Flesh and Blood

‘Just as I thought. How pathetic,’ Tatiana said. ‘Lord Ivan, would you be so kind as to escort my feeble ex-husband into his proper place?’

Ivan, still hefting the weapon he’d taken off the Mohawked kine, gave a short nod. ‘If it means this circus will be over sooner, then by all means.’ He stepped over the kine’s body and pointed the crossbow toward the unfinished circle. The kine reared up, yanked a blade from his boot, and jammed it into Ivan’s leg. With a yowl, Ivan twisted and pulled the bow’s trigger twice, putting a bolt through the kine’s shoulder and another through his thigh, pinning him to the floor. Cursing, he collapsed, unable to free himself.

‘Creek!’ the comarré cried out.

‘Bollocks,’ Ivan snarled, tugging the dagger from his thigh. ‘I could have sworn the kine was dead.’

So had Tatiana. He had no heartbeat or breath sounds. What human managed that? ‘Lord Ivan, if you could get Malkolm into the circle?’

‘Yes.’ He stared a second longer at the kine, now oozing the most bitter-scented blood Tatiana had ever smelled, before giving Malkolm a shove with the reloaded crossbow. ‘In you go.’

Malkolm refused to budge. ‘I owe you death.’

‘I’ll help you,’ the bleeding kine added.

Ivan sighed. ‘Such tedium.’ He goaded Malkolm with the bolt tip until he moved, and kept it up until Malkolm stood inside the circle of earth. ‘There,’ he said to the witch. ‘You have your pawn. Go about your business.’ Ivan kept the crossbow up and just at the edge of the magic circle as the witch finished her spell and placed her crystals.

Next, she extracted a vial of blood.

‘That’s mine,’ Dominic hissed.

Now in an almost trancelike state, the witch ignored him and added a drop of blood to each of the crystals, starting with the circle around her daughter.

Malkolm gazed at the comarré with such woeful eyes Tatiana thought she might lose her accounts right then and there. How had that lowly creature captured the affections of a man who’d once been the greatest fear of all five vampire families? It was as preposterous as the lamb seducing the lion. Malkolm should just eat her and get it over with. Bloody fool.

‘Per cruor quod terra, vita revert. Per cruor quod terra, vita revert. Per—’

‘Aliza,’ Malkolm hissed. ‘Don’t do this.’

‘Yes, Aliza,’ Tatiana crooned to the witch. ‘Do it.’

‘Cruor quod terra, vita revert.’ Aliza flicked a drop of blood onto the statue, then turned toward Malkolm. A brilliant white vapor leaked out of the statue. It reared back, reminding Tatiana of her late albino cobra, Nehebkau. Aliza dipped her finger in the blood and lifted it to shake a drop on Malkolm. The vapor shifted toward him as well. In a move faster than any human eye could follow, Malkolm jumped out of the circle, grabbed Ivan, and dropped him into it. Aliza released the drop of blood. It splattered Ivan’s chest.

The vapor struck, pouring into Ivan like quicksilver and catching him in a net of lightning. He opened his mouth to scream and froze that way. Lips curled back. Fangs extended. Hands clawing against the inevitable. Stone from head to toe.

Beside him, Aliza’s daughter, now flesh and blood, fell limply to the ground, coughing and gulping air in great gasps. ‘Ma,’ she whispered hoarsely.

Aliza gathered her child in her arms, tears streaming down her white skin. ‘Evie, Evie, Evie,’ she chanted over and over.

Bitter regret washed through Tatiana. There had been no saving her child. No magic words or sacred blood or second chances.

She straightened and took stock of the situation while the rest looked on in shock. Malkolm was unscathed, but in saving himself, he’d done her an enormous favor.

Ivan was out of the picture in a way she could never have even hoped for. She walked toward the statue of her Dominus. Aliza had brought her daughter out of it, which meant there was hope for Ivan yet.

That could not be. Ivan was all that stood between her and the next position of power she so desperately craved. The rest of the House of Tepes would have no choice but to side with her when she held the title of Dominus.

Hope had to be eliminated.

She forged her hand into a sledgehammer and with a cry that shook the house to its foundations, swung it round her body with the strength of centuries and slammed it into Ivan’s stone form.

The stone cracked slowly like ice, fractures webbing across his body. His pinky fell first. Then an arm. More chunks followed until rubble covered the floor.

She scooped up the largest remaining piece of his face and tucked it and a handful of smaller shards into her coat pocket. The council would want proof. And she wanted a souvenir of her latest victory.

‘Tatiana.’

She spun. Octavian’s face was awash in panic. The knife he held to the comarré’s throat trembled. ‘Don’t fear, my love. Malkolm has done us a great favor.’

‘No.’ He shook his head and pointed past the weeping witch and her daughter, toward the porch windows. ‘Look.’

And she did. Orange edged the horizon line.

Dawn had snuck up on them.

Chapter Thirty-four

With her hands behind her back and the distraction of dawn’s approach, Chrysabelle had managed to extract her Golgotha steel and saw through the electric cords binding her hands. She’d almost dropped the blade when Tatiana smashed Ivan to bits, but she’d hung on, just like she clung to the hope she might yet slip the blade into Tatiana’s chest.