The City Beneath

by Melody Johnson

  Could anyone, even a vampire, survive that? I thought. I winced as the next thought slammed home. Without Dominic, would I survive?

  Kaden rose up from the stone, no worse for Dominic’s wear, and faced Dominic while Jillian held him immobile. Dominic coughed, and blood spewed from his mouth. Drops clung to his lower lip. His blood was more viscous and darker than mine, perhaps because it wasn’t constantly flowing through his veins.

  Jillian jerked back on Dominic’s head to better expose his chest, and Kaden pulled back his claw to strike.

  We didn’t have anything left with which to fight, but that didn’t mean we couldn’t survive.

  “Jillian Allister,” I said, and I poured every drop of rage and loathing I could summon into the syllables of her name. The moment the words left my mouth, I could feel the connection bind us. Dominic had played his cards tight to the chest as I’d suspected, so Jillian was as unprepared for me as Dominic had been that first time. She might have reflected Dominic’s commands with her metal mirror, but she didn’t have anything in place to deflect mine.

  Her eyes widened in horrified astonishment.

  Dominic jerked his gaze between Jillian and me, and I could see the instant he remembered my connection and exactly what I was capable of. “No,” he whispered. “Jillian’s too powerful to be entranced by you.”

  “Release Dominic Lysander immediately,” I commanded.

  Jillian’s face fell slack, and as per my direct command, she released Dominic.

  Dominic dropped to the stone floor, much like I had, and crumpled onto his side in a heap of black designer clothing and blood. He didn’t move.

  “Jillian Allister,” I continued my command, “grab Kaden and lock him and yourself inside the silver cage. Now.”

  Kaden lunged for me in a blur of glowing violet eyes and hissing fangs, but Jillian was faster and more powerful. She rushed him before he could reach me, and they both disappeared with the force of her incredible speed. A loud clang sounded behind me. I jolted, but by the time I managed to turn my head, the barred door of the silver cage had already slammed shut with Jillian and Kaden locked inside.

  Jillian stood silently, dumbly, waiting for her next command. Kaden raged next to her, pounding on the bars, hissing and growling and rattling the cage in a roaring tantrum. Smoke steamed from under his claws where his hand wrapped around the silver bars. He shrieked and yanked away from the cage. He stared down at his burned palms and then glared up at me, and I could see the variety of deaths he imagined for me reflected in the heat of his fury.

  With Jillian and Kaden effectively detained, I turned back to Dominic. He still hadn’t moved. Although I could move my legs, muscles in my back were damaged or missing, and I couldn’t support myself. Everything hurt. My entire body was in screaming, chattering, unbearable agony, but I dug my elbows into the stone and dragged myself next to Dominic until my head was even with his.

  I slumped next to him. I was exhausted and spent and if I admitted the truth to myself, likely dying. Dominic’s eyes were open and focused on something behind me.

  “Dominic,” I whispered, terrified that I was too late. How would I escape the coven and survive the night without his help?

  A moment of still silence passed. I held my breath, and then like a miracle, his eyes shifted to focus on me.

  I exhaled in relief. “You’re not dead.”

  “Not yet,” Dominic whispered. Blood poured from his mouth when he spoke.

  I winced back, but the blood spread faster than I could move. It seeped around my face as it pooled on the stone. Where it flowed over the scrapes on my cheek, I could feel the heat of it healing.

  “Why aren’t you healing like before, like when you were battling Kaden?” I asked. “Why aren’t you recovering this time?”

  “Kaden wasn’t next to inherit my Master’s power. Jillian is, so unlike Kaden, the wounds she inflicted are lethal.” Dominic choked on more blood before catching his breath. “Without feeding, I’ll die in a matter of minutes, Cassidy. My final death.”

  “No, you can recover from this,” I insisted.

  “Jillian will keep the powers she’s gained thus far, and the rest of the power will die with me.” Dominic continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “The coven will come to either finish me, challenge Jillian, or claim Jillian as their new Master, but in any scenario, they are likely already on their way.”

  I blinked. “The entire coven will come here? Now?”

  “Yes, and I’ll be dead. You need to heal yourself as best you can with my blood and leave. You—” Dominic coughed, and although I wanted to ease back from the gore of his struggle, I needed to lean closer to hear his words. “You still have the necklace?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Take it, and use the blood I’m hemorrhaging for yourself. I wish I had more time. You would have been—”

  More coughs racked his body. I waited for him to gather his composure and continue, but he couldn’t stop coughing this time. Blood poured in a steady flow from his chest wound, hemorrhaging in a strange, thick viscosity that seeped instead of pumped onto the floor around us. My skin burned from its healing as it soaked into the superficial slices and nicks on my arms and legs.

  The other vampires were approaching. Their growling rattles and the clicks of their talons scraping against stone grew cacophonous as they closed in. I opened the vial of blood still hanging from my neck and stared at the shining crimson liquid inside, reluctant to pour it on my injuries. With the coven approaching, the healing properties of Dominic’s blood would only prolong the inevitable.

  “Do you hear them?” Kaden hissed from across the room, echoing my thoughts. “Go ahead. Use his blood to heal, and see how far you can run, little one.” Kaden laughed.

  I shifted my gaze back to Dominic. His coughing fit was starting to subside, but so were his breaths and bleeding and movement. He was dying, and even with his blood, without him, I wouldn’t survive. I needed him. I hated not being able to save myself, but I’d always believed in facts. And the fact was that I would not survive the next five minutes without Dominic Lysander.

  I twisted the lid off the vial and poured Dominic’s blood down my back to heal as much of myself as possible. The heat of its healing scalded my wounds, and I felt some of the strength return to muscles as they regenerated. But it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t nearly enough considering the extent of my injuries, but I didn’t need to heal completely to survive.

  I smashed the empty vial on the stone floor and sliced my wrist open with the jagged edge of the broken glass. Blood welled from the wound. I massaged it to gain a steady flow and held my wrist over Dominic’s mouth, streaming the blood down his throat.

  Watching my blood flow from my wrist into his mouth made me nauseous and woozy. Black starbursts dotted my vision. I closed my eyes and focused on the chill of the stone floor beneath my cheek to ground myself. A minute passed, and Dominic still remained unconscious. I bit my lip. The vampires were approaching, hundreds of vampires who would release Jillian and Kaden and feast on me. I could order Jillian to protect me, but there was an entire coven of vampires against only one of her. I bit my lip harder, feeling desperation, like the approaching vampires, closing in from all sides.

  “Dominic,” I whispered. I scooted closer to him, ignoring the tacky cling of blood suctioning my skin to the stone floor, until my body spooned the side of his. “Your coven is coming. This is your chance. You are the only one who can save them from Jillian and Kaden. You are the only one who can save me.”

  The vibrations of the coven’s approach shook the floor beneath us. I flexed my wrist over his mouth to increase its flow, and blood poured into his mouth.

  He didn’t stir.

  “You said that life often takes more than it gives, but you were born to lead this coven, Dominic. Life gave you this coven and this opportunity to prove to them that you are their rightful Master. You are greedy and single-mindedly selfish, as I recall, and you have
the means, power, and authority to take exactly what you want. Isn’t that what you said to me?” I leaned even closer, so my lips pressed against the shell of his ear. “But I’ve never been one to believe in words. You want me? You want to lead this coven? Prove it. Dominic Lysander, I dare you to heal stronger with my blood, survive this, and fucking prove it! Take back what is yours!”

  I’d meant my words as a taunt or pep talk, but between our shared blood and my command, our minds connected. I felt the frayed thread of his will stiffen with resolve as my words shot through his defenses and into his brain. His eyes snapped open. They glowed a luminescent blue, and he stared at me with inhuman stillness, like his thoughts were a language that I couldn’t comprehend.

  His hand suddenly clamped around my wrist with crushing force. He pressed my hand to his mouth, bit into my wrist, tore my veins open, and guzzled my blood.

  “Dominic,” I whispered, unsure if I should command him to stop, and if I did, trying to think of a phrase that wouldn’t endanger me if he reflected it.

  Before I could decide what to do, Dominic rolled on top of me. His weight pressed my butchered back hard into the stone. My wound sizzled as it suctioned into the puddle of his blood and began to heal. I screamed. I struggled against him and the burning snap of pain, but Dominic pushed my head to the side and sank his fangs deep into my neck.

  The pain was sharp and immediate and tore away my breath. His lips clamped on the wound to suck my blood, but instead of the pain turning to exquisite pleasure, like it had before, it just felt like horrible, aching, throbbing pain.

  I pushed at Dominic’s shoulder and yanked hard on his hair in a final, desperate attempt to gain his attention, but my efforts were weak and he was astronomically strong. Eventually, even that movement was too much for my body, and I felt my arms drop away from him. My knuckles scraped against stone as they fell limply to the ground.

  His fangs sank in deeper. He tore my neck open a little bit wider, and I heard a noise escape from me. I felt myself twitch in pain. The attack lasted mere seconds, but he was efficient and experienced and ruthless. Mere seconds was all the time he needed to drain the rest of my blood. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t feel. My mind drifted, and I saw everything as if from above, hovering over our bodies and watching from the rafters.

  Hundreds of vampires entered the room and flanked around us. Dominic was holding me with an arm under my back and my neck clamped in his mouth, but as his coven approached, he dropped my neck to growl at the coven, like a dog will drop its bone to protect it from being taken.

  I fell limply to the floor underneath him. My neck was bent at a harsh angle. The wound was still pumping blood and spilling in a creeping circle around us to mix with his, but Dominic didn’t notice my neck or the blood; he growled at the enclosing vampires. The noise began as the same low growl that I’d heard rattle from all their throats, but the noise quickly expanded, vibrating through the room in a terrifying, encompassing, awesome cacophony that shook my roots.

  Most of the vampires shrank back, instantly recognizing Dominic as their rightful Master and bending to him. Some fought the compulsion for a moment or two, testing whether he was still strong enough and powerful enough to lead and protect the coven, but the majority of those vampires succumbed to Dominic after a moment, as well. They bowed their heads, hunched in on themselves, and backed away from the room in supplication.

  A little over a dozen vampires stepped forward through the cacophony and stood in front of us in a tight semicircle, refusing to supplicate, denying Dominic as their Master. The rebels. They were all fully transformed into the gargoyle, beast-like version of themselves. Their eyes glowed brightly in the dim room and seemed to glow more luminescent as they growled back. Their own growls mixed into an equally awesome and compelling rattle. Together, theirs were almost as moving as Dominic’s, but Dominic didn’t flinch. He hovered over my body, spread himself over me in a strangely protective stance, and stood against them.

  The first rebel attacked from his left. Dominic let the vampire approach from the crowd, but once separated, he met the attack. Dominic’s movements were faster than Kaden and Jillian, faster than I could comprehend. I couldn’t even track his exact movements, only their devastating effects.

  Dominic’s hand blurred through the air, and the vampire’s chest exploded in a spray of blood. Their eyes met, and even impaled by Dominic’s arm, the vampire didn’t bow down. Holding his gaze, Dominic twisted his wrist while still inside his chest, and the vampire’s knees buckled. He crumpled to the ground, twitching and gasping.

  Another rebel attacked, and a third and fourth, until a swarm swelled from the hallway, charged into the room, and crashed into Dominic. Dominic, however, crashed right back, and the faster and stronger they swarmed, the more powerfully he stood against their undertow until a ring of incapacitated vampires was strewn at his feet.

  One of the vampires inched closer to me while Dominic fought. I felt myself trying to open my mouth, to warn Dominic, but I couldn’t form the words. Nothing was left inside of me that could speak or move. Dominic was distracted by three other vampires, and I couldn’t do anything but watch my own death approach from the sidelines.

  The approaching vampire knelt beside me, and I recognized the burns across his face from my last visit to the coven. He was Neil, the young vampire who had singed himself on the silver bars trying to attack me. Neil gazed at me with his starving otherworldly eyes. My head was still bent backward where Dominic had dropped me, baring my esophagus like an offering. Neil rubbed his nose over the front of my neck and released a restrained, pain-filled exhale against my blood-soaked, clammy-cold skin.

  Dominic froze for a fraction of a heartbeat, recognizing the movement and noise and intention behind it. Without further thought or hesitation, Dominic lashed out at the vampires currently fighting him with his long, lethal talons. He ripped out all three of their throats with one swipe of his hand. Blood sprayed in an arching wave, and their spines gleamed through the blood and hanging tissue.

  Dominic was beside me before the three vampires hit the ground. I could feel the rush of his movement whip over my face as he flew, collided with Neil, and smashed him on his back into the ground next to me. Neil struggled and whipped at Dominic with his talons, but Dominic dodged his movements easily, punched his hand into Neil’s stomach, and jerked up into his chest cavity. Neil screamed, but Dominic didn’t even flinch. He twisted his wrist nearly elbow-deep despite Neil’s squealing pleas.

  “No,” Neil hissed, his voice keening. A shocked, affronted expression lit his face as he stared at Dominic. “You can’t. You’re not my Mast—”

  Dominic tore out Neil’s heart.

  Deep red, nearly black, ropes of blood stretched from the gaping wound in Neil’s chest to his heart raised aloft in Dominic’s hand. The blood ropes broke after a moment and dripped in long strands from the heart, down Dominic’s blood-soaked hand, and to the stone floor.

  Neil struggled for a frantic, ineffective moment, attempting to snatch his heart from Dominic, but Dominic restrained his efforts with one hand and held the heart out of reach with the other. Neil’s movements became lethargic and strained. His body jerked involuntarily. His eyes glazed and his lax, unseeing expression dropped to the side to face me.

  Neil’s gargoyle-like features weren’t any less horrifying in repose, but his expression was still human-like enough to chill my heart. Neil had felt betrayal and fear and uncertainty at the very end, but he’d also looked desperate to recover his heart. I had a horrible, sneaking suspicion that if someone were to shove the heart back into its chest cavity, Neil could still potentially recover.

  The hundreds of surrounding vampires shrieked, and a low rattle hummed through the room. The few whose throats had been slashed were healing quickly, and although bloody, their throats were formed enough to function again. They bore their fangs, and joined in the vibrating growl that spread through the coven. They shrieked and chittered like the
frantic dissonance of insects.

  I would have covered my ears if I could still move. I watched them form a tight semicircle around us, becoming a united force of will and power and strength. Even the majority who had initially shrunk back from Dominic were swept up in the current. Rage and solidarity infused them with courage, and they joined in the attack.

  Dominic sheltered me under the protection of his body, lifted Neil’s heart high over his head, and belted out a blasting roar that shook the very foundation of the coven. From one heartbeat to the next, Dominic transformed from his human-like vampire form to the gargoyle-like version. Gone were his captivating blue eyes, replaced by glassy, black shark eyes. His fangs elongated, his ears pointed, his nose flattened, his forehead thickened, and his muzzle extended until he barely resembled himself. This massive, rabid, lethal creature crouched over my body, protecting me and claiming me as his in front of his entire coven. To cross me was to cross him. And no one would dare cross him.

  Every single vampire, including the dozen rebels who had stood firm against his rule, were knocked back by the force of Dominic’s roar. They stumbled to regain their footing, hissing frantically to each other, but they reluctantly kept their distance.

  Holding his crouched stance over me, Dominic met each of their eyes. He growled, and the noises that escaped his throat were like aftershocks to the initial blast. The vampires continued to stumble back, some unwillingly and others in complete submission, but not one could withstand the force of his power.

  Dominic held the heart a little higher. “Anyone else?” he asked, and his voice scraped through his throat with a very inhuman, gravelly growl.

  The vampires each averted their gazes. Even Kaden bowed his head, quelled without Jillian’s lead. I doubt Jillian would have bowed her head. She might have been the only vampire in the coven with the ability to overthrow Dominic, but she was still staring limply at the wall, waiting for my next command.