13
As soon as we stepped into the ornate mansion, with its dark mahogany interior, our mind-connection abilities snapped off. I wasn’t surprised, since that’s exactly what had happened to my father and me last time. Eudoxia had some sort of interference spell that kept mind communication closed. It made sense that she’d want to protect herself. If her minions could talk, they could plot.
The gigantic foyer was draped with gold fixtures and deep red carpets, all the furniture polished and well kept.
The Vampire Queen was nowhere to be seen.
A moment later a voice chirped from the top of the staircase. We all glanced up to see Valdov leaning over the banister. He brought his long white fingers together in his standard steeple pose as he cackled, “So the rutting was a success, I gather?” At our last unfortunate meeting, he’d guessed correctly that Rourke and I were a mated pair.
I took a step forward. “It was actually mind-blowing, but we’re not here to discuss private affairs. Where is your Queen? She said she’d meet us here.”
“Eudoxia is lying down, mending her eyes. Sunlight is so very powerful and nasty on us, you know.” He made a clicking sound with his tongue. “She handled the threat against us perfectly, however, and with great authority. You have been ordered to deal with me. When she wakes at sunset, she will meet with you then, if you … er … decide to accept our demands.”
“I’m not swearing anything to you, Valdov,” I said, clearing things up from the start. “You have no honor and I wouldn’t loan a guy like you five cents. I’m certainly not going to bind myself to you. So you and your Queen are going to have to rethink your tactics. Go see what else she has in mind and we’ll wait here admiring her Ming vases.”
Before any of us could blink, he launched himself down the stairs in a rage.
As he came at us, his face slid and his fangs elongated. We all took a few steps back because it was so unexpected. “You will not question my honor!” he slurred through his pointy incisors. He huffed to a stop a few feet in front of me, his eyes fully black, no white showing. “You are below me in every sense, you rotten mongrel. Do you hear me? You will swear whatever I ask in return for the Queen’s favor. There is no other compromise! You should count your blessings you are even allowed to stand here in our home.”
I didn’t flinch.
His power was strong, but nothing like his Queen’s, and I’d learned a thing—or several—since we’d last met. “If there’s no compromise, we’re leaving,” I said. “I don’t need anything badly enough to swear to you, Valdov. You can tell your Queen you let her prize slip right between your bony white fingers. I’m sure she’ll be extremely happy when she wakes up and finds out I’m gone.”
As one, we turned and headed toward the door. It was a power play, but we had no other choice. I would leave if I had to. I couldn’t trust Valdov to keep his word. It was too risky. Once we were outside, we’d regroup.
“Aren’t you forgetting something, mongrel?” Valdov snickered behind me. “A certain vampire or two you’ve become … acquainted with … perhaps a bit too deeply?”
I stopped midstride.
Motherfuckeronacracker.
“Did you honestly think we would not notice she had changed? You cannot possibly be so naïve.” He strolled toward a big open room to our right like he hadn’t just gone bat-shit crazy on us. I refused to acknowledge him or look his way. “She reeked of your blood, you know. And the abomination she brought with her? He shan’t be allowed to survive the night.” He tut-tutted as he picked up a knickknack and pretended to examine it. “We choose our humans extremely carefully, and with the utmost discretion. His making was nothing less than a … travesty. An utterly uncouth individual cannot become a Nosferatu. Do you know, when we hauled them away, he had the nerve to try to bite me, all the while ranting and raving about the ‘ass kicking’ he was going to mete out once he became free? Can you imagine? A fledgling that stunk of werewolf was going to give me retribution?” He threw his head back and cackled.
It was an ugly sound.
I clenched my teeth. Unable to contain myself, I glanced up and said, “They came here for protection. They are part of my group and will not be harmed.”
A slow, evil smile slid across his ivory features. “Ah, ah, ah.” He wagged his cruelly sharp nail at me. “You have chosen not to swear anything to us, remember? They came of their own free will into our home. Naughty, naughty Naomi, with a broken bond to her beloved Queen, and that … abomination. They are ours now to do with as we please—”
Rage covered my eyes in a film of red, churning my irises a deep, menacing violet. I reacted before I knew what I was doing, my wolf fueling me, my Lycan form morphing instantly, faster than it ever had before.
I had Valdov by the throat.
We were on the stairs.
Someone had me by the shoulders, but I didn’t move. Not even an inch. “Listen to me, Valdov,” I said, my voice gravelly, my vocal cords strained, “you will let all my friends go and we will all leave peacefully, or you die here. Do you understand me? No compromises.”
Genuine surprise lit his features so completely, I almost laughed. He had never guessed my true strength and now he paid the price. As much as he had tasted my power, he had chosen to categorize me as a nonthreat. I squeezed a little harder to prove to him how big a mistake he had made.
“Let him go, Little Wolf Girl, or you will not enjoy my wrath.” A commanding voice full of power shook the walls of the house. Picture frames bounced and delicate artifacts tinkled on tables.
Eudoxia stood at the top of the stairway.
Her eyes apparently healed enough for her to witness the scene of me taking out her favorite henchman.
I didn’t let go. Instead I glanced up at her and snarled, “You had your chance to keep me here fair and square. I came willingly. I’m certain you had an elaborate scheme to drink me dry, or siphon off my power, during your gala in a few weeks. But I’m here now. And once I leave, you’re going to be too busy to chase me down. You’ll have you hands full trying to keep the sorcerers from blowing your Coterie to pieces.”
“The sorcerers are fools,” she snarled, gliding down the grand stairway like she wasn’t using her feet. “They believe you have the power to rule the race of supernaturals. But I know better. You are not here to rule, as the other Sects may believe. You are here to cause a war between us.” When my features flashed my surprise, she continued. “Yes, that’s right, Little Wolf Girl, it’s because of you that we will fight, and not because you will rule us, but because you are the determinate. When one like you surfaces, magic changes and morphs, cross-couplings occur, Sects that would never speak will unite as one. Our world is changing again, as it has once a millennia since time began. And there will be an outcome, but it will only emerge after you rain chaos down upon our heads as you bumble through this life.” Her fangs flicked down as she hissed. “But you see, I am smarter than the rest. Because I will pick no side!” She finished with a grim smile, obviously satisfied with her tirade.
It grated that she knew so much about me, and even more so because I was still very much in the dark about everything. The Prophecy of the True Lycan had surfaced right before I’d gone to find Rourke. My father was only five hundred years old and our history had been tampered with, our sacred book burned, whole entries unaccounted for. It was clear the vampires knew much more and likely had since I’d been born, along with many of the other Sects. It put me, and the wolves, at a huge disadvantage.
Eudoxia had stopped a few steps above, gloating over me as I growled my displeasure.
We stood on uneven ground, her magic swirling around me, pushing and prodding at my skin. I made a split-second decision about how to move forward in this game, aided by my furious wolf. I had to make her choose a side. “The vampires don’t get to be Switzerland, Eudoxia,” I snarled. “You’re already involved. You jumped in willingly when you kidnapped me weeks ago, and now you hold my friends hostage.
The damage is already done. The sorcerers will be back and they will bring their High Priests and their powerful allies, seeking retribution for your counterattack.” No need to mention their allies were, in fact, demons. “You will be forced to pick a side, and I suggest you pick the winning side. Mine.”
Valdov had used my conversation with the Queen to wiggle loose from my grip and I let him go. It would achieve nothing to kill him now. I stepped back. Rourke stood right behind me; his warmth calmed me as I slid back into my human form, his strength fortifying me.
Tyler stood to my left, ready to react, Danny slightly behind, his face set.
Their anger and need for retribution pounded in my veins. It made us strong.
“You cannot force me to choose anything, you fool, and I took no one hostage.” Eudoxia’s voice shook, her face twitching. She was dangerously close to losing it, but managed to keep it in check as her power thrummed inside my chest like an amp at a rock concert. “My servant tried to pretend nothing was amiss when she arrived. She didn’t even try to deny our bond had been broken when confronted or that she had murdered her blood-kin. And it will do you well to remember that she is mine, not yours. I care not about the human fledgling. He is of no use to me. But you will not take my tracker. She will pay for her indiscretions and the death of her brother dearly.” The Queen wore a deep red satin gown, her lipstick a matching blood red. Her hair was once again piled high on her head to give the effect of maturity, but none of it masked her youthful appearance.
“She killed her brother because he was Selene’s spy,” I grated. “Did she inform you of that? Did she tell you he delivered her to Selene’s door to be tortured? Eamon was never in your control. It was only an illusion. He couldn’t wait to get back to his true Master. The one he’d never left.”
Valdov shifted impatiently next to me.
“Impossible.” The Queen sniffed. “Eamon was a faithful servant. Naomi was the conniving one. It was she who beheaded Selene all those years ago, snatching the sacred cross and fleeing like a thief in the night. It was she who deserved the punishment from the goddess herself. She should’ve taken heed, as I told her before she left. She was not to cross the river into Selene’s territory. And now she will pay the price for ignoring her Queen’s order.”
“Eamon was deeply in love with Selene,” I countered. “He betrayed you and his sister willingly, and if he’d stayed alive, he would have done it again. Willingly. He was hers to wield.”
“You are mistaken once again, mongrel,” Valdov spat. “You know nothing of what you speak. All the Queen’s servants are faithful beyond reproach. If they are not, they are dispatched quickly and efficiently. We do not tolerate traitorous actions at court. The penalty for such a thing is death.”
I turned to examine Valdov, taking in his hands, which were clasped in front of him, and his practiced demeanor. Underneath he was seething. “Is that your job?” I asked him. “To weed out the threats? To dispatch those unwilling to follow their Master blindly?”
His chest puffed with pride. “Of course! I’ve kept this court functioning in its purest form for hundreds of years, and I will continue to do so until there is no blood left in my veins.”
It’d been clear to me from the start that he and his Queen had been together since the very beginning; both of their accents still held traces of their Russian roots. But one discrepancy kept Valdov apart from all others, which jumped to the forefront now as I eyed him. All vampires appeared to have been converted in their early twenties or thirties. They were usually exceptionally beautiful and vibrant, each chosen, as Valdov had said, with the utmost discretion.
Except for Valdov.
He appeared more like the former chancellor of a boarding school, curved nose, sharp features, late forties. He held an air of superiority, like the kind of teacher who would’ve enjoyed rapping a metal ruler over your knuckles just to see you squirm.
I narrowed my eyes. “I don’t believe Eamon worked alone. He wasn’t smart or powerful enough to keep a secret relationship with Selene going by himself. Not one where they shared information on a regular basis. He had to have help.”
“What you say is false,” Valdov replied briskly. “Eamon was faithful to this court. If he was a spy, I would’ve known in an instant. His sister is the wily one. If there is something amiss, a leak in our ranks, it is she who is responsible and I will see she dies a wretched death for it.”
Before he could mask it—at the very center of his eye—a tiny flare of silver ignited. It was almost undetectable. If I hadn’t been staring right at him, I would’ve missed it.
The Queen waved her arm before I could respond. “It doesn’t matter what you think, Little Wolf Girl. We will not deal any longer.” The Queen huffed. “I offer you nothing and I pick no sides. But you may be thankful I am allowing you to walk out of my door unscathed. I do not care if the sorcerers harvest your body parts on their altar and wash themselves in your blood. I want you out of my sight. Your chaos will not touch us any longer.”
Valdov’s lips formed a cruel grin. He clearly enjoyed his Queen’s order to kick us out.
But I wasn’t leaving.
I’d just figured out something vital. “You might want to hear what I have to say before you send us away,” I said, and without waiting for her consent, I asked, “Was Valdov your schoolroom teacher?” It was clear Eudoxia had been turned into a vampire at a very young age, and her real father had been mad. It made sense she would’ve turned the only father figure she’d ever had into a vampire. At her confused expression I added, “You know, did you change him because you were scared and sought his guidance?”
“What?” she responded, obviously taken off guard.
“You heard me,” I persisted, taking a bold step forward, ignoring her building wrath. “Your father was Ivan the Terrible. You were born in Russia. I catch your accent, even though it’s clear you’ve spoken French for a very long time. I’ve heard the rumors of your lineage. You come from royalty, and with peerage comes private tutors.” She peered at me, her gaze becoming steely. “I’ll ask it again. Was Valdov your schoolroom teacher?”
“I owe you no answers, and you will get none from me.” She crossed her arms, folds of red material cascading down the front of her body in silky waves. Her impatience had reached its peak with me, and I was running out of time. Her eyes flickered between gray and jet black. She was unsettled. Just enough for me to know the truth. “My heritage is of no concern of yours. I want you out of my—”
I turned like a shot, switching control to my wolf as my fist smashed into Valdov’s face as he stood sneering next to me. His body rocketed into the wall because it was so light, exploding the plaster, sending pictures flying in every direction.
I growled, turning my focus back to a livid Queen, her irises a kaleidoscope of silver. “I think it’s time you hired some new advisors,” I said. “It seems this one isn’t working out so well for you after all.”
14
The Queen’s shriek rocked the foundation and vamps came running from every direction. They filled the stairway and hallways, most appearing to be fresh from sleep.
Eudoxia flew forward, coming to a halt inches from me. Her eyes were fully black, her fangs as sharp as I’d ever seen them. Her power struck me hard, but I was ready. My wolf had infused us with adrenaline, fortifying us in a cloak of our own power. The golden strands, my magic signature, coated me, providing a solid barrier against Eudoxia’s magic as it tried to needle its way in.
We kept her out for now.
I ran the back of my hand over my mouth, anchoring myself.
“You will answer for that.” The Queen hissed. “I will happily skewer you to the wall and lap up your blood as it drains from your body.” White light shot out of her hands, hitting me fully in the chest, as it had once before.
The impact launched me backward, right into Rourke’s body. His hands steadied me and a fierce growl erupted from his chest. “I’ve had enough,” he snar
led. “No one strikes us and lives. We came in here to offer you a deal, which could’ve been beneficial to you, but I see you’ve lost your touch when it comes to negotiations, Eudoxia.” Power radiated off of him, his muscles tightening under his skin. “But you’re not the one doing the killing here. I am. I will tear your head from your shoulders so fast your body won’t have time to react.”
Eudoxia’s hands were fisted, and she vibrated with anger, more livid than I’d ever seen her. She was beside herself that her magic had not worked against us. By all rights I should be a babbling puddle on the floor. And as much as I wouldn’t mind seeing Rourke tear her to pieces, I still needed her.
I wrapped my hand around his arm lightly, tugging him back. “Nobody is killing anyone,” I said. “At least for the moment. Because the bigger problem here is the man you’ve trusted for years has turned against you. Valdov’s a spy. You can’t ignore that.”
“How dare you make such accusations. You know nothing!” the Queen spat. “He has been my loyal servant for centuries and I will not listen to nonsense spouted by a lowly dog like yourself.” Her power continued its assault against me, my wolf working diligently to keep her out. At this pace, she was going to break down our barriers shortly.
Valdov had risen from the ground already healed. He moved forward, spitting his malice, but his Queen put her arm out to stop him.
She wanted me for herself.
Tyler and Danny both stepped toward Valdov and they all eyed each other critically. Nick slid to the right, ready to come up from behind if necessary. Valdov was outnumbered.
“Eamon couldn’t have been a traitor on his own. You and I both know that,” I pressed. “Even if you don’t want to admit it, it’s clear Valdov has been with you from the very beginning, and how very tired he must be of taking orders from his lowly pupil. He betrayed himself to me a moment ago, but if you need more proof, ask yourself this: Whose idea was it to bring in the goddess when you cornered me? Yours or his? You don’t seem like the type to hire an archrival to do your dirty work.” It was a hunch Selene and the Queen were rivals based on what Naomi had confided to me on the road. When the Queen’s eyes flicked quickly to Valdov, I knew I’d guessed correctly. “Once you ordered Eamon and Naomi to accompany me, it must have played perfectly into his hands. Get Selene to kill me, finally get the cross from Naomi for himself—something you had failed to do—and finish you off so he could finally rule. Over five hundred years of taking orders from a nineteen-year-old girl. I bet he didn’t even like you that much when you were human.”
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