by K Loraine
Torture.
She wore a gown of midnight blue, the bodice tight and the sleeves made of sheer blue lace. Her honey locks cascaded down her shoulders in soft curls, violet eyes rimmed with dark liner. If I’d been hungry for her before, I was ravenous now.
“I see you deigned to grace us with your presence, Briar,” I said through a tight throat.
“Lucky you.”
Cashel chuckled from where he stood at the head of the table. He waited for Olivia and Briar to be seated before taking his own chair, then motioned for Martin to enter.
Martin served Olivia her own meal while pouring blood for the rest of us, including two vampires I’d never thought I would see again. Logan and Knight, both hunters who’d been turned during the war for our family legacy.
“Knight, what are you doing here? You were on Sorcha’s detail.” I frowned at the man but waited to hear his explanation.
“I was with her until we arrived in Scotland. Then MacLeod claimed her.”
“So what took so long for her to arrive? We’d heard she was missing,” Cashel asked.
Knight shifted in his seat, concern coloring his features. “She resisted for weeks. Your sister isn’t easily swayed.”
I snorted. “That’s saying something.”
“But she’s safely where she belongs now?” Cashel pushed.
“Yes. Though I don’t think she’s very happy to be there.”
“I can’t believe you forced her to go through with that marriage, Cash.” Olivia pushed her food around on her plate, looking a little green. Morning sickness was clearly rearing its head.
“There was nothing I could do unless we wanted to wage another war, little bird. Anne made the treaty, Sorcha was the only part of the deal.”
Anne. That bitch who’d tried to kill us all and take the crown should never be spoken of in this house. But he was right. An alliance with Declan MacLeod was the foothold we needed to secure our place after our father’s death. Like it or not, politics had to play a part in our lives.
“Well, that explains Sorcha. Where’s Callie?” Briar asked, her question completely innocent, yet terribly painful.
Everyone at the table went silent, most with eyes cast down rather than looking to Cashel or myself.
My brother’s gaze flashed with grief, but he nodded. So, I cleared my throat. “Callie is dead.”
Briar laughed, and shock rolled through me. “What? That’s ridiculous. I just talked to her an hour ago. She drew me a bath and gave me permission to stay in her rooms…thanks for the heads up, by the way.”
Every single creature in the dining room stared at her, the tension growing thicker with each passing second. Then Cashel stood, jaw clenched, eyes hard.
“Lucas, is this your idea of a joke? I spent centuries being toyed with, I won’t allow it in my home any longer.”
I was just as confused as my brother. I also couldn’t understand why Briar would say something so hurtful. “Briar, she died months ago.”
Shaking her head, Briar stared into my eyes before all the color drained from her face. “Oh, no. No. No. No. I will not be haunted by the ghost of a vampire in addition to everything else I’m dealing with.”
“Ghost?” Cashel asked.
“I swear to you, Cashel. I didn’t put her up to this.”
Briar stood and rested a hand on one hip. “You put me in her rooms. I thought you set me up there in order to get her to convince me to give you a chance. Lucas, I am not lying about this. Callie came into the room, we talked, she drew me a bath and then…vanished. I thought she was just super fast, being that she’s a vampire. But it makes sense now. She didn’t touch me. She seemed so lonely.”
“So our sister is haunting us?” I asked.
She shrugged. “Spirits in a house like this are practically guaranteed. I’m surprised you haven’t had run-ins with them before.”
“I have,” Olivia said, her voice soft.
Cashel’s eyes widened. “You have? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I thought it was just a dream. I drifted off in the library during the day about a month ago. I saw her walk past the open doors. I chalked it up to weird pregnancy dreams.”
Cashel locked gazes with me. “Why haven’t I seen her?”
I shrugged. “Maybe she doesn’t like you.”
“Fuck you. She likes me better than you, always has.”
“You keep telling yourself that, brother. I was her favorite.”
“I think you’re missing the point,” Briar said. “She’s dealing with unfinished business if she’s still here.”
Cashel’s eyes found Briar’s, and the desperation in his expression hurt. We’d all mourned the loss of our sister, but he’d taken it the hardest. “Take me to where you saw her.”
Briar balked for only a moment before nodding. I stood to accompany her, but she shook her head. “I’ll be fine, Lucas.”
Then the two of them left me with the woman I’d married and died for sitting across from me, and two former hunters who still looked as though they wanted to kill me.
Brilliant.
11
BRIAR
“Where did you see her?” Cashel asked, desperation in his voice. We’d just walked through the door, and he looked around as though he expected her to appear at any moment.
“She was right there.” I pointed to the place Callie had been standing. “We had an entire conversation about mate bonds and Lucas and destiny. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you by bringing her up. I honestly thought she was alive.”
“Well, I’m not alive. I’m bloody well dead, and I can’t believe it took this long for anyone to see me, a wolf besides.” Callie stood in front of the balcony doors, brow furrowed, hands on her hips.
“Cal?” Her name was a broken thing on his lips. He couldn’t continue, and it was heartbreaking. Cashel had changed so much over the last century. Olivia had softened his heart. I wondered what exactly they’d gone through to get here.
“I’ll just let you two get reacquainted.” I backed out of the room and shut the door, leaving Cashel and his sister to their conversation.
I wandered the house, not quite ready to talk to Lucas and deal with the questions I was sure he’d have about my ghost sighting. The manor was sprawling, filled with corridors and passageways, so very like the Dumond estate. I ran my fingers over the polished wood paneling in the hallway, pressing lightly on a button I found, and grinned when a secret doorway opened.
Stairs curled in a spiral down into the belly of the house, and I wondered just how far their reach went. I followed them and walked through the hallway, stopping when I found doors and peeking in on the rooms. A swimming pool, a vampire-created greenhouse with plants that all seemed to thrive at night, and at the end of it, a laboratory. The space was sparkling clean, a table much like one I’d once seen at a morgue set off to one side, along with tools and microscopes like none I’d ever seen.
“What is all this?”
Notebooks lined one floor-to-ceiling bookcase, all leather-bound and stamped with a date. All the way back to three hundred years earlier. I pulled the first one out and read the perfectly cultured handwriting.
Calliope Blackthorne Research 22nd January 1701
Reports of madness sweeping vampire population. Vampires walking into the sun. Due to Salem? Study forthcoming.
Madness? What kind of madness?
I continued poring over the journals learning everything I could about the illness I now knew was called sun sickness. It killed their brother, the mother of all of them but Lucas, and it drove their father mad until his death. How had we not known about this?
Had the shifter community known and just never said anything?
They likely had hoped it would kill off the vampires and we’d never have to deal with them again. I remembered a conversation I’d heard my parents share in hushed whispers over drinks one night. The phrase “let them die out” rang with a different truth now.
The space arou
nd me was filled with shelves containing vials and samples, herbs and tinctures. Callie was a scientist. She’d been working for centuries studying the disease killing their people, and by the looks of it, she hadn’t found a true cure before her death.
I ran my fingers over the vials, searching through them for anything that might reveal more about sun sickness and her progress. This was truly fascinating.
Grabbing the journal dated 1920, I gave in to my curiosity and read her notes for the year, wondering if she had any insight into what had happened between Lucas and me. I scanned, reading about further research, about Callum and his struggles with sun sickness. It was heartbreaking to learn about how hard she tried to keep the disease from progressing.
Then I found myself reading my own story. Her observations about Lucas’ feelings for me. Suspicions that he’d found his mate even after our first meeting. But the thing that stopped me was her mention, just a casual notation, that her father had made her poison mine. Not a long drawn out paragraph filled with remorse, just…a simple, “Father ordered me to slip colloidal silver into the Dumond alpha’s wine.”
Rage curled in my chest. Was it really that easy for her? She nearly killed him. Nearly started a war.
I snarled as my wolf came roaring to the forefront of my mind, and with one sweep of my hands, I flipped the table into the wall of herbs and tinctures. Glass shattered, filling the air with a multitude of scents. Rose, jasmine, silver, and underneath it all, blood. I fell to my knees, breathing hard as I tried to control my anger, keep my wolf at bay, and when I finally had her managed, I pressed my palms to the floor to help myself to my feet.
“Briar, no!” I heard Lucas’ shout an instant too late as my skin was pierced by a shard of glass, and the blood and silver mixture began to burn.
LUCAS
Briar had been gone a while, with no sign of returning to me. Perhaps she needed a bit of freedom. Freedom from me? I didn’t want that, but I had to give her and Cashel time to discuss Callie.
“Walk with me, Lucas. You know Cash won’t hurt Briar. She’s your mate. It’s easy to see.” Olivia stood and held out her hand.
I didn’t even look at Knight and Logan. The two of them had no say in what we did, and aside from their help with Sorcha, they had no reason to be here. It was purely due to my sister-in-law’s kindness that they were even allowed to live.
“All right. The garden?”
She nodded and smiled as I took her palm in mine. The two of us walked through the garden filled with night-blooming flowers and shared a companionable silence. It was nice, and I honestly never thought I’d be able to be here like this with Olivia. Had it only been months ago that I’d been married to her in an effort to save her life?
“I never got to thank you for everything you did for me.” The earnestness in her tone made clear that this was important to her, but I didn’t need thanks. “I mean it. I know you made a huge sacrifice. Cashel explained that your bond is ruined forever. You’ll never be able to truly be connected like he and I are.”
“It’s all right.” But was it? At the time, I’d thought the only creature on this earth meant for me was dead. Now? All Briar and I could have was the connection of our hearts. I would never be able to seal our bond.
“I thought you told me it was a witch who stole your heart and ruined you.”
Fighting a sigh, I said, “There are times I am honest and times I embellish. My story with Briar was never something I planned to relive with anyone, not even you, Olivia.”
She nodded. “I understand.” Our feet crunched on the gravel path as we wound our way deeper into the maze of flowers. “Painful memories aren’t things we ever really want to be honest about.”
After a while, she looked at me and cocked her head. “Do you still love her?”
“I’ll always love her. She’s burned on my heart as sure as Cashel is on yours.”
A soft smile spread her lips. “Then why are you here with me and not showing her that you’re worth fighting for?”
“I have no clue.”
Taking her hand, I kissed her knuckles and smiled. “Thank you, darling.”
“Flirting with my wife?” Cashel asked from his place behind me on the path.
“If I were flirting, you’d know it. Where’s Briar?”
“She left Callie and I to talk.”
“So it’s true?” I asked.
“Yes. Our sister seems to be permanently housed in Blackthorne Manor. She’s just a little less solid than she used to be.”
I felt the tickle of fear at the back of my neck before I could comprehend what was happening. Apprehension had my hair standing on end. “Do you feel that?”
“What?” Cashel asked.
“A chill.”
My heart lurched as I realized exactly what it was. My mate was in danger. “Briar,” I whispered, bolting for the house.
I followed the pull of her heartbeat, down the spiral stairs, through the long halls underground until I heard the growl, the crash, and I knew something terrible was happening.
“Briar, no!” I shouted, reaching for her even as her palm connected with shattered vials of blood and silver.
The shriek she released nearly brought me to my knees. Cashel was right behind me, hand on my shoulder as I tried to go to her.
“Stop. Some of those samples are from Callum. You could be infected.”
“Infected? Why are we worried about that? Isn’t Olivia the cure?” He clenched his jaw, and a vein popped out on his neck. Oh, no. “Brother, tell me we have a cure?”
He shook his head. “I claimed her. I ruined her blood.”
I shrugged out of his grasp and went to Briar anyway. She stared down at her hand with anger and fear in her eyes. Without giving her a choice, I scooped her into my arms and carried her out of the lab.
“You didn’t keep a supply?” I hissed at Cashel as we ascended the stairs and finally returned to the main house.
“We did. But most of it was sent to the other clans to cure their sick. We were storing the remaining blood in Callie’s lab.”
“How can we test her? How can we see if she’s been infected?”
Olivia came through the doors to the library with Callie—the ghost of Callie—behind her. “Callie can test her. Or…she can tell me how to test her. I can’t get sun sickness. I’m not a vampire.”
“But you’re carrying a half-vampire child, little bird. You can’t risk the baby.” Cashel’s tone was firm and harsh.
“I’ll take every precaution. What will I need, Callie?”
My sister bit her lower lip and thought for a moment before she instructed Cashel on what supplies would be necessary and directed me to place Briar on the dining room table.
“Is it normal for this to affect her so harshly?”
“The samples in my lab were highly concentrated, both the blood and the silver. I’m not sure what she touched, but it’s likely if it were virus, it would be accelerated. If it were silver directly into her bloodstream, she may not survive without a transfusion.”
I dragged a hand through my hair and worked to control the erratic beating of my heart. “Fucking hell, come on, Cash.”
Cashel returned with his arms full of supplies. He set them on the other end of the long table, and we waited while Callie instructed Olivia on what to do.
“Lucas, you’ll need to hold her steady. She could hurt Olivia.”
I looked into Briar’s eyes, and while Olivia bandaged her hand, I grabbed my mate by the wrists and held her down. Cashel did the same to her ankles. Then we waited, helpless as Olivia went to work, drawing blood samples and running the tests.
“She doesn’t have sun sickness. But the silver is killing her, Lucas,” Callie said. “You need to give her as much as you can stand in order to help her heal.”
“Anything.” I hated how the word broke, but it was the truth. I’d give anything for Briar. It was always she who had my heart, and I wasn’t ready for her to release me
yet.
I sat in a chair and let my brother and his wife connect Briar and me via a tube and needles. It seemed so strange not to simply let Briar feed from me, but Callie assured us this was more efficient. I would do whatever would make Briar herself again.
An hour later, my head was spinning from blood loss, and I found myself nodding off in my chair. My arm ached, and my skin was nearly translucent, my veins dark blue and purple.
“That’s enough, Lucas. She’s taken all she can.” Callie’s voice was gentle and light, almost airy, as though she weren’t even real.
“I’ll give every last drop if I have to.”
“You don’t have to. Look, her color is coming back and her palm is healed.”
I removed the bandage from her wound, and it was barely a scar now. Relief flooded me. “Thank you, Callie.”
Cashel helped disconnect the two of us, and I watched as the small pinprick in the bend of Briar’s elbow healed instantly. It was a rewarding thing to know that because of my blood, she could heal so quickly. Then, he handed me a wine bottle filled with blood and said, “Drink up. I’ll put her to bed.”
He scooped her into his arms and headed for the door as I downed a third of the bottle.
“My bed,” I growled. “She belongs in my bed. Nowhere else.”
12
BRIAR
I woke shaking as the nightmare clung to my mind. The burn of silver on my tongue was a reminder of what my father had endured at the hands of Elias Blackthorne. The scent of bergamot both soothed and terrified me as I sat up, trying to get my bearings. The last thing I remembered, I was fighting my wolf as anger raged through me. Then pain. Intense pain.
A palm slid up my spine, soothing the trembling. “Hush, darling, it’s all right. You’re safe. I’ve got you.”
“Lucas?” I fought the tremor in my voice.
“I’m here. It was only a nightmare.”
“It was a memory. But I felt it this time. The pain of the silver going down his throat at the ball. Callie did that to him.”
