Of Darkness & Light: Blood Descent Book 2

by T. L. McDonald

  Of Darkness & Light

  Blood Decent Book Two

  T.L. McDonald

  Contents

  Of Darkness & Light

  Books By T.L. McDonald

  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

  Thank You

  Acknowledgments

  Coming Soon

  The Marked Series

  About the Author

  Of Darkness & Light

  Blood Descent Book Two

  By

  T.L. McDonald

  Of Darkness & Light

  Blood Descent Book Two

  By

  T.L. McDonald

  Copyright © 2020 by T.L. McDonald

  Book Cover Design by Covers By Christian www.coversbychristian.com

  The characters, events, and places portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarities to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only and may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to our favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in whole or in part in any form or by any means, including photography, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Created with Vellum

  Books By T.L. McDonald

  The Marked Series

  Marked

  Fated

  Redemption

  Blood Descent Series

  Of Blood & Magic

  Of Darkness & Light

  1

  Seth stares up at me, equal parts fear and awe swimming within his dark brown eyes, as I hold the sharp end of the stake over his heart—his beating heart.

  He’s human.

  Seth, the bloodsucking vampire who nearly succeeded in killing me at Night Life, is human. The pounding thumps within his chest fluttering against the palm of my hand leave no room for denial. But how is it possible?

  You, Indiana Grace Bellamy, are a cure.

  His words echo over and over on a loop inside my head. I pull every syllable apart, trying to understand it. I deconstruct it, process it, consider every far-fetched theory, but no matter how I lay it out, it makes no sense. How can I be a cure? How can there be a cure at all?

  Seth lays a hand over mine, his touch light and hesitant. Taking a slow breath in, he pulls the pointy end of the stake away from his heart. I snap back to attention and crush my forearm down over his throat. His hand slips off mine without a fight, falling back to the ground beside his head.

  I stare down at his reddening face, my mind warring over the two versions of him invading my every thought. In my head, all I see is the vampire who sank his fangs into my throat. The vampire who manipulated me into thinking I was safe only to show me how wrong I was. He stole my blood, and my innocence, and tore my whole world apart so fast, and so easily, I’m still reeling. I want so badly to make him pay for the things he took.

  But I can’t.

  I can’t because my eyes are telling me a different story. When I look at him now, I see the soft flush of his cheeks from running through the park. I see the sweat dampening the roots of his hair along the edges of his face. I see the hints of fear building within his eyes at being held at my mercy. I see a human being, and not the monster with fangs my mind screams he is. I can’t distinguish one from the other when the trauma of what happened between us is still fresh in my head, even if the situation has now changed. I’m in limbo, stuck between what I want to do to the vampire terrorizing my nightmares and what I can’t do to the human being pinned beneath me.

  “I’m not here—” Raspy words choke past his lips and I instinctively press harder along his throat, squashing whatever he’s about to say. He gasps for what little air he can get as his eyes widen. Despite his lack of oxygen, he does nothing to fight me off. Conflicting emotions swarm within his gaze, half of them pleading for release, the other half resigned and begging for a death he probably feels he deserves, leaving me more confused than ever.

  I tighten my grip over the stake held at his heart, forcing my hand to stay steady. He tried to kill me—he did kill me—and I should have every right to avenge myself. But things are different now. He’s different now. And the rules are no longer black and white. Everything is gray, and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do or feel when I don’t know what’s wrong or right anymore.

  I loosen my hold a fraction.

  He sucks in a breath, expelling it with a cough. “—To hurt you,” he wheezes out. “I’m not here to hurt you.”

  I press the tip of the stake against his chest, keeping my arm held firmly across his throat. I might be confused about what to do or how to feel, but under no circumstances can I let him know that. Just because he says he’s not here to hurt me doesn’t mean he’s telling the truth. Who’s to say Seth’s human side isn’t just like his vampire alter ego—a killer? One who likes to manipulate before he strikes.

  “Then why did you chase me through the park?”

  “Because you ran.”

  “Wrong answer.”

  A grunt slips through his clenched teeth as I dig the tip of the stake into his chest. “I swear. I only wanted to talk to you, but I knew I couldn’t just come up to you on the street after what I did. So I’ve been following you. Waiting for the right time to reveal myself.”

  “And you thought jumping out at me from a wooded area behind a graveyard was the right time?”

  “No. But you saw me, so I didn’t have a choice. Look, I’m sorry I scared you, and I’m sorry I…” His eyes lower to my neck and stay there. “I’m sorry I hurt you the way I did. I never wanted—” His words hitch, the corners of his mouth turning downward as he bites his lip. His eyes take on a glassy sheen, tears collecting along his bottom lashes until they’re full enough to spill over the sides of his face.

  My mind spins even more. Are his tears real or just another manipulation? Can I really trust the regret and shame I see on his face when he’s fooled me before?

  “I swear. I never wanted to hurt you,” he continues. “I tried so hard not to do what I did. I tried to give you a way to escape, but I wasn’t strong enough. You have no idea what it’s like. The hunger.
It’s so strong. And with Ludvikas shouting in my head, I couldn’t fight the darkness anymore, and I… I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry, Indi. I wish I could take it back. I wish I could make it so it never happened, and I understand if you can never forgive me, but I promise, I’m only here now because I want to help you.”

  I press against his throat a little harder. “You want to help me? Why? Why should I believe anything you say?”

  “Because I want the chance to do what’s right,” he rasps beneath the pressure on his larynx. “To make up for the things I’ve done wrong.”

  He coughs under the weight of my arm, yet he does nothing to remove it—or me—from keeping him pinned to the ground. He stares up at me, waiting, and I take the opportunity to study him. Aunt Claudia told me once the eyes are the windows to the soul, and all you have to do is look deep enough to see who a person truly is. So I search the dark brown depths of his unwavering gaze for any signs of a threat, but what I find is endless pain, sadness, confusion, desperation, hope, and self-loathing all wrapped up in an anger I don’t believe is meant for me. What I find is someone who’s broken.

  My heart aches a little for him when it shouldn’t. It should be hard and closed off and full of contempt for what he did, but it’s not, and that makes him more dangerous now than he ever was before.

  “If you try anything…” I let the threat hang in the space between us as I remove my arm from his windpipe. He sucks in a lungful of air and nods, his fingers rubbing over his throat. I stand and move back, pulling the knife Jack gave me from my pocket so I’ve got it in one hand and the stake in the other. Keeping my stance loose, I watch his every move as he pulls himself to his feet. He isn’t exactly up there on my trust scale. I don’t care what I saw in his eyes. For all I know, it could all be some kind of sick trick, a dark magic illusion to make him appear human and vulnerable.

  He keeps his distance as he studies me in much the same way I’m studying him—with caution. Both of us unsure of what the other might do given our history. But where I’m more leery and confused, he is on the opposite side of the spectrum with a pleading hopefulness beginning to take shape on his face.

  “I know what you’re thinking, Indi, and it isn’t a trick. I really am human, and you really are the reason.”

  “What you’re saying doesn’t make sense. How can I be the reason you’re human?” My brain swarms with implications of what this could mean. If he really is telling the truth, and I really am somehow a cure, then the target on my back just got a thousand times bigger. It’ll be more than just Ludvikas coming after me. Every vampire in the world will either want me dead or want me to turn them human again—something I have no idea how I did the first time, let alone know how to repeat. Or worse yet, every one of their enemies will want to use me as a weapon. Either way, once word gets out, life, as I know it, will be over.

  Seth takes a step toward me, and I tighten my grip over my weapons, holding the knife out defensively between us.

  Hands raised, he takes a step back. “I don’t know. All I know is that after that night at the club when I… when I hurt you…” He says those four words with such remorse it eats away at the notion of hate and distrust I’m holding onto with every fiber of my being. A notion that further dissolves little by little each time my mind flashes back to the moments he tried to give me a way out before the monster within him took over. Moments I convinced myself were nothing more than manipulations to toy with me before he went in for the kill. But now, I can’t help but question everything again. Now I’m not so sure what to believe. Maybe Sebastian was wrong when he said vampires were nothing more than monsters. And maybe Seth really was trying to give me a way out.

  Maybe he’s sincere now.

  Or maybe I’m a fool.

  His eyes lower to the ground for several moments before his gaze meets mine, and he’s looking at me with wonder once again. It’s a little unsettling, considering not that long ago he was looking at me like I was a helpless baby deer and he was the big bad panther ready to pounce.

  “Something changed in me that night at the club. It’s like my body was rejecting what I had become. I threw up every bit of blood I had consumed until I was dizzy and feverish. Eventually I blacked out after convulsing for so long I thought everything inside of my body was going to tear apart.” He blinks slowly, his gaze taking on a far off look. He lifts a hand to his chest and covers his heart, a small smile gracing his mouth. “When I woke up days later, I had a heartbeat.”

  His brown eyes sharpen, focusing back in on me like I’m some miracle sent from Heaven above. With a hesitant step, he chances moving closer—close enough, he could reach out and touch me if he wanted to. In my current stupefied state, I’m not sure I’d be able to stop him if he tried. “I don’t know what caused it to happen, only that it had something to do with you. You gave me my life back, Indi. Being a vampire was never something I wanted, and now because of you, I have a second chance to live life as I was meant to. As a human. Thank you.”

  I have no idea how to process this, let alone respond. Before me stands the very person who briefly ended my life and uprooted everything I thought I knew, and I’m supposed to do what? Say you’re welcome? Forgive the fact that he tore into my neck like I was nothing? Forgive how he shattered my world? Forgive that he set the end of my life in motion while I gave him back his, all because he’s human now? I honestly don’t know if I can do that. It may have been the monster who did all those terrible things, but his human form wears the same face, and when I look at him, the monster is still who I see first. It’s going to take time, lots and lots of time, before I can see anything else. Before I can trust anything else—if I ever can.

  From the corner of my eye, I catch a glimpse of movement just before Seth is slammed to the ground. His head bounces off the grass before he’s flipped over and straddled. The stake in Sebastian’s hand comes down fast, aimed straight for his heart.

  “Sebastian, no!” I tackle him, throwing my arms around his torso with the full weight of my body. He slams to the ground, the stake aimed for Seth’s heart missing the mark, piercing instead just under his collarbone near the edge of his shoulder. Seth’s unfiltered scream tears through the air as Sebastian and I land in a heap off to the side. In full vampire hunting mode, Sebastian immediately goes about untangling his arms and legs from mine without really seeing me.

  Teeth clenched in agony, Seth wraps a shaky hand around the sharpened wood speared through his body. Sucking in a deep breath, he yanks it out as another scream forces its way up his throat. His arm falls to the side, the stake rolling away as he brings his hand back up to his shoulder. Blood seeps through his fingers, spreading out over his chest and running in rivulets over his shoulder where it collects in a pool of crimson on the ground.

  Without a word or even a glance in my direction, Sebastian grabs the discarded stake, then Seth by his shirt. He jerks him up to his feet, only for Seth to slip back down, suspended from fully falling by the grip Sebastian has on him. Sebastian doesn’t even seem to notice. Maybe he doesn’t want to. He raises the stake, prepared to finish what he started. Seth’s head lolls backward as he closes his eyes, prepared to let him.

  “Sebastian, stop!” I push myself up onto my feet. “You can’t kill him. You don’t understand.”

  Sebastian whips his head around at the sound of my voice. Vengeance and terror darkens the blue of his eyes. He promised me once when he found Seth, he would not escape a second time. It’s evident he plans to make good on his promise, but the circumstances have changed. Seth isn’t a vampire anymore, and to kill him now would be murder. I can’t condone that, no matter what Seth did to me when he was a fanged monster.

  Shaking my head, I lower Sebastian’s arm to his side. He stares at my fingers wrapped around his wrist, then shifts his questioning gaze back to mine.

  “You can’t stake him. He’s not a vampire anymore. He’s human.”

  “That’s impossible.”

  “
Not anymore. Look at him.” I shift my eyes to Seth, and after a few moments, Sebastian does too.

  Thick strands of dark hair are plastered to Seth’s face, mingling with sweat and blood from a fresh wound at the upper edge of his forehead. Below his shoulder, blood continues to pour down his chest. It soaks through his shirt until the fabric is so saturated it drips onto the ground below. Shallow breaths drag in and out past his lips, while the pulse at his neck flutters with proof of a heartbeat.

  “I don’t understand. This is impossible. Vampirism can’t be undone.” Dropping the stake, Sebastian fists both hands in Seth’s shirt and jerks him up until they’re face to face, despite Seth being too weak to hold himself up. “Tell me how you’re doing this or so help me, I’ll drag out your death in the most painful ways possible.”

  “Sebastian,” I chide. Never in a million years would I have thought I’d be defending Seth. But never in a million years would I have thought he’d become human again either—or that I would be the reason for it.

  Anger darkens the blue of Sebastian’s irises so much, it threatens to devour the spot of brown in his left eye. “He tried to kill you, Indi. Or have you forgotten what he did to you at Night Life? Because I haven’t.”