Chapter 47

Chapter Forty-Seven

T he pain of his child’s death seared his veins, doubled by the pain he tore from Tatyana as her sire perished. Oleg felt his blood dying in Zara’s body. He felt the last of Luana’s amnis dying with her.

Though he remained standing, Oleg was frozen and his amnis was screaming in pain.

“Knyaz!” Mika ran to him and threw his arms around Oleg’s torso. “I have you. I have you.”

If Mika had not caught him, Oleg knew he would have collapsed.

Zara’s blood spread across the inlaid mosaic floor, crimson over aquamarine and jade, the scarlet red feathering through the pooled water from the fountain until the flooded ballroom was awash in glistening, stinking rose.

Oleg stood with his feet planted wide, his chief boyar holding him up as the water coating his skin started to steam. His element finally woke and reacted to his pain. Tears that fell from Oleg’s eyes turned to steam when they hit his cheeks.

“I have you,” Mika kept repeating. “I have you.”

After a few long moments, Oleg threw his arm around Mika’s shoulders. “Brother.” He leaned down and kissed his boyar’s temple. “My brother.” He gently pushed Mika’s arms away even though the pain still twisted in his veins. “Where is she?”

Oleg answered his own question when he turned around to see Tatyana—a vision in the water—passed out on the ground.

The silk she wore was stained pink from the bloody water she lay in, and her golden hair was matted with blood and gore. There was a red gash across her abdomen that the water was quickly healing.

Oleg looked at Mika with a raised brow. Despite his pain, the violence that had touched Tatyana offended him. “That was from your blade.”

“I thought she was with Zara.” Mika lowered his head. “I thought?—”

“I know what you thought.” Oleg had thought the same. For a moment he had thought the same, and he’d even wavered for a second.

Would death be so unwelcome if it came at her hand?

The thought of killing another gentle creature was exhausting.

He patted Mika’s shoulder and walked to Tatyana, scooping her up even though the water tried to hold her. “Deal with the bodies,” he commanded. “Our guards outside must be dead.”

“There had to be fifty men with her,” Mika said. “All Russian. Two vampires—one flew away before I could identify him, but the one I killed I did not recognize.”

Oleg took a deep breath, his amnis slightly mollified with Tatyana in his arms. “We’ll deal with who was supporting Zara after I clean her up.”

“Yes, Knyaz.”

Oleg paused at Zara’s body, glancing at the head covered in dark curls that lay against the far wall. “Prepare her body for burial,” he said quietly. “We will return her body to the earth.”

Mika frowned. “She’s a water vampire.”

After three nights, if a vampire didn’t burn, their body would return to its element. Water to water. Earth to earth.

“She is my daughter,” Oleg said gruffly. “She is a Sokolov. We will return her body to the earth.”

With Tatyana curled in his arms, Oleg strode through the bloody entry hall where his druzhina waited.

“Zara is dead,” he told them. “Help Mika in the ballroom.”

Carrying Tatyana to his own day chamber, he kicked open the door and shut it behind him. He’d deal with the locks before dawn. His druzhina was awake; no one would cross the threshold without his permission.

Tatyana was still limp in his arms as he walked to the lavish bathroom made of grey marble. He set her on a carved bench in the shower and considered how to remove her bloody clothes. Should he cut them off? Try to get them over her head?

He didn’t want the blood and gore from the battle to stay on her skin any longer than necessary.

“Are you happy now, volchitsa?” He stood and walked to the faucet to turn on the water as he pictured Zara’s head flying through the air. “Are you at peace?”

She was rootless now, an orphan in the immortal world. She had no clan, no family, and she refused to ask for his aegis.

“Yes.”

He turned when he heard her speak.

She was awake, staring at him, and there were tears in her eyes. “Oleg.”

“Shhh.” He walked to her and knelt, brushing the bloody hair away from her face. “I did what you wanted. It will hurt for a while, but you will be free of her influence now.”

“When she came to my room…” Tatyana hiccuped a little bit. “I… I loved her. She wanted me to kill you, and I forgot all about Elene. I forgot about the beatings and the violence. All I wanted was to please?—”

“Shh.” He put a finger on her lips and forced her chin up to meet his eyes. “She was your sire. Of course you wanted all that. Of course you did.”

Her face crumpled in pain, and she threw her arms around Oleg’s shoulders, her body shaking.

He held her tightly. “But you didn’t kill me, did you?” The thought brought a sharp jolt of satisfaction. She was already attached to him. More even than she realized. “You didn’t hurt me; you tried to kill her.”

The strength it must have taken. Oleg hadn’t even been able to challenge his sire for a hundred years. Tatyana had defied her blood bond with Zara in less than a month.

“You are stronger than I was, Tatyana. You are so strong.”

Yes, his little wolf’s resolve was a thing of beauty. When he made her fall in love with him, she would be his fiercest protector and his most trustworthy ally.

Oleg held her tightly as she wept, lifting her up and walking her over to the shower so she could wash the night of violence away.

He lifted her hair, pouring oils and soaps through it to wash the caked blood away until the strands were golden and the water ran clear.

“She was so angry,” Tatyana murmured. “We looked all over the house for her gold, but she couldn’t find it.”

Oleg smiled a little bit. “I moved it to the Amber Room. I had this sentimental vision of you naked, wearing some of the jewelry I collected that Luana never wore.”

She turned to him and slid her arms around his shoulders. “You wanted me to wear Luana’s jewelry?”

“I wanted you to wear my jewelry,” he growled. “Gold and silver I’ve collected for centuries. I gave it to Luana, but she…” He shrugged. “It was not to her liking. I thought you might enjoy it more.”

“You would give all that to me?”

He met her blue eyes and didn’t look away. “I would give you far more than you can imagine, Tatyana Vorona.”

All she needed was to surrender to him.

So why did it feel like he was the one begging?

Her eyes were impossible to read. “So in this vision, I was wearing gold and jewels… and what else?”

Oleg could feel her hunger, and he couldn’t hold back the smile. “Skin.”

He slid slick hands down the sides of her body. The water on his shoulders began to steam with the heat of his element, and he felt his blood move. The pain of Zara’s death was leaching away like water down the drain, and the satisfaction of victory was rising like his cock.

His soldiers would be fucking after their fight, working off their remaining energy in far more pleasurable ways than violence.

And he could feel Tatyana’s amnis rising too.

“I won,” she whispered. “She’s dead.”

“ We won.” He bent to Tatyana’s ear and muttered, “They tried to kill you, but instead, you killed them. You are the victor, little wolf. Your fangs were stained with blood, and you are alive .”

“I’m alive.” Her hand slid to the back of his neck.

Oleg closed his eyes at the pleasure of the intimacy. He wanted to press her mouth to his neck and feel her teeth pierce his skin. “Yes, you are alive .”

Her hand reached down and wrapped around his hard erection. “ We’re alive.”

Oleg reached down and lifted Tatyana against the wall, the water from the shower hitting his shoulders and turning to steam.

With his fire neutralized by the flowing water, he let his amnis free, and the moment it touched Tatyana’s skin, she gasped.

“Why do I want you so much?”

“It’s a very ancient rule, my little wolf.” He ran his fangs along her slick shoulder. “To the victor go the spoils.”

“Yes.” Her fingers threaded through the hair at his nape, and she wrapped her legs around Oleg’s hips, pulling him closer. Her chin lifted and Oleg wanted to shout in pleasure at the triumph in her eyes.

He angled his hips, aligning their bodies before he slid inside, her tight heat grasping him more firmly than her hand. He seated his cock to the hilt and pressed her back against the wall, fucking her slowly as his amnis spread over her skin, licking his energy against hers so that every inch of her skin was stimulated.

“It feels…” She gasped.

“How does it feel?” His strokes were excruciatingly slow. He gripped her wrist in one hand and lifted it over her head, holding her to the wall so she could barely move.

Tatyana shook her head. “I can’t… I can’t?—”

“Yes, you can.” His left hand gripped her ass, angling her hips to his, while his other continued to hold her arm captive. She clung to his shoulders as her body erupted in pleasure.

He felt the flood of her amnis release over his body as she came, but Oleg waited until her eyes opened and locked with his. “Tatyana?”

Her lips were red and flushed with blood. “Yes.”

He bent down, pressing his lips to her flushed mouth and biting, then licking away the sweet drop of blood at the corner before he drove his hips harder into her and moved his mouth to her ear.

“You are mine,” he whispered. “I am patient. But you are mine. And when you are ready, you will give me your fangs.”

With one last arch of his hips, Oleg closed his eyes and released.