by Editor
Busy trying to save herself, she didn’t respond.
With the train back to full speed, the rocking and swaying motion gave Lucian and Phillip a test of balance. Lucian had André for an anchor. Phillip had Serina and only one leg, thanks to Duncan’s precision placed blow with the shillelagh which severed Phillip’s tendons. Outside the train, the ground gave way to a large expansion bridge that spanned a dark murky river about fifty feet above the river. Winds whipped into the car from outside as a storm shifted in. Dangling and stuck, Serina took a moment to look around and regretted it. Peering out of the hole, she saw the swift moving current of the river below. That’s when she screamed, “Lucian...I don’t do water. Get the oaf off me. I’m not going in that muck. Now, m’lord!”
Swearing non-stop, with an arrow stuck through his shoulder, André had a painful reminder that he would have to teach Payton how to shoot a crossbow.
André reached for the crossbow, but caught sight of Chyna. He watched her trapped inside her glass prison that his brother some how concocted. She pleaded with him, her words landing on deaf ears, as he took aim with the bow and aimed the weapon on Phillip. His aunt’s face turned to stone as the arrow pierced Phillip’s back, a direct hit on his heart. André never lost sight of her dead black eyes as he delivered a fatal blow.
The arrow forged through the front of Phillip’s chest. Between Lucian’s chokehold and the arrow bulging from his heart, his number was up.
Lucian glanced down to the proximity of the tip of the arrow...A few more inches and André would have skewered two for the price of one. Lucian bent his head around Phillip and asked, “Explain this.”
André returned the look with a mocking, “What? I missed you. It’s more than Payton can say.”
Wilting fast, Phillip dropped Serina. With the knowledge he was indeed dying, Phillip decided he wasn’t going down alone. He bent over and grabbed Duncan’s long brown hair in one fist and Jonah’s dark brown curly hair in his other and leapt through the hole in the train dragging both men kicking and screaming over the side with him.
“Duncan! Jonah!” Lucian, André, Payton and Serina all screamed in unison, as they rushed to the opening.
Leaning dangerously outside of the train, and grabbing at air to attempt to bring the men back to her, Serina lost her balance and almost fell a second time.
Lucian yanked her back in, and wrapped her in the safety of his arms. Serina fought him, yelling, “Help Duncan and Jonah.” They looked out, seeing nothing but a fast flowing river beneath them.
With less than a split second to think of something Lucian surged forth every ounce of energy he owned in attempts to slow their descent, which almost dragged them from the train and hastened Duncan and Jonah’s fall. Backfired! Yes, there seemed to be a learning curve to his newfound power.
He created a reverse vacuum sucking out anything that wasn’t nailed down. All the suitcases, boxes filled with trinkets were lost to the river below. The carpets proved there was no magic in them as they tumbled through the air to a watery grave.
Payton clung to Lucian and Serina for dear life while André held the back of his pants to keep him from falling as well. The area where the arrow pierced him oozed the more André struggled to save his family.
Lucian changed his train of thought immediately to envision a leaf sifting down to the water and floating safely to the shore.
Serina read Lucian’s thoughts and added her own, sending a blistering heat to Phillip’s hands. He relinquished the death-grip on Duncan and Jonah. They watched as the men crawled from the river. Phillip never resurfaced.
Lucian shook Serina. “Never scare me as you have just done, ever again. My heart is too fragile where your wellbeing and life are concerned. I would not choose to live without you. I would have no choice but to join you somewhere in the heavens, because I will not live with out you, Serina.” Lucian secured his grip on her.
Her temper one degree hotter she yelled, “We have to stop the train, Lucian. We have to go get Duncan and Jonah. And you bugger—don’t you dare reprimand me. Lucian, you almost tossed us off the train as well!” Serina pointed her finger at him. Her favorite emotion had resurfaced, panic. How could they have lost Duncan and Jonah? She was so upset there was no thinking straight. She headed out the door of the car but stopped in her tracks and looked at Chyna. Really studied her. Lucian threw his arm around Serina and André and Payton joined her.
Trapped inside an invisible prism, Chyna resembled a wild, exotic animal. She pounded on the barriers until blood covered her knuckles. Then she stopped, sniffed her hands and licked them clean.
“Someone should put her out of her misery.” Didn’t matter who said it, because they all thought it.
“You’ll see the sunrise alone, Chyna.” Serina said before she turned to leave.
Lucian grabbed Serina’s wrist. “We will not stop the train again. Duncan and Jonah will be fine as long as they don’t kill each other. The poor people aboard this train have already endured much too much from this trip. I can only imagine the looks we will encounter when we exit this car.” Lucian looked at André and Payton, and started to laugh because at this point, if he didn’t laugh he was going to cry.
Serina turned to face the others. “André, let’s get the arrow out. Sit.” Serina squeezed Lucian’s hand. “I need you to remove the arrow, and I’ll go inside and make certain the lung is fine.”
Concern etched into every line of his face. Never mind having an arrow ripped out from his body—going in was bad enough—but André wondered more what it would feel like having another person inside him. Crowded came to mind, especially after witnessing Serina with Jasper. The whole body/mind snatching escapade left a bitter taste in his mouth.
Serina placed her hands on his shoulders. André mirrored her actions bracing himself for whatever happened.
“Ready?” Serina asked
With a solid, “Just do it,” André closed his eyes and waited.
Serina told him, “Count to ten―”
Lucian butted in. “He can’t count that high.”
“Imbecile,” André muttered. “Why do you want me to count?”
“The element of surprise.”
“One…”
Lucian snapped the arrow at the tip and pulled the arrow out backward with such speed André didn’t realize the arrow was out.
“Jeepers, Luce, I never felt a—how’d you—”
“Vampire!” Lucian’s impish grin took up his face. Then witnessing the way André looked at his wife, all misty-eyed, with a sappy infatuation, alarms began to chime. Lucian dragged her back to him.
“What is it, m’lord?” Serina asked.
Lucian’s cheeks flushed. “I am ashamed to admit I am jealous. I am sorry.”
Serina looked directly into his beautiful silvery eyes. “Never apologize to me, Lucian, for wanting me close to you. I want and need the same things. I’m not going anywhere, husband.” Serina tugged Lucian down to her height, and gently kissed him, not caring there were still others in the room with them.
Chyna watched them carry on as if she didn’t exist and from the looks of things she only had a short hour to go before she didn’t. Sunrise was well on its way and thanks to Chyna herself, the sun would shine directly through the hole she’d knocked in the train car’s wall. Frustrated, she tapped her twisted nail on the wall of her prison. She hated it when things backfired.
Serina pondered aloud, “Poetic justice is about to be served. Sun’s almost up. Let us leave her to her fate.”
Lucian headed for the door.
“Should we leave Chyna alone? What if something goes awry?” André asked. “Don’t take this wrong, Luce, but you’re a fledgling at the whole vamp business. It takes most of them a few hundred years to perfect some of their techniques, not a few days. The reverse vacuum being case in point, not that I’m bringing it up, mind you.”
“We’ve only got two stops left on this holiday from hell. As long as I’m b
reathing, she’s not going anywhere. And I’m finished making objects float, Ands, so if you end up in water I hope you can swim.” Lucian flashed a smile towards his brother. “Once we get Serina safely back to Raven and Molly, we can get fresh horses and retrieve our two boys. Hey, did any of you notice the resemblance between Duncan and Jonah? It doesn’t jump right out at you, but there are similarities between them that are rather obvious.”
“What? Similarities like identical cousins? You’d definitely be the first to take note of that,” Serina teased, then paid for it when Lucian gently paddled her behind. She just laughed and nudged her body closer to his.
“Luce, you know you’re right. Aren’t they ’bout the same age too?” André asked.
Chyna stood up, shook out her orange cloak with the large silver knife still wedged in her back. She moved onto her tiara and yanked it from her scalp, huffed on the dull gems and spit-shined them clean. When finished, she pushed the ends of the comb back into her scalp as one would a thumbtack into a wall. She didn’t even flinch as the prongs penetrated her flesh. She turned to them, both hands pressed on the see-through enclosure and pleaded for André to rescue her. Chyna did not want to die like this. Hell, she didn’t want to die period. But then she still believed she would be Queen some day soon.
Lucian tried to ignore her. “No. They’re eight years apart. Jonah graduated two years before Ray and I did.”
“I must go. I’ve seen more boogey-man, hocus-pocus than my brain can register, and I’m hungry. I’m going to the food car to make breakfast for whoever is left aboard.” Payton walked out.
Lucian leaned against the makeshift prison, his legs crossed at his ankles. He tapped back at Chyna. “Auntie, I believe farewells are in order. ’Tis that beautiful dawning when the sun kisses the night adieu. You however, shan’t be kissing anyone anymore and especially not Phillip. What an odd couple you made! André, I would think it best if you went with Payton and take my wife with you. Oh, before I forget, although I seriously doubt I’ll forget it any time to soon, please keep your nob in your trousers and try to keep your hands off my wife’s ass!”
André and Serina froze.
With a slow turn and a guilt-ridden expression, André started to explain, “Lucian—I’m—”
Serina cut him off. “Not here. Not now.” She pushed him out the cabin door toward Payton.
André opened his mouth to say something, closed it and turned back around. He shoved his way back into the cabin to face his brother. “Lucian, forgive Serina. She had nothing to do with what went on between us. Believe me when I tell you that the vampire had complete control of her. Her heart remained true to you. I have no excuse. I will leave the manor when we return if that is what you wish. I am no gentleman. If you knew, why wait until now to say something? Why didn’t you attempt to intervene on the mountain?”
“You don’t understand!” Lucian yelled his fists knotted tight to his side. “André, do you have any idea what it was like finding my wife in your arms and on my honeymoon no less? I wasn’t even cold and yet you wasted no time making a claim on my wife.” Lucian spun away from the two of them. “What you did was worse than what Jasper did to me. At least I saw him coming. Betrayed by my own brother.” Before anyone had a second to react, Lucian turned on André and pinned him to the door, his fist blowing past André’s face and punching a hole in the wall next to his head. He spit in his face, “I wanted you dead on that mountain that’s why I never interfered, because I wasn’t the only one. Jasper was in my head egging me on. You and I will talk much about this, André, but you will remain with us. Get out now!” Lucian dropped him to the floor and dismissed him. The scars carved into his soul would be there for some time to come.
“André, I need to speak with Lucian.” Serina showed André out of the car a second time, then she turned toward her husband. How did she tell her husband she’d almost had sex with her brother-in-law due to some vampire’s morose sense of humor, not out of lust. She loved Lucian with all her heart. His brother was just that, his brother. “Lucian—” Serina still couldn’t look him in his eyes, and she loved his eyes. She felt unworthy of his love. Of his trust. Tears welled up behind her closed eyes.
“M’lady, look at me. Please?” Lucian tickled her under her chin.
Serina’s bottom lip quivered, and she knew she was out of her element. She’d hurt Lucian, and she’d never intended to.
“Serina,” he whispered, “I love you. Please, my wild rose, look at me. I know you did none of that with André from desire.” He trailed kisses down her cheeks, chasing each teardrop with his lips. “I love you.”
He said it again. Maybe he really did mean it. Serina opened both eyes, her bottom lip still making her teeth chatter.
Lucian placed both hands on her cheeks to steady her jaw and then he did the only thing he knew how to do to stop the rattles. He flashed his fangs at her as he shifted his brows mischievously.
Serina unclenched her fists and hugged his waist. She pulled him to her, and kissed him while, trying to avoid the incisors that had sprouted in the past moments.
“Lucian—ah―”
Lucian put his fingers back over her mouth stilling her. “Please forgive me, Serina. André and I shall speak of this later.”
“You’re just like Raven you know,” she said. “Such compassion. If I never had that one random thought of André and you together nothing ever would have happened. And you try to ease my burden when ’tis I who should ease yours.”
“I appreciate your honesty.” He deliberately kissed her neck, thinking it was a safer area.
Not quite.
Serina looked up to Lucian with that one look he knew so well, that look in her eyes that begged him to take her.
“Do it.”
“What about,” Lucian nodded towards Chyna, “you know who?”
“Do it now.”
All right then. He wasted no time and did as he was asked. Passion, relief, power and trust flooded his injured soul. He felt what he was doing to her as she merged her mind with his. Her orgasm came fast and hard and left her breathless in his arms. Just once, he wanted her to bite him like this, instead of someone trying to rip out his throat, so he could experience the sensation first hand, although he thought this was pretty darn good.
He drank carefully, only taking a little from her then closed the wounds in her neck.
“Thank you. You’ve no idea how I fancy what you do to me.”
“Anytime.”
He faced Chyna when he noticed the sun inside the cabin.
Chyna watched horrified, as her shelter slowly evaporated into the light. Backed up as far as she could go, her screams fell silent.
Lucian and Serina watched. Chyna tried to hover off the floor, as the morning sunbeams inched closer and closer to her, resembling the incoming tides of the ocean eating up the sand as it washed ashore.
Chapter Twenty-One
Serina had that nasty knot in her stomach again. A knot of guilt...the knot that would not allow Chyna to die this way, at the hand of her husband and she. For as much as she wanted Chyna a pile of ash, and she did, she knew this would not be the day. It was a horrible way to die. To slow and too smelly. People burning up—charred flesh...Ewh! It hit a little too close to home. Serina scrunched her nose at the very thought.
“Lucian—” Serina looked at Chyna. “We can’t do this. There must be an alternative.”
Chyna stopped her whining and stared at Serina as she hung in the far corner of her prison, her orange cloak pulled around her as a shield.
“I agree, luv. I will allow her access to her casket. Once in, we will bind her with chains and crosses and deliver her to the queen. Let her sister determine her fate. I’m so grateful you spoke up, Serina. I really wasn’t up for the show either.”
“You’d best expand her barriers before our good intentions go up in smoke, so to speak. She’s beginning to singe, Lucian. Hurry up.” Serina half screamed and half laughed.
Lucian closed his eyes as his fingers weaved through the air in methodical pattern. When he finished the two of them watched Chyna dart across the car to the safety of her bleak confines, the knife still protruding from her back. She thumped her back into the base of casket a few times until the blade pushed through to the other side of her chest. The hole in her chest healed as if it were a mere scratch.
After securing her coffin, Serina and Lucian headed out after André and Payton.
****
Once they gathered their belongings, Lucian stopped and sent a telegram to his aunt, the Queen, that read:
Dear Auntie Mattie,
Soon you will be receiving a large black box, a casket actually. To open it at night would be a fate far worse than opening Pandora’s box. ’Tis your last sister. We traveled with her for a night that was unforgettable and unrewarding by most standards. She does not travel lightly. Please, do not unlock the wholly evil that lay locked within this box, unless ’tis high noon. Keep her guarded at all times. It has been many years, give our cousins Deidre, Devona and Deba our best.
Lucian
Serina wasn’t happy with the way Lucian closed his note, thinking it sounded so informal and distant. She asked, “Why not sign it, With love, Lucian?”
“I have no love for the woman. Nor she me.”
“How about, sincerely?”
“There is nothing sincere about her. Or my feelings for her.”
“Best wishes, then?”
“Serina, the only wish I have for the woman is that it was she on the mountain with Jasper.”
Serina’s last attempt made Lucian smile. “Have a nice day,” but still he signed only his name.
****
The sight of the small church stole Serina’s breath. It was her home away from home for so many years, her refuge. It hit her then; she missed Father Butler more than her own mother. He always held a smile for her. And his hugs, they held a warmth that saturated her soul. Serina hopped out of the carriage and ran up the five steps to the church. She burst through the heavy wooden doors, acting like a child running home and happy to be there.