Page 30

I sat in a room much like the ornate bedchamber Lord Ashfen had allowed me to use during my first visit to the manor, for recovery. This time, I needed no recovery.

Two fullbloods waited outside my door as guards.

As the hours dragged on, I began to pace. My mind was shifting, twisting into madness as I pored over everything.

I pulled the velvet curtains of the window back to peer at the bright moon overlooking Olhav. The buildings in the splendid city touched the sky and created a metropolis of gold tinting to hide vampires from the sun.

Perhaps I can wait long enough for the sun to rise. Once all the vampires here sleep, I can escape.

I knew it was a foolish notion. It was something Lord Ashfen would prepare for, undoubtedly. I wasn’t even sure if they needed sleep, so long as the blinds and curtains were drawn tight in this mansion.

My pacing resumed, eyes cast to the lush rugs under my feet. My head shook as thoughts swirled.

Master Lukain did not visit me in the hours I was a prisoner of Skartovius Ashfen. I had no idea if Rirth or Culiar had survived their bouts, or which of the women were chosen. I was being kept in the dark, punished for allowing Baylen Sallow to live.

“The one . . . tasted . . . cursed . . . rid me.”

Lukain’s words to his shadowy messenger. The four-fingered accomplice had spoken about a Mistress Mortis. Their hushed conversation repeated like an earworm.

The idea Lukain had abandoned me, just like everyone I’d ever known, roared in my mind, until the fire was as sure as anything real.

Is he even still at the manor? The fighting and debauchery in the ballroom must surely be finished by now.

So what am I waiting for? My gaze narrowed on the locked door of my comfortable prison.

How am I supposed to do what Lord Ashfen asks if he keeps me caged in here with vampire sentinels standing guard?

To pass the time, I tried to piece together the faint conversation I’d heard over the alley. I stuck in every word I could think of that would complete the sentences, until I thought I landed on the most logical.

She . . . is the one.

I . . . have tasted her.

She . . . has cursed me.

I . . . must be rid of her.

There was also the chance my anger was misguided, fueling my thoughts in a false way—that I was completely off the mark.

Yet in my head, it sounded correct. Likely, even, given Lukain’s reticence and phantom attitude toward me lately, ever since our night in a room identical to this one.

Frowning, I walked to the large bed, pulling back the translucent veil.

My fingers ghosted over the fluffy pillows and mattress.

I recalled every torrid touch of my dhampir master on my skin that night.

The way his fangs penetrated my soft flesh and sucked my blood.

The intimate closeness of our bodies as his cock drove into me, bringing me pleasure I’d never known.

I winced, remembering a moment of pause and discomfort during our heavy coupling. Lukain, shortly after tasting my blood, his face contorting with a quick flash of something unexpected. Pain, perhaps? Or was that fear in his eyes?

I remembered asking him if something was wrong. He had promised me nothing was amiss, even managing to finish our scalding affair.

I had not remembered that moment until right now. It smoothly draped over the puzzle playing in my mind. It became an answer I hadn’t known to look for.

Making a fist, I sank my hand into the pillow. Madness was guiding me. Or logic. It couldn’t be both. After nearly two decades of people betraying me, I liked to think I knew the signs.

I wasn’t being paranoid. I was being pragmatic.

“Fuck this,” I growled to myself, and then spun to the window.

The glass slid aside, surprising me, welcoming a stiff breeze against my face.

I peeked up and down. A ledge rested above me, and then sheer wall. Vines and tiered layers of the mansion would make for easy handholds. Below, a drop of nearly thirty feet into darkness. Easily deadly if I missed a step.

Throwing my caution aside, I stepped out onto the windowsill, gripped my strong fingers around the lip of the ledge, and climbed out the window.

Ten minutes later, I’d made progress. I refused to look down or wait for long, urging my body to carry me across the mansion’s edifice.

The wind was stronger up here, cutting against my neck and ears as I kept my body pushed close to the wall.

I intuitively knew where my hands were leading me as I scaled the wall. The view from my recovery room, the angle of the moon that night, it had been on the third floor of the mansion.

I stepped onto a cranny separating the second and third roofs of the manse, catching my breath. Then I continued on, hoisting my heavy body up the wall until a window came into view just above my head.

Finally taking a glance over my shoulder, I frowned at the position of the moon. It seemed wrong—this window did not lead to the room where I had stayed.

I reached far to the right for a crevice of stone to grab onto, so I could pull my legs that way and scale the wall in a new direction—

A voice from the room past the window stopped me.

“P-Please, sir. Give me another c-chance. I got turned around by her. I’ll bring her back to the light, Dim.”

My throat constricted. It was Baylen’s voice, crooning, tired, raspy. “Dim.” Dimmon Plank.

What in all the True gods is he doing here?

“I don’t know, Baylo. I just don’t know.”

Dimmon’s voice was lower than I’d ever heard.

The man first on my list.

My fingers fumbled for the latch of the window, provoking me before my mind could stop and consider the possibilities.

My recklessness almost sent me tumbling to my death, and I kicked at air for purchase. The door to the room opened and creaked closed, and I cursed under my breath.

I stayed put for a moment, listening. The room had fallen silent. Baylen was alone.

My fingers were getting tired of holding me on this ledge. I had mere moments before I needed to rest, and nowhere to go . . .

So I unlatched the window and climbed in.

My body appeared from behind the velvet curtain like a wraith, a hellbent specter.

“Who is that?” Baylen whined.

His words to Dimmon ran through me. “Give me another chance. I’ll bring her back to the light.”

It was at that moment I understood Baylen Sallow would never stop coming for me.

I was furious he had fallen so hard, so far. My mind was already tipping with madness from my thoughts about Lukain, and now this? The last thing I needed was a haunter, a parasite, cursing me for the rest of my life.

I pushed past the curtain, wading into the darkness of the room with the moonlight bathing me from behind. My body was silhouetted, striking a terrifying figure as I advanced on Baylen Sallow in his bed.

He was reclined, his wounds wrapped in white bandages and gauze. Baylen’s hands were on his lap, his body unclothed like mine had been during my recovery, only covered by a thin blanket.

I had given him a dozen new scars to look at.

“Are you a b-banshee? Seph, is that you?”

I emerged from the moon’s glow, past the circle of darkness, and into the murky candlelight near his bed.

“Well met, Baylen.”

His body stiffened. His eyes became suspicious, slitting as he glared at me. “Come to finish me off, have you?”

I smiled. “I heard you. In the ring, you know. What you wished for, Bay. What you desired.”

His throat bobbed, gulping hard. “Wh-What?”

I climbed onto the bed then, hooking my thick leg over his torso.

I sat on Baylen’s stomach. His breath caught in his throat, holding it still as he watched me trail my fingers down his shallow cast over the bandages adorning his chest and arms.

Goosebumps broke out along his flesh.

The Diplomats are here for me. Lukain is nowhere to be seen. I’ve been left all alone. I smiled down at his shocked face, pale from our duel. “This is what you’ve always wanted, isn’t it, Bay?”

His hands came to life, clutching the round swells of my ass on top of him, roving up my tapered sides and squeezing my curves. “Yes!”

I let him touch me. My eyes never left his waxen face, even as it filled with color. Something else besides his hands came to life too, and I felt it rustling behind me through the blankets.

When I reached back, his cock was rigid in my palm. Warm as it pressed against my leather pants.

“This is all men ever want, isn’t it?” I gently stroked his length to fullness, feeling his arousal beading and dripping down my hand behind me.

He grunted, closing his eyes and blinking them open rapidly. “Can you blame us?”

Of course I can, dear Baylen. Who else would I blame?

I leaned forward until my breasts pressed against his chest. Only the fabric of my tunic separated his heated flesh from mine. My lips ghosted over his, and I smiled again.

He peeled my pants down from the back, blindly, and I allowed him his fun. I only rose from straddling his body high enough so he could tug them down my thighs.

My hand closed around his cock and I guided him.

Next time I sat, when I planted my ass onto his lap, it was to let Baylen Sallow spear his warm cock inside me.

His groan was molten, filled with bliss. Bay’s hands clutched my hips tighter, harder, and he rolled his head back on the pillow, as if contemplating if this was a dream.

He was clearly lost in one.

I rolled my hips, grinding against him, feeling his nice cock surge and swell inside me. “This is real, Baylen.”

He was hard, wounded, and finally given the thing he had wanted our entire lives.

. . . Cursing me for the rest of my life . . .

“You did it, Bay. You brought me back to the light.”

His eyes shot open, consternation threading his brow as he stared past my heavy breasts to my face. “What was that?”

“Shh,” I murmured, and put my hands on his chest so I could slam down harder against his thighs. “I’m only giving you what you deserve.”

A loud clamor picked up outside his bedroom door, emanating from down the hall. The sound of thudding boots filled the space, growing louder and then dimming as they receded. Voices joined the boots, shouting, the words muffled.

My body tensed on top of Baylen. Shit. They know I’ve escaped from my room. I inadvertently clenched on Baylen’s cock, and he sputtered.

“S-Seph? What’s going on?” His voice was little more than a croak.

I stared down at him. Something in my eyes had changed. The softness, the dreamy, haunting quality, was replaced by a menacing visage that made his features twist with fear.

He opened his mouth to cry out. “D-Dimmon! Are you out— mmmph !”

My hand slammed over his mouth. I snarled and leaned close. “How dare you speak that name in front of me, inside me, Baylen.”

He yelled into my palm. His hips bucked, trying to get me off him. But he was too weak and I was too heavy—a tall, strong girl I’d become.

I reached behind me. Not for his cock this time.

A chorus of new boots and shouts echoed out in the hallways. Something big was happening out there.

I leaned forward, kissing the trio of scars on his face—the ones he had gotten for me. Then I whispered in his ear, “Don’t worry, Bay, Dimmon will be joining you soon enough.”

His eyes bulged—

A silver blur appeared in my hand.

I lifted my palm from his mouth and dragged the dagger across his throat before he could open his lips and scream.

Baylen gurgled as a thin line of blood cascaded down his neck. He came at the same time, releasing his seed as his hands moved from my hips to his ruined throat, trying to stifle the waterfall of red pouring between his fingers.

He was dead within seconds. I watched the light go out of my childhood friend’s eyes, even as his cock stayed hard and swollen inside me, pulsating to the rhythm of the heartbeat flowing out of his neck.

I looped my leg over and stepped off him and the bed. As his blood pooled around his head and neck, I frowned at the monster I had created.

And the monster I had become.

“Thus ends your curse over me, Baylen Sallow. I will never again be a pawn in other men’s schemes. From tonight on, I write my own story.”