by Ella M. Lee
“Is that allowed?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said. “As long as I don’t physically hurt one of them, kill one of them, steal from them, or harm their property, I’m not breaking the truce. We’re just going to have a pleasant toast together, and this will drug them while we finish our task.”
“What about El?”
“El?” he asked, whipping his head around to study me.
“Didn’t you understand me?” I asked. “When I was trying to tell you that your sister is here?”
“My sister is here?” he repeated. “I didn’t quite get what you meant. I thought you were trying to say that something else owned by a demon was here. Where did you see her?”
“She was in Shaw’s library with him. She was kissing him.”
Ren choked, shock rolling through the thread. “Well, that’s interesting.”
“That’s not all,” I said. “She threatened me yesterday. I think she wanted to kill me, but she saw our soul bond and decided not to. She tried to…I don’t know, bribe me into leaving. She said she could free me. She really doesn’t want you to get the dagger.”
“Yes, I know that.” Ren sounded annoyed. “I didn’t think she’d interfere quite this much. I was hoping my instructions for her to leave me alone would be enough. Now it seems I’ll have to deal with this myself.”
“I think…” I hesitated, hoping it wasn’t a terrible idea to mention this. “I think she may have had something to do with the assassination attempt, with the dagger ending up here.”
I tried to drench the thread in honesty and apology. It didn’t matter that we were soul bonded; this was still Ren’s sister we were talking about, his flesh and blood. I wasn’t sure he would take kindly to accusations.
But he just studied me for a moment longer and sighed. “Yes, I could see that. Maybe. I don’t sense her in the house right now. She might have noticed my arrival and fled. Don’t worry about El. I can take care of her. Focus on our plan.”
“Plan?” Hannah asked in a whisper. It was the first thing she’d said.
Ren and I both turned to look at her.
“We’re sort of here with a goal,” I said. “Ren needs something the vampires have, so we’re here to get it then get the fuck out of here.”
Hannah was trembling. After a moment of looking between us, she burst into tears. “Take me with you! Please…”
I turned around to look at Ren. He looked pained. Saddened. Guarded.
“I’m sorry, I can’t,” he said, and each word was a devastating knell.
I looked at Hannah, her face crumpled into tears, then back at Ren. His regret pulsed through the thread; he wished he could take her with us.
Property.
Ren nodded at me as though he’d heard the word. “Shaw bought her. She belongs to him. I can’t take her.”
“But…but…he bought me, too,” I said.
“You and I are soul bound. I could sell you a hundred times over, and you’d still be mine. You can never be someone else’s property while our bond exists. I planned it that way, so I could get you out if I had to.” He looked past me to Hannah. “But she is already his. I can feel that inside me. I have intuitive warnings for things that get me too close to breaking the truce. That would do it.”
Hannah held her face in her hands, weeping.
I gritted my teeth, reminded of my own weeping the night before, reminded of all the weeping I’d done in the past year. Reminded that she’d wept, too, possibly more than I had. She was seventeen, and a toy for vampires.
Life wasn’t fair.
I gripped the thread. Please, I said through it.
Ren shook his head. “I’m not all-powerful. I don’t know how.”
“What if I get her out?” I asked. “What if I…what if I help her escape? What if I get her off the property? Won’t it be like the dagger?”
“Maybe,” he conceded. “I don’t know. I checked over the circumstances for the dagger. I planned that carefully. I can’t know what will happen with an unknown human.”
“Then I’m going to walk her out of here,” I said. “I have to walk the dagger out anyhow. I’ll get her out, and it won’t have anything to do with you.”
He studied me for a long time. He thought Hannah would slow me down, that I’d fail my task because of her.
“I can get both of them out,” I said. “I promise.”
He sighed. “I have to go.”
He took my hands in his, stroking my fingers gently. He kissed me again, almost desperately, and my whole body trembled in pleasure. My lips parted, and our tongues met for a moment.
“Stay here,” he said to me, cupping my chin with his hands. “I’ll come back as soon as the royals are asleep, and we’ll leave. I can’t bear for you to be here any longer.”
He flung himself off the bed. He took the ingredients out of Hannah’s plastic bag and shoved them into his jacket pockets—I saw some sort of plant, a jar of red liquid, and a few other small items.
He was out the door with only a single backward glance, his beautiful eyes filled with so much emotion I could’ve almost believed he was human.
I gave the bond a slight tug, throwing longing and affection into the connection.
When the door was shut, I took a deep breath. “Ren said you found me?”
Tears still leaked from her eyes, but she nodded. “I thought, well, I figured, when you didn’t come back…but you were there on the porch, and you were alive. I don’t think you remember, but I woke you up for a minute. You walked here…somehow. I was just trying to figure out what to do with all the blood when, when he appeared. I heard the commotion in the entryway, and I knew we had guests. I peeked out. I thought he was a vampire. He talked to them and laughed with them. I was just trying to clean you up when he barged through the door.”
She paused, wiping her face with her sleeves. “I thought he was going to kill you, but when he saw you, it was like he was seeing the sun. He pushed me aside and knelt by you. He said his name was Ren, and you were his, and he needed to heal you. He said he was a demon, not a vampire, and that he wouldn’t hurt me. He took a flask out of his jacket and poured some stuff on you. I just watched. I didn’t know what to do. Your bleeding stopped, and he curled up on the bed with you. He said that you’d be fine and that he needed my help if I wanted to keep you alive and safe. He sent me to the kitchen and the garden to get some stuff.”
“All of that is true,” I said.
“And now you’re leaving?” she asked, her voice breaking. “I don’t understand…”
“I’m stealing something from the vampires, for Ren,” I said. “Once I have it, I’m getting off the property. And you’re coming with me. We’re going to escape together.”
“We can’t,” she said.
“We can,” I insisted. “Now, can you find us one more thing? We need some black clothes.”
Because I couldn’t wait to use Ren’s shadows to get us the fuck out of here.
Chapter 43
My luck ran out a few minutes after Hannah fled to find us better clothing for our escape.
I was just peeling the sticky blanket off, examining the bites on my skin, when the bedroom door banged open.
On the other side of it stood Weston. My heart sank, bile rising in my throat. Instinctively, I looked down, but I’d seen his eyes, his expression. He wasn’t in vampire form. His glossy hair and plump skin told me he was sated. In his right hand, he held a slip of black fabric. He threw it at my feet.
“Put that on,” he said harshly.
I swallowed. Gently, I tugged at the thread. Problems, I told it, hoping Ren would understand.
I couldn’t easily interpret the response I got. I thought it might be something like, hold on, but I wasn’t sure. Maybe it was, lie low? I didn’t know.
“Now,” Weston growled at me, and his voice sent cascades of fear through me.
Calm down, the tiny voice said. Not off, just calm.
With trembling
fingers, I picked up the fabric. It was a dress, silky and thin. I pulled it over my head, ignoring the aching pain as the slippery fabric slid over my wounds.
Weston grabbed me, pulling me by my arm out the door and down the hall.
There was no one in sight.
If Weston dragged me back outside, if he wanted to bring me somewhere to kill me…there would be nothing Ren could do. He couldn’t kill the royal. Couldn’t hurt him. He could maybe rescue me, but I still didn’t have the dagger.
Our plan would be ruined.
But, thankfully, Weston led me up the grand staircase and down the second-floor hallway toward a fancy sitting room I’d explored on my first day here.
My heart eased automatically, because the thread in me went bright and taut, and that only happened when Ren was nearby.
When Weston threw open the door of the sitting room, I thought my heart would burst from my chest.
Ren. I couldn’t help the feeling when I saw him, the yearning, the intense longing.
Stop it, the voice in me said. Look around. Pay attention.
Three vampires were gathered here. Shaw, in another impeccable blue suit, seated on a chaise longue. A human girl was stretched out next to him, her head in his lap. She appeared to be asleep or drugged. He stroked her hair and neck.
Standing behind him was Cassania, resplendent in pale pink. She could’ve looked human, except for her impossibly dark eyes and sallow, purplish skin. Her hand was on her mate’s shoulder.
Tomas leaned against the far wall, the only person who looked uncomfortable. As the only non-royal vampire in the room, of course he would fear the demon standing among them.
Ren’s eyes passed over me without recognition, focusing instead on Weston.
“Welcome,” Ren said, as though inviting Weston into his own home. Weston bristled.
Nice, I sent down the thread, although I doubted he understood.
Weston took a seat in a high wingback chair and pulled me into his lap. I gritted my teeth as he stroked my body through the thin fabric.
Ren said something to Weston in Estrerian, and I tugged on our bond gently to remind myself how to understand the language.
Weston laughed. “Just a toy,” he said, the words resolving into meaning in my mind.
“May I?” Ren said silkily.
“Be my guest,” Weston said, and laughed again at his stupid joke.
Ren approached us. He smiled down at me. I’d seen that smile before; the same smile he’d given to Jenna before breaking her bones. His eyes were filled with shadows. They ringed his wrists and fingers. With coldness I’d never felt from him before, he pressed two fingers to my throat, sweeping them up to my cheek. He tilted his head at me, assessing. His fingers continued, snaking through my hair.
The thread reverberated in me. Sorry, it said, echoing over and over again.
I’m fine, I sent back, driving the sentiment home as firmly as I could.
“You want her?” Weston asked, spreading his hands.
Ren turned away, his hand gone from me immediately. “No.” Complete disinterest in his tone.
Weston’s hands returned to me, rubbing my shoulders, his fingers stroking my neck. I shuddered.
Ren went to the long table by the windows. It had a crystal decanter of alcohol and heavy glasses. “It would be rude of me not to offer you a toast,” he said casually, “for your health and good fortune.”
The eyes of all the vampires were on him. He poured five glasses and, with immense gravitas, handed them to each in turn. His eyes brushed mine as he reached past me to Weston.
“To royals,” he said in English, smiling his devastatingly beautiful smile.
All five of them drank.
Silence settled over the room for about ten seconds before Shaw turned his head to Ren. He pushed the human girl off and stood. “What did you—”
He didn’t get any further before dropping to the ground. Tomas fell at the same time. Cassania tried to run for the door, but she stumbled and fell halfway there.
Weston went last. I watched as his eyes slid up into his head, and he slipped off the chair. I jumped off him, backing up as quickly as I could.
Ren caught me in his arms, and I tensed.
“You’re okay,” he said, the thread pinging with soothing softness.
“Go,” he said. “This won’t keep them down for long. Get the dagger. I’ll meet you at the north edge of the property.” He pointed. “Run as straight as you can. I can’t help you if you’re holding the dagger.”
Adrenaline shot through me. I nodded.
He touched my face, smiling, then gave me a slight push toward the door. The thread between us hummed, and I got the faintest glimmer from it, just a single impression, a single image. One I’d seen before.
A lion.
Chapter 44
I ran back down to my bedroom.
Hannah was there. “Where were—”
“No time,” I said. “Did you get us clothes?”
She shoved a pile of them at me. The two of us dressed quickly. I tied my hair back. We ran to the kitchen. It was 5:30 a.m., still pitch black outside the house.
Hannah was shaking. I grabbed her hands. “Listen to me. We need to get to the guesthouse then get the hell out of here. Ren will meet us at the north edge of the property, and we’ll be safe.”
“We’ll die in the swamp,” she said, a whispered sob.
“We’ll be fine,” I said. “I have some magic. Some powers, from Ren. Stick close to me. Do not leave my side. We’ll get out.”
I twined my fingers among hers, and we fled out the back door.
There was no one between us and the guesthouse. I used Ren’s strength to shove the bed aside in one swipe, and Hannah gasped, shrinking back. I descended the stairs so quickly and powerfully that I almost put my feet clean through them, ripped the dagger out of its box, and zipped it into the pocket of the black jacket Hannah had handed me.
The thread in me was taut still, and I tried to place where Ren was.
Above you, the tiny voice said, and I looked around, just barely sighting his huge wings far above the dense treetops.
I studied the blackness of the swampy land. I didn’t have to worry about the royals for now, but there could be vampire guards out there, probably on their way back to the house. I turned on that net, the one that sensed vampires, and grabbed Hannah’s hand again. She hesitated.
“We have to go,” I said. “There’s no turning back now.”
“What about…” She glanced at the house. “What about the others?”
I followed her gaze, frowning. Pain shot through me, choking me, burning my throat and eyes.
“I wish I could…” I said. “I wish, but we can’t. Sometimes…sometimes you have to pick your battles.”
And I understood right then that I’d never be happy if humans remained trapped in vampire harems while I was free. Hannah didn’t look like she could stand it, either.
You could come back someday, the tiny voice said. Free the women. Burn the place down. Do it to this vampire burrow, and then do it to another, and another, and another…
The tiny voice had good ideas sometimes. Ideas I would have to consider when I had a moment to think about anything other than my own survival. Hunting and killing vampires sounded like a pretty good career right about now.
I pulled at Hannah’s hand, and she followed me numbly into the nearest copse of trees.
We didn’t run.
I didn’t want to make too much noise.
But we walked quickly. I tried to juggle everything in my mind: the vampire-sensing net, the thread tugging me toward Ren, the thrumming of the dagger against me, the shadows I held close to us to mask our forms and scents.
The ground squelched under our feet as we sank into it, as we stumbled through vines and tree branches and scratchy bushes.
Something pinged on my vampire net, slightly behind us to the left. I tugged Hannah closer and swerved, bringing us
into denser forest, trying to pull more shadows over us.
Suddenly, running too fast for me to avoid it, a vampire launched at me out of the darkness. I flung Hannah away, rolling that hardened skin over myself just as he tackled me to the ground.
I tumbled, using Ren’s strength to rip him off me, and he hissed.
I clambered to my feet and groped blindly behind me, backing up until I was pressed against a thin sapling. The vampire advanced.
With a prayer that it would be enough, I ripped the sapling out of the ground with a deafening crunch and whipped it over my shoulder, colliding with the vampire’s head. He dropped with a crunch.
With a cry that didn’t even sound like my own voice, I threw myself at the vampire, slamming the sapling into his chest over and over until his heart was crushed and he shriveled underneath me.
Appreciation and pride rang through the thread, calming my heaving chest.
I looked around for Hannah. She was off in the distance, pressed between two large trees, staring at me as though she’d never seen anything like me. I thought it was fear in her expression, but no. Something about the quirk of her pursed lips and her lifted eyebrows spoke of envy and respect.
When our eyes met, she clapped silently.
Chapter 45
We must have run for close to an hour; this land went on for miles, and it wasn’t easy for a human to get over quickly. I might’ve been faster on my own, but I was hauling Hannah with me, and she was frail and frightened. More than once, we stumbled into waist-deep water, into thorny bushes that grabbed at our clothes. At one point, I barely kept us from tumbling into a trap—a pit we wouldn’t have been able to get out of.
Without Ren’s strength, we wouldn’t have gotten far.
But the thread tightened, and I knew we were close to the end. The trees thinned out just a little, melding into open, wet land. As we neared their end, I felt another vampire nearby.
Shit.
Weston.
He’d followed us somehow. I could fight guards, but I didn’t think I could fight the royal. At least not well enough to disable him completely and reach my goal.
