Nkosiyabo lifted a hammer of pure darkness and vampiric energy, and then brought it down upon the vampire queen.
I recoiled, covering my closed eyes, as debris and air rushed towards us. I held on to the lip of the broken wall, as Henri and Kyong were bowled over. Heather dug her blade into the ground, holding herself steady.
When the shockwave ended, I opened my eyes, expecting the Sanguineas vamps to have turned to ash, as Ukwesaba’s retinue had. But they were still standing, fanged mouths agape, looking at the ground where Victoria had lain.
“KAT!” Brett yelled, suddenly waking, and looking around hastily in a raw panic.
“It can’t be…” the vampire muttered.
Cindy nodded towards something I couldn’t see and smiled.
“Treth is back,” she said, and stood by me at the window. “And so is she.”
The darkness above Victoria writhed, and then moved. Below it, she lay. Alive. And even from here, I could see the shock on her face. It mirrored what was on ours.
For, hovering above her, with wings of splendid flame, Kat stood defiant against the dark titan before her.
As her light entered the world, the unnatural darkness began to abate. The stars began to shine, revealing the rest of the Izingane Zegazi in their hiding places.
I turned to the others, cocking my rifle.
“Our Last Light is back,” I announced, tears welling up in my eyes. “And there’re still monsters to slay!”
With a determined cry, led by Heather and Brett, those who could surged from the hospital, among many other purifiers and Crusaders who still lived. And we cut into the vampiric hordes, as our angel flew high above us, ready to slay another god.
Chapter 23. Retribution
***KAT***
The blackness turned into a red-hued world of fire and blood. Corpses lay all around a ruined structure, surrounded by spent shells and flames. Unnatural storms quaked around us.
Seems I’d missed a lot.
I felt Treth’s presence within me. I held onto him. Cherished him.
“Welcome back, Kat.” I felt his smile, and the tears he’d spent for me.
“I missed you, Treth.”
“Likewise, but it seems sentimentality will have to wait.”
Treth pulled my attention towards a pillar, like a burning conflagration, of dark energy. It pulsated with darkness. Like a writhing shadow creature. Atop it was a vampire. I immediately knew who it was. He made it quite easy. Wearing that crown of teeth and all. Nkosiyabo.
Which meant that Ukwesaba had been killed. I’d left the Crusaders in good hands!
The dark pyre was growing, gathering in energy, as a pale woman in a red dress lay at its feet. The King of Blood was readying an attack. A finishing blow.
I didn’t exactly know what was going on, but I did know a simple rule: an enemy of my enemy is my friend. At least for now.
“Are you ready, Treth?” I asked, letting him drop Ithalen into my hand.
“Are you, Kat?” Ariel spoke into my mind.
I smiled, as my coat sparked to life. It had been bored without me. And it was hungry for some action.
“Always,” Treth and I said. I felt fire burst from my back, forming wings of flame.
In a flash, I rushed above the fallen woman…vampire…and held up Ithalen. The darkness fell, like a collapsing skyscraper. But Allandrea and Ariel spoke to me. Fed me. And I even heard a bark during the chorus.
They were with me. They all were.
The pyre fell on my blade and I felt the shockwave resonate through me. Glass smashed and the concrete below my feet shattered.
But I wasn’t feeling exactly normal at the moment. In fact, I felt positively exhilarated. No more fatigue. No more doubt. Perhaps, I’d just needed a nice long nap.
The dark force hesitated and retreated. I landed on the ground, as I heard a rallying cry from inside the ruined building. Crusaders and Heiligeslicht purifiers poured out of the building, fighting toe to toe with vampiric beasts.
I landed, realising I had been hovering, and offered my hand to the vampire woman on the ground. She blinked at me in surprise, and then accepted.
“So, are we on the same side?” I asked.
“Seems that way,” she replied.
“And you are?”
She looked surprised that I needed to ask.
“Victoria Kruger.”
I laughed. “It seems they’ve been busy while I’ve been away.”
Victoria’s surprise turned to humour, as she smiled with me, exposing a pair of fangs. But the crackle of dark energy interrupted our levity, as the pyre pulsed and formed into tendrils of darkness.
“You okay to fight?” I asked.
Victoria opened her hands and let red smoky energy fall and coalesce into a platform, and then a tower like the dark pyre itself.
“Are you?” she countered.
I grinned, clutched Ithalen, and shot up into the sky.
A tendril shot out towards me. I spun, feeling Ariel guide my flight. Treth called out, helping me dodge another attack, as Victoria formed her own tendrils to wrestle with the darkness.
Like the pixies would harry a human, I jinked hard and dove underneath Nkosiyabo’s defences, cutting into the darkness with Ithalen. It melted away at the blade’s touch.
I heard Nkosiyabo cry out in pain and frustration. Victoria smashed her red pyre into the darkness, using the openings I’d made to rush her power into it. Nkosiyabo strained at the assault and pushed her away.
The seismic wave that followed pushed me backwards. I flapped my wings hard, lest I be blown away. Victoria held onto her pyre, visibly straining and gritting her fanged teeth. I flew close to her.
“I never thought I’d fight side by side with a vampire,” I yelled over the cacophony of combat below us and the booming cries of Nkosiyabo.
Victoria grinned. “And I never thought I’d fight alongside an angel.”
“I’m not an angel,” I argued.
Victoria shrugged. “Close enough to one.”
A battering ram of dark energy almost knocked Victoria from her platform.
I rushed it, cutting deep into the darkness.
“Destroy the leader,” I heard Ariel tell me. Valour barked. “Cut off the head of the serpent.”
I dropped underneath the dark ram, using it as cover as I flanked behind the pyre, slicing bits of it out as Victoria renewed her assault.
At the base of the dark tower, purifiers shot their holy energy towards it. I saw Pranish among them. Trudie was trying to bite at the darkness.
The sight of my friends gave me an extra surge and, with it, a jet of fire courtesy of my coat, I shot up the side of the dark pyre, dodging tendrils and bolts of darkness. When I couldn’t dodge a tendril, I sliced it like I would a lunging snake, letting its shadowy energy dissipate into nothingness.
Like a rocket, I kept rising, and rising, until I came face to face with the vampire king. I stared into his red, soulless eyes, and charged.
Ithalen stopped short of his heart. I strained. Harder. Harder. But it was like trying to stab through solid metal. Nkosiyabo grabbed my blade, ignoring the silver entirely, and flung me to the earth.
I hit the ground hard, forming a dusty crater. Only my wings and a sphere of fire protected me.
Nkosiyabo’s voice boomed in my head.
“My people banished the Seraphim from our world. We expunged it of your unholy light. An endless night followed. And it will follow here, again. I will purge this world of the Seraphim, as I did on my world. Starting…with you.”
Well, lucky for me that I wasn’t Seraphim!
Victoria landed by my side, panting. I didn’t know vampires needed to pant! But it made her seem more human.
“It’s not enough, Last Light! He’ll just keep healing and rebuffing our attacks. And the sun won’t rise while he is here. We need something…”
She dodged as a spear of dark energy incinerated the spot where she’d been s
tanding.
“Angel or not, we need your holy fury. Summon it up. Purify him!”
“I’m not an angel!” I argued, this time more desperately.
“I don’t care!” Victoria yelled back, jumping back onto her platform of red as the darkness came charging back towards us.
Treth manifested by my side.
“I’m not an angel, Treth,” I said. “I can’t do this.”
“You can,” Ariel and Allandrea said, at once. “We know what you must do.”
I looked up towards the dark tower, as Victoria continued to attack it. She knew she could never win. Perhaps, she’d always known. But she fought anyway.
Like me.
“And so do you,” Treth said, continuing from Allandrea and Ariel.
I felt a glow coming from within me. And that glow became a red-hot sensation of pure energy. On wings of flame, I ascended, speeding up towards Nkosiyabo.
“Take cover!” I yelled to Victoria, and all the other vampires on our side.
Victoria let herself drop and fell behind a shattered wall.
I smiled. I knew what I had to do.
Darkness assailed me. I did not dodge. I did not block. I just let it wash over me. It recoiled and dissipated at my touch. Nkosiyabo tried to increase his attacks. Striking at me as I sped towards him. Again, and again. And he weakened with every blow.
Until he knew what was coming next.
Nkosiyabo thought to smother the sun. To rid the world of light. An unending night…
What a joke!
Because, whatever darkness befell this world, I would always be there. To be the Last Light.
I broke past Nkosiyabo’s last defences. I saw fear in his red eyes, as he lost control of his magic. The dark pyre disappeared, and he began to plummet, as I flew to him, and held him close.
“I would forgive you, Nkosiyabo, but I know you don’t understand that. You can’t forgive. You can’t forget. The Blood remembers - but so do I.”
Nkosiyabo screamed, and that scream turned into a warble, and then silence as he was consumed by purifying flame.
Not even ash was left of him.
I stayed in the sky, as I gazed at the carnage below. The darkness was parting. The sun was rising.
The Izingane Zegazi who remained stared dumbstruck at the death of their king, as my comrades cut them down.
It was over.
Chapter 24. Dawn
I landed softly on the shattered concrete. My flaming wings dissolved, turning into sparks that disappeared into the wind.
I was normal, once again. Well, kinda.
Crusaders, purifiers and vampires in business suits formed around me. Silent. Many mouths, fanged and not, hung agape. Many of these people had not been at the Battle a few weeks back. They had probably thought my last winged escapade had been a myth. Well, it took a while for myth to become fact, even after the Cataclysm.
I gazed across the motley array of faces around me and saw many I knew. Many were new. Mostly vampiric. Many more were missing.
But through the crowd, I saw the one face I cared about more than any other. Brett, bloodied, but alive. Trudie rushed to him, helping to carry him through the crowd. The throng of bloodied healers, fighters and vamps opened up, letting the cut-up werewolf and pale Crusader past. Worry stung my heart seeing him like this. Then guilt, that I couldn’t protect him. But most of all, relief, because he was still alive.
I embraced the love of my life. He winced.
“I think I may have gone a little overboard while you were gone,” he said.
I laughed and kissed him on the lips, not caring about the blood or grit. Gorgo analysed him through my eyes. She was as good as Cindy when it came to healing. She said he’d be fine. She’d patched up worse.
Two figures moved through the crowd. Cindy and Guy. Another weight was lifted as I saw my friends. Both were bloodied, bruised and bandaged. I released Brett and inclined my head towards them. Not yet smiling, as I didn’t know if it was appropriate.
Guy smiled and offered his hand. I smiled back and hugged him suddenly, and tightly.
“I hope things weren’t too tough in my absence.”
Surprisingly, he laughed.
“Please…” he said. “Don’t ever leave me in charge again.”
“He served with distinction,” Victoria said, suddenly. Some Crusaders gasped. Victoria stood, her wounds stitching up before our eyes, surrounded by her smartly dressed vamps. I hadn’t seen her arrive, and I doubted many others had as well. Trudie’s fur was on end, but she didn’t growl.
I also didn’t know what to make of Victoria Kruger. From what Brett had told me, and from what I had learnt myself, she was a queen of vampires. A demi-god among the blood drinkers. My enemy.
But she had helped me save this city, and my friends.
If people could be monsters, perhaps monsters could be people?
I turned to her and offered my hand. She considered the outstretched appendage. Treth was watching closely. He was still on edge. Watching for signs of hunger.
Slowly, subtly, she smiled and clasped my hand in hers. We shared a look. My blue and hazel eyes stared into her red ones. All her wounds had closed up. There were no signs of wear and tear. Even her clothes had stitched up. A seamless red dress. Right off the hanger.
I saw the devastation around the hospital and its surrounding area. The corpses, the craters, and the destroyed walls and roof. She had been a part of that. And faced with the power that had caused it.
And she didn’t even have a scratch.
She was powerful. I could see that. More powerful than almost anything I had faced before. But I also saw a flicker in her eyes.
She saw something in me. Something that made her maintain eye contact, not as a predator, but as an equal.
We nodded to each other in mutual respect and understanding, then she turned to Guy, who looked a bit taken aback.
Guy looked at his own hand, bandaged and seeping with blood. The fact that he was still standing was a testament to not just Cindy’s healing, but his own tenacity.
Victoria laughed. “I’m not hungry, Guy. And never for your blood. Unless you’re offering freely.”
She purred the last bit, and then went silent, as Cindy fixed her with a death glare. She gulped.
Seems that every monster feared something!
Guy seemed to come to some conclusion in his mind and he smiled as he accepted her hand in his. They shook, just as we had, as equals.
I looked at Brett, expecting rage, disappointment and conflict in his eyes. Instead, I saw acceptance. It seems both of them had reached an understanding with their past and moved on, in some way.
“Thank you…” I said, as they let go of each other’s hands. “I’m not sure exactly what happened, but I can see from this that without you, we wouldn’t have won. You have my gratitude.”
Victoria shrugged. “I’m a monster. But monsters are simple. We’ll do what it takes to survive. And we repay our debts. The Blood never forgets. And we’ll never forget that the Last Light did not only save humans when Loviatar and the Necro Lord tried to consume our city.”
She turned towards her men, and looked out towards the east, towards the rapidly lightening sky.
“It’s about time we take our role as the vampires of Hope City more seriously. The Empire has their own monstrous lapdogs…it’s only fair that Hope City has theirs. And I’m sure that the surviving Izingane Zegazi will be even angrier without their lords holding their leashes.”
She breathed deeply, closing her eyes. As if smelling the scent of a new day. A new life.
“I hear the Three Point Line is lovely this time of year. It may be just the place for a new beginning…”
A piece of rubble collided with her face, leaving not even a scratch or heralding a reaction as it bounced off her cheek and landed on the ground.
“Monster!” I heard a wheezed yell. Krieg forced his way through the crowd, clutching a silver dagger.
>
Brett and Guy dove in his way. He didn’t see them coming, his eyes fixed on Victoria. They tackled him to the ground, struggling with their wounds even as Krieg was bleeding from his.
Victoria held her hand up, halting her vampires from intervening.
Tears fell from Krieg’s maddened eyes, as he swiped the dagger impotently towards the calm vampire queen. Brett and Guy grunted after every strike as Krieg tried to break free.
“You took everything from me!” Krieg half-yelled, half-screamed “You left me alone without them. You killed everything I loved.”
Victoria looked at me, and then Guy. She nodded.
“Let him go. This is only right. He deserves his revenge.”
Guy and Brett, almost disbelieving, let go of the mad Corpsman. Krieg tore towards Victoria, as she stood completely still. He stopped short of her and plunged the dagger into her gut. Smoke rose from the wound. He pulled the dagger back and plunged it into her chest. Still, she didn’t move. He sliced at her neck, her head, her breast, her gut. Again, and again, and again. We all watched in silent horror, as every wound he dealt stitched up, and Victoria looked at him impassively, as he screamed, sobbed and wailed.
Finally, he fell to his knees, letting the dagger drop uselessly to the ground.
Victoria straightened her dress, still without a scratch, and knelt down to look into Krieg’s eyes.
“If I could die, Corpsman, I would have. I am a monster that goes away when you close your eyes at night. You can forget about me, in time. And you can move on. But I can’t do that. I can’t escape what I am. But you can. Go home. Killing me won’t bring them back.”
Krieg stared, silent, before collapsing into a heap on the floor. Brett rushed to his side, holding his comrade as no one else could. For as much as I feared and hated what the Corps had done to my love, I could not deny him it. It had brought him solace during loss. And it was as much a part of him as Treth was of me.
“You should go,” I warned Victoria. “The sun is rising.”
But there was no need to warn them. They were already gone.
Children of Blood (Kat Drummond Book 13) Page 19