Hidden (House of Night #10)(91)

"The circle is open. The spell is cast. Now all we can do is wait," Thanatos said.

"And watch," Kalona agreed, adding silently to himself, and wonder.

Aurox

He felt the protective spell being cast and knew what it meant. Without hesitation, Aurox rushed into the elevator and pushed the button to the penthouse. "Hurry! Please hurry!" he shouted at the closed doors. Too slow! I need to be there now! If I could feel the spell, she could feel it as well! Aurox wanted to bash his fists against the walls of the slowly moving metal box. Frustration filled him, hot and thick. The beast stirred.

Aurox froze. Panicked he slowed his breathing. Control the beast ... control the beast ... chanted around and around within his mind. It was as the elevator finally reached the top floor and the doors slowly opened that the elements found him. With a surge of energy they filled him with strength and calm, drowning the heat of the beast.

He released a long sigh of relief, and with new confidence stepped within the slick marble entry hall. The scent of Neferet's blood was thick in the air. For a moment Aurox didn't understand. Had Grandma Redbird managed to wound the Priestess?

Then he heard laughter and the familiar rustling sounds the tendrils of Darkness made when they fed. He also heard the terrible moans of a woman in pain. Stealing himself, Aurox drew courage from the infilling of the elements, and he moved quickly and quietly into the main living area of the penthouse suite.

Aurox had thought he was prepared for what he would see. He'd known Neferet had caged Grandma Redbird in Darkness. He'd known she'd be frightened and hurt. It was so much worse than he'd imagined. He spared Grandma only a glance-met her pain-filled eyes for only an instant. It was Neferet on whom he focused his attention.

She seemed to not even know he was there. She was lounging on the large black sectional that formed the shape of a half circle. Her arms were spread, palms up, and she was laughing. Tendrils of Darkness were all around her, seething over the cushions and writhing against one another in their haste to reach Neferet's bleeding wrists to feed. When one mouth would unlatch from her skin, another would take its place. Aurox watched as the bloated tendril slithered to the cage that held Grandma where it joined others of its kind who were steadily slicing the old woman skin with the same razor-edged whip marks from which Kalona had so recently healed. Aurox knew Grandma would not be so fortunate.

He strode to Neferet and dropped to his knees before her. "Priestess! I have returned to you!"

Her head had lolled back. At the sound of his voice, Neferet lifted it. She squinted at him, as if she was having a hard time focusing, and then her eyes widened in recognition. Belying the lethargic appearance of her body, in one swift motion Neferet grasped a newly fed tendril and hurled it at Aurox. The snake-like creature hit him in the middle of his chest, slicing through his shirt and ripping his skin.

"You are late!" Neferet shouted at him.

Aurox did not flinch. "Forgive me, Priestess! I became confused. I could not find my way back to you." Aurox recited the excuse he had decided Neferet would be most likely to believe.

Neferet sat up straighter, brushing the tendrils gently from her wrists and clucking to them soothingly as if they were beloved children.

"You ignored my command. I had to sacrifice to claim control of the beast, and still you failed me." She hurled another tendril at him. It cut a red ribbon across Aurox's bicep.

The pain multiplied. The beast felt it and began to stir. Aurox closed his eyes and pictured the glowing circle, imagining it surrounding him with its protective glow.

The beast reluctantly quieted.

Strengthened, Aurox opened his eyes and beseeched Neferet, "I did not ignore your command! It was the casting of the circle and the invocation of Death that caused my failure. Priestess, I cannot describe to you the influx of Light and power that Thanatos called forth. It affected the beast. I could not call it forth!"

"But I could, and even after that you failed to destroy Rephaim and to break the circle." Neferet flung yet another tendril at him. This one did not simply cut him. It wrapped around his neck and began feeding from him.

Still, Aurox did not flinch but inside him, the beast roared, though the sound was drowned in a cool rush of water and blown away with a powerful gust of air.

"That was the fault of Dragon Lankford. He was protecting Rephaim," Aurox said, holding his body very still as Darkness continued to feed from him.

Neferet shook her head in irritation. "Dragon shouldn't have been there. I thought Anastasia's death had broken him. Sadly, I was mistaken." She sighed. "I still do not understand why you didn't kill Rephaim after Dragon was dead."

"It was as I said, Priestess. The spell did something terrible to me. I was not myself. I had no control over the beast. After it gored the Sword Master I could not force it to remain and finish Rephaim. It ran, and I could not stop it. It was only today that I finally returned to my senses. The instant I was myself again I made my way back to you."

Neferet frowned. "Well, it isn't as if you had much sense to return to. I suppose I must expect this type of thing. Imperfect sacrifice-cracked Vessel," she muttered more to herself than to Aurox. "Well, it has not ended so badly," Neferet spoke to him again. "You did put an end to Dragon Lankford's annoyingly honorable life. You did not stop the reveal ritual, and because of that I have been shunned by the Vampyre High Council, but I have decided that I do not mind that so very much. Not when I have local humans and my own little group of vampyres to play with." She leaned forward and offered Aurox her blood-spattered hand. "So, you are forgiven."