Page 58

And there, gleaming in the moonlight upon their unholy altar, my silver crucifix—stolen from my chambers. She held it high as she danced, defiling its blessed purpose.

I fled before they saw me, but when I returned home, Padre Rodrigo was waiting in my chamber.

How did he know? He pressed me for every detail, his eyes alight, his hands gripping my shoulders until they bruised.

“You owe me the truth. You owe me everything,” he hissed.

When I confessed about the crucifix, his rage was terrifying. “She must be stopped.”

He’s right that I owe him. Without his guidance, his teachings, his faith in me, I would be nothing. And yet…

He speaks of using my position in the Tribunal. He says I must be the one to bring the charges. “God has placed you here,” he insisted, “for this holy purpose.” When I begged for time to speak with her, to save her, he struck me across the face. I can still feel the sting of his hand, even now.

He’s sent three messages since returning to his chapel. A brother of the order waits below my window even now, watching. Another stands at our gate.

Mother weeps behind locked doors. Father has not emerged from his study. And Magdalena sleeps, unaware that by dawn, everything will change.

Padre Rodrigo is right. He’s right. He must be right .

Sweet Christ, let him be right.

- Sebastián Salazar

31st October, 1525

It is done. My sister is dead.

A week ago, Padre Rodrigo brought the warrant himself after Vespers. “Your signature,” he said, “will save her soul.” When I hesitated, he reminded me of all we had discussed—how a quick trial now would spare her the torture chamber, how my influence could ensure a merciful end.

“Sign,” he whispered, standing so close I could smell the incense on his robes. “Sign, my Sebastián, and prove your devotion—to God, to Spain, to me .”

The ink was still wet when they took her.

Magdalena did not cry out when the guards came.

She looked at me only once, but I will carry that look until my dying day.

My crucifix—the one she had stolen for her ritual—hung from the guard’s belt.

When Padre Rodrigo saw it, his eyes gleamed strangely in the torchlight.

“She must hold it,” he announced. “Let her clutch it as the flames rise. Perhaps its blessed silver will grant her final salvation.”

I did not watch her burn today. Neither did Mother, or Father. Cowards, all three of us.

Though even now, I smell the smoke. The crucifix lies before me, stained dark with her blood. Padre Rodrigo placed it in my hands himself, a phantom warmth from the pyre. “Keep it always,” he whispered, his fingers lingering over mine. “A reminder of your dedication to our holy purpose.”

Padre Rodrigo stays with me now, has not left my side since it was done. He speaks of pride, of divine purpose, of my great destiny. His hands never leave me—my shoulder, my arm, my face. He says we will be bound together, forever. That none will understand me as he does.

I feel ill. The room spins. He brings me wine, insists I drink.

God forgive —

The entry ended abruptly there, the pen having scored a line across the page.

I flicked to the next page to find it empty, and the next, for the rest of this volume. “What happened after?” I asked, though the violent slash of ink across the page told its own story.

Seb’s hand was still in mine. When I looked up, his face had that distant quality it got sometimes, like he was staring through time itself.

“That was my last entry as a living human,” he said quietly. “The memories after… They’re like trying to catch smoke. Impressions. Feelings. Terror, mainly.”

I waited, barely breathing.

“I believe Rodrigo said God had shown him the way for us to be together forever. That he would make me eternal, make me his. I remember his hands on my face, so cold. I didn’t understand why they were so cold.

” He swallowed hard. “Then, he bit me.” His free hand drifted to the junction of his neck and shoulder.

I couldn’t help but picture it: a younger Seb, drunk on doctored wine, confused and afraid, with that monster’s teeth at his throat.

“I remember fighting when he tried to make me drink his blood,” Seb continued, voice hollow. “I think I might have vomited. He grew angry. Held my jaw, forced more down my throat. Said I was being ungrateful. That this was God’s will.”

“Fucking hell, Seb.” I pulled him closer, pressing my forehead to his temple. Every muscle in his body seemed to tremble.

“I don’t remember dying,” he whispered. “Just the terror. The confusion. Wanting my mother.”

I held him tighter, wishing I could reach back through time and save that scared man who’d written these entries. Who’d trusted the wrong person. Who’d lost everything.

He turned his face into my neck and stayed there, silent, letting me hold him together. “I hate him,” I said. “He’s the worst sort of evil.” After a pause, I asked, “Do you remember those early days? As a vampire? ”

“Not much. An eternal hunger. Rodrigo stroking my hair, calling me his perfect creation—”

I must have made a sound of disgust because Seb stopped. His cool thumb brushed my cheek, catching a tear I hadn’t realised I’d shed.

“Don’t cry for me, Flynn. I escaped him, eventually. Had to sacrifice ever seeing my family again, but…” He shrugged. “I lived in shadows for years, but I found others. Good people who taught me how to survive. How to feed without taking too much. How to find willing donors.”

He gestured to the bookcase. “These all document much happier times. My European travels through the Renaissance. Dancing in the courts of France. Learning to paint in Florence. Great love affairs—”

“Love affairs?” I pulled back, hating how my voice pitched up.

A smile tugged at his mouth. “Don’t be jealous.”

“I’m not!” But my face heated, and his knowing look didn’t help.

His smile grew wider. “You know,” he said, lifting our still-joined hands to press a theatrical kiss to my knuckles. “All those centuries of experience just led me here. To this moment. To you. My favourite vampire hunter.”

“Oh my god.” I tried to pull my hand away, laughing despite myself. “That was terrible. You’re terrible.”

“Was it?” He kept hold of my hand, eyes sparkling now. “I thought it was rather romantic. I could try again. Perhaps compare thee to a summer’s day? I did meet Shakespeare, you know. Or at least, someone pretending to be. It isn’t entirely clear…”

“You’re such a prat.” But I was grinning, my chest warm, not even a hint of chill in that moment.

I stacked the diaries carefully. “Thank you,” I said. “For sharing this with me. And Seb… you shouldn’t feel guilty about your sister.”

Seb’s face twisted. “I absolutely should. What kind of man condemns his own sister to death?” His voice cracked. “A monster, that’s who.”

“But you were groomed!” The words burst from me. “Christ, Seb, I just read it. He isolated you, manipulated you, used your faith against you—”

“I was weak!” Seb slammed his fist against the floor, making me jump. “I should never have listened to him! Should have seen through his lies, should have protected her…” His accent thickened with each word until he was practically spitting them out.

I crawled closer, wrapping my arms around him from behind. He tried to pull away, but I held on. “You were young,” I whispered against his neck. “Sheltered. Impressionable. You trusted someone who was supposed to guide you. To protect you. He was the monster, Seb. Not you.”

His whole body shuddered. “You don’t understand. I signed the warrant. My hand. My signature. I killed her as surely as if I’d—”

“No.” I tightened my grip. “He killed her. He murdered you both that night. You were just as much his victim as Magdalena.”

Seb’s hands came up to grip my arms, his fingers digging in almost painfully. But I didn’t let go. I pressed my face between his shoulder blades and held on while he shook.

“I still see her face,” he whispered. “It’s like the diary entry says. I’ll forever remember it. When they took her. She just… looked at me. Didn’t even cry out. Just looked at me like…”

I stroked my thumb across his chest, right over his heart. “Like she knew it wasn’t really you doing it. Like she knew her brother was trapped too.”

A sound escaped him then—something between a sob and a growl. He turned in my arms, burying his face in my neck, and I held him while five centuries of guilt poured out of him.

We stayed like that for a long time, until the tension slowly leaked from his shoulders. When he finally pulled back, his eyes were rimmed with red, but there was something lighter about him. Perhaps I’d helped, in some small way.

Picking up the diaries, I leaned over to place them back in the chest. Something inside it caught my eye—a glint of silver that compelled me to touch it.

“Is this… the crucifix?” I reached down, fingers closing around the metal.

White-hot agony exploded across my right palm. I screamed, the silver cross clattering to the floor as I yanked my hand back. Seb was there instantly, twisting my hand to examine it. Angry blisters were already forming, the skin an ugly red.

“What the fuck?” I hissed through clenched teeth. The pain radiated from my palm in waves of searing heat, like I’d grabbed a hot coal from the fire. Each throb sent fresh sparks of agony shooting up my arm.

Seb unleashed a low stream of curses in what sounded like three different languages. “Does it hurt terribly?”

“ Yes ! It feels like it’s still burning!

” I cradled my hand against my chest, but even the light brush of my shirt against the blisters made me wince.

The skin had gone a horrible scarlet, puckering around the cross-shaped burn mark.

The pain wasn’t fading—if anything, it was intensifying, spreading deeper into the flesh like acid eating through layers.

Seb grabbed his phone, jabbing at the screen. “Peacock? Are you in the building yet?” A pause. “My office. Now. Flynn’s hurt. Run .”

To Priya’s credit, she followed Seb’s instruction very literally—I heard the thundering of footsteps before she burst through the door, hair escaping her usually neat braid, Rory hot on her heels. Freddy sat perched on his shoulder like a parrot.

“What happened?” Priya’s eyes darted between us, seeming to zero in on my neck. “Sebastián?”

“It wasn’t that,” I managed through gritted teeth. The burn pulsed with each heartbeat. “The crucifix—”

“He touched this.” Seb gestured to the silver cross on the floor.

“Don’t!” I shouted as Rory bent to pick it up, expecting his skin to sizzle like mine had. But nothing happened. He turned it over in his hands, frowning.

“Why’d it burn you and not me?”

“Don’t move,” Priya muttered, already rushing back out .

She returned moments later, dumping an armful of supplies onto the floor—bandages, bottles, dried herbs.

“This will hurt,” she warned, examining my blistered palm with gentle fingers. “But it’ll help with the burning sensation.”

“Here, mate.” Rory dug in his pocket and offered me a small white pill. “This might take the edge off.”

“What is it?”

Rory shrugged. “Could be a painkiller. Could be my ADHD meds. Could be—”

“I think I’ll pass.”

He went back to examining the crucifix. “This isn’t Flynn’s blood, is it?”

Staring at the cross—though the pain made it hard to think—I noticed a small splattering of dark crimson.

“No,” Seb replied. “It’s a relic from my human years.

” His face darkened. “The blood… It’s my sister’s.

Magdalena’s. Padre Rodrigo—my sire—he gave me the crucifix first as a gift.

Then Magdalena stole it for some ritual in the woods.

When they caught her…” He trailed off, staring at the cross in Rory’s hands as if seeing it anew.

“They made her clutch it as she burned. Rodrigo returned it to me afterwards.”

“Hold up,” Rory said, turning the crucifix over in his hands. “If she was holding this when they… Shouldn’t it have melted? Or at least got a bit mangled? It looks mint apart from the blood.”

Seb went very still. “I’m… not sure.”

Priya continued her ministrations, spreading a cooling paste across my palm that provided blessed relief for about three seconds before stinging like hell. I tried to hold in my grunts of pain, but a few escaped. Seb’s hand remained steady on my shoulder, thumb rubbing circles through my shirt.

“Almost done,” Priya murmured, wrapping gauze around my hand.

“So silver doesn’t burn vampires?” I asked Seb, though why he’d keep that damned crucifix if it did was beyond me .

“No,” he said quietly. “Though it’s very harmful to shifted wolves, various other entities. Including demons.”

Priya’s head snapped to Seb’s. “Ah.”

“Ah.”

Looking between them, I waited for them to explain.

“It’s possibly… probably … something to do with your demon mark.” Priya’s brow furrowed as she examined my bandaged hand. “But this level of burn? Considering you’re not actually a demon?”

My throat tightened. Fucking hell. First Seb tells me my blood is demon-ing, and next I’m getting burned by a silver ornament? When was this nightmare going to end? It took all my patience each day not to question Seb, not to ask him if he was finally close to saving me.

With a large sigh, Seb took back the crucifix, holding it up to catch the light. “Something has compelled me to keep this, all these years,” he said quietly.

“It’s… lovely,” Rory said, his mouth twitching. “Really brings out the whole ‘centuries of guilt and trauma’ vibe you’ve got going on.”

“Rory!” Priya smacked his arm.

He dodged away, grinning. “What? I’m just saying—”

The door burst open, making us all jump. Kit strode in, his face grim. “We’ve got something. A lead on the Brixton vampire clan.”

Seb was on his feet instantly. “What is it?”

“Source spotted their leader, Marcus Vale, meeting with your friend Damien last night at that underground club near the market. Reliable intel—came through an old military contact.”

My stomach lurched at Damien’s name. The memory of his cold hands, that smile…

Seb’s entire demeanor shifted, a dangerous energy crackling around him. “Finally, something solid to work with. Let’s go.”