Chapter 24

Chapter 24

I met his gaze with fire in my eyes, defiance eating at my senses. His grip was tight against my wrist, holding me in place. How dare he command me? How dare he tell me to stop trying to save someone. She was being abused; she was being hurt right in his home.

I tried to push him away, push him off of me, but I was so tired. The exhaustion devoured my strength. My focus was blurring as I tried to use my will again, use the darkness or maybe even the light to do something, anything. A small flash of light erupted between us. His silver hair blew in the wind it created, but he remained there, holding my wrist, holding me in place.

The crowd was growing around us. Every vampire and hollow that had arrived was circling around us. If they hadn’t witnessed my powers in the garden, they were seeing them now. There was no hiding from any of them anymore. They all knew I was special and that I controlled the moonlight. Altyr knew. The vampires knew. Everyone now knew I was something they had to be worried about. They were creatures who worshiped and controlled darkness and here I was controlling the light.

Looking down, I remembered the Night Flower that was firmly tucked into my side. The one thing that gave me the powers to even try to hold the vampire’s back. I was able to control their darkness with the light, not because it was moonlight I was given, but it blessed me with the power of the blood moon. The darkened moonlight that only came once in a while. But it was still light, it was still their weakness.

Hugging the Night Flower tightly with one arm, I let the white, dripping petals touch my chest. Desperately, I tried to pull energy from it, pull the moonlight it had absorbed the last few days. A gasp escaped my lips as I felt it. Like a fiery inferno, strength pulsed from its tips and into my body. A surge of energy slithered into me, warming my body and tingling my senses. I let my mental forces latch onto it as I went to thrust my hand back toward him instead of pulling away. He wasn’t prepared for it as I pushed it into his chest, causing him to stumble off balance.

With one last force of will, I threw the magic out, the light out, and the exploding flash of it forced everyone to cover their eyes. I heard wailing shrieks as the moonlight emitted seared into those who were too close. The tight grip on my wrist lessened, and I felt his body fall away. Frantically, I searched the area to find Idaal cowering close to the ground. Grabbing the hand of the frightened hollow, I yanked her along as I turned to run away from them all.

The energy burst had come and gone, striping my body of any strength it had left. Darkness came flooding in at the edges of my vision, trying to consume me. The only thing repeating through my mind, the only instructions it could muster was to run. One foot in front of the other, over and over through the grass as I drug Idaal closely behind me. Reaching the gates, they were open and waiting for more arrivals. Freedom was only a few feet away. My heart dropped when Altyr stood in front of me with defiance and anger once again. His speed unmatched by our mortal feet.

Any energy I had to fight him was gone, my strength a mere whisper in my bones. He grabbed me and whirled me around so it forced my body into his. Pulling me in tightly so I couldn’t move, pinned to his body, I was facing the crowd. With one arm, he grabbed Idaal and using little effort he threw her back toward a seething, burnt Nathaniel. Her scream shattered the darkness, the dark veil being lifted from me as a twinge of power reentered my mind. It quickly returned when I looked to see Nathaniel throwing her over his shoulder and marching back to the castle. It was all for nothing.

“How dare you,” I said in a whisper.

“I dare, you foolish mortal. You’re messing with things you don’t understand.”

“If your world consists of violence and rape, I don’t want to be part of it.”

Peeling the Night Flower from my hands, he tossed it to Lenora as he threw me over his own shoulder just as Nathaniel had, only I had no energy to fight it or scream. The crowd of vampires were watching us, daggers boring into me with their glares. In a louder voice he said, “You won’t be part of it, not anymore.”

Darkness welled at my vision. The strength to fight was completely gone. I had nothing, nothing left in my well, it had finally run dry. I had tried to save her, tried to save a girl from the grips of an evil man and I failed. Altyr knew how much it would mean to me, I told him how horrible I had been treated and abused, and he let it happen right in front of me. Now the one man I had come to care and trust after all this time betrayed my wishes and willingly threw her back to the wolves.

Altyr’s voice boomed across the yard, ordering them to go back to their business. Awkward looks and shuffling happened all around us as he carried me toward the looming castle. My eyes met Lenora’s as she shook her head at me while holding the flower. Orrin was trying to pull her away. I couldn’t hear what was being said between them but it didn’t look like she was too happy with the situation as she threw off his hands repeatedly.

We passed under the large doors and he took me off toward a wing I never really bothered to go to. Kicking a heavy stone and wood door open, he grumbled as he descended some steep steps.

“Where are you taking me,” I squeaked out.

“Somewhere you can’t make any more trouble… Somewhere safer.”

The stairwell twisted and we fell upon a platform. To the left was an empty room. Hesitating for a moment, he avoided it and continued down the stairs, further into the darkness below. Eventually we reached the cold, dark bottom. He had brought me to a dungeon.

There were several cells with metal bars separating them from each other. Torches on the walls illuminated as we walked further inside the darkened room revealing only more cold stone and empty air. No one had been in them for ages. Rust and the droppings of creatures was all that was down there.

The aching in my chest was so intense, I cringed at the physical pain that burned through my senses. His presence was no longer giving me a feeling of warmth, he was no longer filling that hollowed hole in my heart. He set me down with a little more force than was necessary in one of the cells.

The ground was extremely cool to the touch, much like my skin. If what Lenora had said was right, I had used what light magic I had left to stop them. Now I was just as close to death’s door as I was in the grove.

Before closing the metal door, his hair fell in his face, obscuring his eyes as he looked back over his shoulder toward me. The light off the flames was dancing across his shimmering eyes. They looked wet, almost as if tears were forming.

“We could have been great together. We could have—”

I heard arguing voices echoing down the stairwell. The low rumble of Nathaniel and the familiar sarcastic bite of Orrin were getting louder and harsher as he stood there. Altyr sighed and shook his head.

Without waiting for a response from me, he closed the gate. The clang echoed down the long room, bouncing off the stone walls. He was gone, his footsteps echoing back up the stairs. I heard the scrapping of the door above as he closed it. I heard his commanding tone snap at them before everything was cut off and I was left in silence. Torches slowly extinguished themselves the further away he got, and I was left completely and utterly alone.

That silence hung in the air. No sounds from above even penetrated that far below once the door was shut. I was alone in darkness. I couldn’t tell if the darkness at the edge of my vision was taking over or not. Letting myself fall to the ground, I spread out my arms and let the ocean of exhaustion wash over me, drowning me.

My skin was cool to the touch, my heart empty and hollow. The stones underneath me didn’t bring the chill, my empty heart had already let it in. I had depleted nearly everything I had trying to escape. A frustrated groan eked out my lips and echoed against the empty abyss I now resided in.

He took my light from me once, now he watched as I gave it away willingly to protect someone else. Instead of making sure the darkness didn’t consume me, he left me here, in the cold, again, to battle it once more. I didn’t know if I could win that battle alone again. But I had to, no one was coming to save me.

I was all alone.