by Rae Foxx
Gee, you would think that me not dying would be the top of her priorities. I rolled my eyes, which made my head spin more, and curled into Howl just in case I was going to fall out of his arms again.
Clutching me close to his warm chest, blood splashed beneath Howl's feet as he carried me through the door. Finn and Tommy were on either side as we followed Saxon and Mama into a cavern that was just as dark, just as cold, and just as soaked in blood as the hallway. I exhaled; a plume of condensation burst from my lips as all those splintered bones began to seize.
The tunnel of blood had been cold, but this was like walking into a cube of ice. The air was so cold it bit against my arms and legs. Steam rose from the river of blood that ran over the floor, seeping from its source as it ran down a stone staircase like a waterfall. A waterfall that sprouted from the feet of the most horrifying woman I had ever seen.
Her skin was a pale fawn. Paper-thin but without a single wrinkle. No line, no blush, just perfectly pale features beneath hair as dark as night and perfectly arched brows. All those pale features seemed nearer the almond glow of a human thanks to the stark white of the gown she wore, the surface pocked with drops of red, the hem soaked in it.
She was beautiful. Horrifyingly beautiful.
She rose from a crystal throne, the diamond surface as streaked with blood as she was, as the heavy velvet curtains that hung limp and dead behind her. Just like the body that lay at her feet.
If they’d asked the interior decorator of this place to give it a menacing, oppressive vibe, they’d succeeded.
Saxon, Ivory, and the vampire faced the woman, all of them bowing as she smiled and turned blood-red eyes to me. To Howl, who held me, and to Finn, and Tommy. All three of them looked ready to bolt, at least with Tommy I knew that was a possibility. He was already a little wavy around the edges.
“The fuck?” I wheezed out and felt a new sharp, stabbing pain as I tried to wiggle to a different position to see better and was instead rewarded with a stabbing pain in my abdomen.
Because, you know, I had been stabbed.
This bitch looked like she was ready to finish the job and feast on my remains for dessert. Her smile stretched as she looked at me, nostrils stretching like a bull when it smelled danger.
When she smelled blood.
Because Vampire.
Judging by the whole raised crystal throne and a blood-stained dress drama we had going on she was the Vampire Queen. And I thought mama was dramatic.
"The smell of this girl," the woman drawled, her voice slow and filled with a liquid lust that was doing weird things to the stab wounds in my belly. "Did you bring me a feast, Saxon? Is this my apology for your betrayal?"
"I didn't betray you," Saxon said, the grind of his teeth audible from here. "I left."
"So, you admit it--a betrayal," she continued as she descended the blood-soaked stairs, each step filled with a splash and a slick of heels on stone. Heels against blood.
"It was not a betrayal. You know why I left." Saxon was shaking now. His hands were fists against his thighs as he faced this Queen of the Vampires.
"What in the donkey dicks is going on here?" I erupted, much louder than I should have been able to, seeing as the world was spinning again.
"You child. You are 'going on' here," she said with a drawl that sent what was left of my stomach into a tangle. Her focus flicked back to mine. Her stare was harsh. While I should have regretted the outburst, I met her stare head-on, smiling at her with blood-stained teeth. "You are the reason for everything it seems, and yet here you are, bleeding all over my floor. Leaving your delectable scent in places it should never be. If Saxon wanted to keep you to himself, he has clearly misjudged his arrival."
One of her fingers flicked and before I knew what was happening, seven vampires burst onto the floor, busting their way through doors so perfectly inset into the stone that I hadn't seen them before. They walked toward us slowly, long pointy spears lowered to our neck height. The weapons were so tribal that I almost laughed, might have if I didn't know who was wielding them. A vampire could be to my side and slicing into my neck with their teeth before I could blink. I didn't want to know what they could do with a spear.
"Not so fast, Queeney," Mama said when the Queen stepped equally with her, the ballsy woman placing her hand against her shoulder. The powerful woman's face slid from shock to anger as she met her face on. The two locked in a stare down.
"Ivory." It wasn’t a question.
Yep. Totally arch enemies.
Was there anyone that actually liked my mother? The witches hated her. The Vampire Queen hated her. I was certainly close to hating her.
"Katarina," Ivory smiled as big as the queen was scowling. I was amazed that Mama hadn't summoned flowers and sunshine to counteract the blood queen. They were both clearly drama queens, although right now that drama seemed to be restrained to scowling.
“Not only do you bring the whore you left me for," Katarina said, hair flinging in Mama's face as she turned to Saxon. "But you bring her as well? You come to my lair, uninvited, and do nothing but disrespect me. What is your business here? Or, shall I feast from you all and teach you all for the sins you have committed against me."
'If I ever think I'm a god will you slap me?' I buzzed into Howl's mind, the corner of the guy's mouth quirking.
'Is that retroactive?'
"Ivy is not a whore. She is my mate," Saxon began, the queen's jaw dropped as she rounded on Saxon, all of the spears lowering and pointing right at my vampire.
"And my daughter," Mama decided to tack on, because that was clearly needed.
The Queen roared, rounded from Saxon to Ivory before turning to me, flinging her hair back as she straightened, the anger on her face vanishing as she splashed her way over.
"Give me one reason not to end her right now..." The Queen mused, her red eyes darkening to black as she looked at me, as her fangs began to protrude as she licked her lips.
"She's my mate," Saxon began, but Mama cut him off.
"Nicky, Nickolinia, has the Nascence Book. She controls the girl’s father. You let her die, our future dies too. You already know why we are here, Katarina. Why play these games? Drink her blood, then save her life. Like you did Saxon. Like you did to the Prince of the Dark."
"Saxon is no longer a prince in this court." She whirled on Saxon, giving him a red-eyed glare as she leaned over him, towered over him. He suddenly looked so small. Small and helpless. But he didn't even flinch. He had clearly been under her before. "He abandoned me. His creator. He was my first, and now he is no longer."
Holy fuck did she just say what I thought she said? The Queen of the Vampires created Saxon. Created Saxon first. Like, he was the third real vampire ever in existence.
"What if he could be your prince again?" Mama was playing some kind of cat and mouse game, but I didn't care - I fucking lost it.
"Holy fucking vampires." Yep. I really needed to learn to control those. They all turned to look at me, well, everyone but Saxon who was doing his best to look anywhere but.
"What are you suggesting?" Katarina said, still licking her lips as she stared at me, nostrils flaring.
"Heal her," Saxon said, still not looking at me. "And I will reclaim my title."
I might as well have blacked out. Hell, maybe I was hallucinating all of this. My vision blurred, my heart skipped a beat, and everything in the room spun as the Queen smiled, her shoes sloshing in the blood as she approached.
"Done. A bite. A drop. And you are a prince once more." Katarina's face was even more beautiful close up. The perfect skin like a flocked brown silk. Her eyes dark, welcoming.
Predatory.
She held her hand out to me, palm up as she waited for something to seal the deal.
What deal?
"Done," Mama said before anyone else could, grabbing my hand and placing it in hers. Placed my wrist in hers.
"No!" I yelled as her fangs protruded, as she leaned forward and sunk them in
to my skin and bleed me dry.
Sucked my blood from my veins. Memories from my mind. Life from my body.
Everything went black again, the world falling around me as I splashed into a warm pond, as everyone began screaming. I tried to open my eyes, to see what was happening and fight against the Blood Queen’s grip, but the world felt so far away. I flailed and fought back against her grip, from whatever her bite was doing to me, but I knew I wasn’t battling back. Mostly I was flopping around like a dying fish on the bank of a pond, gasping for air, waiting to be gutted and fried. Flopping in a pool of blood. Flopping around on the ground.
“Into the wounds directly for this one,” the queen said in a voice like slithery silk as my hand fell lifelessly to my chest. “We have a deal, correct, Saxon? Don’t even think about going back on your word. You know the consequences.”
“Do it.” His voice was low and menacing as his cool hands gripped my shoulders, his scent growing thicker in my nose as he leaned down. His soft lips grazed the rim of my ear as he whispered, “forgive me, my rose. It is the only way.”
Panic shook my bones and muscles as not only his words, but his tone sunk in.
I screamed, but no sound came from my mouth as drops of acid plopped into each cut that Danvers’ had made in my stomach. Each drop searing me like a branding iron from the inside out; spidering over me in veins of a spider’s web, a web that was trapping me. Turning me into something I didn't want to be.
Damn it. If I came out of this as Spider-Man I was going to be pissed.
I arched my back as the web clawed into me, cut at me, burned at me.
This time my scream was real. I heard it over everything else around me.
Even the Queen's laugh.
Chapter 4
My heart slammed against my sternum like it was trying to escape and break out of me like alien babies did in the 80s. The rhythmic pressure jolted me awake like those paddles they used on fake doctor shows, calming the alien and sending me upright. I gasped for a great breath that ran through me like water. That dried blood sandpaper feeling from before had gone. That coppery taste faded into something sugary and wonderful.
I inhaled again, just to get more of the liquid drugs that were lining my tongue and instead inhaled.... everything.
I could taste everything. I could taste Howl’s wolf and what I was ninety-percent sure was Tommy’s dandruff. I could taste every drop of blood, every particle of dust in the air.
Air that I could see like it was water or some shit swirling around me in jetties of dust and light.
Who could fucking see air? I could. I could see every crack and ridge in the stone, and every drip of still-wet blood that slid down the walls. I could see everything. I could taste everything...
Oh god! I clutched my belly, my fingers ready to dig in the hole there, but there was nothing there. Smooth skin and abs that were too defined for the number of doughnuts I liked to consume.
“Fuck.” I gasped; the word sounded like bells as it swirled in the air. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
“I’m dead. I died.” So, this was death. I had transcended to some god-like creation that could taste the air and see-through stone.
"Don't be dramatic," Howl snickered beside me. I whirled, air swishing past me as every particle made itself known as the fucking god of a wolf made himself known.
"Fuck me," I half-begged, looking at Howl as though I had never seen him before. The guy was a god. His skin pulled over muscles like silk over marble, everything about him glittering as though he had been freshly polished. Even his sexy little half-smile was glistening, the teeth below so white they might as well have their own brand name.
Howl had always been perfect, but this was lickably perfect. Because licking a statue, or even wanting to fuck a statue was normal. But damn, I wasn't the first person to look at a hot guy that way. And he wasn't even the vampire.
"Excuse me?" Howl asked, the laugh trying to sneak out. "What statues are you wanting to lick?"
“Fuck,” I corrected, throwing caution to the wind and letting my eyes drag lower.
"Well, she knows how to say fuck," Finn said; Tommy laughing beside him as the two pulled my focus.
I braced myself for impact, ready for the onslaught of yummy Fae and Demons. I was not disappointed. If Howl was carved from stone by a chiseled master, Finn was formed from clouds and moonbeams and Tommy of fire.
Sexy fire.
Didn’t care that that wasn’t a thing, Tommy was made of sexy fire. Black smoke was rippling over him as muscles bulged
Screw licking statues. I was going to bite me some fire.
"Okay, stop. I can't take it anymore. Your internal monologue is one step away from a porno," Howl laughed, pulling everyone's focus. "What the hell did you do to her, Saxon? She seems to think that Finn is made of clouds and I'm from a YA novel. My cock is not made of stone, I'll have you know."
"I never said it was," I whispered, although I was now staring at the bulge in his pants, wondering what that was going to look like... what it was going to feel like as he pushed it into me. God...
Okay, maybe glowing sexy Howl had a point.
"What did you do to me? Am I dead?"
"You're not dead. Although your mother didn’t seem fussed either way. We left her back with the Queen. She seemed more interested in her than in you," Saxon said, stepping around to my line of sight, perfectly placing Howl's ethereal luminescence behind him, framing himself perfectly. The air swirled as he leaned forward to look at me. The motion was simple enough, but I heard every muscle inside him move--every bone, every joint bend.
He sounded like a bag of broken pretzels.
"That's not normal," I said to myself and Saxon smiled at me with gleaming fangs and perfectly red lips. Red like I had never seen before.
Red like blood.
Tasty, tasty blood.
"Oh my god! I'm a vampire!" I jumped to my feet, everything moving so fast and seamlessly. I pushed myself into the air like I was trying to take flight, and promptly landed flat on my face. Heels flung themselves over my head and turned me into some weird ball thing. A ball, which, of course, had its ass in the air.
I would’ve been concerned about that if my dress wasn't already in tatters and I hadn't borne my ass to them enough times. It was how I got here that was more concerning.
I soared into the air like a grasshopper on steroids.
"Okay, what was that?" I asked as I untangled myself, looking around the blood-smeared cave to make sure no one else had seen that. Like the vampire queen that I had forgotten had been there until a minute ago and seeing as I wasn’t dead should have been present for my asshole making a grand appearance.
Luckily the cave was empty, and also not the same cavern as before. The river flowing throne was gone, ceilings lower, stone cleaner.
We had been moved, and all of them had been given new clothes. All except me. I still wore that tattered yellow dress, the thing so ripped to shreds that it wasn’t just my ass hanging out.
"How long was I out?" I asked as I shifted the fabric to cover my left breast, which seemed perkier than it had before. “Oh, and what the fuck did you do to me?” I added on, stomping my foot against the stone and sending micro-vibrations through my sole, although that wasn't as weird of a sensation as feeling the air stream past my skin. “And why can I feel the world like it’s made of testicles and hair?”
“Testicles?” They all said together, and I balked, my heart falling to my toes.
“Tentacles,” I corrected, not that it made any difference. They all looked at me like I was crazy, and I stared at my chest like I had lost something.
Like my heart.
Which wasn’t beating.
My head snapped up to Saxon, who was giving me a smile that was unusually smug for him. I curled my lips, ready to demand answers, and instead, I snarled.
I fucking snarled.
And not a wolf snarl either… I sound like…
“I’m a vampire?
” The high-pitched shriek of my voice rang through the cave and everyone cringed.
“Or a banshee,” Howl said, digging a finger into his ear like he was trying to realign his eardrum or some shit.
Saxon stepped closer, standing before me as he looked at me, fangs stowed behind his lips for once.
“Not a banshee,” he said, his fingers running down my exposed arm.
His hot fingers.
“Saxon? Your skin.” The usual chill of his fingers was gone. His touch was no longer the sensation of freezing temperature. Cool, yes, but more like the zing of static electricity.
“I probably feel less cold to you now, yes?” He asked, running the back of his hand down my neck and over the top of my collar bone.
“Yes,” I said, already breathless. As if I needed more confirmation.
“You’re a vampire,” Saxon confirmed, still smug smiling his way into utter doom. “For now.”
I stopped whatever snarling monster was ready to break out of me in its tracks.
“For now? Explain.”
“You have been given some of the blood of the first vampire. The last and only vampire to have blood pump through his veins.”
I blinked at him, “So I am a vampire?”
“The effects are only temporary. You will feel the strength and insight of my kind for forty-eight hours at the most. For my kind, the blood can fully revive a fallen vampire. Which is why the Queen hoards it for her use and the use of her immediate kin.”
“Kin?” I asked, something about the fog of the throne room breaking through. “So, I didn’t hallucinate that. You are royalty.”
It wasn’t a question--more like a request for confirmation. He had never spoken much about his lineage, always evading the question by turning to another subject or simply sticking his head in a book when it was brought up. But he had brought me here, and the queen had totally outed him.
No wonder he hadn’t liked the idea when my mom had suggested it.
“I am. Katarina is my elder sister. She was the only one to be created by the vampire whose blood she hoards. And she, in turn, only created ten others. All vampires flow through her and her creations.”
