Blood Betrayed

by Gabrielle Bisset

  Chapter Twenty

  Saint awoke alone and instantly missed Solenne's touch. Still groggy from sleep, he worked to focus his eyes on the clock near the bed.

  6:01.

  Not fully awake but at least half dressed in a pair of workout pants, he made his way down the stairs to the kitchen, rubbing his closely cropped hair as he walked. A familiar voice made his eyes open wide, and in seconds a rush of adrenaline had him wide awake by the time he entered the room to see Solenne sitting at the table with Teagan.

  "What are you doing here?" flew from his mouth before he could stop himself.

  Teagan put up his hands. "Wait. Before you hit me again, hear me out. I'm here to apologize."

  Saint stood behind Solenne's chair, glaring down at his brother. "Apologize?"

  Lowering his hands, Teagan began. "Vasilije talked to me when Dante took me back to the monastery. I've been a real prick for a long time, Declan. I've told Solenne I'm sorry, and I want to say it to you too."

  "So that's it? Vasilije gives you some blood, your face goes back to normal, and now you want to apologize for a lifetime of shit?"

  Saint stood waiting for Teagan to answer, convinced there was little point in holding the grudge any longer. He'd gotten what he'd always wanted. He had Solenne's love. Everything else was in the past. Maybe it should stay there.

  That didn't mean Teagan should get a free pass for a simple apology, though.

  "Uh, yeah. That's about right," Teagan answered.

  "Did that work on Solenne? That lifetime of shit affected her too."

  Teagan flashed a big smile and looked over at her. "I think Solenne can forgive me, Declan. Think you can?"

  Solenne turned in her seat to face him and gave him a hopeful look. "I can forgive him because I have you again."

  Saint bent down and kissed her cheek. He didn't want to hold all this hatred in anymore. He had one brother in this world, and even if they were never as close as their mother hoped they'd be, they were still family. "If you can, maybe I can," he whispered. Looking across the table, he said, "Maybe it's time. But fuck up again, and you'll need more than magic Romanian blood to fix you."

  "Fair enough," Teagan answered with another big smile. "I guess I can't ask for any more."

  "Declan, Teagan was telling me he's planning to return to the United States."

  "Yeah, I'm going back to New Orleans and leaving you guys to fight the Archons. But I promised Vasilije I'd keep my eyes open there."

  Solenne took Saint's hand in hers and squeezed it. "I told him maybe when everything settles down we could go visit him in New Orleans. I hear it's so much fun there."

  She gave him that look that never failed to work on him. Even if he never wanted to go to New Orleans or see Teagan again, he would if it made her happy.

  Saint heard the click of the back door and footsteps coming down the short hallway to the kitchen. "Vasilije came with you too?"

  Teagan shook his head. "No. He and the two prophecy guys were close to a breakthrough on some parchment, so I came alone."

  As the footsteps drew closer, a voice called out, "Declan Collins. You here?"

  Saint grabbed Solenne and pulled her toward the other hallway as Teagan followed. "Solenne, do you know who that is?"

  Shaking her head, she squeezed his hand tightly. "No, but I think I've heard the voice before. I heard him talking to Vasilije on the phone last night, I think. Declan, you need to get out of here now!"

  Teagan nodded and turned to go find the man. "Solenne's right. I'll deal with him. You go."

  Solenne grabbed his arm. "No! I've heard that voice before at Verrater's too! He's been at the Archon's when I was there."

  "There's no point pretending you're not here, Declan," the man called out. "Come out and the girl doesn't have to get hurt. You know how this has to end."

  Saint led Solenne and Teagan to the guest bedroom on the main floor. Once inside, he turned to his brother. "Take Solenne out of here now! Get her to the monastery and Terek will get her somewhere safe. Go!"

  "No! Declan, don't do this! It's three against one. We can take him," she cried.

  Teagan took Solenne's hand and pulled her toward the door. Opening it a crack, he looked out and turned back to face her. "Stay here."

  Looking at Saint, he said, "Declan, we're even now. Stay here until it's all clear and I call you out."

  Pushing Solenne toward Saint, Teagan ran out into the hallway toward the man's voice.

  Solenne's eyes flashed in horror. "Declan! We have to stop him!"

  "Stay here. Don't come out until I say so!"

  Saint heard the man speak to Teagan, mistaking him for the man he was sent for. Before he reached the end of the hallway, he heard the sound every vampire feared as a stake was plunged into Teagan's heart and then there was nothing but silence. He rounded the corner of the wall and saw his assassin pull the stake from Teagan's chest and then his brother was gone.

  He charged the vampire, who stood stunned at the realization he'd staked the wrong brother, tackling him to the ground. Saint's fists smashed into his face, breaking his nose and jaw, but knowing he'd hurt him only made Saint want more. Again and again, he slammed his knuckles into the assassin's face as blood splashed from his mouth and nose, covering Saint's hands.

  Finally, when he could hit him no more, he grabbed the stake that had just taken his brother's life and plunged it through the man's chest. In seconds, all that was left of the man was dust on the floor beside Saint.

  How long he sat there, exhausted from rage and the pain of losing the brother he'd just had returned to him, he didn't know. Time seemed to stop as he stared in utter sadness at the pile of dust that was once Teagan.

  Solenne called out from the bedroom, her voice terrified. "Declan? Please answer me! Please let me hear your voice so I know you're still with me."

  The fear in her voice shook him from his misery, and he rose to intercept her before she saw the evidence of the two murders. "Solenne, stay where you are."

  Always strong-willed, she didn't listen and ran into the room. "Declan, thank God! I heard you hitting that man." Looking past him, she saw the remains of the assassin on the floor.

  "Solenne, we need to leave. Come."

  "Where's Teagan?"

  Solenne looked up at him and tears began to fall from her eyes. "No! Tell me what I felt was wrong. Tell me he's gone back to Vasilije's."

  Saint took her in his arms and held her tightly to him as she sobbed. He understood her pain just as she understood his. "We need to go now. It's not safe for you here."

  Solenne nodded sadly and looked around at the place that had been her home for almost a hundred years.

  "I promise we'll come back," Saint whispered as he pressed his lips to her cheek. If it was the last thing he did on this Earth, he'd make sure Solenne was safe and back home.

  Saint held Solenne next to him as they waited for someone to answer the monastery's front door. As long as he got her safely inside, he could know she was out of danger and protected by his fellow Sons. The door opened and Sasa reached for Solenne, taking her into her arms.

  "I'm so sorry. Vasilije felt it as soon as it happened. Is he really gone?"

  Solenne nodded and began to cry, her tears muffled by Sasa's embrace. Saint stood silently, sharing her grief at Teagan's loss, but inside that sadness began to slowly morph into a hatred that would only be sated by the death of the one responsible for his brother's death.

  "Saint, I'm happy to see you and Solenne escaped," Vasilije said quietly from the doorway to a room nearby. Saint said nothing. No words seemed enough.

  "Join us. We need to discuss your leaving with Terek."

  The usual confident tone of Vasilije's voice was absent, replaced by a somberness that struck Saint. Teagan's death was final this time. No mistake.

  Solenne turned to Saint and squeezed his forearm reassuringly. "Go. I can't sit and listen to this now. Sasa's offered me a place to rest for a while. When you'
re done with them, come find me and we'll go to our new home."

  Saint bent down and kissed her lips, wishing he could take even some of her pain away. With his thumb, he wiped the tears from beneath her eyes. "I won't be long. Rest and I'll find you when I'm done."

  As Solenne left with Sasa, Saint's hatred for what he'd brought into her life merged with his hatred for the Archon and he knew what he had to do. He walked into Vasilije's study and saw the others waiting for him. "I need to talk to Vasilije alone."

  Without a word, they filed out of the room, leaving a sire and brother in mourning. But Saint didn't have time to grieve.

  "I need you to make sure Solenne goes with Terek to Spain if I don't get back tonight. She's going to fight you, but I need your word you'll see her away from all this."

  Vasilije stared up at him. "I will. Be careful. She can't handle losing you too. And we need you, so don't do anything stupid."

  "I don't plan on doing anything other than killing the fucking Archon. I'm done playing cat and mouse games with this motherfucker. He wants me dead? Too fucking bad. I want him dead more."

  "What do you want me to tell Solenne?"

  "Tell her..." Saint hesitated and then said, "Tell her I'll be back."

  The streets of the walled city of Avignon were eerily quiet as Saint marched through them, a vampire on a quest for revenge. Each step he took echoed off the stones underneath his feet. Houses that had seen the march of armies, of death from plagues, stood silently as if abandoned in anticipation of his coming.

  Down alleys and side streets he strode, each one taking him closer to his final destination and the end of Marc Verrater. The memory of the bruises on Solenne's pale skin played on his mind, and Saint's rage spiked in him, spurring him on. He knew she'd done what she had to in order to protect him, but that only made it worse. It made him responsible in some way, an idea that sickened him.

  But for one of the rare times in his existence, he'd turn his hate outward toward the one who truly deserved it.

  A light wind blew in off the Rhône River, chilling the air as Saint at last turned onto the road where he'd find the Archon. The air did nothing to cool him, though, as he took the last steps to the building he sought. Every hurt, every loss he'd take out on the one who symbolized everything he hated about being a vampire.

  He'd been to this place before. A lifetime ago, it seemed. A different Archon had stood in judgment of him then, sending him out of the vampire world for ten years. Tonight, he'd be the one meting out the punishment.

  The Archon's offices were dark, all except a room at the end of the hallway, where a dim light peaked out from under the door. Saint knew the one he sought was in there. His heart pounding, he turned the knob and opened the door. In front of him sat Marc Verrater. Dressed similarly to Saint, he was much younger than any Archon he'd seen before. For a moment, he stood stunned by the man, who appeared calm, as if he'd expected Saint to come that night.

  The Archon stood, showing while he may have looked calm he knew why Saint had come.

  "That stupid fuck you sent to kill me is a pile of dust."

  A smile crept slowly onto Verrater's face. "Not surprising, but it doesn't change the ultimate outcome. Your kind must be eliminated. The Sons of Navarus. The prophecy can't be fulfilled if you live."

  Saint moved toward him. "I hate to disappoint you, but that's not going to happen. You'll be the first Archon to find out what happens when you fuck with us."

  The Archon looked past Saint and shrugged. "I see no us. All I see is one."

  "This is personal. I'm here for my brother, who that fuck you sent for me staked by mistake, and Solenne."

  "Dear Solenne. She disobeyed me by not handling the job herself, so I had to send Arnie."

  Saint curled his hands into fists. He was going to enjoy beating the hell out of the Archon before draining him so slowly he begged for mercy. "Don't speak her name. Don't think of her."

  The Archon slid his tongue across the seam of his mouth and smacked his lips. "I've done far more than say her name and think about her. She's a rare treat wasted on a vampire who only fucks humans."

  His words made something rage inside Saint, and he lunged at the Archon, grabbing him by the throat. The force sent the two of them hurdling toward the far wall, and it stopped Verrater's movement with a loud thud. Saint took advantage of his shock and hit him hard on the jaw, slamming his head into the wall.

  Almost as big as Saint, the Archon quickly put up a much stronger fight. Twice he caught Saint in the mouth, drawing blood, and he overpowered him to take him to the ground. Landing on top of him, the Archon's weight crushed against Saint's body as it smashed against the floor.

  It had been years since Saint had fought anyone so close his equal, and after the initial shock wore off, he began to relish the chance to humiliate Verrater before taking his life.

  The Archon may have been as skilled a fighter, but Saint quickly found his weakness. Unless he was on the offensive, he was unable to fight at all. But he was big and getting him on the defensive wasn't easy.

  Finally, Saint maneuvered him under him and began pummeling his face. Each time his fist hit him, a tiny part of the hurt and rage left Saint. It would take far more than what he could do with his fists to rid him of everything that made him hate Verrater, though. No, that release would only come with his death.

  Beneath him, the Archon lay bloody and beaten, but Saint needed him to feel more pain. For every time he'd forced himself on Solenne. For every bruise his hands had left on her tender skin. For every drop of blood that he'd taken from her. For every hurt he'd inflicted on the woman he loved and the life he'd taken from his brother.

  Saint pulled a rope he'd brought out of his coat and tied Verrater by his hands and feet to his chair. Unable to move, he sat motionless, his head lolling back and forth on his neck.

  "I could just stake you, but that wouldn't be enough. I need you to feel pain—pain like the kind you've caused."

  Verrater looked up at him, his one eye swollen shut. "You'll never get us all. There are too many of us," he groaned.

  "I don't need to hurt all of you tonight. Just you. And we will defeat you bastards."

  Saint didn't want to talk anymore. He wanted to make the one who'd hurt those closest to him suffer. Leaning in, he scraped his fangs over the Archon's neck and roughly jammed them into his skin. The agonizing pain was evident in the cries that escaped from the Archon's mouth, but Saint bit down as hard as his teeth allowed and pulled painfully on his vein.

  Blood filled Saint's mouth, and he yanked his fangs from Verrater's neck to spit it out on the white tile floor. Over and over, Saint plunged his teeth into the Archon's skin, slowly draining him until the floor around them was covered in blood. Verrater's life hung by a thread, and Saint would be the one to cut that thread.

  Saint watched the man in front of him as he desperately clung to life. Never before had he so viciously used his ability as a vampire to hurt another, but even now as he prepared to take the final drops of the Archon's blood from his nearly empty body, Saint's desire to hurt him wasn't sated. He would be the first of many Archons that must die to ensure the vampire world didn't end up like them.

  A noise behind him made him turn his head, and before he could react, Saint was charged by two of Verrater's men. Even with adrenaline behind him, he couldn't overpower two of them. Fists seemed to come from everywhere, pounding his face, his chest, his gut until he fell to the floor in a crumpled heap nearly as battered as the Archon.

  Though eyes blurry with blood, he saw the one whose fist had first smashed into his mouth lift a stake in the air. Saint braced for the moment it would pierce his heart and send him to dust. Thoughts of Solenne were the last he had—her beautiful eyes so full of love, her kiss that never failed to thrill him, her sacrifice for him that had all been for nothing—and then everything went black.

  Epilogue

  Solenne dug her toes into the white sand, loving the feel of its
cool, grainy texture against her skin. The water that had seeped into the sand earlier in the day still remained to dampen her feet, sending a tiny chill over her skin.

  The moon sat low in the sky, a deep yellow orb above bathing the beach in pale light. Again and again, she looked up and down the span of sand but saw no one. Each night she waited, against the suggestion of Terek's vampires, sure Declan would come to her, and each night was ended by dawn hastening her inside to wait for another night. For months she'd hoped and waited alone, wondering when fate would ever see fit to grant her the one wish she made on the stars above.

  She knew he'd come, no matter what the pitying eyes of Terek's vampires showed they believed. He'd come. She'd waited nearly a century the last time. She'd wait as long this time, if she had to.

  Spain had become her home since that night Declan had moved against the Archon. Terek had taken her as he'd promised to somewhere warm, but no sign of Declan had been seen since then. The Sons pretended to believe he still lived, but she knew when she wasn't near they whispered what she refused to believe.

  That Declan was gone, lost to the war with the Archons.

  A lump formed in her throat at the thought. No. She'd know. Even though he wasn't her sire. Even though he wasn't her vampire, sired from her own blood. She'd know because he was hers.

  Her love.

  Her soul.

  Hers.

  Solenne scooped a handful of damp sand and let it fall in clumps between her fingers. The dark waves rolled in front of her, marking the passing of time as another night ebbed away from her. Tonight, as she did every night, she'd believed he'd come.

  "Declan, where are you?" she whispered toward the night sky and North Star.

  "The only place I ever want to be—with the only woman I've ever loved."

  Solenne spun around to see him standing behind her, smiling like no time had passed between then. "Where have you been?"

  "Still not very good with understanding how a man likes to be welcomed home," he said with a wink.