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Chapter 16
My only regret as I closed in on the area of the city where Lazarus’s feeding community used to be was that I hadn’t been able to grab weapons from whatever remained of Dark Iron. It hadn’t been the best of ideas. Aside from the fact that my workshop might have been swarming with cops and emergency services right now trying to quell the flames, I wasn’t exactly trained in swordsmanship.
I was, however, very skilled in how Mrak’s presence had altered me. In the fire magic now at my fingertips. And with an extra boost of power lingering closer and closer, I’d use that magic to finish what I’d started. To burn Lazarus—his memory and the remnants of his community—to the ground, turned to dust and ashes.
I felt the change happening in real time. This transformative fire searing me from the inside out. Not painful, but changing. I was more okay with leaving everything I had been before today behind.
When this coven was gone, all of us survivors would be safe from them once and for all. Me. Willa. Everyone.
I slowed as I approached the couple of blocks that’d been burned in my escape from Lazarus’s feeder community. I’d started the breakout, burning every vampire who dared get close, killing those who clutched to feeders even as flames erupted around them. But when it came to taking down everything Lazarus’s community had been, Mrak had taken over and caused all of this destruction.
I smiled as I strode through the remains of that community now. I’d expected returning here to be difficult. But with Mrak at my side and his magic at my fingertips, it was easy to keep my chin raised high and my pace even. The past was gone, burned away, and all that existed was the future promised after today’s events.
Just ahead, in the middle of the ring of burned blocks, was a newer structure still with construction plastic on the windows. It stood out amongst the charred rubble and scorched earth that smelled as though parts of the area were still burning to this day.
I wasn’t deterred. It was a pretty front, but I’d been around Lazarus’s coven and their magic long enough to know an illusion when I saw it.
“There,” I said to Mrak as I kept walking. “Ahead. They’ll have used magic to create a new fortress below the earth, just like the last community. They’ve done a decent job of hiding it, though. It just looks like the neighborhood is about to be rebuilt.”
“You’re well acquainted with their ways.”Mrak’s presence coiled around me tightly like armor.
“Lucky for us, I don’t think they’re quite expecting your power to come from me.”
I doubt Cassius had predicted I’d show up to finish the job. If they’d threatened me in my shop instead of outright killing me, it was possible that Cassius thought I didn’t have the relationship with Mrak that I did. Val and her enforcers had never had the chance to return to him and tell him the truth.
A swell of magic sent flames churning around my fingers and up both arms in all shades. White-hot flames danced on my fingertips, leading to cooler orange flames around my arms. But just at the edges, I noted hints of black flames—shadows, almost, like Mrak’s form sometimes took.
“I’ve given you all the power I can in this form,”Mrak said.“If I were corporeal or you changed, then I could do more.”
My jaw locked hard. “You’ll be here soon enough.” I was determined to see this through. If killing Cassius and his coven for all the death they’d dealt, if this justice wasn’t enough to see Mrak to this plane and then through a portal to Kithonia, I’d find more vampiric criminals. New York City was full of them and their covens. But the last thing Mrak had said stuck in my mind. “What do you mean if I was changed?”
I felt monstrous arms close in around me, holding me close even while I approached the smaller, new-construction building. It appeared empty, much like the space around me despite Mrak’s ethereal presence.
“If you were like me and my kind,”Mrak whispered in my ear, his tone alluring.“You could hold more of our power. Develop your own.”
“Is that possible? Wouldn’t that defeat the purpose of our pact?”
I’d reached the front of the new structure now. There was still not a single vampire guard. Cassius must have been utterly full of himself to assume they’d not be found—or that anyone wouldn’t want to come knocking. Not that the cops seemed to care. I was convinced the police in New York City turned a blind eye as long asthesevampires didn’t go hunting in the streets.
“Once Cassius and his coven is gone and a portal to Kithonia is open, our pact would be complete,”Mrak whispered.“You’d come with me, be mine. And I could help you become something so powerful, no one would dare challenge you again.”
My grin widened. I so very much loved the sound of that. “Then let’s do it.”
I wrapped my hand around the locked door handle and melted the metal before opening the door. I was more than sure that once I got deeper inside Cassius’s vampire den, I’d be swiftly overwhelmed and outnumbered. So as I stepped through the threshold and the light of day gave way to the hidden, dimly lit interior I knew I’d find, I pressed myself into the shadows. Stealth was the only way I’d get to Cassius.
Hidden by an illusion from the outside was a manor built with magical skill unlike many mages could construct. Luckily, those mages tended to flit around from feeder community to feeder community, never staying in one place for long because their power was both sought and too dangerous to keep. I’d even heard rumors that the rich elite of the country hired those mages to make them secret homes and paradises, a dimension tucked away by magic and hidden from view by illusions.
I’d burned through one such illusion one year ago and then leveled the surrounding buildings once it was gone. I’d do so again easily enough with this power boost. Mrak’s increased magic coursed through me, making me feel alive and ten times stronger all at once. It wasn’t just a confidence boost, but a raw energy pulsing within me, like flames growing larger and larger.
It sought release, and I sought revenge.
I continued deeper into Cassius’s manor den, weaving through corridors of red marble floors, blood-red wall decor, and way too many memories. Cassius’s manor was much cheerier than Lazarus’s had been. Where my previous captor had favored dark and dreary motifs to make his vampires feel at home and his feeders without hope, Cassius seemed to keep his den more posh-looking. A gilded cage, and a higher-scale restaurant. That was all this place was for vampires and feeders.
My stomach churned as I made my way through the halls, hoping to find Cassius quickly. I knew I wouldn’t. But that hope—and Mrak’s power—kept me from falling into a full-blown panic attack at the realization that I was inside a feeding community again.
But why the hell was it soquiet?
That was when I heard it—a bloodcurdling scream that echoed through the corridors of Cassius’s den. I swallowed hard and charged toward it. Sounds of a fight coursed through the corridors, and before I even got close to where the action was, two vampires ran toward me with guns drawn.
