“Drop your weapons,” I ordered the other two, who were still frozen in place, glaring at me. Seven stakes, a mini crossbow, three rapiers, five daggers, and a set of silver handcuffs landed in the snow. I reached cautiously for one of the rapiers. The weight was familiar and comforting in my hand. “Now go away and leave us alone.”
They turned and walked away, leaning as if they were fighting a wild wind at their back. They tried to fight the compulsion but couldn’t. I had a tiny delicious moment of smug satisfaction.
And then the handmaiden fighting Constantine whistled shrilly through her teeth signaling to the others, even as she dodged a vicious jab to the jugular.
The handmaidens were bad.
Being possessed was bad.
But this was so much worse.
Chapter 12
Lucy
It was my experience that when vampires start bowing and looking all formal, it’s best to get the hell out of the way.
Which I would have done if I wasn’t chained to a post.
There was more bowing and murmurs of “My lord” and “My prince” and two of the female donors strained at the end of their chains, smiling and showing cleavage. One of them actually sighed, like she was meeting someone from a boy band. It was embarrassing. Which could only mean one thing.
A Drake brother.
And since all but one of them were exiled on pain of death, it could only mean one person specifically.
Nicholas.
My palms went damp. I wasn’t sure why but I felt nervous and exposed, and it had nothing to do with the chains. The crowd parted and suddenly Nicholas was there, stalking toward me, his serious face cut in hard, uncompromising lines. His gray eyes flared silver, like jagged pieces of mirror sharp enough to slice through your skin. I half expected blood to be running down my arms.
“What is she doing here?” he asked. He sounded lethal and dark. It was hard to remember that this was the same seventeen-year-old Nicholas who’d given me a mix CD just last week. He stood like a man, not like a younger brother or a youngest son or any of the other things that defined him. They were still part of him, but the pieces now fit into a more complicated puzzle.
“She said she was here on your orders,” a guard replied, glaring at me. I lifted my chin and glared back.
“I mean, what is she doing chained to the tree,” Nicholas continued, so evenly the guard swallowed.
“Queen’s orders,” he replied quickly, defensively.
My boyfriend made a vampire guard at least twice his age nervous. I was kind of proud. Also? Really freaking nervous.
Because the truth was, I still didn’t know if he was broken.
“Unchain her,” Nicholas ordered while I tried to interpret his expression. He looked stronger and older.
“Beg pardon, but she hasn’t been vouched for,” the guard said.
Nicholas raised an eyebrow. “My sister isn’t here,” he said. “But I am. So Un. Chain. Her,” he repeated, slowly and emphatically, his fangs lengthening to killing points.
I actually shivered. My animal self, the one who reacted to lightning and strange sounds at night, urged me to run run run. My animal self was forgetting the cardinal rule with vampires: don’t run.
The clamp of iron around my aching wrist was replaced by the clamp of Nicholas’s pale fingers. It wasn’t any less confining or unbending. I grabbed his arm with my free hand. “Nicholas, what—”
He spun so fast, I got dizzy.
“You will address me as ‘Your Highness,’ ” he demanded, his voice like a whip slicing the air, or the tail of a poisonous snake. He backed me into the post, until the dangling empty chain pressed into my side. The bloodslaves parted around us. Nicholas’s hand slid up my bare neck, tilting my head forcibly to the side. He dragged his lips along my jugular, pausing with his lips over my ear. I swallowed, my throat so dry I could barely form words.
“Be scared.” His voice was barely a breath, tickling my ear, sending shivers over my skin.
I had to hope he was asking me to play along.
That he wasn’t actually serious.
He pulled away just slightly, his pupils wide and black as a pond at night, edged with pale fog and moonlight. I could almost, almost, catch a glimpse of the real Nicholas.
And then he yanked me along behind him until I was stumbling and tripping over my own feet. One of the bloodslave girls started to weep when she realized Nicholas wasn’t picking her. She made me irrationally angry. “Oh, grow a spine,” I snapped at her when she tried to touch Nicholas’s boot. “You’re giving all girls a bad name.”
Said the girl who was currently allowing her boyfriend to pull her about like a rag doll.
“I’m so going to punch you if this is a trap,” I muttered.
Nicholas didn’t even glance back at me and he didn’t pause until we approached the Drake tent. There was a tiered table full of burning candles and flowers on a rug out front. There were wine bottles of blood, pomegranates, and baskets of silver jewelry, all at the foot of a painting of Solange. I gaped at it.
“She likes the attention.” Nicholas yanked me through the opening to the tent. Except for the wooden furniture and the rugs and lanterns, it was empty.
I reached out and yanked his hair as savagely as I could. “Okay, what the bloody damn hell—”
He put his finger over my lips, silencing me. He shook his head once.
I narrowed my eyes. “It’s like you think I won’t bite you,” I muttered, but I nodded my head to let him know I understood. He kicked a Persian rug over to reveal a wooden door leading to what I assumed was one of the tunnels. I followed him down the stairs, into the cold damp darkness, hoping I wasn’t being one of those stupid girls in a horror movie.
My fists were clenched and I was getting ready to fight when Nicholas pivoted to face me. “Lucky,” he said, his voice breaking.
I lowered my fists. “Are you you? Really you?”
He caught me up against him. His hold was just as strong as before, but it was gentle, restrained, and honest.
Nicholas.
“I missed you,” he said hoarsely.
I wrapped my arms around him, not nearly as gentle. He dipped his head, slanting his mouth over mine. The kiss didn’t meander or hesitate, it went straight to fire. I was a drought-dry field and Nicholas was the spark. Our tongues touched and I felt it all the way down my thighs and into my toes. He backed me up against the wall, one hand on my waist, the other flattened on the stones by my cheek. I couldn’t get close enough. I finally had Nicholas back, and he wasn’t lost or missing or broken. He was right here, kissing me, as desperate to touch me as I was to touch him.
I had no idea how long we’d been clinging to each other but I finally had to pull away to catch my breath. “Oh my God,” I exclaimed finally, smacking him in the chest. “You scared the crap out of me, Nicholas Drake!”
“I know,” he answered, his lips still hovering over mine. “I’m sorry. But bloodslaves are either obediently adoring or terrified. I needed you to be one or the other. And since a vampire can smell the difference, I chose the latter, ” he added drily. “I didn’t think you could pull off obediently adoring, even if your life depended on it.”
I didn’t bother answering, I just kissed him until he shifted against me and suddenly we were lying on one of the cots. He pressed me down into the thin mattress, hands roaming wickedly. I ran my fingers over his back, under his shirt, letting the moment take us out of the world, out of vampire politics and death threats and the heavy jagged weight I’d been carrying since he first went missing.
I touched his cheek. “I really missed you,” I said, blinking when my eyes started to sting.
“Hey,” he said softly, half grinning. “Are you crying?”
“Shut up,” I replied, wiping my cheeks. “I don’t cry over boys. Not even Drake boys.” I sat up reluctantly, straightening my clothes. “We should stop. Fate of the world and all that.” He groaned, still kissing my n
eck. I ran my fingers through his tousled hair, just because I could. “What happened to you?”
He paused, closing his eyes briefly. “It’s not important.”
I twisted to stare down at him. “Are you nuts?”
He scrubbed a hand over his face and pushed off the cot. “I’m okay now.”
I swallowed, trying to dissolve the lump in my throat. “But you weren’t okay before.”
He met my gaze. “No,” he replied quietly. “I wasn’t. When you talk to my parents, and I know you will, tell them someone named Dawn is behind the kidnappings and at least some of the Dracula Killer crimes.” He helped me to my feet, brushing his palm over the puncture marks of his fangs at the crook of my elbow. His expression stilled, went stark. “There’s no excuse for what I did.”
I rolled my eyes. “Oh, don’t be a drama queen,” I said lightly. I knew if I let him, he’d spiral into guilt and blame.
He gave a short, startled laugh. “Lucy.”
“Well, come on, extenuating circumstances and all. Besides which, we have way worse to deal with, so cheer up.” “Great,” he said.
“Are we secure down here?” I asked. It was a mark of how dire the situation was that he didn’t tease me for sounding like I went to Vampire Hunter High.
“Not secure enough.” He sighed, taking my hand. “So come on.”
He led me through the tunnels, doubling back when his vampire hearing picked up sounds I couldn’t hear. Torches burned sporadically and moisture seeped through the walls, staining the cement and the tiles. We passed a few doors and metal stairs leading up into the forest. He kept going until he came to a hole in the wall that I wouldn’t have seen in all the thick shadows. I scraped my elbows and knees wedging myself through it. On the other side was a small circular room, just big enough for a cot and a wooden chest. A rope ladder led to a trapdoor set in the ceiling.
“Is this where you’re sleeping?” I asked. For some reason, the lonely space with the twisted blanket and the candle he crouched down to light made me sad.
He shrugged unconcerned. “It’s safe. And Solange keeps trying to compel me to stay closer to the family tent.” He looked up at me. “For some reason, I can resist her now. Well, it’s getting harder but for a while I didn’t feel compelled. ” He paused, the light making his eyes glitter. “Why are you smirking?”
“Because for once I actually know something,” I said, dropping down onto his bed. “And it’s such a nice change from not knowing anything about anything.”
“So spill, Hamilton.”
“I took out most of the books in the school library,” I said. “And after talking to Spencer and reading several hundred very boring texts written by extremely biased asshats, I think I figured something out.”
“What’s that?”
“Why I’m immune to Solange.”
He raised his eyebrows expectantly.
“It’s partly what we’ve always thought,” I explained, sliding off the bed to sit next to him. I wasn’t sure how long we had together and I didn’t want to waste a single second. “I’ve grown up with it so my body doesn’t recognize vampire pheromones as anything out of the ordinary. But with Solange, I think it’s more than that. I think that if you have her blood in your system, you can resist her.”
He frowned. “I’ve never drunk from her.”
“But you drank from me.” He winced. I waved it aside.
“Wait.” He paused. “That doesn’t explain it. You never drank from Solange.” His jaw hardened. “Right?”
“I never drank her blood,” I reassured him. “Not only is that gross but . . . actually, it’s just gross.” I made a face. It was one thing for a vampire to drink blood, they needed it to survive. “But when Solange and I were thirteen, we swore an oath to be blood sisters. We made cuts on our little fingers and pinky swore. My theory is because we mixed blood, it’s protected me.”
“Actually, you might be right,” he said slowly. “Solange used her blood to heal London when she was injured, on the assumption that because Solange once had minute traces of Madame Veronique’s blood in her system, it might save London the way it saved Solange on her birthday. And it did.” He took my hand, weaving his fingers through mine. “Have you told my parents?”
I nodded. “I e-mailed Connor before I came here. I’m pretty sure checking their e-mail isn’t very high on your parents’ to-do list right now, but he’s always online.”
He lifted our joined hands, kissing my knuckles. His mouth was soft, tempting. “Maybe you just saved us all, Lucy.”
“It might not mean anything, but at least it’s another possible weapon.” I thought I might be blushing. “And I think you should drink from me again.”
He recoiled so sharply I nearly laughed. His eyes widened as he pressed himself back against the wall, dropping my hand like it was on fire. “Are you crazy?”
“According to everything I read, this kind of blood magic can fade, sometimes more quickly than others, especially when it’s not straight from the source. London would have healed faster if Madame Veronique had given her blood directly, and lots of it. You’d have better immunity if you drank from Solange directly, but you can’t. And you barely drank from me. Plus, Solange’s blood must be so diluted in my system only magic could detect it by now. And you said yourself, your resistance is fading.”
“No.”
I frowned. “Nicholas, it makes sense.” “I don’t care.”
I scooted closer. He skirted away, keeping out of arm’s reach. I paused. “Nicky.”
“No way,” he returned tightly. “You just stay right there.”
“Are you afraid to touch me? Seriously?”
“Just, please.” He looked like he was in pain.
I shifted back against the bed. “Okay,” I said gently. “Hey, it’s okay.”
His fangs were out and the whites of his eyes were bloodshot. He looked worse than that time we’d made out in the tree fort so long it had taken us fifteen minutes to find my shirt snagged on a pine branch. The veins tracing his wrists and neck looked as if they burned and I could see faint scars under his shirt collar. It took a hell of a lot to scar a vampire.
“What did they do to you?” I asked, feeling a kind of bone-searing fury that made me literally see red. Nicholas licked his lips.
“Change the subject.” He was practically begging, though his eyes were the eyes of a hunter.
I tried to control my temper, trying not to let the anger and sorrow turn my entire body into a grenade. “Okay, but that’s not all.”
“Of course it isn’t.”
“The Drakes are a little too good at multitasking when it comes to disasters,” I agreed. I took a deep breath. “I think Solange is possessed.”
That was enough to distract him from his bloodlust. “Is that even possible?” He sounded bewildered.
“Spencer says it is but I can’t get a hold of Isabeau to find out for sure. Regardless, all the research I’ve done so far says it’s possible but unpredictable. Magic and vampires are a volatile mix. There’s a reason the Hounds are so . . . you know.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “They are.” He sat back on his heels. “If she’s possessed then she didn’t really do all the things she’s done.”
“Explains a lot, doesn’t it?” I smiled grimly. “And if she’s possessed, then it means she can be unpossessed. Or exorcised or whatever.”
“How?”
“No idea,” I admitted. “But still. And it has something to do with the twelfth century.”
He finally closed the distance between us. “You’re kind of amazing, you know that, right?” He’d said that to me once before, the last time we’d been trying to save Solange. He kissed me again, long and deep until my breath trembled in my throat.
“Jenna thinks we’re fooling ourselves,” I felt compelled to add, as we sat there, foreheads touching, eyes filled with nothing but each other. “That we want Solange to be possessed because it’s easier.”
> “Maybe,” he said softly. “But I’m guessing exorcising a vampire queen with brainwashing pheromones is going to be harder than it sounds.”
“Probably.”
“Can’t wait, can you?”
“Nope.”
“Me neither.”
We grinned at each other for a moment, until he got to his feet, pulling me up with him. “We have to get you out of here,” he said, suddenly looking dangerous again. “Now.”
Chapter 13
Solange
I’d never seen anything like the vampire woman who dropped down from a branch and landed right in front of me. She wore white, from leather pants so tight they looked like wet oil paint, to the hood drawn up over her head. Her sleeves ended above her elbows and the rest of her arms were covered in leather bracers set with slim silver stakes. There were more stakes on the straps that crossed between her breasts and at her belt, and a long slender sword in a scabbard at her back.
She made my mom look like a perfectly normal member of the PTA.
The really strange part was the way everyone else froze for a heartbeat, staring at her with the kind of fear that left a coppery taste in the mouth.
“A Seki.” One of the handmaidens gasped.
The animals in the forest fell back into the shadows, sensing a predator they had no hope of defeating. Viola was trembling inside my head. Seki looked directly at me, even though her irises were such a pale gray they were practically translucent, but the pupils were completely and violently red. Her fangs were out, glistening like bone needles, and she wore a pair of ornate silver-capped nose plugs.
I didn’t even see her jump: there was no whisper of displaced air, just the crack of her boot on my knee and the jab of the side of her hand on my throat when I fell to the ground. I flung to the side like a rag doll in a washing machine as she kept attacking me. She knew where I was going before I’d even moved.
I fought back because I was my mother’s daughter, not because I thought for one second that I could defeat her. But I was also my father’s daughter, born to an ancient family. I pushed up to my knees, blood dripping from a cut under my eye. “You can’t hurt me,” I said, forcing pheromones so intently that I pulled a muscle in my eyelid and my teeth ground together. I could taste blood from my split lip. Bruises throbbed along the left side of my body, from neck to hip. “You can’t hurt me!’
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