Captiva Master - Vampire Warewolf Menage Six Feet Under Series Book 4) (24 page)

When Dakota reached the tallest branch, a sudden gust of wind nearly knocked her to the ground. She tightened her hold, watching as a Gryph flew overhead, passing them, though his were arms empty. “Hey!” she shouted. “Come back!” She swore loud and long, looking back down at Adam, his sword coated in black blood, his strength, and his precision amazingly endless. “You are incredible,” she whispered, right when a searing pain slammed into the back of her skull, and then Dakota saw absolutely nothing.

M
aestru went straight to the empty crypt, forcing thoughts of Dakota from his mind, by trusting Adam. This was the only way he could end Bordis’ nightmare. “I know this is where you want me,” he shouted out, unsheathing his long sword. “Show yourself. Centuries of hiding in cowardice are nothing to be proud of nor is the mess you’ve made over half the globe. Don’t you have anything better to do?” Maestru noticed a hint of shadow moving beneath an unhinged coffin. He shook his head, holding the sword high against an unseen menace, as he made his way to the coffin.

He stepped over two extraordinarily deep fractures and flipped back the lid. “Oh, Bordis, you’ve been watching far too much Svengoolie.” Maestru, keeping his sword high and readied with one hand, reached inside the coffin with the other, and removed the stake from Tesolos throat. Amazingly, he remained alive although a second stake was plunged deeply into Tesolos’ heart.

“It’s a trap,” he sputtered, blood gurgling from his lips.

Maestru expected nothing less. “I know, and you’ve been tainted.” In his side vision, a solitary shadow moved in a semicircle around a crumbing column. “I have many regrets in my life Teslos but -”

Teslos lifted a shaky hand, dropping an all too-familiar necklace into Maestru’s palm. “None of your regrets…can compare… to what he’s done to your Bride.” The shadow crossed, darting soundlessly, and then waiting.

Maestru flicked a glance at the necklace and his entire world shifted beneath his feet. “Ah, Tesolos, this is the part where I say I’ll see you in hell.” He slammed the hilt of his sword on the stake, finishing the job Bordis started, finalizing Tesolos death. He pocketed the necklace, watching as the Undead began to slide out of their hiding places. They weren’t sluggish one bit; their moves as fluid and graceful as their Master’s were.

Suddenly Bordis appeared in a fissure of crimson lightning, his dark magic coating Maestru’s entire body with its evil taint. He pushed out, fighting the attack, spurning the twisted sensation of history repeating itself.

“Love always weakened you, Maestru. I failed so long ago,” Bordis said, gliding down the steps toward his brother’s body, “and I have learned from my mistakes.”

“You call this learning?” Maestru regrouped, weaving spell after spell to dismantle Bordis’ own. There were too many of them, and the Undead were making their presence known, moving closer while waiting for Bordis’ mental command.

“The best part is that I received a bonus,” he said, gesturing at Maestru’s pocket, where he’d buried the necklace. “A
delicious
bonus.”

A roar left Maestru, spiraling his Species onto a path he could never veer from until he tasted Bordis’ blood. The Undead suddenly clawing at him mattered not. The centuries of loneliness and regret mattered not. He saw nothing else but the threat to his mate, and he and his Species were in such accord - a one-minded unison - he could do nothing but win.

To his side, Prince Volos suddenly appeared with claw marks on his face and arms, his magic thundering from his fingertips, breaking the Undeads’ connection with Bordis, rolling their bodies away in waves of stench and flesh. Maestru lifted his sword high, the metal coming alive in his claws, and surged forward, slashing Bordis across the chest.

They performed the dance of death. Maestru tore him apart slice by slice as Bordis commanded more magic for Prince Volos to dismantle. “You never could manage hand to hand combat,” Maestru said with a sneer, throwing down his sword and then thrusting his claws deep inside Bordis’ chest.

“It doesn’t matter if you kill me,” Bordis laughed manically as Maestru found his heart, piercing it. “It’s you who has been schooled this time, because even in my death, I am avenged.” Maestru tore out his heart and dangled it before his face, but Bordis got the last word with the coldest of threats, “Volos may have dismantled all my Undead, but there is one still out there who will remain
sickly
alive unless she dies by your hands, and your hands
only
.”

Maestru jumped up, incinerating Bordis’ body with only a thought. When he locked eyes with the prince of vampires, Maestru placed his hand over his pocket, where the necklace hid. “Dakota. Oh, God, what has he done?”

D
akota was lying on the ground in a patch of red mulch, centering thousands of rosebushes, hearing footsteps, shouted orders, and muffled cries from all corners. “Why does it always have to be roses?” Dakota could feel the wooden dagger still lodged between her corset and her dress, and she had to wonder how close to death she had come. Considering the weapon would kill her just as easily as it would any vampire, and it had torn through the bit of fabric over her heart, as she’d fallen. She rose on her knees, her face throbbing like the devil from smacking onto the unforgiving ground. A stinging pain above her nape told her she wasn’t just sporting a bruise, but a definite contusion. Dakota hoped she wouldn’t bleed out before she found Maestru and Adam.

Gentle hands met the back of her head, prodding and poking her wound. Dakota made out a feminine scent but no more than that under the assault of the sickly-sweet roses. In a sudden burst, she kicked out her leg and flipped around, her breath leaving her in short bursts, as she landed with a knee to the woman’s chest. She gasped at what she saw, her heart contracting in shock. “Mamma!”

She didn’t know who was trembling more, her mother or her, but neither could speak, staring into one another’s eyes until they could no longer see for the tears streaming their faces. Dakota immediately removed her knee, cradling her mother in hers arms as if she were the child and Dakota the mother. “You’ve been here all along?”

Finally, she heard her mother’s voice, the same tenor that called to her in sleepless dreams. “Yes, yes, for all this time. I could never have left you willingly.”

“This is your garden,” Dakota whispered. “Years and years, you have planted these blooms.”

“You always enjoyed my roses,” she sobbed.

Dakota broke down with new tears. “I love you, Mamma, and Dad never remarried. He,” she stopped, sensing another female pass close by. Even though the roses were disarming, the putrid scent of rotting flesh hit her strongly.

“She’s back for another round,” her mother said, pushing off the ground. “I didn’t think she could scent you here.” Dakota saw that her mother had been wounded by deep claw marks to her thigh, and in Dakota’s overwhelming haste in greeting her, she hadn’t noticed. On the ground, a great pool of blood reflected black in the moonlight. Oh, she wouldn’t have long to live with such a blood loss. “You fought her for me. You saved me? Run, this time, Mamma.” Removing Maestru’s dagger from her secret hiding spot, Dakota held it upright in a firm grip. “Go! I’ll follow you!”

“Yes, my darling, follow me.” Her mother kicked up her heels, veering to the left. “I know a secret path!”

Dakota moved after her, and then she heard a female’s taunting voice, “You can stay here with me, and she still lives.”

Dakota spun around just as the female landed on her, thumping the back of her head against the ground, further aggravating her wound. She reached out with one hand, holding the stunningly beautiful Undead by the throat, trying to keep the creature from biting her while wedging the dagger between them.

“How could he have marked you?” she hissed, staring at Dakota’s throat with a bloodthirsty smile.

Drawing the dagger closer, Dakota knew she had to aim just right or she would be the one to die instead. In an effort to buy more time, she continued the strange conversation. “Yes, my husbands marked me,” she whispered, fighting the crushing sensation of being overpowered, and suddenly she couldn’t catch her breath.

The Undead shouted, “He’s mine!”

This female must have been an old immortal before she was remade. Holding Dakota down with her inhuman strength, she peered into Dakota’s eyes, her irises red, her body poisoned with the vilest blood. Dakota managed to bring her knee up, hooking the back of her heel around the creature’s calf. However, when Dakota tried to flip her over, she hadn’t the strength. “Who’s yours?” she asked, trying to distract her again. A sudden shadow loomed behind her, blocking out the moon.

“I am,” Maestru said quietly, wrapping his hands around the female’s torso and lifting her back to his chest. With the tip of his toe, he knocked the dagger away from Dakota’s hand. “Go, Dakota. Now.”

Like hell, she would. Dakota stood up and glanced down the pathway her mother had taken. From an opposite path, Volos strode toward them, narrowing his eyes on Dakota. She asked her husband, “Why are you saying this, when you’re mine?”

Maestru openly ignored her. “Aleena, my Bride,” he murmured in those soothing tones Dakota always found comforting, his arms still wrapped tightly around the female. “Let’s take a walk in the moonlight.”

“Aleena?” she gasped just as Volos appeared at her side, and when Dakota made a move to follow Maestru, the prince easily stopped her. She pulled her eyes away from Maestru long enough to tell the prince, “My mother is badly injured.” A thousand icicles pierced her heart. “She needs help.”

Volos picked up her dagger, turned it over in his hand, and handed it back to her. “I can’t believe your mother skirted the Gryphs.” Then, he vanished.

Dakota looked back at Maestru and
his
Aleena, the moon casting a halo around their magnificent profiles. Feeling as though she were in a waking dream, she walked almost mechanically, making her way to them, though part of her wanted to turn away. When she was close enough to hear Maestru’s words, to see him cup her face and kiss her cheek gently, she stopped.

“My dearest Aleena, you asked me once that I not condemn you to living in darkness by making you my Undead.” He reached inside his pocket and pulled out a thin chain, flicking open the oval shaped locket, showing Aleena what looked to be a miniature portrait of Maestru dressed in a dark cowl. “Do you remember that, Love?” She nodded, her reddened eyes brimming with confusion as he fastened the necklace around her throat. “You are now free of the darkness,” Maestru said tenderly, lowering his hands to her throat and wrenching Aleena’s neck.

When she heard the distinct crack of bone, Dakota dropped to her knees, staring on in horror as Maestru ignited his fingers and burned Aleena’s body with immortal fire. Other than the fierceness in his gaze, he showed no emotion whatsoever. What could Dakota say? What could she do to soothe the pain she saw in those obsidian eyes?

“There you are!” Adam bellowed, dropping to the ground next to her, his great body trembling and bleeding. “Don’t ever do that to me again!”

“I didn’t do it,” she mumbled, pointing to Maestru as Aleena’s ashes swirled to the sky. “His first Bride did.”

Adam’s mouth dropped open, his mind taking a second to recover from the realization. “Bordis knew no bounds,” he growled, sniffing her wound and then lifting Dakota up in his arms. “The Prince just announced his death, but I say death was too kind for all the bastard’s done.” He stood with her cradled against his chest. “You need blood first. Then, I’m taking you home, and I don’t think you’ll be leaving the house for at least a hundred years, even if I have to lock you in the cellar to accomplish it.”

In a flash, Maestru walked behind them, and she still didn’t know what to say, what to do. “I’m -”

“You are injured,” he replied, immediately cutting off her sympathy. “I could hardly find you for those damned roses.”

“Same here,” Adam said vehemently, kissing her forehead as she wrapped her arms around his neck. “Feed quickly, heal that head wound, My Mate.”

She eagerly bit his throat, finding the vein she was accustomed to, and sucked madly. While she looked over Adam’s shoulder, Maestru still wouldn’t meet her eyes, but he followed close behind them. In the near distance, a sudden plume of blue fire lit the air, briefly drawing her attention away. Then the rose garden erupted in sudden flames, the fire consuming every bloom. She narrowed her eyes on her Coven Master, noticing the slightest curve to his lips.

Maestru reached around Adam’s arm, commandeering his wooden dagger from Dakota’s grip and sliding it inside his belt, muttering, “If I ever see a rose again…”

Minutes felt like hours when the three finally reached a covered walkway, its intersection displaying a gilded fountain. Bodies were everywhere, most were the deranged Undead created by Bordis and his brother. “Mamma,” Dakota cried out when she spied her mother sitting on a marble bench veined in crimson and bronze.

“So it
was
her, just as I suspected,” Maestru whispered nearly inaudibly.

“You were right all along,” Adam confirmed.

“You suspected?” Dakota pushed at Adam’s chest until he lowered her on the ground. She couldn’t throw verbal stones at Maestru now, wasn’t going to yell selfishly after everything he’d just gone through, but his deceit still stung. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“After everything we were dealing with concerning Randall, you wanted me to get your hopes up?” he asked wearily, his fists clenching at his sides.

She took a breath, nodding. “Maybe, I would have done the same thing.” It would have been so easy to hug him, to bring her mighty Coven Master against her breasts and soothe him for his loss twice over, yet he would hardly look at her, his stance untouchable. Sighing, she ran to her mother, hugging her fiercely. When they parted slightly, keeping hold of one another’s arms, Dakota asked, “Are you healed?”