Ironic Sacrifice Page 9

  Pale sapphire eyes peered out under sharply arched brows. Full, sensuous lips curved in a knowing smile. It felt like he could see inside her soul. He throbbed with power, so much that his presence nearly made her teeth ache. He had to be at least twice as old as Razvan. For the longest time Delgarias sat and smiled at Jayden before he finally turned to Silas and gestured for him to rise. There was something about his hands…

  “You honor me with your presence, my lord,” Silas said with only the slightest bit of inquiry creeping into his tone as he stood up. “Ah, would you like something to drink?”

  Jayden’s pulse sped up. Surely he didn’t mean….?

  Delgarias grinned at her, flashing fangs before nodding. “I would like a glass of water if you don’t mind.”

  She sagged in her seat, unable to hide her relief— until Silas left her alone with the strange vampire.

  “Be at ease, Jayden Leigh,” Delgarias said in a voice that would have been more soothing if not for his vast power ramming itself down her throat. “I am not here to hurt you.”

  “I…” she tried to speak, but the reverberations in her skull made words impossible.

  Delgarias’s eyes shone in understanding. “I am overwhelming you, aren’t I?”

  Jayden nodded and the creature closed his eyes. The intensity ebbed away and the tension drained from her body as if she’d slipped into a pool of cool water.

  “Thanks,” she said, now noticing what was wrong with his hands. The fingers were at least an inch longer than those of a human.

  “I am sorry about that,” he said. “You are far more powerful than I anticipated. This is good.”

  Silas returned with a glass of water and a piece of paper. Handing both to Delgarias, he said, “We are having problems with Selena, my lord.”

  Delgarias sipped his water and read Selena’s letter with a chuckle. “Yes, Akasha told me about this when I paid her a visit earlier. Selena is more insane than ever, it seems. Poor thing.”

  Silas grimaced. “My sympathy for her mental instability evaporated centuries ago. I don’t suppose you could speak to her?”

  “I could,” Delgarias replied disinterestedly, “but at this point I’m certain it would have no effect. Only killing her will make her stop her nonsense and that I cannot do.”

  “Why not?” Silas and Jayden chorused.

  “I have other things to attend to,” he said vaguely. “I only stopped by to see how you are getting on and now I must be off.”

  The vampire stood, towering over Silas by at least five inches. He bent down and placed a long-fingered hand on top of Jayden’s head. “It was a pleasure to finally meet you. Take care of Razvan. He has endured much loneliness.”

  He gave Silas a slight nod and vanished. The rush of air barreling into the spot he vacated turned Jayden’s stomach.

  “Ye mean ye dinna think her threat is serious enough to merit yer almighty attention,” Silas growled to the now empty chair.

  “I’m not certain that’s what he meant,” Jayden said, scooting back slightly in case her statement upset him.

  The vampire raised a brow. He opened his mouth, shut it, and sighed. “Yes, I know. He was just being his usual enigmatic self.”

  “What did he mean by checking to see how we were?” Jayden asked. “He didn’t even ask how anyone was doing.”

  Silas smiled. “He didn’t have to, not with his power.” He turned and nodded as the front door opened. “What concerns me most is that he made an appearance at all.”

  Razvan strode into the room trailed by Max and Akasha. As usual, Jayden’s heart clenched at his dark beauty.

  “Ah, so he came here too.” His Romanian accent was thicker than usual. “I expected as much.”

  Akasha darted around him to place a possessive hand on Silas’s arm. “How did he get here so fast? He was just at the shop five minutes ago.”

  Max cut in, “Don’t answer her, I don’t want to know. That guy shivers my skin as it is.”

  Razvan stalked behind Jayden, sliding his hands down to cup her shoulders, holding her frozen in her chair as he addressed Silas. “I presume he came to reiterate his instructions to me?” He laughed, low and dangerous. “As if you could stop me.”

  Silas leaned back in his seat, undaunted but for a silky undertone in his voice. “And what instructions would those be?”

  “I am not to Change Jayden without Delgarias’s permission.”

  “Ah,” Silas replied with a slight smile. “He didn’t tell me anything of the sort. He really didn’t say much of anything.”

  “Wait!” Jayden interrupted as their words became clear. “You mean change me into a vampire? I’m not sure I—”

  Razvan squeezed her shoulder painfully then absently rubbed it as if in apology. “Yes, I was told not to…yet. Not that I intended to do so at this point in time.”

  Jayden felt a pang of disappointment even as her mind screamed at her. What’s the matter with you? You don’t want to drink blood!

  Max went to the kitchen and scooped three bowls of chili from the crock pot as Akasha heated up the cornbread. During dinner, Silas and Razvan speculated as to the significance of Delgarias’s visit.

  “I think it’s starting,” Silas said. “The events of the prophecy—”

  Razvan scoffed. “I think the old bastard just wants to keep us on our toes.”

  Jayden shivered as the memory of the ancient vampire’s power washed over her. She hoped he wouldn’t drop by again. Forcing her thoughts from the terrifying creature, she focused instead on getting back into Razvan’s memories. Maybe this time it would work again.

  ***

  As dawn broke and the vampire’s breathing delved into deep slumber, Jayden focused her will on Razvan, concentrating with all her might. Nothing happened and she heaved a sigh of disappointment before trying again. Her consciousness began to float away and her heart surged in triumph. It was working!

  Jayden left her body behind and drifted into a dark chamber, poorly illuminated by banked coals in a worn fireplace. A figure sat in a chair, facing away from her. Was it Razvan, or Radu? Just as she reached forward with invisible fingers, the chair swiveled to reveal Delgarias’s ethereal countenance. His brow rose in amusement as he looked right at her.

  Slowly, Delgarias shook his head and pointed an abnormally long finger to the right. His other hand rose, waving her off in that direction. Jayden was catapulted away from Delgarias and back into Razvan’s memories….

  The twins hurried out the door of their birth mother’s home and down the winding streets. Nothing looked familiar in the waning light. After an hour of searching for the square and doubling back, the twins sighed in defeat.

  “Father is going to strap us raw for certain,” Radu said glumly.

  “He’s not really our father,” Razvan countered. “And I intend to confront him about that fact before he can say a word about his stupid command to stay away from the village. It’s because he didn’t want us to know the truth. You know that, right?”

  Before Radu could answer, a voice behind them said, “That is not the reason, not entirely, anyway.”

  Alexandru Nicolae stepped out of the shadows and surveyed them with a stern frown. Razvan shivered despite his earlier bravado.

  “I wanted to wait another year or two to tell you the truth, but now that you have learned some of it, I suppose I’ll have to tell you the rest tonight.” He let that cryptic statement hang in the air before he asked suddenly, “Where is the wagon?”

  Razvan cleared his throat, his ears burning with embarrassment. “We paid a boy to tether it while we explored, but we got lost and cannot find the place where he put it.”

  “Did you offer him more coin upon its return?”

  “No.”

  Alexandru frowned. “Then it has probably been stolen.”

  Humiliation poured through Razvan in waves. His face felt like a hot coal.

  “I should have taught you better,” the Voivode said.

>   Radu spoke up in defense of his brother. “Razvan protected me from a harlot today!”

  Alexandru’s eyes bulged in surprise then he burst out laughing. Neither had heard him laugh that hard before. It seemed to echo through the village. There was an eerie quality to it that made goosebumps rise all over his flesh.

  Finally the laughter faded and Razvan couldn’t help his relief.

  “Well, that is probably fortunate. Diseased things, they are,” Alexandru said. “Never mind about the wagon, I will deal with it tomorrow. A long walk will teach you boys a lesson, I think. And it will give me time to explain a great many things.”

  They walked with Alexandru in the darkened village. The moonlight reflected in his eyes, making him look otherworldly. He told them the tale of how he met Crina and how her longing for motherhood persuaded him to take the twins.

  “But why was she ‘sacrificed’ to you in the first place?” Razvan asked.

  “Ah, now here is the most important part of my tale,” Alexandru said. “I and, thanks to me, your adopted mother are no longer human beings. We are something far greater, and far more powerful.”

  “What do you mean?” Razvan asked.

  Alexandru answered him with another question. “Would you care to hazard a guess as to how old I am?”

  Radu answered, “You look to be no more than five and thirty. But then you’ve always looked the same.”

  Razvan sucked in a breath at his brother’s observation. Radu was right. The Voivode seemed not to have aged in all these years…it was the same with their adopted mother. Now that he thought of it, Crina only looked to be a few years older than themselves! The oldest of his newfound sisters seemed to be older than her. How could that be?

  The Voivode looked at them gravely before answering, “I am four hundred years old and I have been Voivode of this ţări for nearly three centuries. For you see, my sons, I am immortal.” He smiled at them and the moonlight fell full upon his face, revealing gleaming fangs where his canines should have been.

  The twins gasped and took an involuntary step back. Razvan shuddered. Crina must have such teeth as well.

  Just then the door to a nearby inn was flung open and a man stumbled out, singing loudly to himself as he shambled down the road.

  Alexandru put a finger to his lips. “Watch and see how I maintain eternal life.”

  One moment he was standing before them, the next, he was gone. Razvan felt a phantom wind brush his cheek.

  “Look!” Radu said, pointing.

  Alexandru held the drunkard in his arms. The man’s eyes were glazed over as they stared back at the Voivode. Slowly, Alexandru tilted the man’s head to the side. He looked up at the twins and smiled before plunging his fangs into the drunkard’s neck.

  The twins were rooted to the spot as he drank. Razvan couldn’t decide if he was fascinated or repulsed. Radu’s jaw was slack and his eyes looked ready to topple out of his face. After an interminable amount of time, Alexandru released the man to gently slump against the wall of a smithy. At first Razvan thought the man was dead. Then he saw the gentle rise and fall of the man’s chest, revealing that he was in a deep sleep. Alexandru bit his index finger and allowed his blood to drip on the man’s wound. The puncture marks slowly disappeared.

  “Strigoi!” Razvan whispered.

  Alexandru shook his head. “No, my son. A Strigoi is a walking corpse. I am quite alive.” He showed them his finger. The wound had healed. “I know not what we are. Only that we must drink blood to survive and that the light of the sun or fire is death to us. Some of us can see the thoughts of mortals and some of us can fly.”

  Before they could digest that information, Alexandru rose up in the air as if pulled by invisible ropes. He flew up until the darkness nearly obscured him from view, did a somersault in the air, then he came to a graceful land in front of the twins.

  Radu gasped and stepped back.

  “Do not fear me, my sons. I have raised you both since you were babes suckling from your nurse’s breasts. It is my intention to give you the choice to become as I am. When your beards have grown this long,” he held his fingers around two inches below his shaved chin, “I will hear your decisions.”

  For the rest of the walk home, Alexandru explained more about the nature of his powers. “When the time comes, I will drink nearly all the blood in your bodies. Then I will cut my wrist and feed it back to you. That is how the magic is passed on.”

  Later that night, when the brothers were alone in their bedchambers, Radu asked, “What do you make of this, brother? The man we thought was our father is not our sire, and he is also an immortal creature that drinks the blood of humans.” His mouth twisted in revulsion.

  “He doesn’t kill them,” Razvan said defensively. “He even healed that man’s wounds when he was finished.” He got up to stoke the fire burning in their chamber. “Just imagine, Radu, being able to fly like that!” He couldn’t suppress a rapturous sigh as he imagined such powers. “To live forever!”

  “I don’t know if it is worth it,” Radu said, “I don’t know if I could drink blood, and to never see the sun again, to never again spend a day fishing? I couldn’t bear it!”

  “Do not worry,” Razvan said calmly, “We have at least ten years to think about it, maybe more.” He stroked the minute fuzz on his chin. “I wonder that our beards will ever get that long!”

  “And what of our real family?”

  Razvan smiled, a wave of tenderness for his brother engulfed him. “Why, of course we shall continue to visit them. I do not see why that should change.”

  As the boys became men, their closeness with their birth family grew. Ihrin behaved as if they had always been family and Razvan soon found himself seeking her approval. Still, as was the case with Crina, Ihrin seemed to prefer Radu with his openness and fervent joy with life. Shortly after they had discovered the truth of their birth, Razvan learned why.

  Radu, it seemed, had gotten the whole story from the Voivode. Razvan had been the one that Ihrin had given up. Radu was paid for. He was the one that was wanted. The knowledge was like a spear through Razvan’s heart, but he would die before letting anyone know how badly it hurt him. As his beard grew, he increased his efforts to distance himself from his emotions. It didn’t take long for him to come to the conclusion that there was nothing for him in the mortal world and he anticipated the night when he would be Changed into a powerful being that could thwart death. Unfortunately, his whiskers didn’t share his urgency and continued to grow at a snail’s pace.

  Finally, in the twins’ thirty-third year, their beards grew to the requisite two inches. Radu scratched and grumbled about his beard daily. Razvan rather liked his, although he would like it to be better groomed.

  “I cannot wait to shave this infernal thing. I am sick of discovering weeks old bits of food trapped in this mess!” Radu said.

  Razvan’s breath caught at the statement. “Have you made your decision yet?”

  “No, I’ve tried not to think about it. Have you?”

  He nodded. “I think I’ve wanted it since the night we first saw father take to the air in flight.”

  Radu was silent for a long while before he abruptly changed the subject. “We should leave for the village now. Ihrin is expecting us and we don’t want to be late.”

  During their visit with their family, Razvan was struck by two things. The first was that Radu was avoiding speaking of their upcoming transformation into immortality. The second was how old their birth mother looked. Ihrin’s hair was now almost completely gray and her cheeks were beginning to sink into her face. Her aging looks disturbed and frightened him, but not as much as the sight of Dorin’s balding pate. He didn’t want to grow old. He looked at Radu and noticed that he was studying the changes in their family as well. Razvan craved immortality, but he didn’t want to leave his brother behind.

  The wagon ride back to the castle was silent and pensive. Razvan tried to converse with his brother, but he remained hu
nched in his seat staring at the sunset, deep in thought. After a while, he gave up and prepared himself to announce his decision to let the Voivode Change him.

  ***

  As the vision faded, Jayden tried once more to link her mind to Radu. At first she felt a flicker of….something, but then she was once more forced back into consciousness with nothing but a throbbing headache as a reward for her efforts. Sighing she let sleep close over her. Maybe next time….

  Chapter Twelve

  A loud knock on the door pulled Jayden into wakefulness.

  “Jayden, wake up!” Akasha’s voice sounded from the hallway outside. “The concert starts in two hours! We need to get ready!”

  Razvan yawned and stretched before getting out of bed. He crossed the room to his dresser and grabbed a pair of pants. “I am starving,” he said. “Would you care to feed me, my pet?”

  Jayden groaned and resisted the urge to pull the covers over her head. She doubted that she got any rest with her foray into Razvan’s memories and now he wanted her to volunteer to be his breakfast. She looked up at him, searching his face for signs of the tousle-haired boy he used to be. It seemed that the centuries had swept him away, leaving a sardonic stranger in his place.

  “On second thought, I will seek my meal elsewhere,” Razvan said, studying her. “You look like you did not rest well.”

  “Why, thank you,” Jayden said sarcastically. “You’ll turn a girl’s head with such flattery.”

  She did her best to tamp down jealousy at the thought of him drinking from another woman. She couldn’t be his blood donor every night and besides, maybe he’d pick a man.

  He chuckled. “Perhaps you should go back to sleep until your mood improves.”

  “Forget it,” she said, getting out of bed and heading for her own dresser. “I am going to this concert.”