Valkyrie Divided (Pyralis Book 2)

by Brandy L. Cunningham

  I grinned. “Once they were close to disappearing. Their kind was scattered around the world, but now, we have been gathering their kind, rebuilding their once formidable Cast.”

  Vittoria stared at me. “You cared? I don’t think I ever expected to meet a Vampire who actually cared about the lives of other Casts.”

  From ahead of us, a deep male voice greeted us. “Valkyrie has never been an ordinary Vampire.”

  My gaze rotated forward, and I smiled warmly into Chandler’s gray eyes. His answering frown wasn’t as condemning as he would have hoped, because I could see that he was trying not to smile. He looked past me, taking in the ebony skinned woman behind me. “It seems she has a knack for rounding up those of us in need of a home, and a direction.”

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  The appearance of the Arannea generated a lot of interest in our gathering. Vittoria sent out a signal to her kind, and soon, we had added over one hundred new faces to our allies. I was glad we were able to offer them a place to find refuge, and sad that we hadn’t been able to stop Byron from invading their home. However, the unsettled itch I’d felt when I had entered the woods had not gone away. Once the Arannea were settled in and we’d made sure they weren’t an enemy, I was anxious to leave. I needed space, and I needed to hunt.

  Unfortunately, it seemed I wasn’t going to get either of the things I needed. As the night faded into what should have been morning, the sky didn’t change. Unrest descended on our camp, and whispers spread. Where had the eclipse gone? Why didn’t we see any signs of the sun or the moon? Nothing made sense. Rafael retreated deep into his tent, meditating as he sought to find answers. Viren returned to his Lost City, feeling the need to ready his followers for the impending battle. Dresden too left our camp, in the hopes of gathering more allies to our side. My brother had been eerily quiet since my return, and I wasn’t sure why.

  The voice in my head had also grown quiet, but I was uncertain if that made me happy or not. Standing in the midst of those who had chosen to follow me and fight against the evil that sought to darken our world, I felt the wind hit me with a new force. It sped through our camp, ripping at the staked tents, and knocking some over. My hair whirled around my face, and I twisted around slowly, scanning each direction, worried. Whispers began around me, but they were for my ears only. Heat caressed my back, and for the slightest second, I closed my eyes. When I opened them, it was gone.

  The wind died down as suddenly as it had begun, and the Casts gathered around me looking at one another, confused about the suddenness of its arrival and departure. I, however, was buffeted by images only I could see. They played out in my mind as though projected there on a screen for me to see. Aeron laughing, Aeron and I dancing at a masked gala, Aeron playing the piano while I sat beside him in Byron’s house. They fluttered in and out, filling in gaps that had long been missing. The very last image fed to me I had seen before, but not fully, I realized now. I watched in turmoil as I saw again the day Aeron had attacked Desmond. There was something that had been missing from the original memory.

  Blinking away my surprise, I stomped quickly toward the tent erected in the middle of camp and surrounded by guards. They didn’t stop me as I threw the flap back and entered. I stared angrily at the man suspended between metal poles. He lifted his brown eyes slowly to me, a smile tugging at the corners of his attractive mouth.

  “Ah, so you’ve finally remembered, have you, my sweet?”

  I glared at him, anger welling up inside of me. “Why was my memory incomplete? Why didn’t I see the truth before?”

  Desmond’s honey voice was low and gravelly from disuse. “Maybe you didn’t want to see it.”

  Gritting my teeth to hold back my rage, I asked, “What do you know that I don’t? What was it I saw that night?”

  Desmond’s eyes bored into mine. With the first trace of honesty I had seen in him in centuries, he replied, “I honestly don’t know, Valkyrie.”

  A growl escaped me. How could he not know? “Did you know that your lover, Niada, was sleeping with Byron far longer than she’d been with you?”

  The answer spread across his face. I didn’t need to hear his words as I watched the surprise and rage fill his face. “What?”

  “So you didn’t know…I guess I am not the only ignorant one here then, huh?” I started to turn, when Desmond’s voice called out.

  “Wait. If its answers you seek, why don’t you ask your brother? Valkyrian knew Aeron much more than anyone else.”

  I gave him a nod, stepping toward the opening of the tent when his next words gave me pause.

  “Before you go seeking answers to the questions you have Valkyrie, perhaps you should consider the cost. Will the answers heal the hole in your heart? Will they chase away the darkness, or will they steal the last ounce of your humanity?”

  His words hung heavily in the air. I didn’t want to think about the foreboding that crept into my heart as I left. I wanted the answers. I needed the answers. My steps were quick as I made my way through the camp, looking for my twin. I had long suspected that he kept things from me, but now, I was certain of it. It saddened me that my own beloved brother would keep information from me. I didn’t know how much he kept from me, or what it was, but I was determined to find out. Locking down my grid, I searched the camp for him, but he wasn’t there. Standing amidst so many other casts, I struggled to pick out his unique signature.

  I couldn’t find him. I realized he must have left, but then, I heard Tamyra’s voice behind me. “He is waiting for you at the edge of the woods, near the fallen tree.”

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  I knew the place Tamyra described, and I made my way swiftly there, my wings stroking the air fiercely in my hurry to get there. I had little doubt that my brother knew why I was coming, and I guessed that was the reason he had moved away from the camp. I found him reclining on the giant trunk of the fallen tree. His head was propped on one arm, and he had one knee drawn up. As I landed a few feet from him, he never bothered to glance away from the stream he studied.

  “I think I would give just about anything to bathe in the sunlight once again. Wouldn’t you, little sis?”

  I ground my teeth. “I didn’t come here to reminisce about the way things used to be, Valkyrian. I came for answers.”

  Now, he moved his head to the side, his eyes coming to rest on me. “I know why you came. I just don’t think you understand the choice you are making.”

  I laughed, but it was a bitter laugh. “Understand? Of course I don’t understand. Has my own beloved twin betrayed me?”

  Valkyrian’s eyes were soft. “I would never betray you. Your soul is the other half of mine. What I did, I did to protect you. We both did. It had to be this way. If you had known the truth, how differently you might have reacted. Don’t you understand, Val? You are the one with the power to end all this, and if you had known the truth, you wouldn’t have been powerful enough. You see the darkness inside of you as a curse, but in truth, it’s as much a part of who you are as the goodness and light is.”

  I scoffed, shaking my head in disbelief. “You see this blackness, this insatiable appetite for death as part of me? How can you say such a thing?”

  Now, my brother sat up quickly, rotating his body to face me. “Valkyrie, don’t you remember what Dresden told you? We have that in us, in our DNA. There exists darkness in us already, and although it can be a burden to control it, it is also what feeds our powers. We are stronger than others. You have the ability to rise from your own ashes like a phoenix. Doesn’t that prove to you your power? If it weren’t for our DNA that wouldn’t be possible. If it weren’t for your link to Death himself, it wouldn’t be possible. How can you deny yourself that?”

  My ire was rising. “How? How can I deny that? Because, brother, every moment of my life is torture! I walk a line of choice every moment. The scent of humans feeds the desire to destroy, but so too does the scent of those I love. How would you handle it, if to stand beside your own sib
ling was such sweet torture? To stand beside me fighting the battle not to sink your fangs into the flesh of your sister or brother, to suck the life from them, and collect the dark soul from them?”

  Valkyrian’s face faltered. He stared at me in shock. “You feel that? You desire to kill me?”

  I choked back a sob. “I desire to kill everyone…” I could hear the anguish in my voice as I spoke the truth for the first time. Hearing it out loud, it made me flinch, because I knew I was a monster. Looking into my brother’s face, I could see that he thought so too.

  Valkyrian’s face was a mess of expressions and emotions. His shoulders drooped. “I had no idea…I thought you would crave only humans.”

  With fire igniting along my hair, I faced him in suppressed anger. “Now will you tell me what you’ve hidden from me?”

  His eyes drifted away, but came back to me after a long moment. With a nod, he said, “We didn’t know. Please, try to remember that what we did, we did to protect you, and to make you stronger.” When I didn’t reply, he bowed his head, and said, “Aeron isn’t dead.”

  My world tilted, and I felt the ground beneath me sway. My mouth went dry, and my body lit in flames. I gasped for the breath that wouldn’t seem to come, and my vision swam. Aeron’s not dead. The words reverberated in my brain, in every nerve ending, and deep in my bones. Not dead. Not dead. How could that be? Lifting my haunted eyes to my twin, I asked, “How is that possible? I saw his Ghost.”

  Valkyrian didn’t falter as he held my gaze. “Aeron isn’t who, or what you think he is. He is older than any of us, older even than our forefathers. He wasn’t born on this earth, but in the stars above. He is not a man, or a Vampire, but a creature forged from the fires of mars and the blood of Vampires. I do not know his story, and it is not for me to tell, but I know he is much more than we know. We were wrong when we thought you were the only one who could be reborn.”

  Shock washed through me in painful waves. I was grasping for answers, but finding only despair. “So what does that have to do with me?”

  “We knew that the only way to free the real you was to make you grieve, to cause the darkness inside of you to awaken due to extreme need. Your link to Aeron is stronger than you realize, and we knew that losing him was the only thing that would awaken the Reaper within you.”

  I blinked, trying to clear my head. “So you helped fake Aeron’s death? He rescued me from my fires, knowing full well he wouldn’t stay dead, but he let everyone else believe it, including me?”

  Valkyrian nodded. I could see the sorrow in his eyes, but at that particular moment, I could only feel the red-hot rage beginning to boil inside of me. “So where is he?”

  Valkyrian sighed. “I don’t know. He told me that if he allowed himself to be reborn, the other side of him would take over, and it would take him time to regain control and come back. Like you, he too struggles with control. I’m sorry we had to do this Valkyrie.”

  My heart thundered so loud in my chest that Valkyrian’s words were a mere whisper in my ears. My body began to shake as new questions took root in my already cracked heart. Had Aeron ever truly cared for me, or had it all been a farce, created to draw out the evil in my soul? I am so tired of being a pawn, of being moved around on an invisible chess board by others. Everyone thought they knew what was best. Rafael had sought to protect others from me, Valkyrian and Aeron had conspired to bring out the darkness I feared, and Desmond had wanted to use and control me like a weapon.

  In my angered mind, I wondered if there had ever been anyone in my life who was real, who hadn’t sought to use me for their own goals. My heart ached, and despair began to take over as it battled with the anger in me. I didn’t know whether to cry or rage, whether to love my brother or hate him. I didn’t know anyone or anything anymore. With a final look at my brother, I unfurled my wings from within me, relishing in the physical pain I felt with their emergence, and then, I shot into the sky with a power I hadn’t tapped into before.

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  16

  The Pits of Hell

  Wind swirled around me like a vortex. Ice tried to gather on my wings the higher I rose, but the heat beneath the surface of my skin melted it before it could take hold. Inside me, I was a mess of uncontrolled emotions. Rage colored my vision red, and disappointment clouded my thoughts. I wanted to kill, and I wanted to die. I didn’t want to live a life where no one around me wanted me except to use and manipulate. I had thought that Desmond’s betrayal was the worst thing I would go through, but I was so wrong. The pain Desmond had caused me, both emotionally and physically was nothing compared to what Aeron had done.

  Valkyrian was right when he said the link between Aeron and I was much deeper. In my heart, I think I had always know he was the one I chose, the one I wanted above all others, and for a time, I had entertained thoughts that he could be my true soul mate. Now, those childish beliefs had been shattered. There was no real soul mate for me. Even my twin, forged from the same womb, had sought only to use me. In my heart, I wanted to believe that my brother did love me, and he had acted only from the need to save our world, but the doubt was thick and dark. It cloaked everything inside of me, poisoning it.

  Gliding through the deep black sky, I released the pent up fury in me. Fire erupted all over me, eating away at me in temperatures hot enough to cause an explosion. My feathered wings charred, replaced by the deathly wings of my other side, and I floated there for a while, a hot burning ball of fire. When I began to fall, I didn’t care. I wanted to be gone from this life, to leave all the pain and the deceit. I didn’t want to care about anyone or anything. Screw this world, and its inhabitants. I wanted to rip into the throats of every human, sucking the sweet metallic blood from within them. I wanted to rip apart everyone who had harmed me, or used me.

  I wanted to light the world on fire, and watch it burn, to bask in its ashes and feed off its charred remains. Nothing mattered to me anymore. Aeron was a liar, a traitor, and he was no better than Byron or Desmond. Valkyrian…I tossed him from my mind. I didn’t want to think about him. I didn’t want to think of anyone. In fact, I wanted nothing but silence. Nothing but the feel of the wind ripping through my skeletal wings as I plummeted from the heavens. I was fallen, and now I doubted that the good inside me still lived.

  As my body hit the rocks below me, I listened to every crunch of bones, every hiss of fire. Pain laced through me as my bones were smashed, and my body broken. My fire raged around me, until all that remained was the heat of its flames, but still, I didn’t die. Laying there, I had hoped I would die, but my body lay there broken, until the fire had licked away my wounds and mended the broken bones. Only, it could never mend the deep crevice in my heart.

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  It was the screams of pain and fear that finally roused me as I lay in the crater my flames had created. My body was mended, but not my heart. Shouts rang in the air, and bloodcurdling screams pierced my sensitive ears. People were dying. I could hear the difference between the human cries and the screams of Others. Something was happening not far from where I had landed, but the question was: what would I do about it? Laying there, I didn’t want to care. I didn’t want to get up and fight the good fight, but nor did I want to turn to the bad side. Eventually, it was the screams of children that drove me to my feet, and spurred me into action.

  Emerging from the woods that surrounded the city, I caught sight of the sky, watching as something seemed to shift in the universe, and a bright white radiance lit up the sky with what I knew must be the final eclipse. The time had come to take a stand and make a choice. A Vampire ran at me, twin blades held out, ready to attack. I remained still, and as she neared, I grabbed her mid-run, holding her by the throat. Her eyes widened and her face drained of color. I didn’t need to ask why. The Reaper in me had risen to the surface. Flames licked over the curves of my body, and the skeletal protrusions of my wings hovered behind me.

  Smiling in malevolence at her, I asked, “Are you re
ady to face your judgment?” Without waiting for her reply, I pierced her skull with the tip of my wing, and as her body fell from my hand, I licked her delicious blood from my boney wing. Inside me, I felt a purr as the two halves of my soul rose up together.

  Working my way down the dark streets, I slaughtered and fed. The power I could taste in the blood of the Witches fueled my own power, and I felt drunk on the exhilaration of killing. Closer and closer I moved to the epi-center of the city, drawn in by the influx of power and evil I could feel there. This was not the same as the other battles. Here there was evil beyond knowledge, its scent reeked of death and decay, but to me, it smelled of the fires of Hell.

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  A voice from my past brought me to a halt. I stopped, my heart beating wildly, and my mind playing tricks on me. That voice…so smooth and deep and powerful. A voice I had heard in the darkness of my captive mind, and still heard, in the dead of night, when sleep called me to it. Swallowing, I shook my head. It could not be him. This was a trick. A conjuring Byron had called up using one of his Witches. If I turned around, I would see only the empty dark street. Or would I? Recalling the conversation I’d shared with my twin, I clenched my jaw.

  I took a step forward, but his voice called out once more. “Valkyrie, please. If you go in there, you will not come back out. Please listen to me.”

  I wasn’t going to turn around. My mind was a mix of turmoil, grief and rage. They battled within me. “You are dead.”

  Another step forward, the voice came again. “I am not dead. It would appear you are not the only one who cannot die.”

  My heart screamed for me to turn around. My mind told me he didn’t really care for me. It was just a trick, a ploy to gain my cooperation again. Keep walking, it said.

  “The Aeron Nyte I knew would not tell me to stop. He would not want me to give up on trying to stop evil. Ah, but then again, I never really knew you, did I?”