“I have the power over souls,” Fallon informed us. His face softened. “And over these creatures.” He waved a hand, and three reapers trotted into the room. Cupcake scampered in, pushing her way through the legs of the older reaper dogs. Her pink tongue lolled out like a tiny goof where the other jackals remained: stately sentries. I recognized Anead, Secnarf, and Idurt.
I hadn’t seen hide nor tail of the reapers, or Cupcake, since Grim fragmented in my arms.
This time, the sob broke. An animalistic wail emerged from my mouth. The dogs immediately jumped on the bed and covered me in a dog pile. Several more followed in until I was buried in reaper dogs.
Fallon stepped out of the room to give us a moment, while Timothy crossed over to sit on the edge of the bed. One of the reapers, Ydnic, sat next to him. Timothy held a hesitant hand out, then finally smoothed the fur along the canine’s face. Timothy’s shoulders relaxed a fraction.
Though Miranda couldn’t see the dogs, she didn’t say a word. Just kept stroking my hair.
“We’ve been weighing hearts for thousands of centuries. Grim and I had been through wars, plagues, and all manner of tragedies. Our work has been important as the souls came and went, but Grim and I were a constant team.”
I wasn’t the only one who lost. Gently pushing the dog pile away, I crawled over to wrap my arms around Timothy from behind. Miranda lay her head against his shoulder, and we stayed there in a bundle of pain and solace. Cupcake nosed her way between us until she made it onto Timothy’s lap. She looked up at Timothy’s face and whined before nuzzling into him.
Miranda and I had an unspoken understanding. We knew loss. Her husband, my parents. But Timothy lived in a world where he didn’t have to endure the absence of someone who’d lodged themselves into the place where your heart had been. Timothy, Thoth, was a powerful god. He’d seen time erode land and people cross the threshold to the afterlife, but this rocked him.
We stayed like that for a time. Some of the tension left my body in the embrace. I’d never had friends like this, friends who would share in heavy emotions, and I didn’t realize how much their mere presence would affect me.
Finally, Miranda stood up. “As much as I want to let you stay in bed to mourn, from what I understand, we have some bigger problems about to go down.” Her tone was somehow gentle yet firm. “Now I didn’t go on a heist with a couple of rabbits to steal an ancient, powerful weapon, only to leave it discarded.” It was true. She hadn’t let the sword out of her sight since she took possession of it.
The need for vengeance reignited its light, though the heaviness in my soul dulled it. A leaden ache that only Grim’s arms wrapping around me would soothe. But the spark was enough to get me to my feet. I pulled on some shorts and walked out into the living room, where Fallon waited.
As if sensing the change in mood, the reaper dogs disappeared, until only Cupcake remained. I missed the pack already.
On a day like this, as a human, I’d end up in the bakery below my crappy apartment with one of those perfect cupcakes to fill the emptiness in my heart. Grim had offered once to get me a dozen, since I couldn’t visit the Cupcakery when it operated during the day, but I politely declined. I explained there was an entire experience we’d miss out on. I always loved getting to pick out my pastry in the sunny shop. The entire place smelled of sugar and the glass case was always packed with fancy and whimsical desserts
But right now, not even a hundred of those cupcakes could fill the black hole inside my being.
Fallon sat hunched over, forearms resting on his knees, with a thousand-yard stare. He acted like he’d been given a death sentence. Yes, I recognized the irony of that statement.
“Where is she?” I asked, gathering my hair up into a ponytail. Cupcake trotted in beside me as if ready to do her best to help, though she was only a pup.
Fallon’s gaze tilted up at me, not moving from his pensive repose. “She did as she said she would. The concealment spell and the wards disappeared once Grim did. Nothing kept Galina from sensing her sister, so she went directly to Sekhmet at the rest home, where Grim had hidden her. Then Galina woke her up. The Original needed to feed and turned everyone there into a sekhor.”
“We have to stop them,” Miranda said. “We have the Blade of Bane and between you and Timothy, you can take down Galina and Sekhmet while the numbers are still even.”
“That’s not exactly true,” Bianca said, appearing from the library. Sadness hovered around her like a gauzy film, but she floated toward us in her usual elegance. “Galina has gone to great lengths to shake the chain, enough times and with enough force that many of the gods who seek change have immediately joined her ranks. They practically lined up. Sekhmet is turning humans in sekhors, and the gods are snatching the vampires right up, forcing or coercing some sekhors to drink of their blood. They’ve made blood bonds, which means there are far more of them than us.”
Numbness spread through my body again as the nightmare continued to only worsen. I sat on the couch, curling up into a ball, my arms wrapped around my legs. Cupcake jumped up and settled on my feet.
Miranda sucked in a deep breath, as if preparing to say something unpleasant. “I hate to say this, but I’m going to say what everyone is thinking. Maybe Vivien should drink from Fallon? That way she can help you guys kick butt. Or, if nothing else, do it for her protection?”
Without Grim’s supercharged blood, I was back to being a normal vampire. Galina immediately demonstrated how far I’d fallen sans my suped-up divine strength and stamina.
Fallon and I looked at each other. I knew my face mirrored the reluctance on his. Drinking from Grim had always been an incredibly intimate experience. If I drank Fallon’s blood, it wouldn’t only feel like a betrayal to Grim, it would also be like frenching my brother. Ick.
“I know, not ideal,” Miranda said, reading the room. “But it makes logical sense.”
“It makes a kind of sense,” Bianca agreed with a grimace as her fingers dug into the back of a leather chair. Fallon shot her a look I couldn’t decipher. Perhaps it was a surprise, or maybe disappointment?
I loved how Miranda tried to organize things into their rightful little boxes, but that wasn’t how I operated. I followed my heart. Sure, it got me into some trouble, and it certainly didn’t earn me any marks in intelligence, but it was my design. And I had to follow what was right for me.
“No,” I shook my head. “I can’t. I’d rather go back to drinking pig’s blood.” Every bit of me screamed in revolt against the idea. Drink something other than the nectar from the neck of the one I wanted and needed more than anything or anyone? I felt sick at the thought. But it was still better than jumping to the next willing god. I was a one-god girl.
Fallon’s shoulders fell an inch and he let out a breath, as if relieved. He didn’t want to enter a blood bond with me any more than I wanted to with him. Bianca turned her face down. Did she try to her hide her relief? If I weren’t so weighed down, I might have been able to decipher what was going on with the two of them.
Timothy was on his feet in a moment, straightening his suit jacket as best he could. “I’ll arrange for the blood.” He seemed grateful for the task.
Miranda paced behind the couch where I stayed curled up. “So if we need to stop this new vampire uprising, we need to know why Grim was the only one who could stop the sekhors in the first place?”
