by Aja James
Alad sheathed his sword over his back and took down a double-pointed long spear from the wall and a coil of rope.
Inanna favored the chained whip he had specifically made for her given her combat strengths and preferences, but she loaded up on bow and arrows just in case.
Though muffled by the thick stone walls, they could hear the battle waging violently outside. The enemy was storming the gate now with a battering ram. The whole fortress seemed to shake with the resounding assault.
Wordlessly they made their way out onto the spiraling steps that led to the highest rampart. The General’s quarters were immediately below it and could be accessed through a large window facing the mountains.
But even before they gained the top step they could hear fighting close at hand, as well as the whistles of arrows that shot past the parapet.
With an audible indrawn breath, Inanna shot past Alad before he could react. She ignored all else but for the lone figure, taller than most of the fighters surrounding him, battling his way through what must have been dozens of enemy soldiers.
Inanna flew into action, accurately dismantling a number of the fighters closest to her with rapid-fire arrows and throwing knives.
Alad was only half a step behind, protecting her from the continuous onslaught of arrows flying over the wall and fighters who moved from their target to engage them.
Inanna had only one goal, to reach her father and pull him to safety.
From the glimpses she had of him, he looked as if he’d been fighting for a while already. Though his moves remained swift and lethal, his precision unerring, she could tell from the grim line of his mouth that his strength was waning. His face and body were streaked with blood, his or his enemies’ she could not discern, but if these were the odds he had been facing for Goddess knew how long, she must assume he had sustained heavy injuries.
The fighters were not only numerous but well-trained. There were no humans in the lot, all vampires. Stronger, more deadly.
In a heart-stopping moment, Inanna saw her father go down on one knee.
No! He had to get up!
In that position he would be at their mercy, his chances of victory slim to none.
But he did not rise. And in her haste to reach him, she did not avoid the sword that slashed through her side, the spear that stabbed into her thigh. Distantly she heard Alad’s shout of warning, but it was too late.
A flaming boulder struck the tower not six feet away, shattering the stone bastion and watch spire that anchored the fortress.
Out of the corner of her eye, Inanna saw the lifeless body of her father being dragged away by two vampires and down the opposite spiral of steps that mirrored those she had climbed just a short time ago. She did not register the watch tower crumbling above her, the stone and wood reinforcements shattering, until it was almost too late.
Something heavy and hard knocked her flat onto her stomach, walloping the breath out of her in a loud oomph, but otherwise, as she lay still on the stone ground, she was unhurt. Whatever covered her entire body from head to toe took the blunt force of the falling rocks and debris from the blast and the disintegrating tower.
“Be still,” Alad’s deep voice rasped beside her ear when she tried to move, and Inanna realized that his body was the shield that prevented her from harm.
All around them the destruction continued, arrows zinging into the ground inches by their faces, many carrying flames and torching whatever object they hit, whether wood and straw debris or fallen bodies.
The tower groaned, cracked and snapped as it collapsed in ruins around them. Inanna saw that all the remaining vampires on their stretch of the rampart were silent and motionless where they lay, the dead that caught fire crackling into the air as their bodies turned to ash.
When the storm of falling debris finally abated and the fortress gate was simultaneously breached, Inanna twisted her body and clawed her way out from underneath Alad, unscathed save for the wounds she had sustained earlier.
Once free, she immediately reached for his hands, intending to help him climb out of the rubble, for they had no time to lose.
Any moment now, enemy soldiers would swarm the ramparts, having already entered through the main gate and were now scaling the stone outer walls, the Pure soldiers stationed at the parapets dead or fallen. Inanna and Alad needed to pursue her father’s abductors if they could still detect a trail. If not, they needed to escape the ruins, heal, plan and fight another day.
But while Alad took her hand, he did not budge from his position, and that was when Inanna realized that he was crushed under the stone ruins and wood beams, only half of his upper body visible beneath the wreckage.
No! Dear Goddess No!
As if hearing her inner screams of anguish, Alad tilted his head to the side as if resting it idly on his outstretched arm and smiled.
“Go ahead without me,” he rasped out, barely able to prevent his facial muscles from contorting in excruciating pain, “I shall catch up in time.”
Inanna lay herself flat on the ground and pulled on his arm, hard, and Alad could not help the shout of agony that tore through his throat.
Inanna managed to hold back tears, but her mouth began to quiver with fear and anguish for she had never heard Alad utter such a sound of sheer torture.
When Alad had caught his breath once more, he swallowed hard and said with barely any voice, “’Tis no use. My spine is severed. My legs are crushed…Too much internal bleeding.”
Inanna gasped at the words that seared through her heart like the flaming arrows that continued to fall around them. Even with Pure Ones’ healing abilities, this was too much. There was no hope of survival and death would be slow and agonizing.
“Stop,” he commanded her with what was left of his broken voice. And it was only then that she realized she had been frantically shaking her head, the tears she’d desperately held back flowing freely down her face.
He took another shuddering breath, and she could tell that every inhale hurt terribly, most likely due to punctured or damaged lungs.
“Come here,” he murmured, so softly she could barely hear him, only reading his lips.
She inched as close as possible to his body until her face was beside his and his arms could hold her. She wrapped her own arms around his shoulders and conformed her body to what was exposed of his beneath the ruins.
“You must take what is left in my veins,” Alad said with surprising strength, still issuing orders even now.
Inanna snorted through her tears and the knot in her throat at the ridiculous command and was about to respond when Alad squeezed her hand to stop her.
“Do not waste time,” he rasped out, “you must take all I have to give to heal quickly and build strength. You will need it to survive this night. Let me do this for you. Let me inside you one last time.”
Inanna was back to shaking her head, but she could not speak to save her life, the gasps and shudders of her silent wails preventing words from forming and leaving her lips.
Alad had closed his eyes and could not see how she flailed like a person drowning, but he could feel the racking breaths tear through her torso.
“Quickly now, Libbu,” he quietly urged, “save me from this unending pain. And allow me to save you in return with my blood. I wish…”
He paused to draw breath and had to inhale in short bursts with great effort. Inanna knew the end was near, knew he was succumbing to the ravaging torment of the mortal wounds. She held onto his body tighter as if she could physically prevent his soul from leaving.
“…I wish I could have given you everything,” he finished on a sigh, almost wistful.
“Do not leave me,” she finally whispered, “please do not leave me. I do not want to live without you. I love—”
“’Tis but a brief separation,” he cut her off, for the pain of hearing her heartbreak was even more unendurable than the pain of his physical wounds.
He sounded so certain she almost believ
ed him. “I shall find you again, I promise.”
Using what strength he had left, Alad tilted his head closer to hers so that her lips grazed his throat. “Do it now, Libbu. Take my pain away. Take my strength for your own.”
Inanna distantly heard footsteps approaching the spiraling stone steps, shouts of soldiers drawing near.
As if he knew how to push her past the last hesitation, he vowed again, “I shall find you, no matter where or when, I shall ask the Goddess to guide me…. always… find you.”
He bit the inside of his mouth and brought his cold, quivering lips to hers in a tender kiss. As he intended, the blood from his mouth trickled into hers, awakening the vampire within.
Unable to resist, her heart shattering, her tears scalding, she struck.
As Inanna drew on the vein at his throat, she could taste both his rich, heady life’s force and her salty tears. She let the venom from her fangs flow steadily into his body, replacing pain with a numbing pleasure, cold death with radiant heat.
As his last breath faded away, softly and painlessly, Inanna completed his vow in her heart: I shall wait for you always.
My Mate.
My love.
But Alad had lied.
When the Goddess met him at the gates beyond life, he asked only one thing of her:
To make Inanna forget him.
Forget what he all but forced her to do. For he knew that she would blame herself if she remembered. Even though she had saved him from unimaginable pain, she would only recall that she had been the means that infinitesimally hastened his end.
To the last, Alad wished only to protect her.
If the Fates were kind, if their souls were to meet again… then…
Then he would claim her.
Forevermore.
“Upon her choice, the future rests. To welcome the Darkness or create a New Light, only her heart can show the rest.”
—Excerpt from the Lost Chapters of the Ecliptic Scrolls
Chapter Twelve
Sophia and Aella entered the exclusive nightclub in the poshest part of the Upper East Side through a VIP-only door that was barred by lethal-looking bouncers in black leather and dark shades.
Why did people wear sunglasses at night? Sophia wondered. Did the fashion statement really trump being able to see one’s hand in front of one’s face?
Given that she was certainly no arbiter of fashion, she did not have the answers. It would have to remain one of the greatest mysteries of life, she supposed.
She had wheedled and whined and bargained and entreated, and she was finally able to convince her overprotective guards that only Aella need accompany her this night.
It worked out because someone had to stay with Benji while Inanna and Gabriel remained at her apartment for the duration. Based on Aella’s second-hand message, Sophia got the gist that the pair had some unfinished “Blooded Mates” business to attend to.
And if Sophia was not mistaken, the stoic warrior was relieved to stay with the boy rather than accompany the females. Perhaps Cloud did not enjoy loud music and scantily-clad bodies bouncing up and down and bumping and grinding in the dark, Sophia thought with a silent snicker, but she rather thought it was because he didn’t particularly relish the experience with Aella as a partner.
Or perhaps he wanted it too much.
Oh well, Sophia would let the adults sort through their complex and convoluted feelings themselves. She had her own drama simmering on the stove, thank you very much.
Ere had texted her the location of the nightclub during the day, as well as the time to meet him: midnight. How he knew her top secret phone number she chalked up to one of those handy skills he spoke of, for she had never shared it with him.
If Sophia paused for a second to think about it, she might begin to have a doubt or two about her resourceful ex-teaching-assistant. He was just a tad creepy if his actions were viewed with a Criminal Minds serial-killer sort of lens, though the thought reminded her of the first mp3 he gave her, “Creep” by Radiohead. However, her curiosity about him and the desire to see him overruled what few reservations she had.
And besides, she was almost certain he had a Pure soul.
As Sophia and Aella wound their way slowly through the packed club, Aella subtly but surely discouraging any male or female from getting too close or too friendly, Sophia searched the dark, laser and candle-lit warehouse for the beautiful Ere.
A dance remix of “Sadness” by Enigma was thumping through the blackness of the club, the melody haunting and voluptuous, the words sensual yet full of pain. Countless bodies tangled and collided as they moved to the seductive rhythm, reminding Sophia of reefs swaying in a stormy sea.
With her head turned to the side, looking entranced at the mass of strangers around her, she collided with something hard and immovable.
Wincing to herself, she looked up at the wall she’d run into and stared directly into Dalair’s smoky gray eyes.
All thought vanished as Sophia held his gaze. She should have been thinking, where have you been? What have you done? Why are you here? But all she thought was, finally.
Finally.
It was perhaps just as well that she’d forgotten about Aella behind her, for the Amazon retreated into the crowds when she saw the Paladin with the young Queen. Sophia knew nothing else but Dalair’s familiar yet different face before her, perhaps because she viewed him through different eyes.
Ah. How she missed him.
How she hated him.
How she wanted him.
Wordlessly and without touching, a hair’s breadth separating their bodies, they began to move to the flow of the music, just as the cult classic “Closer” by Nine Inch Nails began playing, the raw, angry, hungry words clawing into their bodies, electrifying their nerves, heating up their blood.
Sophia was the one to close the distance between them, inexplicably needing physical contact, as if to reassure herself that Dalair was truly here, within reach.
As if in a trance, her mind a blank canvas, Sophia’s hands reached for his. Once she found his fingers, warm and calloused, her own wandered upwards along his arms, skimming feather light across the thin cashmere that covered his skin.
They kept roving upwards, those seeking fingers, past his biceps, then inwards to his pecs, which jumped reflexively at her almost-but-not-quite caress. Upwards still to the turtleneck collar that covered his throat, and around, where they laced loosely at his nape, a couple of stray digits exploring the silky hair there.
He, however, did not touch her, his arms staying resolutely by his sides. But his silver eyes bore intensely into her, and he bent his head downwards, ever so slowly as if giving her a chance to retreat.
Scattered inklings of thoughts chased each other like disoriented beads in the pinball machine that was Sophia’s brain. Zigzagging nothings like I’ve never danced before now. My body feels so heavy and foreign, my blood thick as molasses.
So this is lust.
So this is desire.
I want I want I want I want…
As if he heard her inner ramblings, Dalair dipped his head the rest of the way until his full lips were a whisper of a breath away from hers, until his thick, long eyelashes fluttered against her sensitive cheeks, and Sophia gasped at the sheer eroticism of the touch.
Eyelashes, for Goddess’s sake!
But still he did not touch her, though he clenched his jaw so hard, she saw the vein at his temple throb.
Sophia tightened her arms around his neck and, standing on tiptoe, molded her over-heated body to his, hips to hips, chest to chest.
As their cores fit together, the thick bulge between his hard thighs slotting into the notch at hers, a guttural growl vibrated through their bodies, and Sophia couldn’t be sure whether it was he who made the sound or her.
Probably her.
Because she’d never known the primitive drive to possess another being before now. She wanted to mark him for her own, climb his body and crawl un
der his skin.
She wanted to own him.
What she did was bite him on the neck, hard enough to draw blood even through his sweater.
Dalair hissed, and as if the desperate little nip had awakened him from a deep hypnosis, he took a step back, separating their bodies, and another step so that her hands unwound from his neck and they were no longer touching.
After a long, deep inhale, he said, “Choose me. Not him.”
Sophia blinked in confusion at his nonsensical words.
Was this a new sort of greeting? For they were the first words he said to her in months. Was this some secret code the Dozen had neglected to teach her?
“Choose me this time,” the Paladin repeated, his voice deep and husky, vibrating with raw emotion.
The command tugged at an invisible tether within Sophia, hitched to something in the region of her heart, and she swayed forward involuntarily.
Abruptly, Dalair’s eyes shifted above her head to something or someone beyond her.
Sophia turned around to see what had caught his attention and saw that Ere stood on a platform above the dance floor, looking down at them.
She could not see his expression clearly but she felt a wave of negative energy radiating from Ere toward Dalair, just like the first time the two males had met.
Sophia swiveled back to Dalair to ask what that was all about, only to find the Elite warrior gone.
She craned her head left and right to search for him in the crowd, but he had disappeared as if she’d imagined him. Aella must have seen the distress and confusion on her face, for she started making her way back to Sophia’s side.
No, can’t lose him, can’t lose him again.
Sophia turned this way and that looking all around her for the Paladin, a desperation she’d never known choking her lungs.
But there was no sign of him anywhere. And when she turned back to look for Ere, almost as an afterthought, the platform was empty.
*** *** *** ***
The vampire watched the screen before her as if mesmerized.
And perhaps she was. For she’d seldom seen such deadly elegance, such lethal efficiency. The fighter in the streaming video moved so fast that if she didn’t know better, she would have thought the clip was doctored by special effects.