“You want me to protect the naturi?” His brow furrowed. “Is Shelly going to be down here as well? Are you?”
“Yes, Shelly is going to be down here with you. Most of us are going to be crammed down here, I imagine,” I said. My gaze darted away from Danaus for a moment and I licked my lips. I had to just come out and say it.
“The spell won’t discriminate between naturi and human. It will attack anything that moves,” I explained, looking back up at the man that didn’t trust my kind, and yet I was asking him for the ultimate moment of trust. “I want Shelly to put you in a sleep spell like Cynnia.”
Danaus’s face twisted with horror and rage. “No! Absolutely not!” he shouted, pacing away from me. The sound of his boots hitting the concrete floor rebounded off the walls, filling the room with his anger. “There has to be another way. I will not be helpless during the day!”
“Welcome to my world,” I said with a tinge of bitterness. “I’ve been helpless during the daylight hours for more than six centuries and yet I’ve survived. I’m asking one day of you.”
“I’m not a vampire!” he snarled at me. He undid the safety strap on the knife handle he had been holding and drew the knife. I was grateful that we were alone down there, or this could have become an even uglier stand-off. “I’ve been a hunter my entire existence. I won’t lie side by side with my enemy while the naturi come to kill us all.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him that he had been a hunter for too long, but then that was for another fight and another time. “We have no choice.”
“That’s your answer for everything!” He took a step closer to me with the knife drawn, but I didn’t move. I wasn’t going to do anything to give him the fight that he was currently aching for out of fear. “We’re trapped. We’re surrounded. The naturi have us beaten at every turn. Let’s combine our powers and destroy their souls!” he shouted at me.
“Well, then you should be happy that we’ve got an alternative this time,” I calmly stated. “This spell will only kill them. Their souls are set free to go on to their afterlife the moment the spell has been ended. From my understanding, it’s not a particularly painful death either. It’s just a need to sleep that can’t be overcome.”
“How nice! A humane death,” he sarcastically snapped.
“Do you have an alternative?” I growled, finally reaching the end of my patience. “We tried to kill them our way and it didn’t work. You may get your wish, and it may never work again after what Cynnia did to me. I still don’t know. All I do know is that the moment the sun rises above the horizon, all the naturi waiting just beyond the fire are going to come flooding into the lodge with the simple goal of beheading every nightwalker within its confines. You are a master swordsman and a warrior whose equal I have not seen, but you cannot win against that many naturi.”
“I won’t be left helpless during the day.”
“We’ll be protected from the naturi,” I said, finally taking a step closer to him.
“I’m not completely human. You know that. Maybe the spell won’t affect me,” he suddenly countered. It was an angle I had thought of and didn’t like. There was something else that could happen because of his bori background that I wasn’t too thrilled about either. Putting him to sleep was the safest solution.
“You’re human enough,” I sighed heavily. “It just means that it might take a few minutes longer to kill you, and the more you move, the faster the spell will work. It comes down to this, Danaus. You either let Shelly put you into a sleep spell so you can be protected here, or you try to sneak away from the lodge as it is surrounded by naturi. Your odds of survival are higher if you stay here.”
“I won’t be helpless!” he repeated, but some of the venom had left his tone.
I closed the distance between us and laid my hand over the hand that was still tightly clenching the knife. When I touched him, I could feel fear radiating through him, similar to the terror I had felt the first few nights I spent alone as a nightwalker. Helpless during the daylight hours, at the mercy of anything that happened to stumble across you while you slept. “We will all be protected from the naturi.”
“And what about when the sun rises?” he inquired, his grip on the knife loosening somewhat under my hand.
“Then you’ll awaken,” I reassured him.
“Not like you will. I’ll be trapped within a sleep spell. Someone will have to wake me up.”
“No one will touch you!” I snarled suddenly, finally getting to the root of his problem. It wasn’t just that he was afraid of being surrounded by naturi while he slept during the day, but that he feared being helpless against the nightwalker enemy when we awoke the following night. I reached up and cupped his face with both my cold hands, threading my finger through his thick black hair. “No one will touch you! I forbid it. You belong to me and me alone. I will be among the first to awaken and I will wake you. No nightwalker or naturi will touch you, I vow it.”
As I spoke, a dark, feral need rose up in me. I needed to pull him down to me and drain some of the blood from his neck. I needed to feel his blood coursing through my veins, marking him as mine. I needed for all in the nightwalker world to realize that none should lay a hand on the hunter. He was mine.
Biting the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste blood, I released my hold and took a couple steps away from him. I shoved my hand through my wind-blown hair and drew in a sharp breath through my nose, pushing those feelings deep down inside of me. Danaus didn’t need to know about such desires. It was a nightwalker thing—this strange need to possess and control. But he didn’t belong to me; not as a friend anyway. He was simply my enemy put on hold.
“Will you let Shelly put you into a sleep spell?” I asked when I was back in control of my emotions.
“You make it sound as if I have a choice in this matter,” he calmly said.
I smiled at him. “You do. You can agree to do this and we go about it calmly and quietly. Or, we fight it out until I knock your sorry ass unconscious and then Shelly completes the spell.”
“But the sun is rising. There’s only time for one thing.”
“Please, Danaus, don’t commit suicide out of fear. That’s all this would amount to. You’d die because you were afraid to sleep for a few hours.”
“I’m going to be helpless.”
“But protected.”
After a moment of tense silence as he turned the knife over in one hand, I knew he was drawing closer to his decision, though I wasn’t completely sure that I would like it.
“Do it,” he bit out abruptly, surprising me. I had thought he was going to force me to knock him out.
“You need me now?” Shelly asked, softly coming down the stone steps that led to the basement.
“Yes,” I murmured, looking back at Danaus. “I need another sleep spell.”
No one spoke as Danaus placed his knife back in the sheath on his belt and sat on the concrete ground next to Cynnia. He crossed his arms over his chest and stretched out his legs before him. His dark blue gaze never left me as I stood before him. My attention was torn between the hunter and watching Shelly as she pulled out her blue chunk of chalk and drew a circle around the hunter. It was outlined with a set of symbols I didn’t understand and probably never would.
“You’ll be safe,” I said just before Shelly murmured the final word of the spell. Danaus’s brilliant blue eyes slid shut and his head fell forward so his chin rested against his chest. His breathing was even, and I could feel a deep peace drift over him. A part of me wanted to reach over and push aside the dark locks of hair that had fallen across his face, but I couldn’t break the seal. Something inside of me ached to see him like that, vulnerable to the world, vulnerable to my world.
“What do you want me to do now?” Shelly asked, drawing my attention back away from the hunter. She nervously turned the chalk over in her hand, waiting for the next spell that she was to perform. The tips of her fingers were a mix of black and pale blue f
rom the ash and chalk she had been using around the lodge to protect us while we slept during the daylight hours.
“I’m guessing that you can’t perform the same spell on yourself,” I said with a frown. She shook her head and shoved the chalk into the pocket of her now worn and dirty jeans. “And there isn’t enough time to teach me how to do it properly.”
“What are you going to do with me?”
I sighed. I knew it was going to come to this, but we were left with little choice. I felt bad putting her in this dangerous position considering all she had done to protect us, but it was all I could think of.
“You have to sleep during the day with the others,” I said. When she opened her mouth to possibly counter what I planned to say next, I held up my hand. “You have to sleep the entire day without moving or you could die. It’s why you’ve put both Cynnia and Danaus in sleep spells. I need you to do the same, and the only way I can accomplish that is to hypnotize you.”
“Why didn’t you do that with Danaus?” she asked, taking a step back away from me.
“Because I seriously doubt that it would work on Danaus,” I said, leaving out the part that I would not drink his blood. I might want to mark him, but his background with the bori meant that it was best if I avoided his blood altogether. Of course, it was highly unlikely that the hunter would allow me to drink from him anyway.
Shelly took a step backward again, holding up one hand to ward me off. “How do I know you’re not just trying to kill me? I failed you on the island. Your people could have been killed because of me. I haven’t been as useful as I should be. I’m a burden. This could just be your way of finishing me off.” She edged farther away from me.
I matched her step for step, finally grabbing her outstretched hand with mine. Her fingers trembled in my grasp. “If I wanted you dead, I’d leave you alive to fuel the spell that Stefan and I are creating. I’d use your life to save us all. Instead, I’m trying to keep you alive because I’m going to need you to help me protect Cynnia for as long as possible tomorrow night. I’m not trying to kill you.”
“Oh,” she whispered. “Will it hurt?”
“You won’t feel or remember a thing, I promise.”
Before she could give me any further argument, I pulled her into my arms at the same time as I entered her mind in a single, quick thrust. She had left her thoughts a wide-open door to me in her confusion and fear, easily allowing me to take over. As my fangs sank into her slender throat, I was already sending through her body feelings of safety and serenity. I sent her images of being at home in her own bed, wrapped in a thick warm quilt. Shelly curled against me and softly sighed as her blood flowed down my throat in wonderful waves. I’d needed to feed again before I could complete the Stain with Stefan.
I drank as deep as I dared. I needed her to remain weak throughout the day, helping her to remain in the deep hypnotic state I was about to place her into. However, I didn’t need her so weak that she couldn’t function properly the next night.
Sleep deep, Shelly. I command you to sleep deep this day, I repeated within her brain, burrowing the thought into her mind so it was the only thing there. You will sleep through the entire day until the sun sets on the horizon. You will remain asleep until I summon you. You will not move. You will not stir. You will not dream. You will sleep until I summon you.
Quickly healing the wound on her neck, I gathered her up in my arms and carried her over to lay on the other side of Cynnia and Danaus. Around them, boxes of hotel supplies of different sorts rose up, obscuring them from view, protecting them in a type of cardboard fortress. It was the best I could do for now. Before the last of the night was through, I would join them in this little niche of the basement and offer up my own body as protection against the naturi.
Somewhat rejuvenated by Shelly’s blood, I bounded up the stairs to find Stefan waiting on the front stairs leading from the lodge. The blue wall of flames was beginning to flicker and thin in places. The night was nearly gone, and my hold on both the blood and earth magic was failing. We needed to finish the Stain now if we were going to be able to complete it at all.
“Have your little ones been taken care of?” Stefan asked snidely.
“All of mine have been seen to. Have George and Bertha gotten everyone into the lodge?”
“Everyone has been settled.”
“What about the humans?” I demanded, suddenly remembering the human guardians that were supposed to be arriving in the morning. If they came to the lodge, they’d all be killed just like the naturi.
“I’ve reached a few of them telepathically,” Stefan blandly commented with an indifferent wave of his hand. “They’ve been told to remain at Aguas Calientes until after the sun sets. They are supposed to spread the word to the rest of the humans.”
I was surprised that he had bothered at all, but then I was willing to guess he had a human or two within the group that he was partial to. As the old saying goes, good help is hard to find. And finding a human that you could trust to properly take care of your daylight needs took more than a few years of training.
“Then let’s do this,” I said, extending my hand to him.
Stefan smiled down at me as he took my hand and led me out into the open yard just in front of the lodge. “You make this sound so dire. Do you honestly fear the Stain on your soul?”
“We never expected the naturi to walk the earth in force again,” I said when we stopped walking. “Do you not wonder if there are bori here as well? I have no desire to become a beacon to such a creature.”
Stefan turned to face me and took my other hand in his. “Yes, I’d say you’ve attracted more than your share of attention already.”
There was nothing to say after that. He was right. I was already a beacon to every dark and/or pathetic creature that crawled out of the night. I didn’t need to draw the attention of anything else, much less the bori.
A creature that seemed more myth than reality now, the bori were the guardians of the soul. They gained their powers from anything that had a soul, and considering the number of humans that now occupied the earth, any remaining bori would be extremely powerful. While the lycanthropes had the dubious honor of being created by the naturi, according to legend, any nightwalker that wasn’t in total denial was fully aware of the fact that the bori had created nightwalkers as a type of servant. We had freed ourselves from our masters centuries ago with the help of the lycanthropes, and were in no hurry to return to such servitude. The bori might be locked away, but the naturi had already proven that such a thing could be a temporary arrangement. I had no desire to have a Stain on my soul calling to them should the bori ever return. I had enough masters pulling my strings already.
With our hands clasped, I closed my eyes and opened my mind so I could easily hear Stefan’s thoughts. I could feel his worry and his deep-seated frustration at being forced to protect me when he would much rather kill me for my seat on the Coven. I could also feel his confusion over Danaus, his curiosity over what he truly was and over what my fascination with the hunter.
There were no words for the spell. It didn’t need them. After we both relaxed and opened our minds, the tendrils of our souls were free to wander and merge. The energy rose up between us and blanketed the area from one edge of the perimeter to the other, circling us completely. In unison, we drew in a breath of the cold night air, drawing our souls back into our bodies, creating the first step of the spell. Anything with a soul would have the energy immediately drained from its body if it stepped within the perimeter. Stefan and I then slowly released the breath, forming an invisible bubble between our two bodies. There, the energy would be stored until we released it the next night—the souls set free again to go to their respective afterlife.
I frowned as I slowly opened my eyes to meet Stefan’s gaze. He was frowning as well because he felt the same thing that I did. When we started the spell, our souls had mingled together, and when we pulled our souls back into our bodies, they had not complete
ly separated as we expected. I could still feel the cold touch of his soul within my body, and I had no doubt that he felt mine as well.
“It’s like a fire burning inside of my chest,” he whispered as he stared at me.
“And I now have a chunk of ice in mine,” I replied.
“Interesting.”
“Will it cause problems with the Stain?”
Stefan shook his head as he lead us back into the lodge, both of our hands still joined. “I would expect it to strengthen the spell. I have never done the Soul Sucking spell with another. I had not expected…this.”
I paused at the doorway and looked back at the blue flames that ringed us. With a blink of my eyes and a smile, the fire died just as I kicked the door to the lodge shut with my foot. The spell was set. Let them come.
Stefan and I continued to hold hands until we reached the basement. There, our fingers slowly slid apart, releasing the invisible bubble so it was now housed in the relative safety of the underground room. I could feel its presence hanging in the air, but there was nothing else to indicate that it was there.
With my focus off the spell, I wavered on my feet and stumbled backward into the waiting arms of another nightwalker. The basement was crowded with bodies. I could feel a few on the upper floor, guessing they had preferred to find a hiding place in the closet of a darkened room or in the bathtub of a windowless bathroom. But most were in the basement with Stefan and me. If a fire started, the hope was that it would reach us last, buying us as much time as possible.
Exhaustion was starting to take its toll on me and everyone else. The nightwalkers around me settled on the floor, mindless of the dirt and the dust. They curled into balls like cats and hid behind piles of boxes. I didn’t see where Stefan settled as I headed over to the corner that had been seemingly avoided by all the other nightwalkers—the corner that held Danaus, Cynnia, and Shelly. I settled on the floor directly across from Danaus. With my back against the wall and my ankles crossed, I stared at him, waiting for the sun to finally rise.
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