Prince of Twilight (26 page)

“My God, how long have we been here?”

Beta shrugged. “A couple of hours. Why?”

Clearly Beta didn't know about the drastic and rapid changes in her appearance. But as Stormy watched her, she could tell the woman didn't feel a hell of a lot better than she looked. She walked in tiny, weak steps, feet barely leaving the ground, back bent, head low. She was out of breath, it seemed. She had aged fifty years in the space of a few hours.

“Where did you get the candles?”

“They were in Brooke's bag. She saved them from last time.”

“And the herbs?”

“The same. I only wish Brooke had memorized the rite itself, but she didn't.” She shrugged. “It doesn't matter, I suppose. I need to wait for the ring.”

“I see. And, uh, what are you doing now?” Stormy asked.

“Lighting the candles.” Her voice was hoarse.

“Well, yeah, I can see that. But could you elaborate?”

“For the ritual,” Beta said. “Vlad is coming. He's bringing the ring and the scroll.”

Stormy would have liked to think he wouldn't go through with it. That he would arrive like some kind of a dark knight in onyx armor and save her from the madwoman. But the madwoman was his
wife. The love of his life. That was fact. Anything else she might come up with was guesswork. Hell, he'd never told Stormy how he felt about her. Not even in the past. Maybe if Beta had never been squatting inside her body, he never would have felt a damn thing to begin with.

And yet he tried to save me from her, all those years ago. Maybe he would again.

No, she couldn't count on him to get her out of this mess. She had to save herself.

She tugged, pulling her right arm, but not jerking it as she had before. Best to keep her efforts hidden. She exerted steady pressure and hoped to feel the stake in the ground give a little.

It didn't.

Perhaps sensing something, Beta turned to study her. “What are you doing?” She had lit half the candles by now.

“I can see why you moved us to a different spot,” Stormy said. “The wind isn't even touching the flames, is it?”

“No. We're sheltered here by the trees and those bigger boulders over there,” she replied, nodding toward the giant rocks that flanked their spot. So dark, the boulders. They blended into the night; Stormy hadn't seen them there behind the trees before.

Elisabeta resumed lighting the candles.

“You don't look so good,” Stormy said. Making conversation, hoping to mask her movements by keeping Beta distracted. She'd had no luck with the stake at her left arm and so was tugging surreptitiously on the right one now. One at a time, she thought, would let her exert more strength on a single goal. But so far this stake wasn't moving any more than the first one had.

“It doesn't matter. I'll be out of this body soon enough.”

“Yeah, it looks like any minute now.”

She felt the glare Beta shot her and stopped tugging on the right stake. No progress at all. Okay, maybe the one at her feet. She tugged hard, bending her knees upward a minuscule amount.

“Ahh, he's coming,” Beta said, straightening from the final candle and turning slowly. Her form was bowed, as if she were very old or very tired. The change in her from only a few hours earlier was astounding.

Stormy twisted her head to look in the direction the other woman was staring, and she saw a giant raven, as large as an eagle, easily, land heavily on the ground nearby. And then it opened its wings and seemed to stand straighter, stretch higher, and
right before her eyes it changed until it became a man, all dressed in black.

Dracula.

Smiling, an expression that was downright frightening to behold, Beta called out, “Here, Vlad. I'm here.”

Stormy closed her eyes and tugged harder against the ropes holding her ankles. They burned, scraping her skin. It didn't matter. She had to get away. Dracula had arrived. To kill her or to save her? There was no way to know. She kept her eyes trained on his approach and struggled against her bonds, no longer trying to be quiet or still.

And then he stepped into the light cast by all those dancing candles. His eyes sought her out, found her, but gave nothing away. No sign of affection. No hidden, reassuring smile. Nothing. He just looked at her, his eyes skimming her face, then the stakes that held her arms and her ankles. She stopped straining to pull free while his attention was on her.

Then he looked at Elisabeta, and this time his face
did
change. He couldn't hide his shock and horror at the way she looked.

“By the gods, Beta—”

“I know,” she said. “I know how I look. I'm dying, Vlad.”

He nodded, moved closer, and lifted a hand to touch her hideous face. Damn him.

Stormy tried not to see the tenderness in his eyes, but she saw it anyway. He was here, and his mission might very well be to take her life.

And yet she loved him.

God, she was sick. Hopeless. Possibly helpless. And love him or not, she wouldn't hesitate to slit his throat and let him bleed if it meant the difference between her own living and dying. Not for a second. Maybe she wasn't totally hopeless after all.

She tugged harder. And the stake at her feet moved just a little.

 

Vlad couldn't believe the change in Beta. Though he supposed, logically, the changes were happening in Brooke's body, not in Beta at all. Just to the body she happened to be occupying at the moment. She looked weak. And in pain. She was suffering, and it hurt him to see it.

Tempest, on the other hand, seemed fine. Her eyes flashed the same fire as always, and though there was a swollen, purplish lump on one side of
her head, she was well. Strong. Whole. Frightened, though. And angry, too.

He'd felt her eyes searching his, probing, as if for some sign of his intent. She didn't trust him, then. No. Why would she?

“Did you bring the ring and the scroll?” Beta asked.

“Yes.”

“Give them to me.”

He glanced at Tempest. Her eyes pleaded with him, but he tore his gaze away, and took the ring and the scroll from his pocket.

Elisabeta snatched the scroll from his hand, unrolled it and bent to set it on the ground, using small rocks at the top and bottom to keep it from rolling up again. She positioned it between two candles, so she could see to read it; then, as her eyes raced over the lines, she spoke to him without looking up. “Put the ring on her, Vlad.”

He looked at Tempest again.

She stared back at him, her eyes holding his powerfully as she shook her head slowly left, then right, then left again.

He hadn't moved. Beta swung her head toward him. “Do it, Vlad. We haven't much time. I…am weakening, even now.” Then she moved to the first pot of herbs and touched one of the candles to the
pile until it caught and blazed. She let it burn a moment, then bent close and blew it out. Smoke wafted then, thick and fragrant. And Beta moved on to the next pot, and the next.

Vlad forced himself to step past the ring of blazing candles. To kneel beside Tempest, between her outstretched arm and her legs. He held the ring in his fingers, and he moved it toward her hand.

She bent her wrist, flinching from his touch. “Don't do this, Vlad.”

He looked at her, and saw the mistrust and hurt in her eyes. “I'm doing what I have to do.” The smoke from the herbs was increasing, growing thick, swirling around them.

“Look, I get that you love her and not me, okay? I totally get that. You want to be with her, and you'll do whatever it takes to be with her.”

“Stop it, Tempest.”

“No, I won't stop it. This is my
life.
I don't blame you for wanting to be with the woman you love, Vlad, but it's not fair that I should have to surrender my life to make it happen.”

He hesitated, the ring near the tip of her finger. He had to put it on her, but his hand was shaking.

From beyond him, Beta said, “And is it fair that I should have to die? Was it fair to keep me trapped
between life and death for the past five hundred years?” She paused to draw a breath, exhausted, it seemed, just by the act of speaking. “One of us has to die, Tempest.”

“One of us already did, Elisabeta. One of us
chose
to die, by her own hand. You made that decision. Be woman enough to deal with the consequences.”

“Enough,” Vlad said. But his voice was choked and shaky, even to his own ears. “It's enough. There's no point in arguing. The decision is made. What must be done, must be done.” He clasped Tempest's wrist in his hand to hold it still.

She clamped her hand into a tight fist. “No! I won't let you do it.”

“Open your hand, Tempest.”

“No!”

Gods, he hated this. If emotional pain could kill, this would surely be the end of him. He stared into her eyes through the smoke that made his own water, and for one brief moment he let his heart show through. “Please, Tempest. Open your hand.”

She held his eyes, tears pooling in her own. “Vlad?”

Trust me, just this one more time.

He didn't know if their bond was powerful enough to allow her to hear his thoughts. But he thought it must be, when slowly, her fist unclenched,
her fingers unbending slowly. “Damn you for this, Vlad,” she whispered. “Damn you. I love you.”

“I'm sorry.” He slid the ring onto her finger, then turned away, unable to meet her eyes for even a moment longer.

Elisabeta took his hand in hers and tugged him to the spot at the top of the circle of candles. “Here. You can read from the scroll here. Follow each instruction precisely.”

Nodding, he knelt and bent to look at the words on the scroll, then turned to observe what Elisabeta was doing.

She was lying down, taking a position beside Tempest.

“Begin,” she said.

“Don't do this to me, Vlad,” Tempest begged.

Vlad ignored her, though it wasn't easy. Not when there were tears sliding from the corners of her eyes and down her face. “Beta, this ritual isn't going to work.”

“Of course it will. Just begin, for the love of the gods. We haven't much time.”

She lay there, eyes closed. He slid a look toward Tempest but didn't dare let his eyes linger on her. “No. It's worded in a way designed to release you from the bonds of the ring, into the body of the one
who wears it. But you've already been released from the bonds of the ring into Brooke's body.”

“We have to try, Vlad.”

“I didn't come unprepared,” he said. “I was afraid of exactly this problem, in fact. But I located another ritual, this one designed to do specifically what we need it to do.”

Beta opened her eyes but didn't look at him. “And what is it that we need it to do?”

“Free your spirit from Brooke's body.” He said it slowly. “Once we do that,
then
we can proceed with the original rite, the one to take you into Tempest's body.”

Beta drew a deep and stammering breath. “I…see. And where did you get this ritual?” She tried to sit up, struggled, and Vlad quickly went to her side, gripped her shoulders and helped her.

“I stole it from the files of the Sisterhood of Athena. No one knows I have it.” It was a lie. He'd stolen it not from the Sisterhood's files but from Rhiannon's pocket.

Once sitting upright, Beta leaned forward, bending over herself, hugging her waist. “Thank you, Vlad. I just…I'm not sure I—”

And before he knew what she had intended—the very instant the alarm in his mind began to
warn him, in fact—he heard the explosion and felt the red-heat impale him. The gun barrel stabbed into his chest at the same moment she pulled the trigger, sending the bullet straight through him. The pain was blinding, and he sank to his knees to the sounds of Tempest's screams, blood gushing from his body.

Beta tore the ritual from his hand and moved toward the candlelight to read it. “I knew it,” she rasped. “I knew it was a trick. This ritual would exorcise me! You…you were going to kill me!”

“No. Beta, no,” Vlad said through clenched teeth. “I was going to free you.”

“You were going to save me,” Stormy whispered. “You…you chose me.”

He met her eyes, though his vision was beginning to blur. “I made that choice long ago, Tempest. I love you. All this time, I have loved you.”

“Bastard!” Beta shouted.

She crumpled the ritual Rhiannon had copied down for him, then held it to the flame of a candle until it caught and burned. Then she bent over the original sheet, the one with the ancient rite that would condemn Tempest to death, and she began to read the words. “Powers of the ancients and of the Underworld Gods, open the gates between life
and death. Open the gates and take this one, this Tempest Jones. For her body belongs to me—Elisabeta Dracula.”

Vlad lifted his head, knew he was growing weaker by the second. “It won't work, Beta. It won't work, not this way.”

She paused to send him a hate filled glare. “How do I know you are not lying to me yet again,
prin
t
ul meu?
”

“I swear it. I swear it on…on her life.”

“Her life? Yes. She matters that much to you, doesn't she? That the most meaningful vow you can imagine is to swear on her life. It does not matter, Vlad. Her life is about to end.”

“It won't work, I tell you. You'll both die if you go through with this.”

“I am dead either way,” she said. “Better I die trying to save myself than to simply give up. Better she die with me than I should die alone. She will never have you, Vlad.”

“I have him now, Elisabeta,” Stormy told her. “I've had him for sixteen years. Only I didn't know. I'm sorry I didn't trust you, Vlad.”

“I gave you no reason to trust me. And yet you did, in spite of everything, when you let me put that ring on your finger.”