I didn’t say anything. I didn’t have to. The flush on my cheeks spoke for me, and it seemed the wisest thing to let him think that. One day, many, many years from now, I would tell him about what nearly happened. One day when I was certain he would be able to see the funny side. One day . . . yeah, right, when pigs fly.
The sound of raised voices made us turn our heads in the direction of the kitchen. Tomas and Stavros appeared to be in the midst of a heated discussion. At least Ryiel’s sentinel hadn’t been mistaken when he’d told me Tomas wouldn’t mind him using his kitchen. When the two of them met, it was almost magical. They hugged, made loud smacking noises as they kissed each other on the cheek, and hugged again. The affection had made me wonder if they were related, even though they looked nothing alike.
“They are in a way,” Gabriel said, “as all sentinels come from the Void.”
“So did you.”
“Yes, but I was something else to begin with. In the Void I was reborn.”
I considered what he was telling me. “So you’re saying all your sentinels were actually created in the Void?” Gabriel nodded. “Will they return there?”
“They do, periodically.”
I suddenly recalled him mentioning something about Tomas being five hundred years old. “Is Tomas returning anytime soon?” I couldn’t imagine him not being here.
Gabriel shrugged. “The Void will call him back when it chooses to. Sometimes it will wait a thousand years, sometimes it will be sooner.”
“And what then? Does he get to come back to you?”
“Only if the Void permits it.”
“That’s not right!” I protested.
“Actually it is,” Gabriel corrected with a smile. “Just as the Void agreed to provide each Original Vampire with a Promise, it also agreed to provide a sentinel. But unlike a Promise, a sentinel belongs entirely to the Void, is a part of it, and has no choice but to obey its command.”
“So the Void will give you a sentinel, just not necessarily the same one it took from you?”
“Precisely.”
“Well, that sucks.” I pouted for a moment. “Will a new sentinel know who you are, and how to take care of you?”
“Of course, but I’ll let you in on a secret. Though he has looked different in the past, I’ve never had anyone but Tomas.”
“And he was always a runecaster?”
“Yes. That has never changed.”
I jumped at the sound of a fist being slammed on the kitchen counter. A little more force and the tiles would break. Both Tomas and Stavros seemed equally short-tempered over whatever it was they were discussing. “I hope they’re not talking about me.”
“They’re not,” Gabriel smiled. “It’s a lively disagreement about haggis.”
“Haggis? Sounds horrible.”
“It’s a dish made from a sheep’s stomach filled with the animal’s heart, liver, and lungs, plus oatmeal, onions, stock, and spices.”
I felt my nose wrinkle and my lip curl in disgust as I looked at him. “You’re joking, right?”
Gabriel shook his head, doing his best to hide his smile with his hand.
“And they’re arguing about it?”
He nodded. What the hell could there be to argue about, unless of course it was the merits of making the awful meal to begin with. Watching my face, Gabriel’s smile broadened, becoming a grin he could not hide.
“I don’t really want to know, do I?” I sighed.
“Probably not.”
From somewhere Tomas had pulled out a book that looked more like a grimoire than anything Betty Crocker dreamed up. It might have been something Macbeth’s three witches would have used if they were making haggis. I watched as Mr. Rogers and our Yul Brynner look-alike pored over the book’s contents. I didn’t need to understand what they were saying; their body language spoke volumes. Tomas let out a yell and threw up his hands in a gesture of I-told-you-so triumph. Whatever the basis for the haggis argument, it seemed the ancient manual had proved his point. Stavros conceded with more grace than I would have done.
“Do you believe him?”
“Who?”
“Stavros. Do you think Katja is really gone?” Gabriel shook his head, confirming what I already suspected. If he truly thought Katja was loose in the world, he would have shown more concern. “So is he lying?”
“No, Stavros is telling the truth, at least his version of it. I think Katja was hiding—probably still is—somewhere in the monastery. It’s not possible for her to leave the physical confines Ryiel set for her.” He raised my hand to his mouth and kissed my fingers, one by one.
“That, my friend, is where you are wrong.”
“Ryiel!”
Gabriel didn’t exactly toss me off his lap, but it was close. I watched the two vampires embrace. Not some fake hand-to-hand-chest-bump thing I see a lot of guys do these days. The kind of contact that’s supposed to be a declaration of how comfortable they are with their own masculinity. Gabriel and Ryiel had no such concerns. They embraced with true affection. The dark-haired vampire broke away and looked directly at me. Whatever he had been through had left its mark. Purple shadows colored the skin beneath his eyes, and the hollowness of his cheeks gave him a gaunt appearance. He seemed smaller somehow, but it might have been an illusion because he was standing next to Gabriel. The sight of his ribs, and the low ride of his pants on his hips, however, was not an illusion.
“Hello, Rowan, it’s a pleasure to see you again.”
The last vampire who’d expressed a similar sentiment at meeting me had been lying through his fangs. And we’d both known it. The timbre of Ryiel’s voice was deeper, his accent different, but I knew he meant every word he said.
“It’s nice to see you again,” I told him, “only I think this time I’m not the one who’s at a disadvantage.”
He smiled and came toward me, taking his time as if each step was a carefully considered act he had to put into motion. He was barefoot, and I watched him flex his toes and roll his foot, feeling the smooth surface of the hardwood floor with each step he took. I hoped his humorous socks hadn’t been misplaced. Standing before me, he slid his fingers into the open neck of my shirt and pulled the material back, exposing my shoulder. Never mind the fact I’d been buck-naked with him in the shower. He’d been enough of a gentleman to keep his eyes averted, and now the idea of Ryiel seeing my lacey bra strap seemed highly improper. Long fingers danced lightly down my neck and skimmed across the top of my shoulder, making the breath catch in my throat.
“I’m glad to see Katja did not scar you.” He smiled enough to show his fangs and ignored the low growl we both heard. “Down, puppy. I already know I have nothing to tempt your Promise to my bed.”
After a statement like that, you might want to reconsider telling lover boy you took a shower with Ryiel.
I didn’t take a shower—I was barely in there long enough to get wet!
You think that’s gonna make a difference to him?
Ryiel straightened my collar and smoothed the material with his hand. His eyes were liquid silver, framed by thick black lashes, and though somewhat eerie to look at, they suited him perfectly. He smiled at me, and I knew my indiscretion was safe with him. He would never tell Gabriel. Whatever the bond existing between the two of them, it ran far deeper than ordinary friendship.
“I have news for you,” the dark-haired vampire continued, “but I fear it may not be what you hope to hear.”
My mind began to race. There was only one type of news Ryiel would need to give me. My heart was pounding in my chest, and beads of perspiration broke out on my forehead, my temples, and the nape of my neck. Suddenly I couldn’t pull any air into my lungs. An invisible hand was wrapped around my throat, squeezing slowly as it inexorably choked the life from me. Dark spots floated in front of my eyes, and I felt as if I’d just stepped into a sauna. I was hot and sweaty and starting to shake.
I didn’t want to hear what Ryiel had to say, because I alrea
dy knew what he was going to tell me. It wasn’t that he hadn’t been able to find a way to break the agreement I had made with a demon. He hadn’t had anywhere near enough time to exhaust all the resources at his disposal. Instead, he must have found irrefutable proof the agreement could never be broken. It was the only thing important enough to justify telling me in person.
Gabriel’s arms wrapped around me, and I felt myself pulled back against his hard chest. The slow, steady beat of his heart pounded rhythmically against my back, trying to persuade my own pathetic organ to match it, beat for beat. Picking up on my free fall into a full-fledged anxiety attack, Gabriel took me in his arms and held me to him, enveloping me in the scent of pine trees and snow. It was his way of telling me I was safe. Except I wasn’t sure I was safe. Not anymore.
But instead of addressing the issue of my demon, Ryiel said, “Stavros was not lying. Katja has broken her bond with me.”
Chapter 16
“How?” Gabriel’s voice was a rough whisper next to my ear, and I felt his arms tighten around me.
Ryiel curled his lip in disgust. “Through the use of drugs.”
“And she’s not dead?”
Ryiel shook his head. His hair reached almost to his waist, and it swirled across his chest with his movement, alternately covering and revealing the tattoos on his torso. The glyphs, though different in detail, bore enough similarity to the ones on Gabriel’s spine to tell me they had been designed by the same hand. Whether the hand had been angelic or demonic in nature was another matter.
“Are you certain the bond is broken?” Gabriel asked.
“She no longer stands within my influence.” Ryiel frowned and leaned forward. Elbows on his thighs, he let his hands fall into the open space between his knees. “I know she still lives, I can feel that much, but she could be in the next room suffering the most horrible torture and I would not know it.”
“We should be so lucky,” I murmured under my breath. I had momentarily forgotten I was surrounded by beings with exceptional hearing, until I felt their eyes fixed on me. “Don’t ask me to apologize,” I said stiffly. “I won’t forget what she did to Oscar.”
Deliberately starving another vampire to the point that Ryiel had no choice but to put him out of his misery was not something I was ever going to forget. And I refused to pretend I wasn’t waiting for the day the psycho vampire bitch got a taste of her own cruelty. What goes around, comes around.
Gabriel rubbed my arm before asking, “If Katja is no longer bonded to you, and she’s not dead, then . . . ?”
“She’s bonded to Kartel,” Ryiel told him.
“Son of a bitch!” My arm suddenly felt like it was caught in a vise.
“So my home is not the only one to be contaminated by his presence recently,” the other Original noted, startled by Gabriel’s vehement response.
Gabriel sighed and loosened his grip on my arm. It took some effort, but he managed to put his anger aside. “Do you have any idea how it happened?”
“It would seem Kartel took advantage of the massacre in the village to pay a visit to the monastery. As Katja was alone, she had to be the reason for his stopover. I have to assume he was the one who subsequently injected her with the chemical severing the bond between us.” The silver color of his eyes turned a hard iron-gray. “And allowing her to ally herself to him.”
“She may not have had a choice,” Gabriel murmured, “if the alternative was death.”
“Kartel would have killed her?” I asked.
“He wouldn’t have had to. In all probability, breaking the bond with her maker would have done that, unless she had another Original to bond with right away.”
“Vampires can switch who they’re bonded to?”
Gabriel shook his head. “No, that’s the point—they can’t. It’s always been known that breaking the bond is a death sentence for a regular vampire.”
“Not anymore apparently.”
“It was almost a death sentence for me.” Ryiel’s voice was low. “If Stavros hadn’t brought me to you in time . . .” The vampire shook his head. “It’s not the first time you’ve both saved my life.”
“How do you know Katja was actually injected with something?” I wanted to know what evidence there had been to make him suppose this.
“I could taste the compound in my head, but my knowledge of such matters is not comprehensive enough to identify the individual components.”
And there was I, thinking he was going to tell me he’d found a syringe or some other paraphernalia left behind.
“So Kartel has found a way to chemically transfer a vampire’s bond to himself,” Gabriel said glumly.
“But why?” Ryiel seemed perplexed. “What would he gain from it?”
The answer seemed obvious to me, but I bit my tongue so as not to blurt it out. Better to get a few more ducks in a row first. I was dickering over how to get Ryiel to tell me what I wanted to know when Gabriel spoke. It was probably coincidence, but I told myself we were riding the same thought wave.
“Stavros has already given an account of the massacre at the village, but I would be interested to hear your perspective.” He wasn’t asking because he thought the tale was lacking in some way, but Ryiel would notice things his sentinel would not. “And I will tell you about our encounter with Kartel. Perhaps together we will see what links the two events.”
“So you do not think it is chance?”
Gabriel snorted. “Have you ever known Kartel to do anything by chance?”
It didn’t take long for the dark-haired vampire to relate what had occurred, and his details varied little from what we had already heard. Except for a few personal observations, it was the same story. A harrowing tale of the cold-blooded murder of close to a thousand people.
“And you’re certain it was vampires?”
Ryiel nodded. “Newly made, but unlike any vampires I ever turned.” He drummed his fingers on the arms of the chair. “And Kartel was definitely involved.”
“There can be no doubt?” Gabriel asked in a quiet voice.
“The one that died at my feet carried enough of his signature for me to be sure.”
In my head I could picture a stamp on the back of every vampire’s neck, much like a kid’s toy doll. Only instead of saying Made in China or Made by Mattel, this would say Made by Kartel, or Made by Ryiel, or Made by Gabriel. The sudden urge to giggle horrified me, and I smothered it as quickly as I could. In light of the deaths of over a thousand people, it was both inappropriate and horribly inexcusable.
Well, you do realize you have Gabriel’s name tattooed on your ass . . . my inner bitch reminded me. I decided to ignore her and focus on the discussion at hand.
“So you believe the annihilation of a village was a way to get Katja alone in order to conduct an experiment?” Gabriel was asking.
“I don’t think so.” Ryiel leaned back in the chair. “I feel as if the two events were of equal importance, and undertaken for the same reason.”
“Can you tell me what it felt like?” I asked. “When the bond broke?”
The vampire put his elbows on the arms of the chair and rested his chin on his folded hands. “It felt as if someone had taken a hot branding iron and dragged it across my chest, and then there was a sharp burning sensation that came from a cold so deep I was certain it would paralyze me. And then . . . nothing.”
“How does it feel to you if you try to sense her now?”
“Like trying to grasp a leaf in a hurricane.”
“Or hold quicksilver in your fingers?”
He gave me a puzzled look and nodded. “Yes, that would be a good description.” I couldn’t see the expression on Gabriel’s face, but if it was anything like mine, it was probably shocked surprise with a hint of I-didn’t-actually-believe-he-could-do-it thrown in. However, it was enough to make Ryiel ask, “What is it that you know?”
I turned my head and looked up at Gabriel. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
&nbs
p; He nodded. “Petrov has been playing with his chemistry set.”
Ryiel looked confused at this new addition. “Who is Petrov?”
It took less than ten minutes to bring him up to speed. He bared his fangs at hearing the abuse I’d suffered at the hand of Kartel’s vampire. “You are thinking he has improved this drug that did not work on Rowan?”
I felt Gabriel nod behind me, and then nothing was said. Both vampires appeared to be deep in thought, searching for the common denominator. Unable to stand the silence any longer, I asked, “If Kartel needed a guinea pig to test his formula on, why choose Katja?”
“To avoid retribution from any of us, he would need a vampire who wanted more than anything else to break the bond. Katja was the perfect choice.”
Choice or not, I was genuinely curious to know why the universe would bring together two vampires I detested so completely. “Why? What made her so?”
“Her current circumstances,” Gabriel said.
“I don’t understand.”
Gabriel took my hand. “The bond between a vampire and a human can be broken in one of two ways. Either the vampire can release the human as an act of free will, which is what Aleksei did with Anasztaizia, or death will sever the link.” He paused for a moment, and I felt his thumb glide across the inside of my wrist. “Breaking the bond between a vampire and its maker is a little more complicated. It has never been attempted before as it usually means death for the vampire.”
“But you don’t know for sure. You said it was all speculation.”
He shrugged.
“Well, now you know,” I muttered under my breath.
“Yes,” Gabriel agreed, pressing his lips to my temple. “Now we know.”
“I find it hard to believe Katja was actually willing to risk her life.”
She might be a psycho vampire bitch, but the exotic beauty had never struck me as someone who would become so despondent about her circumstances that she would willingly accept the chance of death as an alternative. Then again, Katja was a vampire who appeared to have embraced the modern age with gusto. Being incarcerated had probably felt like being hurled back to the Stone Age. It was difficult to know how anyone, human or vampire, would react to a punishment so draconian.
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