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He’s laughing, but he isn’t trying to make this last; he knows how dangerous I am. Both blows were intended to kill, and it was only my speed and skill that stopped them. I just need to get control of myself. But the rage within me doesn’t seem like it wants to die down.
“You put up more of a fight than your family did.”
I cry out in anger and lash out at him. Balor catches my sword arm and twists till the joint screams and I’m forced to drop the blade.
“On your knees.”
He forces me down, twisting harder, claws digging into me. I can barely see, blinded by pain, but through the red haze of my peripheral vision, I see Balor raise the knife.
“So glad that this time I get to kill you myself.”
Though Suisse jumped from the tower of her own will, Balor killed Suisse as sure as he killed his brother.
But that was Suisse. Not Jo. Not Joanna Delvigne. I’ve killed monsters of every size and shape. I know my trade, honed through the years. I’m the best in the business. And that means no damned monster is going to kill me.
As Balor’s knife falls, I yank my body forwards. The pain in my shoulder is almost unbearable, but the move is so unexpected, that Balor goes with me and sinks his knife into his own forearm. He shrieks as much in anger as in pain and his grip on my wrist loosens so I can pull myself free, clutching my wrenched shoulder.
“You bitch!” Balor snarls.
“That’s no way to speak to your wife,” I manage.
My sword is gone, but the bobby blade that had once belonged to my mother is in my hand and I fling it with an accuracy gained over years of fighting, years of waiting, years of honing my skills. The blade pierces Balor’s right eye, and he shrieks again. In the next instant, I’m on him, stake in hand, and I plunge the wooden spike straight into his chest.
I keep my eyes on his as the look of shock and horror passes across his face. Instantly, his gargoyle form recedes into that of a man. Then the expanse of flesh-toned skin begins to take on a grey pallor that creeps up from his neck, across his cheeks, colonizing his face. Cracks skirt across what was once skin and now seems to be turning to stone as I watch, before crumbling into dust.
Then, from the heart of the dust, a bead of light rises like a firefly, zipping out and up and across the room, heading for the ceiling.
When Balor falls, the monsters instantly know it and fall back. They no longer have any reason to be here, no one driving them, their stomach for the fight has gone as well as the mind control Balor had over them. Now this is no longer their fight. This leaves Derith fighting the last few hanging on (some literally hanging onto the rafters), but even those flee as the bead of light strikes, making Derith glow from head to toe, shifting awkwardly back into his human form.
Which means he can no longer cling to the ceiling.
“What the…?”
He drops to the floor with a thud andI rush over to where he lies. “Are you alright?”
He nods. “Something broke my fall.”
I look over at that thing.“It’s an ogre.”
“Thank God,” he answers on a chuckle. “I thought I’d broken the furniture.” His amber eyes train on me. “You look different.”
“I feel different,” I nod.
“Different how?”
“Free.”
“Good feeling,” Derith mumbles, half to himself.
“Are you sure you’re alright?”
He nods again, but doesn’t seem quite sure. “I… don’t know why I changed from my gargoyle form… And now… I feel… myself.”
“That’s good.”
“No.” His face is a mask of confusion. “I mean yes, but… I…” He looks down at his hand as if this is the first time he’s ever seen it and rotates it under his gaze, his frown deepening. “I don’t know how it’s possible, but I don’t believe I’m a vampire any longer.”
And as he says the words, the first shafts of dawn sunlight stream through the window to hit him full force in the face.
