by Lizzy Ford
“Myca was put to earth for a thousand years.”
I blink, recalling Myca’s tale of being under a rock. “Really?”
“Vampires only die when you tear out their necks. They’ll be miserable underground, but they won’t die.”
“So he was awake, underground, waiting, for a thousand years.” No wonder he’s not concerned about waiting a day or two for me to come around. “What the hell did he do to deserve that kind of punishment?”
“He was right.”
“Come again?”
“A thousand years ago, his father wanted to break the curse, and Myca opposed him,” my companion explains. “He was the only one in the Community to voice his dissent. The vampires led the revolt and lost half of their people. Myca was put to earth to prevent the Community from siding with him in further disagreements he had with his father.”
“Wow. What a terrible thing to be right about.”
“It is said he was present when his mother died upon the onset of the curse a thousand years before that. He couldn’t bear to see others die like she did, so he did what no vampire has ever done and opposed his father to try to save the lives of his people.”
Myca is the good guy I wish he wasn’t. Definitely deserving of the role of Community leader. Definitely not deserving of being stuck with me or exiled.
I don’t want any of the candidates to be good guys, but why? Because the Book says they shouldn’t be? Or was that the case at first, and now, I’m afraid of what they’ll think of me, when I tell them the price of breaking the curse?
The thought of any of them hating me … it’s unbearable. They care about me, might even believe in me, even though I’m the last person on the planet anyone in their right mind should put faith in.
“I don’t understand,” I whisper.
“What?”
“I don’t even know.”
We fall into silence, and I review the last talk I had with Myca, when he said I might be overcomplicating everything. I’m not sure how that’s possible – this is complicated.
Please find me, Myca, I beg him silently. Swallowing hard, I focus on breathing steadily, on not crying.
But it feels like my heart is breaking again. Discovering what I am … knowing what pain I’ve caused those I care about in the two and a half weeks on trial and that it’s nothing compared to the pain my family’s inflicted upon the Community …
“Maybe I deserve to be here,” I murmur.
“Myca will come for you.”
I don’t know how this guy can be so confident. I’m not sure Myca should come for me. Maybe the vampire council is right, and putting me to earth will end the curse and stop the suffering of the Community. If so, I’ll gladly stay here and never face Ben, Tristan and Myca with the news I have to exile another few tens of thousands of people to make things right.
God, I wish I could shut my stupid brain off!
I alternately think myself to tears and then doze off in the silence of my grave for hours and hours. The hunger hits me sometime later, and I awaken with a grimace. My stomach is cramping up. With no concept of the time and no light whatsoever reaching us through the twenty feet of earth, I can only guess I slept through most of the night. It’s been almost a full day without food, judging by the pain in my abdomen.
“You awake?” I whisper to my companion, the accidental murderer.
“Yes.”
“How’re you feeling?”
“Weak.”
“Me, too.” I rub my stomach, as if that’ll help anything. The muscles of my back are starting to ache, too, a sign I’ve been in one position too long. “If you decide at some point to eat me, can you warn me first?”
“I’ve been through worse.”
“Okay, then consider this my warning. I’m not doing so well, and I’ll probably eat you,” I joke.
“Myca will come.”
My eyebrows twitch. I’m starting to get irritated with his faith in Myca. I mean, shouldn’t we be looking for another solution, just in case? I have no idea what that’d be, but something other than waiting. I’m serious about my food, vampire or otherwise.
It’s the longest day of my life. I don’t know what’s worse: being alone with my thoughts and no distractions, or the fear I’m going to spend my last days here, unable to break the curse.
My grave companion is quiet. I have a panic attack sometime around what might be midmorning, and he calms me once more before subsiding again into silence. I have a feeling this is taxing him as much, if not more, than it is me. Aside from the stomachache, I’m physically fine, with unimpaired mental clarity and a body that’s unhappy but not injured. I keep waiting to feel short of breath, but so far, we seem to be managing our air well. I’m not sure how, given my occasional bouts of hyperventilating.
It’s quiet, dark and peaceful. Being buried isn’t so bad, if I weren’t trapped and could leave when I wanted or if I didn’t fear Myca might not find me soon. I can’t stop my thoughts or the circles they’ve been going in. I can’t stop envisioning the faces of all three candidates, or the pain that accompanies the thought of how I’m going to break the curse without losing any of them – or anyone else.
Because, the curse must be broken. Putting anyone else through this torture, or racking up an even larger number of victims, isn’t an option. The curse cannot outlive me.
I doze off and on, talk to my companion in brief spurts, then doze off again. My sleep is restless, and everything I’ve learned since starting the trials swirls in my head without any epiphanies to help me navigate what’s coming after my week with Myca.
The more I think of my father, the less angry I am, and the more I pity him. Perhaps it’s the empathic ability left over from Tristan, but I can’t feel quite as upset with my father for not revealing the truth to me. According to Myca’s memory, my father did what he could, however small it was. If the curse is strong enough to wipe out half of a clan, then my father was brave to try to undermine it on his own.
Maybe, instead of anger, I should be proud of him for doing his best, for recognizing how wrong it is to condemn the entire Community. I want to be good enough to finish what he started, but …
God, I’m a wreck. How do I become the person the Community needs? The person Ben, Tristan, Myca, and my father can be proud of? How do I become the Kingmaker who breaks the curse?
Is this what the candidates have been gently grooming me to do? I didn’t have any clue that Ben was trying to guide me during my trial with him. I did with Tristan, because I was forced to share his soul and see firsthand what it means to lead. And Myca’s been leading me to the answers I need.
I’m itching to discover what they sacrificed in order to do what my father told them and what he wrote them in his final letters. I’m also terrified to know. I’ve hurt two of them; I can’t stomach causing any of them more pain. I’ll never recover if Daddy’s letters to the candidates share his doubt in me in any way.
“You okay?” my companion asks.
I jerk out of the uneasy doze I didn’t notice I fell into. I feel it this time, as if I’ve scaled a tall mountain, where the atmosphere is thinner. It’s hard to draw a deep breath, not because my chest is tight, but because there’s no air to breathe in.
“I’m having trouble breathing,” I admit.
“Do you hear that?”
“What?” I hold my breath and listen hard. “I don’t hear anything.”
“I do. Someone found us.”
My heart quickens at his words and I strain to hear anything.
After a very long, agonizing pause, I hear it. I don’t know what exactly it sounds like – digging or shoveling or scratching – but the fact I’m twenty feet down and can hear sends me into a state of anxiety.
“Down here!” I scream and claw at the wooden lid until my fingertips are raw.
“Stop,” my companion says. “Save your air. It’s almost gone.”
I release a shuddering breath, barely able to restra
in the panic. He’s right, but I’m close to a meltdown, so I’m not sure how long I’ll be able to wait to see if someone really has found us, or if we’re both going crazy.
We listen to the sound forever. It grows closer at a snail’s pace, and I’m soon crying in frustration, unable to breathe deep, afraid to scream.
A loud thump sounds as a blunt tool hits the wooden coffin. Seconds later, fresh air reaches me as one of the boards is ripped up. The sky is dark, the stars bright overhead. Myca’s athletic body is framed against them.
I’ve never been so happy to see stars in my life. I gasp in huge breaths of air.
“Leslie?” Myca sounds tense, grim.
“Myca!” I cry and begin pushing at the boards.
“Hold on, angel. I’ll get you out.”
I hear the sound of the metal shovel hitting earth as he tosses it out of the hole, which looks every bit the twenty feet my companion claimed it to be. Myca grips the next board and rips it off with brute strength, doing the same to two others, until I’m able to shimmy out of the space he’s created. He pulls me out and wraps me in his arms. I collapse against him, weak and relieved, and breathe in his darkly sweet scent.
“Holy fuck,” he whispers what I’m thinking.
I cling to him, sucking in air.
Myca scoops me up in his arms and kneels on top of what’s left of the coffin. Feeling my trembling, he bites his wrist and places it at my lips. I drink him down hungrily without hesitation, until the pain in my belly is gone, then lift my head and kiss him deeply.
His response is immediate, and he holds me tightly against him, his mouth hungry for mine. He breaks off the kiss.
“Are you hurt?” he whispers in a ragged voice.
“No,” I reply. “Just hungry and freaked out.”
His blue eyes glimmer silver in the starlight, and he studies me. I hug him and press my cheek to his neck before nuzzling the soft skin over his jugular.
“Oh!” I exclaim suddenly. Wriggling out of his grip, I settle onto my knees and thrust my hand into the coffin. “You can come out now!”
“Leslie.”
I can’t place the odd note in Myca’s voice. Worried my companion passed out from the lack of air, I lean down to try to see into the box then wave my arm around to reach his body.
“Leslie, there’s no one there,” Myca says and grips my hips. He pulls me back to him and wraps his arms around me.
“Of course there is. I talked to him most of the time we were trapped,” I reply. “You have a flashlight?”
He hands me one, and I lean over again and peer into the box.
The vampires didn’t have the decency to bury me in a real coffin. This is a cheap, wooden box that appears to have been repurposed.
“Fucking assholes,” I mutter and peer into the box.
No one else is present.
In fact, there’s only room for one person in the box: me. The pressure I felt against my right shoulder wasn’t someone else. It was the wall of the box.
The flashlight falls from my hand and clatters against the wood.
“I know I talked to someone. Someone else was there,” I breathe.
“I believe you.”
I twist to gaze up at Myca. “Am I going crazy?”
His smile is warm. “No.” He cups my cheeks with his hands. “Let’s go home.”
“But …” I glance back towards the empty box.
“Leslie, let’s go home.” He draws me into his body.
I don’t resist and hug him hard, afraid to consider what the hell happened, and who I was talking to, if it wasn’t another vampire trapped underground with me.
“Myca,” I whisper, stricken. “What just happened?”
“We’ll talk about it later. You’re safe, Leslie.”
I’m shaking again, but it’s not from hunger this time. It’s bone deep fear.
Chapter Ten
A couple of hours later, we’re in the oversized, Jacuzzi bathtub in Myca’s en suite. The hot water soothes me, and I start to relax against his chest. My hot pink toes peek out from the vanilla-jasmine scented bubbles at the other end of the tub. My shoulders fit perfectly between his. Myca’s arms are around me, his legs stretched out along either side of mine.
I’m full, comfortable, and safe. He’s been quiet, as if aware I’m on the verge of freaking out, and fed me until I started to feel drowsy. My eyes close, and I rest my head against his chest.
“You’re hungry,” I murmur. “You have to be.”
“When you’re ready,” he replies and pushes warm water onto my exposed shoulders.
“I’m ready.” I tilt my head to expose my neck, hoping his bite can drive out the cold chill that’s settled into my core. I can’t wrap my head around how I spoke to someone who didn’t exist after being buried alive.
Myca nuzzles my neck before I feel the faint pinch of his fangs sinking into me.
I sigh deeply. His muscular arms close around me in a warm embrace, and I’m still. The odd sensation of him draining my blood warms the frozen part of me but can’t dispel my fear and confusion completely. Even so, it’s calming for him to feed from me. He does so longer than usual, a sign of his hunger, before he withdraws from my neck.
“How did you find me?” I ask and open my eyes to study his profile.
“I had help,” he replies.
“The council?” I frown.
He rolls his eyes. “Definitely not. Though I went to them first, when I was tipped off about what happened.”
I shiver. “They won’t do it to me again, will they?”
“Nope. I took care of them.”
Something in his voice makes me uneasy. “Meaning …”
Myca is quiet. For the first time since we’ve met, I see darkness in his eyes. “Ancient vampire tradition refers to it as death by a thousand cuts,” he starts slowly. “It’s not entirely accurate. The older the vampire, the harder it is to kill him or her. The only way to die is to rip out someone’s throat. But if they heal quickly enough, they’ll stop the bleeding and walk away without a scar.” He touches my neck gently. “So, you hang them upside down to maximize the drainage, rip out their throat, wait for it to heal and do it again. Over and over, as many times as it takes.”
“You did that?” I ask, startled. Just when I start to trust one of these guys, I’m reminded of what they are, what they’re capable of.
“They weren’t going to talk, and I wasn’t going to listen if they did.” He shrugs.
“But you tortured them.” I lean forward, tensing.
“It’s one thing to fuck with me like they do on a daily basis. They crossed a line when they put you to earth.”
My heart is quickening, and the coldness is back. They killed Barry and would’ve killed me, but what he’s describing … it’s horrific. Drawing my knees up, I wrap my arms around them.
“So much for being predators not monsters,” I say. “That’s not like you … is it?”
“No,” he admits. “Not that I didn’t want the council out of the way. I did. They’ve been blocking my attempts to reform the clan’s laws, but … this bond is stronger than even I expected. When Michel called to warn me, I lost it.”
The silence is tense, taut. I don’t know how I ever become so comfortable with these supernaturals that I forget what they can do, how easily they can kill.
“Michel told you where to find me,” I say to break the silence. “That’s good.”
“He didn’t know where you were. He’s one of the newer generation of vampires on the force, another of my fans. The councilmembers probably knew this, which is why his partner was charged with burying you. I had help to get from another source.” Myca draws me into his body once more. “You have nothing to fear from me, Leslie.”
“Really? Because you just admitted to systematically torturing and murdering twelve vampires.”
“I told you I’m not like the current generation of vampires. As much as I’ve worked to curb my primal inst
incts, they’re still present, and apparently, triggered by any sort of threat to my mate,” he replies. “Good to know, I suppose.”
For both of us. Why do I have the recurring suspicion I’m not meant to survive these trials?
“Leslie, it’s okay.” Myca’s tone softens, and he rests his chin against my shoulder, pressing his cheek to mine. “You know what all of us are.”
“Yes and no.”
His fangs sink into my neck once more, and I begin to relax again.
He’s right. I do know what they are, but that doesn’t mean I’m not freaked out knowing Tristan killed ten fae, Ben twenty wolves and Myca twelve vampires – all because I’ve been involved in their lives.
Maybe I’m not surprised about what he did. Maybe I’m guilty about my role in all of this.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
Myca lifts his head from my neck. “For what?”
“I fuck up the lives of everyone around me. You wouldn’t have had to kill them if I weren’t here.”
“I wouldn’t guarantee that,” he says, amused.
“Seriously, Myca. My magic power seems to be fucking up the world.”
“No, angel, it’s not.” He hugs me.
Hearing the nickname he’s used since our first day, I straighten and twist to face him. “You son of a bitch!” I exclaim. “You’ve been telling me all along what I am!”
Myca laughs.
“But I’m not really an angel,” I add in dismay. “I’m a demon.”
“You’re an angel with clipped wings.”
“Whose ancestors betrayed the Community. Doesn’t that make my clan demons?”
“No.” He cups my face with his hands. “You’re an angel, Leslie. A wounded angel but an angel nonetheless.” He holds my gaze, and I release a breath, distraught. His confidence in me blows my mind, given what I know of my family’s history and the damage I’ve done in two and a half weeks. How can he be so sure of me, when I’m completely lost?
He seems to see through me to the part of me that’s hurt and scared. Intimacy is one thing but knowing he sees that dark side of me and understands throws me for a loop. Being with Myca has been too personal, from him fucking with me to his confidence in me. I don’t understand why, despite knowing what he’s capable of, I want to curl up in his arms and forget the rest of the world.
