He didn't finish the sentence, because in the space of three words, she'd collected her sword, then shot behind him to tuck it menacingly between his legs. She'd moved so quickly she was a blur.
"Yes, let you live," she hissed at his ear.
"You are unused to this." He traced across the room and stood, arms out, a hand on each side of the doorway. "As am I. We will find our way with this together. But you are my Bride."
She closed her eyes, struggling for calm. "You're not my husband. And never will be."
"This can't be random, Kaderin."
Enough. As she started for the door, she could sense apprehension building in him. They both knew the sun would protect her. All she had to do was get past him -
Suddenly, she doubled over as sorrow for Dasha and Rika ripped through her like barbed wire dragged through her veins.
"Kaderin?" He strode toward her. "Are you hurt?"
Gulping air, she shoved her hand out to stop him before he reached her, and forced herself to stand. All Valkyrie were related, but she and her two sisters had been born together. Triplets. Inseparable for one thousand years, until two had died in battle. Because of Kaderin's weakness...
"Kaderin, just wait - "
She charged for the door, but he traced back to it and held his ground. She feinted left and ducked right, moving so fast she knew he couldn't make out her form. As he blinked, she swooped around him, bringing the sword handle crashing back into his chest, deciding at the last minute not to crack his sternum.
He gave a bellow of fury when she barreled past him. She darted down a rotting landing, toward the three sets of winding stairs, running through massive cobwebs so thick he must have traced through them for centuries.
Half staggering, half tracing, he was right behind her as she bounded down the stairs. But she pushed a hand on the railing and vaulted over to the next flight of stairs, then once again to the ground floor.
With a hoarse yell, he leapt down behind her, lunging for her. At the last second, she shimmied out of his grasp, reaching the heavy front doors. She burst through them, wrenching them off their rusted hinges and sending splinters arcing into the air.
Even outside under the morning sun's protective watch, she didn't slow. She raced down the valley toward the village - ragged breaths, leaves crackling beneath her boots, the warmth of the light. Don't look back.
Tears blurred her vision as she fought not to sob. The sorrow ached as unbearably as it had when she'd collected and buried the... pieces of her sisters. She ran away as if to forget that last night, as if to leave that memory back at that desolate castle. Don't look back...
After the burial, she'd torn at her hair and clawed at her skin, alternately shrieking with fury and grief and yearning for the oblivion of death herself. Exhaustion finally rendered her unconscious, and in that heavy sleep, an unknown power had communicated with her as a voice in her mind, promising surcease from the pain yet deadening all of her emotions.
Then, as now, the pain was unbearable. Just as she had before, she prayed for mercy.
But none came. Had Kaderin been forsaken? Had she angered the mysterious power? Don't look back. But she did.
The vampire had followed her.
4
Val Hall Manor, New Orleans,
Home of the tenth of the twelve Valkyrie covens
Sometimes Nikolai Wroth really hated his in-laws.
He exhaled wearily as he accompanied his Bride, Myst the Coveted, to the expansive front porch of her former home. They'd just made it to the front steps when the first shriek sounded.
He wasn't surprised, having already learned that his mere vampiric presence would be enough to provoke this nest of Valkyrie.
Though he was a Forbearer, he was often hated as much as Horde vampires - natural-born vampires, a faction that had warred with the Valkyrie since the first days of the Lore. In addition to killing his Bride's kind, Horde vampires often imprisoned them and fed nightly on their exquisite blood.
He understood their hatred of the Horde, and as a Forbearer, he shared it, having battled against them since he'd become a vampire. But this mattered little.
Another scream, and then more followed. Nikolai still was unused to his in-laws' shrieks. They liked to scream. Yet even if they had been silent, he would know their rage over his sensed presence, because the Valkyrie produced lightning with emotion, and right now the yard was like a minefield of exploding bolts.
The many copper rods planted all around the grounds couldn't contain such an onslaught. The ancient oaks surrounding the manor were lashed with ribbons of lightning and gave up their smoke, thicker than the fog.
Did anything smell as odd as burning moss?
He shook his head to the sky but didn't see the stars above him. No, his view was blocked by the wraiths the Valkyrie had paid to circle and guard the manor. The ghostly fiends howled their amusement down at him.
Nikolai had no patience for them. A month ago, when he'd tried to trace into Val Hall to win Myst back, they'd caught him and thrown him so far he'd entered another parish. Nothing could penetrate their guard.
With the wraiths, the lightning, the shrieks, and the smoke, it was no wonder other Lore creatures feared Val Hall almost as much as they feared the Valkyrie themselves. The fact that his beautiful wife had hailed from this place of madness always astounded him.
Tonight she had coaxed him to trace them here to ask Nïx - the oldest Valkyrie and a soothsayer - to help them find his two younger brothers. He secretly thought this a fool's errand. Nïx, or Nucking Futs Nïx as the coven called her, was rarely lucid and had a diabolical sense of humor. And Myst had been warned that Nïx was "in a pissy mood" this evening.
In fact, all the Valkyrie he'd met were... eccentric. Even his wife, Myst, thought in ways he didn't understand. And if Nïx was unmatched in Valkyrie madness... ?
But he had to try. He couldn't go on any longer wondering if Sebastian and Conrad were alive or dead. The last time he had seen his two youngest brothers, they were just about to leave Blachmount as newly turned vampires. They were both weakened and had gone half mad at the turning. Although three hundred years had passed, Nikolai did not delude himself into thinking that they had forgiven his offenses against them.
He and Myst gained entrance past the wraiths the only way possible. She offered a lock of her hair as toll, and one swooped down for it. In exchange for the wraiths' unfailing guard, the Valkyrie proffered their hair, which the wraiths wove into a braid. Once the braid attained a certain length, they could bend all living Valkyrie to their will for a short interval.
Once inside the darkened manor, they passed the ultramodern movie viewing room. The Valkyrie were obsessed with movies, indeed with anything modern and ever-changing, whether it was technology, slang, fashion, or video games.
A number had grudgingly accepted him now that he and Myst were married and because he'd helped save the life of Emmaline, a member of their coven. He'd even garnered permission - through blackmail - to enter their home at will, becoming the only vampire alive who'd seen the inside of this legendary place.
From the viewing room, they crossed to the stairs and up to the second landing. Myst had explained that Val Hall was like a violent Lore version of a sorority house, complete with catfights and clothing thefts. At least twenty Valkyrie lived here at any given time.
She stopped at a door with a sign painted to read "Nïxie's Lair, Forget the Dog, Beware of Nïx." Myst listened at the door, then knocked.
"Who is it?" came a muffled reply.
"Aren't you supposed to know that?" Myst asked, turning the knob when the door was unlocked.
They entered the room and found it darkened as well, lit only by a computer screen. Nïx stood, her expression inscrutable as she swiftly braided her long black hair. She had on jeans and a small T-shirt that read "I play with my prey."
Inside were a massive TV, hundreds of shades of nail polish, and a pinup poster of a man identified as "Jeff Probst" and labeled "The Thinking Woman's Sex Symbol." On the floor lay piles of shredded books, crashed paper airplanes, and what looked like the remains of a grandfather clock that had been torn apart in a frenzy.
Myst wasted no time. "We're searching for his brothers, Nïx, and we need your help."
Nïx snared one of the few untouched books from the floor, then sat on her bed. He caught the title - Voodoo Lou's Office Voodoo Kit: Take Charge of Your Career... with Voodoo! "And why would I assist the leech, hmmm?"
Myst's green eyes flashed with anger. She still called other vampires leeches and didn't care if her sisters did, but, as she'd said to Nikolai, "It's a double insult to call you one. If you're a leech and you like to drink from me, what does that make me? A schmuck? A suckah? Do I look like a host to you?"
Myst leaned back on Jeff Probst and drew a knee up. "You'll help us because I'm asking you to and you owe me for keeping a juicy secret from the coven."
Nïx made a scoffing sound as she ripped her sharp claws through the voodoo book. "What secret?" She yanked up another tome - The Crutch of Modern Mysticism - flexed her claws, then seemed to think better of completely mauling it, instead ripping out several pages, one with the chapter heading "Why It's Easier to Believe."
"Remember the year 1197?" Myst asked.
"B.C. or A.D.?" Nïx said in a bored tone as she began an intricate creasing of a book page. Origami? A form started to emerge.
"You know I'm only circa A.D."
"A.D. 1197?" Nïx murmured with a frown, then her face colored. Her expression turned mulish, and her fingers began flying over the paper, deftly folding. "Not sporting to bring that up. And one more time - I thought he and all of his pack mates were of age!" When her fingers stilled, she placed the perfect form on her bedside table. It resembled a dragon poised to attack. "Do I bring up your unpleasantries? Do I call you Mysty the Vampire Layer like the rest of the Lore does? Like the nymphs do?"
Myst clasped her hands to her chest. "Oh, woe, the nymphs have shunned me. I weep bitter tears." Her face hardened in an instant. "What information do you need from us to help you see something?"
With a huffish flip of her heavy braid, Nïx turned from Myst to Nikolai and asked, "Why do you want to find them?" She started another origami without looking, this one requiring four pages from the Crutch book.
"I want to know if they're alive or dead. To know if I can help them and bring them back home."
"Why did they leave?" The way she studied him was almost invasive. Her fingers were so fast they were nearly invisible, making the paper appear to fold of its own accord.
He put his shoulders back, hating having to be so open with her. "Sebastian was enraged that I turned him against his will. Both were furious that I tried to turn four young sisters and our elderly father when they were dying." Myst studied him, nibbling her lip, knowing how reluctant he was to speak of this. "I have no doubts that they went away only to get strong enough to come back and kill me." Because both had tried just before they left.
Sebastian had woken with that terrible hunger that Nikolai remembered so well. When they'd placed a tankard of blood in front of Sebastian, he couldn't drink it fast enough. But once he'd comprehended what he'd done, he'd lunged for Nikolai's throat...
Nikolai had waited months at Blachmount for them to return, uncaring if either attempted it once more. Each day they didn't return made him wonder if they could fend for themselves, gathering blood each night - without drinking humans. Without killing.
Never lowering her gaze from his face, Nïx finished a twisting shark and placed it by the dragon creature. He found his eyes drawn to the shapes again and again.
"You knew they would be angry?" Nïx asked.
After a hesitation, he admitted, "I did. But I turned them anyway."
When Myst saw him exhale wearily, she began relaying to Nïx everything he'd told her of his brothers. Granted a reprieve, Nikolai yet again justified his decision to himself. That night, seeing Sebastian about to die had made Nikolai realize how much Sebastian especially had missed out on. All he'd wanted was a family and a place to live in peace. Sebastian had never had a chance to find either - he hadn't yet lived - and Nikolai couldn't accept that.
As a lad, Sebastian had shot to his full height of six and a half feet early, without the weight and muscle that would come a year or two later. Though he'd been rangy and awkward, Sebastian had almost fared better before his body had caught up with his height.
After that, he hadn't known what to do with his size, with his incredible strength that grew every day. He'd accidentally blackened more than one girl's eye with his elbow and actually had broken one's nose that way. He'd stepped on so many toes that the village girls joked that they wouldn't walk near him without "clogs and fortitude."
But the worst occurred when he and Murdoch had been running in the village, most likely doing some mischief of Murdoch's, and Sebastian had collided with a woman and her young daughter. He'd laid both of them flat, knocking the air from their lungs. A disturbing experience in itself, but once the woman and girl got their breaths back, they'd screamed bloody murder.
Sebastian had been appalled at himself. From the time he was a small boy, he'd always had a shy bent, and things like this made it much worse. He'd become unsure around all women, without the smooth charm of Murdoch or the indifference of Conrad.
At thirteen, Murdoch had had a devilish grin that had already earned him entrance under many women's skirts in the village. At the same age, Sebastian had been the quiet lad with a sweating fistful of crushed wildflowers that would never make it to their intended.
So he'd turned to his studies. Incredibly, even after he'd trained for war since he was old enough to hold a wooden sword, Sebastian's mind was the strongest part of his body. He'd written treatises and scientific papers, which garnered him the notice of some of the great minds of the time -
"You've seen something," Myst said, bringing Nikolai from his thoughts.
"I can tell you where Murdoch is."
"I saw him only yesterday," Nikolai grated. Murdoch lived at Mount Oblak, a castle seized from the Horde. It was the new Forbearer stronghold, so Nikolai traced there most days.
"Oh, yes. Of course," Nïx began in a sarcastic tone. "Murdoch is right where you left him."
"What's that supposed to mean?" At her blank look, he said, "About Murdoch - what did you mean?"
"Did I say something? What did I say? How am I supposed to keep track of what I said?"
He was losing patience. "Damn it, Nïx, I know you could tell us where they are."
Her eyes went wide as she breathed, "Are you psychic, too?"
Sometimes he really hated his in-laws.
"Nïx, I need you to help with this," he said, biting out the words. As a former general in the Estonian army, and a current one with the Forbearers, he was used to giving orders - and having them obeyed with alacrity. This... this asking for things was excruciating.
Yet now Nïx concentrated only on her craft, until she'd folded what looked like an intricate fire, gingerly placing it next to the other two. More pages ripped free, folding at an even faster rate. Nikolai found his attention riveted to the creations that she seemed compelled to make.
Moments later, she'd wrought a baying paper wolf. Four shapes placed as though for a storyboard. Myst spared them no more than a glance, but Nikolai was enthralled.
"Nïx, try harder!" Myst snapped, and Nikolai shook himself, forcing his gaze away.
"I can't see Conrad!" she snapped back, and lightning struck nearby.
"What about Sebastian?" Myst said. "Tell us anything."
"Anything? Well, what do I know?" Nïx frowned. "What do I know? Oh! I know what I know!"
Nikolai paced impatiently, gesturing with his free hand for her to continue.
She shrugged. "Right now, your brother Sebastian is bellowing at someone outside a castle, demanding that they return to him, wishing it with everything that he is." She smiled, as if pleased with herself for seeing so much, then gave a quick clap. "Oh! And his skin just caught fire!"
5
Why would she run from me?
Repeating this agonizing question over and over in his mind, Sebastian scuffed through the pouring rain and the puddles of water along the main street of the deserted village.
At sunset, just as he'd set out to search for her, the rain had begun. Even now, hours later, it still fell with a pounding force, visibly eating away at the cobblestone grout. It struck his burned face and hands, but he hardly perceived it.
What the hell had happened? He'd just been feeling the centuries-old weariness lifting, disappearing with her arrival. Now it had returned doubled.
"Don't!" he'd bellowed to her. Before he'd been forced to trace back, she'd turned to him, her eyes wide, her lips parted. She'd seen his pain, his skin beginning to burn.
Her expression had become stricken. He'd seen that look before. It was the same one soldiers had a split second after a cannon blast had landed too close - as if they simply couldn't assimilate what had just happened.
Why did she run? What did I do wrong?
He'd searched all night, scouring the empty streets and the entire valley. He'd traced to the airport, but he knew she was long gone.
As were the denizens of this village. Only a dog howled in the background. Though Sebastian had avoided humans since he'd been turned, he was fully prepared to question them now. He was desperate to. If they had information about his mysterious Bride, he'd become the thing they feared in order to get it from them.
Yet they had disappeared. Even the home of the butcher who secretly sold him blood and occasionally transacted for clothing and books was darkened and empty. Apparently, she'd warned them that he'd be searching for her with a vengeance.
Again and again, Sebastian contemplated what he knew about his mysterious Kaderin. At times he thought her too beautiful, too perfect, a vision who existed only in his fantasies. He had been alone for so long...
And had been mad in the past.
But if he thought he'd imagined the entire thing, he had a glaring bruise on his chest and rents in his shirt from where her claws had dug into his back and his arms. God, she was fierce, his Bride, and even now he was hard for her.
Never before had he felt such lust. No woman had ever stirred him to anything like this. Surely the desire for her was stronger because he'd abstained for so long. That had to be it. He hadn't even taken her.
Hell, he hadn't even seen her naked body or touched her skin.
He shook his head, flushing yet again at his behavior with her. He was in no way experienced, but he knew enough to know that what they'd done was... irregular.
In his entire life, he'd had sex fewer than half a dozen times, with just two women, if you could call it that with the second. Sebastian had never been inclined to charm ladies, but even if he hadn't been quiet and introspective, there simply hadn't been time, opportunity, or, more important, women to have.
His family's home of Blachmount had been secluded from towns and markets. Any attractive farmers' daughters within a hundred miles had been hopelessly in love with - and most likely enjoying - Sebastian's rakish brother Murdoch. Which excluded them forever from Sebastian's interest. He could never have compared with Murdoch's experience, and he'd dreaded looking down as he took a woman and knowing that she was thinking the same.
If not Murdoch, Sebastian still had to compete with two other older brothers.
Then came the war.
Sebastian's forgettable - or disastrous - experiences had not prepared him in any way for Kaderin's passion. She had been as frantic as he was. He couldn't even imagine what she would be like naked and writhing beneath him. His erection throbbed at the idea, and he cursed it.
She'd urged him on and then reveled in his strength, like some wild creature. Which reminded him that not only did he not know her full name or how to contact her - he didn't even know what her species was.
If only he understood more about this world he now inhabited, the Lore. He was as ignorant of it as he was of modern human culture.
When he had awakened from the dead all those years ago, Nikolai and Murdoch had tried to explain what they knew of the Lore, which was little - they'd only been turned recently themselves. Sebastian hadn't listened. What good would their teaching do him if he was going to walk into the sun anyway?
For all these years, he'd avoided Blachmount, instead residing in the one country where no one would have thought to look for him. What if he returned now? Could he even predict what he would do if he faced Nikolai?
From the corner of his eye, Sebastian caught sight of something. He twisted around to find his reflection in a shop window. As he stood arrested, he brought his hand up to grasp his chin.
Christ, why wouldn't she run?
He looked like a monster in the pouring rain. His face was sun-blistered down one side and gaunt from irregular feeding - he had never been able to make himself drink enough to sustain his weight. His hair was cut haphazardly, and his clothes were worn and threadbare.
In her eyes, Sebastian was penniless, living in a heap, without friends or relations. He'd given her no indication that he would be a worthy partner for her. In his time, a female had needed to be assured that the male she cast her lot with could provide for her. Surely something so elemental hadn't changed.
Worse than all this, he was a vampire - which she clearly detested.
He would never be able to share days outside with her. God, how he already missed the sun - now more than ever because he couldn't walk in it with her.
Vampiir. He raked his hand through his wet hair. What kind of children would I give her? Would they drink blood?
He'd have run from him, too.
How could he expect her not to be repulsed by what he'd become, when he himself was? He subsisted on blood. He was relegated to shadow.
"You'll never be my husband," she'd vowed.