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Seraphina crept beside me, her arm winding through mine with a victorious smile aimed at her audience. It took everything inside me not to yank away from her venomous clutch.
“And so,” my father continued with a growing smile that revealed gleaming fangs, “it is my pleasure to announce the betrothal of my eldest son, Alexei, to Seraphina Dvorak. A union destined to maintain the royal line and continue our hold over creatures from disintegrating into the past.”
As if in reply to my overwhelming disgust, the castle rumbled.
Darting a worried glance at mother, another booming shake rattled the chandelier, the marble beneath my feet suddenly treacherous.
“What on Gaia?” someone shouted from behind me, but I had already moved.
Whatever plan Silas had crafted, clearly something had gone wrong. Before I could reach the doorway, a yank on my jacket pulled me back into the room, just as the doors slammed shut, entrapping us. My father seethed as he glared down at me.
“What is the meaning of this, Alexei?”
“I don’t know—” I started, though my lips fell shut as I glanced out the tall windows surrounding the ballroom. The full moon crested in the sky, the gleam startling in its intensity as all the lights and flickering candles doused, leaving us in darkness.
Magick rose around us, gruesome and wonderful.
And then there was Jade at the ballroom entrance, still entombed in her shredded ball gown, her hair falling around her face in a dark mass of snarls. But to me, she had never looked more beautiful.
She looked like a fallen queen.Myqueen.
Silver glowed in her eyes as the Amulet of Davorina sent another terrible reverberation through the room, sending vampires to the floor as the castle shook once more.
“You made a mistake keeping me alive, Alistair Vasyliev,” she pronounced, her voice laden with wild, ancient power. “Now you’ll pay for it with your life and everything else you hold dear.”
She smiled as the spirits of hundreds of dead witches, demons, Fae, shifters, and vampires surged into the room.
Gods, I fucking loved Jade Belle.
And it was time to burn the fucking world with her.
31
As Silas broke through the cage doors and gingerly lifted me off the dungeon floor, fear crystallized within me.
“Jade, can you stand?” he urged, but I wasn’t listening.
I struggled, knowing the vampire was probably leading me to something horrifying, and I felt spirit magick engulf me through the amulet. The total loss of self that occurred the night at the Boston Court consumed me. Only this time, I welcomed the feeling.
“I need you to focus, Jade.” Silas gripped my shoulders hard enough to hurt. “I’m going to get you away from the castle where Killian can portal in to rescue you, but first, we need to escape the dungeons. They’re enchanted with wards, so no portals or other magick can be used within.”
Distantly, I mused that the amulet and my spirit magick didn’t seem to subscribe to the vampire king’s rules, but as Silas dragged me towards the stairs, his words finally processed through the fog.
“Killian?” I sucked in a choked breath. Yanking away from Silas’s grip, I bit out, “What do you mean, portal me home? What about my family? Alistair will never stop his pursuit! It will mean war.”
Silas ignored my protests and merely lifted me over his shoulder. “Sorry, Jade. But there’s no time to discuss this. Rebecca will deal with the consequences, but first we need to get you home.”
I fought to free myself.
No way would I allow grandmother to pick up the mess from my latest failure. Nor could I leave behind the spirits to suffer in purgatory. It was now or never to end the Vampires King’s cruel reign.
As Silas strode through the dungeons, I could hear the party unfurling above. Elite vampires from around Gaia, dressed in their finest attire as they traversed around Slovenia, hunting and killing mortals in Alistair Vasyliev’s depraved Wild Hunt.
Glimpses of Vera and the other spirits flickered in my vision as I passed the empty cells.
Alistair needed topay.
“Let me go, Silas,” I warned, my voice distorting with dark magick as I opened myself up to the amulet’s influence. “Now. Or you won’t like the consequences.”
