Now, however, I was free. Clutching that thought, I finally shoved Sadira from my mind and threw up as many metal barriers as I could. I pushed her back until she was just a vague shadow at the edge of my thoughts.
“I did not come here to fight with you, my Mira.” Sadness tinged her voice. “When I felt your presence, I thought you had come to talk.”
“Did you think I had come back to you?” Dragging my eyes back to my maker, I shook my head. “How could you believe such a thing?”
Sadira smiled at me, her head tilted to the side. The look a parent gave a foolish child; one of infinite patience and love. “Why do you still harbor this hatred for me?” We were circling each other like cats, waiting for an opening. “Does it chase away the nightmares? Does it help you to forget about Crete…and Calla?”
“I warned you to never speak her name.” My low voice crouched in the shadows, watching. I stopped circling, my whole body painfully tensed.
“You left her and now you find it easier to blame me for your regrets. You can’t run from us both forever,” Sadira said, taking a step toward me. She lifted her hand to touch my cheek, but I raised my hand, just an inch from her face. Flames danced over my fingers and slithered down to my wrist. Her eyes widened.
Before Sadira, I had a life. It was a short, fragile human life, but it was my life nonetheless. I’d had a family that I loved and a place in my small corner of the world. My world didn’t include nightwalkers or torture. It didn’t even include my own powers, since I’d chosen to hide that unique ability and start fresh.
But Sadira slipped into my world one night centuries ago and stole me away, threatening to kill all those I loved if I did not remain at her side. So I stayed through the humiliation, pain, and seemingly constant fear. She kept me at her side as a human for roughly four years. During that time, I discovered that I would make a better vampire than I could ever be as a normal human. The nightwalkers surrounding her feared me, feared my powers. And for good reason: Sadira had taught me everything she knew about torture and manipulation. When the Black Plague swept through Europe, she offered to make me a nightwalker in an effort to save my life. I agreed, walking away from any hope of returning to the life I’d lived before.
I hated Sadira for stealing me away. I hated myself for saying yes, because I could not be what I wanted—normal. Human.
Lifting my open hands, a pair of flames danced on my palms, flickering yellow and orange. I lowered my hands again, but the flames remained hovering in midair like little balls of light. Sadira took an uneasy step back, unable to drag her eyes from the flames. She had seen my tricks with fire before, even commanded me to perform, but I’d learned a few things since I was last with her. She had never seen me burn the air itself.
With the barest nod of my head, the flames streaked toward her. Less than a foot from her chest, they split in two different directions and started to circle her. She pulled her arms against her chest, her head jerking from one side to the other, desperately trying to keep the fire in sight at all times. She was terrified…and with good cause.
“I left her because I had no choice. You would have killed her,” I said, unable to even speak Calla’s name. I hadn’t thought about her in centuries, but Sadira’s cruel mention brought a fresh rush of pain, as she’d no doubt intended. “I left you because I would have killed you had I stayed. You made me, so I spared your life as an act of gratitude. I owe you nothing now.”
Sadira lifted her eyes to my face, and I could see a mixture of anger and genuine confusion in their depths. A part of her honestly could not understand my hatred. She did everything in the name of protecting her children, but that also meant controlling them. And no matter how hard she tried, she could not completely control me. In the past, she could make me bow under the pain and anguish she caused, but it was always short-lived.
Danaus purposefully entered my line of sight, standing behind Sadira’s left shoulder and frowning. He didn’t have to say anything. This argument was wasting time we didn’t have. I would have to add Sadira to my list of unfinished business. If naturi didn’t kill me first, I would finally deal with Sadira and my past.
“Enough of this.” Waving my hands in the air, the flames vanished with a puff of smoke. I paced away from Sadira, over to the windows that looked down on the city. Pushing aside the gauzy white curtains, I looked down on the busy street as a steady flow of traffic rushed below us.
When I turned back around, the tableau looked exactly as it had when I entered the room. The moment had been erased. Sadira’s face was expressionless, but that did not mean I’d been forgiven. A vampire never attacked another of her kind that was twice her age. And you never attacked your maker unless you were sure you could kill them. While Sadira worked under the pretense of love and protection, she was no different than the others. She would strike out at me at her first chance, but I wasn’t particularly worried. She could hurt me but would not try to kill me. I was a valuable pet, and she wanted me at her side, broken and obedient.
“One sacrifice has been completed at Konark, and the naturi have attacked me twice,” I said, trying to boil down everything that had happened recently into a concise description. It wasn’t easy. Was it fair to leave out the dead in my domain or the fear that seemed to burn in me every time I stepped outside? “We think they are going after anyone who survived Machu Picchu.”
“We?” Sadira said, cocking her head to the side as he eyes slid back to Danaus.
“Jabari and I,” I sharply corrected her assumption. “Tabor is dead. That leaves you and Jabari as part of the triad. I don’t remember who else was at the mountain that night, but not many of us survived.”
Sadira’s dark brown eyes narrowed on me as she frowned. Resting her right elbow on the arm of the chair, she settled her narrow chin in the palm of her hand. “What do you remember of that night?”
“Not much after you arrived. I remember Jabari rescuing me, holding me, with you and Tabor standing nearby. And then nothing…just light and…pain.” I struggled to pull the memory loose from the jumble of thoughts crowding that night. “Why can’t I remember? What happened after you arrived?”
“Have you asked Jabari?”
“He said he would tell me later.” Frustration and anger crept back into my tone. I shoved my right hand through my hair, pushing it from my face.
“Then I will leave it to him,” Sadira said quickly, with a relieved look. She was obviously glad to wash her hands of the ordeal. “I don’t wish to talk about that night.”
“Why? What happened? It couldn’t have been that bad if we won.” Taking another step closer, I moved around the coffee table in the center of the room in front of the sofa.
“No, Mira, please. You may doubt me, but I do love you. Even after all these years, the sound of your screams still haunts me at night. It is a sound I know I shall never forget.”
“You never heard my screams,” I said in a low voice. “The naturi had stopped torturing me before you arrived.” Her eyes darted away from me, locking on a point somewhere over my shoulder. A heavy knot twisted in my stomach as my mind pushed against the dark shadows that crowded my memories of that night. “How could you have heard me screaming?”
“It’s not important right now. There is nothing we can do until the triad has been reformed.” Her voice wavered before she could bring herself to meet my gaze. I stared into her brown eyes for a long time before I spoke again. She’d made her decision and I couldn’t move her.