by SARA FREITES
“Autumn?” Blake’s voice broke through the silence of the building.
I tried to scream at him to run, but my throat remained paralyzed. When Blake came into view, he froze at the sight of me. He went to say something, but no words escaped.
{Blake, run!} I screamed in my head, hoping my attempts would be strong enough to break their hold over me.
I watched Blake’s chest wound, where he’d stabbed himself, go through a healing cycle through the rip in his shirt. At the same time, his eyes scanned me and paused at the joints in my arms, the bare skin at my neck and then back into my eyes. There was no doubt—he knew what had happened to me. He had the chance to stop me then, but he never took it.
My lips parted, leaving the corner turning up while my longest fangs brushed against my bottom lip. I could feel the dagger in my hand and at the same time, could sense the twin evnauts growing anxious. If only I could tell Blake what I’d learned by listening to their thoughts now—they were weakened, weren’t strong enough to fight now unless their strength was united by possessing another body together. I could hear their thoughts as they deliberated on what to do about their weakening state. They wanted an easy out.
I swung around and plunged the dagger into Blake’s side. My insides churned as I felt the resistance of Blake’s body against the blade. The act of forcing a sharp object into a solid, living being was one of the most repulsing feelings I’d ever experienced. I heavily cussed at Vex and Scythe in my head, using every vile word I could think of. Without a moment’s rest, I wrenched the dagger from Blake and shoved him so forcefully that he shot across the hall. He tumbled over the carpet. When he hit the base of the wall, portions of it collapsed on him. I waited a beat, gazing after him from under my brow as he slowly gathered himself.
“If you fight us, you’ll break her delicate bones. If you don’t, we’ll break all of yours,” I said, my voice distorted, the twins’ voices echoing from my throat along with mine.
I felt another abrupt high. Along with this, my skin tingled and my head swooned. I explosively lunged for Blake. Our impact forced him deeper into the wall. I grabbed a handful of his shirt and wrenched him from the rubble, throwing him, this time sending him down the hallway. His back hit the exposed brick of the side wall, and pieces of it crumbled to the ground. Blake recovered gracefully on all fours.
With this one instance, I noticed Blake's reaction time had slowed. I couldn't believe he wasn't going to fight back. The evnaut brothers were going to kill him...I was going to kill him.
I moved before Blake in an instant, yards away from where I stood only a second earlier. I desperately threatened the twins all over again, swearing I’d kill them if they didn’t stop. They laughed at me. My arm uncoiled from my side and drove the dagger into Blake’s chest. His back hit the doorframe. The sound of his sternum cracking under the pressure had me reeling on the inside. My other arm extended over my head, then swung out. The side of my fist struck Blake in the head. I felt something crack inside my hand as the force of the blow caused his head to snap to his left. The pain was there but only from far away. It was like listening to a TV on the lowest volume only still being able to understand every word. Blood gushed from a new wound in Blake’s right eyebrow.
“Uh oh,” I mocked him. “It seems we may have broken her delicate hand.”
Ever so slowly, I leaned in, sliding the dagger further into Blake and demanding his eyes on me with my closeness. He cringed and breathed heavily with every inch of the blade that penetrated him.
“Maybe you didn’t take us seriously,” I continued on through my fangs. “We may not exist in this dimension by our own accord, but we could conquer it if we chose to. There is nothing standing in our way. Not you…”
I viciously jabbed the blade deeper into his chest. The hilt was the only thing keeping it from going any farther. Blake bared his fangs and panted in pain.
“Not the human. Not even Arlos,” the evnauts continued through me. “But this place makes us nauseous with disgust. We don’t care to be here any longer. Yet here you are, brother, forcing us to fight, prolonging our stay here.”
“I’m not going to let you leave here,” Blake snarled. “Once you get settled into your dark little hole in hell, you might decide it’s not enough. You’ll realize you’d rather live in a weaker dimension, one you can rule. You may not want to be here now, but once you sit in hell, rotting long enough, you’ll wish you’d never left.”
I could feel the brothers’ anger. My feelings rose along with theirs as the back of my neck and shoulders burned hotter and hotter. My arms tensed. My hands stiffened around the dagger’s handle.
“What are you saying?” I seethed.
“After living in a place like this where you could have the beings of this world bowing down at your feet, you’ll come back with hundreds of others just as greedy as you to take over. You’re built just like Arlos. It’s in your blood to hurt people and take what’s not yours. But I’m not going to give you the chance to do it.”
Vex and Scythe roared inside my head. I ripped the dagger from Blake’s chest and backed away as the two evnauts thought about the hundreds of ways they wanted to kill Blake. Every image flashed before my eyes, and this brought comfort to the evnaut brothers.
“If that’s how you feel, then you can just die now as you stand in our way!” I hollered.
Blake’s hand lifted over his healing chest wound, and he extended his middle finger at me. I felt my nostrils flare, my lips pulling away from my fangs. I charged him. Blake pushed off the wall into me, slinging me back through the hallway. When I found my footing a few yards away, Blake was there. I slashed at him with the dagger. He blocked my attack, defensively knocking me into the nearest wall. I ricocheted off it and slammed my fist into the side of his head. Another cracking sensation spread throughout my hand. Blake staggered away. I readied the dagger and dove in for him. This sent us both through the drywall. I felt pain from the impact, dulled and muted like everything else I felt.
I landed directly on top of Blake before pulling us all to our feet and moving to strike him. He dodged. The momentum of my action sent me into one of the concrete pillars. I charged, this time knocking him against the wall. I raised the dagger, a clear shot at his side.
{No! Stop!} I cried in my head.
My body hesitated. Blake caught my wrist in his hand. He was suddenly stronger, holding my arm there in the air. My vision blurred, and I blinked. I felt something slide down one side of my face. Blake bumped the dagger from my weakened grasp and pushed me back. I staggered away. I could feel their agitation as the two raised my hand and harshly wiped my cheek. My eyes fell upon wet smears on the back of my dusky blue hand.
“Tears?” they hissed through me.
Blake plowed into me. He plunged the dagger’s blade into my chest just next to my heart. I was just as surprised by his action as the evnauts were, and the pain was intense. I could feel it all over. Invisible knives stabbed me in every crevice of my body as I screamed all on my own along with the inhuman shrieks of Vex and Scythe. A consuming pain burst from every nerve ending I had. I could hear my voice whimpering. All I could do was wonder why, why would Blake do this to me.
“It’s okay, Autumn,” Blake said into the side of my head as he reeled me in closer to him.
I gripped his sleeve out of my own will. My red human blood dripped around our feet, but it appeared mixed with something else...the blackened blood of the evnaut brothers. The agony subsided and centralized around the wound as Blake eased the dagger from my chest. I stumbled back, holding the wound. I could feel the evnauts move violently inside me. They thrashed side to side before wrenching themselves from my body. I crumpled to the ground.
And then, the twins were standing over me, each with a large bleeding wound just like mine in their chests. The pain came back, worse than before. I clutched at my wound. Blood gushed into my hands, and it pooled on the floor as I struggled for air. My right hand began to thro
b, along with my sides, but the sharpness in my chest overshadowed it all.
Without hesitation, Blake took Vex by the back of his shirt and whirled him around, slinging him through the door on my right. Scythe moved to fight, but Blake deflected his attack. He whipped around behind Scythe, wrapped his arm around his neck and plunged the dagger into his chest. When Blake drew the blade from Scythe’s flesh, the wound failed to heal.
“Scythe!” Vex hollered when he reappeared.
Blake’s arm moved so fast I almost didn’t see it. Scythe’s head rolled across the concrete. Vex shouted his brother’s name again as Scythe’s decapitated body collapsed. Blake rushed to me. Quickly, he bit into his wrist and pressed his now bloodied forearm against the stab wound at my chest. The pain subsided, but the healing process went unfinished.
Vex collided into us. We were forced against one another into the wall. Blake shielded me from the impact with an arm. Vex backhanded Blake’s hand that held the dagger, causing him to drop the weapon. It fell against the moldy baseboards close by. Blake shoved Vex, and they wrestled across the carpet. My chest heaved but wasn’t bleeding profusely anymore. Feverishly, I went for the dagger as they fought, but my body moved in slow motion now. My ears started ringing. I could smell my blood, could unexpectedly taste it. My fingers gripped the dagger’s handle. I dragged it across the carpet into me to keep it out of sight in case Vex came looking for it. Smoke from the floors below began seeping through the windows. Flickering blue flames could be seen dancing at the bottoms of the windowsills.
The floor before me burst. A man surfaced from it with his clothes smoldering, partially scorched. Tiny embers fell from his creamy-white dreads as he stood. It was the happiest I’d ever been to see Thade. Five others erupted from the ground around us. Thade knelt beside me and pushed my shoulder back to get a better look at my healing wound. I slid the dagger to him. I watched just over his shoulder as Blake threw Vex to the ground.
“Autumn,” Thade began.
”I’m okay,” I told him. “Take it.”
He grabbed it and readied it in his hand. Several more vampires came from the floor and readied themselves to fight. I saw Blake move away from Vex just past them. The dark evnaut rose to his feet, observing the vampires who came to join us. Cerulean fire arose from the holes the vampires had left as a slight smirk tugged across Vex’s face. Blake came to me, and Thade stepped aside, visibly concerned. Again, Blake bit into his wrist. His wound there had, by now, healed over. He pressed it against my chest to complete my healing process.
“I’m sorry I had to do that,” he apologized in a hushed voice. “It was reckless, but I had no other way.”
The dizziness and the last of the pain subsided along with all of my other cuts, bruises and breaks. By the time Blake pulled away, my wounds were completely gone, all except for a pink scar, the second scar the Soleil Dagger had left on my body.
“Thank you,” I said to Blake in a weak whisper.
“Fools,” Vex panted from across the room.
“Go to hell,” Harper sneered as the vampires surrounded the dark evnaut.
“Join me, will you?” Vex shouted, his eyes glowing a bright sky blue.
Like geysers, cobalt flames shot out from the gaping floor and swept through the entire area. It spread across the walls, blinding me. I screamed as my jeans caught fire. Blake’s hands were on me in an instant, smothering the flames that popped up.
“Get to the roof!” Thade shouted.
The ceiling caved. The floor under us slanted. Blake wrapped me in an arm and everyone fell to the level below. Blake lost his grip on me, and we tumbled down burning and falling slabs of wood and debris. Unprotected, I was rolling through the fiery rubble when Blake caught me by my wrist and guided me back into him, shielding me from the fire and falling concrete. When he found solid ground, he placed his arm over my head like a shield, then sent us up through the collapsing building. We broke out of the ceiling with ease. He lifted us from the concrete that I realized was the flat roof of the hotel. There, at least fifty vampires had gathered. I patted out small flames on Blake’s shirt. The burns left on his skin vanished right before my eyes.
“You’re alive!” Terry burst frantically as he went to help us from the rubble.
“Yes,” I coughed, still shaken by our encounter.
The vampires moved to the building across the street as Thade beckoned for us to follow. Blake took me in his arms. We sailed to the neighboring rooftop with Terry to join the others.
“I can’t believe that bugger got away,” Neil grumbled and brushed ash from his shoulders.
“It doesn’t matter,” Thade unsuccessfully held back a laugh. “His brother is dead and we have the dagger. He can either follow us to London for it and die along with Arlos, or hell, he can wait here and we’ll finish him off when we return. His choice. Either way, he won’t be near as tough without his brother.” He took Harper aside to talk to him.
“I’m just glad everyone’s okay,” I said as Blake set me on my feet. “Where was everyone when the fire started?”
“We escaped fast enough to recover,” Eden explained. “We waited in the warehouse next door until we thought we heard something going on over here. We searched every floor, even the ones on fire, as best we could until we found you.”
“This will undoubtedly end up on the ten o’clock news,” Garrett mumbled.
He took a quick peek over the edge. More fire trucks and several police cars swarmed the street below. As firemen continued to hose out the fire, the blue flames shrank back into the hotel, extinguishing themselves abnormally fast. Smoke billowed from the windows, and it, too, disappeared, leaving behind scorch marks around the walls of the structure. The smell of burnt wood filled the air.
“I’ll have the jet ready to leave for London as soon as I can,” Thade announced as he took out his cell phone. “Let’s get going!” he shouted as he moved by us into the crowd of vampires.
I sighed, disappointed. And there I was, hoping for a night to rest before our final battle with Arlos. As the group followed after Thade, I stopped Blake by the back of his shirt. Without restraint, I hugged him around his waist from behind. His hands rested on my arms, his thumb moving up and down along my wrist. I held him longer than I intended to.
“I’m so glad you’re okay. You had me scared for a second,” I admitted, almost laughing at myself. “Thank you.”
“You did really well, Autumn,” he said quietly. “I’m sorry I had to hurt you. Thank you for fighting with me. I couldn’t have done it without you.”
“I’m pretty sure it’s the other way around.”
“Autumn! Blake!” Thade waited high up on the adjacent building, watching us.
He motioned for us to get moving. Blake took me in his arms, and we went with the vampires across the rooftops. In the distance, the sun peered over the horizon, warning the vampires of their diminishing time.
The fight had not only been terrifying but also enlightening. I’d seen a side of myself I didn't even know existed. I also felt I’d seen a glimpse of what it would be like to go up against Arlos...if it came down to it, and a confidence in my ability to fight grew. For the most part, I felt I could hold my own as long as I had my guardian spell. I knew I had to get Jacoby’s knife back as soon as possible.
For the first time since I was forced into all of this, I felt like I had a fighting chance, that I truly wanted to be a part of sending Arlos back to hell—and since he’d made things personal, get rid of Vex myself.
Chapter 23
The Prophecy of a Vampire
“Whatever we do, we need to do it tonight and end this as quickly as possible,” Thade advised while he paced.
Blake and Harper entered the cabin, keeping a distance from one another. Eden and Garrett boarded shortly after them. As the jet left for London, I could hardly keep my eyes open. Thade was the first to notice.
“There’s a cot in the back,” he offered. “Try to rest as long as
you can. After tonight, you’ll never have to sleep again.”
Thade’s attempt to comfort me did nothing but make my insides churn. He showed me to a small room in the back and left me alone in the dim light. The fear of having another hellish nightmare wasn’t nearly as strong as my urge to sleep. I slept for most of the flight when it happened again. It began with flashes of light and loud, distorted noises. Unrecognizable images flashed across my mind. At first, I couldn’t make sense of what I was seeing until the dream sequence began. Ear-piercing screams filled my head.
“Autumn.”
A warm hand caressed up my back. Alarmed, I rolled over in bed.
“Oh, thank God,” I whispered, relieved Blake had been there to wake me before the dream completely took root. “You just saved me.”
I felt like I’d run for miles as I stared up at him, trying to catch my breath. The sheets were damp with sweat, my hair stuck to the back of my neck and cheek.
“I could hear your heartbeat over the engine. Was it him again?” he asked, whispering as he sat on the bed’s edge beside me.
“Yeah,” was all I could say.
“This will all be over soon,” he promised.
“I hope so,” I said deliberately as I brushed my hair out of my face.
I pressed the back of my hand to my forehead. My skin felt hot to the touch. Thade’s muffled voice could be heard through the door, but I couldn’t quite make out his words.
“We’ll be landing soon,” Blake told me.
I spotted a small mirror hanging on the wall just beyond the nightstand. It caught my reflection from the waist up as I lay there. I knew it would be the last time I’d ever see myself like this—healthy glowing skin, prismatic dark blonde hair, pinked cheeks, mauve lips. All of that color would die out with most of my soul. I would become a muted version of myself.