Russian Roulette (Helena Hawthorn Series Book 1)

by May Freighter

  “You look like shit,” she told the girl in the mirror who returned a half-smile.

  The energy she had recovered from her sleep was rapidly draining away. She held on to the sink with one hand and used the other to splash some cold water on her face.

  What is wrong with me?

  Helena thought hard on what may be the cause of her sudden illness. She felt fine until the strings were connected.

  There must be something wrong with the link. She closed her eyes to concentrate on the new connection. It was a lot harder to do than she had anticipated. A migraine from before was chipping away at her sanity.

  At a sudden surge of pain in her skull, both of her hands shot up. Her support disappeared and her knees gave way, hitting the floor with a loud thud. She screamed her agony aloud. To add to her suffering, the headache built up, thudding in what seemed to be timed intervals.

  “Helena what have you done to yourself?” Michael asked.

  His words were nothing more than background noise amidst the pulsating hammer in her head.

  She gritted her teeth. “I…don’t know. It hurts!”

  Her nails dug into her scalp. Through closed eyes, she could tell Michael’s hand hovered next to her face. Forcing them open a tad, she regretted her decision instantly. The light from his palm was unbearable to her sensitive retinas. Without delay, her eyelids fluttered shut.

  The pain slowly faded. Whatever Michael was doing helped her regain control of her thoughts. And, once her migraine receded enough to become a minor buzzing, he stopped whatever he was doing.

  She was glad he returned to her side. Mouthing a ‘thank you’, she observed him.

  Michael’s condition hadn’t improved. He appeared spent. The glow around him had dimmed, and he almost looked human. His sunken red eyes indicated restless nights.

  She snorted. Somehow, she knew exactly how he felt. Whatever he was undergoing took a toll on him.

  Guilt gnawed at her. She shouldn’t have overreacted the way she did when he avoided her questions. Michael had always been there to help her. He should be allowed to have some secrets of his own.

  The cold from the floor seeped through her clothes, making her shiver. That didn’t stop her from giving him the best smile she could muster as she rested her head against the tiled wall.

  “What was that?” she asked him, hugging herself.

  “Why have you created another link with the vampire? I warned you about this. Am I so untrustworthy that your first choice became an undead?”

  “I’m sorry. I-I want to trust someone…”

  Michael sighed, bowing his head. His long golden hair slid from his shoulders, hiding his face from her. “I should not have left you alone. This link… It shouldn’t exist between a mortal and a vampire.”

  “Why not?”

  “I do not have enough time to explain the semantics. The reason your new connection is so laborious on you is because you are not of the same energy level.”

  Helena couldn’t help staring at him. Her brain was trying to catch up to what he was saying and failing miserably at digesting the influx of data.

  He raised his fisted left hand, facing it downwards. “This is your energy,” he said and lifted his second hand with his fingers spread out. “And this is his.” He placed both hands next to one another, touching his thumbs to represent the link between them. “Your energy level is much smaller than his. So, the leftover energy from the bond is trying to find a host by roaming the link.”

  “This headache is energy hitting against our shields?”

  “Yes.”

  “How can we fix this?”

  “Call out to the vampire,” Michael instructed.

  If she had a megaphone available, sure, but there was nothing in her vicinity. She raised a brow. “Just like that? Do vampires have such good hearing?”

  “Not using your voice. Use the bond. The connection is strong enough for you to communicate mind-to-mind from any distance. The last time I checked on him, he was somewhere on the premises.”

  Helena didn’t bother asking why Michael was spying on Lucious. In a way, she was thankful he kept an eye on the vampires while she relearned to walk.

  She focused and thought of Lucious. From the confines of her shields, her string was no longer plain. It was replaced by a new, merged string of white-red. The blood from the red string seeped through the cotton-like material of her pale string without leaving a single stain behind. She didn’t dare try to understand how any of it worked and hoped that one day, when he was not running away, Michael would tell her what she needed to know.

  The link hummed with energy when she sent Lucious a message. “Help me.”

  Without delay, she heard his strained voice in her mind. “What is this? How can I hear you in my head?”

  “I can’t explain it. I need you to come to me. I don’t feel too good.” Sending the last message took a lot more out of her than she had anticipated. It was growing harder to stay conscious.

  “I’ll be right there,” he replied, and the connection went dead.

  She found Michael staring at her. “He’ll be here soon.”

  “As unhappy as I am with this arrangement, this is the only way to make you feel better.”

  “Look, Michael, I’m—”

  Before she could give a proper apology, Lucious arrived in the doorway. After a quick look at her, he knelt at her side. Her brain didn’t even register the movement. Cursed vampire speed.

  Helena noticed he wasn’t in a much better shape than her. This problem was making both of them suffer. They needed to fix it before any more damage was done.

  “Why did you call me and not the maid?” he snapped.

  “I didn’t call her because she can’t help me. There’s a problem with our link.”

  “What is wrong with it? It feels a lot stronger than before…” He paused and assessed her. “You’re shivering. Let’s get you off the floor.”

  He reached for her, but she shook her head. “No time. We have to get this fixed before it gets worse.”

  Her headache picked up where it left off, gaining more strength than ever since Lucious entered the room. Their proximity was affecting the length of the bond, causing the collisions to happen faster.

  She turned to face Michael who observed Lucious in silence.

  “What do you want us to do?” she asked.

  Lucious glanced to where Michael was. “Is your guardian here?”

  “Yes. Is that a problem?”

  “No, continue.”

  Michael glared at the vampire.

  Trying to ignore his childish behaviour, she urged him to say something with her mind.

  Her guardian diverted his attention back to her, his eyes softening. “First, place both of your hands on him.”

  Lifting her arms was a lot tougher than she had imagined. They moved sluggishly as if she was wading through water. She struggled and, with much effort, managed to do what she was told.

  Lucious said nothing and kept stealing glances to where Michael would have been if he could see him. The moment her hands made contact with his shirt, she felt faint. The strength in her arms waned the longer she held on to him. They slid down, breaking the touch.

  He caught both of her hands and pressed them against his chest.

  Helena did her best not to think about what was under the thin material. She hadn’t realised how aware of him she had become once their new bond was formed.

  Her heart sped up, revealing her nerves to him. She saw a hint of a smile hiding in the corner of his mouth. To stop the oncoming wave of embarrassment, she directed her attention to Michael.

  “Concentrate on the link, Helena. You don’t have the time to be distracted,” Michael grumbled.

  She closed her eyes, thinking of their connection. Speechless, she stood inside of her shields. The string started pulsating faster. Outside of her bubble, she heard something slamming against her mental protection. Michael was right. The battering noi
se created by the trapped energy was in sync with her headache.

  “What now?” she asked out loud, waiting for another set of instructions.

  None followed. Helena searched the bathroom a second time. She and Lucious were alone. Michael left them without as much as a warning. To make sure, she scanned the bathroom again. He was nowhere to be found.

  She turned to Lucious. “Michael is gone! I don’t know what to do next.”

  With his absence, her headache climbed in intensity. She couldn’t stop it. Helpless, she tore her hands away from him to fend off the pain.

  Lucious grabbed hold of her face. “Calm down. We can figure it out. What did he tell you?”

  She nodded—too fast—and took one long, strained breath. Her eyes widened when her panic retreated slightly. “There is energy trapped between our shields. He said it’s trying to find a host.”

  He absentmindedly stroked her cheek with his thumb. “Did he say anything else?”

  Helena raked her memory for further details. Her thought pattern kept swaying between Michael, the pressing pain, and the soft feel of Lucious’ thumb brushing her skin.

  “H-he said something about our energy being different.”

  Lucious took hold of her hands and placed them on his chest where they were before. “Close your eyes and try to concentrate.”

  Having her eyes closed didn’t seem to help her focus in the least. She clung to her resolve, desperate to relieve her headache. A few seconds ticked by and she, once more, stood inside her shields, sensing his presence on the other side.

  She opened them for him, at the same time, taking away the barrier between them. With nothing in the way of the wild energy, it slammed into her, setting her nerve endings on fire. The intensity of her body’s torment tore a scream out of her.

  Lucious appeared by her side. For some reason, the closer he got, the greater her suffering became as if he was pushing the energy into her body by force.

  “Don’t…move,” she begged through grinding teeth.

  He, too, collapsed on the ground, clutching at his chest. His eyes burned with a blue flame.

  Helena couldn’t keep her eyes open anymore. She squeezed them shut, desperate to fight the sizzling energy as it scorched her insides. It ran through her almost like a trapped snake, seeking a way out.

  I can’t accept this energy. I’m not the host.

  “Drop…shields,” she wheezed.

  Without delay, his barriers crumbled. Not caring for what may happen next, Helena forced the energy back out through the string. A moan of agony escaped him, and his presence vanished.

  With the excess energy gone, she regained some strength and broke the concentration to find Lucious lying on the floor next to her. She searched for a pulse and remembered he had none.

  “Lucious, wake up!” She grasped him by the shoulders.

  He didn’t respond.

  “How do you know if a vampire is alive?” she asked herself. An image of Alexander tearing off a head from the intruder came to mind. He shrivelled and became a mummy-like carcass. She waited a long moment for anything to happen. When nothing did, she let her head fall back and thanked the heavens. Carefully, she lifted his head onto her lap.

  “Please, wake up,” she whispered, running her fingers through his hair. It was softer than she had expected.

  What if he doesn’t wake up? She blinked away the tears. Even trapped with two vampires was better than being alone.

  “What the hell did you do to him?” a shout came from the doorway.

  Helena turned her head to find Alexander glaring at her. There was no room left for fear. She was filled to the brim with worry for Lucious which kept her stomach in knots.

  “We were trying to fix the link and…”

  Alexander bent over Lucious and lifted him off the cold ground. His eyes burned with the hatred she was certain she deserved.

  “If anything happens to him, I will personally snap your neck. You are lucky he wants to keep you around,” he said and carried Lucious out of the bathroom.

  The increased distance between them didn’t bring the peace of mind she sought. With no friends to talk to, no guardian angel to guide her, and no family to help her through this mess, she was alone.

  When Helena came out of her trance-like state, she found Magda sitting next to her. She couldn’t remember how long she had been in the bathroom or how she got there to begin with.

  Magda offered her a pink handkerchief, but Helena ignored it and kept staring at her blurred reflection in the tiles. She felt numb. Nothing mattered now. Whatever she touched and anyone involved with her ended up dead or close to it.

  In a soft voice, the maid said, “Don’t cry. It be good.”

  Somehow those simple words made Helena smile. She assumed Magda meant that things would be alright, but who was she to correct her? She couldn’t even get her life in order.

  Helena noticed the room was full of steam drifting through the air. The maid managed to get the bath ready without her taking notice of it. She needed to get a grip on reality.

  Magda helped Helena to her feet. She assisted in undressing her and left the room once Helena sank into the hot bath.

  Alexander’s angry words replayed in her mind as she swirled the water with her finger. Why did Lucious want her there? She was nothing but trouble.

  She lowered her body underwater, welcoming the serene warmth. It couldn’t fix the torment in her heart, but it soothed the stiffness in her back.

  If it was attached to Lucious’ body, it hurt. He had never felt so drained in his entire life. Even creating a childe didn’t require so much energy from him.

  Lucious rocked into a sitting position and discovered Alexander sitting across from him with his elbows resting on his thighs and his clasped hands hanging between his legs.

  “Such a serious expression doesn’t suit you,” Lucious joked.

  Alexander raised his tired eyes. “You truly have a knack for scaring people. I asked you to get her to fall in love with you, and you go off and create some kind of link that had almost killed you!”

  “I wanted to keep her close. This connection it’s…something else.”

  “I don’t care. The Council is due to arrive in a couple of hours, and I would prefer if you didn’t do their job for them.”

  “Just listen to me. The link, it’s different—stronger. I can feel her in the other room as if she is right here with me.”

  Alexander shook his head. “I don’t know about this. Being this entangled with whatever she is on such an intimate level could be a mistake of major proportions.”

  “Or it could be a way to control her.”

  “As long as you are not thinking of anything else, I’m fine with it.” He stood. “Let’s get ready. They should be arriving soon enough. We need to prepare. Although, I don’t believe there is anything that can spare us from Eliza’s wrath.”

  Lucious joined him. He pretended he was unaffected by the stress his body suffered, but Alexander saw through him.

  “I’ll call one of my girls. You need to feed,” Alexander added.

  “No. I’m fine.”

  “We cannot allow the elders to see you like this. The fact you’re a new sire and their curiosity about the girl is keeping them from pulling your head off your shoulders. So, let us hide our weaknesses so far down our throats that even modern technology cannot find it.”

  Lucious gave a reluctant nod. “Alright, I will feed before we leave.” He didn’t want Alexander to know the saint’s blood was incomparable in taste to another human’s. The pleasure he took from drinking her blood was immense, and he was unable to find a replacement.

  Alexander studied him attentively. “As curious as I am about your thoughts right now, I will refrain from asking.”

  After the bath, Helena sat on the bed, wrapped up in a fluffy white towel. She stared out the window at the thin treeline and the houses beyond.

  The door slammed shut, and she whipped her hea
d around to see if it was Lucious. To her dismay, it wasn’t him. Instead, the receptionist from ‘Russian Roulette’ glared at her with her piercing aquamarine eyes. “What the hell do I have to babysit you for?”

  Helena clutched her towel closer to her body. “Excuse me?”

  “You heard me. I have to sit here with you instead of helping my darling recover from whatever you did to him.”

  “You’re with Lucious?”

  The blonde flicked her hair over her right shoulder with her expertly manicured fingers. “I wish I was,” she said, drawing closer to Helena. “I have a lot of work to do to make you look good in front of the Council. A lot of work.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t feel like elaborating, kid. Take that thing off and let’s get started.”

  Helena’s brows shot up. She wasn’t about to strip naked for a stranger. “I don’t think so.”

  The blonde moved faster than she could fathom and grabbed a large chunk of Helena’s damp hair.

  “Let go, you—”

  “I’m not you, I’m Tanya. The first human Alexander sired.”

  Helena glared at her. “You sound almost proud.”

  Tanya tilted her head to one side. “Why wouldn’t I be? He gave me a new life, a better one.”

  A dark emotion flashed behind the woman’s eyes. Was there more to the story than she was telling?

  The second Tanya let go of her hair, Helena fell backwards on the bed.

  “I was ordered not to harm you in any way and I shall abide by the order, for now. I suggest you take a seat on that chair over there unless you want me to carry you.”

  Helena scrambled to her feet and retreated towards the chair. If Tanya was anything like her sire, she would follow through with her threat.

  “Oh, do not look at me like that, human. I will do what any great stylist would.”