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“There’s nothing anyone can do,” Castor proudly declared. “What is done is done.”
I was so gonna obliterate that fucker. Not any time soon, though. He needed to suffer some first. And he would. We’d all make sure of it. But that brought me no satisfaction or comfort. How could it, when Lexi’s cries of pain echoed through the rainforest? I swallowed around the lump in my throat, brushing her hair away from her face.
Sam tilted her head, studying Castor intently. “You know the penalty for taking someone’s human life against their will. And yet, you took the risk of doing this here, where there was a better chance of someone tracking you. That’s not making sense to me.” A few moments later, a realisation appeared to dawn on her. “Oh, I get it. You thought you could do this right under our noses and then flee, right? You thought it would make me and Jared look weak.”
Jared sighed, giving Castor a look of mock sympathy. “That’s where people like you always fuck yourselves over. You care so much about avenging slights that it often overrides your sense of self-preservation.”
Motherfucking done here, I scooped up a trembling Lexi and stood. “I want to get her out of here. And I want him to pay for this in ways he would never have seen coming.”
“You cannot kill me,” Castor insisted.
“Not right at this moment, no,” agreed Sam. “But that’s fine. I don’t wish to kill you anyway. I have way bigger plans than that, and they all involve making you scream like a fucking banshee. Will that work for you, Damien?”
“It’s a start,” I replied.
Jared looked at Colm. “You’ll be a guest of our fine accommodations as well.”
The vampire’s eyes flickered. “I just t-teleported—”
“There’s no ‘just’ in the part you played,” Jared told him, his red irises flaring.
Castor’s breathing began to pick up. “If you hurt me, Lexi will feel my pain. You would put her through that?”
“Lexi won’t feel a thing,” said Jared. “Imani will sever the blood-link before we touch you. Of course, that won’t be until after the conversion is complete. You’re going to spend the rest of whatever years we allow you to live in a cell.”
Castor suddenly charged at him in vampire speed, a battle cry on his lips. A cry that ended abruptly when Jared swept out his arm and wacked Castor, sending the asshole careening into a tree.
Sam snickered at him, conjuring her energy whip. “You think you can provoke us into killing you?” She shook her head sadly. “Oh Castor, Castor, Castor.” She lashed out her whip, and it wrapped tight around his throat. She smiled. “We’re going to have so much fun with you.”
Hours later, I sat in the chair beside the bed on which a very pale Lexi lay, my elbows braced on my thighs. The convulsions had eased, and her cries had faded, but only because I’d had Chico use his poisonous thorns to make her unconscious so that she’d have a fucking break from the pain. That break wouldn’t last long, though. She’d fed from me several times already, but she’d need more blood soon. That need would snap her awake.
Cursing beneath my breath, I swiped a hand down my face. The conversion generally took three days, though it could sometimes take four or five. I couldn’t keep her unconscious throughout the entire conversion, because she needed to feed on blood to get through it. She needed to be awake for that part. Giving her blood through a drip wouldn’t work, and the bloodlust was powerful enough to drag her out of unconsciousness anyway.
The transformation was rough as fuck. I didn’t have vivid memories of my own, but I did remember the pain—there was nothing like it. Every part of you hurt from your teeth to your veins. Every breath seemed to burn your lungs. Every inch of your skin felt raw and hypersensitive, so that even the feel of the air dancing over your nerve-endings hurt like a mother.
There was no way to get comfortable, but still you slept every now and then … as if your brain knocked you clean out to give you whatever brief escapes it could. You’d never otherwise psychologically survive the all-consuming agony. You’d just check out. Disconnect from what was happening. Disappear into a corner of your mind to hide. Yeah, it was that bad.
Right from the very beginning, the need to feed was always there. Always. It made your stomach burn and cramp and pang. And when the bloodlust kicked in, it reduced you to your animal instincts.
I didn’t remember much about those times when I was somewhat feral and plagued by the drive to hunt. But I did remember when the need for sex crept in. Remembered the insanely intense arousal that never seemed to ease off, no matter how often I came. The sexual cravings didn’t replace the bloodlust, they enhanced it. And through it all, the pain was ever present. Not quite as crippling by that point, but there all the same.
