Chapter 26
26
Spirit Reapers
When I came to,I was lying on a cold stone ground in a dark room. It looked, unsurprisingly, like a dungeon. The witches were known to be decidedly more medieval in their prison accommodations than the vampires. I tried to speak, but my throat felt like sandpaper. And when I tried to rise to my feet, my legs gave out.
Aaron was sitting against the opposite wall in the cell, about three meters away. He was missing his armor. He was missing parts of his bodysuit too. The thin fabric was torn and bloody.
I cleared my throat and tried once again to speak. “Where are we?” My voice sounded ragged.
“In an Avan prison.”
His words confirmed my fears. My stomach clenched up. The witches were even worse than the vampires. They’d murdered my mother. Many years ago, Father’s fear and hatred of the witches had compelled him to seek out the vampires as allies. It was the lesser of two evils, he’d said.
“I’m not sure which planet we’re on,” Aaron continued. “I was unconscious when they brought us here.”
“Your men?”
“Dead.”
I’d thought as much, but I’d still hoped some of them had survived. “I’m sorry.”
“I will avenge their deaths.” His face was hard, emotionless.
“How long have we been here?” I asked him.
“Three days.”
Ethan must have hit me harder than I’d thought. And kept me asleep with drugs.
“You don’t look good,” I told Aaron.
A hard laugh broke past his lips. “They’ve been torturing me for information.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Stop apologizing. It’s not your fault. If anything, you’re the only reason I’m still alive.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“The witches want to turn you to their side.”
“How do you know?”
“The only things they ask me are about you.” He reached out and captured a lock of my hair, rubbing it between his fingers. “Your weaknesses. Your triggers.” He dropped my hair, and it bounced against my chest. “I told them nothing.”
“Why not? Why not betray me to save yourself?”
His laugh was low and jaded. “As soon as I told them, I’d cease to be useful to them.”
“They’d kill you,” I realized.
“Yes,” he said. “But I wouldn’t tell them anything anyway.”
“You don’t want to give them the satisfaction of breaking you.”
“There is that, yes,” he said with a sardonic smile. “But it’s more than that. I won’t give them anything they could use against you.”
“Why not?”
“You fought so hard for Hayden and Ian. Why?” he asked.
I noticed he hadn’t answered my question.
“Because it was the right thing to do. They were betrayed and abandoned. No one was coming for them. I couldn’t leave them there.”
“They’re your aunt’s children. Your cousins.”
I looked at him in surprise.
“It’s not common knowledge,” he said. “I haven’t told anyone. And I won’t.”
“Who told you?”
“I have my sources.”
I drew in a deep breath. “Yes, they’re my cousins. But I would have tried to save them even if they weren’t.”
“Why?”
“Because someone had to fight for them.”
I saw something in his eyes, something I didn’t expect. Admiration. He was a vampire. I was a mage. We were from different worlds. We were opposing elements: sorcery and science, magic and machines. But at this very moment, we didn’t seem all that different.
“We have to get out of here,” I said. “Can you fight?”
“I’ll manage.” He rose slowly, steadying himself against the wall.
I’d never seen him look so weak. “How often do you need blood?” I asked.
“To stay at full strength? At least every day.”
It had been three days. Plus, he’d been tortured. He’d lost a lot of blood, he was in pain, and he didn’t have his armor. I didn’t have my magic-augmenting accessories. And neither of us had any weapons. As far as escape attempts went, our chances were looking pretty bleak.
The door groaned and opened. A mage entered our cell—a Siennan. The mage world of Sienna had broken away from the others long ago to ally with the witches. This Siennan had topaz-yellow eyes and a caramel-blonde ponytail highlighted with crimson streaks that perfectly matched her leather armor.
“You’re finally awake. I was afraid the foresights would drive you mad, and then you’d be of no use to us.” She said it like my continued existence was a minor annoyance.
Aaron moved his body between us. “Leave her alone.”
What the hell was he doing?
Her lips drew back in a feral smile. “The great vampire warrior, leader of the fearsome Diamond Edges. Aaron Pall.” Her fist slammed into his stomach.
Aaron doubled over, spitting blood. “Is that all you’ve got?” He straightened, putting himself between her and me once again.
As the Siennan glared at him, I realized what he was doing. He was drawing her wrath toward him. To spare me. That was unexpected. The Diamond Edges were known to be cruel and ruthless—and I had no doubt Aaron was both. But he was also more. More than his uniform. More than that blue diamond symbol he wore.
The Siennan hit him again. And again. And again. She smashed his face against the stone wall.
“Stop!” I shouted, pulling her off of him. The force of the movement made me stumble. I barely caught myself before I fell.
“You are weak,” the Siennan sneered. “Just another weak, crazy Prophet.”
She swung a punch at me. I lifted my hand to block her, even knowing I would be too slow. I wasn’t at full strength right now. Not even close. So I was surprised when her fist bounced back before making contact.
“What the hell,” she muttered, shaking out her hand.
She tried again. The smooth tickle of a breeze brushed over my skin, growing in intensity as it moved down my arms. Telekinetic magic exploded out of me, hurling the Siennan across the room. Her body hit the wall and fell to the floor.
“What are you?” she gasped, her cheek pressed against the stone ground.
I could feel Jason’s Phantom magic still inside of me, even all these days later.
“I am Terra Cross, PI, Elite Prophet, Oracle, and former Princess of Laelia,” I declared, my voice ringing. “Who the hell are you?”
“I am Shift.” She spat blood. “The face of your destruction.” She slapped her wrist band, and the prison’s alarm sirens blared up. A sick, victorious smile twisted her bloody lips, then she passed out.
I snatched up her key card and used it to open the cell door. Aaron was already right behind me.
“We need weapons,” I said.
“Follow me.”
He moved down the hall like he knew where he was going. With a twinge of guilt, I realized why. The Spirit Reapers had been coming for him for days. For days, they’d tortured him while I slept.
We found our weapons, my magic accessories, and his armor inside the room at the end of the hallway. Spirit Reapers in heavy armor ran down the hall after us. I locked the door to keep them out. So now we had our gear—and no escape route. There wasn’t so much as an air duct in the dreary concrete room. Our only hope was to fight our way out.
The armory was two connected rooms: a front room with the Spirit Reapers’ gear, and a back room with all the stuff they’d stolen from their prisoners. Aaron and I moved into the back room to collect our things.
“They’re coming,” I said, slipping on my magic-augmenting accessories.
Honestly, I didn’t know what good the accessories would do against armored soldiers, but at least they calmed my mind. When I got agitated, the foresights grew stronger, more turbulent. If they got too strong, they’d leave me incapacitated during the fight.
I grabbed my swords next. “Put on your armor,” I told Aaron. “That door won’t hold them off for long.”
“I can’t.” Embarrassment crinkled his brow, chased down by anger. “I’m too weak to wear it right now.”
Because vampire armor was really heavy, and Aaron had been starved and tortured for three days. I should have thought of that, but I’d been too busy trying to plot our unlikely escape. My escape plan wouldn’t work without Aaron’s power armor. We wouldn’t survive the witches’ onslaught.
“Maybe I can wear the armor?” I asked. I was pretty strong with Jason’s magic inside of me.
“It’s custom fit. And you have a very different body than I do.” To his credit, Aaron didn’t dip his gaze to my chest. But he didsmirk.
“I’ve heard of your reputation with women.”
Aaron shrugged, completely unapologetic. In that, he was just like his reputation.
The door exploded. A shrill cry trilled over the sound of falling debris. The Siennan. Shift. She was awake. And she looked pissed off. She was dripping blood from the massive gash in the back of her head, from when my mind blast had knocked her into the wall. The manic gleam in her eyes as they met mine told me she hadn’t forgotten that either. She lifted her battle axe with a loud war cry, summoning forth her forces. Soldiers streamed past her, dozens of them, charging into the room. Every single one of them was wearing Spirit Reaper armor.
There was no way we were going to make it out of this.
I hit the controls for the back room, and a thick door slammed down. Now we were really trapped.
“I’m open to suggestions,” I said, turning to Aaron as the door began to quake.
“Well, there is one way I might be able to regain my strength,” he told me. “But you won’t like it.”
I threw my hands up in the air. “At this point, we’re kind of desperate.”
“I need to drink your blood.”