“Partially,” he said. “She never destroyed a vampire so she never became a huntress.”
I turned the branch over in my fist, then met his dark eyes. “And what happens when a vampire’s destroyed?”
“We hollow out and then turn to dust. Without our souls, this decay is almost immediate.”
I snapped my gaze away from him before my mind ran away with the image. According to my mother’s visions, watching Kayn crumble to ash was part of my future as this huntress. If I didn’t destroy every single vampire, I’d eventually lose my mind to madness. Every other witch before me had suffered this same fate.
Kayn angled the tip of the stake to the right of his ribcage. “Our hearts don’t beat the same as humans’ do, but you have to cut through it all the same.” I frowned and tugged the stake to pull it away from his chest. He held it steady, reminding me, once again, I could never overpower a vampire.
“It will take effort to push it through,” he continued. “But with the right angle, you don’t have to be strong, just precise.”
I sucked in a breath and nodded. With Loki’s power of compulsion, I didn’t need exceptional strength or speed to bring a vampire down, but their bones and muscles stillmaintained a tough barrier to break through. This would be so much easier if Odin granted me a powerful body. Until I uncovered whatever the Allfather would give me for this task, I had to rely on Freya, Loki, and Kayn.
Thanks to Freya’s visions, I would be able to track the undead and catch them in their most vulnerable states.
Like a true huntress.
A tremble snaked down my spine. My mother encouraged this. Odin wanted this. The Gods wanted this. They wanted me to kill, and yet I couldn’t shed the part of me that clung to becoming a seer. If I grew into a witch who helped and protected others, I’d strip away every selfish choice I’d made and replace them with decades of service to my fellow witches.
That was the Silver I knew, not the huntress with her hands wrapped around a stake.
Kayn tipped the stake up. “Aim to the side of the hard bone at the center.” His free hand tapped the middle of his chest and then shifted to his left. “Point up and into the soft spot between the ribs. Try it.”
I shook my head. “Not on you.”
“I’ll stop you.”
“Can you? I’m the huntress. What if this draws Odin’s power out of me?”
“I can’t die except to a stake made from the tree of Yggdrasil.”
I tilted my head, my lips parting. “But you’re?—”
“Different. I told you.” Something akin to regret shimmered in his abyssal eyes as if reflecting the darkness in my own. “This isn’t Yggdrasil, but it is an ash tree. A stake sharpened from any ash tree will sink through undead flesh without much effort if angled correctly.”
My eyes flickered to the line of trees behind him. No wonder The Hall of the Gods was built so close to a forest of ash. “Then why hasn’t the council burned allthe ash trees?”
“Because it’s not a threat. Nobody is fast enough to even think of getting a stake at the right angle. Remember, we are not human. We are predators, created to be pure power.”
“And they’ve never suspected a huntress like me might be a threat?”
His hair fell into his face as he shook his head. “Like Anastasia said, history proves that the chosen witches lose themselves to madness long before they ever become a threat. Right now, the council has one main concern; their food source dwindling from the harsher winters.” Glancing over his shoulder, his eyes scanned the line of trees. “Winter also doesn’t make it easy to burn the forest. The perpetual dampness keeps the trees from being their target. For now.”
“So they won’t expect a huntress at all?”
He turned back to me, the warmth in his eyes, like charred wood and just as dark. Concern pressed his brows together. “I didn’t say that. You can’t hope to catch them unaware. If you get too complacent, or reliant on Odin and Freya, you’ll be ripped apart.” Grimacing, I tried to keep Ragna’s belief in a Draugr’s feeding habits out of my mind’s eye. “I can’t let that happen, so we’ll keep training.”
“Nine days,” I breathed.
Matching my frown, he trailed his gaze over my face. “Nine days,” he echoed. He brushed the soft pad of his thumb over my knuckles and then pulled his hand away. Tipping his chin down toward the stake, he prodded me. “Try it.”
My hands quivered. I peeled each finger off the wood and then tightened my grip. With both hands and the entire weight of my body, I shifted the tip of the stake upward. Blowing out a hard breath, I shoved every bit of energy I had into him. The stake was pinched between his ribs but did not melt through him the way he said it would for other vampires.
A wince flickered across his face and he drew a sharp breath.
I yanked the stake away. “I hurt you.”
He scrubbed his palm over his clean-shaven chin and huffed. “Only for a moment. You need practice to get the aim correct. Try again.”
