Wait…
No, it can’t be…
In a bright red flash (tinged with gold?), the massive hall window shatters. Glass spills everywhere, littering the floor and chairs.
Celine flies into the hall, her fierce gaze trained on Lazarus and I. Yellow and red light radiates from her fingertips. She must have absorbed some of my magic when she drank from me last night!
I can’t believe she’s here, hovering over the shattered glass like an unholy angel.
“C…Celine…” I whisper weakly, a tear falling gently to the blood-splattered floor.
“Enjoying yourself, you sick bastard?” Celine hisses at Lazarus.
The ancient vampire tears himself from my neck, looking up at her lazily. I gasp with relief.
“Howniceof you to join us,” he says. “You’ve come just in time to watch your little plaything die a slow, agonizing death. I have to say, you have excellent taste. Her blood is delectable, even for a witch. She must have been quite powerful. Not powerful enough, however…”
I’m shaking uncontrollably, aware that blood is still gushing from my neck. A wave of dizziness overwhelms me. But I can’t pass out. I need to do everything I can to stay alive.
But at least if I die…I got to see her one last time…
“Thank you, Hecate,” I whisper weakly.
“Let her go immediately,” Celine demands, with a voice forged in iron. A voice from a time when weakness wasn’t an option. A voice that shakes the foundations of the mansion itself.
But Lazarus isn’t deterred. “You’ve wasted your time, progeny of Tudor Thornblade. This witch is going to die. And while you stay here talking to me, Cedric is invading your precious hotel. I’m sure he’s already captured your useless sisters, and is fortifying his position. If you leave now, you might have a chance to stop him.”
I blink, trying to process what he’s saying. Cedric is at the hotel? Possibly hurting Renata and Lexi? What about Xia and Nova?
I summon all of my effort. “Ce…Celine, you have to go! Save your s…sisters!”
My voice is weak, and hoarse. But Celine has vampiric hearing. And even if she couldn’t hear me, she knows what I would say.
She knows more about me than anyone else. Her eyes meet mine across the hall. Despite the resolve in her expression, they soften.
Maybe it’s the blood loss, or the adrenaline coursing through my veins…but time slows down.
I know how important getting revenge on Cedric is to Celine. It’s what she’s dreamed of for years. And the hotel, the empire she’s built…she can’t let those things go…
But I can see something different in her pale violet eyes. Something beyond the monster that she thinks she is. It’s the same look she gave me that night in the park. The first time she told me that she loved me.
“I’m warning you one last time, Lazarus Gray,” she says. “Let her go.”
The ancient vampire tosses his head back in a single, barking laugh.
“If you want her so badly,” he replies. “Come and get her.”
Then, in one movement, he grabs me by the neck and holds me up in the air, my legs dangling above the floor.
He squeezes my throat, and blood gushes down, soaking my chest. I cough and gasp, clawing at his hand with my fingers, my weak body instinctively hanging on for life.
Celine doesn’t hesitate. She swoops out of the air like a bat out of hell. She launches herself at Lazarus, powerfully enough that he drops me. I crumble to the ground, trying desperately to catch my breath.
She’s strong, and she’s ingested my blood, and therefore my light magic.
But so has Lazarus. And he’s much older than she is.
I watch as she struggles to reach the dagger-stake at her ankle. Lazarus hoists her up by her blazer and tosses her across the room. She lands in a pile of chairs, but quickly rights herself again.
