Page 52 of Dark Souls

Luka lowered his voice to barely a whisper, but I still heard every callous word as it fractured something deep inside of me. “I’m not capable of love. Never have been. Not since that emotion died with me the same day your family took my soul.”

And with that, the love of my life twisted Ronnie’s neck mercilessly. The crack of his bones echoed around the room as I screamed, falling to my knees. Lorcan raced forwards and met Luka’s hand with force as Luka flung him back, sending his body crashing into the wall. Leif sent a blast of magic in Luka’s direction, but he was too quick, diving backwards out of the window.

My grandma wrapped her arms around me, rocking me against her as my body trembled, and I felt myself falling into the empty abyss of shock as I stared at Ronnie’s lifeless body on the floor. He killed him. He actually did it. Just like that. He took the life of someone I cared about, knowing the full extent of the damage it would do. Lorcan was running his hand through his hair, swearing repeatedly, while Leif stared out the window, searching for any sign of Luka.

“He’s fucking gone!” Leif shouted, turning around and glancing down at Ronnie. Those words had more than one meaning.

They were both gone.

“How long has she been like this?”

“Hours. She won’t stop pacing. She won’t talk.”

“She’s in denial. It’s the first stage of grief. We just need to give her space and time.”

“What’s the next stage?”

“Anger.”

“How’s Sienna doing?”

“She’s in bits. So is Archer. Raiden is with her.”

“That poor girl has lost too many people she loved in this life. Do we have any idea where Luka is?”

“No. Right now, our priority is Ilaria and Sienna. And making sure they’re okay.”

“Fuck, what are we going to do when we do find him? He’s still Ilaria’s soulmate.”

The voices of my family around me barely registered as I stared at my bare feet, taking one step in front of the other against the marbled floor tiles. Left. Right. Left. Right. Reach the wall. Turn. Left. Right. Left. My fingers tapped out a jumbled rhythm against my thighs to stop the panic attack that was brewing under the surface. It ached so deeply; this pain in the hollowness of my chest that was intent on crippling me. On bringing me to my knees. But as long as I kept walking, that wouldn’t happen. I wouldn’t fall. Because once I did, I wouldn’t get back up. And that wasn’t an option. This wasn’t over. This wasn’t how it ended.

Luka’s words repeated over and over in my head.

I’m leaving.

This is the last time you’ll ever see me.

Isn’t this exactly who I am?

A monster.

Everyone thinks so.

It’s time to wake up.

I’m not capable of love.

I didn’t believe it. It was real. What we had was real. He was capable of love because I’d felt it. I’d felt it in those moments he held me when we were alone. In how he looked into my eyes and made me feel like I was the only person in the world. In the way he always comforted me when he could see I needed it. In the way he kissed me like my lips were his sanctuary. He always thought of my safety and my needs before his own. He opened up to me about his past. He’d shown me the strength of vulnerability and put his life in my hands. He trusted me. He trusted me.

He. Trusted. Me.

I stopped walking. The room fell silent around me as everyone seemed to hold their breath and waited for me to either speak or start pacing again.

“Ilaria?”

I turned to find my mum staring at me with so much sorrow and concern in her magenta eyes and her dainty hand on my shoulder.

“He trusted me. He doesn’t trust anyone. But he trusts me.”

Her eyes darted between mine as pity took root and she gave me a small smile. I shook her off, turning towards the balcony doors of my bedroom at the palace. They didn’t get it. They didn’t understand how deep our connection ran. He was in my blood. He was beneath my skin. My heart beat in sync with his. Our souls were so entangled that I no longer knew myself without him. There was no way Luka would have ruined all of that, all the trust between us, just because he’d found Ronnie in my flat. There was no way. Even without his humanity, he would have listened to me. There was something else. There had to be.

My hands tangled in my hair and tugged painfully as I growled in frustration. Was I making excuses for him? Still trying to search for the good, look for the hidden meaning behind his cruel actions when there were none? He knew this would break us. He knew this would force my family to turn against him. Yet, he still did it. He looked into my eyes and mercilessly killed someone I cared about. Why?

“How’s she doing?” I heard my grandpapi ask as he entered the room behind me. I closed my eyes.

“Still processing,” my mum whispered, though I wondered why she bothered. I could hear every word. My ears worked fine. It was my heart that was broken. “We should talk about the blood oath. I am guessing it’s starting to take effect.”

I spun around when I heard those words, my eyes wide with alarm. “What about the blood oath?”

Everyone stared at me and I hated the sympathy that plagued their expressions. The way they were looking at me was as if I was about to break. Like I was too fragile to handle the truth. But their truth wasn’t mine.

Mum took a step forward, holding my shoulders and forcing me to take a seat on the edge of the bed between my brothers. She crouched down and held my hands in my lap as I frowned.

“Luka and Grandpapi exchanged blood in an oath to ensure no harm ever came to you and if it did, Grandpapi would be bound by fate to kill him. He wouldn’t be able to stop himself, Ilaria. A blood oath between vampires can never be broken, only by death.”

“I know. I was there.” I glanced up at Grandpapi, who was standing behind her, his careful eyes studying my face as I frowned. “But he didn’t harm me. I’m not harmed!”

“Physically, no. But emotionally,” Mum answered, squeezing my hands. I stood up abruptly and stormed towards Grandpapi. He grabbed my shoulders to halt me and, before I could open my mouth to protest, he beat me to it.

“Interestingly, the blood oath isn’t taking effect. Don’t get me wrong, I want to rip his head off for breaking your heart like this, but that’s my protective grandparent instinct, not the oath. The oath was that he promised to keep you safe. That he promised no harm would come to you. Killing Ronnie, even though it hurt you to do it, doesn’t seem to have triggered the oath.”

I stepped back, my mind racing. Without knowing it, Grandpapi had just awoken a powerful surge of understanding deep within the depths of my soul that fate had preserved for the one person meant for me in this life. The realisation vibrated through every nerve of my body, through every vein and vessel of my heart, keeping it pumping with the knowledge that Luka loved me. There was no doubt in my mind.

“He was keeping me safe.” The words were soundless as they left my lips but when I met my grandpapi’s blue and brown eyes, I repeated them louder. “He was keeping me safe. He did the only thing he knew would push me away to keep me safe.”

“Ilaria, he killed Ronnie. He’s disappeared. I don’t think–”

“No.” I shook my head and started up my pacing again, but this time because I couldn’t physically keep still. The adrenaline was rampaging through me and causing my mind to spin with a million thoughts. But one was certain. He did this to protect me. Which meant…

“He knows.”

“Who knows?” Mum asked.

“She’s lost it,” Leif muttered from the bed. “She has that crazy look in her eyes.”

“The Devil.” I paused and stared at them all. “The Devil knows about me. He must have found my belongings at the manor because he arrived unannounced. He confronted Luka. He must know. Luka killed Ronnie because he knew it would push me away. He knew you would all hate him for it and never accept him. He must have told The Devil that he’d make me hate him. To never want to see him again. He did it to protect me, don’t you see?”

My family looked unsure. Their gazes darted between each other like ping-pong balls, back and forth, exchanging silent doubt. They clearly thought I was crazy. Still in denial. But I had never been so sure about anything in my life.

“I’m going to find him,” I said, attempting to storm from the room.

“Wait!” My dad grabbed my arm and pulled me back. “If what you’re saying is true, then you can’t go looking for him, Ilaria. That will only put him and you at more risk. If he truly has done this to try to protect you, then we need to act like it worked for your own safety. Until we figure out who this Devil is, we can’t jeopardise Luka’s plan.”

“So you believe me?” I asked, my bloodshot eyes brimming with unshed tears and I held his gaze. He smiled sadly and stroked his huge hand down the side of my face.

“I know that a man in love would do anything to keep his soulmate safe. And I do believe he loves you. How could he not?”

I fell forward in relief and wrapped my arms around my dad’s waist, no longer feeling alone in this. I wasn’t crazy. Luka wasn’t an unhinged, ruthless monster.

Grandpapi’s phone started ringing in his pocket and he answered it with a frown.

“Raiden?”

As my uncle spoke to him, his face morphed into a look of complete shock and his eyes found mine across the room. “Hang on.” He quickly pulled the phone away from his ear and put Raiden on loudspeaker for the rest of us to hear. “Say that again.”

“Ronnie is alive.”

“What the fuck? I saw the way Luka snapped his neck like a twig. There is no way!” Lorcan shouted, standing up from the bed.

My heart started thundering against my ribs.

“I don’t fucking know how, but we were about to take his body to the morgue and the man opened his freaking eyes, jumped off the table and threw himself out the window, stark naked. We can’t find him.”

The gasps and exclamations around the room erupted and I raced to the phone, taking it from Grandpapi’s hands.

“Raiden! What colour were Ronnie’s eyes? When he opened them, what colour were his eyes?”

“Uh, I didn’t see.”

“Red,” Sienna’s wobbly voice interrupted from the background. “They were red.”

“Oh my god.” I slammed one hand against my forehead. “He turned him. Luka turned him into a vampire. He didn’t kill him.”

“Well, technically he still did…” Leif muttered. My grandma flicked his ear.

“Ronnie is a vampire now? Fucking hell, his dream came true,” Raiden said.

“We need to find him. Immediately,” Grandpapi announced. “A newly turned vampire is extremely dangerous. And one from Luka’s bloodline. We need to find him before he massacres the whole of Oregon.”

“Raiden, Sienna, grab a belonging of Ronnie’s and transport yourselves here. I’ll do a locator spell to find him. Christ, this is exciting,” Leif said, rubbing his hands together. “Now I’m glad Neve banished me from Heroux. I forgot how much drama this family accumulates.”

“We’ll be there in five.” Raiden hung up.

My pacing started again. I knew it. Luka had planned the whole thing. Okay, so turning Ronnie into a vampire still wasn’t the most moral act, but it was better than having actually killed him.

“Why would he turn Ronnie? It is so bizarre,” my mum asked.

“Because…” I chewed at my lip, trying to work backwards to unpick Luka’s motives. “He was a human and Luka knew me and Ronnie had a past. It was the perfect setup. He’d make The Devil believe I’d want nothing to do with Luka because he’d kill someone I cared about. Someone this family cared about. The Devil would be none the wiser that Luka actually turned Ronnie, who could come and tell me what was really happening later.”

“What kind of past?” my dad growled and I rolled my eyes. No way in hell was I getting into that.

“That is actually quite genius. Completely disturbed but genius,” Grandpapi said, shaking his head with disbelief.

“But no one can know. None of this information can leave this room. We have no idea who The Devil is and how far his reach is. He has to believe Ronnie is dead, and we are all grieving. No one outside this immediate family can know the truth. Not even Archer. I mean it. We can’t risk it,” I said sternly, pointing my finger around the room.

“I agree. This stays between all of us. Not a word to another soul.” My mum nodded. “As far as the rest of the world is concerned, we treat this like we would any murder case. A vampire, unknown to us, murdered a human unjustly and is on the run. We will pretend to be handing the investigation over to the SIA to deal with.”

Raiden and Sienna appeared holding Ronnie’s clothes. Sienna passed them to Leif, who got to work immediately on a locator spell and then turned to face me. Our bloodshot eyes locked, and her lips trembled as she fought back tears.

“I’m so sorry, Sienna,” I whispered, and she choked on a half sob, half laugh.

“Honestly, Ron always wanted to be supernatural. I wouldn’t be surprised if he agreed to this insanity.” She sighed, shook her arms out and physically pulled herself together. “I’m just happy he’s still alive. I just want to find him.”

I nodded and glanced over at Leif.

“Found him!” he shouted, causing all of us to step forward as he waved his hand in the air and a see-through map of Oregon appeared in front of us all. A small red dot showed on the map and Leif pinched his fingers, zooming right into the desolate land between the mountains that the moving dot was on. It was hard not to be impressed by the level of talent my brother possessed, even with a simple locator spell. Even though other members of my family who inherited magic could do this, none could do it with quite as much sophistication and flair. “Who’s going then? It’s probably easier for me to create a portal to the exact location, as none of you will have been there before to transport.”

“I’m going,” Sienna demanded, and we all nodded. We had no idea what state Ronnie would be in and Sienna would hopefully be a comforting face he’d respond well to.

“Then obviously I am too,” Raiden threw his arm around her, and she leaned her head on his shoulder.

“I think Leif and Arius would be a good idea,” Grandpops Logan said, nodding towards them. “Leif for the portals and Arius has the most experience with newly turned vamps.”

“Okay. Let’s go,” I said, pulling my boots on. From the apprehensive looks on their faces, clearly, they thought I’d be staying behind.

“Ilaria. You should stay here. You need to be seen as grieving and heartbroken, remember?” Dad argued.

“I’m going through a portal to the middle of nowhere. I won’t be seen. If Ronnie has information about Luka, I need to know. I can’t sit here and wait for this all to come to me. I need to be proactive.”

“Just let her come. Keeping her here would be more of a headache for everyone than it’s worth,” Leif groaned and I smiled. He knew me so well. “Right, let’s go get this naked runaway before he gives the locals the fright of their lives.”