by E. M. Moore
He chuckled. “I’ll be on my best behavior. Unless of course T.J. will be there, then all bets are off.”
I scratched the back of my neck. “That’s probably going to be a problem because I bet he will be there. He works very closely with Lex on all this stuff. I actually don’t know why he wouldn’t be there.”
Nic’s jaw clenched. He pushed the door open for the dungeon area where they kept all the cells and stayed quiet until we’d descended halfway down the stairs. “I’ll do my best,” he ground out.
For Nic, I knew that was as good as it was going to get. I trusted that he wouldn’t do anything to sacrifice the intent though. We needed Soren to talk. If we couldn’t get him to talk, we were flying blind, which wasn’t a good scenario, but it particularly wasn’t good since we were always a step behind when it came to Dumont. We were a step behind when it came to them taking me. We were a few steps behind when it came to them trying to takeover The Fort. This was the first instance in which we could have the upperhand and I wasn’t about to let it slip out of our grasps. If we wanted to defeat him once and for all, we needed Soren.
These thoughts floated through my mind as we made our way down the rest of the stairs. The lone light bulb shone again above the singular table in the middle of the room. T.J. sat in the chair in front of Soren, and they just stared at one another. Nic stiffened.
When Soren’s gaze flicked to me, T.J. turned. A smile lit his face when he recognized me, but when he looked beyond me and found Nicolai, his gaze narrowed. “Hey,” I said quickly, trying to diffuse the resulting tension. “I was wondering how our prisoner is doing this morning?”
“Ah,” Soren said. “The young guard missed me.”
“Don’t count on it,” T.J. said at the same time Nic almost growled.
Soren laughed. “You certainly do have a devotion of fans.” He peered behind me and then his eyes glinted as Nic and I moved into the light of the room. “Well, if it isn’t a Ravana Prince. How nice to see you young Nicolai.”
Nic scoffed. “You want to overthrow my entire family. I can’t say the same for you.”
“Overthrow?” Soren said dismissively. “More like take you out entirely. Isn’t that what your ancestor did to my family?”
“Obviously not. Dumont’s still alive. How old is he now again? Five hundred?”
“Not a day over 333, actually.”
Nic stalked forward. “And you wonder why no one wanted your family in power anymore. Times are changing. Your family is stuck in the same old purist ways. In order to keep surviving here, we had to adapt and your family refused. You say my family took you out? I say you did that to yourselves.”
“Well, since only one of us was actually alive when it happened, you won’t mind if I keep my own opinions on the topic, will you?”
“You just keep proving my point again and again.”
Soren rocked back in his chair, the front legs coming off the ground. A pale hand swiped over his chin before folding over his chest. “Tell me, Nicolai. What is it like to know that you brought this guard to your world only to die?”
Nic and T.J. both growled, but Nic charged the cell, his finger closing around the bars in a fierce grip.
“Oh,” Soren said, the chair dropping to all four feet. “Well, this is interesting.”
I rolled my eyes and pulled Nic back from the cell by the back of his shirt. I waved T.J. away from the chair and sat in his place. His gaze flicked between me and Nicolai, scrutinizing until a deep-seated fear started to take root. Nic’s reaction may have just tipped the enemy off as to my relationship with the princes.
“Tell me, Ariana. Do you plan on becoming a vampire?”
T.J. openly laughed. “Guards don’t become vampires.” His lip curled in disgust. “Vamps like you and—” his gaze flicked toward Nic, but he didn’t say his name, “—would never condescend to make someone like us someone like you.”
Soren tapped his chin, not bothering to even look at T.J., but his gaze staying on mine instead. He leaned forward. “But let’s say that you could. Would you do it?” He paused, the question sinking into me like a dead weight. It was a question I often asked myself. If I wanted to be with the princes forever, that was literally my only option. I could be with them until I died, or I could be with them, youthful, forever. Truth be told, that was one of the only selling points. Sure, being a vampire would be cool. Superior strength and abilities, but they also led a very limited life here. At least, that was what I’d witnessed so far. They were constantly in fear of being found out and I learned a long time ago that living your life in fear was not any way to live. “You don’t have to answer,” Soren said, getting to his feet. He clasped the bars in front of him and rested his head between two. “A word of advice though. A word to tell you all how ridiculous it is that I’m even being kept here. When you’re turned, the blood of the vampire who turned you becomes your everything. I won’t give Dumont up, because his blood is mine. I’m loyal to him only. You’re wasting you time trying to drag answers out of me because it’s literally beyond my ability to answer you truthfully.”
“So death is your option then?” T.J. asked, a dangerous hint to his voice.
Soren spared a derisive glance toward the other guard and then stared back at me. “So be sure when—if…” he shrugged. “…that you have chosen your sire appropriately. You will be bound to them for eternity.”
“And how’s Dumont for a sire?” I asked, trying to take the emphasis of me. Warning bells were going off in my head that Soren had already gleaned too much.
“He has sired many like me.”
“An army,” I said.
“I suppose you would call it that.”
“Well, I did see others in the alleyway, then most recently at The Fort. They were all sired by Dumont? What about free will? What about—?”
“Free will? Even you do not have free will, Young One. I told you before that by them bringing you here as their guard, they’ve literally sentenced you to death.”
“I’m still standing. No one’s told me to come here and talk to you today, I did it on my own. Last night I was at a party with my friends. That sounds an awful lot like free will to me.”
“I hope you live like that while you can. Soon, there will be no more parties. When Dumont takes over, he will let the vampires take their proper places in this world. We will feed off humans, become stalkers of the night again instead of encapsulating ourselves into small pockets throughout the world. The humans will again learn to fear us. There will be no more uprisings such as the one you dealt with yesterday. Tell me, were you the one who killed him? Did you start all this?”
I looked at T.J. who shrugged. “He probably heard Lex and I talking about it. We had to fortify the grounds last night with extra guards to make sure none of them got in.”
Soren sneered. “And you say you have free will? Stuck in The Fort, no where to go because you are at the whim of those who will guard you and keep you safe. When Dumont is in power, the humans will not dare such a thing because they will know their place as our meals.”
Nicolai’s teeth clenched. “Dumont will never be in power. We’re not going anywhere.”
“You are no closer to figuring anything out. While you waste your time here with me, he is gaining strength again. His ‘army’, as you put it, is far greater than you can even imagine. He has been dormant for hundreds of years. How do you think he spent that time? Preparing for this one moment. You’re all but dead.” His eyes flicked to me. “I did warn you. I do wish there was something I could do for you. I suppose if you let me out, I could turn you myself. You would be a prize to Dumont.”
Nicolai lunged forward again, peeling one of Soren’s hands from the bars and yanking him forward until his face smashed into the bars in front of him. Nic hissed, his fangs coming out in full force. Soren mimicked him. His fangs lengthening to needle-like points as he hissed back at Nicolai.
T.J. moved forward a second before I jumped up. Th
e vampires all moved too fast to keep up with. He pulled Nic away. Nicolai still attempted to get Soren, nails sharpening from his fingers as he clawed the air. Soren laughed deep in his throat as my stomach bottomed out. T.J. had a hell of a time pulling Nic to the exit while I just watched, surprised by his outburst. Both of theirs actually. I’d never seen two vampires try to fight before. It set a tingle of fear down my spine. Both beasts, more agile and strong than any human. They were fierce, and the very looks on their faces cultivated a panic inside me. I stepped back, almost blown away by the outpouring of pure hatred until T.J. wrestled Nic into the other room. I knew I should help. Nic didn’t like T.J. under the best of circumstances and this was bound to piss him off more, but I was stunned.
“The offer stands,” Soren said, his eyes still bloodshot as he stared at me. His pupils were thin slits, but regaining normalcy by the second.
“I’ll pass,” I said, my voice hard.
I turned to walk toward the exit when Soren chuckled. I spun toward him, done with all the games and word puzzles. “What?”
“He is not long for this world, Young One. Better to pick a different sire.”
I swallowed, my throat like sandpaper. I turned and walked as fast as I could from the room, hoping it didn’t look like fleeing, which was all I could think about. How had Soren been so easily able to connect the dots? There was something different about him. Something almost human in his reactions, yet so vampire in others. He was a mystery, which just made this task all the more difficult. He said he wouldn’t give up his sire, but I needed him to. I just had to figure out how to get him to do it. Otherwise, his last threat was probably right. Nicolai—along with the rest of my princes—probably weren’t long for this world. And that very thought, froze me to my core.
Chapter Ten
Sounds of a scuffle met my ears when I passed through the doorway. I immediately lunged forward and pulled T.J. and Nicolai apart. “Enough!” I said.
They both retreated to opposite sides of the hall. Nicolai wiped his chin while T.J.’s hands clenched at his sides. His gaze narrowed at the prince. I tried to tell them both to calm down again, but T.J. barreled ahead. “What the hell was that? You can’t go after our prisoner. One, we need him. Two, if your ass gets injured, it’s on me. Not that I would care.”
I sucked in a breath, realizing T.J. had pretty much just committed treason right there, whether he meant it or not. Nicolai’s gaze narrowed, but he didn’t call him out on it. He wasn’t the type to do that kind of thing. Slowly, he crossed his arms in front of his chest and regained his composure. “It was just a pissing contest between two vampires.”
Footsteps thundered down the stairs, and Lex, her eyes wide and worried ran into view. “What the hell’s going on down here?” She took in the sight of T.J. and Nicolai and sighed. “Can’t you two knock it off? We have more important things to worry about.” Her eyes found me and she stopped short. “You were talking to Soren again? Did you get anything out of him?”
I blew out a breath, looking at Nic and T.J. to make sure they would behave themselves. “Not too much of anything.”
“Yeah because this one decided he was going to lunge at him,” T.J. said.
Nic shrugged. “I don’t like others talking about my guard.”
“She’s not your guard yet, Prince.”
Nic’s lips started to pull back, so I stepped forward. “I didn’t realize what he said about becoming a vampire was true. That you’re loyal to your sire. How are we ever supposed to get him to talk if it’s virtually impossible for him to defy Dumont?”
I looked at Nic, pleading with him. He let his guard down and shrugged. “It’s like that and it’s not. Yes, whoever turns you fosters a love inside you. That’s how even when children are taken away from their human lives under perfectly normal circumstances, they still go through the process of becoming a vampire well. Well,” he locked eyes with me. “I’ve only seen one who rejected it. Those cases are rare. Maybe even one in a million.”
My stomach churned as I thought about my late best friend. His absence here would always haunt me along with the questions of ‘why’. Why didn’t he make it when everyone else had? I pulled my shoulders back. “So, it basically transfers the love from one to the other?”
“In essence,” Nic said. “You’d have to ask Isabelle for more in-depth information. I only have the basics.”
“He does seem particularly interested in Ariana,” T.J. said, finally shaking off the remnants of his spat with Nic. “At first, I thought it was just because of Nic’s responses to his threats. Soren likes to get under others’ skin, but it seems more than that. He seemed genuinely curious as to whether or not Ariana was going to become a vampire, even though there’s no way she could. He seemed earnest in wanting to tell her about what would happen, even telling her he would turn her himself. What would drive him to do that?”
I shook my head, a thousand different thoughts flickering through my head. I paused, a niggle of an idea starting to take shape. I spoke aloud, the thoughts coming together as words passed my lips unfiltered. “We need him on our side. He says he’s loyal to Dumont so there’s no way he can give us the information we seek. What if we looked into his human life to see if there’s anything we could use? He kept saying sire when he referenced Dumont, and being loyal to him. He didn’t say anything about being family or being loved. Maybe that’s what we could make him see?”
Lex gazed at me curiously. “I’m not following.”
I tried to make my idea into a more sensible one. “Soren is loyal to Dumont, but just being someone’s slave isn’t enough to win their love. What if we could pull something from his past and use that against him? Show him what Dumont did to him, took him away from his family and made him a servant basically. We could also use our way of life here to show him that it’s not like that everywhere. He didn’t like when I said that Dumont had essentially changed humans into vampires to grow an army. He likes the idea of being family, but he doesn’t know the difference. Dumont hasn’t given him what people crave as their basic needs.”
Lex started to nod. “Let’s give it a try. T.J., I want you to tell Matthews to start research on Soren. Maybe there’s something we can find out about his background. Who were his parents? Brothers? Sisters? Anything we can use to see how different a world Dumont created for him.”
Nic stared at the ground. As T.J. and Lex continued to run with the plan, I walked up to him. “Hey, you okay?”
He nodded. “T.J. doesn’t bother me. I was going easy on him.” He looked up, the dark set in his eyes growing. “I don’t know if you’re on the right track here, Ri. Soren’s right. You are loyal to the person who made you. We might have to find another way to get to Dumont. There’s no way I would give up Mom and Dad if put in his position.”
I grabbed his upper arm. “Of course you wouldn’t. I agree with you a hundred percent there, but you know why you wouldn’t? Just by what you said, Nicolai. You just called them Mom and Dad. What does Soren call Dumont?”
“Dumont.”
“What has Dumont groomed Soren to do?”
He shrugged. “Fight, I guess.”
“Exactly,” I said, my smile growing. “It’s like raising pitbulls to fight. Sure, that might be all they ever know, but they’re not family. They don’t have something worth fighting for. He’s just a pawn to Dumont. If Soren died here, do you think Dumont would mourn him? Don’t you think anyone would feel the difference there? The difference between being loved and just being a chess piece in a game?”
“I don’t know, Ri. I don’t know what the other part of that feels like.”
Heat pricked behind my eyes. “I do. I know exactly how that feels. I know what it’s like to wake up in someone else’s house and realize that you’re definitely not one of them or one of theirs, or even a part of them. It’s like you’re an alien and you’re going through the motions of a happy family. They might pretend to dress you up, take care of you. Hell, they
might even be trying their best, but some people, they just don’t have the compassion to care for someone else in that way. From what I’ve heard about Dumont, he’s that person. In fact, he’s worse than that person. He’s the kind of foster parents I had that just took me in for a purpose. Money, other, worse reasons Nicolai that you can’t even dream of. They like having power over someone. No matter if they’re twice as small as you and you’re not half as strong, they still try to make you feel smaller. They bring you into their home to exert their authority over you in ways that would make you cringe if I told you. That’s the kind of figure Dumont is and trust me, if any of the human is left in Soren, he’ll recognize it for what it is. I can relate to him on this level. After my mom died, I didn’t know what family was until you and your brothers saved me. I told you before, that’s not living. He’ll see that. I know he will. We just have to show him how others live. In safety, in love, in happiness. It’s a world he can’t grasp because it’s possible he’s never seen it before. That’s why he kept trying to get you to react, I bet. He was curious. Why is the prince defending her? She’s just his guard. She’s nothing.”
Nicolai peeked behind my shoulder and then pulled me close. “You’re everything.”
“I know that.” I squeezed his arm and then dropped my hand. “I’ve got a really good feeling about this, Nic. I think we’ve finally got our answer about how to deal with Soren. He’ll come around. I can feel it.”
Nic turned, addressing Lex. “Alert Ariana when the info about Soren’s past comes back. She should be the one to talk to him again.”
“Already planned on it, Nic.” He winked at her and she just shook her head. “You’re lucky I like you or I might remind you that your father put me in charge of this mission.” Nic smirked, and started to lead me up the stairs. Lex called out and we turned. “Good work in there, Stuart. I think you’re on to something.”
I smiled back, my chest lifting in pride. All I wanted to do was help and it finally looked as if that was happening. A place to start, that was all we needed. Part of me felt bad for Soren. I’d felt his pain before, and I’d also felt his hopelessness. Maybe there was a chance to save him, too. If he gave up the information—when—he gave up the information, maybe it was possible to acclimate him to our way of living. It was possible he could turn his life around if he knew what living truly meant. Didn’t everyone deserve that chance?