Page 17

Fifteen

ALEC

Very few mortals chase vampirism. Many end up getting turned when becoming victim to a vampire’s boredom, loneliness, or when feeding accidentally goes too far.

The case of myself was linked to a larger ploy, so my situation doesn’t fall into any of those.

My threat to Sinclair is under the same category. If she pisses me off to the point I’ll be forced to keep her around for a few centuries, it certainly won’t be out of boredom or loneliness. The thought of dealing with her ass for any longer than fifty years makes me want to rip my own head off.

But I will if she doesn’t start opening up about her damned family.

Her teeth nibble on the corner of her bottom lip, making the skin red, and my own hunger increases. She looks away and knots her hands together in the blanket, tugging it a bit higher over her. When returning earlier, I noticed she replaced the dress for her dirty pyjamas, and I wish I had them removed from the bathroom. They reek, for one, burning my nose—not that the dress held up much better down below—but she looked nicer in it.

Nicer? What a strange thought. There’s nothing remotely nice about this witch.

She sighs, but it’s in no way relaxing as she twists back to face me, her jaw tight and set with a resoluteness. “Fine, you want everything, asshole? To make me relive the single most painful day of my life? One night, two vampires somehow got through my parents’ wards. They were fighting them, but their magick and the vampires’ abilities were equally matched. My dad told me to run, so I started to. When I was nearly outside, my mom screamed. I couldn’t leave them. Couldn’t run and save myself knowing it could have been their deaths. I was fully into my powers and Mom had the cure too, so it’s not like I was anything special. I stayed to help, channelling everything I had into my attack. But it was too much…” She drops her hands, and I find myself leaning forward. Her next words are a whisper, her tone scraping with the kind of pain only sorrow can create. “My magick took over. Sinclairs, as I assume you know, are fire witches, and I…I accidentally lit the house on fire. It was chaos. It burned the vampires…but also my parents.”

Harlow Sinclair and I have something in common, because I, too, killed my parents. Only, I never cried over it.

A tear slips down her cheek, and it’s like that little, salty drop punches me in the gut. A cough travels halfway up my throat, the sensation itchy and irritating. A fucking cough ? I haven’t had those since my days as a mortal.

“It was an accident,” she whispers. More tears linger by her lavender irises. “I think they tried to put it out, I don’t know. It was too much, though.”

Two fire witches couldn’t put out the flames? I’d never known a Sinclair to get so weak, even during an attack, that they were overwhelmed. With two of them working together, the blaze should have been out instantly.

“The barrier?”

She shrugs, except her shoulders are already so low with grief, it doesn’t make much of a difference. “Appeared afterwards. The fire died down, and other than a few soot marks, the house was fine. Magick, I suppose.” She attempts to smile, but it’s fake, fragile and watery at best. “I was left with two piles of ash from the vampires, my dead parents, whose bodies were burnt beyond recognition, a barrier that erected itself around the property, no magick, and shadows that continue to torture me. I spent days afterwards trying to figure it all out, and the only thing I got is that my fear channelled too much magick— so much that it exploded, burned everything, and erected the barrier before draining me. That barrier became my final act as a witch.”

I’ve tuned her final few sentences out, lingering back on her mention of shadows. I do a quick study of the room, noting nothing different. Nothing like she’s talking about. Miss Sinclair’s trauma has manifested into something greater, I wonder. Something she’s imagining.

“Have you tried to get your powers back?”

“In between the grief and ongoing tears and self-hatred?” She scoffs, her sarcastic tone returning somewhat to normal. “Nope. Not until the first night you left me downstairs.”

Freya said a big emotion could trigger her magick. It was grief that got rid of it, so grief to return it? That seems counterintuitive.

Or was it fear she felt in the moment of losing them? She was scared for her family and fought back. If it’s fear that’ll trigger her powers, then it’s a task I’m content to take on.

Sinclair continues crying, every once in a while glancing towards the lamp in the far corner when she wipes her face. The tears leave wet lines on her cheeks that make me want to murder something. Despite who she is, seeing her cry seems…wrong.

I toss a sealed granola bar her way, followed by the water she can quench her thirst with. They land in her lap, earning a raised brow followed by another attempt at a smirk, this one a bit stronger.

Before she can ask—and before I can analyze my own actions—I mutter, “You’ve earned it.”

She rips into the bar, eagerly taking a bite, her next words a mumble around the food. My mother would have once had me beaten if I spoke with my mouth full. Everyone in my life was so proper—still is, I suppose. Miss Sinclair is refreshing. She’s something.

Something that’ll send me to Hell if I’m not careful how I handle her and this situation.

“You’re a strange vampire, Alec Dormer.”

“You’re a strange witch, Harlow Sinclair.” A witch without magick. A witch who doesn’t look at me like I’m about to eat her. That, too, is refreshing. To be around her and not have her flinching in fear or sobbing constantly. Her fear might smell appealing, but if she cried every minute down below, I might have ended her life to shut her up. Her personality has made her semi-manageable.

She pauses mid-chew. “That’s, like, the second time you’ve ever said my given name.”

“I told you what I feel about you and first names.”

“Mhm. But then you also go and call me Miss Sinclair once in a while, and correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t Miss a title of respect?”

Fucking witch. “Habit, I suppose. Titles were everything in my time.” I downplay it while also ignoring the strange sensation this conversation strikes inside me. “You asked a question and gained an entire bar and water. It’s my turn again.”

She rolls her eyes while taking the final bite of food. “You’re in charge, Your Majesty . See? Title of respect.”

Ignoring everything she rambled about beyond my title, I ask, “Why do you not live with your coven?”

She shrugs, all taunting slipping from her tone. “When we got kicked out when I was a kid, my parents moved us away. Mom said it had something to do with the cure. That the coven feared how many vampires targeted us in their attempt to get to me.”

That makes no sense. Her people, Highridge Coven, are ancient and notorious for generations of Sinclair witches, but only this High Priestess has decided to abandon them? Witches are loyal to a fault and will always protect their own above all else, so why wouldn’t they want to keep the young Sinclair safe behind their lines, their spells, and their curses? Hell, if memory serves, the Sinclairs created Highridge.

I search for lies, but her expression remains neutral, if not a bit open. Propping my elbows on the armrests, I fold my hands over my stomach and kick my leg up over one knee, adopting a position of ease all while my mind whirls with suspicions and unknowns. There’s something more there, and if Sinclair doesn’t know, perhaps Freya will be open with information.

“You haven’t seen them since?”

She shakes her head, scrunching her nose. “All my training came from my parents. Oh, and Gram’s grimoires. Though she died before my birth.”

I toss her another bar, finding myself less and less interested in the game where I feed her a bite for information. I’ve gotten what I need—for the time being, at least. Now, I have to think about how to get her magick returned, and thus the cure.

I should go and consider next steps, but instead I find myself watching her. The way she brushes her hair into her face, as though trying to hide from me. The way she tugs the blanket higher, continuing to ease the shivers caused by the dungeon. So many micro movements. The intake of breath. The double blink before she rolls her lips together. The barely audible sigh.

“I killed my parents too,” I find myself admitting, though I’m uncertain why. To ease her guilt by making us equal on one level? That can’t be it, because this woman’s guilt is her problem and not my concern. “It was after I transitioned. I went back for them; they weren’t good people.”

She winces. “That’s a lot for a newly turned vampire. Traumatizing. If you were in control, would you have still?”

“Who said I wasn’t in control?”

“Oh.” Her lips remain slightly pursed, her brows pulling tighter together as she realizes that while we both might be the cause behind our parents’ deaths, we run in opposite lanes. She misses her parents, and I don’t. My only regret is not keeping my father alive for longer to drag out his agony.

“Yes, ‘oh.’” I study her expression, searching for that deeper realization that no matter how peaceful this momentary truce may seem, I’m not a good person. I’m a vampire, intent on using her until she dies from old age, blood loss, or when I get irritated by her presence.

“Why’d you tell me that?”

“I don’t know.” Shaking my head, I stand and start for the door. “If you stayed awake all day from your phobia, you’re no good to me now. You’ll be too tired for what’s next. Stay here and rest. Don’t bother trying to escape; the windows don’t open and the door will be locked.”

She scrambles across the bed, her feet making thumps entirely too loud. “Wait, I have more questions.” Her hand wraps my bicep, but I immediately shake her off, glaring over my shoulder.

“Your questions weren’t the point of today. Go to bed, Sinclair. That’s an order.”

“Fuck you.” She cuts in front of me, blocking my path, though I can so easily nudge her aside. “Why am I here?”

I sidestep her, reaching the door.

The persistent thing trails me. “What did my family do to you? That’s what all this is about, right? The cure is only your means to torment me.”

“Two points to the witch. Yes, but it’s a story for another day.”

“Alec—”

Her attitude’s been picking away at me slowly, like a fucking stake being shredded against my insides, but now she’s stabbed it into me and I am done . I whirl, my movements a quick blur, obviously unexpected given how her eyes widen, hands coming up between us. I stand above her, looming, ensuring she realizes that no matter the semi-pleasant conversation we had tonight, we are far from friends, allies, or even fucking acquaintances.

She is my prey. She is my captive. She is my revenge. She is meant to be hunted, ensnared, and tormented exactly how her family once did to mine.

“Get. To. Bed.”

I’m out the door before her next breath, escaping the gnawing that continues ravaging my insides. The feeling she causes.