Page 14

Thirteen

ALEC

It worked. All my planning is paying off. All my years of hunting Sinclairs only to end the line in a way most satisfactory to me.

For you, Cora. All for you.

Beside Sinclair, Cedric watches on with an equal measure of shock and wonder.

The newly changed vampire manoeuvres himself to his feet, swaying with his shitty balance after hundreds of years of perfect poise. He’s upright, but with a harsh cry, abruptly falls to his hands and knees again, adopting a position identical to the one he was in moments ago.

Blood pours from his mouth in a wave, and I yank Sinclair away from the mess. He gurgles, his brown eyes screaming with a silent plea: Help me!

Another choke, a sob, and he slumps to the floor, his mouth open as blood slowly pours out.

Sinclair makes a noise while Cedric curses, stepping towards the buyer. He crouches and checks the pulse he had for the few short minutes, feeling for what we can both hear has stopped beating.

“He’s dead,” I state before Cedric can announce it.

He jerks his head in a nod. “What happened?”

Exactly what I’d like to know.

Satisfaction from seconds ago dwindles as my gaze narrows on the witch. “ You . You did something to your blood.” I’m by her side instantly, grabbing her arms and hauling her to my chest so she can get a front-row view of my fangs before they jam into her neck to drain her until she’s dead. May as well get some use out of her. “What the fuck did you do?”

Fear radiates from her in a sour scent, and she tries to fight, her little attempts nothing short of pathetic. Her eyes are blown out, her skin a bit paler than normal, making the freckles pop. “I, I swear, I have no idea. It didn’t work on you either, so maybe I’m broken?”

“On you?” Cedric approaches, getting annoyingly close to Sinclair. Too close, and I feel that rumble in my chest that demands he back the fuck up.

Before I kill my oldest and best friend, I demand, “Leave, Ced. Forget what you saw here. I’ll be in touch.”

“Alec—”

Sinclair practically lights up with excitement at hearing my first name.

Damn him.

“Cedric. Go .”

He sees my face, nods, and is out the door instantly, leaving me and the witch who has a whole lot to answer for.

“I’ll repeat. What. The fuck. Did you do? ”

“Nothing!” She yanks on my unyielding hold until her skin turns red. The sleeves of the dress she has no right to be wearing slip farther down her arms, and it takes every bit of restraint not to rip it from her body, to protect the material. “It worked; he turned human. We all saw it!”

“He didn’t stay human.”

“That’s not my problem.” Her face tips up defiantly, but beneath that very defiance, fear is crumbling her walls. A few more seconds and I’ll make it into nothing more than rubble. “It’s over, Alec . Let me go home.”

She’s making demands when I’m barely clinging to my sanity. Watching fucking years of effort and centuries of revenge become meaningless. I have her lovely throat in my grip before realizing what I’m doing, walking into her until she steps back, my grasp the only thing preventing her from tripping.

“Test me, witch, I dare you .” My hold tightens. “If you’re truly useless, your life is now meaningless.”

She isn’t, not yet. It’s the mantra I repeat to myself so I don’t accidentally kill her, because until I know for certain, she might still have her uses. Amidst the fog coating my vision, I consider what she said. That the cure worked to transition him, though mortality didn’t remain.

So before I tear her throat out or call back every single one of those very eager and hungry vampires to hand her over to them for the slaughter, I pick her up and run her straight down to the dungeon, opening the door nearest the exterior one and dropping her into the smallest cell. She stole my sanity, so I’ll steal the bit of space the other one gave her.

Don’t hurt her.

And, of course, that pesky voice that won’t leave me alone. The instinct that says to hunt, chase, and feed from her is the same one demanding I leave her be.

I’ll listen to neither and leave her to rot until I figure this out.

She scrambles to her hands and knees, eyes darting around the dark cell as recognition sets in. I shut the door as she reaches for it, hands clenching around the poles. She presses her face into them, and then dares use my name in her plea. As though she has any right to beg me for shit after what she’s done.

“Alec, please, you can’t leave me in here!”

I laugh, one full of darkness that channels my every ounce of hatred towards her into it. “Oh, believe me, witch, I certainly can.”

She smacks the post, realizing begging isn’t doing shit for her. “What did I do to deserve this? Tell me!”

Miss Sinclair doesn’t get those facts yet. Especially now, when I’m a fraction away from sucking her dry and saying to hell with the consequences. I turn away before the meager thread of control still tied around me snaps.

“Alec!” She slaps the metal again. “Don’t ignore me! Get me out of here! The other cell. Please .”

Miss Sinclair doesn’t enjoy the smaller space? I keep walking, reaching the door.

“You realize I eat like a human, right? If you want me to stay alive, I’ll need more food. One apple won’t cut it.”

“Suffer. Then you’ll know exactly how I feel every single day you and your family live.”

I slam the door shut, zipping through the hallways until reaching my office. I stop short outside the door before my fist slams into the wood, creating a dent; one of many that’s been placed there over the centuries. At this point, there’s more busted wood than there are flat panels.

“Fuck!”

Her blood worked. It fucking worked , and never in the history since its creation has there been a report of it not. Or working, and then the newly turned dying shortly after.

There also hasn’t been a report of a Sinclair—or any other witch, for that matter—not having their magick.

Are the two connected?

It’s with that question I enter my office, my enhanced senses immediately picking up what I was too distracted to in the hallway and zeroing in on the newcomer seated behind my desk. Her feet are propped up on the surface while she twirls the seat back and forth, head tipped back to stare at the ceiling.

It’s that witch who took down the barrier around the Sinclair house. Freya, the First Witch.

“You. How did you get in?”

Her head rolls, hair that’s now a bubblegum pink rather than white-blonde falling into her face as she circles her finger. “Magick, remember? Your pathetic defenses are nothing. Also, considering I’m the only reason you got to Harlow, the correct greeting was, ‘Hi, Freya, how are you? Welcome to my humble abode.’ Although humble isn’t exactly the word I’d use to describe this place.”

“You’re here to collect on that favour, I assume?”

I cross the room, standing on the other side of my desk. She drops her feet and straightens in my chair, sliding it in closer and propping her hands on the surface like she’s about to conduct a meeting.

“Not at all. I’m simply here to check in. Make sure she’s still alive and all that.” She centres her stare. “That’s a joke, by the way. I’ll know when a witch passes into the Otherworld.”

“Summerland.”

She tips her head in acknowledgement. “You do know your stuff.”

“I make it my mission to learn about my enemy.”

“Except you didn’t know about Harlow not having her magick,” she says in a sing-song voice.

“You did. ‘And good luck, Alec. She’ll make you wish you had some.’ You knew exactly what I was getting into.”

“And that isn’t even the best part.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I demand, the nerves in my neck tightening.

She shrugs, then randomly starts opening my desk drawers and rifling through them. “One would think a vampire would have more interesting stuff in their desk.”

“Freya.” Agitation gnaws at me, but attacking the First Witch won’t end well. “Back to Sinclair, witch. The cure didn’t work—twice. She tried to shove it in my mouth, and later another vampire drank a glass of it. He changed into a mortal, but died while vomiting blood directly afterwards. It didn’t work because she doesn’t have her magick, correct?”

She finishes searching through my desk and returns with a folder, flipping it open to scan through the numerous deeds for the various lands I own worldwide. I’d inquire about the purpose, but based on her mindless flipping, I’m getting the sense this is Freya being herself and not because she’s searching for something.

“Hm, look at you figuring it all out. Yep, that’s correct. The cure is magickal; a spell placed on her bloodline by her coven’s old High Priestess. Harlow no longer has magick, so the cure doesn’t work anymore. It’s a part of her, which would explain why the vampire did transition, but the lack of power prevented it from being long-term. As for you, the cure won’t affect you. You could drink her dry, and it still wouldn’t.”

“How’s that possible?” I drop my palms onto the desk’s surface, leaning closer. “What aren’t you telling me?”

She better change what she’s announced, because knowing I can drink from Sinclair and not be affected…well, it’s a temptation I’m unsure I’ll be able to avoid. A moment where I can finally solve the hunger that seems to plague me every time she’s around.

She shrugs one shoulder, focused on her pointless task. “You’re too old and powerful. If the cure was at full strength, then yeah, it’d work. But given its weakness, you wouldn’t complete the transition to human, and it certainly wouldn’t kill you.”

My fangs throb at the notion of Sinclair being available for my mealtimes, at least for the time being.

“How do I know you’re not lying, trying to get me to become mortal?”

She glares up at me. “Believe me or don’t; it’s only your hunger affected. Besides, why would I lie now of all times after everything I’ve done to help you? Logically, I would have left the protection barrier up, if that were the case.”

Fair point.

Moving on, I check, “If she got her magick back, then the cure would return too?”

“In theory.” She flips a page, pausing on an island in the middle of the Caribbean Sea. “You seriously own an entire island? Hm, I may have to visit one day. I could use a vacation, especially after dealing with your cranky ass.”

Ignoring her, I demand, “How did she lose her magick? Is that common?”

Her eyes flick up from the deed, her expression oddly serious. “It’s unheard of. Before Harlow, no witch or warlock has ever lost their powers. She’s truly one of a kind.” Freya pauses, pursing her lips. “Although, in her case, she gave it up.”

“Gave it up ?” This entire fucking time, she’s at fault. All while acting like she’s broken without it.

Freya turns to a house in Russia I once won in a bet from the reigning Romanov family in the nineteenth century. “She didn’t do it on purpose, nor does she realize she’s to blame. Her grief was too much at the time.”

“Grief?”

Unamused, she glances up again. “I take it back. You truly don’t know enough about your enemies. Look into what happened to her parents, Alec, and maybe she’ll give you the story.”

“They died in a house fire.”

“Mhm. But there’s more. A lot more. Ask her, because it’s not my business.”

It’s very much Freya’s business, but I demand the more important information, the shit I actually care about. “How does she get her powers back?” Can she?

“Well, figure out what happened to her family and you’ll figure that answer out.”

Fucking witch. Slapping a hand on the desk, I reach for the folder, ripping it out from her hold. “No, you don’t get to avoid answering. How does she get it back?” I bare my fangs, letting my threat speak for itself.

Freya lifts her hand, and pressure in my gums has my fangs forcibly retracting. She stands, her demeanor nothing like the tiny witch began as. Her bright hair flares a bit, almost glowing as a sense of death radiates from her. “Do not underestimate me, vampire . Between the two of us, I am much older than you and much more powerful. Because I’m rooting for you, I’ll put it like this: grief is the centre of her story. Grief is a heavy emotion. She needs a heavy emotion for it to return.”

Heavy emotion…fuck, what even are emotions anymore? The emotions mortals are plagued with don’t affect vampires the same way. We lust for blood, revenge, and sex, not always in that order. Emotions involving grief and terror, sadness and love, aren’t built into us. We lost those abilities with our transition to an immortal. Something about our kind being descended from a demon—one of the original fallen angels—and demons are soulless creatures.

“More grief then. Or fear.”

Freya shrugs again, her expression smoothing. “Sure. Don’t really know the trigger.”

“You’re unhelpful.”

Scoffing, she stalks around my desk. “I’m very helpful. In fact, you owe me for quite a few things now. I’m keeping a list, Your Highness.”

“Majesty.”

She waves her hand. “Whatever. Majesty. Asshole. Dick. Vampire. It all works. Anyhoo, I’m off.” She stalks towards the door, throwing it open before glancing over her shoulder. “Oh, Alec, you’re playing with fire. She’s more powerful than you assume.”

“Powerful. She’s power less. Wasn’t that the point of this conversation?”

Freya winks before shutting the door on all my unanswered questions.

“Wait—” I flit across the room, catching the door before it shuts, but the hallway’s empty, the First Witch having disappeared.