by Kristie Cook
Tristan let out a growl.
“That’s what I thought. Your Amadis vows won’t let you do anything. Not with human lives at stake.”
“Those things don’t look human,” Tristan snarled, although we both knew they were definitely Normans.
“Ah, yes. They do have some of Noah’s blood. Oh, and some of your lykora’s.” Lucas’s icy blue eyes glanced behind me to where Owen’s and Charlotte’s bodies lay, and then came back and pierced into me. “Thank you for that, by the way. I’d smelled lykora on you when you came to visit me and sent Victor to get her. But Kali took the opportunity to send warlock-boy in to snatch your son and make me look like the bad guy. Imagine that.” He rolled his eyes and let out a mocking laugh. “Because of that damn warlock, Victor didn’t get the lykora, but he was able to collect some of her potent blood. A whole wing, actually. Enough to see that it worked. And now I have the dog herself.”
“What?” I seethed.
“Oh, yes, indeed,” Lucas said. “These soldiers here—all of them—have some of Noah’s inhuman speed and strength, but his blood was too diluted to give them much else. The stones were a nice touch, too, I’ll give Kali that. But the lykora . . .” He said the word with a glee that sounded odd in his voice. And evil. Very evil. Sasha growled under his hand. “Her blood gave them the ability to grow, to fight ferociously, and to be extremely loyal. Kali’s little stones were nothing compared to this. They’re almost as loyal and protective as a mother. But not quite. What, exactly, would you do to keep your son, Alexis?”
“I already have my son,” I said through clenched teeth.
“Only because I allow it. I have no use for him until he comes to me on his own. Do you know why I let you go when I had you in Hades?”
I glared at him, refusing to indulge him with a guess because I still didn’t know. Yet, I remained quite curious.
“For the same reason. I have to admit, I still have hope for your potential. And I know one of these days, you’ll come around and see things my way when Katerina and Sophia never would. They live in a sugarcoated, lovey-dovey world whereas you, Alexis, my daughter, you know differently. You’ve had your own dark thoughts. You know that some people do deserve to die.”
His words were like a knife in my heart. The truth of his words cut deep to the bone. I couldn’t deny them. Because at this very moment I was thinking he certainly deserved to die.
“I have no qualms about killing my own when they betray me. In fact, I thank you for taking care of Kali for me. She’d become quite the hindrance. You shouldn’t have such qualms about killing either. You should be able to kill your enemy. You should be able to fight this war that’s brewing without having to hold back. You, my daughter, might still have that in you. You better—that’s the only way you’ll win.” His tongue slid over his lips as he considered me. He must have seen the hatred in my eyes. The willingness to fight. He nodded. “This world is about to change, and I want to see you and Seth ruling it. You deserve it. So does Dorian. And when that happens—when you are in power—I will happily descend.”
“I’ll never fight for you,” I said, my voice quiet but full of determination.
“We’ll see about that. You are your father’s daughter, I do believe.”
“Never!” I screamed as I lunged for him, my dagger out.
One of his soldiers snarled and snapped, and when I didn’t back off, he threw himself at me. My hands flew up. I stopped him in midair, and his face filled with surprise. I hadn’t even set him on the ground, though, when his body flew at me. Lucas laughed as his soldier landed on top of me, my dagger piercing straight through the man’s body. He immediately became dead weight.
No! Oh, no! By the time I pushed him off and scrambled to my knees to inspect him, he was already dead. And I’d killed him. I sprang to my feet, my heart pounding, my stomach a small pit.
“So what will you do for your son?” Lucas asked. “How far will you go for those you love? What will you do to keep him alive?” His eyes darted around the scene before they came back to me. “Does Dorian understand all that’s been lost for him? And when he doesn’t deserve such protection from these people he’ll only abandon?”
“Leave him out of this,” Tristan seethed.
Lucas ignored him, and called out, “Dorian? Come here my boy.”
No! I yelled at him.
“Come on out, Dorian,” Lucas yelled louder. Everyone behind us stilled; their sobs and whispers fell silent. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mom rise to her knees, staring at Lucas with confusion. Sasha wriggled in Lucas’s arm, but he held her tightly. “Come see what has happened on your behalf. Come look at all the death and lives ruined because of you. But truthfully, it’s only your mother and father who love you, son. Everyone else blames you. And even your mom and dad will come to despise you one day.”
Don’t listen to him, Dorian, I told him. He lies!
“They’re going to tell you that I say nothing but lies,” Lucas said, his voice still carrying across the grounds. “But it’s they who lie! I want to take care of you. I can make you a king. I can give you everything you’ve always wanted and more! But they . . . your mother and father and everyone else you know will blame you for everything. For Katerina’s death! See your great-grandmother’s body lying on the ground? She’s dead, Dorian, and they blame you. But I don’t!”
“Mom?” Dorian’s voice called out from the shadows. “Rina’s really dead?”
At the sound of her master’s voice, Sasha squirmed harder in Lucas’s arms.
“Come with me, son. Let us go before they take their revenge out on you.” Lucas’s voice had grown more and more agitated the harder Sasha struggled. He became more demanding of Dorian even after telling us he had little need for our son right now. But he lied. He needed Dorian to be able to keep Sasha. And he needed her blood. Lucas yelled, his voice booming in the night: “Come on, Dorian! I’ve had enough of this!”
“Who are you?” Dorian demanded as he stepped out of the abbey. At the sight of him, Sasha sprang out of Lucas’s arms and by the time she landed on her feet, she’d grown to her size large lykora protective form, wings flapping and lips lifted in a growl, baring long fangs.
Lucas’s thought hit me at the same time his hand twitched: He was about to force Dorian to him.
“Sasha, protect,” I yelled.
The lykora attacked Lucas.
Her jaw snapped at his face as her huge paw swiped at his chest. Her claws drew fat lines of blood in his shirt and skin.
“Soldiers, protect,” Lucas ordered. The Norman soldiers all lifted their guns again and aimed them at us. “No! Get this mutt off of me!”
But the huge soldiers refused to obey. Would they not attack Sasha whose blood flowed through their veins?
Lucas growled, the sound not quite as ferocious as Sasha’s, but pretty near Tristan’s. His icy eyes found me.
“Fine,” he said as his arm swung out and smacked Sasha hard in the side, and she tumbled away from him. “Let’s see how you feel, Alexis, when they’re all your children.”
What? I didn’t understand what he meant.
“Soldiers, aim,” Lucas ordered, and all of the barrels in front of him as well as those belonging to the eighty or so soldiers who hadn’t been killed or injured aimed toward the center of the grounds. Toward Julia and Solomon who still hovered over Rina’s body. Toward Vanessa who now stood protectively in front of Dorian. Toward Charlotte and Owen, who were just now beginning to stir. Toward Mom, who rose to her feet between her dead husband and her dead mother, her eyes wide and her head tilted as she looked questioningly at Lucas.
“I see you enjoyed my gift to you,” he said to her as his eyes flitted to Winston’s black body before returning to her face. He laughed at her expression, but only once. Sasha flew toward him again. He gave one final order before he disappeared from sight:
“Soldiers, fire!”
For the third time in ten minutes, gunfire tore through th
e night. I spun around as each soldier let off a single round this time. Only one. That was all. That was all that was necessary.
I hadn’t realized it, but Lucas had aimed all of the guns only at Mom. Her brown eyes filled with fear as she swung her gaze toward me. Her arms lifted, and she reached out for me. Her mouth moved, and she called out my name. As though she thought I was the one being shot, even as her own body jerked in all different directions with each hit she took. She tried to run for me and stumbled a few times, but she kept moving. Kept going. Kept yelling my name.
“ALEXIS!”
And then she fell one last time.
“MOM!” I screamed.
“Mimi!” Dorian yelled, and Vanessa threw her arms around him and held tightly before he could fly into any more danger.
Rage filled me. The urge to kill every single one of those soldiers surged through my body, and I trembled as the pressure built inside me. I no longer cared that they were Normans. That they were merely humans under someone else’s control. That they were the souls I was supposed to protect. The murderous rage I felt the first night Dorian disappeared burned like fire through me, consuming any rational thought.
“How far will you go?” Lucas whispered in my mind.
And I knew that’s what he wanted. He wanted to see me unleash the wrath I’d kept so tightly balled inside me. He wanted me to lose control. To cross the line. To ignore my values and beliefs—to trade them for his. He wanted me to prove to myself and to everyone else that I was his daughter.
But I wasn’t.
I never would be.
I was my mother’s daughter. And I ran for her now.
“Mom,” I cried as I skidded on my knees next to her. I scooped my arms under her shoulders and pulled her into my lap. “Stay with me, Mom. Please.”
I could barely see through the tears in my eyes. I swiped at them angrily.
“Mom, please,” I begged. “Heal. You’re healing, right?”
Mom’s head moved slightly in my now blood-streaked arms. “I can’t, honey. It’s too much. I’m not as strong as you.”
“Of course you are! You’re the strongest woman I know. Tristan!” I yelled again. Could this really be happening for the second time tonight? No. No, no, no. It couldn’t be. “Tristan, Mom needs you. Help her heal. Please, hurry!”
He came around to Mom’s other side, and his mouth turned down as his eyes took in all of the bullet holes riddling her little body. Charlotte crawled over to us, with Owen right behind her.
“Honey,” Mom whispered, “it’s time for me to go, too.”
“No. It’s. Not,” I growled. “You can’t leave me!”
“Don’t you do this, Sophia,” Charlotte ordered as she gripped Mom’s hand.
“It’s your time, Alexis,” Mom said, her voice growing fainter. “Your time to lead.”
“No.” I shook my head vehemently. “I’m not ready. You’re not supposed to go yet! Mom, please. Don’t do this to me. You both can’t leave me!”
Mom’s eyes glassed over and then they closed. The corners of her mouth turned slightly up.
“They’re . . . calling . . . for me,” she gasped.
“No, Mom. Sophia. I can’t do this without you.” I crouched further over her, sandwiching her between my thighs and upper body, trying to hold on as tight as I could because they couldn’t have her, not yet, it was too soon. I needed her here, the Amadis needed her, they already had Rina, why my mom, too, why, why, why?
“You . . . can. You are . . . so . . . strong.”
Tears flowed down my cheeks as I pulled back. “Mom, you must fight this. You can make it through this. Please don’t give up. Please.”
Rain began to fall again, leaving streaks in the dirt and blood on Mom’s face. Tristan brushed his hand over her forehead and wrapped his other arm around my shoulders.
“Mimi,” Dorian cried as he fell to her other side. “Don’t die, Mimi.”
“Help her, Tristan. Please help her,” I begged.
“I’m sorry, ma lykita,” he murmured as he huddled over us, pulling me closer to him. “She’s too injured. She won’t recover.”
“He’s . . . right,” Mom said.
“No. Mom, please. Don’t give up.”
“Take care of her . . . Tristan. Be . . . what . . . she needs,” Mom said, air whistling in her lungs.
“I promise,” Tristan vowed.
“Be . . . strong . . . Alexis. You. . . must . . . lead.” She paused and her chest rose as though in slow motion as she inhaled a wheezy breath. The last one she would ever take. Her eyes rolled to Tristan and up to Dorian, then back to me. “I . . . love . . . you. All of you.”
I watched as her mind replayed her memories of us, starting with the first time she saw me and cradled my tiny body in her arms on the day I was born. She remembered our days of my childhood, our friendship even through my teen years. She recalled Tristan’s and my wedding day and then bringing Dorian into the world, and the pride she’d felt then. Her mind played out all of our hugs, all of our laughs, all of the joys we experienced together. It slowed as she remembered the last few months with Winston, and I realized then just how lonely she had been when Tristan and I had married, and how happy she’d been to find her Oliver again.
And then her mind blanked out. The light in her beautiful mahogany eyes extinguished.
My mother left us.
“NOOOOO!” I sobbed as I held her body against my chest. “Oh, God, NO!”
I clung to Mom’s small body, refusing to let her go. Tristan tried to pull me tighter to him, but I shrugged him off and began rocking her back and forth. Dorian scooted closer to me, but I couldn’t acknowledge him. I couldn’t do anything but try to hold onto my mother, my confidante, my best friend, the woman who had given me life and then gave hers to save mine and my son’s.
And then I reached out and pulled Rina’s body to me, as well, holding them both as tears streamed down my face faster than the rain fell.
“I can’t do this without you two,” I cried. “We’re supposed to conquer everything together. And now you’ve left me. You’ve both left me to do this on my own. How can I fight without you by my side? I’m not ready to lead alone!”
“You are not alone, dear Alexis.” Though the words came as only a whisper, I recognized the voice. Cassandra’s. “We are always with you.”
The air around us suddenly changed.
The thick weight of evil I’d felt earlier disappeared. The rain stopped as though turned off at a faucet. The clouds above us parted in a circle, exposing a nearly full moon that shone down on my mother’s pale, still face. On my grandmother’s lifeless body.
And I saw them.
A hundred or so women, here but not quite, surrounding us, and although I couldn’t really see them as physical beings, I knew they had dark hair and dark eyes and looked like Rina and Mom and me. I also knew they remained on the other side of the veil, in the Otherworld, but their presence felt so close, pushing warmth and love into our world, enveloping us with it. And I knew why they were here: to escort my mom’s and grandmother’s souls home, to the Otherworld, ensuring their safety while reminding me that I would not be alone. I was never alone.
But, God, did I feel like I was.
Chapter 25
Owen eventually regained his energy, and Charlotte recovered from the blast Kali had given her. Along with Julia and Solomon, we all crowded around Mom’s and Rina’s bodies, saying our final goodbyes. None of us seemed able to move for a long time, as though we believed if we waited long enough, their spirits would return, and they’d rejoin us. But of course that didn’t happen. There would be no reunion until each of us joined them in Heaven. In the Otherworld.
The rain returned and drizzled over our misery for a while, but by the time the sky began to lighten, the clouds had scattered. The sun rose and shone over us from its perch in a perfectly clear blue sky. And I couldn’t decide if it was all wrong for the day to be so beautiful and warm when
my mom and grandmother were no longer here to enjoy it—when their bodies lay dead and cold—or if it was right because it meant they were happy where they were. That they’d finally found peace and joy for the first time in decades, and they wanted us to know it.
At some point before we left the U.K., Lisa and Jessica popped in to take the vessel that held Kali’s soul. My mind remained in a fog for a long time, but although I couldn’t pinpoint the exact place and time, I clearly remembered handing over that jar, never so happy to be rid of something in my life. And I remembered the faeries letting out a squeal of joy when they took possession. Debbie and Stacey joined them, and they all left for the Otherworld, taking the sorceress’s soul with them. Removing it from this realm once and for all.
Noah and all of the soldiers had also left the abbey grounds, though my foggy mind didn’t notice when or how.
I barely noticed as someone escorted us to the Amadis jet in nearby Whitby. The journey to the Amadis Island was hazy as grief consumed me, but I remembered the underlying happiness of having Dorian back at my side. And of Charlotte’s delight of having her son where he belonged, too. I knew Owen told his side of the story on the plane ride to the Island, but I barely listened, my heart dulling my brain so it wouldn’t think about the bodies in the boxes below us in the cargo area.
The triple funeral was a formality. I already knew Mom’s and Rina’s souls were gone, probably already at work in the Otherworld, and Winston had surely joined Mom. But of course we gave them an Amadis send-off with all of the pomp and circumstance worthy of them. Amadis from all over the world crowded onto the Island for the service, and we all watched from the cliff side as flames licked the sides of the pyre they shared before the whole thing disappeared, taken by the Angels.
