They flinched, immediately shaking their heads. “Of course not, Master Ambrogio.”
I let out a breath of relief, recognizing the situation for what it was. Nosh had asked them to do something that might go against my wishes. To punch Dracula in the face. “Do as Nosh asked you,” I told them, deciding that it couldn’t hurt and that it might be good for morale.
They stared back at me, stiffening in surprise that I knew of their plight.
I shrugged. “What’s one more secret among friends? I’ll act surprised.”
They nodded uncertainly. Nero stepped up beside me, scrunching his nose up at the wall of fog. “I’m going to need a piggyback ride,” he said. “From the pretty one,” he smiled at Eve.
“It would be my pleasure,” Adam said, grabbing him by the waist and propping him up on his shoulder, ignoring Nero’s angry squawk.
“What’s up with the gray crystals? Is that like Nephilim back hair?” Nero complained, frowning at the occasional gray tendrils shifting back and forth across Adam and Eve’s bodies. I’d noticed them as well, but I hadn’t had time to ask about them. I was betting they were a result of the secret souls I had given them. “Are our Nephilim not bathing? Growing lichen?”
Adam and Eve remained stoically silent.
I shrugged. “When Dracula was trying to break out and sacrificed all of his vampires in the attempt, it weakened the Nephilim a little bit.”
“Not enough to break us,” Eve growled, clenching her fist.
Adam nodded. “I feel excellent now. Better than ever.”
Nero frowned, glancing out at the white and black castle in the distance. “I still can’t believe he took such a stupid gamble. His whole army?” He shook his head. “Idiot.”
I nodded. “There are a few vampires left. For the next few minutes, anyway.” Nero frowned curiously. “His brides,” I elaborated. “But poor Dracula is about to become a widower. As long as you guys don’t mind getting your hands dirty.”
Lucian wagged his tail happily and everyone else smiled, nodding along.
Eve clapped her hands and then held them out towards Lucian with an eager grin on her cheeks. Lucian happily bounded up into her arms. She straightened, holding him in the crook of her elbow, making him look like one of those canine-rodent hybrids that humans liked to carry around in purses. I walked into the fog towards the gate, smiling as the fog recoiled away from me, forming a clear path. It did the same for Adam and Eve as they flanked me.
I hadn’t dared bring anyone else to the castle. I couldn’t risk anyone hearing Dracula mention any Olympian interference—what he had attempted with Hades.
The fog billowed around us, keeping everyone else far back. There were about two hundred werewolves and vampires gathered on the streets surrounding the park, all watching the momentous event of me entering my castle for the first time in hundreds of years.
I placed my palm on the gate and it instantly vibrated warmly, opening on silent hinges. The castle no longer felt strained and weak. Instead, it felt hyper-aware of the unfolding events. I strode a few paces inside, motioning for the Nephilim to follow me. Once clear of the gate, I closed it and motioned for them to put Nero and Lucian down. Because the fog remained just outside the gate, unable to enter the castle grounds.
Lucian and Nero took deep, satisfied breaths and nodded at me. I didn’t speak as I began to walk down the long, bridge of land connecting the gates to the castle itself. I didn’t look down at the yawning chasm to either side of me. But I did smile.
I was coming home.
The very air seemed to quiver and hum with anticipation, waiting for me with bated breath.
“This…is a very long fucking driveway,” Nero complained, kicking a rock over the edge and down into the endless darkness. The rock let out a muted wail as it fell, and I glanced back to see Nero’s face paling.
“It wasn’t a rock,” I said. “You just kicked some poor bastard’s skull into infinite darkness.”
Nero winced guiltily. “Sorry, pal!” he called out, cupping his hands around his mouth to apologize to the skull. It continued wailing, still falling.
A few minutes later we reached the massive wooden front door. It was tall enough for even the Nephilim to walk through without concern. I marveled at the ivory and ebony columns rising all around me. I’d been so used to the black stone that it almost felt like a new castle rather than my old one.
In a way, it was a new castle. One touched by the Nephilim. Now, it was also touched by Titans. Then again, if the Nephilim were also Titans, nothing had changed. I pounded my fist on the door. It sounded like a hammer striking an anvil, echoing throughout Central Park.
“Did you get my cards, old friend?” I called out.
Rather than hearing Dracula answer, the door opened to reveal three ancient, almost desiccated women in once elaborate velvet dresses. Their skin was as fine and dry as aged parchment. Nero hissed, lifting his claw. His bone hand flared with purple light and their rheumy eyes began to glow the same color.
Although, they hadn’t been doing anything threatening. They had just been standing there.
I held out my hand to Nero. “Who are you?” I asked, even though I was fairly certain that I already knew. I’d seen them in my vision of the castle, helping Dracula kill off all his vampires for his ritual. Except they had been a lot more…youthful then. Had Hades done this to them, or was Dracula now so deprived of blood that he had been forced to drain his own trinity to survive?
Could this happen to Natalie and Victoria if I drank too much of their blood?
One of them shifted her attention to me, her skin cracking and letting out faint puffs of dust. Lucian sneezed loudly, pawing at his nose as he inhaled some of the particles.
“You killed our Mina,” she said in a dry rasp. There was pain in her voice, but no anger.
“One of my fondest evenings since returning,” I admitted with absolutely no shame. “She deserved much worse. You must be the Brides I’ve heard so much about. Dracula’s trinity. Sorry that I missed the weddings.”
The three nodded in unison. “Yes. We are all that remains to him, now,” they said in unison. “Please, show him mercy, Master Ambrogio.”
I stared at them without reacting. “Where is he?”
“He is…indisposed.”
“Grab them.”
Nero grinned wickedly. “Nah. They look like they’re resisting.” The women shook their heads frantically, holding up their palms in innocent gestures.
Nero clenched his fist and all three women went flying into a massive pillar inside the castle. They shrieked as bones broke upon impact. They squirmed weakly, pinned down by a purple force emanating from Nero’s claw.
Lucian trotted up to them, wagging his tail. One of the brides lifted a hand, begging for mercy from the happy wolf. He clamped down on her offered hand, sinking his fangs deep into her flesh, still wagging his tail. Then he began trotting over to me, dragging her along behind him.
Eve bent down and tentatively poked one of the brides with a finger. The vampire winced in terror and Eve spun back towards Adam, hooting triumphantly. “You owe me a five-minute massage!”
I stared at her, baffled.
Adam snorted, turning to look at me. “I could have sworn the vampires would blow up the moment we touched them,” he told me, shrugging. “But a five-minute massage is an easy price to pay,” he murmured, licking his lips.
I stared at the two of them. “You’re just now telling me this?” I demanded, wondering why I hadn’t considered the risk earlier.
His smile faltered. “I wanted it to be a surprise.”
Eve nodded. “You mentioned making Dracula a widower, so we didn’t think you’d care.”
Nero began to laugh. Hard.
The Brides were openly whimpering and begging now that Eve had mentioned making Dracula a widower. I remembered the Nephilim telling me that, in the past, vampires attempting to drink from them would be destroyed, but Eve poking them
brought up an interesting topic. How much had the Nephilim changed? They had changed the castle, but had the castle also changed them?
If we survived all of this, I would have to find out.
Eve bent down over the vampire she had just poked and gripped a fistful of her hair. She tugged it sharply enough that it tore some from the scalp, forcing the gasping bride to follow or lose what little hair she had left. Adam grabbed the last vampire by her leg, bringing up the rear as I made my way to the throne room. I reached the familiar wooden door, glaring at the absence of my crest. Dracula must have torn it down.
I glanced back at Eve with a mild frown. “I do not see an attendant. Nor do I see a door knocker to announce my presence.” I frowned up at the door. “And this is not my original door.”
Eve nodded obediently, striding up to the door with her vampire. “What is your name?” she demanded, baring her teeth at the dazed vampire bride.
“Akeldama,” she wheezed.
Nero whistled. “Hell of a name.”
She nodded with mild pride. “It means field of blood.”
Nero grunted. “Of course.”
Eve nodded. “Announce our imminent arrival, blood-field whore.”
Nero hooted. Akeldama stiffened instinctively but was wise enough not to show offense. Instead, she nodded eagerly. “O-okay. What are your n-names?” she stammered.
Eve sighed. “Pitiful creature. I said imminent arrival.” Akeldama had time to widen her eyes before Eve palmed her face and slammed the back of her head into the wooden door once. “Knock,” she said, ignoring Akeldama’s muffled cries and the strange squishing sound from her skull. She repeated the gesture with a squishier thud, lessening the muffled whimpers. “Knock.” Then she put her back into it for a third and final motion. “KNOCK!” The force of her strike shattered the wood and ripped the door from the hinges, sending it skittering into the throne room.
Akeldama’s head also exploded like a burst melon, splattering me with pale, almost pink blood and gore. Eve bent down to wipe the gore off her hand on one of the surviving vampire’s dresses. The pair of terrified brides shied away in sobbing horror at her proximity. Eve straightened back up, unsheathing her scythe. She frowned at the open doorway. “There. Whore-knocker.” She beamed at her joke.
“We will find your original door,” Adam said absently, studying the new opening through the dust and falling debris.
“So hot,” Nero commented, appraising Eve. The surviving vampires whimpered and sobbed, too weak to fight back against their abductors. Eve smirked at the necromancer, curtsying.
Adam drew one of his blood scythes and used it to swipe away excess wood and debris from the frame. Then he held out a hand and bowed formally, motioning me to enter first.
I strolled inside.
43
They followed me into the vast but spartan throne room. A bright green glow in the far corner of the room behind the throne drew my attention, but I pretended not to notice it. Inwardly, I let out a breath of relief.
The Soul Spring. Even though it was no longer purple. What did that mean?
But my attention riveted onto the sad shell of a man facing us with his head hanging down to his chest. He was kneeling at the base of the steps leading up to the raised dais that held my ornate, inky black throne of polished marble.
Hellish wings fanned out to either side of the back, and the lush red velvet looked just as soft and pristine as the day I’d first acquired it. I sighed longingly.
Lucian jerked his head violently, tearing off the vampire bride’s arm. Her instant wail of anguish snapped me out of my reverie. Dracula gasped as if impaled, his shoulders shaking as the amputated vampire screamed, clutching at her wound with her free hand. Her screams echoed off the marble walls like a cat’s hiss and nails on a chalkboard.
Lucian gobbled down the arm without fanfare, and then licked his lips a few times. Then he began barking excitedly, circling the wounded man kneeling before my throne.
Dracula finally managed to lift his head, and I kept my face blank as I stared into the pale, misty eyes of the usurper.
His cheeks were hollow and gaunt, much like I had looked upon waking after my centuries-long slumber. His breathing was a steady wheeze and rattle, like dead leaves rustling through a forgotten graveyard. I thought about a pile of sapphires and a riverbank to bolster my resolve and smother the desperate desire to kill him myself. Right here. Right now.
I came to a halt five paces away from him, staring at him with a cold smile.
“Welcome to New York City, old friend.”
“If you could call the return of an ingrown cock hair an old friend, anyway,” Nero muttered, stepping up beside me. Lucian stepped up to my other side, his head hanging low and his golden eyes blazing. He licked his lips—slowly and loudly, not even blinking.
“P-please,” Dracula wheezed, extending a hand towards his two remaining vampire brides. “They are all I have left.” He fell into a wet coughing fit.
“Adam? Eve?” I asked, not breaking eye contact with Dracula.
The vampire brides began screaming louder as Adam and Eve stepped up to my other side, each holding one of the brides by the neck. “Master Ambrogio,” they said subserviently.
“What are their names?” I asked Dracula.
“Polona and Thana,” he croaked. “They have nothing to do with our feud.”
I stared at him. “Feud,” I repeated flatly.
Dracula nodded, clapping his hands together in a begging gesture. “They are all that kept me chained to my human side. They are gentle women, and they have great magic. They can help you. They know how to make magical artifacts like bracelets,” he said, noticing the nullification chains hanging from Nero’s belt—the ones he had brought to restrain Dracula for when we took him to the Sisters of Mercy.
A voice suddenly rang through the halls, but no one else seemed to hear it.
Vile, merciless, and cruel, but spineless in the face of real threats. Polona experimented on pregnant mothers, initiating the turning at the last possible moments in the hopes of producing a vampire child for her husband. Thana worked on babies, trying to turn them at the moment of birth. They worked tirelessly in their efforts to help Dracula’s conceive a child and threw the discarded bodies into the depthless moat leading to the castle. Thousands of innocent women and children…
Castle Ambrogio was speaking to me. Judging by Dracula’s intent focus on Polona and Thana, he hadn’t heard the castle’s commentary either.
I slowly glanced over at Adam and Eve. They were trembling furiously, and I knew that they had heard the castle’s warning. I used our connection with the castle to give them a command.
They clenched their jaws and I turned back to Dracula in time to observe his face. I might not be able to get my ultimate revenge, but I could do much worse. In a way, this was better. I could assassinate his heart long before the Sisters ever got their hands on him.
“Dracula says you can make powerful bracelets. Is this true?” I asked the brides.
They began speaking so quickly that their words were just a waterfall of consonants and vowels.
“Now,” I said, cutting them off.
Eve hoisted Polana up into the air by the base of her throat, holding her face inches away from her own nose. “Mothers,” Eve accused, her fiery crimson eyes blazing. I sensed golden lightning now in those depths, but I kept the observation to myself. Then Eve used her other hand to grip Polana under the chin. There was a moment of stasis, and then she ripped Polana’s head off in such a way that her spine remained attached, ripping out of her body cavity like a straw lifted from a drink.
She discarded the body, hurling it at Dracula’s feet. She inspected her work, studying Polana’s head and the dripping, gory spine dangling from her neck.
Dracula let out an agonized sob, his shoulders slumping as tears poured down his weathered, bloodless cheeks.
Thana screamed, panting wildly as Adam repeated the process, lifti
ng her up to his face. “Babies. Fucking babies!” he roared, the force of his voice blowing Thana’s hair back from her face. She continued screaming, begging and pleading in terror. Adam ripped her head off the same way Eve had done, also managing to keep Thana’s spine intact. He also tossed the body before Dracula, nodding satisfactorily as the man cried out in physical pain.
“Don’t let him die, Nero. It’s not his time yet. The night is young.”
Nero nodded. “He will live, but that greatly wounded him. I think he was relying on them to survive. That’s why they looked so drained.”
Adam and Eve were swinging the spines in the air playfully as Lucian leapt up, barking and trying to catch the tail ends.
Nero was staring at the Nephilim with a frown. “You two on steroids or something? I thought you were weak and hungry.”
Eve glanced over at him. “We are always hungry, but after Sorin put a stop to Dracula’s nonsense ritual, we felt much better.” Adam grinned mischievously, nodding.
I very carefully kept my face blank. The Titan souls were working wonders.
Nero shifted his attention to study the spines with great interest rather than amusement or disgust. “I think I can use them,” he said, glancing down at his glowing bone hand. The spines began to glow with a matching purple light.
I studied the necromancer and his new hand. “How so?”
“To make personalized nullification cuffs,” he said, licking his lips. “And I think they will work better than these,” he said, patting the cuffs on his hip. “Because these are already bound to Dracula.” He approached Adam and Eve, holding out his hand. Adam held out his prize to the necromancer with an interested smile. Nero studied it clinically. “I don’t need the head.”
“Trophy,” Adam said, plucking the skull free with almost no effort. Nero took the spine and his bone hand began to glow brighter. He held the two ends together and I watched as purple fire crackled to life, fusing the vertebrae together so that he held a loop rather than a long string of bone. He twisted the two ends so that it formed an infinity symbol.
Devil’s Blood: Shade of Devil Book 3 Page 27
