Chapter 33
Bash
Every day that passes, it becomes easier to let defeat creep into my heart.
We spend every night scouring this wretched city and in 2 weeks, we have not found a single thing to indicate Elina is still in the city, or even still alive.
Sarah has withdrawn into herself and rarely speaks to us about anything but our next plan. A week ago, Rian called and let us know that Amelie hadn’t been to work and no one is able to locate her.
“Amelie is missing, Bash,” Sarah tells me as she hangs up the phone. It was Rian—I recognized her voice on the other end of the phone.
“What do you mean? Since when?” I ask. Jack looks at me questioningly. “Amelie is the waitress I was with the night I met Elina.”
His eyes widen with recognition. “Seems you may be the target after all, Bash. That is definitely personal.”
Ethan spends every night trying to draw Sarah out of her misery and encourage her to live in her immortality.
Jack strategizes with our allies and walks the streets of the French Quarter from dusk til dawn every night.
And me? I do everything in between. I search. I strategize. I plan. I have almost worn a path in the streets. I have stopped at the door of every house and business in the quarter. Everyone else mimics my movements in the other parts of the city. I try to lighten the mood. I lash out in fury and take my anger out on the streets. On more than one occasion, I have antagonized someone until we’ve come to trading blows, even Jack wasn’t spared my wrath. Standing, our chests heaving, covered in blood, I finally gain some mental clarity.
Every French-speaking vampire in the city is seen as a potential suspect—too many have fallen by my own hand. There is no such thing as innocence when the other half of my soul is missing.
“Where is she?” I ask the tall man hanging from my outstretched arm by his neck.
“I- I don’t- Sebastien, I have no idea,” he says, sobbing through his words.
“Well, you have about thirty seconds to tell me anything you know about her disappearance before I rip your head off.”
“I don’t know who has her, I don’t even know her!”
His words fuel the anger that is residing in my chest as I squeeze his throat, tighter and tighter. I feel blood start to seep between my fingers wrapped around his neck. Giving my arm a twist, I hear the thunk of his head landing next to my foot as his light flares before going out. Dropping his body, I draw my foot back and kick his severed head into the brick wall ahead of me.
It smashes hard and bounces, hitting the ground, blood splattering me.
We are falling apart without the glue for our family.
I know she is alive, she has to be. If she isn’t, there is nothing left for me. I will find her, and if I don’t, I will burndown every single building in this city until I know what happened to her.
Sometimes, I feel her like a phantom at my back, but when I turn—she’s gone.
“Fuck. I wish I knew where to go from here,” Jack speaks quietly as we walk the streets, listening for even a whisper of a clue.
It’s the 5th night in a row we have started from the outside edges of the city and worked our way to the Velvet Tomb where we end the night in commiseration with a glass of whiskey. The City of Blood feels hushed, like a blanket has been thrown over it. The humans have retreated into their safe places—the increased presence of vampires walking around, searching and inquiring, has made everyone jumpy. It feels as though even the air in the French Quarter is full of angst, the very stones that hold up the city are aware that something is wrong. Zelie told her all those months ago, that her blood is in the land and she is a part of this place, and now, I find it a little easier to believe that’s true.
Marcus has granted me a progressively larger army as the days wear on. He didn’t want his soldiers involved, but once Talia told us who has Elina, he knew he could no longer wait on the side-lines. The French gaining a foothold in our territory is a threat to us all, even if we didn’t know who she was at the time. He still won’t allow me to pull people from their homes, or destroy the city, in my search but every day that passes is one day closer to me snapping and embracing the darkest parts of my nature.
Telling my family and the council that Elina is the lost daughter of Ezekiel Devereaux was the turning point.
I think back to the night as my feet walk down the familiar path, recalling the stunned faces of everyone in the room.
“Mother, Marcus, I have some news to share.”
“Did you find her? Do you have anything?” Mother asks me inquisitively.
“No. And yes. We haven’t found her but we have foundsomething.” I pause and take a deep breath. Marcus notices my hesitance and narrows his eyes. “I met with Elina’s grandmother tonight. She revealed something she has not even told Elina.” Curiosity turned to hunger in my mother’s eyes, ravenous for information.
“She is…Ezekiel Devereaux’s daughter.” I say it plainly, letting it drop into the room like a bomb. Marcus looks slightly stunned and my mother’s mouth gapes open.
