Blood Instinct (6 page)

‘We can’t risk him telling Feinith,’ Kane remarked. ‘If she’s been exposing secrets about the prophecy to the TSCD for her own agenda, she could turn this to her own advantage too. You’ve already heard why we can’t risk alerting Sirius to our plans.’

‘But if Caleb believes war is the only way, he’ll do this whether he is the Tryan or not,’ Leila said. ‘My bet is Feinith’s already turning the military’s arrival to her own advantage. I wouldn’t be surprised if she was somehow a part of orchestrating it. This is a game of strategy first and foremost, and a war can’t happen without someone making a move. She knows their presence will evoke Caleb’s desire to protect his own. He’ll pursue this out of a sense of obligation, especially if he thinks he has no choice. And as soon as Feinith has Sophie, she’ll unleash him – I guarantee it.’

Jask looked across at Kane again; for once, he seemed to be struggling to find an alternative. And clearly their hesitation wasn’t slipping past Leila either.

‘I’ve already told you – Caleb could easily have killed me,’ Leila declared. ‘He could already have his Tryan status but he chose not to. He had absolutely nothing to gain by giving me these seven days to find the alternative unless he wanted it too. I
can
get through to him. Let me get to him before the prophecy becomes inevitable.’

‘Then tell me the alternative you found,’ Kane insisted. ‘If you’re so adamant it’s not an option, tell me why.’

Leila leaned back, her arms folded. She lowered her head for a few moments before looking back up at him. ‘The only alternative is that we undo it: we wipe out the past eighty years like they never happened. Take everything back to before the regulations were put into place. You find out who was responsible for instigating the exposure and you kill them to make sure it never happens. Life goes back to how it once was. Remains how it was. The third species stays hidden.’

Kane frowned. ‘A reversal spell?’

‘An eighty-year reversal spell,’ Leila clarified.

Jask glanced between them, absorbing their obvious shared understanding. ‘Why do I sense a but?’

‘Because it’s the most dangerous spell that exists,’ Kane stated. ‘And the longer the time span, the more lethal it becomes. No one fucks with reversal spells – not even ones over a matter of days, let alone eighty years.’ He sighed heavily before staring at the ceiling. ‘Fuck,’ he hissed under his breath.

‘You mess with the past and you mess with the present,’ Jessie remarked, the angel’s eyes flashing with concern.

‘Exactly,’ Leila confirmed. ‘If everything is wiped out back to the point before the Higher Order came forward, you’ll wipe out a whole series of events after it too. That potentially includes the existence of Sophie, Alisha, Caitlin, Eden, me – everyone who wasn’t born before it started. So unless you’re willing to put almost half of this team on the line,
that’s
why it’s out of the equation.’

The room fell silent.

But Jask quickly realised it wasn’t just because of the hopelessness of the revelation.

He followed Leila’s uneasy gaze to where Sophia was making circular motions on the table with her nail – languid movements that could have been mistaken for a mindless act had her gaze not been so lascivious as she drank Kane in.

Worse was the minor upcurling of her lips – a smile that didn’t go unnoticed by Caitlin either, her frown then matching Leila’s.

In that moment, it was as though his Sophia wasn’t there at all, as if something else had taken her over, because as Kane locked gazes with her, instead of looking away, she tilted her head to the side slightly as if she was the predator and he was the prey.

Kane’s frown deepened to a glare in response – a glare none of them needed to see.

I
t felt like a blur
, as if everything was going on around her whilst she watched on from inside her bubble. Like a ghost in a room, it was as if she could do whatever she wanted and no one would know.

All Sophia could focus on through the haze was the vampire sitting opposite her. As he talked, some distant echo, she lingered on his lips, pondering over what they would taste like.

What they would taste like when they bled.

And looking as good as he did would certainly make him a pleasurable toy, the prospect made all the more enticing by him having the kind of flawless flesh that would look good scarred; the perfect, even white teeth that would look good bared in pain.

He could probably endure a lot of the latter and take it well.

She could imagine that powerful body strapped down naked for her pleasure, those biceps flexing in futile retaliation…

The sense of someone touching her made her jump. Her attention snapped to azure eyes staring into hers, azure eyes emanating concern that matched the rest of the eyes she then scanned around the table.

And the second she met Leila’s troubled yet knowing frown, she knew
why
they were all staring at her.

Sophia felt herself flush at the prospect of having done or said something without realising. Hot with embarrassment, needing to get out of the claustrophobia of her surroundings and away from Kane, she shoved back her chair abruptly before fleeing from the room.

She headed down corridor after corridor, her legs like lead, her palms perspiring, and burst into the communal shower area, slamming her hands onto the metal vanity unit ahead. She glanced in the mirror and took in her constricted pupils, her flushed skin, the line of perspiration at her hairline. She recognised herself but it was as if she was looking into the eyes of someone else. As if someone else was staring back at her – some doppelgänger from a parallel world that was using her mirror as a window to spy on her. Someone who was smirking; some identical twin that was finding her fear amusing.

She reached out as if she was going to touch the flesh of the stranger… Then she heard the door open behind her.

Sophia flinched and dropped her hand. In the reflection, Leila stood in front of the closed door. The second their eyes connected, Sophia lowered her head to splash cold water onto her face.

‘Tell me I didn’t say anything out loud,’ she eventually said, needing to know. She smoothed down her hair in an attempt to reassure herself before she turned to face her sister.

‘You didn’t need to.’ Leila’s gaze was as solemn as the tension between them. She stepped forward and stopped in the middle of the room. ‘Sophie, you need to face up to this. For all our sakes, you
have
to face up to this. We
need
to talk.’

The door creaked open again, Alisha squeezing through the small gap she’d created before she leaned back against the wall, her gaze flitting in concern between her two older sisters.

Double the sisters equalled double the attack numbers. She folded her arms and leaned back against the vanity unit.

‘We did talk, Lei, and as far as that discussion point goes we’re done. Trying to scare me into submission isn’t going to convince me to tell Jask to let either of you go – and neither is roping Alisha in to do your dirty work.’

Leila frowned as she took a step towards her. ‘
Scare
you? Sophie, I’m trying to
save
you.’ She pointed back at the closed door. ‘Everyone in that room saw how you were looking at Kane. Is that not proof enough that I’m telling you the truth? You might think you have control of this but you
don’t
.’

‘Thanks for the vote of confidence, sis.’

‘It’s nothing to do with a vote of confidence: it’s about a reality check. Sophie, you don’t have the…’

Sophia felt her frustration, her resentment, at the pending accusation peak. ‘The
what
? The resilience? The strength?’

‘The temperament.’

Sophia shook her head off the back of a curt exhale as she stood upright and took a couple of steps towards her sister. ‘I’m changing, Lei,’ she declared, her hand flat on her chest. ‘For the better. I’m trying to get better for Jask. For me. For all of us.’

‘Which I’ve seen.’ Leila closed the gap further, her hazel eyes soft with concern. ‘But it’s not about how hard you try – it’s about how much more powerful the serryn inside of you is. Look at what happened in there: you’re sat next to the guy you supposedly love and you’re lusting over the vampire directly opposite.’

Sophia dropped her gaze, her cheeks flushing, irritation at the facts burning in her veins.

‘You didn’t even know it was happening, did you?’ Leila added. ‘Because that’s how it is. It’s like a switch. It’s her versus you. And that serryn growing inside of you each day, permeating your blood and your soul, is more powerful than you know. Right now it’s just like tremors before an earthquake, incited by arousal, but eventually it
will
consume you. By being in Blackthorn, the very air that surrounds you is already summoning it.’

‘Which is why I’m staying down here.’

‘And away from Jask?’

Sophia exhaled tersely and looked away.

‘He has a right to know,’ Leila said.

She glared back at her sister. ‘Staying away from vampires worked for you.’

‘Because I was in Summerton, miles away from here; away from as much as a hint of one. But your prey is everywhere above ground, including the pending Tryan. The serryn inside of you knows that. Their presence is like a siren call to it, especially as you’re not just
any
serryn. Sophie. Facing your nemesis will become a compulsion more powerful than anything you’ve ever felt. That serryn is going to be fighting to get out of you and fighting to get out of this place.’

‘You were with Caleb for almost three days and
you
managed to contain it.’

‘Because it was completely different. My serryn was still dormant. It was awakened less than forty-eight hours before I left that place, by which point I was already developing feelings for Caleb that were overpowering it. But I still felt it. I was battling my attraction to him at the same time as struggling to suppress what was inside me, and it was bloody hard work. You’re already days ahead of that. Look at you,’ she said, holding up Sophia’s hand so she could see the tremor. ‘You’re like an alcoholic trapped below a brewery with the fumes seeping into your senses. Whether you like it or not, that darkness growing inside of you is not going to abate – it’s going to get stronger. You
have
to talk to Jask.’

‘Listen to her.
Please
, Soph,’ Alisha cut in, taking a couple of steps closer.

‘So you can get back to Jake?’ Sophia snapped.

Her little sister’s eyes flared at the accusation. ‘You
know
it’s not just about that.’

‘What I know is that you’re both deluded. So unless you’re planning to help us and kill Caleb, this discussion is over.’

‘Because you know what Jask will say,’ Leila remarked.

‘Because it’s not his decision – it’s mine.’

‘Or it’s the decision of the serryn in you clutching for survival.’

‘Have you listened to yourself?’

Leila caught both her hands. ‘I can see how you feel about Jask, Sophie. I’ve seen the way you look at him. And I’ve seen the way he looks at you. I’m giving you a lifeline. I’m giving you a chance. Even if we survive what’s going on out there, by holding on to this you’ll eventually destroy any hope you and him have. And, in the process, you’re going to end up hurting him. Don’t spoil it. Don’t spoil it to protect me. This might be the only chance you have. If you won’t do it for yourself then do it for Jask. If you love him, do it for
him.’

The door creaked open. Sophia’s heart skipped a beat as Jask leaned against the doorframe. His attention switched from her sisters to her as he folded his arms. A trail of expletives cascaded silently through her mind.

His blue eyes narrowed; his frown deepened. ‘Do
what
for Jask?’ he asked.

T
he silence
that descended was like a stifling blanket.

Alisha’s gaze flitted erratically between her two older sisters while Sophia imparted a warning glare in Leila’s direction that was nowhere near subtle enough for Jask not to notice.

This was about more than what had just happened with Kane. From the tail end of the conversation he’d overheard as he’d approached the closed door, this had been just as much about his relationship with Sophia.

Jask closed the door behind him and rested his hands behind the small of his back as he leaned back against it. ‘Well?’

Leila glanced once more at Sophia before folding her arms and dropping her gaze, her lips pressed together.

Sophia too was intent on avoiding making eye contact with him – always a sign of her guilt.

The silence remained, the tension heightening as he glanced between the three sisters. ‘One of you is going to speak,’ he said. He opted for the least stubborn of the three. ‘Alisha?’

But her eyes remained anxiety laden as they too avoided his gaze.

Sophia shrugged dismissively. ‘Same old, same old, that’s all.’

Her explanation was as convincing as her tone. He was a split second from saying so when Leila beat him to it.

‘That’s far from all,’ she said.

Sophia’s eyes narrowed again. ‘
Don’t
,’ she warned her sister quietly, exacerbating Jask’s curiosity – and his impatience.

But Leila was far from perturbed by her sister’s reluctance. ‘At the same time I was looking for an alternative to the vampire uprising, I found a way for Sophie to lose her serrynity.’

Jask frowned as he glanced back at Sophia; it was hardly the big news that was being indicated – and no reason for Sophia to be avoiding the discussion.

He reverted his gaze to Leila. ‘We already know the ways: suicide, or falling for a vampire and consummating it.’

‘Those are the rules if you’re
born
a serryn. Which Sophie wasn’t, of course.’

His heart skipped a beat. He shot a glance at Sophia, her tongue now thrust in her cheek.

‘You’re telling me there’s
another
way?’ he asked Leila.

‘Yes.’

The prospect flashed through his mind – a tumult of thoughts of the chance, the possibility. A possibility confirmed as Sophia closed her eyes and shook her head, turning her back on them to brace her arms on the vanity unit. This clearly wasn’t the first she’d heard of it.

‘That’s why, when we spoke on the phone,’ Leila added, ‘I told her to stay away from Caleb until I’d seen her.’

But that had been days ago. It was a conversation he’d overheard. Nothing had been said about her serrynity then – not before they’d been cut off.

His attention snapped to Sophia again. ‘How long have you known about this?’

Sophia met his gaze in the mirror only briefly before she shrugged in a way that only added to his frustration at her lack of disclosure.

‘Since the second I could get her alone,’ Leila cut in. ‘About an hour after I temporarily closed the dimension.’

And Sophia had said nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Her lack of disclosure felt like an unfamiliar snag of betrayal.

‘How?’ he asked, addressing Leila again. ‘
How
can she lose it?’

‘I can’t,’ Sophia said, the adamancy in her glare convincing as she locked it on Leila’s reflection. ‘Which is why she shouldn’t even be bringing it up.’

‘I have every right to bring it up, just as Jask has a right to know about it.’

Sophia spun to face her. She took a couple of steps towards her. ‘What, know that you’re living in a fucking fantasy world?’

Leila’s eyes instantly narrowed. ‘
Don’t
talk to me like that.’

Sophia’s hands whipped upwards in despair. ‘Then stop bringing up irrelevant suggestions. There’s only one way you’re going to help me,’ she said, jabbing her finger towards the floor, ‘and that’s by killing Caleb Dehain.’

‘Because that’ll make everything okay? You’ll
still
be a serryn, Sophie. Even if we do survive the next week, it won’t solve anything for
you
. If I kill Caleb, if any of you kill Caleb, you may as well be signing your own death sentence too.’

Jask’s pulse kicked up a notch. ‘What do you mean signing her death sentence?’

Leila’s solemn hazel eyes snapped to his. ‘We need him. We need Caleb alive and cooperative in order to rid Sophie of this.’

Like trying to catch falling bricks, every drop of information brought a harder blow.

‘Which just so happens to be perfectly convenient for you,’ Sophia snapped.

But it was also painfully logical. Suddenly Leila’s unrelenting determination to get Caleb on side made even more sense.

Jask attention jumped back to Sophia, now leaning against the vanity unit again, her arms folded defensively.

He could tell from the distress in her eyes that this was more than Sophia simply slipping back to her belligerent and stubborn self though. He was missing something. Something pivotal.

‘Why?’ he asked Leila. ‘Why do you need Caleb alive and cooperative?’

‘For the impossible,’ Sophia interjected.

‘It’s
not
impossible,’ Leila retorted.

‘Will one of you please tell me what the
fuck
is going on here?’ Jask demanded.

‘She’s talking about a spell,’ Sophia explained, ‘for which she needs my blood and, as the serrynity transferred from her, her blood too. But that’s not all. She also needs Caleb’s blood, as he was the catalyst,
and
her
original
serryn blood.’

Jask’s turned back to Leila. ‘You
have
your original serryn blood?’

‘No,’ Sophia remarked. ‘She doesn’t. That’s the whole point.’

‘When I was with Caleb, I took two syringes of my blood one night in an attempt to kill him,’ Leila said. ‘He destroyed one in the fire right in front of me. The other one went missing.’

‘The one that
everything
hinges on,’ Sophia clarified.

It was another falling brick.

‘What makes you think he has it?’ Jask asked Leila

‘It went missing from his bed.’

The bed that they had no doubt shared.

‘Okay, so even if he had it, what’s to say he
still
has it?’ Jask asked.

‘
Exactly
,’ Sophia said. ‘Which is
why
this is a fantasy. And even if he does still have it, he’s not going to give it to her – not without her telling him why she needs it. And he’s really going to hand it over if he knows that, by doing so, he’s kissing goodbye any chance of completing his transformation.

‘And to top it all off,’ Sophia added, ‘to conduct the purification spell she needs access to her spell book, which
also
happens to be in Caleb’s possession. So, basically, she wants to walk back in there and ask him to hand everything over so I can lose my serrynity and fuck up any chance he’s got of becoming the Tryan. She’s off her head,’ she said, her glare locking on her sister’s again. ‘Fucking bonkers.’

‘What’s insane is you not facing up to this,’ Leila declared, closing the gap between them. ‘You’re risking yourself and this pack, including Jask. I’m
trying
to make up for what I did to you, Sophie.’

‘There’s nothing to make up for! You saved my life!’ Sophia declared, standing her ground. ‘If your serrynity hadn’t jumped to me, I would have died in that hovel Jask found me in. Anyway, who’s to say it didn’t jump to me for a reason? Maybe I’m better equipped to take Caleb down than you are. Maybe
I’ll
defeat him at the Brink. I’m sure not going to fall in love with the psychotic bastard like you did!’

Leila’s eyes flared, her lips parting.

‘But what if you being the serryn
lowers
our chances?’ Alisha interjected, her quiet voice penetrating from the background, feeding Jask’s insight into what it had been like for her growing up with them both. ‘He didn’t kill Leila because he cares about her. He has no reason to pull back should he ever get his hands on you. Do you really want to die for this? Do you want to sacrifice yourself when you don’t have to?’

‘As opposed to sacrificing Leila?’ Sophia snapped, her tone laced with adamancy he recognised too well.

And clearly Leila did too from the flash of frustration in her eyes.

‘I
know
what I’m doing,’ Leila said, impressively calmly.

‘Then act like it. If you go back there, all he’ll do is use you as leverage to get his hands on me.’

‘Which is why this is the perfect chance for me to show I trust him.’ Her eyes met his again, wide with pleading. ‘We are wasting valuable time. Jask,
you
have to listen to me even if she won’t. Prophecy aside, what happened with Kane in there is just the start. Sophie was in that room with him for less than an hour and you saw the effect. It’s going to get worse for her. She cannot sustain this. Keeping her confined here will only intensify her serrynity.’

‘Oh, please,’ Sophia said, rolling her eyes.

But Leila kept her full attention on Jask. ‘I can see how you feel about her but you’re being incredibly naïve if you believe you have a hold on this. You and your pack may be immune to serryns but none of you are safe. It will manipulate and cheat and distract and seduce and do whatever it can to get out of here – and at a worse time for you all than ever. I saw what happened earlier. I know how your lycanthropy affects your impulses, your desires, your instincts.’

‘My pack won’t touch her. Or any of you.’

‘But what if one of them messes up? What if
you
mess up? She won’t just pick on their weaknesses; she’ll pick on
yours
. Serryns are cruel and selfish. They’re malicious and strategic and unpredictable. And she’ll wrap it in a seductive smile and not give a damn if she puts you or your pack in danger. You’re all at risk down here – even Tuly and Honey.’

The sharp intake of Sophia’s breath echoed around the room. ‘Now you’re being ridiculous!’

‘Am I?’ Leila demanded, her gaze snapping back to her sister. ‘You can say that without the slightest doubt?’

‘Then why not tell him the whole truth, Lei? Huh? Do you want to tell him it’s a reclamation spell that you’ll be using as part of purifying my blood from the curse? How the serrynity could come back to you in the process? How we could be handing Caleb his sacrificial serryn by letting you go back in there – the one thing we’re
all
trying to avoid?’

The metaphorical brick thunked to the ground before Jask had a chance to see it coming.

And there it was: Sophia’s reticence made total sense.

‘Like I told you: the chance is minimal,’ Leila exclaimed.

‘So you say. But it’s
still
a chance.’

‘And I’m giving you a chance to be with Jask. To live a normal life. Maybe even to have a family one day…’

It was a stab to his chest no doubt as much as it was to Sophia’s.

Sophia’s eyes emanated pain that silenced even Leila – Jask’s cue to intervene.

‘I want to talk to Phia alone,’ he said.

Sophia’s glare in his direction reminded him of the old defiant Sophia, her adamant eyes firm that he should heed her warning. ‘Don’t think you can talk me round.’

But he ignored her protest. ‘Leila? Alisha?’

It took a few seconds, but Leila eventually conceded, catching Alisha’s arm on her way to the door.

Leila cast one more glance over her shoulder at Sophia before she left.

But this time Sophia avoided eye contact with her sister, leaning back against the vanity unit again, her resoluteness clearly unwavering as Jask moved to stand in front of her.

He opted not to take a confrontational stance, as much as he was tempted, knowing it would achieve nothing. Instead he leaned back against the vanity unit alongside her. ‘I can’t believe you didn’t tell me about this, Phia.’

‘And now you know why. She’s delusional, Jask. Caleb’s not going to simply hand those things over – even if he does still have the syringe.’

‘So you ruled it out without even talking to me about it?’

‘Because there is
nothing
to talk about.’ She turned to face him head-on. ‘You know, like there was nothing to talk about when you refused to take the full dose because you weren’t willing to do that to your pack?’

‘You can’t use that as an example.’

‘No? From what I remember, you put yourself right down the bottom of the priority list despite knowing your pack needs you. That
I
need you. But sometimes we take the blows for those we care about, don’t we, Jask? Well, this is
my
sister and I’m not doing it to her. I’m not sending her back to that psychopath who manipulated her and brainwashed her and coerced her and did fuck knows what else to her. She’s spent
years
looking out for me and putting me first. I’m not going to bail on her now that she finally needs me. She stays down here where she’s safe and we stick to the plan. Discussion closed.’

She took a step towards the door but he blocked her way, her determination, though often one of her more charming flaws, grating more than he should have allowed.

Sophia’s gaze snapped in warning up to his. ‘Let’s not do this, Jask.’

For the first time since she’d exited the room to escape Kane, he was uncertain how much of that warning was Sophia and how much of it was the serryn seeping through.

The prospect triggered something in him that wasn’t happy about being dictated to – about the discussion being closed without his agreement.

‘I’m not done,’ he said.

‘I am,’ she stated, her tone as resolute as her stance. And he could see it in her eyes, could sense it in the tension in her hands: the battle to suppress a quarrel. ‘Aside from the risks to my sister, you know as well as I do that none of us can afford to hand Caleb a serryn on a platter. Whatever fantasy she’s living in, he’s not going to choose her over his own kind. Not now Sirius has arrived. It’s too late.’

‘But you dismissed this before you knew of their arrival.’

‘For all the reasons I’ve said. I know I had a blip back there, but I’m stronger than she thinks. I’m stronger than you all think. It didn’t control her and it won’t control me. Just like your lycanthropy won’t control you. I have faith in you, so how about you try and have faith in me?’