Deadly Lovers (The Prussia Series)

by Karisha Prescott

  “Well…life and living,” I said, looking back at Lydia with a smile on my face.

  “There is no honor in hiding,” said Sebastian, stepping between Lydia and I, staring intently into Lydia’s face, ready to square off.

  Lydia and Sebastian stepped very close to each other, intent in their gaze, both of their lips set in thin and determined lines. Lydia put her hands on her hips and Sebastian crossed his arms in front of his chest. He leaned forward, crossing into Lydia’s personal space, and whispered something. Something I couldn’t hear.

  I felt a chill across the back of my neck and walked over, stepping between them quickly and placing a hand on Sebastian’s chest, pushing him back.

  “Stop it,” I said, a warning in my low voice.

  Sebastian’s gaze on Lydia’s eyes broke, blinking down at me in surprise.

  “Say what you want,” said Lydia quietly, a snarl to her lips, “But I know what it’s like. A soul can die long before a body has time to. I think she understands that, a deeper understanding than you have. Being caught can be worse than death. That’s saying a lot considering she can’t die. And I’m not scared of you. Your threats are empty,”

  “Hey!” I shouted, throwing a hand up in front of Lydia’s face, breaking her line of sight to Sebastian, wishing they would stop with the fighting.

  Sebastian didn’t say anything else. He walked around us both, right through the double doors leading from the giant stretch of green lawn into the house. I expected the glass in the door to shatter as he slammed the door but it didn’t. My shoulders jumped up around my ears as I the door slammed, the vibration leaving my teeth on edge.

  “Was that necessary?” I asked, my frustration seething out of me.

  “Yes,” said Lydia, “He was interrupting.”

  “He’s just worried,” I said, “He just wants to make sure I’m safe. And it’s not exactly like we’re following what I would call a normal routine,”

  “This is the fastest, best way to learn,” said Lydia, “So long as I can keep you focused,”

  “Okay…fine,” I said, “What am I supposed to be focusing on? All you’re having me do is run through a bunch of trees.”

  “Well, first there is running, and then a beating, and then some healing, and then more healing,” said Lydia, counting off the events on her finger as she looked thoughtfully at the sky and then looked to me, waiting to hear what I thought of the plan, I assumed.

  I couldn’t do much more than look at Lydia in disbelief. She couldn’t be serious. That couldn’t be the whole plan. At what point had I signed up for Lydia to chase and beat me in order to prepare me? It was insanity and it made no sense. I needed to prepare for a war, to avoid capture, to avoid being taken alive at all costs. I didn’t need for someone to prepare me to escape pain by giving me more pain.

  “You can’t be fucking serious,” I said, placing a hand up, unable to really process what a giant waste of time this had been if that was her plan. I closed my eyes and tried to consider alternative options.

  “Fear is my favorite motivator,” said Lydia quietly with a smile, “it’s the best motivator,”

  I couldn’t say anything without risking completely blowing up on a Lydia. I needed her to teach me to fight, to avoid capture, to prepare me for what was coming. I didn’t need to deal with her mind games and I certainly didn’t have time for it.

  “You’re scrappy,” said Lydia with a sigh, stepping closer to me and throwing an arm around my shoulders as she looked up at the sky with me, “and I know that, from personal experience, after our little tussle in your kitchen ages ago,”

  “You call that a tussle?” I asked, disbelief at her ability to casually label what had surely been her attempt to kill me, and her near success.

  “I call that lucky,” said Lydia with an annoyed look on her face, an exaggerated eye roll, “and the definition of scrappy. You have it in you. You just need to…trust it, trust your instincts. This war may be fought in the open but it’s in the shadows that you’ll find safety, escape, so long as you can keep your wits about you,”

  Lydia gave my shoulder a gentle squeeze and then released me from her half-hearted hug, heading towards the doors leading into the castle.

  “What? That’s it?” I asked, “You’re going to chase me through the woods and terrorize me for most of the afternoon and then just end with a pep talk? You’ve taught me nothing,”

  “You know plenty,” said Lydia, not turning back around, “You know pain and you know you can survive it. That makes you more dangerous than you think,”

  “And if I think you’re wrong?” I asked, “If you are wrong?”

  “I’ll be there to protect you,” said Lydia, looking at me from over her shoulder, her hand on the doorknob, “You’ll do fine. You just need to realize you’re stronger than you think,”

  “I’m not strong. I’m slow, I’m weak, I’m a china doll in a hallway of stampeding bulls,” I said.

  “Just don’t curl up in a ball and accept defeat,” said Lydia, “When the time comes, cause damage, inflict pain. Get the message across that you’re going to cause more trouble than you’re worth to whoever decides to mess with you. Your instincts have already saved you several times. We’re alike in that way, you and me,”

  “What, we’re both unprepared?” I snorted.

  “No,” said Lydia, a sad smile spreading on her lips, “We’re both survivors,”

  The door that Lydia’s hand was poised to open was swung out of Lydia’s grip abruptly. The door opened and Sebastian poked his head out, looking visibly annoyed.

  “Are you two coming or what?” asked Sebastian.

  Lydia and I looked at each other and then blinked silently back at Sebastian. I hadn’t realized he’d been waiting. For the life of me, I couldn’t think of why he would be waiting for us, either.

  “Coming for what?” asked Lydia, taking a step back from the door frame that Sebastian came to fill out.

  “For whom,” said Sebastian, “We are supposed to see Queen Victoria. As in, now,”

  I threw a hand up to my face and covered it. I had completely forgotten about my meeting with the Queen.

  “We should change,” said Lydia, biting her lip as she looked down at her clothes covered in bits of grass, dirt, and twigs.

  “And find shoes,” Sebastian said looking at my wiggling toes, dirt and grass smeared all over my feet.

  I nodded in agreement, imagining the Queen’s face if I walked in without shoes. I couldn’t help but laugh out loud, Sebastian and Lydia both gave me a strange look. I cinched my lips together to keep from laughing. My face could use a good scrub too while I was at it. I turned slowly to head back towards the tree line, not completely sure where I had tossed my shoes.

  “I’ll help,” said Lydia.

  A few seconds later she walked right next to me, looking out across the expanse of grass. I turned and looked for Sebastian but he must have gone back into the castle. I didn’t see him and the doors were all closed. The sun was starting to drop quickly. It would be night soon. I put a hand up to shield my eyes from the glare of the dipping sun.

  “You’ll do fine,” said Lydia, as we made slow progress retracing our steps across the lawn.

  “I can’t imagine war,” I said, glancing quickly at Lydia as she looked out across the grass for my tossed shoes, “I can’t imagine what that would be like,”

  Lydia squinted at me a moment, our pace slowing almost to a stop as we neared the tree line, still no sign of my shoes.

  “Bloody,” said Lydia, “and vicious,”

  I nodded my head, breaking eye contact with Lydia and looking into the growing darkness of the shadows under the trees. In my heart, I had known that would be the basis of a war with monsters, with vampires. Blood and pain, things I had become too familiar with. But hearing her say it, that heavy look in her eyes, that shadow of sorrow floating in her gaze, it gave my heart permission to embrace the fear and the sadness. It was coming, war. And
it really wasn’t going to wait on me, on anyone.

  “I thought you tossed your shoes more towards the house,” said Lydia, shielding her eyes to look into the shadows of the tree line too.

  I couldn’t see anything in the thick brush. The hedges and flower bushes, the creeping thyme and low crawling wild strawberry plants covered the ground between each tree in thick undergrowth. I scanned back and forth, considering giving up and finding another pair to wear.

  “Maybe they bounced on the grass,” I suggested.

  I looked for a few seconds more and heard Lydia let out a deep sigh.

  “I don’t see them anywhere,” she said, letting her hand flop down to her side and beginning to turn back towards the castle.

  That was when I saw the white shoe sticking out of a bush near a tree, only a few feet into the trees.

  “Wait! I think I found one!” I said, stepping carefully into the thick growth, wondering how I had managed to run through all of this before. I made my way through a sea of green, shin deep, and plucked my white sandal out of the bush and raised it up victorious overhead, smiling at Lydia with triumph.

  “You’re so stupid,” she laughed at me, “Hurry up and find the other…” but Lydia’s voice trailed off, her eyes focused on the shoe I held overhead.

  “What is it?” I asked after a moment, her eyes still fixed on my hand holding my shoe overhead.

  Lydia didn’t say anything, frozen where she stood, but her hand slowly raised, eyes fixed on my hand. I looked up at my shoe, the brown dirt coating the tips and heel where I had dug in to the soft ground as I had run through the trees. Small swatches of greenery stuck in the straps of the shoe, snagged as I had raced for the castle, impeding my ability to run, the entire reason I had taken them off to begin with. But that wasn’t what Lydia had been looking at.

  Hardly visible at all, a few drops of crimson on the white sandal streaked down towards my hand. I lowered my arm, bringing the shoe closer to inspect it. I hadn’t been cut. I hadn’t been injured. I glanced quickly down at my feet to double check but I didn’t see a single spot of blood. It wasn’t mine. I turned the shoe over in my hands again and touched the red liquid, in a trance as to how it had gotten on my sandal. I rubbed the liquid between my fingers. I had no doubt it was blood. I just didn’t understand who’s, because it wasn’t mine.

  My confusion only grew as another drop of blood appeared on the back of my hand. I looked at that drop of blood, my fingers outstretched. I looked at it in awe, the drop having materialized out of nowhere. I felt a light breeze fluff up my hair as Lydia came to stand next to me quickly. I felt her hand grip tightly around my arm that held the shoe still, my eyes still fixed on my hand. I looked at Lydia, speechless, wondering if she would have answers. But she wasn’t looking at my hand. She was looking above me.

  In that moment, seeing her face, I knew I didn’t want to look above me but it was too late. My confusion turned to curiosity. I looked above me and felt the drop hit my cheek, right below my eye, before I even had time to really look at his face looking down at me. His eyes were open, his arms hanging down, his leg tied securely to a high tree branch by a piece of rope. He looked at me, blinking slowly, but he didn’t say anything to me. The fact that his bottom jaw was completely removed, torn flesh dangling around the edges where his jaw had once been attached and steady drops of blood dripping down.

  The light was fading out of his eyes, nearing unconsciousness. My hand instinctively reached up to touch the drop of blood that had dripped off of him down onto my face. I had time enough to gasp before Lydia was pulling me along through the thick green ocean, dragging me towards the flat green lawn, towards the castle. I couldn’t take in a full breath, my heart pounding and my eyes wide with alarm as I tried to understand what I had just seen.

  I continued to clutch my stupid shoe, lips parted to speak or scream but nothing coming out. It was Lydia that pulled me forward, her face full of frustration. We reached the edge of the tree line, my feet finally on the flat green grass, when I heard something moving quickly from within the trees. My heart beat faster than a rabbit’s and adrenaline flooded through me. Lydia grabbed the shoe out of my hand and threw it into the trees, turning back to me with a face twisted in anger, she grabbed both of my arms.

  “RUN, Prussia, RUN!” she screamed at me.

  I heard the words, loud in my ears after a world of quiet and confusion. My heart jumped into my throat as I watched Lydia’s face turn to panic, looking into the tree line and then tugging hard at my arm for me to follow. It had taken me a moment to catch on. What had felt like several minutes must have been only a few seconds because as soon as Lydia had turned to begin running my body had snapped into a sprint right behind her heading straight for the castle doors.

  I panted hard, not from running but from the panic. No matter how fast or deeply I pulled my breath in, my lungs were drowning, not enough breath to sustain me, and I struggled with each step. I looked behind me, over my shoulder, and watched as a dark figure broke out from the tree line onto the perfectly manicured lawn. I couldn’t see the beast that chased us but I knew what he was. A vampire sprinted out across the grass but all I could see clearly were his eyes and they were empty.

  I knew I wasn’t going to make it to the castle. He got closer and closer. For every one of my steps, he took two. I did the only thing I could do - I ran and I screamed. I ignored my impulse to breath, to fill my lungs for anything more than a last ditch effort of a scream. Looking behind me meant that when the elevation and roll of the lawn changed, I tripped and I fell hard.

  Sprawled out and flat on the ground, I was close enough to the castle to fall into the shadows. I filled my lungs deeply and screamed with every ounce of my energy. And that scream might have saved my life. I heard the door swing open and shouting, though I didn’t know what was being shouted. My eyes were locked, fear setting my heart to run the race of a lifetime in my chest. I didn’t blink, I didn’t look away, I watched the vampire close the last few hundred feet of distance between us and just as he was about to leap onto me, I heard the hard crunch of bodies slam together.

  In mid-air, I watched as Lydia’s frame slammed into the vampire. His frame dwarfed hers but the impact when they hit spoke volumes for her strength. They both fell to the ground and I couldn’t believe my eyes as Lydia sprang up from the ground first, fists up and ready to fight. But before a single punch was thrown, Lydia and I both looked over at the tree line to see two more vampires set out across the grass to come to the aid of the vampire that had attacked us.

  Lydia hesitated. Only for a moment but I could see her hesitation clearly. She gave a worried glance to me right before someone grabbed me from behind by both of my arms and began dragging me towards the castle. As I fought to be freed, several of the Queen’s guards raced by me to aid Lydia. Lydia jumped out of the grasp of the attacking vampire just as the guards raced to engage him. Lydia slipped out of his grasp and sprinted towards the castle doors, towards me.

  It wasn’t until the doors were closed and I was released that my heart slowed enough to allow me to process all that had happened. I looked behind me to see who had snatched me off the grass and was surprised to find John Campbell, huffing and puffing with a scornful look directed my way.

  “You know,” said John Campbell, “You’re a bit of a pain in the ass to save,”

  “Excuse me?” I asked, all at once offended and confused.

  “You must have hit me in the groin with your head three times,” said John Campbell, pointing at me in accusation, “and that makes me not want to save you next time you might need saving,”

  “Then don’t,” I said, not sure what else to say to that.

  John Campbell threw his hands up, still trying to catch his breath, and walked through the doors to help the guards that were still fighting outside.

  “What should we do?” I asked Lydia, frightened from my toes to the ends of my hair, “Should we try to help?”

  “Are
you insane?” asked Lydia, “Maybe we’re not as alike as I thought,” she muttered.

  Lydia took hold of my elbow and pulled me to my feet, the growling outside of the thin, weak double doors leading out to the garden easy enough to hear that you would think there wasn’t a wall or a door there at all.

  “This is a perfect example of when you should run and even possibly hide,” said Lydia, removing her hand from my elbow and walking quickly towards the corridor leading to Queen Victoria’s chambers.

  “They might need help,” I called after her, though completely aware that she was right.

  I watched Lydia continue her determined walk in the direction of the Queen’s chambers, an annoyed wave of dismissal for my comment as she walked, not even bothering to look back at me to see if I was following. Of all the people in the castle and royal court, she had the best sense of self preservation. If Lydia said we should run, then I needed to keep up before I ended up a pile of meat-mush.