Fatal Harmony (The Vein Chronicles Book 1)

by Anne Malcom

And when my eyes cast over the final person, I let out a strangled cry.

  Pain and agony radiated through my entire body as I wove through fallen limbs.

  “No, no, no,” the past me chanted, her voice so full of raw agony I flinched inside my own head.

  Shaking hands hovered over the bloodied and mutilated corpse of my husband, not touching him. I didn’t want to make this real, as if it would be my touch that killed him instead of the puddle of blood staining my white dress.

  I steeled myself and placed my hand on his cheek, then screamed. It echoed through the corners of my skull, and I flinched in my spot.

  Pain radiated through my body and my heart pounded at a speed that didn’t seem human.

  Because it wasn’t.

  I proved that when it stopped and an invisible hand closed around my throat, crushing the bones and robbing me of air.

  Still inside my head, watching it happen, I couldn’t say how long it took for me to die.

  A long time.

  I gasped for air, as if emerging from underwater, coming back into the room to the thudding sounds of battle and blood.

  Belladonna’s sardonic grin was all I saw.

  “I’m not nearly done,” she whispered.

  I thought I heard a masculine voice bellow my name before I was sucked under once more.

  “Please,” a frightened voice pleaded.

  I glanced down at the dirty human on his knees, clutching his young wife to his back, as if he could protect her.

  I laughed in the face of their terror, finding it amusing. Or pretending to, at least. Feelings weren’t something I was plagued with. Only death. I dealt in it. Tasted it. Survived on it.

  I left their lifeless bodies at the mouth of the alley in Prague without a second thought.

  A brutal wind whipped around my cold face as I hurtled through time and space. I struggled for a foothold to climb out of the vortex.

  There wasn’t escape.

  Only death.

  The English streets were noisy as I battled the urge to murder every human who bustled through the streets like rats. I managed to swallow my rage to keep my eyes on my target.

  Another couple.

  Laughing. In love.

  Fools.

  It was my job to educate them on how deadly their happiness was. And to do them the favor of watching each other die.

  I gasped at the pain of the deaths my dead self had caused. Drowning in them.

  “Had enough yet?” she purred.

  I grinned through the pain. She was merely using the memories as a distraction so I didn’t realize her spell was rotting me from the inside out. “Fuck you,” I hissed.

  Her gaze flickered for just a moment before she muttered Latin under her breath.

  A fresh and powerful wave of agony washed over me, making the spell at Sophie’s office look like child’s play. I couldn’t hold in my scream, as much as I wanted to. To my amazement, when looking down at my hand, the skin wasn’t being flayed from my body. Though I could see the steam rising from my porcelain arms, which now had a red tinge to them.

  This bitch was literally making my blood boil.

  I was very aware that I was dying, and in front of an asshole like Earnshaw, who was grinning the whole time.

  Not the blaze of glory I had imagined.

  I wanted to fight more; however, this witch not only had power but she’d obviously been the mean girl at Salem because she knew how to truly bring someone to their knees. How to end someone, make them first mentally weak.

  Using someone’s brain against her was a surefire way to get their death on the way.

  I would have admired her had she not been a sadistic, black magic, hideous bitch.

  Not only was my mind weakened, but her spell rendered me paralyzed.

  It took me a second to hear past the boiling of my own blood.

  “Isla,” a muffled voice roared.

  I craned my head with the same effort it would take for me to move a small building. My eyes locked with Thorne’s. He was alternating banging on the invisible and unbreakable glass between us while swatting away turned vampires.

  Blood trickled from a cut in his temple, his muscled arms decorated in torn gashes on fang marks.

  His bloodied fist connected with the wall once more.

  “Don’t let that bitch kill you,” he commanded, his voice a scream through the thickness of the air.

  It was the flick of her wrist that sent him flying into the hordes of snapping vampires that did it.

  I wrenched through the pain and lifted the gun that I had been so sure I wouldn’t use. It wouldn’t have worked, had her attention not still been on Thorne. But the bullet hit her between the eyes, breaking the spell and giving me a moment to step away from the grim reaper’s embrace.

  I didn’t take a chance on her coming back with necromancer magic, using the last of my strength to rip her head from her shoulders. The instant I did, the rancid grip of her spell receded like a tide. It wasn’t an immediate snap like I expected, which disappointed me.

  My blood itched with the aftereffects of the spell and I turned to Earnshaw, smiling.

  “Not so smug without your witch’s skirts to hide behind, are you?” I asked him.

  If vampires could pale, Earnshaw would have been white as a sheet. He blinked it away, grimacing.

  “You will die for this,” he promised. “He will make sure of it.”

  I tilted my head. “Big talk coming from someone inches away from their own demise.”

  I hated that such a statement wasn’t rightly true. As much as I wanted to tear off his head and use it as a footrest when I finally did get to sit down, I reasoned the king might want to have a chat with him. Wasn’t that the whole point of me almost dying? To give the king what he wanted so I didn’t actually die? I would have to call Sophie to get her to do some eraser work on Earnshaw’s memories of me and the slayers. It wouldn’t do well to have him reveal that under torture.

  Not well at all.

  Earnshaw’s wide eyes went behind me as the last telltale crack of bone echoed through the air.

  “No” was his strangled whisper.

  I glanced back. Thorne’s eyes immediately found mine, the cocktail of emotions in them nearly stopping every other thought I had. His chest rapidly expanded and fell with the exertion of breathing.

  No wonder, as he was almost up to his knees in corpses.

  None of which were of his own men, surprisingly. I was a little disappointed that the only thing No Neck was nursing was a blackened eye and a particularly nasty bite wound near his shoulder.

  If only they’d aimed a little higher.

  “Looks like all your abominations have gone bye-bye, Dr. Frankenstein,” I said, turning my gaze back to Earnshaw. “I would say I’m sorry, but I’m not and you’re an asshole who got what he deserved, so I’ll just get down to it.”

  I darted forward expecting an easy fight, but when you corner a predator, you find them at their strongest.

  And I loathe to admit that I was at my weakest.

  Not only had the witch’s spell drained me, but my lack of sleep meant my recovery time was lagging.

  Which meant it was all the easier for Earnshaw’s fangs to attach themselves to my neck and rip half my throat out.

  The pain was white-hot and immediate. Luckily it pissed me off enough to snap his neck and hinder any more mortal wounds.

  He crumpled to the ground at my feet.

  I stared down at his body, holding one hand to my jugular that had yet to stop bleeding. Cool liquid spurted down my neck and coated the front of my body. The pain had yet to recede, as the blood didn’t stop flowing in seconds like was normal.

  No wonder humans were so goddamned miserable.

  “Isla,” a voice growled beside me.

  “Please tell me you’ve got some form of vampire restraints in your Batman belts,” I said by response to the concern.

  A pause.

  “Restraints
?”

  I nodded my still-bleeding head, ignoring the lance of pain that came with the movement. It was intense enough to turn my stomach. Throwing up blood was the last thing I wanted to do; I needed to hold onto as much of that as I could, considering the only people with pulses in the room would kill me surer than the witch could with merely a taste of their blood.

  “Yes. I’m not growing old here but increasingly annoyed,” I snapped. “I can’t kill him, as much as I’d like to. I need him alive for information.” I extended my hand and wiggled my fingers impatiently. “Restraints.”

  Out of my periphery, Thorne nodded. One of his men darted forward, handing me the copper cuffs as quickly as humanly possible before darting out of my presence.

  He was the kid I’d pointed the gun at. Seemed he couldn’t forgive and forget.

  I fought against the way the room blurred at the edges to cuff Earnshaw, the burn from the copper nothing compared to the inferno that had only just receded from every part of my body. He’d be healed in about twenty minutes, so I needed him in transit, or ideally out of my hair, before that.

  I stood, once more trying to convince myself that the world should not be spinning. My blood loss had finally slowed, only a slow trickle escaping from my hands that were still holding my neck together.

  “Can one of you strapping young lads carry him down to the car for me? I think that’s the least you could do since I did all the heavy lifting for the night,” I asked, my voice light.

  The air was charged, and it only then occurred to me that I was injured and seriously weakened in the presence of four bloodthirsty slayers riding off the high of cutting down countless vamps.

  If I was ever going to serve my head on a silver platter, that was their chance.

  Thorne’s body stiffened at my side and I could taste the realization in his emotions. Not subtly, he stepped aside, taking me with him and positioning his body in front of mine while keeping his eyes on his men.

  Third time. It was becoming a habit. And I was beginning to enjoy it.

  “Take him down,” he growled at No Neck. He didn’t wait for a response before he glanced at the other two. “I want you two to take one of those”—he nodded to the corpses strewn at their feet—“and get it to Silver. We don’t want to be here when reinforcements come.”

  His command was clear. The first two rustled to get going, the muscled olive-skinned one hoisting the body over his shoulder in one smooth move. They gave me one last look of distaste. I winked at them.

  No Neck was still glaring at Thorne. “And you, Commander? What are you going to do?”

  Thorne stiffened at his side. “Knowing what I’m doing wasn’t part of your orders, Erik. Are you going to disobey me?”

  The question hung in the air. It wasn’t lost on me that Erik was clutching his copper knife so hard his meaty hand turned white.

  My vision blurred. I was pretty sure he didn’t clone himself, so it was not a good thing I saw two angry roid-freak slayers.

  They merged back into one when he took a step forward. Thorne stiffened, only slightly, but enough to make it clear that he’d challenge one of his own if they went for me.

  Instead of watching the two slayers fight, which even in my weakened state I would have enjoyed, Erik breezed past us, treating me to the bitterness of his rage before he lifted Earnshaw.

  “Mine’s the cherry-red convertible on the curb, Mercedes,” I told him sweetly. “In the back is fine. And if you scratch my car, I’ll rip your throat out.” It worried me there was a slight wet undertone to my voice thanks to my throat being ripped out. “And unlike me, you won’t be standing here chatting after I do it.”

  Erik gave me a look so hate-filled the air swirled with the rancid taste of the emotion.

  Then he looked to Thorne, waiting for him to challenge my request. Thorne folded his arms. They were covered in blood, snaking up his muscled biceps like some kind of tattoo. It was delicious.

  “Do it,” he bit out. “Then go back to the compound.”

  Erik had an internal struggle on whether to drop the bloodsucker, stab his commander and then finish ripping my head off. It was as clear as day. The air charged yet again, but Thorne kept his arms folded.

  Reaching his decision, Erik turned on his heel and stomped down the stairs, enshrouded in his blanket of hate.

  Thorne and I stood in silence, death permeating the air, the last of the black magic seeping into the floorboards.

  My stomach still curled with icy coldness that hadn’t been banished with the witch. That and the blood loss from the wound that didn’t seem to want to heal.

  I needed a fresh blood bag. I glanced at the pulsing tendons in Thorne’s neck, his blood calling to me, hypnotizing me with his thundering heartbeat.

  Which didn’t make sense at all. Instinctively, I should have known his blood would kill me. Instead, I craved it like it was the only thing that would keep me on this earth.

  I needed to get out of here. “Okay, well as fun as this was, let’s never do it again. You really know how to show a girl a bad time,” I said, trying to step around him. He whirled and had me pushed against the wall in a moment. My reactions were dangerously slow, because I let him. Was it the mortal wound at my neck that let him box me into the same position as I had outside, or was it something else? The dark hooded look in his gray eyes, the taste of him mingled with the taste of death? His body that had my blood singing as if it hadn’t been boiling underneath my skin moments before?

  “You’re not goin’ anywhere,” he growled. The savageness of his tone didn’t match how his bloodstained hand reached up to my neck, brushing over the flesh that was knitting back together.

  His eyes glued to the wound that was becoming little more than a scratch, the pain that had radiated through my body muted to an uncomfortable itch.

  In novels and sonnets and those terrible romance movies, people talked about time stopping or slowing down. I wanted to drain those people, or the person who invented the concept of some sort of emotional connection overriding physics.

  Magic could do it, as could some strong vampires, manipulating the thread of time to bend it. Nothing crazy, just a few seconds here or there. All supernatural forces, but there was a reason to the concept.

  Reason didn’t exist here. In the moment where time became a mold that Thorne sculpted with his breath and his beating heart. His head lowered towards my neck, his inky hair falling around him as his lips softly fastened over the newly healed skin. Kissing it. Laying his mouth over my bloodstained skin as if his human lips had a power vampire blood didn’t. They could heal it and chase away the chill that had begun to retreat at his proximity.

  The second he made contact, my entire body went alight with a heat that couldn’t be rivaled by an open flame. It melted the ice at my stomach like I’d drained a hundred humans dry.

  When his head lifted and his hungry eyes met mine, time snapped back and everything happened in a blur. His lips were brands on my own as his hands clutched my sides, a low growl vibrating from his throat.

  I wrapped my arms around his neck, plunging my hands into his hair, brutally tugging at it as he lifted me and immediately threw me brutally onto the bed that was all but forgotten in the midst of the battle.

  His body covered mine before I had a second to chase whatever semblance of sanity remained in my psyche.

  His lips set mine aflame while his body plastered against mine. If this was insanity, then I would happily accessorize a straight jacket.

  He ripped my shirt open, then held my breasts for a glorious second before the garment was gone in a tear of fabric and my last shred of reason.

  Thorne let out a low hiss as he took in my blood-red lace bra, his eyes glowing.

  “You’re fuckin’ magnificent, Isla,” he rasped.

  Then he lowered his mouth so it settled atop the thin lace covering my nipple.

  I clutched his hair, threading my nails through it and yanking hard while he stoked th
e flames inside me. I was sure the bedframe would serve as kindling and burn this whole place to the ground. I wouldn’t have blinked if that happened, as long as Thorne’s body stayed on mine.

  I could deal with anything as long as his scent was close enough to taste, his heartbeat rattling through my soul, giving me life that had been absent for five hundred years of undeath.

  His mouth moved lower, tasting, relishing and worshiping his way down to the waistband of my jeans. His touch, his lips, the energy streaming through him—none of it was gentle. His teeth grazed my belly roughly, his grip on my hips firm enough to imprint bruises on my pale skin. Bruises that remained longer than usual but that I would happily keep as tattoos of his touch.

  The curtain of his hair fell back and feral eyes met mine.

  They stayed that way, locked in a brutal gaze, as he ripped off my boots and jeans in a movement that was a blur to even my eyes.

  I was too drugged by his touch to register the strangeness of this. My eyes devoured him, blood and bruises peppering his muscled body, remains of a battle that had happened ages ago. I moved quickly, capturing him and turning us so he was on his back and I straddled him, my lingerie-clad core pressing into his rough hardness encased in denim.

  My forehead clashed against his. “I told you, I’m best on top,” I purred, my voice barely recognizable.

  His eyes were quicksilver as he clutched my face with a ferocity that I sank into. Then in another blur and a delicious amount of pain, my back pressed into the rough fabric of the bed, Thorne’s entire body pressing into mine.

  “This is one place you don’t get to be in charge,” he growled. He roughly tweaked my nipple and then moved lower, freeing himself from his jeans while the rest of him stayed clothed.

  He leaned in, capturing my bottom lip in his teeth and biting down hard enough to draw blood.

  “You surrender to no one but me,” he rasped against my bleeding lip. Then he covered my mouth with my own, tasting my blood at the same time he surged into me.

  Sex and death were the two most natural parts of life. Natural, necessary and best if feelings weren’t involved in either.

  Yet the moment Thorne and I connected, it was something beyond the natural.