“See, guys, when Leotie transferred her legacy magic to her daughter, it stripped out all the other magic in her. All of it,” I repeated, just in case they didn’t get the implications.
Both of Ian’s brows went up. “Seems Ashael made a very bad decision telling you to verify your heritage.”
“Who is this Ashael?” Leotie asked again, more sharply this time.
I waved. “A demon that’s going to be kicking himself for being too greedy, but forget him. He couldn’t know that one of my ancient Ani-kutani ancestors was still alive. You said yourself that you carefully covered your tracks.” Then, because this was too important to be left to assumption, I asked Leotie outright, “If I gave the legacy magic to someone else, would a hex that’s on me transfer over to that other person, too?”
Gretchen gasped. Okay, I hadn’t told her about that, but in my defense, today was the first time I’d seen her in months.
Leotie gave me one of her shrewd, probing looks. “How deeply is this spell bound to you?”
“Flesh to flesh and blood to blood,” I replied. “If I get cut, the person on the other end of this spell has the same injury and vice versa, right down to if he dies, I die, too.”
“What the fuck?” Gretchen breathed.
Leotie whistled through her teeth. “That’s not a regular spell. Binding that magic to a vampire is necromancy.”
“So I’ve been told,” I said impatiently. “Well? If I give the legacy to someone else, would that spell transfer, too?”
“Without a doubt,” Leotie said, and I almost cried from joy.
“I need to call Vlad,” Maximus said, spinning around. “There’s no signal here, but there is back at the hotel.”
It was all I could do to keep from jumping up and down like a kid on Christmas morning. “Yes, call him and tell him not to touch Samir. All we need to get this spell off me is to find some nasty schmuck to transfer this legacy to!”
This world sadly didn’t lack for murderers, child rapists, or other horrible people. Once I’d transferred the legacy magic, we would put that person out of their misery. It would mean the end of the magic legacy in my family, but oh well—
“You can’t transfer it to just anyone,” Leotie said, slashing through my happy inner narrative. “It can only be transferred to a close matrilineal blood relative.”
I frowned. “What’s that?”
“Matrilineal means a direct descendant of your mother’s bloodline,” Gretchen supplied.
My joy deflated like a popped balloon. “But Leotie just confirmed that we have no other living family on our mother’s side.” And at over eight hundred years old, Leotie was several centuries removed from being a “close” relation to my mother’s direct bloodline.
Gretchen’s expression changed. Suddenly, I had her attention in a way I’d never had it before. “Yeah, so the only person you can transfer the magic legacy to is me.”
She wanted it, I realized in shock. “Did you miss the part about the deadly hex that came along with it?”
“I didn’t miss it,” Gretchen said, shrugging as if we weren’t talking about life or death. “But I’ll take the risk.”
Of course she would, but as usual, Gretchen wasn’t thinking things through. Well, I knew what she refused to admit: that she wouldn’t live long enough to find out what cool magic ability the legacy would give her. I couldn’t sign my sister’s death warrant that way. Not even if it meant losing my best chance at freeing myself.
I drew in a deep breath. Then I looked at Maximus, Ian, and Marty. “You will not mention this to Vlad. I’ll decide when and if and what he knows. If one of you goes behind my back and tells him, I will cut your heart out.”
“Leila!” Gretchen snapped. “You don’t get to make up their minds or mine about this!”
“This time I do,” I said, and unleashed the light in my gaze. “You remember nothing of this conversation,” I told Gretchen, my voice vibrating from vampire power. “You only know that Leotie is our distant relative and we are direct descendants of the Ani-kutani line. That is all.”
A glazed look replaced Gretchen’s angry expression, and I didn’t miss how Leotie looked at me with a sort of pity. Yes, I might once again be following in my mother’s footsteps by hiding things from my little sister for her own protection, but I didn’t care. I also didn’t care if this made me a total hypocrite for ever saying that I didn’t like to mind-manipulate people. Gretchen wouldn’t be able to keep her mouth shut otherwise, and transferring the legacy power to her would kill her as surely as if I shot her in the head. She was human; she wouldn’t survive a gutting like Mircea’s captors’ had just given me, and Gretchen really wouldn’t survive what would happen when those same captors realized that Vlad wouldn’t do their bidding.
And he wouldn’t. I loved Vlad, but I knew him. If only Gretchen’s life hung in the balance, he wouldn’t allow himself to be blackmailed by Mircea’s captors. Vlad would console me and he’d swear to avenge Gretchen, yet he would also let her die. And as much as I loved Vlad, I wouldn’t sacrifice my sister’s life for mine, even if my loss would be devastating to him.
Still, the ramifications of the enormous secret I’d be hiding from Vlad pierced me like silver in the heart. He’d take it as the most serious betrayal, and everyone knew that Vlad wasn’t big on forgiving betrayal. With a muttered comment that I needed a few minutes alone, I ran out of the house. When I was far enough away that they couldn’t hear me even with vampire senses, I screamed out my frustration at the gray December sky.
I now had more answers than I’d ever dreamed of, but part of me wished I’d never come here. Before, I had been tormented by my helplessness. Now, I was even more tormented by my choices. If I told Vlad this, he would do everything in his power to make me transfer the curse to Gretchen, yet if I did, it might end up killing her. But how could I not tell him?
It might not be today, but soon, I would have to pick between endless lies in order to protect my sister’s life, or being a participant in Vlad’s emotional torture. Yes, Vlad was strong, and he’d survived things that would have broken ninety-nine-point-nine percent of other people, but what if Mircea’s captors demanded something that would scar him forever? How could I add a crushing weight to the awful burdens he already carried?
The brutal truth was, I didn’t know if I could live with myself in either scenario.
Yet I couldn’t stay here screaming at the sky. I’d promised never again to let any emotional turmoil defeat me, however horrible my circumstances. This had knocked me down worse than anything had before it, but I had to find a way to push past my feelings and go on. Maybe things weren’t as bleak as they looked. Maybe I wouldn’t have to choose between my sister’s life and Vlad’s soul. Another solution had to present itself, if I fought hard enough to find one.
Yeah, my inner voice sneered. And maybe, you’ll meet a leprechaun who’ll lead you to a pot of gold, too!
My fists clenched. Goddamn my hated internal voice, and goddamn Mircea. If not for him, none of this would be happening. In sudden, explosive rage, I spun around and punched the nearest tree. My bones shattered from the force of the blow, yet the instant, searing pain was oddly comforting. For those few brief seconds before I healed, it distracted me from the far worse pain inside.
I took both my gloves off and punched another tree. Then another one and another, until blood flowed freely from both my hands. How I wished these trees were Mircea. If he were here right now, I’d tear into him so much worse—
What are you doing, Leila? Stop it!
As if I’d summoned him, Mircea’s roar echoed through my mind. Of course. He’d feel everything I was doing as if it were happening to him. Now I really enjoyed the pain.
Where are you, you miserable prick? I roared back at him. This is all your fault!
No, it’s your fault for not dying like you were supposed to! was his instant reply. Now, stop smashing your hands!
What, like this? I snarled,
and whacked the nearest tree hard enough to send my hand all the way through it.
Bitch! rang through my mind so loud, I almost turned around to see if he was behind me. Our connection was somehow much clearer this time. And stronger, like if I concentrated really hard, I might be able to see him . . .
Stop it, Mircea said, the anger abruptly gone from his tone. You can’t find me this way, Leila.
Then why do you suddenly sound concerned? I thought back, stunned to realize that Mircea no longer felt like an unwelcome, invisible shadow in my mind. Somehow, he now felt like a thread, and I grabbed at that thread with both hands and pulled.
Stop it or I’ll leave! he thundered at me.
No, you won’t, I said, a fierce exaltation filling me as I still felt him on the other end of our connection. In fact, he was now even closer, as if a few more hard tugs on that string could bring him into focus. Mircea cursed me and continued to threaten to leave, but I knew him. If he really could leave, he would. That meant that things weren’t just a little different with our connection this time. Everything was different, and though it seemed impossible, there could only be one reason why.
Mircea hadn’t been the one to contact me. Somehow, someway, I’d finally managed to link to him.
Chapter 24
I’ve got you, I’ve got you, I chanted in glee as I continued to pull on the thread connecting us. A haze began to fill my vision, slowly blocking out all the bare trees around me. I knew what that was, and excitement flared as that haze formed into the unmistakable look of another place.
The sky changed into a thick slab where no light penetrated while the trees around me were replaced by tall, jagged rocks. Faint illumination came from torches somewhere out of my line of sight, but it showed that most of the rocks looked like naturally formed pillars. Mircea was in the middle of a tight circle of those pillars, and the glow from his eyes cut through the darkness like twin emerald laser beams.
“I’ve got you!” I crowed out loud this time. I was so caught up in my triumph; it took several moments before I noticed that someone was hitting me on the leg. Hard.
“Leila, come on, it might already be too late!”
Marty. He sounded upset, but he didn’t know I’d finally linked to Mircea after countless failed attempts. I wasn’t dropping this connection. Who knew if I could get it back?
“Go away, Marty,” I muttered.
Even splitting my attention for a few seconds caused those rocks to blur and form back into the trees of my actual surroundings. Dammit! I refocused my attention, cursing again as Marty pulled on me hard enough to knock me off balance.
“For fuck’s sake, Leila, you gotta come with me now!”
Marty never used the F word, so something must be seriously wrong. Concern tore the thread linking me to Mircea, and I fell back into the present. Marty seemed nearly hysterical as he continued to try and drag me along with him.
I shook him off. “What’s going on?”
“Maximus is killing Gretchen!” was his stunning reply.
I didn’t ask any of the shocked questions that instantly sprang to mind. Instead, I ran as fast as I could back to Leotie’s house, outpacing Marty with my much longer legs. I burst through the open doorway in time to see Maximus kneeling on the floor with Gretchen draped across his lap.
Her eyes were closed, her head was back, and blood trailed from both sides of her mouth. More blood splattered her shirt as well as Maximus’s clothes, and from the smell of it, it wasn’t just Gretchen’s blood. It was Maximus’s, too, and for some incomprehensible reason, Leotie and Ian stood like silent sentries behind them, doing nothing about the sight that almost knocked me to my knees from grief-filled rage.
“What. The. Fuck?” I screamed.
Electricity shot from my right hand to whip around like a snake. The only reason I didn’t start lashing Maximus into pieces was because he was still holding my sister. A wrecking ball hit me when I strained my ears and still couldn’t hear her heartbeat. Oh God, oh God, she was dead. More electricity began to shoot out of me, until I was vaguely aware that my entire body was starting to glow from an overload of voltage.
“Power down, Leila,” Maximus said in a steady voice. “She’s not dead.”
I gestured at Gretchen, and without intending it to, my whip tore a five-foot trench in the floor.
“Then why isn’t her heart beating, you murderer!”
“She’s not dead,” Maximus said again, shifting Gretchen in his arms. “She’s just waiting to rise.”
I looked at the blood around Gretchen’s mouth with new understanding. Maximus hadn’t killed her the permanent way; he had changed Gretchen into a vampire. Even amidst my relief that she wasn’t lost to me forever, I was still so furious that crackling noises started to come from the nearby light sockets. Then thin lines of electricity began poking out of them.
“Leila,” Ian said irritably, “if you start another electrical fire, you won’t like the next spell I throw on you.”
I found myself breathing in an effort to force my dangerous rage back. No matter what I was feeling—which amounted to kill Maximus, kill him!—I could not go all voltage-crazy again.
“I tried to stop him,” Marty said, finally making it to the cabin. “He wouldn’t listen, and neither would the rest of them.”
Oh? My gaze landed on Leotie and Ian as I mentally added them to my hit list. Then I continued my inner struggle not to drain this place of all its voltage so I could give full vent to my wrath. Was this how Vlad felt when he was in a near-combustible rage? If so, then he showed a lot of self-control by not having a higher body count than he already did.
Maximus wiped the blood from Gretchen’s mouth and set her down. She slumped onto the floor as if boneless. Seeing it once again struck me like a physical blow. Nothing looked as limp as a dead body, and right now, that’s what Gretchen was.
My gaze landed on Maximus as if I could destroy him with a look. “What right did you have to do this?”
“The right Gretchen gave me,” he replied. “As she said, you keep deciding what she wants for her, but Gretchen’s old enough to do that for herself. So when you stormed out and Gretchen asked me to turn her into a vampire, I did.”
I let out a noise that was more snarl than scoff. “She asks you one impulsive question, and you go ahead and change her very species? Bullshit. You didn’t do this for her. You can barely stand Gretchen. You did it for Vlad. You changed her because you’re prepping her for the hex you want me to transfer to her!”
Maximus stepped over Gretchen and moved within striking distance of my whip, which glowed a brighter shade of white.
“I did it for both of them,” he snapped. “Yeah, Gretchen can be a pain in the ass, but that’s mostly when she’s around you. I realized that a couple months ago when Vlad assigned me to her as extra protection. You won’t stop treating her like a child, so that’s what she acts like with you. The rest of the time, she’s a smart, funny, mostly levelheaded young woman. And Gretchen asked me to change her over many times before today. I kept refusing and warning her of the consequences, but she was undeterred. Humans are easy to kill compared to vampires, so Gretchen knew she would have better odds at surviving all of this if she was a vampire instead of a human. With what we’re up against now, I finally agreed.”
“Liar!” My whip snapped toward Maximus and Ian grabbed my wrist to yank it back. Then he let out a deafening yowl.
“Bloody fucking hell, that fried me right down to my frank and beans!”
I wasn’t surprised. Touching me anywhere near my right hand when my power was up was very dangerous, as the burns breaking out all over Ian attested. Only Vlad could do that unscathed, yet Ian continued to grip my wrist despite his increasing burns.
“Let go, I’m not going to kill Maximus,” I said shortly.
“Really?” Ian eyed my whip, which crackled and curled with sizzling energy. “Tell that to your sparking little friend.”
“I’m
not going to kill him,” I repeated, and Ian finally let go. Yes, moments ago, I would’ve sliced Maximus’s arm or leg off, but the surge of rage that had made me want to dismember him had drained away. Now I felt exhausted, as if losing that rabid anger caused all my other strength to abandon me, too.
My sister was in the in-between state of death and vampiric rebirth. Nothing I did to Maximus would change that, and now we had another problem on top of the cluster fuck that was today. In the next few to several hours, Gretchen would rise. In her newborn-vampire, blood-crazed state, she’d kill anyone with a pulse, be it man, woman, or child. We had to get her as far away from humans as possible, and we also had to have blood bags available to satiate her hunger. Lots and lots of blood bags.
Later, I’d give Maximus a more thorough piece of my mind over what he’d done and why, but first things first. “Do any of you know if there’s a vampire safe house near here?”
“Vlad has a place in Raleigh,” Maximus stated.
Ian glanced at Gretchen’s prone form. “Cutting it close. Raleigh’s five hours away in good traffic. I know a safe house that’s less than three hours from here, and it’s very remote.”
“You know it, but it’s not yours?” I liked the closer distance, but Ian hadn’t gotten a warm welcome from anywhere he’d been and we couldn’t risk getting kicked out or worse.
He flashed me a smile, guessing the reason behind my question. “It’s empty. A mate of mine went through a dreadfully boring phase where he wanted to be all alone with his wife. Now they’re overseas and I have a key to their mountain hideout.”
That sounded perfect, but . . . “You’re sure they’re not there?”
He grunted with grim amusement. “Bet your life on it.”
“I want to go with you,” Leotie said, speaking for the first time since I’d come back.
I turned to her with the word no on my lips. I might be putting my feelings aside for the momentary greater good, but I was still very upset with all of them. Maximus had deliberately changed Gretchen when I wasn’t there to stop him, and Leotie, like Ian, had done nothing to dissuade him. Only Marty had come after me in a vain attempt to stop it.