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Jesus. I’d thought it strange when he was behaving like a manic child, toying with me in a gleeful way. The guy was nuts, but given how much he hated me I thought this whole situation had been strange from top to bottom. But here it was, the venomous loathing I’d been expecting. This was the Peyton I’d visited when he was chained in the darkness. This was the Peyton who had promised he’d see me dead someday.
And here I was, a pawn for him to use as he pleased.
If he wanted to chain me, he would do it.
I drew my sword.
“You’re going to have to take me down first.”
Chapter Thirteen
In the low light from the candles above, my sword didn’t gleam so much as it glowed a dark hellish red color. The handle felt warm in my hands although I hadn’t touched it in over an hour.
Peyton laughed again, and I didn’t like how dismissive he was being.
“I want to talk about you while we have all these people here. I want to talk about what a strange girl you are. Put away your toy. We’re only talking right now.”
I lowered the blade but didn’t sheathe it. My gaze darted side to side, trying to come up with any way I might be able to get up on even ground with him. But that would mean leaving Desmond behind.
I doubted they’d dropped him in here—he wouldn’t have withstood the fall in his wolf form since he’d have landed on his back or broken all four legs. Wolves, while quick and cunning, were not cats, and did not tend to land nimbly on their feet. Maybe there was a gate or door down here we could get out through. Unless he’d been human when they dropped him and the change had come after.
I looked down at the wolf for a split second, wishing he could tell me what had happened to him.
“I think it’s important there are others here to listen this time, Secret. Secret. What an apt name for you, don’t you think? I used to think it was a foolish thing, a stupid name.”
I often thought it was a stupid name.
He carried on when I didn’t reply. “But therein lies beauty, doesn’t it? People will not look much further into a name like that. I remember what you told your mother, that it came from her own letter. Keep her secret. The time is over for keeping secrets, though.”
What the fuck was he talking about?
“It’s a shame Sig isn’t here now to get you out of this. Isn’t the big bad Tribunal leader always saving you when you’re at risk of being exposed?”
A chill crept into my body and refused to leave, making me shiver uncontrollably, shaking so hard I didn’t know if I could keep holding the sword, let alone use it when I needed to.
I had an unsettling feeling I knew exactly what he was talking about.
“Secret McQueen, the only Tribunal leader in history who wasn’t a full vampire.” The smile came through in his voice, and though I couldn’t see his face, I knew he was grinning like a maniac. “How does that work?”
“I’m half-vampire,” I whispered, but the acoustics of the tunnel amplified my voice as it rose upwards.
“What’s the other half?”
My palms were sweaty, and I took a moment to wipe them both off and held the sword up again, wanting nothing more than to hack him to pieces. But he was out of my reach. Desmond sensed my building rage and growled in response, rubbing his giant head against me as if it might soothe me.
“Human,” I said, not sure why I was still bothering to lie. Peyton knew—he knew what I was because he’d sent The Doctor for me. He knew because he’d worked with my mother. I had spent almost twenty-four years able to keep this secret limited to a handful of people, and now a roomful of vampire rogues was about to learn the truth.
This wasn’t the coming-out party I had planned.
“Now, now, let’s not lie to each other. What’s the other half? It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to do the math. Those in this room may not be geniuses, but they’re smart enough to figure it out now, I think. What kind of vampire can make a werewolf kneel before her? What kind of vampire has a werewolf mother? What kind of vampire is wed to a werewolf king? Honestly, Secret, did you expect to hide it forever when you paraded the clues around like that? What’s the other half? Say it. I think you’ll find it quite liberating.”
He was right. The lie was pointless now. “Werewolf,” I grumbled.
“Speak up, dear, the back row didn’t quite hear you.”
I gripped the handle of the sword tighter, feeling the dragon inlay dig into my skin. I would rip him apart. Beheading was too kind.
“Werewolf,” I repeated.
