Fall of Darkness (The Chronicles of Darkness) (14 page)

            “What
is it that you do for work?” Leave it to Daddy to pose a question that
evaluated Dominic’s ability as a provider. He’d probably demand bank statements
and a drug screen too.

            “Have
you heard of DVR International?”

            Kate’s
father nodded. “Top Ten Fortune Five Hundred Company.”

            “I
own it.” Dominic said the words in a quiet, unassuming way, but they hit her
father over the head like a jackhammer.

            Milk
sprayed from his mouth in a shower of white liquid. He gaped at Dominic as
though he’d announced he was an alien from outer space.

            “Well,
that’s nice. Isn’t it, dear?” Mama shot Dominic an apologetic glance as she
rose to get her husband a napkin. She tossed it at him and he dabbed at the
splattered milk on the table and his shirt.

            “Yes,
very nice. I don’t think I’ve ever been in the same room as a billionaire
before.”

            “Daddy,”
Kate chided. She was pretty sure Dominic had never been interrogated by a
social worker and a high school football coach over dinner either, but he
wasn’t making an issue of it.

            “What?
It’s true,” her father protested.

            “Dominic’s
financial situation is none of our business, Dave.” Mama scolded, turning to
Dominic with a sweet smile. “What about your family?”

            “My
mother is deceased. My father manages the family vineyards and wineries, as
well as several other interests. I have two brothers and a sister...”

            The
dinner continued in a similar manner, with Kate’s parents asking questions
about Dominic’s life and him graciously satisfying their curiosity. He was
being such a sport. Kate knew he didn’t like to talk about his home and family.
She’d find a way to make it up to him later.

            After
dinner, Kate and Dominic cleaned up the remainder of the dishes, while her
parents cleared the table and put away the leftovers. Standing side by side at
the double sink, Kate couldn’t resist dabbing a gob of bubbles on the tip of
Dominic’s nose. In turn, he gave her a bubble goatee. Laughing like children,
they fought a bubble war in the middle of Mama’s kitchen, getting more soap and
water on themselves than on the dishes.

            They
tumbled to the floor in a soapy mess of water and laughter. Their laughter
halted in an instant as Dominic tucked a soap laden strand of hair behind Kate’s
ear, his dark eyes burning into hers. Her heart stuttered in her chest. She
wondered if it would always feel like that when he touched her, all fireworks
and electricity. As their lips slowly met, she knew without a doubt it would.

            “Ech-ehm.”
Kate jerked at the exaggerated sound of a throat being cleared. Her father
stood over them in the kitchen, legs apart and hands on hips, his game paint
washed away from his craggy face. A face that looked less than amused as he
watched them through narrowed eyes.

             Kate’s
cheeks burned as she scrambled to her feet. “Oh, hey, Daddy. We were just, um…
finishing up the dishes.”

            “Mmm,
hmm.” He didn’t look impressed. “Well then, carry on.” Kate’s father turned on
his heel and fled the kitchen.

Awkward didn’t even begin to describe
it. Kate and Dominic’s eyes met again and they burst into laughter. Kate had
never seen her father move so fast, unless it was on a football field. Mama had
to be behind it, operation grandbaby or something of the like.

            After
that night, Dominic was part of the family. Mama adored him and insisted he
accompany Kate on all her visits. Daddy liked him about as much as he could
like ‘the man who was stealing his only daughter.’ More importantly, Kate loved
having Dominic share in her family life. It felt right somehow. He belonged
there.

With the exception of Kate’s shifts at
the hospital, Dominic never left Kate’s side. In the weeks that followed, he
devoted his time to checking off the items on her ‘Do Before I Die’ list. He
loved every minute of it.

Numbers one hundred-sixty-seven, ‘join
the mile high club,’ and one hundred ninety four, ‘sex on the beach,’ were
especially enjoyable. Although, number seventy two, ‘go skinny-dipping in Lake
Michigan,” had ended quite nicely as well. Then there was number forty eight,
‘dance in the rain,’ which led to kissing in the rain, which led to a whole lot
of other fun stuff in the rain…

Dominic wished they could live forever
in those moments, but knew it couldn’t be. Though it was all too easy to
pretend Kate was a normal human girl, he knew the truth would eventually come
around to bite him in the ass. He was ignoring reality and avoiding the
inevitable.

Kate was a time bomb, ticking away the
precious seconds until the world around her would be no more. Dominic had no
idea what would remain after her time ran out. For that reason alone, he was
determined to make every last second she had left count.

Cradling her in his arms as she slept in
his bed, Dominic reveled in her slumberous beauty. Dawn broke the sky in
gleaming hues of blush and gold, bathing her smooth skin in the warmth of its
morning light. A slow ache built deep in his chest as he wondered how much time
they had left.

How many sun rises would they share
before she could tolerate the sun no longer? How many nights would she sleep in
his arms before she became a creature of the night? What would become of her?
Of them?

Dominic hugged her closer to his chest
as though his arms could protect her from the devastation she would face. Kate
would miss the sunshine, of that he had no doubt. But she would miss the people
in her life more.

Never again would she laugh with Lindsey
or Guy. Never again would she smile while helping in her mother’s kitchen.
Never again would she perform a victory dance while playing football with her
father. Never again would she comfort a sick child at the job she loved. She
would lose everything and everyone she’d held dear. Except him.

 Dominic wished with all his heart he
could change her fate. This remarkable woman deserved so much more than the
life that would be hers. Banished into a world of darkness. Torn from all she’d
ever known and loved. Forced to feed on the blood and souls of mankind to
survive. It would destroy her.

Dominic would do anything to save her
from the darkness of her future. Would give anything to share every sunrise and
sunset with her through the end of time. To hold her in his arms forever. To
give her a life full of laughter and children. All dreams that could never be. A
much different future awaited them.

But it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered
but Kate.

His subconscious surrender of his heart
had been instant and irrevocable from the moment he first saw her. He’d made
excuses then, but now he knew. He loved her with every fiber of his being,
needed her with every breath he took, and wanted her with every erratic beating
of his heart. The future would not be kind to them, but he didn’t care. He had
no future without her. She was his. Forever.

Dominic refused to spend another day
wondering if it was their last. He would convince her to be his wife,
consequences be damned. If need be, he would take her to the ends of the earth
to protect her. He would stand beside her as her world fell apart, then help
her to pick up the pieces and move on. The world could go to Hell for all he
cared. They would face her fate together.

Chapter
11

Salvatore swiveled back and forth in his
chair, staring blankly out over the vineyard beyond his office window, his
fingers steepled beneath his chin.

            Where
was Dominic?

           
The boy had been gone for several weeks.
Never before had his son taken so long to eliminate a target.  In the past,
Dominic returned in less than twenty four hours, his mission complete.  Not
this time. A mere phone call, questioning the target’s identity, then nothing.

Was the task compromised? 

Salvatore swallowed at the acid rising
in the back of his throat. Was Dominic compromised?

No, not his Dominic. Strong, loyal,
invincible, Dominic.

His stomach clenched at the thought. 
The stakes were too high. His son would see them through. The boy would no
sooner turn traitor than Salvatore himself. And yet…

Salvatore fished a small, tarnished
brass key from his breast pocket. With tremulous hands he unlocked the drawer
of his desk. With gentleness bordering on reverence, he removed a weathered
leather book from its protective case within the drawer and placed it on the
desk in front of him.

Rafe’s journal. Salvatore and Lucan had
shown no mercy as they teased their youngest brother for his obsession with
writing.  If they’d only known his words would haunt them more than four
centuries later. 

Salvatore gently stroked the aged
leather stretched over the wooden cover and thumbed the fragile vellum pages
open to a passage near the back. There, written in his brother’s elegant
script, were the words that would condemn them all.

23 September 1692

One hundred years have come and gone
since my Victoria was taken. A mere hundred years, no more than a blink of an
eye to one such as I. And yet, I have suffered more in this time than one man
should be forced to endure in a single lifetime or an eternity. Which is all
that is left to me now, an empty, yawning stretch of time, without my love.
These may seem the bitter ramblings of a mad man, my mind shattered by grief. Yet
grief cannot describe the emptiness of knowing one will live forever without
the other half of one’s soul.

I am not a mere man. I am much, much
more. I am the greatest vampire hunter to ever walk this earth, greater than
Romulus himself. I claim this without vanity or reservation. I am the greatest
for I fear nothing, for I have nothing left to lose.

They have already taken everything from
me. One hundred years to the day and I feel the stabbing pain of loss as if it
were yesterday. I smell her flesh burning, hear her voice. I see her face every
time I close my eyes. Her memory will not allow me to forget, but it is I who will
never forgive…

I weaved with hurried step through the
thick crowd of onlookers, none too gently bumping and forcing my way to the
front of the masses gathered in the town square. I shook my head in avid
disgust, failing to understand why my family devoted their lives to protecting
such thankless beings. Humans, they were alarmingly vile creatures, delighting
in the suffering and death of another. Thus they congregated in the square in
such overwhelming number.  That day promised the execution of a heretic, tried
and found guilty of the most heinous crimes against the church and state. 

My nose crinkled at the pungent air,
perfumed with the stench of rotten food, brought solely for the pleasure of
furthering the humiliation and suffering of the condemned before their deaths.

Then, I saw her. Pain stabbed through my
chest as the length of a sword.

The troop of guards marched in rigid
formation, escorting a frail, child-like figure to the clearing at the center
of the crowded square. I watched in helpless horror as they secured her to a
thick stake surrounded by dry kindling. My sweet, gentle Victoria stood
trembling in fear before the masses, battered and broken.

I could not force myself to breathe as
my eyes swept up her brutally beaten body to her once beautiful face. Her
bruised and swollen features spoke of resignation, of defeat. Her desolate
stare bored into the ground at her feet. I felt her fear as though it were my
own.

I felt her acceptance of her fate,
suffocating as a burial shroud. Victoria harbored no false hopes, knew there
would be no reprieve from the death that awaited her. Against my desperate
pleas, my family had disavowed her as an irretrievable loss. They would grieve
her death for the pain it would cause me, but they had deemed her unworthy of
the sacrifices her rescue would require. A decision I alone refused to accept.

The vampires had deftly infiltrated the church
and state, manipulating both for their private uses. That day stood prime
example. They publicly executed their enemies for “heresy” in the name of the
church. My gentle, all too human wife was to be executed for committing the crime
of loving me, a werewolf. I cursed her tenacity in refusing the immortality I
had freely offered. Now I can only blame myself for ever giving her the choice.
I should have turned her against her will. I would have suffered her wrath for
a time, but I would not have lost her.

The demons knew of her retained
humanity, yet offered her no mercy. She would die a mere pawn in a perilous
game to which she did not belong. None of my kind would risk the wrath of The
Almighty to save her.

Squinting, I glanced up at the cloudless
sky. The sun peaked high above my head, driving the demons of darkness deep
within the safe confines of their fortress. It mattered not. The square was
overrun with their human minions, determined to obey their masters to the
death.

Curse the humans and their weak minds.
My unseen enemy lurked in the safety of shadows while they compelled humans to
murder my wife. It was the humanity of her captors that rendered my family
helpless. To harm a human would be to violate the sacred Pact. To violate the Pact
would be to forfeit one’s immortality and soul. 

I would willingly forfeit my
immortality, for I had no desire to live forever without Victoria, but I would gladly
sacrifice my soul to save her. My every nerve was drawn taut in readiness, my
hackles raised as I prepared for the fight to come. The beast within me howled
for their blood.

My body ached with the primal need to
rush forward and defend her, to protect what was mine at all costs. The
unequivocal fury within forced my body into violent tremors. I fought for
control of the animalistic instincts that raged so naturally beneath the
surface. My grasp on reality wrestled with the uncontrollable ferocity that
blazed within me, threatening to consume my rapidly unraveling mind. I had to
stay in control.

I could not tear my eyes from my wife’s
face, desperately willing her to look up at me. I dropped the hood of my cloak
to my shoulders, no longer obscuring my identity from the humans. I whispered
her name softly, my voice a muted hush too low for the detection of human ears.
Yet she heard. Such was the strength of our connection following Il Cambiamento.
Her eyes lifted to my voice, searching the crowd for my face. Our eyes met.

Victoria gave the slightest shake of her
head in refusal. “Don’t Rafe. Please, let me die. Live, for me,” she pleaded in
a hoarse whisper meant only for me.

“No!” I protested, my voice sounding
over the roar of the crowd in the square.

The heads around me turned to seek out
the disturbance. Pulling my hood back over my head, I shifted my position in
the crowd. I knew the guards would arrive soon to take me. I didn’t care. I
held her gaze as I longed to hold her. Tears streaked down her battered, dirt
stained cheeks.

I could not let her die. I would not.

Again, a minute shake of her head as her
soft brown eyes pled with mine. “Please,” she begged me silently, her cracked
lips forming the silent word.

I inhaled a sharp breath and nodded once
in reluctant acquiescence. In my heart I knew the coerced agreement was a lie,
told to soothe her worry. My instincts would win in the end. My inner beast
could not stand by and watch her die.

Every fiber of my being shuddered with
raw fury, consumed with the need to save my love from the pain she suffered, to
destroy those that hurt her. I knew that I would die trying and my family would
reap the damning consequences.

With all the flourish and pageantry of a
government lost to corruption, a line of uniformed guards proceeded to the
center of the square, large fiery torches raised in their hands. They
ceremoniously encircled the place where Victoria stood, trembling and alone.
The master of the guard stepped forward, clearing his throat. The roar of the crowd
fell into a deafening silence as they awaited his announcement.

“The prisoner, Victoria Ridolfi, has
been found guilty of heresy, witchcraft, and murder. For these crimes she is
sentenced to death by fire.”

The crowd’s loud cheer drowned out my
anguished cry, but Victoria’s pleading eyes flew desperately to my face,
willing me into silence.

Strong arms tightened like iron bands
around each of my own. I resigned willingly to my fate, relieved that I would
die with my precious Victoria. I did not wish to continue living in a world
where she no longer did. I turned to meet my captors, only to find my brothers,
Lucan and Salvatore, at my side.

I glared in malevolence at them and
struggled to free my arms, but they held strong. They stood morosely beside me,
their eyes flickering as they scanned the scene unfolding before us. They dragged
me with unwavering strength back through the crowd. Desperate to hold my
ground, I fought their hold with all my might. I would not abandon her. I would
not lose her.

My brothers saw what came before I could
and doubled their efforts. They won the battle and my vision of Victoria
receded, but not before I caught a final glimpse of the previously upraised
torches dipping to the kindling at her feet.

“No, Victoria!” I raged against my
brothers’ restraining hold.

I flailed and fought them to no avail.
My efforts were interrupted by the softest whisper that froze me in the place
where I stood. Victoria’s words echoed over the crowd, her sweet voice a
lilting cadence of promise.

“Tell them… Tell them, their time will
come. For over four hundred years, the Cacciatori line will know only sons.
When at last a girl is born to a son of Cacciatori, she will hold the fate of
the world in her hands. She will bring the fall of darkness. Only she can end
the war between the immortals. Only she can free the demons from the devil’s
bargain. She will be the fall of lycan kind. She will--”

Her words halted, her voice caught in
her throat, as pain consumed her, as the hot flames licked greedily at her bare
limbs. The once eager crowd pressed the sleeves of their soiled garments to
their faces, recoiling from the stench of burning flesh that filled the square.
I renewed my efforts for freedom, for her.  I desperately fought to escape the
protective grasp of my brothers all the while struggling to close my ears to
the tormenting sound of Victoria’s cries. The torture of listening to her die
was more than I could bear. Lucan and Salvatore continued their labored
progress through the crowd, dragging my unwilling form behind them. We had
reached the outskirts of the town when at last her screams abated. Though she
was gone, the cruel sound of my wife’s agonized cries echoed in my mind.

My brothers released me as we approached
an opening in the wood. I crumbled to the ground in shattered bereavement, my
whole body quivering with rage and pain. My skin felt afire as surely as hers
had.

 Salvatore and Lucan withdrew a few
cautious steps, aware of the imminent effects of my volatile temper. They
watched in knowing anticipation as I burst into my wolf form. I arched back and
let loose a mournful howl. I turned on them with razor-sharp teeth bared and hatred
burning in my eyes. In denying me my death, they had betrayed me. I ripped my
gaze from my faithless brothers and raced off into the forest. Away from my
family and their duplicity, away from the pain.

I have yet to stop. For no matter how
far I run, I can never escape the agony of losing my sweet love.

I lived among the shadows for a time,
seeking refuge in my feral self, wasting away the years until Victoria, had she
lived as a mortal, would have been long gone from this earth. I imagined I
could immerse myself in the mind of an animal, leave behind the emotions of man
in favor of more basic instincts. I sought to drive away her memory. Alas, my
canine mind failed me. The ache of her loss merely deepened, my need to avenge
my mate even greater than before.

 I began to hunt the dark ones, my every
breath, every heartbeat devoted to their destruction. I slaughtered the demons
without mercy or discrimination. Only in this are my actions aligned with those
of my predecessors. They killed to uphold the sacred Pact, to protect humans
from the demons of darkness. I kill for her. I care not for the Pact, nor the
immortality it offers. I have no desire to live forever.