I was embarrassed. I had misjudged her. She was no child, she was a grown woman.
Her green eyes were filled with anguish. “Please don’t let them murder you. I don’t really want this without you.”
I pulled her toward me and wiped away her tears with feather light fingers. I gazed at her, willing her to know that I understood and would be by her side in eternity. I kissed her, long and deep. She responded with the same passion she always had in life, slipping her arms around my neck and pulling me in as close as she was able. I tasted her, and she leaned into my kiss, moaning softly.
When I finally broke it, my voice was a gentle whisper. “I love you, as much as I ever did. I’ve always loved your curiosity, compassion, and ability to roll with whatever situation you end up in. You took care of me, every bit as much as I took care of you. I stopped wanting to die very soon after you moved in with me.”
She leaned into me, and we held one another for a while.
Finally, she looked up at me, trust complete in her beautiful green eyes. “What’s our next move?”
“We have to find Sembur. We have to get Aristotle to leave us alone, but we’ll need Sembur for that.”
Bronwyn looked at me, puzzled. “Why?”
“Something else I didn’t tell you: Aristotle is six hundred years old.
He could kill me with his little finger. Sembur, on the other hand, is five thousand years old, and Aristotle doesn’t stand a chance against him. Sembur also promised me a small gift, and I want that gift now, to give to you.”
She looked at me curiously, but did not ask, knowing full well I would not tell her what my gift was until I was ready. “How do we find him?”
“We don’t.” My grin was rueful. “He finds us. I can only hope he finds us before Aristotle does.”
“Too late.” A third voice, male, interrupted us.
I whipped around to stare at Allenby’s ugly face, leaning into my window. At the same time, Bronwyn yelped in shock as Lucien pulled her bodily out of the driver’s side window. She grabbed at the frame but to no avail; Lucien’s grip was iron.
Without missing a beat, I matched Allenby’s smile. Quick as a snake, I punched his smug face as hard as I could. I was rewarded with an ugly crack as I shattered his nose, with a satisfying spray of blood. I crushed a chunk of his face so he looked like raw hamburger.
I smirked as I got out of the car and advanced toward him as he rolled on the ground in pain. I kicked him in the stomach almost as hard as I could. A set of steel arms grabbed me, knocking me slightly off balance. Slowly Aristotle appeared in my field of vision, burning eyes as cold as ever. As usual, his clothes and hair were pristine, much to my formless irritation. A wave of dislike crashed over me.
“Well, well, well, Eleanor. It looks like you tried to run from us.”
There was no sign of his ever-present book, and I knew we were in a great deal of trouble. He never traveled without the book.
He pulled my head back by my fringe and leaned in close with a casual, almost cultured, ferocity. He extended his fangs, and I felt an intentional cold wind and the drool from his fangs on my neck.
“Now, now, Aristotle.” The voice came from the vampire holding me. It was David. I should have known. “Undamaged, if you please.
You did, after all, say I could have her.”
“I lied.” Aristotle’s voice was clipped. We were almost nose-to-nose, kissing distance. His eyes were ice cold, with a glint of something in them that I didn’t like at all. There was not one trace of human compassion, only a rigidity of purpose and a stubborn clinging to old viciousness that didn’t fit in a modern world. Happiness was an anathema to him, if it did not involve mangling other creatures. He saw me as a problem, requiring a long overdue fatal solution.
The dislike I had for him intensified, and I extended my own fangs to let him know that I would not be an easy meal. I had been bullied enough by him throughout my life as a vampire.
In the background, I could hear Bronwyn struggling against Lucien’s powerful grasp. I felt a fleeting sick concern for her and hoped she survived long enough to escape, even if I couldn’t.
“Kill me, Aristotle. Find out what happens to you if you do.” Our eyes locked in mutual loathing.
The struggling behind me intensified, and I wriggled in David’s arms. Aristotle looked up and frowned. “Lucien! No! She’s not for you just yet.”
I struggled from David’s grasp and threw him back as hard as I could. He stumbled backward, and I whirled and lunged toward Bronwyn, skin crawling with horror at the spectacle of Lucien’s sharp white fangs dimpling the tender, white skin of her throat. He grinned when he saw me moving toward him.
As my hands brushed Lucien’s arm, I was slammed to the ground by the catlike Aristotle. I thrashed around ungracefully, trying to dislodge him.
“Not now, Eleanor. I have plans for you. For now, it’s time for you to be more submissive,” he whispered in my ear.
His old fangs slipped into my unprotected neck, and I felt the dreadful sucking as he pulled the life-blood from my body. My elbows collapsed beneath me so I lay unresisting under the heavy weight of his body. I grew ever weaker as the stream left my body, until I could not even twitch. My vision failed as the pain of his moving fangs and noisome sensation of his lips on my neck made me cough and retch in revulsion. I moaned in agony, and I heard Bronwyn’s scream of horror coming from somewhere in the burning twilight.
It took no more than a minute for Aristotle to drain me enough for consciousness to desert me. He was greedy, even for a vampire.
I had no idea how long I was out for.
I was awake, but my body refused to move. I fuzzily wondered why that was. I had my arms and legs, I could even feel them, but they would not work. They felt like lead weights attached to an equally leaden torso.
I asked my eyes to open slowly and wondered if they would obey me. I was amazed at the feel of the smooth, cold stone beneath my cheek.
I heard a gentle voice from somewhere beside me. “Crowley?” The question in the voice was heartbreaking, so hesitant and frightened.
I groaned. “Oh. My. Aching. Body.”
“You’re alive.” The relief was almost palatable.
“So it would seem.” My eyes were functioning again, and I decided to push my strength to its limits by sitting up. My stomach screamed abuse at me, willing me to feed it. Slowly, protesting, my muscles responded to my strongly worded question to sit up.
I realized my eyes were not damaged, and that we were really in a dank and dark place. Completely devoid of any light. I realized, to my slowly dawning horror and despair, exactly where we were. Trying to pierce the gloom, I looked all around until I spotted Bronwyn chained to a wall. “Bronnie? Are you all right?”
“I’m okay. How about you? Aristotle drained you—I thought he killed you.” I could see that she was forcing herself to say the words.
“I can’t say I’m fine because I’m not, but at least I’m still alive.”
I crawled to her, and even that was a journey and a half. Ravenous as I was, I craved her touch. It took most of my remaining strength, but I finally managed to sit up against the wall she was chained to and pulled her back so she was leaning more comfortably against me.
“I can’t break the chains.” She was apologetic and slightly abashed.
“Do you know where we are?”
I could feel a clock ticking, signaling our ruination, but I pushed it aside. “We’re in Aristotle’s crypt. He and his mates live in an old church, and they’ve basically put us in the basement.”
“A church!” Bronwyn sounded alarmed.
“Relax. Last time I looked I wasn’t possessed by Satan, crosses don’t upset me, and holy water has a rather nice flavor.”
“You mean we’re not—”
“No, we’re not demons.”
“Thank God for that. I wasn’t terribly comfortable with the idea of having sold my soul to Satan.”
I laughed softly. “I love you, Bronwyn. Don’t ever forget that.”
Salty tears dripped onto my body, wetting my shirt. “I love you too, Crowley.” She sighed and leaned into me for comfort.
“Please don’t cry.” My voice was soft and slightly hesitant.
“I don’t want you to die.”
“No matter what happens, I will find a way for us to be together again. Trust me.”
The salty, slightly bloody tears ran down my body, and I sighed.
We were saying goodbye to one another. It was too late for us to escape. Aristotle would keep draining me to the last drop of blood I had in my body, so I would be too weak to fight back. It was only a matter of time before he did to me what had been done to Kilkenny.
I only hoped Bronwyn would not be forced to watch. Perhaps she would even be able to escape.
We sat like that for an hour or so, taking simple comfort from each other’s presence, before the door to our cell opened and Lucien appeared.
He smirked when he saw us, and the best insult I could manage was a curled upper lip, much to my considerable frustration.
When he saw it, he laughed, and no matter how I willed my body to obey my impulse to kill him I just couldn’t move enough to do it.
Aristotle’s fangs had done their job.
He grabbed me and hauled me into the air, as though I weighed no more than a pillow. I ground my teeth as I was slung with arrogant ease over his shoulder. With a casual flick of his wrist, he unchained Bronwyn and hauled her to her feet.
She struggled, but my night-old youngling was no match for his five hundred year old strength. He took us to the upper chambers of the open-roofed church to cast us before Aristotle. He sat in his comfortable, ostentatious throne, placed where the altar should have been. A light mist curled around his ankles, caressing them. I suppressed a shudder of revulsion at the intimate touch.
I sank to my knees, head bowed, and when Bronwyn tried to come to my side, Lucien pulled her back and hurled her against the wall.
Aristotle pursed his lips in displeasure. I longed to rip both of their throats out.
“That was ill advised, Lucien. Now you’re going to have to pick her back up.”
I struggled to remain expressionless. Bronwyn lay still, too still.
I feared the impact of her head against the wall, which had been sickening, had done her severe damage.
Lucien trotted to her like a good dog and picked her up. With that same shocking lack of concern, he dropped her onto the floor next to me, and I struggled to hide the dismay at the pool of blood that was expanding around her shattered head. Her life hung in the balance, but I could not think of that now. I held back tears, allowing myself a full moment of mind numbing panic that tugged and tore at me.
“Aristotle, you will pay.” My eyes glittered with hatred as I held his gaze to let him know that if he killed me I would find some way to come back and destroy him. Death would never hold me back.
“That’s no way to talk to your elders and betters, my dear.” As always, David huffed in displeasure at my disrespect. Why on God’s green earth had I ever married the moron? What had I ever seen in him? Why had Aristotle brought him into vampirism? Maybe I was really in hell, and we were the spawn of Satan.
Behind us, a huge pile of wood waited, and I wondered how long it would be before they lit it and threw me aboard. I only hoped that it would be quick and it wouldn’t hurt too much.
“David? If you please?” Aristotle gestured elegantly to my ex-husband, who slipped back into the shadows, presumably to get some matches and a bucket of petrol for his barbecue.
“If you kill me it’s only the start of your problems.” I would make good on that promise to Aristotle.
Bronwyn lay discarded on the ground, too still. My beautiful, beloved Bronwyn, caught in the jet wash of my defunct master plan.
David had returned with his matches and lighter fluid. With practiced, accursed ease, he lit the base of the bonfire. The cheerful flames began to eat the abundant fuel.
I smiled, despite myself, and nodded toward the bonfire. “Aren’t you afraid this might burn your precious church down?”
For the first time ever, Aristotle threw his head back and laughed—
a deep, rich, joyful sound, and it made my skin crawl. Finally he quieted in fits and starts. He got off his throne and sat in front of me.
“It’s a horrible feeling, is it not? Is this what you did to Kilkenny?
Did you enjoy her screams of pain and terror?” He appeared honestly interested, but it was the kind of interest you had when you ripped the wings off flies. Like he wanted me to tell him about flesh melting off bone.
I did not answer him.
“Did you enjoy the smell? Did you enjoy the victory over me?”
“Why can’t you ever say something fucking original?” I snarled.
“Time to die.” He got up and dusted off the seat of his brown trousers. Lucien and David walked toward me, both grinning in anticipation.
I shot a bitter smile at my ex-husband, watching the triumph in his burning, red eyes. “Enjoy this, David. You were a rotten and boring husband and I was always stronger than you.” David hefted me to my feet, while Lucien cradled my beloved Bronwyn in his arms. “You used to beat the living shit out of me while we were alive. That’s why I left you. It wasn’t for Rose, it was because you used to torture me. The last time you did it I miscarried, and you lost your heir. The one that was so important to you, remember, David?” The slow march toward the crackling flames was inexorable. “Watch the flames well, David, and pray you never die. They are what await you in hell.”
The mist thickened and blanketed the ground, shying delicately away from the roaring inferno before us. I was resigned as I watched the flames leap high into the air, hungry to consume my almost immortal flesh. I said goodbye to the things that I had loved in life and death, offering a silent prayer to my Bronwyn whom I had not been able to protect, and who did not deserve my fate.
The mist coalesced into a humanoid form, thickening until it had some substance. Aristotle and his merry misfits were so intent on being pyromaniacs that they failed to notice that an opaque male vampire had joined the party. As the figure gained in solidity, it became apparent that he was mighty pissed.