Page 10

VHEX

Bat-wings drops me in the sky above the foothills. His oily shadows feel like shit. This once, I don’t resist.

Gotta have a talk.

I twist mid-air and pop my wings before I crater.

My magic is squeaky-clean and ultra-easy to control thanks to my wifey’s spiritual scrub-down. I pump a few extra flames, enjoying the heat and the rush.

Azrid hovers creepy and motionless, blocking the moon.

The Trezzoran histories claim our sire allied with the first vamps.

So what if our families are tight?

I fucking hate those guys.

And I want to burn his shadowy ass every time my head clears enough to recognize his marble sneer.

Fuck knows I’ve tried.

I pool hellfire in my fists. “The Guide is mine.”

“Go rampage and die.” Azrid flicks his fingers.

“I fucking will.” I dodge a shadow bolt, heating up for battle. “ After I claim her soul. What the fuck do you need a Guide for, Azrid? You can’t even get it up?—”

A shadow lassoes my throat.

Choking, I claw the thread, fighting to burn it off.

Azrid smiles coldly, watching me squirm. “Are you proud of yourself? Rutting like an animal?”

“Pre—” I choke, overpowering his magic in a blaze. “Pretty Gods—” Cough . “Godsdamned proud. Yeah. I’m gonna rut my minty little Guide so many times she’ll beg me to give her this fang.”

“Only one? And only one cock?” Azrid shoots out his lizard tongue, licking blood from his chin, all zombie-cannibal. “How underwhelming.”

Fuck .

I just need to bury my fist in his breathing hole, hollow out his skull, and burn his soul out of existence.

Then the Guide who makes snowflakes in my veins will be mine and only fucking MINE until my poison ruins us both.

There’s no way I’d rather go.

“Come at me.” I crack flaming knuckles.

Azrid’s laugh sounds next to my ear. “I am.”

The shady fucking shadows that snuck around my ankles slingshot me into a mountain.

My hellfire liquefies the rock, but it can’t stop my momentum. I crash and burn, melting a tunnel as I dig in my heels and grab at edges, trying to slow down.

I need more power.

The magic always comes when I call, but it comes with a cost.

It sizzles my veins, burning away everything I am.

I claw to my feet in a massive cavern that was here before I punched my own door-hole.

A roar hammers my ears.

I lock eyes with a rock troll the size of a skyscraper.

As I blaze up, more building-sized trolls break apart from the walls. A whole fam-damn-ily.

Seven of them.

All S-class, crackling with ice and power.

Pain lights me up as I grab for more hellfire.

Well-played, batfucker.

There’s no way I’m making it home to claim my Guide at dawn.

Odds are, I’m not heading home at all.