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She turned her black gaze on me, and I took an involuntary step back.
“Yes,” she murmured, voice silky. “But I have nothing to fear from you; do I, Risa dear?”
I felt like a rabbit caught in the spotlight, only this particular one shone with a dark, dark light and promised a bloody, brutal death.
“Your threats grow tedious, Hunter.” Azriel’s voice held little inflection and no doubt for good reason. It wouldn’t take much to set her off. “And you are here for the Jorõgumo, remember.”
“Yes.”
Hunter’s gaze returned to the caged spider, and the energy radiating off her suddenly spiked. Only it wasn’t aimed at any of us, but rather the Jorõgumo herself. Her form began to flicker, change, shrink, until what stood before us was once again a woman.
A woman who looked suddenly scared.
Just for a fraction of a second, I almost felt sorry for her. Then I remembered what she was and what she’d done. The death Hunter was about to give her was surely quicker than the one she’d given any of her victims.
“Lower the force of your flames and allow me access,” Hunter said.
Chills raced across my skin. There was nothing human behind those words.
Lower Amaya’s flames so they leash just her legs, Azriel said.
I echoed his words to my sword, and she obeyed. Hurry must, she said. Weak growing for both.
Yes, it was. I bit my lip and tried to ignore the fact that my head felt like it was about to explode.
Amaya’s flames followed Valdis’s down the Jorõgumo’s body until they encased just the lower half of her legs. The spider-spirit didn’t move. I suspected the energy radiating off Hunter had a whole lot to do with that.
“For the crime of killing four, you are sentenced to death,” Hunter said, stepping so close to the Jorõgumo that she was practically in her face. “But for the crime of killing one of those four, you are sentenced to death by me.”
And with that, she attacked.
But she didn’t just sink her teeth into the Jorõgumo’s neck and drink her blood. She rendered her apart and consumed everything.
Absolutely everything.
Even her soul.
Chapter 11
It was sheer survival mode that kept me rooted to the spot and watching, even though every instinct in my body was screaming to get the hell out of there—to get away from the monster that was consuming one of its own kind.
Hunter might not be a Jorõgumo, but given what I was witnessing, it was impossible to think of her as just another vampire—however powerful and old she was.
Normal vampires didn’t consume flesh and bone and brain matter. Normal vampires didn’t drink souls.
How I didn’t lose the entire contents of my stomach, I’ll never know.
Unbidden, Harry Stanford’s words came back into my mind. Oh, trust me, she long ago mastered the art of hiding what she truly is.
I guess the question that needed answering now was, what sort of monster had she become?
Unfortunately, it wasn’t a question I could exactly ask anyone in the know. I had a more than vague suspicion questioning Hunter herself would not be a good idea, and the only other people I could approach who might have some clue were Uncle Quinn and Harry Stanford himself. Both were out of the question, for very different reasons.
So I swallowed the bile backing up in my throat, kept my knees locked, and ignored the ever-increasing shuddering in both Amaya’s steel and my body. And found myself looking anywhere but at the scene in front of me.
But it seemed to take far too long for the Jorõgumo to meet her end.
My knees and Amaya’s flames gave out at the exact same time. I hit the floor with a grunt and drew in shuddery breaths, my head swimming and my body on fire.
