by Rye Brewer
“Nothing. Everything. I don’t know. Haven’t you ever felt something so strongly there was nothing to do but laugh just to let it out?”
He shook his head, a little confused. “I can’t say I’ve felt many things that strongly until now.”
Until now.
What did he mean? I didn’t dare hope, no matter how much of me wanted to. I wanted to so very badly.
I glanced down and noted how neither of us had let go of the other’s hand. Our fingers were still clasped as tight as ever. He looked down, too, but made no sign of letting go. Something was happening, something that had never happened to me before.
My heart hammered wildly, and I had to remind myself to breathe.
“Thank you for that,” I whispered.
“Thank you. I don’t think I’ve ever enjoyed doing that more than I just did.”
“I take it that’s a compliment.” I giggled softly.
“It was supposed to be. I’m extremely unpracticed at complimenting women. Or anyone.”
“You’re doing well enough.”
“Am I?”
“I haven’t run screaming, have I? I could literally leave the world right now if wanted to.”
“Fair enough.” He gazed off into the distance then back at me.
Our hands parted. I couldn’t explain the sense of loss. I’d never see him again.
“Can I see you again?”
My breath caught, and, for one brief moment, I was sure my heart stopped beating. I must have imagined it. There was no chance of him saying such a thing. Yet the hopeful expression on his face as he waited for a reply told me otherwise.
There was only one answer. “Yes. Of course. As soon as possible.” I had to bite my tongue to keep from babbling on and making myself sound foolish. Though he didn’t seem to mind.
It was the most natural thing imaginable, the way he leaned down to brush his lips against mine in the sweetest kiss.
17
Anissa
I never saw Gregor look the way he did as he led me out of the Hermitage and through the cool night air. The moon had risen until it was almost directly overhead, and it bathed everything around us in a mystical, silvery light. Stars dotted the sky. I wondered vaguely if there were constellations in Avellane.
Gregor’s face was a mask of confusion, anger, and curiosity, and they fought against each other until his features twisted into something unrecognizable. What was he going through? Why did Allonic disturb him so deeply?
“I know, I know, I should’ve warned you he was also a vampire,” I said, hoping to get through to him. If he would just talk to me instead of walking in silence, with his hands deep in his robes. I had no idea what was going through his head or what it meant for me, only that he was a mess inside.
“Yes. You should have,” he replied, and I was relieved to hear his voice even if frustration made it deeper than ever.
“I’m sorry. Really, I am. I didn’t know what else to do. He needed help, and we were near the portal…”
“Enough.” He stopped so abruptly, I almost crashed into him for the second time in less than an hour. “I’m not concerned with any of that—Well, I am, but not so concerned as I am with other things.”
I gulped. “What other things?”
“Other things such as the fact he reminds me strongly of someone I used to know.” He whirled on me. “How is that possible?”
I blinked, suddenly very cold inside. “I had no idea,” I managed to croak, though my mouth had gone bone dry.
“You’re sure about that, daughter? You’re positive?”
I had a choice to make. Should I even bother lying? He probably already knew what he needed to know. Allonic favored his father, who I had never met, but there were bits of Mom in his face, too. The shape of his eyes, the curve of his jaw.
His fangs.
Gregor went on. “How could the shade-vampire hybrid remind me so much of a vampire who couldn’t possibly have given birth to him? One who is dead.”
There was a weight crushing my chest. He knew. I hadn’t thought of this, any of it. Then again, I didn’t know he would ever find out about Allonic’s presence. Cold sweat dampened the back of my neck.
His shoulders fell, along with his face. He abruptly looked very tired, but there was a spark of hope in his eyes. Regret, too, over so much lost time. “Where is Tabitha? And how long have you known she’s alive?”
My knees were so weak all of a sudden. I sat on the trunk of a fallen tree—its bark was damp and cold, and the moisture soaked through my jeans, but I barely felt it. “I didn’t know until I met Allonic. That’s the truth.”
“Did you know who his mother was the last time we saw each other?”
I tried to think back—it was all such a mixed-up mess in my head, since so much had happened all at once. “I did,” I said, slowly, piecing it together. “I knew I had a half-brother. I believe I knew she was alive. But I hadn’t seen her yet.”
That was a mistake, putting it like that. His eyes flew open the way Allonic’s had when he’d first awakened.
“And now?” he sputtered. “You’ve seen her?”
I nodded.
“How was she? Was she well?” He sat beside me, almost on top of me, breathless and eager. I couldn’t help but pity him, especially since he wouldn’t like what I had to say. How could I put it so it would be easier for him to take?
“She’s well,” I replied, slow and thoughtful. It was like trying to navigate a minefield. “But different than she used to be. She lives in seclusion.”
His eyes darkened. “Different? How? Seclusion? Why?”
Time to be extra careful. “First, you have to know this: the story about her being burned in the Great Fire is true. She was burned horribly, but it wasn’t the Fire that nearly killed her. It was the sun. She was near death when she was found.”
“Found by whom?”
I took a deep breath. “By Allonic’s father. He nursed her back to health, gave her his blood in order to heal her. It took a long time and a lot of feeding after being burned so severely.”
He took this in, and I held my breath as I watched. He had to imagine her growing close to somebody else, letting the shade heal her in such an intimate way. A shade who eventually became Allonic’s father. It couldn’t have been easy. I resisted the urge to reach out and pat his hand.
He pulled himself together and asked, “Why is she in seclusion, then? I assume she’s healed by now?”
“I guess it’s the only place she felt she could stay—in ShadesRealm, where Allonic lives with the rest of them. She’s safest there, in her mind—but she has to stay away from the shades. They don’t love vampires, as I guess you know.”
“And yet they accept a hybrid?” he murmured, cocking an eyebrow.
“There are ways of accepting someone without really accepting them.” I couldn’t help but remember my history, and how I lived inside the Carver mansion but never felt like I was one of them.
He nodded, then stood. “I want to see her.” I wondered if I looked the way he did when I felt especially determined to do something—shoulders back, head high, a defiant glint in my eye.
I could only sigh. “Yeah, that makes two of us. But it’s not that easy.”
“Why not? You know where she is, right?”
“For one thing, even if she were in ShadesRealm right now, it wouldn’t be as easy as walking up to the tower and knocking on the door. But as it is, she’s somewhere else.”
“Where?”
I shifted uncomfortably on the log. The cold wetness was starting to seep into my consciousness, and I didn’t enjoy it, but I needed the rest after coursing earlier. “She’s with Sara. My sister. There was an emergency.”
“Is she in trouble?” He sounded like he cared, and I wondered why. For my sake? For my mother’s?
“I won’t bother trying to sugarcoat it. Yes. There’s trouble. She went with Sara to get things straightened out. I can’t go where they are
—neither of us can,” I added when he opened his mouth as though he wanted to argue that he could.
“Why not?” he asked instead.
“Because they’re in Hallowthorn Landing. Are you familiar with it?”
He nodded.
“We would need a witch portal to get there. I’m many things, but I’m not a witch.”
He chuckled. “You need a witch. I can get you a witch.”
It was my turn to chuckle. “Oh? You have one up those sleeves of yours? Can I borrow her?”
“No,” he laughed, “but I have the next best thing. A mage-fae.”
“And that’s like a witch?” I asked, surprised.
“Every fae kingdom has a mage-fae,” he explained as he helped me to my feet. “Unlike witches, whose power comes through the bloodline, a mage-fae is fae-born and mage-trained. They serve and advise the king. They even harangue the king, in some cases.” His face twisted up in a sour expression.
Harangue the king. That could only mean one person. “Is it Felicity?” I asked, almost laughing.
He grimaced. “Indeed. How do you think she would’ve dared bring another species to Avellane otherwise? She knew she could work her way around me and possibly bully me into submission. I swear, tenacity must be trained into them, too. Unless it’s merely her personality that makes her so impossible.” But there was respect in his voice, too, as well as irritation.
“Could Felicity create a witch portal, then?”
“With my approval.”
My heartbeat picked up. “Would you grant your approval?”
“Of course, I will.”
I would be able to see my mother again. We had so little time together—it was like getting a glimpse of something really incredible, amazing, beautiful, and having it taken away. Life might have been easier if that thing had never been seen. I missed her more than I ever had, knowing she was alive.
Gregor held up a forefinger. “And I will escort you to Hallowthorn Landing,” he added. “I’ll finally get to see Tabitha again.”
18
Jonah
“If you hadn’t spooked Cari, she wouldn’t have run.” Gage’s face was a mask of rage. So was mine, I guessed, based on how I felt as we rode up to the penthouse in the elevator. It made sense. We were twins, after all.
“If I hadn’t spooked her?” I couldn’t help but laugh, though it turned into a snarl at the end. “If you hadn’t created her, none of this would be a problem.”
It was the same argument we’d been having for hours. Changing our location to the penthouse did nothing to cool either of us down.
“You left the damn door wide open,” he growled, still stuck in his train of thought. “You had to go and rush us that way, and you left the door open for her to run. You didn’t stop to think. Do you ever stop to think?”
The two of us marched off the elevator on our floor, and not a moment too soon. I was about to say things that were for our ears only. I couldn’t run the risk of somebody in the clan overhearing and knowing the stupid, vile, repugnant—illegal—thing my brother had done.
With that in mind, I slammed the door hard enough that a cracking noise resounded through the penthouse before I charged him—the way he said I did back at the other apartment, where I’d found the two of them. Him and that thing he’d created.
He was too quick for me to catch him by surprise, and the two of us tussled for a moment before he threw me off. I landed on the sofa but bounced to my feet.
“Don’t you see what really matters here?” I shouted. “You broke the law! You turned a human into one of us! What’s wrong with you? What could you possibly have been thinking, Gage?” I panted, breathless by then, and disappointment tinged the rage that had boiled in me ever since I opened the door on the pair of them. He would die for what he had done. Couldn’t he see it?
He couldn’t. It was obvious. I knew the stubborn expression on his face well enough. The look he got when he was determined he was in the right. Nobody could sway him when he got like this. All the trouble that stubborn streak of his had gotten us into.
“I’m sorry if I couldn’t let the girl die the way she was about to. There didn’t seem to be any choice at the moment.”
“Oh, please,” I spat. “You had a choice, a very obvious one. To allow her to die. We’re not responsible for what happens to humans, Gage. That’s none of our business.”
“She was the way she was because of me,” he said, running his hands through his hair until it stood up in messy tufts. He looked like a wreck—it was obvious he had been through a lot. “She would never have mixed with those Euro-trash shifters if it hadn’t been for me. I mean, she would have met them—at the club—without me, but they were using her to get to me. They hurt her, assaulted her, butchered her, because they thought she was more deeply involved with me than she actually was.”
He let out an animal cry of pure despair, and the sound almost brought me over to his side.
Almost.
“But do you see what this means for you? You have a brand-new vampire out there, Gage. You know how strong the bloodlust is at this stage. And you made this happen. What’ll you do when somebody finds out who created her? There’s nothing to be done! They’ll kill you for this.” The gravity of my words and the truth behind them settled between us, wiping out all sound but that of our breathing.
“What happened to the door?” Philippa walked in, eyeing what I had just done.
“What are you doing here?” I didn’t feel like dealing with both of them at once.
She tilted her head to the side and frowned. “Last I checked, I live here.”
“I thought you’d be downstairs,” I replied, raising an eyebrow. Meaning the vault.
She blushed until her cheeks were roughly the same shade as her hair but didn’t back down. “Where’s Anissa?” she asked instead of pursuing the topic at hand.
That was new. I couldn’t have predicted she’d ask something like that. As if they were friends now. “Why do you want to know?”
“Is she in your room?” She was on her way across the living room and down the hall before I could answer.
I rushed after her. “Probably. Why is it so important for you to talk to her?” I raised my voice in hopes Anissa would hear—there was no telling what she was doing that she might not feel like having Philippa walk in on.
“It just is, Jonah.” She flung the door open on an empty bedroom.
Even I was surprised as we walked in. She turned to me with an inquisitive expression.
I looked away from her—the way she stared at me, like she was offering a challenge. Why didn’t I know where Anissa was? I happened to cast my gaze toward the bed and spied the note propped up against my pillow. I tore it open.
“What’s it say?” Philippa asked.
“As if it’s any of your business, she went to visit her father.” I didn’t need an explanation why.
Allonic was there, in Avellane. While Philippa knew him, I didn’t think she needed to know about his situation. Knowing my sister, she’d barge her way into Avellane to find him.
“Why would she do that?”
“Why is this a concern of yours? I don’t have time for this right now, Philippa.”
Once again, she didn’t answer my question. She did, however, follow me to where Gage waited for us in the living room, pacing back and forth in front of the doors to the balcony with his hands clasped behind his neck.
“What’s the matter?” she asked Gage, going to him. “You look terrible.”
“Thank you,” he grumbled, then turned to me. “I have to find Cari. Being here is a waste of time.”
“Who’s Cari?” Philippa asked, glancing at the two of us.
“Gage’s pet,” I snarled. I couldn’t help it. He made me that furious—and even worse, I felt helpless. I couldn’t do anything for him this time. There was no rescue, no last-minute reprieve.
“Watch your mouth,” he growled before lunging at me. Philippa thre
w herself in front of him, making him pull up short. His fangs descended, glinting dangerously.
“I’m one of the only friends you’ve got right now, brother,” I reminded him. “Are you sure you want to attack me? I’ll admit, I misspoke. She’s not just your pet. She’s your death sentence.”
Philippa spun toward me. “Wait. What?”
“Tell her,” I said, nodding to her. “Tell Philippa what you did.”
The light left Gage’s eyes—she was always his favorite, his closest sibling. He knew how it would break her heart.
So, I did it for him. “Cari is the human our brother turned into a vampire.”
Her eyes opened almost comically wide as her skin went as white as a sheet of paper. She turned slowly, like the news weighed her down. “Tell me this isn’t true,” she whispered as her entire body began to tremble.
Instead of offering an apology, as I would’ve imagined, he snarled, “Oh, and you’re so perfect?”
Both of our jaws dropped.
She gasped in surprise. “What?” she sputtered.
“You heard me. If you’re so perfect, if you’ve never done something that went against the rules, how do you explain the Ancient’s body in our vault?”
“This is out of line,” I warned, as I kept one eye on Philippa.
She swayed a little, as though she might faint. It was against Gage’s nature to lash out at her this way, and she didn’t know how to process it in tandem with news of what he’d done.
He acted like I hadn’t spoken. “Oh, and let’s not forget about your murderous boyfriend. He killed his father, didn’t he? I’m pretty sure that’s the story I heard.”
That would do it. She would lose all strength and collapse on the spot, I was sure—so sure, I was ready to catch her when she fell.
Except she didn’t. Instead, she roared, “You shut your mouth! You have no idea what you’re talking about!”
“And neither do you!” he roared in return, towering over her. But she wouldn’t back down.
“That’s enough from you,” I warned, standing behind her to push him away.
