Sirens wail far off as we climb into our SUVs but none of us look back.
The city moves outside in blurs of neon and shadow. The bond whispers steadily to me now, quieter, but I can feel Cressida’s pulse in it, her unease, her stubborn fire. She doesn’t know what we’ve done tonight, not in detail, but she knows the monster in my blood is hungry.
“Closer,” I whisper to myself. “Every body brings me closer to your throat, Giselda, and before long I’ll be stepping on it.”
The Bogeyman doesn’t lose.
He doesn’t stop.
And tonight, the Bogeyman wasn’t hunting alone.
twenty-four
Konstantin
Istandundertheshower until the soap scrubs the night off my skin and the drain fills with the color of oil and sin. My knuckles peel when I scrub them as old skin gives way to newer, angrier scars. What’s left of me is raw and quiet, a man who looks in the mirror and still sees the storm.
The bond buzzes low in my ribs. Cressida feels me, the echo of what I’ve done skipping against her like a pulse. She doesn’t know the count of bodies we’ve dropped tonight, but she feels the weight of them on my soul.
I kill the water and towel off before sliding into clean clothes.
It doesn’t matter how many showers I take, though, the blood of the souls I’ve taken still clings to my skin.
She’s in the library when I walk out, curled in one of the leather chairs like she belongs to the room. A book is open on her lap untouched. Her feet are up on the armrest because she rules don’t interest her. Her eyes track me without flinching at the bruises or the way my jaw aches from clenching it all night.
“Rough night?” she asks.
“Effective,” I say, the word coming out harsher than I intended.
She tilts her head, tapping her sternum. “You’re humming in here.”
I pour vodka into a glass and lean against one of the bookcases. “Venatori.”
Her gaze sharpens as she sits up. “You’re finally going to tell me?”
Taking a long swallow, I let the burn hit as it glides smoothly down my throat. Then I set the glass down and meet her eyes. “Yes.”
Her brow lifts slightly, but she doesn’t push. She waits patiently for me to say it in my own way. “Our families were killing each other long before we were born,” I begin. “Bloodlines older than the cities that raised them. Enemies. They bled each other out until there wasn’t much left. War after war. Life after life. And then our people started disappearing. Started dying. And not from wars we fought. This time the threats came from outside of the bloodlines. So, they decided to stop feeding the feuds and build something else. Something that created peace when there shouldn’t be any. A covenant. A law. A secret society to help fight the evil that was targeting us all.”
“Venatori Nocturnus,” she says quietly.
“Yes. Five lines sworn by blood and oath. Hunters of the dark. We wear masks so the world doesn’t know which monster bows to. We move when the law fails.”
Her fingers curl on the arm of the chair and the hum of her gift brushes mine. This time I let it because there’s no lies here.
Cressida studies me. “You think she’s trying to copy your bloodlines. That’s what her drug is, right? This poison she’s feeding to people that’s killing them.”
I take a seat in the chair across from hers and fold my elbows on my knees. “Ourbloodlines, Cressida, yes. She thinks she can steal what we are and put it in a vial to sell it on a corner.”
“Can she?”
“No. Our blood collapses once it leaves the body. Cells fall apart like ash in water. The DNA unravels. You can’t bottle what we are. You can only be born with it. She can feed it into her experiments, but all she’ll make are monsters who burn themselves out. That’s why her addicts die screaming.”
She swallows. “You sound certain.”
“I am. What we are—you, me, the others with abilities—can’t be replicated. That’s why we exist. We carry power the world would corrupt if it could. This law keeps it from becoming a weapon.”
Her eyes go bright with anger and grief and something softer that hits me where I keep everything wrapped up. “People are dying because she’s trying.”
