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He banked down the embers of his magic as he crossed to stand at the very edge of the pit across from her. Less than fifteen feet separated them and there was a scattering of bodies, some of them impaled on stakes he’d rigged in the few hours Amy and Gia had stolen to work on the magic for the pit. A few yards back, four bodies were crushed under a fall of rocks. If he’d had time, he could have laid traps to kill all of them. But Amy needed to face Ronna herself.
Hoping to give the human a chance to catch her breath, Sorin smirked at the evil bitch standing just over a dozen feet away. For a being like him, it might as well have been a foot. He could see every line that fanned out from Ronna’s eyes, could see the minute way her lids twitched.
“Hello, witch.” He let a cold smile settle on his face at the spark of nerves that lit her eyes.
“What?” She sputtered and pressed a hand to her chest. “Are you talking to me? I’m no witch. I’m a good, god-fearing woman!”
“Yes, so much so that you talked a woman into bleeding her child to help craft a hex.” Sorin smirked as Ronna blanched and fell back a few steps before she could stop herself. “Careful, witch. You look guilty.”
“You’re crazy,” she hissed.
“Am I?” Sorin crossed his arms over his chest. “So you never tried to make Amy help you catch men, women and children you thought were...what’s the term you idiot humans use these days...Preternaturals?”
“Well...yes, of course, I have. You people are unnatural, an affront to God!” She sniffed, but some of the murmuring around her reassured her and she looked calmer, more assured.
“An affront to God.” Sorin tapped a finger against his chin. “Perhaps you should take it up with your god, then, since He’s the one who let them be created and all. Or didn’t He create them? That’s a theological question for you, I’d say.”
More nervous murmurs rose. Sorin leaned forward and added, “You could try to argue they’re demons, I suppose, but then you’re arguing newborn babies are demons and since you live to kill these people you say are unnatural, Ronna...if there was a newborn baby in that house, would you tell your men to kill it?”
He saw the answer in her eyes.
And he saw the uneasiness in those who’d come with her, which only grew when she didn’t immediately respond. Several seconds ticked by and her silence grew heavier.
“Why...no! Of course I wouldn’t want a baby killed!” She laughed but it was strained and false.
Sorin smirked. While she glared at him, he leaped across the gaping pit and grabbed her arm.
They were all too stunned to comprehend what he’d done and reacted too slowly to keep him from throwing her over his shoulder and leaping back to his original spot.
Shoving his fist into her hair, he clutched it tight and murmured in her ear, “How many have died at your hand, Ronna? How many men, women...children?”
“I don’t kill children!” she said.
“Lies,” he whispered in her ear.
The reeking foulness of fear came from the men across from him and he lifted his head to seek out the source.
“Don’t move another step,” Sorin warned as a tall, stout man tried to edge away from his companions.
The man ignored him.
So Sorin let him move another five feet, far enough that he was away from the others—then he spat fire.
The man went up in a pillar of flame.
Ronna turned into a madwoman while everybody else froze.
“Have you figured out who I am, human?” he asked softly as she jerked and wrenched and tried to break free from his hold.
“Let me go!” she shrieked, almost insensible.
“I don’t think so.” Lifting one hand, he flashed it in front of her face, letting ebony black claws slide free and flash in the early morning sunlight. “You owe me answers, Ronna. I smell the death on you. You shed innocent blood on my land. That blood calls out to me. It demands vengeance.”
She twisted and jerked harder.
Sorin raked a claw down her face, drawing blood from one sliver-thin cut. As it welled up and the scent flooded the air, he said, “Shall I force the truth from you or will you talk?”
She froze as she felt her blood splatter down from her cheek to strike her chest.
