that I could see him and make sure he was okay. He didn’t look okay at all.

  “Cassius,” I whispered as I held his face to mine.

  His eyes were so clouded over that they no longer looked black, but instead more resembled gray, muddied puddles. He was barely breathing, and even when I st
rained to listen, I couldn’t hear his heartbeat.

  “Cassius, what is happening to you?” I whimpered.

  “I’m sorry, Mara,” he said in agony as he tried to speak with barely any breath left within him. It was too much. “I can’t fight off both things at once.”

  “What things?” I started to cry. “What things are you trying to fight off?”

  “Both pieces of my whole are beyond their limits…” his voice started to trail off. “Dhampir and human…they’re both too depleted now.”

  “But I thought you only had one weakness,” I yelled at him. “I thought only magic could kill you.”

  He didn’t hear me; he was letting go of consciousness as I held him. I had to do something, anything. Without thinking, I pushed my wrist up against his mouth.

  “Here!” I cried as I tried to wake him. “Use me! Use my blood to satisfy the bloodlust and strengthen your dhampir side. Cassius, please, wake up!”

  He didn’t hear me, or if he did, he wouldn’t do it. He didn’t have time left to wait. I bit into my own wrist, which I would never have thought I was capable of doing in a million years. Although I didn’t have vampire fangs, I did at least have teeth that were capable enough of sinking a bite to break the skin. I squeezed my wrist until blood pooled out of the bitemark. Then I pulled his mouth open with my other hand and shoved my wrist against his lips.

  “Please, please, please…” I whispered as I squeezed my forearm to try to make my blood spill.

  Cassius’s eyes flew open, and a look of terror filled them as he tried to back away from me but was too wedged against the side of the tree to move. He weakly flailed his arms to push me away, but I held fast to where I was and kept my bleeding skin in his mouth.

  “No,” I said with resolve. “It’s okay, take it. I’m not afraid of you. I’m not afraid of what you are. But I’m terrified of losing you. Take it, or I’ll slit both of my wrists right here, and we’ll die together.”

  Cassius's eyes darted wildly between mine as I refused to move my wrist to let him argue with me.

  “Take it,” I whispered as the tears fell from my cheeks. “I don’t want to live without you.”

  His eyes opened wider than I thought possible, and for a moment, I panicked as he refused to take my blood that was meagerly dripping into his mouth at a rate not enough to save him. But then, he seemed to look right into me and saw that I was right. He knew it, too; we needed each other. He closed his eyes as I felt the sharp pain of his fangs pierce through my skin in two punctures at once. It was such a strange sensation, as if I were a liquid in a glass and I could feel the blood leaving my veins as if they were merely a straw to empty me.

  I got lulled into a dreamy confusion, kind of like being high, I would imagine. I felt dizzy and hazy but calm. The weight of my body seemed to disappear, and I felt as though I were floating in a pool of water or maybe even in space. I saw Cassius open his eyes while his jaw was still wrapped around my slender wrist, and I was happy to see that they were as strikingly black as a freshly cut piece of ebony. Just as I felt myself waning from consciousness, and my body started to fall back toward the ground, Cassius’s arm wrapped around my back and caught me. He pulled me up into his lap and, with his other hand, lifted my face to his after setting my wrist down gently across my abdomen. His face looked strong and comforting, and the blood that was dripping from his mouth tasted warm and metallic as he leaned forward to kiss me before I closed my eyes.

  ***

  When I woke up, we were still inside the alcove of the old tree, and Cassius was cradling me in his arms as if I were a swaddled kitten. I could hear his heartbeat against my ear and felt the steady rise and fall of his chest against my shoulder. My wrist ached but was wrapped up neatly inside a piece of cloth that he had torn from his shirt. I was tired and had a bit of a headache, but other than that, I was fine. The morning light was just starting to peek through the branches at the opening to the tree, and I looked up to see Cassius staring down at me with brilliant black eyes.

  “You saved me,” he whispered. He looked more serious than happy. “I could have killed you.”

  I leaned into him and closed my eyes. “The only way you could have killed me is if you were to die,” I said softly.

  I felt him hold his breath and the flutter of his heartbeat went erratic for a moment. His arms tightened around me, and in the midst of everything, we had one perfect moment at the base of a hollow tree together, knowing that we were both alive and by each other’s side.

  “There will never be a moment where I don’t love you,” Cassius whispered.

  And that set my soul on fire.

  I sat up to kiss him and feel his mouth press against mine with renewed strength.

  “You’re all better,” I said in awe as I looked at him. He was still naked, and the morning light was quickly brightening enough for me to see all of his body. There were no cuts or bruises, and his muscles seemed relaxed and strong. It was as if nothing had happened to him.

  He smiled. “Sometimes, I am more thankful for the dhampir side than others.”

  “This apparently being one of those times,” I said, noting that he looked strong enough to venture farther away from Athan’s stronghold now.

  He nodded. “When it comes down to survival, dhampir instincts surpass that of a human every time.”

  “I don’t know if I agree with that,” I said playfully. “I’m a human, and I managed to save both of our asses.”

  Cassius laughed, but not because he thought it was funny, but because he knew it was true. “You are unlike any other human, Mara.”

  “What are we going to do now?” I asked, regrettably bringing the conversation back around to the dismal reality we were facing.

  He didn’t answer at first as we both sat there together and thought of what possible options we still had left. There didn’t seem to be many viable ones.

  “We need to overthrow Athan,” Cassius said when he finally answered.

  “We’ve tried that,” I reminded him. “We can’t; he’s too powerful.”

  “Athan isn’t powerful at all; he simply has amassed enough followers to create his own army.”

  “It’s the same thing, isn’t it? We still can’t hope to overthrow him. There are only two of us against countless numbers of them.” When I said “two of us,” it suddenly reminded me that I had left Quinn behind, and a pang shot through me as I gripped my stomach in remorse.

  “What’s wrong?” Cassius asked.

  “Quinn,” I said, muttering simply the one word of his name.

  “There was nothing you could have done for him,” he said empathetically.

  “I could have tried to save him as I saved you.”

  “No,” he said. “You couldn’t have. We would have all been caught. You saved me, and now we will find a way to free Quinn.”

  “What is Athan doing to him?” I asked. “When I saw Quinn, his fingers were turning deep purple, and he said it had something to do with shadow magic.”

  Cassius looked like he didn’t want to talk about it, but he knew that I still cared about Quinn, so he answered me anyway. “When a fae is forced to use magic against their will, there is a consequence above and beyond the cost for the magical transaction. With shadow magic, that consequence is even worse. Quinn is one of the few remaining fae who knows how to wield shadow magic. If Athan is asking him to do something bad enough that it is destroying Quinn’s body, I can’t even begin to fathom how awful the things he has performed for Athan must have been.”

  “I shouldn’t have left him,” I said. “He will never forgive me.”

  “It’s not forgiveness that I would worry about,” Cassius said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Quinn was already jealous of our affection toward each other before this. Now he is sure to harbor enhanced feelings of jealousy and inferiority. Shadow magic, when used recklessly, will warp the mind and thoughts of its wielder.”

  “We have to hel
p him.”

  “We will,” Cassius assured me. “But first, we need to be able to help ourselves, or none of this will matter. I had a crazy thought, one that just occurred to me about being in Boston while we were hiding out.”

  “What is it?”

  “What if we created our own army?” he said.

  “An army out of what? All of the vampires have sided with Athan, or they are too afraid to cross him. And all of the fae are enslaved against their will. Unless there is another magical species here on Mystreuce that I don’t know about, there’s no one left to help us.”

  Cassius smirked. “Well, there actually are several other magical species in this world, but that wasn’t what I was thinking. I don’t want to subject any more of Mystreuce’s people to Athan’s reach.”

  “Agreed. He definitely doesn’t need any more forces joining up behind him. What were you thinking then?”

  “Humans.”

  “Huh?”

  “What if we used some of the old, abandoned gaming dens for their access points to gain an open pathway between Mystreuce and Earth and we recruited enough humans to come here and fight with us that we could match the number of Athan’s forces?”

  “That sounds like a crazy idea,” I said, agreeing with his first assessment of the plan. “Humans wouldn’t be a match against vampires.”

  “They would if we had enough of them, maybe triple the size of the clan Athan rules over.”

  “Okay, but what makes you think that any humans are going to want to jump ship on their lives and head over into some fantasy world to fight in a battle that could get them killed?”

  “Isn’t that what some humans go to the virtual gaming dens to do anyway? To escape the mundane and get lost in some quest that is greater than themselves?” he said.

  “Well, yeah, but it’s not real.”

  “All the more reason that some of them would want to come here to help us because they will know it is real.”

  He had a point. There were definitely people on Earth who were so burned out by their daily grind that they just wanted to escape reality permanently. I knew for a fact that some of them would jump at any chance just to know that there was another world outside of their own. It called upon innate human curiosity and the desire to go on some sort of epic quests. When I truly thought about it, there were probably countless people who would drop everything to come to join an epic adventure in Mystreuce. Maybe less if they knew that they might end up dying in the process.