Bitten by Darkness (24 page)

“You are
not lying,” Jasper
said,
a note of sorrow in his
voice.

“Of
course I am not lying. Unfortunately, my father's sense of, well, sanity, had
already begun slipping by then. When Jasper's dear step-brother showed up with
a human wife, he cracked. He took her for a slave. The very idea of taking food
to one's bosom like that is, well, abhorrent.” Sebastian shuddered delicately.

Sienna
ground her teeth. “He had Ambrose killed.”

“Of
course he did.
Ancient history.”
He waved a hand. “But
darling Sara escaped all those years ago, to my shock. I was rather happy about
that, you know. I quite liked her. It's a pity my father became so obsessed.
Such an inconvenience.”
Sebastian took a step forward.

Sienna
sensed Jasper clenching his fists and hurriedly spoke.
“An
inconvenience to you?”

“Yes, my
dear Sienna. I may call you Sienna, yes?”
Another step
forward.

“You
created the winged revenants, too,” Sienna breathed, the full picture suddenly
springing full-blown into her mind. “You created the blood market. It was
always you.”

He cocked
his head, an almost mischievous look on his face. “Well, yes. I had no desire
to run around doing the bidding of a madman for the rest of my life. And there
was no sign my father was about to pop into ash anytime soon. I had no choice.”

“You
enslaved our own.” Jasper finally broke his silence. The rage in his voice made
even Sienna flinch.

“Oh come
now, don't be so naive. I thought you'd gotten past that sort of thing,
Jasper.” Sebastian smiled. “Evolution rules the universe, you know.
Survival of the fittest and all that.”

“Creating
an addiction that will destroy our people isn't survival of the fittest. It's
survival of one.”

Sebastian
scoffed. “You have always been so melodramatic. Your father was the same way.”

Jasper
shook off Sienna's hands. “What are you doing in my house, Sebastian?” he asked
silkily.

Sienna
noted that neither man was using titles anymore. She swallowed, trying to relax
enough so that her muscles wouldn't lock up when she most needed them.

“I'm
taking back what belongs to me, Jasper. Quite a lot of blood you've got in
there, eh? I wondered who’d bought all the blood recently. I even sent more of
my people to find out what was happening, but that created its own problems.”

With a
sense of shock, Sienna realized that Sebastian was the cause of all the recent
vampire attacks.
Because he sent more of
his enslaved revenants here, probably as a result of Jasper buying up the blood
even before he came back to Earth
. He’d addicted his own people to sentient
blood then enslaved them. The horror of it washed over her but Sebastian hadn’t
stopped talking.

“Imagine
my surprise when I discovered that you were the interloper, trying to grab hold
of my monopoly.
Quite an accomplishment.
If it hadn’t
been for dear Sara’s weak mind, well…” Sebastian threw an arm out. The sound of
cracking branches filled the darkness and suddenly a long, sharp stick was in
his hand.

Sienna
shoved Jasper to the side as Sebastian flung the wood at him. It landed in the
dirt, but she had no time for relief as another branch cracked and appeared in
Sebastian’s hand. She didn't even have a chance to curse as he flung it at her.
She knocked it aside, ignoring his snarl. Jasper surged forward, but Sebastian
whirled and Jasper went flying into the trees.

He didn't even touch him
, Sienna thought, shocked. He'd flung Jasper
into the dark with nothing but a harsh look.
Sebastian's mental powers are beyond anything I’d imagined
, she
thought, just as an intense pressure turned her skull inside out. She moaned,
clutching her temples. He was trying to get inside her head, the bastard! He
stood above her, dark eyes flashing triumphantly and she rolled, hoping that it
would distract him, but his concentration didn't break. She groaned. When the
pain stopped, she had just enough energy to look up. Her mother stood behind
Sebastian with her hand on a broken branch. The other end was sticking out of
his gut.

“Oh
please, you didn't think you could actually kill me, did you?” Sebastian said,
not sounding at all bothered.

Sienna
tried to get up, cry out, something, but she was too late. Sebastian raised his
hand and with one swift move, crushed her mother's neck. The older woman's eyes
bulged and Sienna heard a crack. Her mother went limp.

“No!”
Sienna lunged for his legs. Sebastian went down and she crawled her way up his
body, intent on getting her hands on his smirking face. She ground the broken
stick into his stomach as hard as she could, but he growled and flung her away
easily.

Head
spinning, Sienna tried to roll over. She'd just managed to push her hair out of
her eyes when she saw Jasper stab Sebastian in the heart with her penknife.
Sebastian looked surprised, and for a moment she thought they'd won, but then
he punched Jasper again, physically this time. Jasper rocked back, his head
snapping to the side, but his hands didn't leave the knife.

“You
can't get rid of me that easily. Your addiction may make you strong, but it
doesn't make you smart.” With those words, Jasper pulled the blade free and
shoved it into Sebastian's neck, sawing at the tendons. Sebastian went white as
a gout
of thick blood poured from his throat and he
scrabbled weakly at Jasper’s wrist. When the knife made a sickening, wet snap,
Jasper let go and snaked his arm around Sebastian's neck. With a mighty heave,
he ripped off the monster's head. The two pieces of Sienna's knife fell to the
ground in a cloud of ash. Jasper stumbled and sat on the ground, breathing
heavily.

“Jasper,”
Sienna
said,
grief thick on her tongue.

“I'm so
sorry,” he murmured, looking at her with such compassion she felt herself choke
on a sob. She crawled over to him and flung her arms around his neck. He
smelled good despite the acrid tang of dust on his skin. He smelled like home.

“She tried
to save me,” she whispered, wiping away tears. “Did you see?”

“I know.”
He cradled her in his arms. “I'm so sorry I couldn't save her.”

Sienna
blinked and shoved back her hair. “Don't be ridiculous. It wasn't your fault.”

He sighed
heavily. “We can't stay here.”

“I know.”
She glanced at her mother’s body.

“We'll
come back for her, I promise.” Gently he drew her hands to his lips, kissing
each of her palms. “Can you stand up?”

“Yeah.
I'm okay.”

Jasper
stood and pulled her to her feet. “We need to see what's going on at the
house.”

“If
Sebastian is gone, wouldn't his slaves have all vanished?”

He
shrugged. “Better to be sure.”
Her
urged her onto the
trail.

At the
mansion, Sienna sucked in a breath. “How is that possible?” The mansion was a
hive of activity. Winged slaves circled the clearing and a few more ordinary
revenants walked around the perimeter. A large, silver ship was parked along
the side of the building and from what she could
tell,
they were loading something into it. Industrial sized lamps lit the entire
property.

Jasper
nodded slowly, as if in realization. “Nicholas isn't dead.”

She
gaped. “What? But Sebastian said—”

“He
lied.” Jasper’s voice held no surprise.

“Jesus,”
she muttered. “It wasn’t just Sebastian, was it? Nicholas is here. They were in
it together.”

Jasper
grunted. “Yes.”

“They’re
taking the blood?” She wondered how he could be so calm about this.

“Most likely.”
He didn’t sound upset.

“What? We
have to stop them!” She nearly stepped out of the tree-cover, but Jasper held
her back.

“No, I
want them to take it. It has the
nanites
.”

She
stared at him. In the light of the clearing, his face looked as if it had been
carved from granite: all harsh edges.

“You
planned this?” Her heart gave a thump and she pressed a hand to her gut,
willing the nausea down.

He gave
her a sharp look. “No, not like you're thinking.”

“What
then?” She couldn't imagine him being responsible for her mother's death. She
just
couldn't
.

“I'd
planned to lure them here, get them to take the blood, make them think they'd
won, but I never expected you. I thought I had it all figured out, but my
timeline kind of got fucked all to hell, to put it bluntly.” He ran his hand
over his face tiredly. “And I had no idea that Sara had been compromised. This
all happened so quickly.” He pursed his lips.

Sienna's
relief surged through her. “Are your
nanites
ready?”
She tried to keep her voice steady but didn't quite succeed.

He looked
at her, surprise chasing itself across his face,
then
smiled.
“Yeah.
They are.”

“Then we
don't need to do a damn thing except watch them screw themselves here.”

“Huh.” He
grinned, drawing her close.
“Yeah.
Pretty
much.”

“What if
you want to go back? To
Deckol
?” she asked after
they'd stood watching for a while. The creatures loading the ship seemed to be slowing.

“In a few
months,
Deckol
will be completely different.
Kroy
City may be a ghost town,” he said, voice low and sad.

“It's not
your fault. They chose it for themselves, against all decency. They
knew
the blood came from humans, right?
And didn't you tell me that one of your most stringent laws was against the
taking of sentient life?”

“Yes. It
is. Even so, I’ll be responsible for the destruction of half of my people.” He
trembled in her arms.

She
hugged him tightly. “Everyone is responsible for their own destruction. I
learned that after my father left us.”

For a
long moment he didn't say anything. Then he spoke, “So young, yet so wise.”

She was
about to respond, but an explosion shook the ground. She clutched at Jasper. He
held her steady.

“What was
that?” she managed.

“Oh.” He
was looking at the smoke pouring through the trees. “I was afraid of that,” he
said roughly.

She
stared at the mansion. The ship must have taken off when they'd been talking,
but they'd left a little gift behind: the building was on fire and half of it
was rubble.

“Why
would he do that?” she asked, bewildered. She ached for Jasper.

“He
probably sensed his brother's death.” Jasper held her a little bit tighter.
“Even if he thought I was dead, he wanted to make certain if I wasn’t, I’d have
to start with nothing.”

“Your
star-skimmer—” she began to say, but he shushed her.

“It's
just a ship. I can make another.”

“On Earth?
How?”

“I still
have the
grav-lensor
and all my schematics are backed
up on a remote server. I learned how to make contingency plans a long time
ago.” He turned her to face him. His grey eyes gleamed with love. “And I have
you. You'll let me sleep over, right? Otherwise I’ll have to hibernate in the
woods like a bear.”

She
stared at him. “You're completely ridiculous, you know that?”

He
laughed and kissed her temple.
“Maybe.”

She shook
her head and took his face in her hands. “Yes, of course you can stay with me.”
She kissed him softly, imprinting the feel of his warmth on her lips. “You can
stay with me forever.”

He closed
his eyes, the humor fading from his expression. “I'd hoped so.”

“Don't
hope,” she said. “Believe.” And kissed him again the burning mansion behind
them turned to ash.

Epilogue

“Are you
ready?” Jasper asked her.

Sienna
adjusted her scarf and put on her coat. Her new boots were super warm so she
didn't have to worry about getting cold feet.

“I’m all
set,” she said, grabbing her gloves.

Jasper
smiled at her and picked up the rose. The table in the foyer had been her
mother's. Sienna ran a finger over the colorful tiles on the surface,
remembering how much her mother had loved the geometric design. She grabbed her
keys. “Sunset is in twenty minutes.”

Jasper
nodded as he ushered her out of the house. It sat on ten acres of old farmland
and Sienna loved the way it creaked when the wind blew hard. The house was
pretty much as different as you could get from both Jasper's mansion and her
old apartment, and she’d never been happier. She loved the way the land sloped
down hill on all sides so she could watch the sunset or sunrise with ease. She
loved the old forest that settled off to the south like a comfortable blanket
over the meadow. She loved living on the edge of a state forest where neighbors
were few and far between. Those they had were pleasant and kept to themselves.
For some reason, everyone who lived out here in the middle of nowhere seemed to
understand the need for solitude.