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CHAPTER36

Venice, Italy. 23 June, 2007

Sebastian reappeared in the crematorium with Isabel cradled in his arms. “Josephine!” he cried as he lay her gently on the floor. He pressed his ear to her chest and sighed with relief. Her heartbeat was faint, but still there. “She needs your help! It’s her heart!”

Josephine wasted no time. She dropped to her knees and sank her fangs into Isabel’s neck, letting her venom flow full strength into her sister’s veins. There was no reaction from Isabel, but all the vampires could hear her heartbeat beginning to strengthen. Josephine began wiping the blood away from her sister’s still body with her own robe, her frame trembling with suppressed sobs. “Come on, Aurora. Just hold on until the venom can do its work. You’re going to be fine, I swear!”

“What are you doing?!” Vlad shouted, reaching forward to pull Josephine away, but Victor stood between the two, his arms out. The two ancient vampires bared their fangs at each other in a fight of wills. “Victor, howdareyou allow your children to willingly disobey my orders! I would have thought after nearly two millennia you would have gotten over this stubborn streak. Just because I allowed you to walk away and form your own coven doesnotmean that you can disregard my authority. Get out of my way or I’ll drive a stake through your heart for such blatant disregard for the code!”

“She’s a healer!” Victor spat. “This isn’t about disobeying or disregarding authority. Her venom doesn’t have the usual properties. Look for yourself!” He moved out of the way and allowed Vlad to drop to one knee next to Isabel.

Already the wound on the back of her leg was beginning to knit and her breathing was becoming deeper. Vlad’s eyebrows raised as he ran a long, slender finger along the fresh skin. “Fascinating! Victor, you have been hiding some very interesting vampires from me. We are going to have to discuss this further in the future.”

“Yes, much later in the future,” Sebastian interjected as he began throwing paintings into the oven. Sweat was already pouring down his face as the first flames began licking at the oils in the paint. “Josephine will take care of Isabel. I need you two to get over here and help me!” Victor and Vlad looked at Sebastian, surprise at his boldness written all over their faces. But they turned as requested and began filling the other two ovens.

With triple the burning speed, the pain hit hard and fast. Isabel began to writhe on the ground and her piercing screams filled the air as Josephine held her hand. “I’m sorry,” she whispered over and over, tears running down her cheeks as she watched her sister’s torture.

The three vampires moved as quickly as they could to fill the ovens. Sebastian clenched his jaw against the fire roaring in every cell of his body. His own screams thrashed against the back of his teeth, yet he refused to allow them to get out. Isabel had been strong when fighting her demon, and now he must be strong fighting his. His vision grew blurry at the edges, but he focused on tossing each painting as deep into the oven as he could.

Little by little, the stacks began to shrink. “How is Isabel holding up?” Sebastian asked and wiped a stream of sweat from his brow.

“Nothing seems to have changed. You can hear her screams just as well as I can! How much longer am I going to have to watch her suffer?!” Josephine dipped a rag into a bucket of cold water that she’d fetched from the morgue and pressed it to Isabel’s feverish brow. As Sebastian threw five more paintings into the fire, another shrill screech of agony ripped from Isabel’s throat.

“We’re going as fast as we can,” Sebastian spat. “I’m suffering too, you know! I hate this even more than you do!” He picked up four paintings at once and cast them into the fire, watching as the dry canvas immediately caught. A new wave of heat rippled through his limbs and he felt his knees buckle. He fell to the ground and panted for a moment as he fought for the strength to get back to his feet.

Even from his hands and knees he still struggled on, weakly pushing the canvases into the hungry belly of the oven. Sebastian threw the final painting into the oven and collapsed completely, his entire body slick with sweat.

Yet rather than thinking of himself, he immediately turned his attention back to Isabel. “Did she make it?” he asked, barely managing a whisper despite the pain beginning to fade with the dying portraits. His muscles twitched with exhaustion and his lungs fought for air while he fought to keep his eyes open.

“So far,” Josephine replied. She dipped the rag and replaced it on Isabel’s brow, and spread a small amount of painkiller salve on the back of her neck. “I’m doing everything I can, but she lost a ton of blood.”

Sebastian groaned and struggled to drag himself to Isabel’s side. “We have blood, but no transfusion equipment…This is a morgue, not a hospital.” His entire body screamed with every movement, but he managed to pull himself along the floor to reach her. He took her hand and brought it to his lips. “Come on,mio amore.The worst is over now.”

Vlad took a knee next to Isabel and placed a hand on her forehead. “What are you doing?” Sebastian asked, and Vlad held up his other hand for silence. His eyebrows lowered and he growled.

“Where is the last one?”

“The last what?” Sebastian rolled over to his stomach and pushed himself into a kneeling position to look at Vlad better. He felt lightheaded, but fought to stay conscious.

“There’s another painting. Where is it? The curse won’t break if you don’t destroyeverypainting.”

Victor and Josephine shot Sebastian dirty looks, fury evident in their postures. But Sebastian only felt a wave of panic washing over his broken body. Had he forgotten one? Overlooked a corner in the castle or his quarters at the keep? “I swear I’m not hiding any. I even cast my wedding portrait into the fire! All I want is to break the damn curse and free my beloved.” He grasped her hand and pressed it to his forehead, bowing himself to the weight of his actions and their consequences.

“Your words mean little, Sebastian. The fact remains that there’s still a painting of this young woman somewhere. Until it is found and destroyed, she remains under its curse. You better remember where you left one, because I’ll be watching you until the task is fully complete.” Vlad crossed his arms over his chest and glanced around the room, just in case they’d missed one somewhere.

The tension in the room built until the sound of the crematorium doors echoed over the roar of the ovens. All four vampires’ gaze shot to the door, where Remus stood with a canvas in his hands. Sebastian stared at his brother, confusion buzzing in his weary mind. “What are you doing here, Remus? Have you come to see the results of my hubris and laugh in my face?”

“There’s one more painting,” Remus answered, his voice full of guilt. He turned the canvas around and revealed an image of a young woman with bright eyes and raven-black hair, dressed in a pale blue dress and long white stockings. “This was my first painting after being Turned. I never told anyone it existed, but…”

Realization blossomed in Sebastian’s chest, and its flower was blind rage. “I told you I wasn’t hiding any!” he shouted at Vlad and Victor, and his sudden anger gave him the strength to rise to his feet. He stumbled over to Remus and punched him directly in the jaw. “After everything you said to me! After the guilt you heaped on me,youwere just as guilty!”

Remus dropped like a sack of bricks. “Yeah, yeah, I know,” he grumbled, rubbing his jaw as the bones knit themselves back together. “Don’t you think I felt bad enough without a broken jaw? Now are you going to keep punching me, or are you going to let me burn it?”

“I’ll do it myself!” Sebastian spat, picking the painting up from the floor. Remus, caught off guard, just watched him stumble to the nearest oven. He threw it in, and both Remus and Isabel began writhing in pain.

Sebastian collapsed next to Isabel and pulled her into his lap, cradling her like a baby as her muscles flexed and contracted in agony. “I’m here,dolcezza.This is the last one, and then you’re free. It’s almost over.”

Two minutes later, Isabel’s exhausted body went limp. Her eyes fluttered open and Josephine poured water in her parched mouth. Isabel swallowed and reached weakly for the bottle. Josephine dropped to her knees and pressed the bottle to Isabel’s lips, and she drank and drank until the bottle was empty.