Page 48 of Cold Sacrifice

The pity I’d had for the necromancer had fled with the spirits, apparently, because all I wanted to do was kill her. I wanted to protect Farrow, too. Bastien was a master, and he could take care of himself.

At least, that was what I believed.

What he wanted more than the necromancer’s death was Farrow’s freedom. He would save her, and the rest of us would handle the necromancer.

I was good with that.

The necromancer, of course, had other ideas. She wanted to kill the master, but first, she wanted to see him suffer. She would know how much he loved Farrow. It was likely she’d known them both on a personal level, right before Bastien had helped bury her alive.

The only person missing was Joe, and I hated that. It was just one more reason for me to put the necromancer back in the ground where she belonged. Truly dead, of course.

I flew across the ground, my blade smoking, eager to get to her before someone else did. I was a little selfish that way. My alpha kept pace with me, and somewhere behind us were Remy, Zach, and Rick, and behind them would be Sam, who would have all our backs.

I thought it was foolish of the necromancer to come along, dragging Farrow like a recalcitrant child, thinking she could survive us all.

But that wasn’t what she thought at all.

Bastien reached her before I did, but he went straight for Farrow, and god, was he fast. The necromancer, though, was ready for him.

And she was a vampire too.

Before he could grab his favorite—who’d already been through ten lifetimes of sheer hell—the necromancer hooked an arm around her throat and dragged her backward, a stake to her heart.

Bastien didn’t care. He would not let Farrow be taken by the enemy, not ever again. He’d done that once.

Just as he grabbed Farrow, I saw dozens of vampires rush from the trees. Not all the vampires were Bastien’s.

The strength of the necromancer was unbelievable. It was seriously unmatchable.

What nonhuman could call and mind-control vampires, some of the most powerful supernaturals on earth? And yet she was doing it—not just with one vampire, but with dozens.

And we would fight them all. I wasn’t about to do what the necromancer probably expected me to do and ignore her as I went for the vampires currently attacking. Maybe she believed I’d let her and Bastien fight for Farrow.

Maybe she thought I’d mind my own damn business because I was afraid she’d get her hands on my Joe.

But I was going to kill her.

Not even thinking of the danger I posed to Farrow, who was currently fighting against Bastien as she tried to help the necromancer end her life, I slammed my body against the necromancer and viciously thrust my demon blade into her stomach.

And in that one moment, she lost her grip on Farrow. Not on her body, but on her mind. It wouldn’t matter how tightly she held Farrow, though. Bastien wasn’t leaving her there. He wrenched the girl away from the necromancer. At what cost to Farrow I couldn’t tell and didn’t care.

There wasn’t time to care. But I saw the blood hanging in the air, and I saw Farrow collapse. I saw Bastien disappear with her held in his arms. He’d fix her the way he’d fixed her a thousand times before.

Then I forgot Farrow and Bastien and the fact that the master wasn’t there to help fight his own vampires or the necromancer who was compelling them to fight.

Then the necromancer screamed into my face, screamed as I dragged my knife straight up from her belly to her chest. “Demon,” she screamed. “Demon!”

And she didn’t die. She didn’t even weaken. She was like a bloodless, unkillable lump of evil clay, and though I could hurt her, I could not kill her. I wrenched my blade free and stabbed her through the heart, over and over, faster than even I should have been able to move, but she didn’t fall.

She didn’t die.

Honestly, in that moment, I felt like a demon.

And then she pulled me close, forcing the blade deeper into her body, and whispered, “It’s your fault that he dies. It’s your fault that they all die. One more chance, Kait Silver. One more offer. Leave Bastien to defend himself. That’s all I want. The master. His life for theirs.”

Before the fear could quite take hold of me, she melted into the ground. Simply slipped into it like she was a handful of dirt, and she disappeared.

The sounds of the fight going on around me finally sank in, now that I wasn’t laser focused on the necromancer, and terrified, I whipped around to do what I should have done in the first place.