CHAPTER 14
Now I felt pain.
Parts of me were broken, twisted around the wrong way and sticking out in unnatural angles. I tried to move and felt snaps along my entire right side. It felt like I was being stabbed. Maybe I was. But from the inside, with my own bones. I couldn’t move without doing more damage, and most certainly didn’t want to try again.
Opening my eyes, I saw raw meat and exposed bone and squeezed my eyes shut again.
So vulnerable, laying on the floor, helpless. Like Will was, utterly powerless strung up on the wall. Did I really miss being human? Because I had a feeling this was what it used to be like.
I didn’t know what was going on in the room, couldn’t tell where anyone was, and hardly heard what was being said. There was talk. And movement. But that was as much as I could process through the screaming in my brain.
When Viola attacked me, I’d expected it. I expected punishment, and I figured Viola would be the one to administer it. Colin wouldn’t lower himself to dirty his shoes with my blood.
What I didn’t expect was how much damage she could cause. My injuries were white hot and paralyzing. It wasn’t the pain, which was considerable, or the humiliation, which I wasn’t sure why I felt since I didn’t care what my family thought of me. It was the certainty that I’d never be the same.
I could never recover from this. The promise of this was what terrified me. Not that my life had been so great. But my limited existence in this stupid excuse for a Castle was all I had, and didn’t look so bad now considering the situation I was in.
Maybe being a vampire wasn’t so dreadful.
What was I thinking? It was my weakness. I was hurt, and unsure of what would happen to me next that made me think it. It wasn’t true. Being a vampire was lame.
But if this was the alternative, I thought I could learn to deal with it.
“Delilah, my dear, would you please?” rang through the haze of pain and my frantic, absurd thoughts.
As I forced my eyes open, a slender hand was all I could see. Then a big, silver knife. I wasn’t sure I would have tried to get away even if I had been able to. Maybe it was finally time to die, because I couldn’t imagine living through this.
But the knife slid across one of the hand’s slender fingers, and then came to my face. The bleeding finger found an open wound—it didn’t have to try hard—and pressed firmly.
I heard myself scream, but it didn’t sound like me. I had no idea I could make such a noise.
And the pain only got worse, slithering under my wrecked skin and digging into my wounds. It was like a million bugs on fire crawling inside me, and each time I squirmed from pain, another piece stabbed me from the inside with a snap. The stone floor was agony at each point it touched my body. I wished I could fly.
“How long will this take?” I was surprised I could hear or comprehend through the pain.
“A matter of moments,” a commanding voice replied.
In the next few seconds, I was picked up from the ground. Whoever held me said something more, but now I couldn’t understand. My nerves exploded with each tiny movement and I wished I were back on the stone floor.
But whoever had me in their arms was already out of the room by the time I could sense anything again.
Slowly, things became clearer. I could feel Declan around me, his strong arms carrying me through the mansion. Annabelle and Lennox weren’t far behind, and I could feel the rumble in Declan’s chest as he realized they were following.
“Put me down,” I croaked.
He didn’t.
I squirmed, which hurt, but not as badly as it should have. I was healing fast now. My bones were in place again. My skin was regenerating. I’d be back to normal in a matter of minutes, and could hardly believe I was going to heal from the beating I took.
The vampire who mixed her blood with mine must have healed me.
“Put me down!” I repeated, louder this time and Declan let me go, straight into the bathtub and turned on the water, as hot as it could get.
What remained of my injuries stung as the hot water hit them. But I understood why it was necessary. The water was dark red before it reached the bottom of the tub.
Taking off my black pants and Will’s now tattered t-shirt, I scrubbed myself clean. Declan had disappeared, but Annabelle stood with her back to me, not for privacy, I knew. But because she was deep in her thoughts. Lennox stayed in the hallway.
Everything was happening so fast, I hardly had time to process anything. I didn’t have time to have an opinion about it, or feel any emotions on the topic. At least I wasn’t in painful agony anymore.
I had to appreciate the little things.
The moment I was clean and turned off the water, Declan reappeared and tossed me a towel. Neither of them would look at me, which was just as well. I was furious with the both of them. Whatever part they had in my ending up back here, and in risking Will’s life, I didn’t think I’d ever forgive them.
Why should I?
Things now couldn’t go back to the way they were. Not after this, what I’ve learned, and what was surely about to happen. Because with every ounce of vampire blood in my body, I knew the commanding voice I had heard was our Vampire King, Charles. The certainty in me was intense.
Declan put a stack of my clothes on the side of the bathtub and left the room again, but didn’t go far. He waited outside the door with Lennox.
Nervousness and fear infested him. I could feel it like it was my own, yet I felt completely normal now. Even my wounds were healed entirely. But Declan and Annabelle both were agitated and anxious.
They probably knew something I didn’t.
But I wouldn’t speak to either of them. And they didn’t bother speaking to me until I was dry, clothed, and being whisked back toward the Main Hall.
Declan had chosen clothes I never wore. I liked human-type clothes. Blue jeans, black pants, simple tops. I felt completely uncomfortable in the black dress he picked for me to wear.
I guessed he wanted me to look respectable. Meaning less like a human, and more like a vampire.
The mansion was sealed up well so eavesdropping from down the hall wasn’t easy. Colin had made sure his Castle was extra fortified with soundproofing and heavy duty locks. He was pretty paranoid for a super-humanly strong, immortal creature. But I could hear rumblings in the Main Hall and it was not a civil conversation taking place.
Lennox was behind me, and even though I knew as well as he did Annabelle and Declan could hear, he whispered, “Are you all right?”
I nodded, and didn’t turn to look at him.
“What are you going to do?” he whispered again, quieter this time. Not like it made any difference.
What was I going to do? Seriously, did I think anything I did could make a difference against Charles’s huge family and Colin and the rest lined up to stop me? Please. I was lucky Will and I weren’t already history.
I felt dreadful for what I’d done to Will. I couldn’t let this happen to him without at least putting up some sort of a fight.
“Maybe I can do something to get my friend out of this,” I said, this time glancing back and meeting his deep eyes briefly. “Any suggestions?”
If Lennox were human, he’d have laughed nervously.
“No, there is nothing you can do.”
Of course, he was absolutely right. I knew that. But I didn’t care.
“I can try. If there’s anything I can do, I have to try.”
Annabelle, who walked in front of me, stopped at the last door before we reached the room everyone else was in.
“Do you remember what I told you about Charles?”
It was years ago, when Annabelle and I were first getting used to each other, yet I remembered perfectly. The idea of a Vampire King was captivating to me then. But years passed and Charles was mentioned less and less. And I never met him, so my interest faded.
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“He’s very powerful—and unique. And he can know stuff about me by looking at me.”
She nodded, but said severely, “But Charles cannot read your mind. He can only know your true nature. Be coy, but be yourself also.”
Declan added in a mumble, “only respectful.”
I almost wanted to laugh. Declan did know me.
But then Annabelle opened the door, and the sight of so many vampires made all the humor left in me disappear.