Текст книги "A Bargain So Bloody"

Автор книги: Vasilisa Drake

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Chapter Twenty

Raphael, for all his disappearances in our time at the cabin, hadn’t bothered to steal another horse, which meant I was back to riding on Alphonse with him. He had, however, picked up a choice few cards, including one that enchanted the horse’s legs to be able to handle the wet terrain.

Since he couldn’t cast the cards himself, surely that meant he’d expected me to come with him. Imperious vampire.

But I went with him anyway. I couldn’t stay in Apante after Raphael had just killed the highest-ranking members of the Apante Monastery, which was the only place that could shelter me. My next best hope was to follow him north, and once he accomplished his goal, convince him to deposit me in a village where I could build a life undetected. Eventually, the king’s men would likely find me, and I’d need to run and find somewhere new or be caught, but I didn’t have a better option yet.

He rode with uncharacteristic gentleness. Whether it was because of the marsh’s terrain or that he had some lingering concern about my wellbeing… it was easier to believe the former.

We reached the temple a few days later. There was no mistaking the sight. Buried in the depths of the marshes was a temple perhaps half the size of the Monastery and a third as tall. It was made of shiny black stone that had withstood the elements. Even covered in years of vines and shrouded in mists, it radiated power. Something in me felt compelled to see the inside in a way I hadn’t felt at the Great Library or the Monastery.

Another puzzle.

“You’ll wait here,” Raphael declared, dismounting from Alphonse with ease.

“I most certainly will not,” I retorted. “And let an ogre have me for lunch?”

“You don’t have enough meat to entice an ogre to expend the effort.”

I looked around dramatically. “Ah, yes. Because ogres in the marshes have so many options, they’re picky about which weak little humans they snack on.”

“There’ll be traps. It’s too dangerous.”

I frowned. “You sound like you’ve been inside before.”

A beat. “I have.”

So it wasn’t luck that led us so easily to the temple. Still, why? Were things so different hundreds of years ago that vampires ventured into the Witch Kingdom for temples?

Or was it from his life… before?

“Then you’ll keep me safe,” I countered. “You’re the one who’s constantly been saying I’m safer with you than without you.”

Raphael hesitated. Indecision warred inside him—he obviously wasn’t used me challenging him on his plans. Especially not me asserting any kind of trust in him. But I did trust the vampire—to a point. And more than that, I wanted to go inside that temple, the way a child wants to run down a long, empty corridor.

And I really didn’t want to find out which of us was right about ogre preferences.

I could see the moment I won him over. “Step where I step. And don’t touch anything,” he warned while helping me off the horse.

I rolled my eyes and followed him inside.

The temple was dark.

There was barely any other way to describe it. Despite the aged appearance, inside was all sleek black stone. Unnatural, glistening stone, all one piece rather than blocks, as though the temple had been carved from onyx.

Raphael moved cautiously inside, but with his vampire vision, the dark wasn’t an issue. Me, I had to improvise. I’d snagged a branch from the marsh and concentrated, using one of the fire cards to light it. The magic had to work uphill to keep the waterlogged wood alight. The light was dim, barely enough for me to see the area directly in front of me. If Raphael stopped abruptly, I’d probably knock into him.

The air pricked against my skin. Gooseflesh pebbled on my arms as we moved past the entryway. The magic was thick in the air.

At the first fork, Raphael didn’t hesitate to go left.

“How do you know your way around?” I asked, my words echoing off the walls.

He paused, briefly running his fingers against the wall. Could he feel the magic radiating off of the stone as I could? “All that matters is I do. Now, do exactly as I do.”

He pressed a palm into the stone again, and to my shock, the wall rippled like it was made of water. On the floor, the stone lit up splashes of red and blue. He moved deftly over them. Each lit spot sparkled slightly when his foot bore down on it. He only touched the red ones.

I slid my hand against the wall, trying to find the exact spot he’d used. The stone was firm, but when I pressed, it rippled for me, just as it had for him.

But that wasn’t all.

The tingling sensation of magic moved to a faster vibration, like I was shaking even as my body stood still. Like the ripples moved from the wall into me.

Like something was waking up.

“Little dove,” Raphael hissed, snapping me from the sensation. “Stop dawdling.”

“I’m not dawdling,” I grumbled, matching my steps to the red spots. As my foot landed, sparks flew and then the area behind me darkened. The vibrations no longer filled my body. I turned back and lifted my torch to look, but the path behind us was back to normal. Since it reacted to me, it wasn’t Raphael somehow using magic to navigate, but rather the temple’s own magic.

He paused at the next intersection, as if considering.

To the left.

I wasn’t sure where the thought came from, only that it was sudden, strange, and certain, but a second later, Raphael shifted and went down the path to our left.

A lucky guess. That was all.

The hall was identical to the one before, except there were three levers planted in the stone. Here, once again, Raphael seemingly knew just what to do. He pulled the first and third one.

Nothing happened, but he began to walk forward.

“What was the point of that?” I asked. I wanted to get a closer look at the lever system, to see how it worked, but he’d have a conniption.

“If I didn’t do that, the floor would’ve swallowed us whole as we walked across,” he said tersely.

“Really?” I frowned. I knew objects could be enchanted, but only temporarily. This place likely had been uninhabited for centuries, so how was this magic still working?

“This is the temple of a goddess. The same way the prison swallowed magic, her temple breathes it.”

Greymere drove witches mad by blocking their abilities. How would a witch react to the opposite? They should surely be drawn to magic like this, yet the place was abandoned. The Monastery had taken over the place of most temples, utterly devoid of magic by comparison.

Raphael turned the next corner but didn’t advance. He stopped so abruptly I nearly hit him. Confused, I peered past his arm, trying to see.

There was nothing.

More accurately, from the torchlight, there was nothing directly in front of the archway but a massive dark hole.

“What part of the wall do you have to press now?” I asked.

“None. This isn’t a magical trap.”

I frowned. “Then how do we get by?”

He pointed to the right, and I leaned forward to see what he was looking at. At the very edge, jutting from the wall, was a small lip, maybe three-quarters the length of my foot. It ran as far as I could see.

“We’re not…”

“We are.”

I swallowed. “What happens if we fall?”

“My suggestion is don’t.”

That didn’t make me feel any better. “But if we do?”

“You get impaled on one of the spikes below.”

Wonderful.

I could’ve insisted I stay here and wait for him to come back. Of course, if he took too long, the fire would go out and I’d have no way to find my way back. But there was something about the temple. Something that was drawing me deeper and deeper in.

He turned back to face me. “You can stay here,” he said, reading my hesitation.

I shook my head. “I can manage.”

“I’ll hold the torch for you, then.”

Before I could ask how, Raphael disappeared.

A breeze hit my face.

No, not a breeze. I stared at the spot where Raphael had been standing. In his place, at eye level with me, was a large bat.

He flapped towards my hands, an indication to give him the torch.

I was still staring at the creature in front of me.

“You can turn into a bat?”

He dove at my hands again, more impatient.

I’d never sleep well again. Not if vampires could turn into random animals.

Well… if I impaled myself on a spike in the pit, it wouldn’t matter.

I lifted the torch to him, uncertain if his small, clawed feet could grasp it, but they managed, digging so hard into the wood it dented. Apparently, vampire strength extended to other forms. He moved from the edge to the space over the chasm, lighting the ledge for me. I stepped onto the lip, pressing my weight towards the wall. My heart slammed against my ribs, but I mastered my breathing and slowly moved one foot forward, then the other. Bat-Raphael lit the way, a few paces ahead. I didn’t dare look any farther. I didn’t want to know how far I had to go. The stone was smooth, and the slick sweat of my palms meant I couldn’t even fool myself into thinking I had any kind of grip.

When faced with a terrifying situation, the only thing to do was keep moving. So that was what I did, one slow foot drag at a time. It could’ve been an hour for all I knew. When I eased around another corner, I dared to let myself believe I might actually make it. I was close. So close. Raphael flew closer, the beating of his wings cooling the sweat beading on my neck. The torch seemed to be growing dimmer, but perhaps that was just my nerves. It lit the space immediately in front of me, so I stepped there, then again and again.

I’m going to make it.

Then the dim light sputtered out.

And I was in the dark.

Clinging to the wall.

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Chapter Twenty-One

Panic seized me. Any chance of controlling my breathing died as I began to hyperventilate.

I’m going to die here.

I’d thought it would be worth it. That I needed to continue on this journey. Stupid. Survival above all else. Now I would die for my godsdamned curiosity.

“Samara. Slow your heart.”

“Raphael?”

“I’m right here, just a few feet to to your left. You’re nearly there.”

“I-I can’t,” I stammered. It was hard to even speak between breaths.

“You can,” he insisted. “Keep going.”

Hesitantly, I slid my foot forward. Into the dark. But just like in the light, the path was smooth. I moved my other foot, and resumed inching.

“That’s it.” His voice was soothing, like the night sky. “Just a bit more.”

I followed the sound of his voice, my galloping heart slowing to a canter.

“Good. Nearly there. Now just step forward and you’ll make it.”

Just another step. That was all I had to do. My foot slid off as the lip ended. I was there. I tried to hook my leg to catch the opening.

I lost my balance.

I was going to fall. The awareness hit me a second before I began to drop—an immediate, absolute certainty that I was done for. My hands slipped off as I fought to regain my balance, my foot trying to come back but missing, and I was falling, falling, falling—

Strong hands snatched me from the air itself. Raphael threw me back against his body, sending us both tumbling. I landed atop him. There was no light save the faint, unnatural glow of his red eyes.

In the dark, every other sense became more acute. This close, I inhaled his scent with my rapid breaths. Cedar, spice, and something more dangerous than the dark. My fingers gripped the fabric of his shirt, like he was the only thing stopping me from falling into the pit.

“Told you that you’d make it.”

I didn’t have to see his mouth to know it was curved into a smile. Me, I couldn’t smile right now. Not with my heart still slamming in my throat. I couldn’t even force my fingers to unclench from where they were still fists in his shirt. My head told me I should be getting off him, that if I was close enough to feel the rise and fall of his chest beneath me, I was too, too close. But my legs were shaking too much for me to move.

“You caught me.” Three words. The most I could manage in this position.

“I did,” he agreed. Like it was nothing.

Like of course he had saved me from certain death, and how could I even doubt it?

How, indeed.

“As much as I enjoy having a woman on top of me, we should continue.”

His teasing jolted me out of the remnants of panic that had caged me. My chest was flush against his, my legs sprawled over him. Even riding together on Alphonse didn’t compare to this. I scrambled to stand, pressing my hands into his chest to leverage myself up, but in the dark I was moving blindly. His hands rose to my sides, steadying as he guided me up, and I told myself my heart was pounding only because I’d nearly fallen to my death, not because of his touch.

“The torch?” I asked.

Wood brushed my fingers as he offered me the discarded branch. It took a moment to figure out which card I needed, but eventually I managed to relight the flame. It was even smaller than before, as if the magic struggled to stir this deep in the temple. I stuck closer to Raphael as we ventured farther.

Even as the shock faded from the prior trap, I couldn’t let go of one thing. “You can turn into a bat.”

“Yes.” And your point is? was the silent continuation.

I recalled the time we’d been in the inn, and he’d let himself out the window. I’d looked and seen no sign of the vampire. But I hadn’t been looking for a bat.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

His steps slowed as we hit another trap. “I’ll tell you my secrets as soon as you start volunteering your own.”

Absently, my fingers threaded around the pendant on my neck. Fair enough.

But still… “Can all vampires do that?”

“No.”

That was a small relief.

We continued along the winding path. We crossed a few more traps that Raphael navigated—sliding tiles, trick walls—but no more near-death experiences. At some point, we started going down, the ground beneath us sloped.

“We’re here,” Raphael announced.

Even if he hadn’t said so, the change was obvious. The pitch black of the hallway changed as blue glyphs covered the walls. At first, they were sparse, thickening as we went deeper. The runes glowed, lighting the space enough that I could finally see. Few knew Old Runyk of runes, but my mother had made me learn the basics at a young age. Power, one said. Death, said another. The rest, I couldn’t decipher, but their magic charged the space. Even the air felt different, like it was charged on a stormy day and waiting for lightning to strike. The hallway was wide enough for us to walk side-by-side, so I could better see the path ahead. The runes seemed to call me forward, a siren song that was hard to resist.

I lifted a hand to them, wanting to trace the magical shape with my fingertips.

Raphael snatched my hand back. “Remember what I said—don’t touch anything.”

I drew my hand back from the wall, but Raphael didn’t release his grip. He pulled me forward while I glanced wistfully at the wall.

Then I shook myself. What was I thinking? This temple was devoted to the goddess of death, and she seemed intent on killing trespassers. Why would I try to activate the magic guarding the heart of the temple? It was thoughtless, and I was never thoughtless. The magic seemed to cast a haze over my mind, and even the vague awareness of it wasn’t enough to stop the desire.

The blue glow bounced off the black stone, brightening as the long hallway widened the farther we went. Conspicuously empty.

Until it wasn’t.

It was really here.

Even with the Librarian’s assurances, I hadn’t really believed we’d find the Black Grimoire. It was a myth, lost to time. Yet there, at the end of the hallway, a book sat on a black stone lectern that seemed to be carved from the floor. Whatever magic was in the temple and the runes was magnified tenfold here, a magnetic pull tugging us closer.

Raphael’s pace increased. His face reflected something nearing surprise—as if he, too, hadn’t expected to find it here. In a matter of moments, we stood before the book, shoulder to shoulder.

The cover was ornate, inlaid with shining black stones that formed the shape of a skull, twin rubies in the eye sockets. The grimoire itself wasn’t so large, but it practically pulsed with magic. Raphael lifted a hand toward it, then withdrew his fingers suddenly, as if burned. He let out a vulgar curse, something I’d never heard from him before.

“I can’t touch it,” he hissed. “It’s enchanted so no vampire can.”

I pulled my hand from his grip and flashed him a grin. “Good thing the weak little human is here, then.”

Raphael glanced between the book and me. I forced my fingers to clench at my sides, when all they wanted to do was grab for it.

“Fine. But Samara—”

I was already reaching for the book. The second my fingers grazed the cover, its magic slammed into me. Touching the wall had been like something waking up inside me. Touching the book was like I was waking up after sleeping for years. Sensation overwhelmed me, blocking out the rest of my senses. There was no sound, no sight, only the book between my hands, beckoning me, as if to say, At last, I am found.

I need more. I had to get more of this, whatever it was. It was the same as being a void when you used enchanted cards for the first time, except a thousand times more potent. All the magic I could ever crave, all the power, and it lay just inside this book.

Unable to stop myself, I began to lift the cover.

Distantly, I heard a voice cry out, “Samara, no!” but it was too late.

Three things happened at once.

First, as I opened the book, the magic soured. What had been lively and joyful turned dark, as if it were disgusted with me.

Second, I was knocked to the ground, the book falling from my grip.

Third, Raphael cried out as a whoosh cut through the air. The book gone, I glanced up in time to see arrows spring from every side of the room. Right toward the spot I’d been standing. Raphael had shielded me and absorbed the blows.

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Chapter Twenty-Two

I pushed myself out from under Raphael.

His body was riddled with arrows. Blood coated the ground. So much blood. He lay face down in it.

No, no, no. Not again.

I lifted to my knees, checking him over. At least a dozen arrows covered his back.

I’d be dead if they’d have hit me.

Perhaps he’d done it because he was a vampire, invulnerable to simple arrows. He had accelerated healing. Surely, if I removed the arrows he’d be fine…

“Are you okay?” It was a stupid question, but I just wanted him to say yes. Yes, he was fine. Yes, he was an extremely powerful vampire, and what would fell a mortal was no match for him and his ego.

The only answer was a groan.

I swallowed. Even if he could heal, he wouldn’t do it with the arrows inside him. I maneuvered around, taking care not to aggravate the wounds. Arrow wounds were tricky, because taking the head out ripped the flesh on the inside. There was a special way to get them out… Think, Samara. I’d seen it somewhere. A book, as a child? I’d need something that could hook around the point. I withdrew the contents of my skirt pockets, thanking the gods I hadn’t left everything on Alphonse. In the days I’d spent tinkering, I’d made a few different objects. One had to work… there. What I’d intended to use to make a kit for picking locks. Now, I twisted the metal into a new shape, a long stem with a loop at the end, which I lined with the leather to hopefully protect his body from the worst of the arrows.

“This will hurt,” I warned.

Raphael didn’t answer, but his back tensed. I swallowed and set to work, snapping off part of the arrow shafts and working out the pieces. It was slow. If I rushed, I risked breaking off the tips inside his back. I didn’t dare move him and jostle them further. Raphael grunted through his teeth as I worked, trying to hold steady for me. My fingers grew slick with his blood. I wiped them on my skirt, returning to the task. Don’t think about the blood. Just get them out. For once, memories didn’t take me. Only the pressing need to get the arrows out.

I stole glances at the ripped flesh, hoping it would miraculously knit together. When the last of the arrows were removed, I helped lift Raphael, moving us away from the center of the hall. I didn’t want to risk the arrows coming for us again, but something told me as long as I didn’t open the grimoire again, we’d be safe. The book was… aware. Of that, I was certain. If it didn’t want a vampire to touch it, perhaps opening it had elevated its awareness to the point it detected a vampire—a threat—in the space.

But none of that mattered if Raphael died here.

There was an alcove a short distance past the lectern, with no glowing glyphs on the wall. He was heavy, so it was a struggle to move him that far. By his pained exhale, I wasn’t doing a very good job. Still, with reserves of strength I didn’t know I had, I managed to reach the alcove.

“Can I set you against the wall here without setting off another trap?” I asked quickly.

The slight dip of his head was either a nod or he was about to pass out. I propped him against the obsidian wall. The swirling storm in my chest refused to stop.

“You’ll heal, right?”

“It’s cursed copper.” The words came out strained.

Panic swept through me. “But you’re a vampire. You’ll heal. Right?”

He strained to lift his head up, dull, hooded eyes looking back at me.

“Not without blood.”

I bit back a curse. He’d never make it out in this condition to feed. And I didn’t stand a chance at going out to get him an animal. Even if I could navigate the traps on the way out, I doubted that would be enough. He’d once said animal blood was barely enough to survive on. To heal wounds of this magnitude, it wouldn’t suffice.

No choice.

“Feed on me.”

It was hard to tell which of us was more surprised by my words. His eyes widened, pain forgotten for the moment while he took me in. As for me, all I could see was that moment playing over and over in my mind, the impact of the floor as I was slammed to the ground while he shielded my body with his own.

“Before I change my mind,” I said with impatience, trying to hide my urgency. Hadn’t I sworn I’d die before I ever let a vampire drink my blood? Not after that night. But here I was, offering, instead of leaving him to die.

“You’re sure?” he rasped.

“You’re bleeding out. I’m pretty godsdamned sure!”

The promise of blood roused him from his stupor. Still, this weak, he could do little to move from where he was propped against the wall. I sank to my knees in front of him, kneeling between his legs. I steeled my core, readying for the pain that would come. I’d endured worse. And he’d saved me twice over. I owed him a debt.

Was the debt really the only reason I didn’t want Raphael to die? He bent his head, red eyes glowing in the dark. Lithe fingers brushed my hair away, tickling my shoulder blades.

His breath burned hot against my skin. I fought a shiver. Fear? Worry for him? His hands gripped my shoulder for stability. I was grateful for the brace, because if he didn’t hold me in place I might bolt before allowing him to do this.

He lowered his mouth to my neck.

And I let the vampire bite me.

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