Page 5

Chapter Four

Something’s wrong with the shadows.

I’ve been pacing Costin’s underground mansion for hours, trying to walk off the restless energy that surges through me.

My senses are on overdrive.

The blood he gave me has settled uncomfortably in my stomach, making me feel nauseous and full.

I watch servants press against the walls every time they fall into my eyeline, trying to be invisible.

One of them has fresh puncture marks on his neck.

The sight makes me both sick and hungry.

I can’t say I blame them for avoiding me.

I don’t trust me either.

My eyes focus too closely on the floor, and I smell damp rocks, like moisture is seeping into the underground walls, but I can’t find the source.

The search gives me purpose, and my mind becomes obsessed with finding the damp.

“What are you doing, Tam-tam?” Conrad’s voice whispers to torment me.

I whip around, looking for him, but he’s not there.

My shoulder joint pops.

It’s only my mind playing tricks as insanity takes hold.

I don’t know when it happened, but I’ve stopped pacing and now find my body pretzeled on the floor sniffing the run of carpet like some kind of ghoul.

But none of that is what’s bothering me.

The shadows are moving wrong.

At first, I thought my new vision was playing tricks on me.

Everything appears different, like the camera on my phone zooming in to create a sharper, clearer image with details my human eyes couldn’t see.

This is something else.

The shadows aren’t just dark spaces where light doesn’t reach.

They’re shifting in ways they shouldn’t.

“Don’t be paranoid,” I mutter to myself, watching a particularly dark corner where two walls meet.

The shadows seem to pulse, like they’re breathing.

I’m not being paranoid.

I see movement.

I crawl slowly toward it, trying to make out shapes in the darkness.

I’ve found the source of the smell.

My gaze meets the smaller eyes of a creature lurking in the dark.

For a moment, neither of us moves.

My breath catches in my throat, like something is pressing against my neck, preventing me from pulling air into my lungs in an attempt to weaken me.

I think of the story Lorelai told me about when I was a baby.

Goblins had come to my crib and tried to steal my breath.

The supernatural attacks were one of the reasons she gave me to my father and Astrid for protection, before disappearing from my life.

I take a step back, crawling backward as my new instincts scream danger.

My shoulders pop as I straighten my spine, moving too slowly stand while focusing on the darkness.

Tension rolls through me.

I start to call for Costin, wanting his protection, but stop myself.

I can’t bitch about his control and then call for it the second I feel scared.

I don’t have the excuse of being mortal.

“What do you want?” I ask the creature in the shadows.

I hate how weak my voice sounds.

A clawed hand swipes out of the darkness.

I leap backward, clearing half the hallway faster than should’ve been possible.

My new reflexes are a surprise, but the shadow creature is faster.

I only see a small streak as it comes at me.

Razor-sharp teeth come into focus encased in sickly skin the color of old bruises.

Claws anchor into my arms.

Its wide smile and gnarled body remind me of the creature Costin, and I saw in the graveyard outside the mausoleum entrance to the underground supernatural city.

Goblin.

Fear trickles through me and, though I know I have strength, I remain frozen.

It’s hard to breathe.

With each struggle to draw air, the goblin’s black veins rise and pulse beneath its flesh as if it’s gaining energy from my struggle.

Its beady eyes are wide, and the damned thing is smiling.

I feel the wolf inside me bristle, even as the vampire blood surges.

Rage and hunger fill me, bringing with it a mindlessness I can’t control.

“Tasty hybrid,” the goblin taunts.

Its voice crackles like stepping on fall leaves.

“Not so powerful, not so pretty, not so special.”

I rasp in response trying to tell it to fuck all the way off.

More shadows emerge from the darkness, surrounding me with fangs and claws.

They swarm my body.

The first goblin attacker lunges for my neck.

Claws bite into my arms and legs.

The sharp stings propel me into action.

I move on pure instinct.

Bam, bam, bam, I strike one goblin after another, sending them flying.

They land in the distances with sickening thuds.

My hand wraps an arm, stopping it mid-strike, and I feel a bone crack against my palm.

There’s a loud shriek of pain.

The sound gives me a perverse pleasure and I try to do it again.

A drumming sounds in my ears.

At first I think my heart is the cause of the chaotic rhythm, but then I realize it’s coming from the goblins.

I hear their heartbeats calling to me.

Their blood smells of rotting tree roots in a decaying forest.

I see it sludging through their veins just beneath the skin.

I keep fighting, hitting one after another.

Rage and hunger.

It’s all I know.

It’s all I care about.

A goblin cackles, as it perches high on the wall sconce like a gargoyle.

Its black tongue lolls out of its mouth as it chatters commands in a language that mimics nails on a chalkboard.

The others respond instantly, their attacks becoming more coordinated and vicious.

My senses focus on the leader.

A wild darkness takes completely over, drowning out every human thought.

Everything fades but that cackling face.

I see every detail of its twisted expression.

I smell the rot in its blood like a fine wine.

The savage rhythm of its heart pounds like a drum.

The monster inside me wants to tear it apart.

Correction.

The monster inside me needs to tear them apart.

I shake off the attacks and launch myself at the wall.

My claws dig into the stone as I scale my way toward the ceiling.

Fur ripples along my arms, and my bones crack as my body reshapes.

The vampire and wolf war for control, but for once, they want the same thing.

Blood.

“Show them what a real monster looks like,” Conrad’s voice urges.

I have never moved so quickly or with so little thought.

The other goblins try to pull me down, but I kick them away without looking.

All I see is my target.

The leader’s smile falters.

Its taunting laughter turns nervous.

Good.

I swipe at the sconce, knocking it off the wall, but the goblin is quick.

It leaps to another fixture.

I growl in frustration and my rage intensifies.

Copper flavors my mouth.

My fangs stab into my lip, but I don’t care.

I chase the creature along the wall, stone crumbling beneath my grasp.

I leap to catch it mid-jump, and we fall, crashing down into the swarm of goblins.

They scatter away from us to form a circle.

The chatter intensifies as I clutch their squirming leader in my hands.

I growl, my voice a guttural sound I barely recognize.

The goblin’s eyes widen as I bare my fangs.

Time becomes a frenzy of moments.

I feel pressure in my mouth as my teeth tear into the goblin’s throat.

Black blood sprays across my face.

The blood tastes like it smells, of earth and decay, and I don’t drink.

Instead, I rip and claw.

Tissue separates under my hands.

Bones snap.

Screams turn to gurgling, then silence.

I don’t stop.

I can’t stop.

I need to?—

“Tamara!”

Costin’s horrified voice cuts through the red haze.

I look up, still gripping a lifeless body in my hand while straddling what’s left of the goblin leader.

I open my mouth, and another goblin falls to the ground.

It crawls away from me.

The other goblins lucky enough to have escaped my wrath have vanished back into their shadows, leaving me alone with my massacre.

Costin stands in the doorway, Anthony and Astrid beside him.

The horror on their faces brings me crashing back to reality.

I release the goblin in my hand and slowly stand.

I look down to find my hands covered in black blood, chunks of flesh cling to my nails.

My silk robe is shredded and soaked.

I can feel goblin blood cooling on my face and sticking to my hair.

“I...” My entire body shakes.

The bitter taste in my mouth gags me.

I don’t want to move.

“They attacked me,” I try to explain, more to myself than to them.

I step toward Costin.

“They were trying to?—”

“Don’t move,” Costin says, but his voice isn’t steady either.

He takes a step toward me, hands raised like he’s approaching a wild animal.

Which I suppose he is.

My breathing is ragged.

“Costin, I?—”

“She’s lost control,” Anthony whispers.

“We need to chain her again.”

“No!” I stumble backward, leaving bloody footprints on the carpet.

“I’m fine. I’m in control now. I was protecting myself. I don’t want to hurt anything.”

Astrid moves next to Costin and touches his shoulder.

If she says something, I can’t hear it.

Even as I say it, I feel the monster inside me stirring, wanting more.

I look at the horror on the floor.

It’s not just the carpet.

It’s splattered on the walls and staining my skin.

The violence has awakened something that won’t easily be put back to sleep.

“This isn’t me,” I say, wishing I could make it true.

I stare at Costin, begging him to stop this.

“Please, this isn’t me…”

“Tamara.” Costin takes another careful step closer.

He doesn’t seem to be listening as he stares at my face.

I catch my reflection in the polished metal of a shield on his wall.

Black blood covers my distorted features.

I lean closer to look at the monster I’ve become.

My eyes are a swirling mix of vampire red and werewolf gold, and there’s nothing human left in me at all.

I see movement coming at me but before I can turn I feel a sharp jab in my arm.

I try to fight it off, but Costin holds me tight.

I look down to see a spent syringe sticking out of my arm.

I fall limp.

“I’m sorry, Tamara,” Costin whispers as he catches me against him.

“Forgive me for what I’ve done to you. I never meant for you to become this.”

I wonder if this is what Elizabeth felt when she was first turned by her husband, this overwhelming urge to destroy.

Is that why she attacked her brother and turned him?

Why she’s so desperate to harness more power?

Is this why she is like she is?

Is it why Costin has been so ready to forgive her, because he knows what we become?

Maybe that’s what we all become in the end.

Monsters.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispers.

“So sorry…”

I can’t answer him as I fall into oblivion, hoping I never wake back up.