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Serge grabbed his hand with ferocious intensity. “You can do it, blood-child. With her.” His voice dropped further, beseeching. “You must.”
Dominique waited for the mad fire to ebb from Serge’s gaze before he pulled his hand free. “Of course,” he murmured. “Of course, I will.” Everything he did of late, he did for or with Cassidy. Delivering his sire to the executioner would be no exception.
On his way out, he pocketed the keys to the Striker van from the kitchen counter. That vehicle had proved invaluable in transporting both Kambyses and Dominique’s bike this morning. Now it waited in the driveway for the next and final leg of their journey.
A figure with bright, unbound hair swirling around her shoulders hurried up the driveway toward the cottage. Dominique suppressed the impulse to vanish before Samantha noticed him. It would be the last contact he would have with her. He owed her a farewell.
She didn’t spot him on the porch until she was halfway up the stairs and pulled up with a small gasp. “Dominique. Have you seen Serge?” When he didn’t respond right away, she continued. “He acted strange this morning—well, stranger than usual—and didn’t tell me much of what happened last night. I think he’s still having visions. Bad ones.”
She drew her fringed shawl tighter and hugged herself as though bracing for something unseen. An unexpected new sorrow pricked at Dominique. Samantha cared deeply for the old pirate and would grieve his death. Through Serge, she had touched eternity. Without him, she would never be the same—because of what Dominique was about to do.
Unwelcome doubt welled as he held her troubled gaze. How many humans would discover their blood-drinker friends and maybe even lovers mysteriously dead tonight? And how many would find themselves free of cruel blood-drinker masters? What was it he would deliver to the world of night? Overdue justice? Unspeakable anguish? He knew why he was breaking Cassidy’s heart—it was the only way to keep her safe—but what about all the others and the mortal lives they affected?
Samantha’s tentative touch on his forearm brought him back to the moment. “Dominique? Where is he? What’s going on?”
On impulse, he pulled her into his arms, this gentle, courageous woman, his erstwhile enemy’s sister. She went stick-stiff with surprise. “Merci,” he whispered. “Thank you.”
She relaxed a little. “For what?”
“For your faith in us. Serge and I don’t deserve it, but we are better for it.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead and released her.
“You don’t deserve to suffer,” she said, gathering her shawl around her, along with her rattled composure.
“Our suffering will end soon.”
“That sounds…not good.”
He dragged a small smile to his face. “Serge is inside.”
When she glanced at the door, Dominique silently vanished.
At the beach, a cold winter wind blasted from the northeast. Dry sand flew across the ground like swarming snakes, and the sea, blacker than night, boiled with silvered foam beneath a full moon. He didn’t have far to go. The gnarly old sea grape that marked the spot shivered in the wind as he dug into the soft soil underneath.
It wasn’t long before the rug lay exposed, quietly oozing a smoky scent. Dominique knelt over it, contemplating. All he had to do now was pick it up and carry it away, the same way he had carried it here this morning. Put it in the van, drive to the airport, hand it over. That was it. The end. He had seen the last of Kambyses and his world of horrors.
Also, the last of life.
And the last of hope.
His hands fisted on his thighs. Becoming a blood-drinker had not been his choice. Countless times since then, he tried to end his nightmarish existence, but the beast never allowed it. So, instead, he had dared to hope. Hope for some small measure of redemption, and of seeing the sun again.
This time, the choice was his. Nothing would stop him. This time, he would succeed. His life would end, and with it, all his hopes.
For so long, Dominique had been sure about this decision he no longer believed was his. Now that it was at hand, the finality of it reared up before him with staggering power. For himself, he thought he was still sure—maybe—but what of the others he was about to condemn? The untold thousands who would never know what happened and had no choice at all? Would he, in death, be the monster he fought so hard not to become?
A dizzying wave of fury blasted through him. Dominique’s entire body vibrated with a deep growl as he seized the edge of the roll and ripped it open, fully intending to do the same with the contents. A simple death at the hands of mortals was too good for this creature who had taken his body, gutted his soul, and made him his puppet.
Then the head appeared, and he stopped, uncertain again.
No black-eyed glare met him, nor cold indifference. The eyes were closed and sunken, and the face…the face was gaunt as an old corpse, the web of dark veins beneath the translucent skin denser than ever. Was this how ancients died slowly? Desiccate the way the arms and legs had desiccated in the sunlight?
Dominique tore more of the rug, revealing the chest. This, too, was thin, almost birdlike, with ribs and hide wrapped in a fine silk shirt. His anger ebbed further, replaced by a new sense of nameless dread. Kambyses’s blood was a fiery sludge. It didn’t flow, and hadn’t left him in great enough quantities to explain this. Not last night, and not since, judging by how little of it marred the rug.
Hands shaking, he ripped the thick fabric all the way across, and had his answer. Kambyses hadn’t wasted away so much as redistributed himself. This was how blood-drinkers recovered from severe injuries. Tissue in one part of the body dissolved and re-formed elsewhere in whatever form was required. He had witnessed this several times, but never like this.
The ancient body had healed the “injury” of his missing limbs.
New matchstick arms and legs extended from the hacked-off shirt sleeves and abbreviated pant legs. They looked impossibly delicate, these new appendages, but they would be more than enough. Kambyses was essentially restored.
