By sunset, Renee was desperate. Eli’s utter stillness, his complete withdrawal from her, terrified her more than the prospect of burning alive. “Eli?” she whispered for the hundredth time in a cracked and hoarse voice. “Eli, I think the sun is almost down. Eli? Please, answer me.”
He didn’t respond to her at all. Renee shivered. If he hadn’t been holding her tight, she would have thought he truly had died. “Eli?” she whispered again.
The sudden cooling of her skin told her the horrible day was finally over. Renee tried to shake him but the chains did not give her enough range of movement. She called his name over and over, shaking her head free of the enveloping coat and trying to see his face in the shadows. He didn’t respond to her pleading in his mind either, but he’d blocked her out so completely that she wasn’t sure he even heard her. Finally, in utter desperation, she drew on every ounce of power she had left and sent a call for help over the city, not even knowing if such a thing was possible but willing to try anything.
Diego! Sian! Ronin! she screamed, putting everything she had behind the mental call. Someone, anyone! Answer me!
Several voices echoed in her mind simultaneously, responding to her without hesitation, and relief swamped her as she sorted them out.
One voice, disgusted, full of rage. Why the hell are you talking to me, Outcast?
That had to be Ronin. The man would never accept her—he despised her for her tainted heritage and always would—but no matter how much he hated her, he had answered. Even knowing he only did it from respect for Eli, she still could have kissed him.
And two other voices, completely in tune even though they sent different messages. What is your need, Renee? Diego asked, and his calm voice was so reassuring tears filled her eyes.
Dang, girl, you don’t have to shatter my head! Sian’s thought was laced with both the traces of a pounding headache and a wonderful willingness to help.
Renee was about to reply when she felt the touch she’d been praying for. Eli’s consciousness brushed her mind, still distant, but with that feather-light contact, the brief headache sent with Sian’s thought disappeared. There were no words in it, just the touch of his mind, and as it started to slip away she latched onto him. “No, you don’t—I won’t let you go. Do you hear me, Eli? Come back!”
Renee. Diego’s voice was urgent now. I can feel your fear. Are you in danger? Where’s Eli?
He’s here, she said, trying to keep her alarm from coloring the message and knowing she was failing. Eli was slipping away again. He’s with me but he’s hurt, Diego. He’s hurt badly. I can barely reach him at all. Tears were rolling freely down her cheeks now as she held on to Eli and tried to lock him to her with her mind, but she was weak and couldn’t draw him back. The poison’s hold on her was stronger than ever.
Where are you? What happened to him? All three voices, all asking the same questions, but with vastly different overtones. Sian was alarmed. Diego’s thoughts carried an instant readiness for battle. But Ronin…
Suspicion. He broadcast his utter disbelief without hesitation.
He wasn’t even trying to hide his thoughts from her. Eli had been invincible for so long, it was impossible to conceive of anything harming him this badly. If she was with him and he was this severely injured, she must be responsible. Renee could hardly blame him even though she cursed him for his doubt. If she had been Ronin, she might well have thought the same thing. After all, none of the others knew who Eli truly was, what he was. She was the only one who knew Eli couldn’t die, and even she had doubted before today.
But he could suffer. She had to convince the others to come help him. He’s been in the sun all day, she told Ronin fiercely. And before you ask, I did not do this to him! I begged him to leave!
She felt rather than heard Ronin’s snarl. Impossible. If what you say is true, he’d be fried. What have you really done to him?
Renee, where are you? Diego demanded, cutting across her furious reply to Ronin. This time there was a compulsion buried within Diego’s request but it wasn’t necessary. She responded at once, sending the image of everything she’d seen of the place the Outcasts had taken her. After a moment, Diego cut her off. I know this place. I’m coming, Renee. Hold on.
Ronin’s disgust was palpable. I’m coming too, he said, but it was more warning than reassurance. And you’d better pray he’s alive when I get there, Outcast, or I’ll make you wish for death long before I’m finished with you.
Renee felt a sudden surge of fury from Eli at the threat. It sizzled along the mental connection she held with Ronin, inarticulate and vicious. Ronin cut off contact with her at once, but not before she felt his shock.
She didn’t care about Ronin. At last Eli had responded to something. Renee grabbed him with her hands and her mind and called to him.
“Eli!” She wanted to shout but only managed a cracked whisper, so she shouted with her mind. Eli! Speak to me, please. She butted her head hard against his chest, trying anything to get through to him. “Eli!” You’re scaring me to death, please answer me!
He lifted his head at last. Renee gasped as he looked down at her. Deep lines of agony were etched in his face. His lips were pulled back in a silent grimace, exposing wicked fangs. His eyes broke her heart. Those beautiful dark eyes were mad, completely feral with pain and rage. No trace of his laughter or gentleness remained in them.
“Oh Eli, no,” she whispered, tears welling up and slipping down her cheeks.
Eli moved suddenly, raising a hand and whipping the duster off her before grabbing the chains binding her to the wall. He snapped them with a single sharp pull and caught her shoulders in a bruising grip when she stumbled at the loss of the chains’ support. He hissed in a breath as the movement stretched his seared flesh. Renee felt his terrible pain through the mental bond she refused to relinquish and she tried to send him coolness, peace, strength.
She couldn’t tell if he felt it or not. He glared down at her and she didn’t dare look away. His hunger beat at her. She caught the scent of his blood in the air as his wounds broke open again with his movements and knew the Outcasts had bled him as he’d shielded her from the sun. He’d stood there and let them do it rather than expose her to the light.
He’d suffered this for her. He’d saved her life, but only at great cost to himself.
She reached up with one trembling hand and caressed his cheek before tilting her head to the side. She could not let him be lost to madness.
There was only one way to ease his pain. “You must feed, Eli,” she murmured, drawing him gently down. If he could survive a day in the sunlight, the poison in her blood surely wouldn’t harm him. She had to believe that. “Feed and come back to me.”
She couldn’t keep from crying out when his fangs tore into her flesh. This time she felt none of the pleasure he’d always sent her when he’d taken her blood, but she didn’t struggle. She wasn’t afraid.
It’s all right, she told him gently, stroking his hair as he drank deeply, not pulling away even when the darkness started to flow over her vision. It’s all right, love. Take whatever you need.
Chapter Fourteen
Eli came out of the red haze of pain and madness slowly. The taste of blood filled his senses, bringing him strength, bringing him sanity, but something was wrong. That certainty tried to grab him and intrude on the blessed relief of this sweet blood flowing into him, easing his terrible pain. Something inside him demanded he pull away.
He fought it. He knew very little, but the one thing he was sure of was that he needed far more blood than this. He couldn’t remember how he’d been injured, but he knew his injuries had been severe. He had never suffered anything like this. He needed more blood to heal, and none had ever tasted sweeter.
Break away NOW!
This time the instinct was impossible to resist. Eli lifted his head and found himself kneeling on the ground beneath the night sky. All the agony of his body rushed back over him and he hissed in a harsh breath,
his arms tightening reflexively around his prey.
No.
Not his prey.
Eli’s heart froze in horror as the full realization of what he’d done struck him. He stared down at Renee’s still form in his arms, a thin line of blood still trickling slowly from the terrible wound at her throat. The wound he’d put there.
He’d saved her from the Outcasts, from Apollo, only to kill her himself.
“No,” he whispered. “No!”
The night was suddenly alive with violence. Thunderheads burst across the sky. Lightning tore through the air and slammed into the ground. The wind howled through the demolition site, toppling walls. The ground trembled from the force of his anguish and horror. Eli didn’t even bother to try to contain his rioting powers as grief tore through him. He threw back his head and roared out his pain as the storm intensified to hurricane proportions.
Faintly, too faintly, a dull sound reached his ears through the fury of the storm. Again it came and this time he identified it—the slow beat of a struggling heart. Desperate hope surged through him and he ruthlessly clamped down on his rioting emotions. The storm died instantly and complete silence reigned. Eli pressed his ear to Renee’s chest, listening with everything in him until he heard the soft, weak beat again.
His breath hissed out in a rush. She lived, but only just.
Her veins were nearly dry, her hold on life tenuous. She had gravely needed the blood she’d selflessly offered him. Eli closed the wound on her neck and cradled her against his chest, burying his face in her hair to bring her mouth to his own throat. The gash he sliced there was deep but no blood flowed as it healed instantly. He shook in anger and frustration, slashing deeper, but his body refused to relinquish even a drop of the substance he needed so badly. He couldn’t return her gift to her.
He pulled in his power and focused it, wishing now that he hadn’t spent his energy on the storm. “Renee,” he whispered as he sent all his flagging strength surging through her. Her pulse stuttered, but as he waited in agonized suspense, it finally steadied. He had never heard anything sweeter than her heartbeat, and its weakness shattered him.
His duster lay on the ground beside them and he wrapped it around her. “Forgive me,” he said, holding her tight and rocking her, not knowing if she even heard him, but needing to say the words. “Forgive me!”
A car suddenly burst through the fence around the demolition site and skidded to a stop nearby. A motorcycle appeared behind it and Ronin leapt from its seat. Eli lifted his head as Diego and James threw the doors open and ran into the wreckage of the broken building, shouting his name, but all his attention was focused on Ronin. Some part of Eli remembered Renee’s frantic call for help, but the triggering of that memory also brought the echoes of Ronin’s threat.
Rage exploded through him. Eli surged to his feet as they approached. It was an agony to stand but he managed it, unwilling to show his terrible pain to these intruders lest they take advantage of it and harm his woman. The sudden torment of his scorched body at the movement pulled him further from his brief moment of clarity. All he saw were three males, two of them unbonded, one not even trying to hide his murderous thoughts, and all of them running toward Renee. The need to defend his Chosen rose and wiped out everything but fierce protective instinct.
Diego saw Eli first as he moved into the shadows A great deal of his tension melted away at finding him alive but a sudden and powerful premonition of danger all but overwhelmed him.
“Eli!” Diego called, stopping and frowning at the ragged, scorched bundle in Eli’s arms. Didn’t Eli feel the threat all around them? Why didn’t he drop that thing and move to eliminate the danger? “We’re relieved to find you well. Renee said you were hurt. Where is she?”
Eli didn’t answer him. Suddenly all Diego’s instincts were more than alerted to danger, they were screaming it at him. He had no doubt his life was in imminent peril, but he couldn’t discern the source of the threat.
Eli did nothing to enlighten them. He snarled at the three of them and tightened his hold on the thing in his arms. The scent of blood and burning flesh filled the air, a testament to the battle Eli had fought here. A limp, blistered arm slipped free from the leather-wrapped bundle and Diego frowned, wondering why he was still holding on to a dead Outcast.
When Eli’s gaze fell on Ronin, violent rage filled the tense air, unexplained but impossible to deny. Eli bared his fangs at Ronin in a vicious snarl, every muscle tensing for battle, but he did not attack. He would not put down the body and charge Ronin despite the hatred filling the air.
Ronin froze where he stood. There was no longer any doubt where the danger lay. He and Diego exchanged a worried look. Surely he hadn’t been foolish enough to drink from the body!
Whatever had caused it, this was not the Eli they knew.
His fury and pain beat at them as he glared at Ronin with eyes that were not the slightest bit sane. Diego reached for Renee’s mind to try to get more information from her, to try to find out where she was and what had happened to Eli. Only when he finally touched Renee’s weak thoughts did he understand why he had not sensed her at once.
Diego drew in a sharp, shocked breath. Renee was horribly weak, her spirit barely holding on in a body decimated by severe blood loss. She had not been in this condition the last time he’d touched her mind and he understood at once what had happened.
That was no dead Outcast Eli carried.
Whatever had happened to Eli had driven him insane. Diego would never have thought it possible from Eli, but the signs were too clear to deny. He’d snapped and brutally attacked his own fledgling. The stars only knew what had stopped him from killing her outright, and it was still a very near thing. She hovered on death’s threshold.
They had to get Renee away from him. If Eli killed her, they would have to destroy him, and Diego didn’t relish the thought of trying to take him down in battle. He’d fought beside Eli enough to know the man was as powerful as several vampires combined and was practically impossible to wound. The memory of that bizarre, violent thunderstorm tickled at his mind and Diego clenched his fists. He would have bet anything that no vampire could influence the weather, but looking at Eli now, he wasn’t so sure. Even injured, even weakened, power and violence flowed around him like a tsunami.
Diego stepped forward cautiously. He didn’t miss the way Eli tensed and clutched Renee closer at his approach, and he stopped at once. His confusion grew. Why didn’t he drop her and fight them when he clearly wanted to? Nothing about this made any sense, but Diego wasn’t about to question his good fortune. No one would ever willingly engage Eli in battle.
“Eli,” he said softly, lacing his voice with a gentle urge to trust him, to calm down. “You need blood. Let us care for your fledgling while you hunt.”
Eli took a step back, his eyes never leaving Ronin, his fangs bared menacingly. Despite his threatening stance, he still didn’t put Renee down. He held her close to his heart, the posture of his body fiercely protective.
Yet he had clearly attacked her.
It didn’t add up. Diego was certain he was missing something, something vitally important. He stopped and sent his senses searching again. He felt Eli’s pain, winced at the severity of his burns. Deep gouges and stab-wounds marred his back. Despite nearly draining Renee dry, he was still in terrible need of blood, but Eli at half-strength was still more than a match for him and Ronin together. Never had Diego even suspected that any one vampire possessed such raw power. He closed his eyes and probed deeper, searching for a way through his madness.
And at the center of the storm of Eli’s rage he found Renee.
Diego gasped as the realization hit him. Everything became clear. His eyes snapped to Ronin—a single male, and one who was clearly broadcasting the promise of violence toward the woman Eli held. “Get away from him, Ronin!”
Diego groaned when Ronin, as usual, showed no signs of obeying him.
He felt Eli’s desperation surge a
s Renee’s heart stuttered, struggling to find enough blood to function. He looked at his Steward at the same time Eli did.
Oh, shit. Two starving vampires needed blood and Diego knew Eli wouldn’t care where he got it. Any mortal would do, and James was altogether too convenient. Diego was honor bound to defend his servant, but he had no illusions about his chances of winning a fight with Eli.
He had to remove temptation. “James, do not run,” he ordered, his voice low and urgent. “Walk to the car and get inside. Lock all the doors and get the hell out of here.” It wouldn’t help much if Eli did decide to take a bite out of him, but it was all Diego had right now.
James obeyed at once but Ronin still stood his ground. Eli’s attention remained fixed on the Slayer, much to Diego’s relief.
“What the hell is this about?” Ronin demanded when the car’s tail lights vanished through the fence.
“They’re bonding.” No other explanation for Eli’s behavior made sense, and truly, Diego couldn’t believe he hadn’t felt Eli’s claim on Renee before this. “But the ritual isn’t complete.”
Ronin looked at the pair and grimaced. His disgust was clear. “Eli’s not stupid enough to bed a damned Outcast—and bonding with one? It’s sickening.”
Diego shook his head, groaning inwardly. Ronin was doing no one any favors with his belligerence. He wasn’t sure he could make Ronin understand what the bonding process did to a male, how protective it made him. He sure as hell hadn’t understood it until he’d lived it. Even the tiniest slight would be interpreted as a grave threat and trigger a vicious burst of rage. Ronin’s murderous threats were more than enough to guarantee his death at Eli’s hands.
No wonder he’d gone insane. Once a vampire began the bonding ritual, the fear of losing his Chosen would be paramount, crippling.
And Renee lay limp and almost lifeless in Eli’s arms.
He was living a nightmare right now.
“You threatened her,” Diego told Ronin, imagining what he would have done to anyone who had tried to threaten Sian during that mad, intense time. The lengths he would go to now to ensure her safety. “And now you’re insulting her. He’ll kill you, Ronin. You’re damn lucky not to be dead already.”
Amelia Elias - [Guardian's League 02] - Outcast Page 24