Through blurred vision, I looked up at Dominic. He was still holding Taylor by her neck, seemingly shocked by the sudden turn of events. God only knew what he would do to Taylor and me once the shock wore off. He would blame us for this, for all of it. Heck, we were the only ones around to blame.
Dominic’s head twisted at the sound of my choked sob.
I shook my head at him as though attesting to my innocence—to the fact that I had nothing to do with this. As though silently begging him to have mercy on me.
His expression changed suddenly; faltered. For the faintest of seconds I thought I saw something human in his eyes. Something sympathetic. Maybe he wasn’t all monster after all. Maybe there was still some feeling—some humanity—buried somewhere deep inside of him and he would let us go.
“How very pitiful of you.”
“This isn’t my fault,” I quickly defended.
“I was referring to your choice in men. You certainly know how to pick them.”
I felt the sting on my palm even before I registered what I’d done. I hit him. I hit Dominic Huntington right in the face.
I held my breath for what felt like an eternity as I waited for him to delve out the consequences for my massive misstep. But none came. He barely flinched nor did he say anything. My eyes moved to his hand still wrapped around Taylor’s porcelain neck. I wondered if he was pressing down. If he was slowly strangling her to death. And then suddenly, as if responding to my thoughts, he released her from his grip.
“Go.” His dark eyes bore into hers. “Forget everything that happened here tonight and go home.”
Taylor turned on her heels and started off towards the door. I immediately tried to follow suit but Dominic snagged my wrist and pulled me back.
“Let me go, Dominic. Please, I’m begging you.”
“Oh, I intend to,” he said, his tone harsher now. “I have no desire to walk in the wake of the death and misfortune you leave behind.” He stared down at me, watching me with his dark eyes as though trying to read me. “Utterly infuriating.”
I shifted under his unrelenting stare, uncomfortable by our proximity. By his words. By the fact that I was alone with a soulless vampire who had no empathy or self-restraint.
He took a step towards me, surprising me. His hold on my arm tightened as he inched closer to me, moving as though he were going to kiss me. As though he were invited. The very thought of it sickened me, enraged me.
I shoved him back with both hands, freeing myself from his grip. He let out a sharp mocking laugh, showing me once again that this was all a game to him. I was a game.
But I would not be played any longer. Not by him. Not by Trace. Not by anyone.
I reached around and grabbed the chair from behind me and smashed it to the ground in a fit of rage. My strength surprised both of us. I looked down at the scrambled pieces and without even making the decision, I reached down and snagged a piece of jagged wood from the wreckage. Long and pointed, just the way I needed it to be.
I looked up at him, makeshift wooden stake in my hand and lifted it into position.
“You won't do it,” he said, so sure of himself and of me. “You don't have it in you, angel.”
“Yes I do.”
“You would have already done it.” He took a step towards me, and then another, putting himself right in my line of fire.
A moment of deadened silence passed between us as we stared each other down in remnants of the old church. Me with the wooden stake in hand and him with that lopsided smirk that made my blood boil. I hated that smirk. I hated him. The world would be better off without Dominic Huntington existing in it.
So then why wasn't my arm moving? Why wasn't I doing the one thing I swore I’d do if I ever had the chance?
A bustle of men burst into the room, jolting me upright. Dominic snatched my elbow and pulled me to him, stepping in front of me as if to hide me, to protect me. I looked up at him baffled; one minute he's trying to kill me and the next minute he's protecting me? This man, this godforsaken thing, was not only depraved, he was obviously insane, too.
Let me handle this, said a balmy voice inside my mind. It wasn’t my voice. It was a man’s voice. Dominic’s voice—familiar and sultry. Either he just spoke to me through my mind or I was going crazy…again.
“Dominic, my friend,” said the leader of the pact. He was much smaller than the men that followed but there was something alarmingly unsettling about him. His long dark hair was slicked all the way back, accentuating his disproportionally large forehead. “I trust you have what we're looking for.”
“There's been a slight problem, Engel.”
Engel? The Engel? My eyes zeroed in on him.
This was the man that has been tormenting my sister for months, haunting her like a nightmare, and yet there didn't seem to be very much to him. In fact, he looked rather sickly—thin framed, pale skin—especially in comparison to the other men around him.
I took each of them in, assessing their strengths and weapons, and noticed the long blond locks amidst the group.
Taylor.
The tall, burly man standing behind Engel had her by her arm, holding her against her will. They must have grabbed her on their way in.
“A problem you say?” Engel’s pale eyes glowered with supremacy.
“The Reaper has the Amulet,” explained Dominic. There was a definite nervous pitch to his voice.
“Tsk, tsk.” Engel shook his head in a scolding manner. “I'm disappointed in you, Dominic. You had one job.”
“He had his own agenda. I didn’t know—”
“And this one?” interrupted Engel, ticking his head at me (or what he could see of me as I cowered behind Dominic). “Why is she still alive?”
“We need her.”
“She no longer holds the Amulet therefore no longer serves a purpose. You were told to dispose of her.”
The massive knot in my stomach tightened as Engel moved in closer to me, his long fangs visible from behind his grimace.
“Don’t come near me...” I meant for it to come off as a threat, a warning, but it came out like a pathetic plea.
He reached over and yanked me away from Dominic as though I were nothing more than an insignificant commodity.
“Ah, the blood of a Slayer,” he said, sniffing the air around me like a rabid hound. “Truly an exhilarating aroma, though sadly, yours is quite faint.”
I tried to pull away from him, writhing as best as I could, but it was no use. The frail looking little hobbit was shockingly strong. “Let me go you sick—”
His sharp teeth pierced through my neck before I could finish the words. I let out a faint scream though it quickly died in the back of my throat.
In an instant, his otherworldly venom was coursing through my veins, working hard to subdue me, to turn me into a useless bag of bones. Even in my mounting haze, I knew he wouldn’t let me survive this. I knew I was on my own again, and I’d have to save myself. I just didn’t know how I was going to do that.
Engel’s men murmured in the background, their voices scrambled and distant. I tried to focus on what they were saying, tried to hear if they were planning on contributing to the dissolution of my existence, and then everything went quiet. Nothing but the deafening silence of a grave.
Is this it? Am I dead?
My pulse responded, pounding loud in my ears as my heart stopped and started in my chest. My eyes circled the room and found stillness. They were all standing motionless like wax figures; frozen in time—exactly like my first night at All Saints. Whatever had happened that night was happening again. Only this time, I didn’t stop to question it.
In a fog of thinly veiled awareness, I twisted my body into Engel’s, bringing myself as close to his paralyzed body as I could get. I tightened my grip on the stake and brought it to my side just as the room surged back to life. It took every drop of strength I had to trudge forward, to fight the mounting urge to succumb to the sweet poison and surrender all hope. He gr
owled loud and ravenous as though I had offered myself up, and I responded by lifting the stake from my side and plunging it into the center of his cold undead heart.
Engel stammered back several steps, clutching at the stake in his chest as everyone in the room gasped in disbelief.
I waited for him to immobilize, to drop to the ground and cease to exist. But it never happened.
The seconds ticked by like molasses and with each one that passed, he remained very much moving and very much alive. All of which were not supposed to happen. It was painfully clear that something had gone horribly wrong.
“Boss?” asked a slender man from behind him.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” said Engel, eyes wide with amazement. “How peculiar.”
Dammit, angel. “Only you would stake an ancient Rev and miss his heart,” muttered Dominic as he stealthily pulled me back a step.
“Ah, but it appears she did not miss,” replied Engel, looking down at his chest, stunned. “I can feel the wood burrowed in my heart, fiery and aching, yet here I stand.”
“That isn’t possible,” scoffed Dominic.
“Indeed,” agreed Engel as he wrapped both hands around the stake and pulled it out of his heart. “Yet here we are.”
Audible gasps broke out behind him.
“Get her!” yelled one of his men.
Engel held his hand up, halting his herd of undead. A morbid curiosity filled his expression as he took me in. “Veni foras, genus.”
“Huh?”
“What exactly are you, child?”
“I'm a g-girl…a Slayer,” I stuttered.
“On the surface it appears that you are, yes, but your blood...” he trailed off, wiping the corner of his mouth as he searched his mind. “It speaks of different origins. An Ancient I have not encountered for many centuries.”
“An Ancient?” I flinched at the word. “I’m seventeen years old. There’s nothing ancient about me.”
His eyes thinned as he took that in. “Interesting.”
“Why is that interesting?”
A cunning smile formed on his mouth, tugging at the corners like a dirty secret. He knew something—something about me—and by the looks of it, it was something big.
I stepped in closer. “Tell me what you know. Right now.”
His expression darkened. “You stake me so callously yet you dare stand in my presence and make demands?”
“It was an accident—a knee jerk reaction,” I lied.
“One that you will pay for with your life!” shouted the man holding Taylor hostage. Cheers broke out around him. They were out for blood. My blood.
Engel held up his hand once again to silence them. “It appears the crowd desires restitution.”
I swallowed hard.
“Surely you didn’t expect to leave here with your life?” he said, kneading his palm over his puncture wound.
“Well I didn’t exactly think it through.”
“Clearly,” huffed Dominic.
I shot him a surly look. It was obvious he had no intention of helping me get out of this mess. Heck, he was probably enjoying every minute of my impending demise. I was in this alone and I had to think fast.
There was only one thing to do. I needed to make myself useful to him again. If he thought I was dispensable, he would dispose of me without question and I couldn’t let that happen.
I turned back to Engel, my eyes forged in remorse. “I’m no good to you dead,” I pointed out self-servingly. “I can make it up to you. I can make it worth your while.”
“I’m listening.”
“You came here for the Amulet, right? Well I know where it is. I can get it back for you.” I knew I was making a deal with the devil but I was desperate. “That’s what you want, isn’t it?”
“It is,” he nodded. “And to acquaint myself with you, of course.”
“Why?” I flinched back, disturbed by this unfortunate turn of events. “I’m nothing. I’m just a girl.”
“That is as far from the truth as one could get. A rare magical being is amongst us,” he crowed, turning to the men behind him now. “One whose blood can cease death.”
His men cheered in excitement.
“What makes you so certain it was because of her?” argued Dominic. “I’ve tasted her blood before. There was hardly anything exceptional about it.”
Liar, I thought. I clearly remembered him blissfully staggering around like a complete drunk.
“I’ve dethroned more than my share of Slayers,” said Engel, proud of his past conquests. “I know a Slayer’s blood, and that, old friend, is not one.”
“Then you know what she is?” asked Dominic.
He smiled secretively. “Time shall do the telling.”
“So you’re not even sure?” I jumped in, grasping at what little hope remained. “This could all be some random coincidence and have nothing to do with me or my blood. There’s a million possibilities—”
“All of which I intend to explore.”
“Okay. So—” Wait. A new level of panic hit me as I wondered how exactly he intended on doing that. “If I hold up my end of the deal and bring you the Amulet, I get to go free, right? You’re not going to kidnap me and turn me into some magical lab rat, are you?”
“Do you take me for a savage?” he asked, insulted by my insinuations. “I hold no one against their will. My subjects come to me.”
“So I have your word then?”
“Indeed, you have my word.” He dusted off the shoulder of his sleek black jacket. “You will be free to go once I am in possession of the Amulet...if you so choose to do so.”
As if I’d ever choose anything else, I thought to myself as a brief pang of relief kissed my insides. My curiosity over what he thought he knew about me—about what I was (and if it was related to the strange time freeze I kept experiencing)—paled in comparison to my desire to never see his face again.
“You have one fortnight to bring it to me.”
“A fortnight?” I shook my head. “That’s not enough time. I need to get close enough—”
“One fortnight is all you have.”
“And if I can’t do it?” I asked, already feeling defeated. “What happens if I fail?”
“Then I take matters into my own hands, though I assure you, it will be much better for this town and your schoolmates if you succeed. It has been a long time since the rivers ran red with blood. Let us keep it that way.”
My eyes shifted to Taylor. She was a wreck. She hadn’t said a word and was barely even moving. How much more of this could she take? I needed to get her home.
“Your comrade stays,” said Engel, noticing the direction my eyes had taken. “As insurance, of course.”
“But you said you don’t keep anyone against their will!”
“I was speaking of higher beings, child. Those who cannot have their will manipulated. She is but a mere human. She has no true will.” He nodded to her capturer who proceeded to escort her out of the room. “Fret not. She, too, will go free if and when you return the Amulet to me.”
“I won’t fail,” I promised, though it was more of a promise to myself than to him. I had to believe I could do this. I had no other option. “I’ll get you the Amulet.”
“It is in your best interest to do so. I wouldn’t want to soil your hands with the blood of the innocent.”
“Aww,” moaned Dominic. “But think of how much fun that would be.” His steely eyes were as serious as cancer.
I wanted to carve them out of his head with my fingernails.
“One fortnight,” reaffirmed Engel, dismissing me with the flick of his pale hand.
And with that, I was gone.
44. END GAMES
The cool night air encompassed my skin like an oil slick as I left the church alone, my mind fragmented from the weight of the encumbrance placed on my shoulders. I was alive, yes, but for how long? And at what cost?
The truth was cloaked in darkness and tainted with the bitter
deceit of everyone I thought I knew. Trace, Tessa, Uncle Karl, Dominic—they were all puppeteers and I was but a puppet in their show, ready to dance on command and I didn’t even know it. The stage was an illusion; the smoke and mirrors too thick for me to see through. Everything was a lie, right from the start.
But I would be a puppet no more.
I was in this thing alone and that was okay with me. It had to be. My friend’s life depended on it. My life depended on it. I was going to figure out a way to get the Amulet back from Trace and get Taylor home safe and sound. Some way, somehow, I would do what needed to be done. And after that, all bets were off. Jemma Blackburn as I knew her would be no more. I’d seen too much, been hurt too much, to ever go back to the girl I used to be. That girl was dead and gone.
She had to be.
In that moment, as plumes of fog lifted off from the ground to meet me—to guide me home like my own army of vagrant ghosts, I silently vowed to gut this town from the inside out. To find out all of its secrets and lies and then watch it all crumble to the ground like a falling house of cards. Some way, somehow. There would be hell to pay.
And Trace Macarthur was first in line.
Bonus Material
For deleted scenes, character POV’s, and teasers from book two of The Marked series, check out the author’s website at:
www.biancascardoni.com
ANAKIM INDEX
SLAYERS (Warrior Angel Descendants)
Jemma
Tessa
Gabriel+
Karl
Thomas*
Jaqueline*
REAPERS (Transport Angel Descendants)
Trace
Peter
Linley*
CASTERS (Magi Angel Descendants)
Nikki
Caleb
Carly
SHIFTERS (Guardian Angel Descendants)
Inception (The Marked Book 1) Page 34
