In the moment that Razvan spoke, every agonizing stroke of the blade flooded back to her, as the vampires chopped her into pieces much the same way Sergey was doing to Razvan. Methodically. Relentlessly. Mercilessly.
Do not try to save me. Think only of killing him
.
I cannot defeat him. He was a great warrior. He taught me to fight. He is a master vampire. Even our strongest hunters rarely can defeat them alone
.
Who better than you to fight him? You know his every move before he makes it. You have changed over the centuries. He will be expecting that young woman he taught, not the seasoned warrior you have become. He is preying on your emotions. Do not be tricked by one such as he. You are a great warrior, and you, better than any other, can defeat him
.
Around them the house began to shake, the walls undulating and breaking apart so that debris rained down on the vampire. Ivory knew Razvan couldn’t move with his agonizing, mortal wounds, but was buying her time to regroup, using what remaining energy he had, not to attempt to burrow into the ground, but rather to use his powers to aid her.
Ivory took a deep breath and let it out. Razvan may have been inexperienced, but he had the heart and soul of a warrior—like she did. Never had she seen another warrior so courageous, so stoic. She took another deep breath and let it out, allowing a mantle of calm to settle over her. Razvan was right. She could not allow her feelings to interfere with her primary job. She was a warrior first, a woman second.
She forced herself to look only at the vampire—to see only the vampire. As long as she could keep Sergey focused on her and away from Razvan, she might be able to keep her lifemate alive and slay the vampire. What weapons could be used against this master? Vanity was the one trait that not only all the undead shared, but her brothers in particular.
She changed her appearance subtly, very slowly, softening her features to take on a younger, more girlish look—as in the old days, long before the centuries had passed, when her brothers had loved and cherished her more than their own egos.
Sergey lifted his sword and touched it to his forehead in a mock salute, allowing her to see Razvan’s blood running down the blade to the hilt. The ruby drops coated his hand and, with his gaze locked with hers, he licked at the blood.
Her stomach knotted, but she tilted her head to one side and laughed, a taunting, tinkling sound, like that of a young, giddy girl. “You have grown old, Sergey. I thought with all your intelligence and experience, you would become, at the very least, a master vampire, one so powerful it would take our strongest hunters to ban together to defeat you. Yet here you are, struggling to vanquish a woman, your baby sister.”
His eyes glowed with fire. She could actually see tiny flames burning in the dark depths. She had been correct in thinking the way to shake him was through his enormous ego. Sergey swung the sword at her neck, slicing through the air with such force that when she ducked and ran her own sword into his side, the momentum from his swing actually carried him away from her. He screamed, the sound a mixture of pain and rage.
The floor erupted beneath her feet, splintering, so that she nearly fell through. But thanks to her many lessons from her brothers, she was dancing out of the way of the falling floorboards. She could smell the rich soil beckoning from the various holes in the floor.
“Oh dear, you have gotten slow, haven’t you? You are nothing more than a weak, withered shadow of your former self. In the days past, one look from you would have crushed me, let alone the might of your sword, but now you play games like the puny coward you are, the way a shriveled and fading old man might play chess with trembling fingers and a mind forgetting the moves.”
Can you bring the rest of the roof down on him?
she asked Razvan, hating for him to use up his strength, but needing a distraction.
Of course
. There was no hesitation, but she was beginning to know Razvan and his iron will. He wouldn’t hesitate, no matter the cost to him.
The roof crumbled with a thunderous roar, the wood and dirt once more falling on Sergey’s head and shoulders. It wasn’t nearly as effective as the first time, but it bought her the seconds she needed. Ivory tossed the sword to the ground beside Razvan’s hand and jerked out the small, handmade laser. It was powered by a diamond she’d cut herself.
Sergey dissolved to avoid the wood and dirt raining from the roof as the house shook apart. He materialized just behind Ivory, but three wooden boards with jagged points came hurtling at him with breakneck speed, forcing him to dissolve again. Each time he flowed past Razvan the blade sliced another deep cut. Ivory timed him this time, letting loose a blast of white-hot energy that did some slicing of its own. The blade of light didn’t cut all the way through his skull, but the letter T was very prominent.
Black blood splattered across the crumbling walls. A foul stench filled the air, as if a corpse was rotting from the inside out.
“The stamp of a traitor. Wear it proudly. It will not come off.” Ivory inclined her head, the princess acknowledging something crawling beneath her feet. She ran toward him, firing the crossbow rapidly, the arrows running up his body and preventing him from shifting, giving her a straight line up his chest to the wizened heart.
Thin lips peeled back in a snarl, Sergey sprang to meet her, ripping at one of the arrows and slamming it home just over her heart as she plunged her fist into his chest. As her hand burrowed deep, his intestines wrapped around her fist and wrist, sawing away at her skin, opening deep lacerations, allowing the poisonous vampire blood to pour inside the wounds.
Sergey stood toe to toe with her, the black holes that were his eyes staring mercilessly down into her eyes. He twisted and dragged the arrow out of her body and plunged it in a second time. “Feel that?” he hissed. “Dear sister. Beloved sister. This is how much I love you. I will bring you to our side. We will rule the earth soon and you will be part of us, one with us. I do this for you.”
The tone was very much that of the brother she had lost, but his face was a mask of evil, his eyes two hot coals glowing deep ruby-red. His breath was fetid in her face, burning her skin, singeing her eyebrows. She tried to keep her hand moving forward to find the shriveled heart, but the cuts were too deep and she was in danger of losing her hand. Gritting her teeth, she pushed harder, trying to move through those heavy muscles to gain the heart.
Sergey slammed his fist into her chest, intending to drive not only the arrow deep into her heart, but his own hand, using his strength and speed to outrace her for her heart. For a moment the crosses coated in holy water burned through his hand, straight to the bone so that he howled and screamed in rage, spittle running from his mouth. He flung back his head, enduring the pain, trying to push past that holy line of defense.
A flame burst from the sky above them, a fiery blast that slammed hard into Sergey’s back. The vampire was driven forward onto Ivory’s arm. Her fingers scraped the edge of the withered organ. Elated, she ignored the agony as the razor-sharp bands tightened around her hand and wrist and dug deeper.
Sergey screamed, the sound blowing apart the rest of the house, reducing the wood to spears, hundreds of them flying through the air from every direction at both Razvan and Ivory. With his last remaining strength, Razvan threw a barrier around Ivory’s back and the top of her head to prevent penetration of the sharp spears. Half a dozen drove through his body, staking him to the floor.
Sergey swept Ivory’s legs out from under her. She went down hard, slipping in the pools of blood covering the floor. Sergey staggered back, his face a twisted mask of hatred. Before he could slam his fist deep into her chest, she surged to her feet, leaping in the very motion Sergey had taught her as a young child.
Ivory smiled at him, deliberately locking her gaze with his as he had when he’d licked at Razvan’s blood. She knew there was a gaping hole in her chest where he’d tried to reach her heart. Blood dripped steadily, yet she taunted him with a smile. She took a step and went down on one knee, still holding his gaze, watching his eyes narrow, watching the cruel thoughts move through his mind. Keeping their gazes locked, she drove her hand and wrist deep into the welcoming soil. She knew the soil intimately, knew the healing properties. She had lain companion to the minerals and elements for a hundred years.
She whispered to the earth in the ancient language, the language she knew better than any other, a language close to the earth.
Emä Maye, én, lańad, omasak Teteh. Jälleen jamaak—Mother Earth, your daughter stands before you wounded once again
.
Maye mayed—Earth to earth
.
Sív síved—Heart to heart
.
Me juttaak elidaban és kalmaban—We are bound together in life and death
.
Pusmasz ainam, juttad lihad—Heal this body, bring together this flesh
.
Te magköszunam, sívam sívadet—I give thanks from my heart to yours
.
She continued, her voice rising and falling with the ebb and flow of the earth’s blood.
Twist this root, break and bend
,
Fit the wood to my hand
.
Hone the edges, make them sharp
,
To pierce deep within that which is aged and dark
.
I name you need, fit to my will
,
Your making is to stop the evil that would kill
.
Sergey came at her as she had known he would, believing her distracted by her wounds, muttering to herself beneath her breath. As he bent toward her, she jerked her hand from beneath the soil, newly healed, all traces of the deep lacerations gone. In her fist was a root, twisted and sharpened to the finest blade, honed down to the finest ice pick, and in one smooth, easy move, she thrust it up and straight into his left eye.
He slammed his fist into her throat, knocking her back and down as he whirled away from her. As he came down he viciously kicked at Razvan’s head. Razvan was already wielding the heavy sword, swinging it in a brutal cut at the vampire’s calf. Sergey barely moved his leg in time to avoid most of the blade. The edge caught him enough to cut into his tendon. The vampire leapt into the air to escape another blow.
Coming down in a fighting crouch, her weapon already blazing, Ivory added another letter in the word
traitor
to his forehead. The laser cut the R so deep it dug into the skull itself.
“Before we are finished here, you will bear the mark of the traitor for our brothers to know that they taught me well. They will be amused that you could not dispatch a woman, your sister-child, so easily,” she taunted.
Vampires were vain creatures, especially master vampires. Her brothers had always had large egos, believing they would do a better job ruling the Carpathian people than the prince and a better job of protecting the prince than the Daratrazanoff lineage. He knew when word of his defeat, of the damage done to his body, reached his siblings, he would be the laughingstock of the entire vampire world.
As if knowing it was all true, Razvan laughed, the sound low and taunting, echoing through the surrounding fields and sky.
Sergey shrieked, furious, blood and spittle erupting from his mouth. “You are already dead, weak one. You think I do not know how you crawled on the ground like a dog, following after Xavier for his scraps? You are less than a worm and deserve to die writhing in agony. You pathetic weakling. She will die a hideous death before she joins you in the afterlife.”
Ivory put every ounce of contempt she had into her voice. “I will go to my lifemate and live in bliss while you walk through the fires of hell, snarling and spitting and crying like a child for blood. You are nothing, the undead, fodder for our brothers who laugh at your weakness and point fingers at your ineptness.”
Sputtering with rage, Sergey clapped his hands together and his voice boomed like thunder, sounding as if it came from a great distance away, and surrounding her, echoing from the sky and coming up from beneath her feet.
Remove all sound from her throat!
Quiet the words that would be spoke
.
Ivory instantly felt the effects, her throat closing, so that even when she opened her mouth, no sound emerged.
He is using a spell Xavier often used on his underlings when he was tired of their questions. He is even using Xavier’s voice
, Razvan told her.
It is effective in frightening them into obedience because his apprentices believe he is powerful enough to remove their voices permanently
.
Ivory threw her hands into the air and double-time clapped.
Sound abound. Thoughts race by
.
Air to lungs, let my voice cry
.
She could immediately breathe better, and the air hissed from her mouth in blessed sound.
She replaced Sergey’s spell with one of her own, turning his words back on him, although she knew it was temporary and wouldn’t last long.
I call to the power deep within
,
Remove the sound, quiet the din
.
Take away that which is harmful, seal it tight
,
Remove the offending orifice from my sight
.
When Sergey tried to open his mouth, it was no longer there—a thick scar tissue of skin had grown over the opening, sealing it closed so that he couldn’t speak. His face was blank from his nose down. His eyes, widened in alarm, spit venomous hatred at her. The arrows in his chest fell to the ground, eaten through by his acid blood. He lifted his hands and electricity arced from his fingers, leaping at her.
Ivory dodged sideways, firing more arrows, using the same straight up-and-down pattern as before, marking the line over his heart. The hair on her body stood up as the electricity sizzled and snapped, but when the vampire snapped it like a whip, hurling the energy across the room at her, the force struck an invisible barrier and followed a vapor trail back to lash at Sergey.