The smell of burnt wood and singed leaves filled the air as I stared at where the bolt had struck. The sky still rumbling and clapping loudly above us and everyone ceased training at once. My magic grasped for theirs, halting their energy from being expelled at one another. “Fuck,” I uttered as their magic fought against mine. “Laura, help me,” I whispered painfully, my chest constricting with the effort it took to gain control of it all. Her hand touched my shoulder, and the pressure eased as, together, we sheltered them from the magic they’d been distracted from noticing.
“Something isn’t right, can you feel that?” she asked, but I couldn’t do anything but hold the magic as, one by one, I blinked it out of existence and back into the leyline from which our magic originated.
Once the magic was returned, I swallowed hard and looked up, watching as the sun began to disappear behind the moon. Day turned to night, spreading darkness through the meadow in which we stood, exposed. My breathing hitched as I dropped my stare to peer around the edge of the meadow.
“We need to get them to safety, now,” I whispered through the heaviness of my tongue. I’d seen this once before. “This is not a drill, inside now!” I shouted to be heard over the howling wind that came out of nowhere.
“Everyone inside!” Laura clapped her hands, clearing the air around us from the screaming of the wind so we could be heard. “I want you all to get inside immediately. Something is wrong, come with me,” Laura urged, turning to me as I stood still, locked into place, staring at the shadows at the edge of the meadow. “What is it, Avery?”
“He’s here,” I mumbled as fear snaked up my spine to wrap around my throat. “He’s found me; the devil is here.” My heart fluttered as it began to beat faster. The sound of it in my ears drowned out the howling of the wind as I stared at the tallest figure that stepped out of the shadows of the trees. “Laura, go!”
“Not without you, Avery. We can make it,” she stated, but we both knew we wouldn’t. I looked up at the last remaining sliver of the sun, the only thing holding them in the shadows, and turned to face her.
“You will go and get to safety and call the council to come save me. They will demand my release, for the secrets you and I hold against them are too many for them to allow us to be captured by their enemies. The students need you, and he won’t leave here without me. I know him, he isn’t a murderous bastard, and he won’t hurt them if I go with him. You have to trust me on this. Now go!”
She took off at a run to where the students were still milling through the door, and I called forth magic to embrace me, to give me enough strength to give them a fighting chance against the monsters that waited for the last sliver of light to be swallowed by the moon. The moment it was, the entire meadow held its breath as the only sound was my ragged breathing. Laura and the students wouldn’t make it inside before they reached us, and that knowledge slithered around my heart, tightening its hold as if it had been placed into a vise. I swallowed down anger as I watched Royal move to catch Laura while she ushered the students into the school. The entire world seemed to stop as he ripped her back by her hair and turned her to face me. My magic began to unravel as I opened my mouth to whisper the spell that would end his life. A hand covered my mouth as a hard body pressed against my back. Another arm snaked around my chest, holding me in place. Power sizzled over my flesh with awareness as butterflies erupted in my stomach, wings fluttering as the scent of masculinity hit my nose.
“Hello, waif, I’ve missed you,” a deep, husky baritone uttered against my ear as his heated breath fanned the shell of my ear. “Whisper one fucking word of magic, and I will slaughter everyone here, do you understand me? Nod if you do,” he growled.
I nodded and felt his hand moving away from my mouth. Turning slowly, I gazed up into violet-blue eyes that I knew as well as my own. His thick, dark hair was windswept, wild and untamed as he stared into my eyes as if he was looking through me, to my soul. I opened my mouth to speak, and his eyes dropped to my lips as a dark brow lifted in warning.
“Conner,” I whispered thickly as my throat tightened with memories. I searched his eyes, shaking my head, preparing to beg him to release the students as they whimpered and cried with fear, their entrance being blocked by the undead.
“Did you think I would forget what you did? That I wouldn’t come for you and make you pay for it? No, I’ve never forgotten your treachery or the betrayal, and neither has anyone else, Avery,” he chuckled as his hand came up to cup my cheek as if he intended to be gentle, but I knew better. There was nothing left of the gentle lover he’d once been. His fingers wrapped around my throat and a cruel smile spread over his generous mouth as he held me up. “I’m going to fucking wreck you, witch. When I finish with you, you’re going to wish I’d left you in the garbage where I found you,” he purred, his eyes watching as mine rounded with fear as my feet kicked nothing but air. He tossed me back, knocking the wind from my lungs as I landed on the hard ground. I turned over, and crawled to where Royal, Conner’s brother, held Laura, his deadly fangs scraping over her exposed throat.
I opened my mouth to call forth the wind when his hands gripped my hair, and he pulled me back to where he knelt on his haunches. His other hand held my chin, biting into my flesh as he brushed his nose over my bare shoulder.
“You will watch her die with me so that you know what it feels like to have the people you love slaughtered.”
“Conner, no, I will do anything. Please, please let them go, and I will do anything you want, just tell me what to do,” I uttered through the pain and emotions that tore through me. Tears welled in my eyes as I watched Laura’s lip quivering with the knowledge that she would suffer through what Royal would do to her. Tears slipped free, sliding down my cheek to touch his hand. My breathing was labored, my chest rising and falling with each second that ticked by. Crimson red blood dripped from Laura’s neck where Royal had nicked her flesh. “Conner, please. Kill me, torture me, do whatever you want to me, but let them go.”
“Like you did my family? Did you show them mercy?” he asked softly, and I stiffened as those memories replaced the ones that he and I had made so long ago.
Screaming erupted behind me, but I didn’t dare try to rip my chin from his hold as Clara screamed and begged for help. How had I let this happen? How had I missed the magic that they used to turn day to night, and how the fuck was he holding it? Vampires couldn’t wield magic, which meant he employed a very powerful witch. He released my jaw and turned me by his hold on my hair until I was forced to look over my shoulder at him.
“You want me to let her live? Make me believe you will do anything to ensure it happens,” he snapped. I turned on my knees, wincing as rocks bit into them. My hands shook violently as I pushed his shirt up to access his flesh. My head dipped before I stared up at him, kissing his stomach as he watched me through hate-filled eyes. My hand pushed past the waistband of his pants, gripping his thick cock, and a whimper exploded from my lips as his arm snaked around me, pulling me roughly against him without warning. “Did you miss me, waif? Miss my touch, my cock, and my kisses?” he asked as heat banked in his eyes even though his smile remained cruel as his fingers bit into the flesh at the small of my back.
“No,” I whispered, knowing it would piss him off, and yet I wouldn’t let him think I’d thought of him since he’d left me in the care of his father. “Not even a little bit, Conner,” I smirked, working his cock as my insides liquefied to mush and wantonness.
“Mmm, judging by the wetness of your cunt I can smell, I don’t believe you. I’m going to enjoy destroying you and listening to you beg me to do it,” he laughed soundlessly as he ripped me up from the ground by my hair, forcing me to pull my hands from his pants as he did so. “Bring them both,” he ordered.
“No, Conner,” I whispered. “Me, use me. Let them remain here, they weren’t a part of it.”
“No, only one murderous bitch. It matte
rs little to me if they live or die. I’m not afraid to wage war against the covens. They are coming with us so that when you step out of line, I can use them to show what I wish to do to you. Be a good girl, Avery, and don’t make me murder your friends.”
Chapter 2
An entire week had gone by since we’d been captured, and I hadn’t seen or heard from Conner. The small cell that the three of us had been tossed into smelled of mildew and decay, but judging by the corpse two cells over, we could end up staying here much longer. Clara cried in the corner as Laura tried to comfort her. I chewed my lip, ignoring them both while I paced the length of the cell, wondering when he would come for me.
“We need water, and soon,” Laura said softly, her emerald green eyes holding mine as I blinked back tears of frustration.
“I don’t think they care what we need,” I pointed out as I rubbed my naked arms against the chill in the cell. Unlike Laura and me, Clara needed sustenance, and I was sure we were being neglected to make a point. Conner wanted me down here, wondering when he would come and fearing it. I knew his games because I’d watched him play them a million times before.
“She won’t stop crying,” Laura hissed as if Clara couldn’t hear us discussing her two feet away from where she sat huddled in a ball, rocking her lithe frame back and forth as sob after sob expelled from her lungs. “She’s dehydrating herself, and we can’t replenish it in here.”
“No shit? I don’t know what you expect me to do here. It isn’t like he fucking cares if we die, or cares about me at all. If I ask him for water, I guarantee you, the answer will be no.”
Screaming sounded from above us, and I eyed the ceiling irritably, hearing the men grunt as women called out in pleasure. They were celebrating my capture and had been since I’d been tossed into the cage we now sat. It would be hours before dawn, which meant we were in for another long night.
“You need to tell me everything this time because he didn’t do that himself. He doesn’t have the power to make an eclipse happen, and he just somehow managed to make the earth bow to him. I need to know what we’re facing here, and Clara is stuck in the middle of it with us now.” She moved to Clara, sliding down the wall to sit beside her. Clara lifted her eyes to mine as she hiccupped between sobs. I sighed in response and I moved to sit beside them, pulling my knees to my chest as I frowned with the memories that scratched to the surface, peeling the scabs of the wounds he’d left.
“I’m so sorry, Clara. You shouldn’t be here,” I whispered past my dry tongue. “You too, Laura. I knew he’d come for me eventually, but I figured if we were never out at night, he couldn’t get past the runes to reach me or hurt us. I’ve been very careful never to be outside during the night or close to dusk.”
“Why are they doing this to us?” Clara croaked as she leaned her head against my arm, while Laura patted her back. “What did you do to him that made him come for you, Avery? He came in daylight, and that is supposed to be impossible for them to do.” She pulled her legs tighter against her chest, lifting her head to stare at me as she wiped at her red, tear-streaked eyes. Her strawberry blonde hair was matted and clung to her face as she hiccupped again.
“That’s a long story, Clara,” I responded guardedly as I heard the vampire who guarded us shuffle on his feet, listening to us discreetly. I swallowed past the lump in my throat and reached up, pushing her hair away from her face. “It’s not a story for young ears, nor one you need to hear. I will do whatever it takes to keep you both alive. You know that. You have nothing to fear, it will be okay.”
“You know who he is, don’t you? He is the prince, isn’t he? The one you slept with? Avery, what did you do to make him wish for war against us? I’m not in this; they didn’t come for me. He came for you, and we are caught in the middle of it, so I think we deserve to know what you did, and what he intends to do to us.” Clara watched me, absently chewing her lip as she waited for me to speak.
“You’re right, you do, you both do,” I said as I exhaled and turned to lean my head against the wall of the cell. Laura knew most of the story and had heard it all before, but Clara hadn’t heard the details. “I was born before 1665, which is when my story began. I was from one of the most prominent covens of London for that time. Back then, the rules were different. Oh, they were the same where creatures were concerned, but to stray with your enemy meant death instead of banishment by the covenant. I didn’t choose to betray my coven or leave them, as many other witches had. I was born into an era of death, and it came for us. During that time, London was besieged by a different type of death. Thousands of people were stricken down with it and died within one week of the first sign of the fever. The Black Death, they called it. Witches were no more immune than mortals, which we didn’t know until it was too late. Little was known about the sickness, or how it was spreading so quickly. It took thousands to their graves before people even knew it was among them, or how it spread. My mother, the leader of the coven and most powerful witch of her time, thought to save the humans with our magic. So, together, without knowing our fates, we walked into the sick houses to save those who needed help. By the time we figured out that we weren’t immune to it any more than they were, it was too late.
“My mother became feverish on the fifth night; her fingers were covered in black flesh that moved up her hands. I sat with her as, one by one, the others in the coven died around us. I would leave her only to burn the bodies of our sisters; I burned them all, even my mother, as I burned with the fever myself. The healers wore plague masks that looked like the most horrid birds of prey, most wearing the raven to signify death. I can still remember the heat of the fever as it burned my flesh as if I’d been set on fire from within. By the time I fell ill, over sixty thousand people had perished to the sickness that ravaged London and the surrounding cities. It continued to spread quickly, pushing further out into the country. I was alone then, left without a coven or anyone to care for me. I knew I would die, that soon the black poison would cover my fingers and I’d become poisonous to others, so I made my way to the sea to send a warning to the other covens as my mother had asked me to do as she lay dying. I’d intended to reach the piers and send word via the wind that sailed the sea, but the closer I got, the further it seemed. The cool air wafting from the ocean offered relief from the fever that ravaged me. I sat down beside children my age who were dying, and when the men in masks came for them, they took me too. They didn’t even burn our bodies. Instead, they threw us into the alley with the trash that littered the street, among piles of the dead to be taken out to the sea and tossed into the waves.
“I lay there for hours, praying for death to come because I couldn’t find the strength to get up out of the garbage. Then an angel came, and I thought maybe the Gods had taken mercy on me. I was terrified of dying alone, and worse, I feared him catching the sickness, so I begged him to leave me there in the rubbish among the dead. Conner laughed at me; his eyes were of the bluest skies and purple like the flowers that grew wild in the hills of Scotland, his hair the color of dark wheat fields in full harvest. He picked me out of the pile and promised to save me. He chose to save me, to feed me his precious blood that pushed the sickness away long enough for him to take me to his home. Of course, they were immune to the sickness, since they were the undead.
“His blood didn’t fully stop the sickness, though. It held the inevitable at bay. He struck a deal with a witch named Hemlock Hawthorn, who served his father, the Vampire King of England. It was a mix of two things, a spell and his blood that together made me immortal like him, untouchable by the plague. It worked, but it came with a cost. I have to have his blood once every fifty years, or I become sick, and with it, I would spread the plague to this new world. I didn’t stay with him because of the need for his blood, though. I was thirteen years old, an orphan without family or a coven to protect me, but this creature, this man, had saved me. He’d faced down death to keep me safe, and at that age
, he might as well have hung the moon and the stars in my name. I was assumed dead, with no one who cared if I lived or died, but he did. No inquiries were ever made to see if any of our coven lived through the death. They assumed we had perished, but with good cause. I fell in love with Conner; he wasn’t what I’d been told his kind was like, nor did he ever force me to use my magic to benefit him or others. He taught me to wield it with the help of enslaved witches. He never forced me to become his whore or to feed him. Many witches were either a vampire’s whore or their personal witch, but Conner wanted neither from me, and I’d have done anything he asked. He wasn’t what I thought our enemies were, and every day I lived, I saw it. I saw a man who pulled a dying witch out of the garbage and brought her back to life. At that age, I was old enough to become a whore to his kind, and yet he never allowed it. He was my protector and guard; this creature that had every right to demand I use my powers for him didn’t ask it of me. I was old enough to breed, and back then it was expected of girls to do so. On the day I turned sixteen, I went to his bed willingly. I demanded that he make me a woman. He did, and I loved him for it. I never had, nor ever will I love anyone else as I loved him.”
“If he loved you, why are we in a cage and you’re being accused of killing his father?” she demanded softly, her thin, small frame shaking violently with the chill of the dungeon.
“Because I did kill his father and his entire hive. Conner wasn’t created, he was born a vampire to a King and Queen who ruled London and the surrounding hives and nests,” I replied hesitantly. “I loved him, but it wasn’t enough. I never said he loved me, for I’m not sure that is something they do. He never admitted to it, and I never asked for it. I was his enemy and he mine, which is something we forgot along the way. When he remembered, he left me, and everything changed.”
Immortal Hexes Page 2
