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“I don’t care. I don’t want to leave him.”
Della stands, refusing to let go. My weak struggles are nothing against her vampire strength. I don’t care if Elizabeth finds me and kills me for murdering him. It’s what I deserve.
“Take her to my room,” Cassius orders. “I will clean up this mess.”
Without another word, Della shifts so my good arm is around her neck. It’s a losing battle. When I don’t cooperate, she throws me over her shoulder.
“My room,” I say.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she says.
“Please.”
Della hesitates but changes course, speeding in the opposite direction and up the stairs to my sparse room. She settles me into the lumpy bed and removes my blood-soaked clothes, giving me a large shirt to wear—one of Alaric’s.It still smells like him.With swift, efficient movements, Della cleans and wraps my arm, then covers me with the blankets. I shift to my side and turn my back on her.
“I will return later to check on your cut.” Then after a long silence, she adds, “I am truly sorry it turned out this way.”
A moment later, the door clicks shut.
I promised Alaric I would save him, then took his life instead. This is a horrible nightmare. My face is hot and damp with tears that refuse to stop. I cry until there’s nothing left but empty sobs and bone deep exhaustion. Still, the sleep I long for remains out of reach.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I reach for him with my mind, calling to him, begging him to come back. But just like the mark, I don’t feel him. There’s nothing anymore except a vast empty ache.
Eventually, sleep finds me, and I slip away.
* * *
“Clara,” a voice whispers.
I blink open swollen eyes. Clouds cover the moon, bathing the room in utter darkness.
“Clara?” the familiar voice calls my name again.
I sit up and drop my feet off the edge of the bed. My entire body aches with the sudden movement. Then a sliver of cold light finds its way past the clouds and spills through the window.
A distinctly masculine figure stands just behind the beam, then slowly steps forward. I bite down on the inside of my cheek and hold my breath, waiting for him to move into the light.
“Alaric?” My pulse drums in my ears. “I’m sorry…”
I stand and shuffle toward the specter of my dreams. He haunts me in death as he haunted me on the journey.
“Do not be sorry, my dear Clara.” He stops a few feet in front of me. “You set me free.”
I close the distance, tripping over myself, legs weak and uncoordinated. Alaric catches me around the waist as I crash into him.
Craning my neck, I lift my head and try to memorize every inch of his face. I don’t know if he’ll visit my dreams again. “Youdiedbecause I failed.”
A chuckle rumbles through his chest against my cheek as I inhale the masculine scent. I want to smack him for making light of this and kiss him all at once.
“Not quite,” he says. It takes entirely too long for me to understand what he means that I miss part of what he says. “…needed time to break the binds of Elizabeth’s compulsion. I would have come to you earlier, but Cassius and Lawrence insisted on testing me before they would allow me near you.” He kisses one eye and then the other. “I assure you I am very much alive.”
A strangled sound, somewhere between a sob of pain and joy, works its way free. Sliding my arms around his neck, I bury my face against his chest. “I thought I lost you… I—I felt the mark break.”
“Yes—”
I jerk back and thrust my wrist out. “Mark me again.”
Alaric wraps his fingers around my wrist and kisses my palm. “As much as I would enjoy marking you all over again, you have lost far too much blood tonight and need to heal.” His words are kind and filled with longing, but his features crumple with guilt. He waits several heartbeats before adding, “Elizabeth could very well kill you for breaking the compulsion.”
