A Shield of Glass (A Shade of Vampire #49)(15)

“The Draven you loved is gone,” he repeated slowly. “Sorry to disappoint, sweetheart, but I’m still very much here. Just far more… potent.”

His grin sent rivers of ice coursing through my blood as I balled my hands into fists, eager to beat him back to his old self. I cursed under my breath, remembering my inability to do anything in this instance. I was only a helpless viewer.

“Besides,” he added, picking imaginary specks of lint from his shoulder, “I did what I had to do to destroy Azazel.”

“At what cost?” she replied, gritting her teeth. “Calliope is basically a dead land. You’ve burned it all down. Killed millions of innocent creatures. Killed those who trusted you with their lives and offered you their allegiance. And those you spared you exiled to Marton, so they can die on their own in the friggin’ desert! Is this what you wanted?!”

“Don’t go there again,” Draven hissed, rolling his eyes.

They’d had this conversation before, clearly. She’d probably been in there for years, begging him to kill her, and he’d been sneering at her in return. My blood boiled.

“You killed innocent people!” Serena shouted.

“It’s what those traitors deserved! They turned on me after I rescued them all from Azazel!” Draven spat furiously, slithering from his throne and moving toward the cage. “I released them from his grip, and they pointed their swords at me, like I was some loose, mindless animal. Like I didn’t know what I was doing!”

A second of silence passed before Serena started crying again.

“Please, Draven, please… Just kill me… You have no use for me anymore. Just end it!”

“No!” His eyes flared green again as he snarled at her. “No. You will not join your friends and your brother in death. You will not die until I allow you to die. And I’m not giving you that luxury!”

“Why?” she managed to ask between sobs.

He reached her and banged his hands against the iron bars, which resounded with a low clang. He then started rattling the cage, as if he were a child tormenting a small animal. Serena grabbed the upper bars and held on as he shook the heavy structure, laughing maniacally.

He froze, his yellow eyes regaining their original gray color as he gave her a glimpse of his old self. His pained expression was truly heartbreaking, his lips trembling as he looked at Serena with love—a complete contradiction to everything he’d displayed until that moment.

“You are the only reason I have left to live, Serena,” he said, his voice low and husky. “My very being is wired to keep you alive, whether you want to be or not. I will do whatever it takes to keep this darkness inside me from spilling out and infecting the rest of the In-Between. I carry Azazel’s curse in my blood, and until I find a cure to fix all this, you will stay here with me. You will suffer with me.”

Serena was speechless, her mouth slightly open as she wiped her tears with the back of her hand.

“Draven…”

“Enough!” His eyes burst into green flames as he resumed his full Destroyer form and slithered back to his throne. “Sit back and be quiet, darling, unless you have sweet words of love for me. Those I’m interested to hear. I get lonely in here.”

Serena’s shoulders slumped as she exhaled sharply and sat back at the other end of her cage. She’d been through this before. He’d probably said these words before. I didn’t even want to know what it all felt like, as I was already queasy, physically sick from everything I’d seen.

The future wasn’t getting any better. If the Daughter didn’t blow us all up, Draven was going to go all dark side and burn it all down. Jovi would still die. Phoenix would die. I would die.

It all hurt so much, but I still couldn’t allow myself to cave in. There was no way I was going to let all of this happen.

I stepped back, shaking my head as I rebuilt my resolve around this new and horrifying scenario.

“No, no, no,” I muttered. “No way you’re going to put yourselves through this!”

I took a deep breath and let it all out with a roar.

“No one is dying, you hear me?!” I shouted, looking around at whatever invisible force was animating this world and letting the pieces fall into such a foul play. “No one is dying on my watch!”

I groaned and turned around, as if waiting for some kind of response from the cruel universe that had brought me to this point.

But all I got in return was darkness as my vision faded away, and I could feel the soft bed under me again.





Aida





An hour after I spoke to Serena, we reached a meadow farther to the east. A stream crossed it, its crystalline water murmuring and inviting. I was so thirsty that the first thing I did was run toward it, skid down on my knees, and gulp down handfuls of the cool, refreshing liquid.

My senses reignited as soon as the water hit my empty stomach, as if I could already see and hear and smell everything better. The others joined in, while I looked around and noticed an abandoned farmhouse on the edge of an orchard spreading to the south. The colorful fruit hanging low in the trees caught my eye.

“Are those good to eat, you think?” I asked Wren.

“Absolutely,” she replied, rubbing the cold water on her face. “We come here once in a while when there’s nothing to pick in the forest. It used to be run by a couple of incubus brothers who didn’t like the citadel life. They left it behind years ago, but the orchard went on.”