Chapter Twenty-One

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

F lora was pale, leaning on my arm for support as we hurried to the front hall. She let out a deep breath, preparing herself to see her son on the brink of death.

"This is all my fault," Emmett lamented, looking ready to cry. "If I'd been more in control …"

Raven's jaw twitched. "If Ambrose tried to run you through with a stake, he's lucky to be alive at all."

Flora narrowed her eyes. "Careful. That's my son you're talking about."

Emmett's eyes flicked between the two women, and I could see the confusion in him. One human mother, one vampire mother. I noticed he didn't take a side, which was the smart choice.

"Ambrose can be reasoned with," Cecelia assured Emmett. "He'll come to understand your mistake."

"So long as he makes it through the night," Melbourne added.

Cecelia glared at him.

"What?" he demanded. "We're all thinking it. This is why vampires are dangerous. They're stronger than any person has a right to be. And then there's the bloodlust. And the hypnotism. How are we supposed to trust them?"

"Indeed," Raven muttered. "How are we supposed to trust vampire hunters when they can't even imagine peaceful vampires?"

Cecelia shook her head. "You forget, Melbourne. Lucian is a former vampire who stalled Raven on Old Mill Road until we were safe. He tried to save Isabel at Foxglove Abbey. He's been on our side."

I winced. "I confess I … may have made you fall from your horse, Cecelia. Sorry about that. And I deceived you, all of you. But I don't wish to see any of you hurt. I swear on all that is holy … and unholy, if that suits you."

Zachariah turned to the duchess. "Flora?"

"I think it's time to set aside presumptions of one another," the duchess said, squeezing Emmett's hand. "So long as both sides are willing to hear each other out, there's a chance for peace."

We paused as we reached the front hall. "Are you ready?" I asked Flora softly, lifting my lantern.

She nodded silently, and we stepped into the room.

"I'll get a fresh basin of water," I told Flora as we approached the sofa.

Flora nodded absently, and as we drew nearer to the sofa, I worried that perhaps in my absence, Ambrose had slipped away into death with no witnesses.

I became aware of the wet sound before my light illuminated the sofa clearly, and frowned. It sounded like a lapping. I lengthened my strides, but stopped in my tracks when my lamp shown over a figure crouched on the sofa, its back to us. A man, shirtless, fixated on Ambrose.

A vampire.

"Get away from him," Flora shouted, lunging at the figure. She grabbed it by the shoulder and yanked it away from her son.

The vampire turned and my eyes widened. The duke, his mouth stained red. The liver spots on his bald head were gone, the skin as translucent, but firmer, giving him the appearance of a man thirty years younger from the one I'd last seen.

I gasped, stepping back. I had just seen this man earlier tonight in his sitting room. He'd been in the dark, but he'd sounded healthier, had moved easier. I hadn't suspected this to be the reason for it.

"No, Jonathan," Flora said, voice choked with emotion, shaking her head. "No, no."

I stared at the duke, horrified by what he had become, before I remembered Ambrose. I rushed to the sofa, my heart sinking.

The bandages I'd painstakingly wrapped around Ambrose's wound lay in shredded tangles at his side, clumps of hair and scalp with them. His skin had been torn back violently for the vampire to have easier access to the blood oozing from the head wound, and worse still, the cranium was broken open, exposing glistening brain.

The artery in Ambrose's neck was still, his chest silent.

I turned, unable to keep myself from retching.

"Oh, God," Cecelia turned away, burying her face in Zachariah's chest.

"What have you done?" Flora demanded, her voice becoming increasingly hysterical. "Jonathan, what did you do?"

The duke backhanded her so hard that she careened into the floor with an audible smack. Emmett rushed to her side. She moaned, eyes fluttering, but she was still alive.

I wiped my mouth and sneered at the duke. "You monster. Do you have any idea what you've done? You've killed your son. You've killed your heir."

"My heir?" The duke chuckled, his voice cold and void of feeling, sending a chill down my spine. In the past, it had been hard to pick up the words he uttered, but now his voice was strong and sure, dismissive. "What do I have need of an heir, when I can simply live forever?" He shook his head, chuckling as he licked the syrupy blood remaining on one of his fingers. "I must say, Raven, I never imagined how powerful, how good this feels. I didn't quite believe your description, but I would have done anything to regain my livelihood."

"I knew I should have chained you up," Raven cursed.

"Why did you change him at all?" Isabel demanded. "You know what he did to Emmett."

"Because he was dying!" Raven said. "Emmett deserved to choose what happened to his father. If he wanted revenge, I wanted him to have that. If he wanted to say goodbye and be at peace with him, then I wanted that for him too. But if I'd let him die, Emmett would have had nothing."

I couldn't tear my eyes away from Ambrose's still form. I imagined he would sit up at any moment, but he remained still. So very still.

I had to believe that he hadn't suffered under his father's hand. He'd been unconscious, so wouldn't have felt his father mercilessly digging into his scalp with his undead fingers.

My fingernails dug into my palms. "You've spit in the face of everything you've ever believed in. You were a vampire hunter. Now you've become the very thing you once despised."

"Oh, hardly," the duke said, lowering himself back down onto the sofa and leaning back against Ambrose as if he were a cushion. "Do you know what it's like to grow old and weak while everyone around you is just beginning their lives, young and beautiful? Anything is better than death. Raven's offer to make me a vampire was revolting at first, but then again, I had nothing to lose. Of course, she made me promise not to attack humans, but well, I already have what I want, don't I? You can't expect me to regret taking out this human who would have usurped me."

"He idolized you," Emmett said through bared teeth as Flora came to, sitting up and staring at Ambrose's body. "Everything he did, he did to make you proud."

"Yes, well, his declaration of marriage brought Raven to us, at least. I suppose I owe him my gratitude for that. All the money I've spent searching for the key to immortality, and I needn't have bothered."

I couldn't hold back any longer, I launched myself at him. The duke avoided me easily, making for the entryway, but stumbled in his haste. He wasn't only new to his vampire strength and reflexes, but to his youthful body. He was clumsy as a result.

I was precise and ruthless.

He screamed as I broke his leg with a satisfying crunch. It would heal within minutes, but while he was distracted by the pain, his hands going to the shattered limb, I struck him from behind. I shoved my thumbs into his eyes with practiced ease, blinding him as he shrieked. He began to thrash unpredictably, and I moved out of his reach. I knew even his eyes would heal soon. I needed to end this before he got his bearings.

"A little help here?" I asked. I required Helena's strength to help restrain his right arm while Raven and Cecelia grabbed the other. I met Raven's eyes and she nodded to me as Isabel and Zachariah secured the duke's left leg, Melbourne and Nancy his right. Despite this, he thrashed wildly, and it was an incredible effort to keep him still.

"Unhand me this instant!" the duke shouted.

"That's enough, Jonathan," Flora said sternly, gazing down at him. "It's time to let the next generation step into your role. Have some dignity in death."

"Dignity?" the duke spat. "When I get my hands on you, you'll be begging for death."

"And that's why you have to die," I told him. "You can't be rehabilitated. You've been a destructive, horrid man for a long time, perhaps your whole life."

Raven looked to Emmett, who nodded. "Does anyone have a stake on them?" he asked, eyes lingering on Melbourne.

Melbourne snorted. "Left it in my other jacket, I'm afraid." He paused, then pulled a dagger from a hidden pocket. "This is all I have."

"It'll do," Emmett said, expressionless as he turned the dagger over in his hand briefly. "Are your eyes healed yet, Father? I want you to see this. My right hand. The one you broke to stop me from painting. It's healed now, good as new, thanks to Raven. I can pursue my passions again, unhindered." He narrowed his eyes. "And it will be the hand that ends your life."

Flora turned her head away as he straddled his father, pushing the dagger to his throat.

The duke stilled, eyes widening as they came back into focus.

Emmett shoved the dagger down with all of his substantial strength, and despite that, it still stopped halfway through his spinal cord. That didn't stop Emmett, however. Determined, jaw clenched, he sawed the blade through the duke's neck, back and forth, while his father tried to curse him, lungs too full of blood to allow him, death inching closer and closer.

And then it was done.

Chest heaving, Emmett dropped the dagger as the rest of us let go of the duke's headless body, still twitching in death.

I stumbled to the side of the sofa, staring at Ambrose. I'd thought a swell of satisfaction would have revived my spirits, but this triumph seemed empty with Ambrose lying dead near his father.

Flora gazed down at her son, tears brimming in her eyes. I placed a hand on her shoulder, to reassure her, but I wasn't sure if she felt it. "I'm so sorry, Flora."

Emmett covered the wound on Ambrose's head with his jacket. He smoothed out his brother's blazer tenderly, pausing when he noticed a lump, then reached into Ambrose's pocket, withdrawing a small notebook. He scowled, recognizing it as the list of hunters, and handed it back to Raven.

Raven stared down at it for a moment, before meeting my eyes.

Earlier tonight, I had wanted that list above all else. Now I only wanted to erase what had been done to Ambrose, to turn back time to prevent his father from ending his life. I swallowed hard, feeling numb as Flora buried her head in her dead son's chest and wept.