Destined for an Early Grave

  I couldn’t contain my snort. “As you would say, right you are.” I couldn’t hide in a room while Bones fought Gregor in a death match, no matter what. “But don’t concern yourself with me. You focus on him. I’ll be fine.”

  “Oh, he’ll have all my attention, Kitten,” Bones said in a grim tone. “Count on that.”

  I wanted to tell Bones he didn’t have to do this, that we could find another way, but I knew how useless that would be. No matter what, Bones wouldn’t walk away from this fight, even if Gregor all of a sudden promised to let us alone and my mother decided she was thrilled to be a vampire. Gregor had murdered Rodney. Bones was fighting Gregor for more reasons than me.

  Mencheres appeared in the doorway, Ian behind him. I looked at the two vampires, one dark-haired and exotic, the other russet-haired and classically handsome. Both men were responsible for Bones’s existence, since Mencheres turned Ian into a vampire, then Ian changed Bones. So many events had led up to this moment.

  Bones leaned down, kissing me with the lightest brush of his lips. I traced my fingers over his jaw when he lifted his head, fighting the urge to grab him and refuse to let go.

  The harsh scent of my desperation floated around me. Bones held my shoulders, squeezing gently.

  “This isn’t the first time I’ve faced death, Kitten, and I don’t intend it to be the last. I’ve chosen to live a very dangerous life, but this is who I am. It’s who you are, too, and the same would be true even if we’d never met.”

  I knew what he was really saying. If I die, it won’t be your fault. Yes, it was true that Bones and I both would have lived equally dangerous lives even if we’d never met, but the bottom line was that if he died today, it would be my fault.

  “I love you.”

  It was all I could say right now. Anything else would just upset him and he needed to be focused in order to beat Gregor.

  “I know you do,” he whispered. “And I love you. Always.”

  Then he turned before I could even blink and walked out the door.

  It had been decided the duel would take place on Mencheres’s back lawn. It was certainly big enough, with its acres of land bordered by high trees. An area the size of a baseball diamond had been cleared of everything but dirt, as the place where Bones and Gregor would square off. I didn’t know why so much space was required, but then again, it was my first experience with this sort of thing—and hopefully, my last.

  Gregor was already there, standing next to his blond servant, Lucius. I was surprised Lucius was alive since I’d assumed he’d been one of the vampires Bones, Spade, or Rodney had killed inside the house. Lucius’s absence yesterday was odd, since every other time I’d seen Gregor, Lucius had been with him. Still, I had bigger concerns aside from wondering why Lucius hadn’t been at Gregor’s side during the previous ambush.

  Gregor and Lucius weren’t the only new arrivals at the house. Having a formal duel was apparently an event. There were several Master vampires I didn’t recognize. Gregor’s allies, Mencheres told me, plus several more members of Bones’s line, along with four vampires who were introduced as Law Guardians.

  Out of those four, the tall blond female crackled with enough power to make me uneasy. While she looked only eighteen, she felt about five thousand years old, and the three other male Law Guardians with her were mega-Masters as well. Bones, Spade, and I had all broken the law in taking my mother from Gregor. So had Rodney, of course, but he was past any undead judgment. Maybe the rest of us still had penalties coming.

  Speaking of my mother, she was present as well. I’d thought she would avoid getting anywhere near Gregor, but she stood on the far edge of the lawn, watching Gregor with her eyes lit up like streetlights. Anyone within a thirty-foot range of her could smell the rage and hatred pouring off her. I didn’t even want to imagine what else might have happened to my mother during the time Gregor had her. It filled me with enough fury for me to worry about my hands sparking again.

  Bones had avoided me since leaving the room twenty minutes ago. I understood why; he was clearing his mind of everything but the imminent fight. Somehow, he’d even barricaded himself from the connection I’d felt between us ever since I woke up as a vampire. I couldn’t sense anything from him now. It was as if a wall had replaced the rub of him inside my subconscious. I felt bereft, like I’d lost a limb. Many times, I’d heard Bones speak of the connection vampires felt to their sires. Only now that it was gone did I truly understand how deep it ran.

  Bones was on the perimeter of the battlefield, talking to Spade. I couldn’t hear them, either from the background noise of everyone else or because he was keeping his voice too low.

  Moonlight glinted off Bones’s pale, beautiful skin, and his dark hair appeared highlighted under those alabaster rays. I couldn’t stop staring at him, my anxiety mounting as the time ticked ever closer. Bones couldn’t die tonight. He just couldn’t. Fate couldn’t be so cruel as to let Gregor win after every awful thing he’d done, right?

  I hoped not.

  Across the cold red earth, I saw a familiar dark head part through the waiting onlookers. Vlad.

  He glanced at me, but then kept walking in the opposite direction. My brows rose when Bones waved him over, the two Law Guardians around Bones stepping back to let Vlad through. Vlad’s hair obscured his face as he leaned in, listening to whatever Bones said. I couldn’t tell anything from Spade’s closed expression, and I couldn’t hear a word. Frustrated, I could only watch as Vlad replied, also inaudible, and Bones nodded once. Then Vlad walked away, headed this time in my direction.

  “What did he say?” were my first words when he reached me.

  Vlad shrugged. “What you might expect him to say.”

  Ice crept along my spine. Knowing Bones, he would have asked Vlad to look after me if Gregor killed him. Even though he disliked Vlad, that’s exactly the sort of thing Bones would do. Was he just being cautious, or did he know there was no way he could beat Gregor? God, had Bones gone into this knowing he’d die but refusing to back down regardless?

  I was about to run over to Bones and beg that we call the whole thing off when the tall blond Law Guardian strode into the center of the clearing. “The duel will now begin. As agreed beforehand, it will not end until one of the combatants is dead. Anyone who interferes forfeits their life.”

  Mencheres gripped my hand. “It’s too late to stop it,” he said softly, as if he’d guessed what I’d been about to do. “If you interfere now, you die.”

  I swallowed out of habit, but my mouth was utterly dry. Vlad put a hand on my shoulder as Bones strode out into the clearing, Spade following him. Gregor did as well, Lucius at his side. I didn’t understand until Spade and Lucius handed over a knife to their friends, then backed away to the edge of the irregular circle. Weapon-bearers, I realized. Both Spade and Lucius each had carried only three knives, and now they’d given up one of them. When those weapons ran out, there would be no more.

  I gulped again.

  The Law Guardian left the clearing as well. Only Gregor and Bones stood in it now, facing each other with just a dozen feet between them. Their eyes were green and their fangs extended, power uncurling from them until the air felt charged and heavy. I was tense enough to shatter when the female Law Guardian said, “Begin.”

  Bones and Gregor flew at each other with a blur of speed, crashing together several feet off the ground. For a second, I couldn’t make out who was who in the mad whirl of pale flesh, since Gregor was also shirtless. Then they broke apart, both of them with healing red slashes on their bodies.

  I gripped Mencheres’s hand despite my anger with him, feeling his answering tight squeeze. In my peripheral vision I saw Annette standing close to Ian, her face white. Ian also looked grim. Another spasm of fear welled up in me. Did they believe this would end in Bones’s death? Had everyone known that but me?

  Gregor and Bones met together again in a frenzy of violence. This time, I could see silver cutting into flesh, flashing i
n the moonlight before coming up red as they hacked at each other. Neither of them made a sound, though. No one watching did, either. The silence was somehow more loaded than screams.

  Bones rolled away from a downward swipe toward his heart, pushing back from Gregor and coming up dirt-smeared a few feet away. He flung his knife in the next instant, burying it to the hilt in Gregor’s sternum—but not before Gregor fired off his own blade, which landed right in Bones’s eye.

  I choked back my scream, afraid the smallest sound would prove lethally distracting to Bones. He yanked the blade out without pause, countering Gregor’s attack as Gregor freed the knife from his chest and came at him with incredible speed. If I hadn’t been a vampire, I would have hurled at the sticky red substance on Bones’s knife, but he never paused as he fought Gregor while his missing eye slowly grew back.

  Gregor feinted left, then dove low, sliding under Bones and coming up on the other side so fast, I hadn’t realized what he’d done until I saw Bones arch in pain, the hilt of a knife buried high in his back. Gregor barked out a command to Lucius, catching the silver knife Lucius threw and then charging at Bones as Bones tried to reach the knife in his back. He couldn’t do that and hold off Gregor’s fresh attack, though.

  Gregor increased his speed, somehow seeming to have four arms instead of two as he slashed at Bones, opening up new cuts on Bones’s body even as Bones kept that glinting silver knife out of his chest. Gregor had been holding back before, I realized, horror and panic welling up in me. He was even faster than he’d first appeared.

  Bones was forced back, that other knife still protruding from between his shoulder blades, as Gregor pressed his attack. The only sounds were silver clashing with silver, or the sickening slices of flesh and bone being split apart—until the slow, dull boom began in my chest.

  Mencheres squeezed my hand so hard, it was painful, but I couldn’t stop the beat of my heart. Each new blow or slash, each new glittering smear of crimson, seemed to add speed to the tempo in my chest. Murmurs broke out in the crowd, mostly from the newcomers, as the cadence inside me became steadier and more audible.

  Gregor flicked his gaze to me—and Bones flung himself forward, bashing his skull into Gregor’s and ripping his knife into Gregor with a brutal upward swipe that cleaved his ribs. Gregor howled but jerked back fast enough to prevent the blade from climbing higher into his chest. He swept Bones’s feet out from under him, leaping on top of him without regard for how it forced the knife buried in his rib cage deeper still.

  I didn’t understand why until Bones let out a gasp, his face twisting with agony. The knife in his back. Their combined weight had thrust it all the way through, its silver tip poking out of the front of Bones’s chest, dangerously near his heart. When Bones bucked up, throwing Gregor off, and spun around to meet his next attack, I saw that the end of the hilt was level with his back. He’ll never be able to pull it out now, I thought, the booming in my chest becoming stronger. How could Bones beat Gregor with silver burning him up inside? When each thrust and blow forced the knife ever closer to his heart?

  But Bones continued to fight with a speed and ferocity that defied his condition. He forced Gregor back, tripping him with a move too quick to follow, and slashed his knife deep across Gregor’s eyes when the other vampire moved to protect his heart. Bones leapt off Gregor in the next instant, avoiding the knife Gregor tried to ram into his back, and kicked dirt into Gregor’s face, further blinding him. When Gregor’s arm came up to defend himself, Bones hacked through it with a force that left half the limb severed on the dirt.

  I yanked free of Mencheres’s grip to clasp my hands together in fervent prayer that this would be it for Gregor. But he avoided the next downward swipe of Bones’s blade to leap straight up into the air, calling out to Lucius for the third and final knife. Gregor’s eyes must have healed enough to see the flash of silver against the night sky as Lucius threw the blade, high enough that Gregor had to reach to catch it.

  Bones met him in the air just as Gregor grabbed his blade. The knife Bones had aimed for Gregor’s chest drove into his stomach instead as Gregor’s downward blow blocked him. Bones ripped his knife sideways, spilling red gore over himself. The two of them tumbled to the ground, Bones twisting to land on his feet, Gregor falling in a heap, clutching the wide wound in his gut.

  When Bones charged at Gregor, and the Dreamsnatcher did nothing to protect himself, I felt a moment of triumphant exhilaration. But even as Bones’s knife descended on Gregor’s unprotected back, right where his heart would be, Gregor’s fist shot forward, the knife it gripped stabbing Bones deeply in the stomach.

  Pain blasted across my subconscious as the wall Bones had erected between us fell and his emotions came roaring through. I felt the agony of the silver inside his back and his gut. The latter wound burned much hotter, making me clutch my stomach in instinctive reaction. If this was only a shadow of what Bones was feeling, then the pain must be boiling like acid all through him.

  Bones’s blade wavered and skidded across Gregor’s back instead of burying into his opponent’s heart. I watched, appalled, as Bones staggered backward, his hand going to the knife still buried in his stomach. He pulled it out even as Gregor rose to his feet, his arm and the previously disabling slash in his gut healed. Bones continued to back away, his steps wavering. I couldn’t hold back my scream as Gregor yanked the knife out of Bones’s hand and kicked him hard enough to leave Bones sprawled onto his back.

  Rage and anguish washed over me, so tightly interwoven into my emotions that I didn’t know if it was mine or Bones’s. Even though the silver knife was out of his stomach, his pain there didn’t lessen. Unbelievably, I felt it grow with crippling intensity, smashing over me in waves, until only Vlad’s arm around my shoulders kept me upright.

  Something was wrong. It shouldn’t be getting worse; the silver was out. Why couldn’t he move? Get up, I screamed silently. Get up!

  Boom. Boom. My heart thundered in my chest as Gregor pounced on top of Bones, who was weaponless. Dimly I heard Annette sob, felt Vlad’s hand tighten on my shoulder, but everything else seemed to fade away except the two figures against the dark clay of the earth.

  As if in slow motion, I watched Gregor raise the knife. Saw his knees slam into Bones’s arms, holding him down as Bones tried to throw Gregor off. Watched the knife begin its descent toward that blood-smeared chest directly underneath it. Felt Bones’s despair, bitter as poison. Saw Gregor’s glowing emerald gaze flick through the crowd until he found me. And then Gregor smiled.

  It was the same smile he’d given me right after killing Rodney. Satisfied. Triumphant. Merciless. Gregor’s blade touched Bones’s chest, slicing into his skin, and his smile widened.

  My vision went red and a single thought permeated through my whole body: No.

  Flames shot up Gregor, so fast they covered him before the smile had time to leave his face. I had an instant to smile back—and then Gregor’s head exploded. His hands still gripped the knife in Bones’s chest, but then his body pitched to the side, nothing but flames left where his head had been.

  Next to me, Vlad let out a shocked curse. That’s when I became aware that every eye was on me and my hands were engulfed in blue fire.

  “She dies,” the female Law Guardian said.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  NO ONE TRIED TO STOP THE THREE MALE Guardians when they strode forward and seized me. To tell the truth, I didn’t try to stop them, either. I was too focused on trying to see Bones, now that there were people blocking my view of the clearing. He hadn’t moved since the last glimpse I’d had of him. Had Gregor’s knife been stopped in time? Or had it bitten too deep?

  “Cat, what have you done?” Vlad rasped. He couldn’t stop staring at my hands. The flames were dying down, which I supposed the Guardian’s appreciated since they held me by the arms.

  “Is Bones okay?” I asked, ignoring that. A weird sort of peace settled over me. I hadn’t consciously meant to send that deadly fire
ball at Gregor’s head, but I didn’t regret it. Even if I hadn’t saved Bones in time, this way, it wouldn’t be long until I joined him, and killing Gregor meant freedom for my mother. There were far less valuable things to die for.

  Mencheres looked as stunned as Vlad did. He really must have lost his visions of the future since his expression said he’d never imagined things would turn out this way.

  My mother pushed her way through the people. Her gaze was still lit up with green, and she punched the first Guardian she came into contact with.

  “Get your hands off my daughter!” she shouted.

  “Vlad,” I said, “please…”

  His face closed off, and he nodded once. Then he grabbed my mother, holding her against his chest in a grip she’d never be able to break. I gave him a grateful smile, knowing he’d agreed to protect her for more than just that moment.

  “You’re a good friend,” I said.

  That was all I got out. One of the Guardians closed his arm across my throat, choking off my attempted goodbye to my mother, and I was dragged out into the clearing. The blond female Guardian was already in the middle, a long silver knife in her hand.

  Quick with carrying out the punishments, aren’t they? I thought, mustering up my courage. I couldn’t bring myself to look at where people were gathered around Bones. If he was alive, I didn’t want him to see this. I was hoping the Guardians would be really quick and it would be over before Bones even realized what was happening.

  “Stop.”

  I recognized Bones’s ragged voice, and my heart leapt. He was alive. Please let this be quick, and oh God, don’t let him watch.

  “She’s broken the law,” the blond Guardian snapped. She grabbed me, yanking my head back even as Bones staggered into view.

  I met his gaze, trying to tell him in that brief instant that I loved him, and I wasn’t afraid, when his next words made the Guardian pause.