Age of Vampires- The Complete Series

by Caroline Peckham

  A naked dwarf squatted before us with yellow eyes, serrated teeth and a gnarled face. His body was coated in thick hair, one foot was twisted and boils lined his flesh.

  Something in my blood told me this was his true form. Ugly as sin.

  “No!” he wailed. “What have you done!?” He dropped down to all fours, clawing at his face.

  I hounded closer, my heart swelling at the sight of him reduced to this wasted creature before me.

  He held up one clawed hand up to try and keep us back. “Get away!” he snarled. “I am not this. This is not me!”

  “This is exactly who you are,” I growled.

  He lurched away but there was nowhere to go. He was trapped inside the glass and couldn't break out.

  “No!” he begged again, clawing at his eyes as if it would be better to gouge them out than to see himself this way.

  Magnar and I shared a nod, a silent decision passing between us as we grabbed one of the final mirrors and angled it to face him.

  I wanted to see him squirm and beg and fall apart under the sight of his own reflection. I wanted to strip away any ounce of hope he had left. Because he was done. I was ending him. The man he'd tormented for over a thousand years. Who he'd forced to do unspeakable things. Who he'd taken everything from. And now he was going to fall at my feet.

  His eyes opened and he shrieked in horror as he gazed at himself.

  “Erik Larsen!” he begged, shuddering as he squinted through his eyelids to look at me, his face contorting in a pathetic effort to find mercy in me.

  We moved the mirror closer until he was forced to gaze upon only himself. He groaned, trying to pull the dark hair from his head, scratching at his cheeks, his neck.

  Magnar and I threw the mirror we were holding to the ground and I strode toward Andvari with a snarl. “I am not your pawn, I am not a slave to your curse and my name is not Erik Larsen. I am Erik Belvedere, Andvari. And I am your death.”

  He screamed as his hands scraped uselessly against the glass. He had nowhere to go, his connection to the other mirrors was broken. And we'd stripped away every one of his forms until this was all that remained.

  Magnar ran forward, taking hold of the edge of the burning mirror and I grabbed the other side of it. Andvari screamed and screamed, pounding his fists against the glass as he begged to be released.

  We forced the mirror to the ground with a fierce push, yelling our victory. Andvari’s cries rang around the room, so loud the noise tore and bit at my ears. The pane hit the floor and the glass was dashed to pieces with the sound of a thunderclap.

  Magnar and I were thrown to the stone floor as a powerful blast ripped through the air. Every memory, every ounce of my soul was returned to me in a swathe of amber light. I sucked in a breath as I held onto all the precious moments he’d stolen from me.

  The glass scattered in every direction and black blood poured from within it. Teeth and bone and fingers skittered amongst the devastation, Andvari’s true form obliterated along with the mirror.

  Andvari's screams echoed away and silence fell, the only noise the tinkling of the shards as they scattered across the room. The power in the space lifted, departing from this domain as if it had never been. Andvari was dead. Our revenge was dealt. Our sole purpose of living had come to an end.

  Silence reigned eternally.

  I turned to Magnar, his chin held high as he gazed upon the remains of the god who'd thought he could win. But our love for the twins had prevailed. And in this final act we'd done them justice.

  Though it didn't soothe any of the grief flooding my body.

  I pushed myself to my knees as it overwhelmed me. I'd known this wouldn't be enough. But it was something. It meant the beast who'd taken my Rebel from me was no longer a plague on the world. That he'd never hurt anyone as he had hurt me or my family again.

  Magnar placed a hand on my shoulder, dropping down before me, his knees crunching against the glass. He cupped the back of my neck and pressed his forehead to mine. “It's done,” he sighed.

  “Yes,” I breathed, knowing what came next, but holding onto this brief moment with Magnar a moment longer before we departed from this world. Neither of us could remain here without the twins. And if only eternal darkness awaited me when I destroyed my immortal soul, then I knew that was far better than existing in a world where Montana didn't.

  “I am humbled to have truly known you, Brother,” Magnar said, the weight of his final words tearing through me. He handed me one of his swords and my brows raised at the incredible gesture.

  “I'm glad my last fight was at your side,” I said firmly. “There is no greater honour than that.”

  “That is true. My final hour has been spent well in your company.” His eyes dropped to his blades between us. “It is a fine death to die by these swords.”

  “Then let us go,” I said, the last ounces of my resolve fading away and a strange peace washing through me as I rested the hilt of the sword on the ground, angling it toward my heart.

  “These blades are capable of killing gods,” Magnar growled as he did the same. “They hold the power to end us.”

  I nodded firmly, the tip of the blade biting into my skin. “Go well, dear friend.”

  The cold stone pressed against my knees as I leaned my head forward and let out a heavy sigh.

  A pit of despair was opening up before me as I held Venom to my heart, preparing to end all that I was.

  We had finished Andvari and gotten revenge for the deaths of the women we loved but in the end it hadn’t done anything to lessen the pain of their loss.

  “I do not wish to exist in any form now,” I murmured. “I will cast my soul into the eternal flame and let it be burned out of this world forever more.”

  I took a moment to think of my friends from before my sleep and after it. Of my mother and father and my brother and the love we’d all shared. I clung hard to every good memory I could find of them, wrapping them around my heart in a final farewell before turning my mind to Callie.

  Her life had been so short. So savage and unfair. She’d barely even begun to live when fate had demanded her death.

  I thought of the way she’d mocked me and teased me, laughed with me and loved me. Of her eyes which were as blue as a summer sky and her lips which set my skin alight with a desire for everything she was. And of her long, golden hair which seemed to shine with the light of the sun even in the darkest of nights.

  Any amount of pain was worth the price of a moment in her arms. And if there had been any place for her in any level of existence then I would have gladly followed her there. But her fate was so much worse than that. To have been wiped from the world as if she’d never been there in the first place was the greatest crime imaginable. The world would grieve for all eternity that such a soul had been lost for all time.

  What had happened to her wasn’t right. To have been consumed by a beast so foul as the god who had cursed the Earth...

  I gripped my blade more tightly, pressing its tip to my heart as I leaned my weight forward, preparing to throw myself down upon it.

  I wondered if it would hurt? If destroying my soul was akin to ending my time in my flesh? Or if I’d just simmer away, fading from memory into nothing but an unfulfilled dream.

  I took a deep breath, my last in any sense of the word and I felt Venom cutting into my flesh.

  A deep warmth brushed against my cheeks and a golden aura shone through the thin skin of my eyelids, reaching out to me despite the fact that I wanted nothing more from this world.

  I hesitated for the briefest second, wondering if the gods had been kind enough to grant me one last moment in the sun with the girl I loved. Even if it wasn’t real, I’d take it. The thought of her gaze locked with mine, her lips on my lips, her breath on my cheek...

  I opened my eyes and I frowned at the sight which reached me.

  The blazing frame of Andvari’s last mirror was laying on the dark floor, burning brightly as flames consumed the f
inal echoes of his power.

  My mouth fell open as a golden figure spilled from the smoke which rose from the blaze, thickening into the form of a man who stumbled forward in confusion.

  The soul’s eyes found mine and he reached out, his fingers brushing my skin in thanks before he headed on, aiming for the stairwell which would take him from this place.

  “Erik,” I breathed as my friend gritted his teeth, about to plunge Tempest into his heart. “Something strange is happening.”

  I didn’t want to voice the guess which was forming in my mind. But as I watched, another soul clawed her way from the smoke pouring from the frame.

  “Thank you,” she breathed before hurrying away and my heart pounded with the most desperate of pleas.

  “You don’t think-” Erik began and I could tell he was just as afraid to hope as I was.

  If we were witnessing the release of the souls that Andvari had devoured then maybe, just maybe...

  Erik pulled the blade away from his heart. Just an inch. But the small gap held a thousand hopes in the space between heartbeats.

  I loosened my hold on Venom too, feeling a bead of sweat slide along my skin beneath the black robes I wore in this realm.

  We watched in silence as soul after soul rose from the smoke and slowly but surely the flames burned low.

  When there was barely more than a simmering ember left and no more beings rose from the ashes, my stomach dropped.

  I dipped my head, hating myself for hoping and bringing this pain on myself for a second time.

  I ached for a resolution to this nightmare which didn’t end in a death so final as that which had been dealt to my love. But Callie was gone. Lost in every sense of the word and I had to accept it even though my heart refused to do so with every desperate beat it took. It didn’t matter that I was dead already. It only mattered that she was gone. My true love. My destiny. My end.

  I reached for my sword again, ready to finish this suffering once and for all, when a strange light rose from the ashes of the frame as the final ember extinguished.

  It was at once silver and golden, light and dark, night and day.

  It rose from the depths of the soot which had once been Andvari and twisted itself into a shape.

  My breath caught in my throat as a woman appeared before us. She was both familiar and unknown. A friend and a stranger. I knew her with every inch of my heart and yet I was sure I’d never met her before.

  She was clad in a gown which flickered in a wind I couldn’t feel and it seemed to be crafted from the light of the stars. Golden and silver and everything in between.

  Her eyes fell on me and Erik as we knelt before her and a strangled noise left the throat of my friend.

  “Is it you?” he breathed and I frowned because it wasn’t her but it was at the same time.

  She stepped forward and her lips were the ones I hungered for but her eyes were alight for Erik.

  I shook my head in confusion, like I was looking at a riddle I couldn’t understand.

  “I love you,” she breathed, reaching for me while looking at Erik. She stilled like she could feel that that wasn’t right and her brown eyes swung to me. Eyes I knew but didn’t love.

  “Callie always said they were two halves of one whole,” I murmured as I looked at this creature who was mine and wasn’t all at once.

  My blood heated with the realisation of who she was. The joining of two souls who had shared everything starting with a womb. Their lives were linked, tied together in ways which defied all logic and yet was always so true to the essence of who they were. And in death they’d clung to each other, refusing to part ways when Andvari had stolen them from the lives they should have had.

  I raised my arm to meet the hand she still held extended to me, unsure what this transformation meant but knowing I had to find out. If this was Callie. In even the slightest way. Then I had to know. I had to be sure.

  Her fingers brushed mine and I was transported through every moment I’d ever spent in her company.

  I saw myself through her eyes, fierce, determined, strong. She was watching me when she should have been sleeping. Loving me when I drove her to rage. Fighting for me when my mind had been stolen and aching for me when I wasn’t by her side.

  With a deep breath which carved the air in two, Callie tumbled into my arms, the soul fracturing in half to release her and leaving Montana gasping for breath before Erik.

  My heart stopped beating. The world stopped spinning. The sun stopped blazing. None of it mattered but the woman in my arms.

  She was trembling, her eyes brimming with fear and confusion as her nails dug into my arms and she looked at me like I was the answer to every question she’d ever asked.

  “Magnar?” she whispered and my name on her lips was my undoing like always.

  “It’s you,” I breathed, needing to confirm it out loud to convince myself that it was true.

  My world filled with light as I held her again and my chest seized almost painfully as my love for her overwhelmed me.

  A thousand thoughts filled my mind at once but none of them mattered as I fisted my hand in her dress and dragged her against me with a passion which was so fierce I was sure it was going to burn us to dust.

  She melted against me, her arms wrapping around my neck as she pressed her body to mine and the world fell away from us.

  We may have been in the darkest pits of the underworld but none of it mattered. Only the scent of her skin, and the touch of her lips, the caress of her body and the utter beauty of the fact that she was here mattered to me now.

  I’d wanted to burn when I knew she was lost but now I was burning with her as we were reunited. And if the fire of our love was enough to consume us then so be it. This moment was all I had begged for and all that I needed. If the flames took me now then I would leave this place happy for one final moment. But selfishly I wanted more. And as I gripped her tightly, feeling every inch of her here in this moment with me, I swore to myself that this wasn’t it.

  The gods had never wanted us to be together and we’d shown them what we thought of their plans.

  So if they’d decided that our time was up then I refused to accept it. Everything with them was a negotiation and I refused to take no for an answer.

  My fate had been balancing on the edge of a blade, all the light in the world had extinguished and now, impossibly, the love of my life was handed to me once more. The scales of fate had tipped in my favour and I could hardly dare to believe it was true.

  I drank in every inch of her pearly skin, her dark eyes like two liquid pools of bronze, her crimson lips and the tumble of her hair which was as black as midnight.

  “Rebel?” I asked because I was still suspended in disbelief. That fate couldn't possibly offer me this now, not after everything. And yet here she was: my reason to live. And fuck I wanted to live. I wanted to breathe and grow and share everything I had to offer with this beautiful being. But we were still just two souls in the deepest realms of the afterlife.

  She nodded, reaching for me and I lifted a trembling palm to meet hers in the space parting us. I wanted to grab her, burying my nose in her hair, drink in the cherished scent of her, but I was still afraid. Afraid that this was some mirage to drive me mad, afraid the gods had their claws in me once more, afraid that if I blinked she’d vanish and I’d never lay my eyes on her again.

  Our palms pressed together and I released a shuddering breath.

  She’s here. She’s real. She’s not going away.

  Where our skin touched, our life forces flowed between us in the same way the rune of partnership had allowed. The fear in me was washed away by a flood of relief, so powerful it swept through every corner of my body. I sighed, the aching grief in my heart finally parting, chased away by all of the love that rolled between us.

  She released a whimper of pain, excitement and hope, then threw herself at me, winding her limbs around me in the tightest embrace.

  I crushed her against
my body and every fibre of our being met her like our nerve endings were joining, our souls truly united.

  Her mouth found mine and I groaned with absolute bliss over a kiss I'd never thought I'd have again. Her lips were as warm as sunlight, her skin as soft as cotton.

  She’s here and I love her so powerfully my body’s going to break apart.

  “You saved us,” she breathed as she pulled away, brushing her thumbs over my cheeks as she held me.

  My heart beat and beat and beat and I almost felt as human as I had before I'd shed my mortal skin.

  “You saved me,” I whispered. “Everything I am is because of you. I exist because of you. And you didn't just save me, you and your sister saved the entire world by making the greatest sacrifice.”

  Tears slid from her eyes and pure light glimmered within them. I kissed them away, shaking my head because I didn't want her to cry ever again. This woman deserved so much more than an eternity in the afterlife. Her time on Earth had been cut too short. She'd passed on long before it was fair and she'd barely seen a glimmer of what life could have offered her.

  “I'm sorry,” I sighed, resting my forehead to hers. “I wish I could give you more than this. I wish it didn't have to be this way.”

  She wound her fingers around the back of my neck as another tear slid from her eye. “Don't be sorry,” she begged. “We have each other now, that's all that matters.”

  I nodded but a weight hung over me. We were surrounded by this dark world and I didn't know where in the afterlife we'd be able to reside. How could this be where the child of the moon ended up? She was the most divine, merciful, compassionate woman I’d ever met. The gods knew that. And yet they were still allowing this. I hated them for that more than I’d ever hated them for anything.