Russian Roulette (Helena Hawthorn Series Book 1)

by May Freighter

  Lucious slid one hand behind her back to undo the catch when the link to Helena juddered. He paused. A flood of fear roared into him, tearing him away from Zafira. A stronger wave hit him, and he shivered from the unknown-to-him cold that chilled him to his bones.

  “What’s wrong?” Zafira scanned his face for an answer.

  He felt her holding on to him as his legs give way. He landed on his knees and pain exploded in his kneecaps.

  “I don’t…know!” he choked out, finding it hard to speak.

  “Help me, Lucious!” Helena’s words were laden with soul-shattering fear that had appeared out of nowhere and engulfed his mind.

  He wanted to go to her, needed to be at her side. Lucious cursed aloud when the link went dead. The string quietened, and he could no longer feel her. It was as if she wasn’t there anymore.

  His body finally relaxed, and he concentrated on the link between them. Something sinister circled her shields. It was the same creature that had been lingering around them since he met her. The power it emitted now came in much greater quantities than before.

  Lucious opened his shields. His worries were proven to be correct. She was swallowed up by the darkness that was travelling across the link, getting closer to him.

  There was no way he was going to risk having something like that get inside him. He slammed his shields shut, reinforcing them with his energy. Whatever that thing was, he did not want to have anything to do with it because the hunger he felt from it was greater than any thirst he ever felt.

  15

  The Darkness Beyond

  So cold…

  Helena shivered. The cold had permeated from the rough surface she was laying on right down to her bones. She wrinkled her nose. The smell of rotting hay filled her nostrils, and she lifted her heavy eyelids.

  Her head rested on a brownish pile of thinning hay. The rest of her remained on a filthy stone ground. Through tiny cracks in it, yellow blades of grass fought their way to the surface in the dank prison cell.

  She sat up, allowing some time for her eyes to adjust to the surrounding dimness. Did Vincent decide she should be kept in a cell instead of a bedroom? She couldn’t recall him returning home or anything that had happened for that matter.

  Covering her nose with her sleeve, she wasn’t sure which smell invaded her senses through the material more: the stench of something rotten or the sewage that seemed to fill the rest of this cramped space.

  Something at the other end of the room shifted, making her heart begin a frantic dance. She pressed her back against the wall. The uncertainty of her situation had her body break out into a cold sweat.

  “Hello?” Helena’s whisper bounced off the walls.

  The shape didn’t answer or move. She couldn’t distinguish if it was her sight playing tricks on her. Her mind urged her to see what it was, yet the rest of her body disagreed.

  I would already be dead if it meant me harm, right? Once she made up her mind, she used the wall for support to climb to her feet.

  “Please don’t let there be anything else in here with me,” she chanted.

  The cold from the wall forced her to move away from it. Absorbing a deep breath, she took the first cautious step. The shape remained stationary. Upon drawing closer, the shape became a figure and, soon, turned into a woman.

  The stranger hugged her knees to her chest, revealing scraped white knuckles. Her face remained hidden behind a veil of greasy brown hair.

  Helena stopped a safe distance away. “D-do you know where we are?”

  The woman lifted her head but not enough to let Helena catch a glimpse of her face.

  “Chto?” the stranger mumbled in Russian. Her voice came out hoarse.

  Kneeling next to her, Helena took a better look at the poor thing. She didn’t have to wait long before a face came into view. The woman’s emerald eyes were huge against her starved, sharp cheekbones. Her hair was plastered together from lack of a shower, and bits of hay peeked through her locks here and there.

  Helena wanted to pick them out but didn’t dare touch her fragile form, not when those round eyes held so much fear.

  “Where are we?” Helena asked in Russian. Even though it had been a while since Helena used it, she was somehow able to hold a basic conversation.

  “Where do you believe we are?” She studied Helena with curiosity. Her grip relaxed around her knees, and she lifted her head.

  Despite the dirt covering most of her face and torn attire, Helena knew who this was. She had seen her face too often in her dreams. “Eva?”

  Eva’s eyes narrowed. “How do you know my name?”

  “I-it doesn’t matter. Why are you here? What is going on?” Helena scanned the place once more. “Where is here?”

  “You do not know?”

  “No, I don’t have a clue.”

  Eva gasped, and the sound of crunching bones filled Helena’s ears.

  She winced when a gut-wrenching scream came from the witch. Eva’s hands shot to her side. On instinct, Helena rubbed the woman’s arm, hoping it would help soothe her pain.

  Eva’s face relaxed, and she shook her head.

  Understanding her silent message, Helena removed her hand, careful not to touch her more than was necessary. After a minute or so, Helena cringed.

  Eva whimpered after each tiny breath she took. Once her breathing evened out, she opened her eyes again. “We are in prison, to be executed for witchcraft at dawn.”

  Helena stared at her in disbelief. “You are joking, right? I am not a witch. Why would Vincent execute me?”

  Eva frowned. “Who is this Vincent you speak of?” She tried sitting up properly but changed her mind when she let out a sharp hiss.

  Has Vincent managed to brainwash this woman? Why create the charade with the execution? “He’s the vampire who has us trapped here, a member of the Council.”

  Helena’s knees hurt, so she settled on the ground next to Eva.

  “And where is this Vincent?”

  “I don’t know,” Helena said with a frown forming on her brow. Could I be wrong? Maybe Vincent is uninvolved. She thought back to the last thing she could remember. She was in her room, waiting for him to return home from London. The rest was blank. She shook her head. No, that couldn’t be it. She was certain she was missing some vital piece of information.

  “If you are not a witch, why are you here?”

  Helena had no idea what to say. She never believed in magic. Guardian angels, sure, but magic was on a whole different level.

  The slight movement of Eva’s body drew her out of her thought. “I didn’t plan for things to become like this.”

  “Nothing we do is planned,” Eva stated. “Things have already been predetermined for us by fate.”

  She rolled her eyes. The same fate hogwash Michael was always going on about. Not everything was set in stone. Everyone had their free will. There was no major superpower that sat there and nit-picked at each one of them, deciding that person’s path.

  Helena made her way over to the metal bars that kept them from leaving. She grasped the icy iron and pulled as hard as she could. The metal creaked around the edges, but nothing else happened.

  Eva wheezed with a mixture of laughter and pain.

  “What’s so funny?” Helena glanced back at her, scowling.

  “Do you believe I have not tried that? I have spent a week in here, perhaps more.”

  “There must be a way out of here!” She wasn’t about to give up, so she studied the cell one more time. No apparent escape revealed itself. Then, it dawned on her. “Can’t you do a spell or something?”

  Eva pushed away from the wall, her hands shaking as she supported her weight. She raised her hand to stop Helena from coming to her aid. “I do not need help.” She managed to stand on her own two feet and proceeded to brush her dress down with swollen purplish fingers.

  “You don’t understand anything about magic, do you?” Eva’s voice came out cold. When she stopped fussing wi
th her dress, she turned her empty, emotionless gaze to Helena.

  “No, I don’t. People, well vampires, keep telling me that I’m something I’m not.” A half-smile spread across Helena’s lips. This whole set-up was ridiculous. Her life had become an endless cycle of mistakes, and no matter what choices she made, there was no shortage of misery. What was it that she had done to aggravate Vincent to bring her to such a place? And what happened to the darkness that was creeping around her shields?

  Darkness.

  Helena assessed Eva who seemed to have forgotten her presence altogether. Her eyes no longer looked at Helena. Instead, they focused on the metal bars she was holding on to.

  Eva’s eyes widened with terror. “They’re coming…”

  “Who’s coming?” Helena strained her ears to listen for anyone’s approach.

  Though muffled pain, Eva formed a ball in the corner and started trembling.

  In a few short seconds of listening to her pounding heart, Helena heard voices in the distance. Not knowing what to do, she ran over to where Eva was mumbling something and pressed her body to the cold stone.

  Two stocky men unlocked the cell and entered. One glared at Eva and reached for her with grimy hands before dragging her away from Helena’s side.

  Eva screamed in pain as something inside of her snapped.

  The second man scanned the room briefly. Seeming satisfied, he grabbed Eva’s other arm, propelling her towards the cell door.

  Immobile, Helena watched the scene unfold.

  Eva fought in their grasp, screaming foul curses between her sobs. “Help me, I don’t want to die!”

  There was nothing she could do. She wasn’t strong enough to fight off those gorilla-sized men. The sad revelation hurt her more than any physical pain. She wanted to help—to save Eva.

  She shook her head. There had to be something she could do. With newfound determination, she strained to move. As if bound by the vines of fear, her body wouldn’t listen to her commands.

  They dragged Eva out of the cell and, a minute later, they were gone. They vanished into thin air, leaving the cell wide open.

  Helena blinked rapidly. Is this real? Even if they were vampires, there would be some kind of noise when they carried her through the dark corridor.

  Puzzled, she kept peering into the darkness beyond. She must still be in shock. There was no other explanation. She clung to the stone wall for support and swayed as she approached the way out.

  I could go out there and try to save her, but how? At the same time, she heard another voice in her psyche, urging her to run, to get as far away as possible.

  It’s not right. Eva asked for help.

  “And how are you going to do that? Beat them with your hands or throw hay at them?” her mind mocked.

  Her shoulders fell. There was nothing she could physically do to help. This was her fault. She was always useless, always the one being saved. Her logic told her to run, but she had to try. It didn’t matter if things went wrong. At least, she would be happy with the fact that she tried her best to help someone.

  The next thing she knew, she was running. The wide corridor stretched further than she had anticipated and not one other prison cell was in sight. Soon, the light vanished. She was stranded in the shadows with no idea of what direction to take.

  She glanced over her shoulder. Her cell had disappeared into thin air.

  “Help me!” Eva’s voice echoed in the void.

  Helena picked up her pace, her legs aching, lungs burning. “Where are you?”

  Eva’s pained scream broke the unnerving silence. It came from the left, or so she thought, and she sprinted in that direction.

  A glimmer of light appeared in the distance, and she hastened her pace. The ground became softer and short blades of grass tickled her feet as she burst into the sunlit courtyard filled with violet nasturtium flowers and untrimmed hedges. She squinted, adjusting to the bright light above her head.

  Loud curses and shouts came from around the corner. Helena slowed her pace and edged around the tall hedge that blocked her vision of the epicentre of commotion.

  A buzzing crowd of more than two dozen people dressed in old ragged clothes, similar to Eva’s in design, chanted words she couldn’t make out earlier.

  “…the witch, burn the witch!” their unified voices sang whilst their fists pumped into the air.

  Helena searched past the crowd to find five frightened women, tied to tall wooden stakes in the middle. Her gut squeezed. She knew what was going to happen to them. It made her want to run away, to avoid getting closer to the murderous gathering. She could already see the thick smoke beginning to rise from underneath the women, from left to right.

  Excitement bubbled in the air. The audience clapped and cheered.

  “Die, you monsters!” someone shouted.

  Helena clenched her fists. She could no longer stand there and do nothing. She pushed her way through the swarm of people. The smell of sweat and alcohol flowed from men and women alike. They stood side by side, discounting her existence. She pressed on.

  The screams of the trapped women got louder the closer she got. Her clammy hands trembled, but she kept fighting her way to the front row.

  Just keep going, she told herself, determined not to stray from her path.

  Once she burst through the final row of hateful people, she was met with the horrid goings-on that took place before her. The first woman who was tied to the stake was not Eva. An agonised face came into view, causing her to intake a sharp breath.

  “Grandma?” The word rolled out of her mouth of its own accord.

  Her grandmother’s long hair was a mess of silver that reflected the orange glow of the flames beneath her feet. Her clothes were the last thing Helena remembered her in—a long blue linen dress and a pale green, flowery apron.

  “Why her?” Helena screamed her question at the cheering crowd, not managing to dampen their spirits in the least.

  “Don’t cry, child,” her grandmother said.

  Helena didn’t realise when her tears emerged. She brushed them away with her sleeve.

  The fire had reached her grandmother’s skirt and continued to climb. Helena raked her eyes over her surroundings. There was nothing useful there. No buckets, no water, just disturbed people who enjoyed the show.

  “I’ll find help, I promise!” Helena shouted.

  The courtyard they were in was bound to have a source of water. She tried fighting her way through the crowd again, but Eva’s voice stopped her in her tracks. “There’s one thing you can do for us.”

  Helena faced the woman who was next to her grandmother. She hadn’t noticed Eva being there. If the witch knew of a way she could help, she would do it.

  “What can I do?” Her gaze flicked back to her grandmother. Most of her lower body was engulfed in flames. She had to do something. There was no time.

  The women vocalised their suffering in an almost perfect unison. Her heart pumped hard enough she thought it would fight its way out of her chest.

  “Please, tell me!” she begged Eva.

  Helena’s body shook with agitation. She took in a deep breath. It was a mistake. Her nostrils filled with the smell of smoke and burning meat. Her hand covered her mouth while she willed the contents of her stomach to not rise any higher in her oesophagus.

  “Tell me, damn it!” Helena screamed over the cheering crowd.

  Two women on the left of Eva had grown silent. She was running out of time. Eva did not respond and continued to scream with the remaining women, their voices becoming hoarse.

  Helena turned to those who had gathered. None attempted to breach the line in which they arranged themselves to observe their victims’ suffering.

  “Someone stop this! This is madness,” she shouted. Her voice began to wither. Her pleas were drowned in the noise they produced. She stood in their way, but not one of them bothered to look in her direction. It was as if she didn’t exist.

  Helena tried her bes
t to force her way back through the crowd, yet they stood there like a solid wall. Using what little energy she had, she hit at their chests to get some attention. She froze in confusion when not a single member of the crowd brought their eyes down to her level.

  Her grandmother’s weakened voice filtered through. “Helena, help us.”

  Helena’s tears blurred her vision as she turned back and saw her beloved grandmother looking into space with her eyes glazing over.

  “I don’t know how to help you!” Her breaths came faster which made her stomach churn. She covered her nose and mouth with her hand, but it didn’t stop the fetor of burning. She tasted the charred flesh on her tongue. Bending over, she collapsed to her knees and vomited what she was fighting to keep down. Her throat hurt and her eyes stung with tears.

  When she glanced at the smoking remains of her relative, her heart missed a beat. No matter how hard she tried, her eyes wouldn’t move away from the unrecognisable woman who spoke with her a moment ago.

  She can’t be dead. Not again.

  “Help…me,” a heaving voice came from above.

  Helena found Eva who was struggling with the flames that licked at her chest. As if unable to comprehend anymore, Helena remained still.

  “Help!” Eva croaked.

  She’s alive! Helena shook her head and dug her nails into her palms to get a grasp on reality.

  “How?” She stood, frantic to get an answer before Eva was gone, too. “What can I do?”

  “Accept the deal,” she choked out.

  Her brows drew together. “What deal? I don’t understand.”

  “Accept the deal.”

  Eva’s face melted into the flames. Her cheekbones showed through the muscle tissue that leaked away like wax on a candle. Helena stared, incapable of uttering a single word.

  She felt something wrap around her chest. The strange energy that was unfamiliar to her. When she glanced down, there was nothing there.

  The energy began squeezing the air out of her lungs. She gasped, and her hands shot to her throat. Without much warning, it pulled, landing her on her ass.