Page 40 of Fated In Forever (Nocturne Vampire Clan #4)

EVANGELINE

T wo more weeks passed with no sign of Ravok.

No attacks, no rumors of new thralls, no sightings of my rotting uncles.

We had all fallen into a waiting pattern, and it was early morning, I was practicing my daily exercises in the castle's garden, when the first wave of wrongness hit me—like ice water flooding my veins, making every dark vein beneath my skin pulse with awareness.

Not just awareness, more like an omniscience .

Something was happening at Chateau des Ombres éternelles. I felt the fates shift from here, a thousand miles away, ripples spreading through the air, catching me where I stood.

“ Blake ,” I called, stumbling toward the castle as the sensation intensified. The magic inside me was responding to whatever darkness was being unleashed in France, like a tuning fork struck by the same note. “ Riordan .”

But I was too far away, my voice carried in the other direction by the wind, smothered by the thick stone walls of Laith Castle. The crawling feeling beneath my skin intensified, veins pulsing with an otherworldly darkness.

Again, those ripples washed over me—through me—and my body torqued, muscles screaming as they were wrenched in unnatural directions .

The world tipped sideways, my breakfast sloshing around in my stomach.

I became as insubstantial as a feather, my form dissolving into shadow in a wash of cold air.

This had never happened before—I'd never dematerialized, not by myself.

But the pull toward France was so strong, so demanding, my molecules responded without any conscious thought from my brain.

I wondered if I could be torn apart, then cursed the thought.

“Evangeline,” Riordan’s shout faded into nothing as I was yanked out of the garden, arms and legs jerking to the side, my atomized form racing toward whatever catastrophe was unfolding in France.

I’m going to the chateau . I thought, something’s wrong.

I materialized on the top of the Keep into a thunderstorm, my poor body snapping back into solidity so violently I crashed to my knees, skinning them on the rock. This wasn’t a storm, this was chaos.

No, this was an attack.

Bodies littered the stone floor—some guards I recognized, both Shadowsend and Nocturne—their faces frozen in masks of pain.

The air reeked of death and dark magic, so thick I could taste brimstone on my tongue.

And there, standing in the center of the destruction with his hands raised toward the sealed rift, was Ravok.

He looked different than a month ago.

Stronger, his face ruddy with life, luminous from all those stolen life forces.

Surrounded by an army of thralls, he ripped the rift open wider, darkness spilling out like midnight meeting the day.

There had to be a hundred thralls around him, standing in perfect formation like some nightmarish flesh shield.

But they weren’t there for protection, not really .

No, even as I watched, they decayed in front of my eyes with every fresh blast of shadowy magic, as if Ravok was funneling his power directly from them. But for all their grotesqueness, I couldn’t take my eyes off the figure hunched at Ravok’s side.

Romulus.

Once powerful, now reduced to a broken shell, stringy hair hung in matted tangles around a crushed in, ruined face, his body a twisted, mangled mess. I didn’t know how he was still alive, and maybe he wasn’t, animated only by Ravok’s cruelty and hate.

Behind them, barely recognizable as the cruel, powerful men they'd once been, stood my uncles.

Dante and Alistair were little more than walking corpses, their tattered flesh gray and rotting, their eyes sunken pits of darkness.

Whatever bargain they'd made with Ravok had cost them everything, and much like my father, all I felt now was pity.

In the precious seconds I gathered my thoughts and brutalized body back together, Ravok noticed my arrival, his eyes widening, magic faltering, hands falling limply to his sides as he stared at me in shock.

Oh right, the last time he saw me, I was diving through a portal to the Underworld, barely a handful of days ago. He’d warned me I wouldn’t survive, so…

This probably was a shock.

“Surprise.” I yelled through the churning haze of magic, because I didn’t know what else to do, really. Here I was, unarmed in the middle of a war, without a plan. Way to go, Evie.

“ You ,” Ravok’s voice carried clearly over the roar of the rift. “How can you be here?”

Then he growled, raised his hands higher and I watched in horror as more darkness spilled down over us, reeking of primordial rot, and a hundred other noxious smells I didn’t care to identify.

To my left, Fiona's protective ward splintered like glass.

Ancient ley line magic dusted the air with iridescent glitter, particles spinning inside the darkness like tiny jewels.

“ Stop .” I commanded, my voice echoing, as if I stood at the bottom of a well. The power in my blood was singing now, responding to the darkness around me like a weapon drawn from its sheath.

Ravok turned to face me, and I saw that his eyes were completely black—not flecked with darkness like mine, but consumed entirely.

“Stop?” His laugh was like the sound of breaking glass.

“I'm only finishing what I started. You forced my hand, taking away my weapon to conquer this world. Now I’ll destroy it.”

Movement caught my eye, fear flashing hot and bright when I saw Nash crouched behind an overturned pillar, clutching a blade in one hand and his gun in the other.

Behind him, Brendan was shielding Fiona, who looked spitting mad that all her hard work was being undone.

When Nash pointed his gun at Ravok, I shook my head.

Steel and silver would do nothing against Ravok, not now.

And we’d need Brendan and Fiona to fix this mess, if we survived.

Ravok noticed my gaze and his smile turned predatory. “These are friends of yours, no?”

He raised his hand toward Nash, dark energy crackling between his fingers, and I responded without thinking. No. The shadows spilling from the rift responded to my will, all that raw, untamed darkness seeping from the wound in the sky akin to the shadows of the Underworld.

The veins in my hands darkened…no, my hands darkened, fingers turning midnight black as tendrils of shadow wreathed my fingertips.

These were inkier than Blake’s shadows, darkness gathered from all around me, from the writhing depths of the rift itself, coiling around my arms in serpentine ribbons of pure black, cold as ice against my skin, but somehow, I didn’t mind.

They felt oddly familiar, like I’d done this before…like I’d been here before, fighting this very battle, and for one impossible moment, I got caught up in a stomach curdling sweep of déjà vu, reality slipping away.

Go. Kill him.

The shadows obeyed, forming misty spears that shot toward Ravok with deadly precision, while others spread like liquid night across the ground to tangle around his feet, thorny vines that held him in place for the killing blow.

The air thickened with a haze of magic as he roared, swiping those spears away, sending me a look of pure hatred as one got through, stabbing him in the shoulder.

His eyes narrowed, studying the dark veins crawling up my arms, as if I’d dipped my hands in a vat of ink. “Impossible. You’re a fucking turned human,” he spat. “The Underworld should have eaten you alive, the second you stepped through that portal.”

“Nope.” I lifted my hands and wiggled my fingers, the rift above us groaning in response.

Huh. Interesting.

“As usual, you are wrong.” I retorted, cold power slipping through my veins like mercury. “Because here I am, alive and well and will you look at that…” I raised my hands and the choking haze rose off the Keep, as if I had the power to lift the entire sky.

“Huh. It looks like you’re not the only one who can control the rift. And I don’t even have to suck the life out of a bunch of thralls to do it, you sick fucker.”

His face twisted with rage. “This is a trick. Where is Malachi? You’re siphoning off his power, that’s the only way this is possible. You are nothing .” Spit sprayed from his mouth, along with the vitriol.

“I don’t need Malachi. I only need myself,” I said, and for the first time in a very long time, I mean every word when I added, “I am strong enough to take you on.”

I turned my attention to the figure by Ravok’s side. “You should have let him sleep,” I murmured, pity stirring, along with revulsion as I stared at Romulus. “You truly are a monster.”

Romulus raised his head, pain flickering in his one good eye before that was replaced by the blank devotion for Ravok.

“My Master knows the future,” he husked.

“He offers eternal life. Power. Everything I've ever wanted.” With every word, his broken, bent fingers twitched, crimson red flashing at their tips.

I narrowed my eyes, trying to place where I’d seen that color before.

“He offers you nothing but suffering.” I gestured at my uncles, barely recognizable. “There is your eternal life, Romulus. Rotting away, piece by piece. Is that really the future you wanted?”

Something almost human flickered across his features, regret, and I felt sorry for him. Felt sorry for someone so empty, he’d allowed Ravok to fill him full of cruelty and hatred, while calling it love.

“Enough,” Ravok snarled, raising both hands, energy swirling around him like a storm.

“Let me show you what real power looks like.” His attack came from all sides—crushing me down to the Keep floor, tearing at my face, my skin, like the shadows had grown claws and teeth.

Any ordinary human—any ordinary vampire—would have been reduced to ash in seconds.

But I wasn't ordinary anymore.

The corruption in my blood rose to meet his assault.

I didn't block or deflect his attack—instead, I absorbed the bulk of his strike, letting the foulness of the rift flow through me and join the power already burning beneath my skin.

When the magical storm cleared, I was back on my feet, unharmed and rolling my neck against the sheer force of magic straining against my skin.

Nash popped his head up over the rubble and gave me a thumbs up.

Ravok stared in shock, panting. “Impossible.”

Half of his thralls were spent, carved out husks crumpled onto the stone floor, the other half still standing, but…he’d only manage one more blow, if he was lucky.

Except the rift was cracking wider and Fiona's ward continued to fail and I did not have the right magic to fix any of this. I glimpsed another realm through the growing tear—a realm of pure black that waited hungrily for a chance to invade our reality.

I couldn’t fight Ravok and hold all that darkness at bay. I had to get rid of this asshole so Fiona could do her job. “Nash,” I called without taking my eyes off Ravok. “Stay down. Keep everyone else down, too. Tell Fiona to get ready to fix that leak.”

“I'm fighting beside you,” Nash said firmly, rising from behind his stone shield, gun in hand.

“Stay the fuck down. That's a direct order.”

“With respect, Miss Evangeline, you're not my queen. Not yet.” Despite everything, I had to smile at his incessant stubbornness. Still, if he got between us, he would die, and I couldn’t have that on my conscious.

“How touching,” Ravok sneered. “But you cannot stop this. The rift will open, the barriers will fall, and this world will burn.” He sounded delighted. “The only question is whether you die quick or slow.”

Those eyes narrowed. “Slow, I hope.”

Okay, now the bastard sounded even more delighted.

I looked at him—the real monster determined to destroy everything I loved—and felt something as hard and cold as obsidian settle in my chest, like a shield around my heart. There was a price for love, and one I was willing to pay.

“Wrong question,” I said quietly. “The only question is whether there will be anything left to identify when I’m finished with you.”

Thuds echoed behind me, boots hitting the ground, and I knew without turning Blake and Riordan stood there, along with Finn and Nikolai. If we could finish this today, if we could finally stop Ravok, I swore I would throw a fucking party.