Suddenly, that second attacker vanished, yanked back into the pall of smoke. A gurgling scream echoed out. The other two strigoi closed ranks, as a small, dark figure stalked into view, climbing from the lower stairs to the second-floor landing.
Elizabeth.
She carried a broadsword that dripped black blood. The blade looked absurdly huge in her dainty hands, but she held it easily, as if the weight did not concern her.
The largest of the strigoi charged toward her, his falchion cleaving through the air faster than Rhun’s eye could follow. But she melted away at the last second, pirouetting on one toe, swinging her sword around, and cutting her attacker cleanly through his throat. The creature’s headless body went tumbling down the steps behind her.
Rhun used the distraction of her dance to lash out at the remaining strigoi, planting his karambit through the back of its neck, severing the spine with a deft twist of his wrist. As the body went limp, he kicked it over the landing’s rail.
Elizabeth joined him, both arms soaked in blood, her face spattered. “Too many,” she gasped. “Scarcely made it back.”
He thanked her with a touch on her free hand. She squeezed his fingers.
“Working together,” she said, “we could still make the front door.”
Rhun sagged against the wall. Blood trickled from a hundred cuts. If he had been human, he would have been dead a dozen times over. As it was, he felt terribly weak. He pointed an arm up.
“Erin and Jordan,” he said. “We cannot abandon them.”
The howl of the grimwolf reminded him of the danger.
Elizabeth put an arm around his shoulders, holding him up. “You can barely stand.”
He could not argue about that. Rescuing the others would have to hold a moment longer. He pulled his wine flask from his thigh and drained it in one long swallow. Elizabeth stood sentinel next to him, patient and silent in the smoke. He remembered a long ago day when they had walked across fields enveloped in a late-spring fog much like this. She was yet human, and he was yet the Sanguinist who had never fallen.
He closed his eyes and waited for his penance.
It tore him back in time to his worst sin. Memories washed over him, but he had no time for penance now, and he fought it, knowing that it would claim him all the stronger with his next drink of wine.
Still, snatches of the past flashed through his body.
… the scent of chamomile in Elizabeth’s long-ruined castle…
… firelight reflected in those silver eyes…
… the feeling of her warm flushed skin against his as he claimed her…
… her body dying in his arms…
… his foolish, dreadful choice…
He returned to himself, with the taste of her blood still on his tongue: rich, salty, and alive. He gripped the cross around his neck, praying through the pain, until the taste of her was gone.
He then stepped free of Elizabeth’s arm, standing straighter, feeling renewed strength in his veins. Her silver eyes met his and it was as if she saw straight through him to that night and the passion and pain they had shared. He leaned toward her, his lips touching hers.
A chunk of the ceiling crashed down across the upper stairs, chasing them both back. Fiery embers billowed up, surrounded him, lighting in his cassock and on his hair.
Elizabeth beat them out with both hands. Anger flashed across those silver eyes, then resignation. “We cannot return upstairs… at least not from inside the house. We will best serve your friends if we leave this place now, then climb to the roof from the outside.”
Rhun acknowledged the logic of her suggestion. He must get to Erin, Jordan, and Sophia before this cursed building came down, turning this place into their fiery grave.
He pointed below, into a maelstrom of fire and blood, praying he wasn’t already too late. “Go.”
21
Legion strode across the flat roof of the malevolent structure, while overhead the vault of the sky crackled with lightning. Below, fires burned through the house, flames blew out its lower windows, and smoke choked up into the rainy night. Under his feet, the evil of this place flowed through his bones of his vessel, filling him with power and purpose.
Over the rooftop, he tracked his prey, closing in on them: two heartbeats, marking the only two humans within the fiery structure.
The Warrior and the Woman.
As he had planned, the enemy had fled the flames he had set, chased ever higher.
Toward me.
If the two humans were nearby, the Knight would not be far from their sides. But as this immortal did not have a heartbeat to track, Legion could not be certain of his exact whereabouts. So he intended to hunt down these two and await the Knight.
And he did not hunt alone.
Heavy paws padded alongside him, splashing in the pools of rainwater. The wolf growled with each boom of thunder, as if challenging the heavens.
Legion shared the beast’s senses, staring equally through its eyes, straining with its sharper ears, smelling the lightning in the air. He reveled in its wild heart. Even corrupted by black blood, the wolf reminded him of the beauty and majesty of this earthly garden.
Together, they homed in on those two heartbeats underfoot. He intended to slay the Warrior first, listening even now to the strange beat to that one’s heart, how it pealed like a golden bell — bright, clear, and holy. He also remembered how the Warrior’s blood had burned through one of Legion’s enslaved. He must not be allowed to live.
And the stone the Warrior possesses will be mine.
But the Woman… she could yet prove useful.
Leopold had supplied Legion her name: Erin. And with that name came more details of the prophecy concerning her, this Woman of Learning. Leopold’s respect and admiration for the woman’s keen mind was easy to read. Merged as one, Leopold equally knew Legion’s purpose, flickering with the knowledge that Legion needed all three stones. Leopold believed that she of all people possessed the skill to find those last two stones. And though he could not possess the Woman and bend her to his will, he would find other ways to persuade her, to make her submit.
At last, they reached the spot on the roof directly above those two beating hearts. Legion sent his desire to the wolf. Powerful paws began to dig through the clay roof tiles, then sharp caws tore away the green metal nailed beneath.
Once there was only a thin sheaf of wood remaining, Legion touched the wolf’s flank, sending it appreciation and respect.
“This prey is mine,” he whispered aloud.
The grimwolf submitted, lowering its muzzle, ever faithful. Legion felt his love for the great wild beast echo back to him. Knowing it would guard him with its very life, Legion stepped to the ravaged section of tiles and stamped his powerful heel through the last of the wood, breaking the way open — and dropped heavily through the hole.
He crashed to the floor below, landing on his feet, not even buckling a knee.
He found himself facing the Warrior, who carried an iron bar in his hands. The Woman huddled past his shoulder, holding a beam of light in her grip. Both were unsurprised, ready, having heard the wolf digging, but still Legion enjoyed the looks of horror on their faces as they gazed upon his dark glory for the first time.
He smiled, showing teeth, revealing Leopold’s fangs.