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I was still holding the splintered shaft of my scythe. All I had to do was stab it into Agana’s back and mutter two spells, and she would go up in flames and turn to ash. Then I could solidify my place in history by killing one of the most brutal vampires ever.
Gritting my teeth with resolve, I plunged the wood into her flesh. Her scream of rage and pain threatened to break my eardrums. But before I could speak the first syllable of the imb spell to imbue power into the stake, Agana hissed and buried her face in my neck to sink her fangs deep into my throat.
I heard my name being shouted in despair, but my ears were roaring, and all I could focus on was the thick needles piercing my neck, making blood gush out when she started to tear.
Is this how I die?
Agana wasn’t drinking. She was biting, then tugging, as if I was chicken meat she was trying to get off the bone. If I just lay there, she was going to shred me.
Disgust and anger shot through my system—but so did Agana’s venom.
The stuff that coated a vampire’s teeth to subdue their prey by inducing a calming effect, making the victim intoxicated and complacent. I started to feel a sense of peace, my body going limp, my vision hazy. Agana was attacking the human part of me.
Then she withdrew, hissing and spitting, unable to handle the taste of impure blood. Vampires didn’t drink from vampires. The taste was rancid.
But she succeeded in taking away my ability to defend myself. I could barely move my limbs. My best hope was that my vampire half would burn away the venom with its rapid healing abilities.
The blaze of blue fire exploded to my left. I managed to turn my head in time to see one of Agana’s lackeys go up in flames, yowling and thrashing. Tess was the caster, hefting her axe in one hand as she turned toward me, another spell on her lips.
On the other side of the room, Sloan and Em screamed her name in warning as Agana ordered, “Knock her out!” and roughly hoisted me to my feet by my collar. “Witch! Away!”
Through blurry vision, I saw one of Agana’s witches vanish and reappear beside the coven leader. Her hand took Agana’s wrist. At the same time, a vampire lunged behind Tess, hands reaching to grab her shoulders. I stared in horror as his hands clamped down and dragged her toward him so he could—
Plunge his fangs into her neck.
“No!” The word ripped from my mouth as blood spurted from Tess’s pierced flesh. In a burst of vampiric super-strength, I freed myself from Agana’s grip and sprang to wrench the vampire away from Tess. She dropped her axe and reached for me. Our fingers brushed and hooked together—
A fist cinched the back of my shirt. “Away!” Agana shouted again.
I felt myself being sucked into a teleportation and all I could see was Tess’s terrified face—
And then we were no longer in the White Tree.
Agana’s clawed hand on my upper arm kept me upright, but Tess collapsed under the vampire’s weight as it clung onto her like a parasite. I writhed to break free of her again, but she shoved me away so roughly I stumbled and slammed into a wall. The witch appeared and held me back with a hand to my chest. The warning shake of her head and the intense look in her eyes made me hesitate to attack Agana again.
The stake was still in the Bloodfrost leader’s back as she snarled wordlessly when she hauled her lackey off Tess, who slumped onto her stomach, unmoving. Every nerve was alight within me in fear for her, but her heart was beating strong, and her words from the Redfang arena rang in my head: Don’t do anything stupid!
“You blood-drunk fool,” Agana hissed to the vampire, who was dazed with satisfaction.
He didn’t get to defend himself when she punched her hand into his chest that made a horrendous crunch of broken bones, and ripped out his heart with a sucking-squelching sound. His eyes widened at the vital organ outside of his body, and then the light in them faded just before he crumpled to the ground, deader than dead.
Agana sighed in exasperation and dropped the heart on the floor. The wet thud made me sick to my stomach.
Wrenching the broken shaft of my scythe out of her flesh with another spattering of blood onto the floor, she padded over to Tess and toed her onto her back. I seethed furiously but knew moving would only make things worse. Tess whimpered in pain, hands pressed over the bite, but was muttering quickly under her breath, which Agana did not like.
“What are you muttering, witch?” she spat. Without waiting for an answer, she whirled on her witch. “What is she saying?”
“A healing spell.”
Tess withdrew her hands and showed her neck to the Bloodfrost leader. Even from my angle, I could see there was nothing left of the deep bite except for smeared blood. The look in Tess’s eyes was bright and defiant, as if to say, Look what I can do.
But Agana wasn’t impressed. By her age, there couldn’t be much she hadn’t seen before. “Take her back to my traitor offspring, Ena,” she ordered the witch standing next to me.
“Liv had Arik’s token, Lady Agana,” she said, referencing the other witch that Agana brought, who might still be at the library. I couldn’t begin to imagine what was happening right now. “I don’t have any to take her back.”
Agana hissed, opening her mouth to spit another suggestion, but Tess sat up quickly and blurted, “I can be of use to you, Lady Agana.”
My spine tightened with fear. What was she thinking, interrupting a coven leader? I tried to catch Tess’s eye, to try and decipher what her plan was—Tess always had a plan—but she wouldn’t glance my way. She fearlessly stared Agana down.
The leader laughed daintily. “I am a reasonable vampire,” she mused, making me glance at the brutally murdered vampire on the floor, “and you have masterfully already healed yourself. You must be a powerful witch for your age. It is nothing I am impressed by, but I am intrigued by the prospect of power.”
Tess’s eyes flicked to me for the briefest moments, her throat bobbing when she swallowed hard. My heart lurched when I understood what she was planning—self-sacrifice.
I mouthed No desperately, fearing she would reveal her identity as an heir of Dawnhaven, but Tess spoke confidently, “I understand there’s a highly-wanted commodity lately. Galen Shayla’s spellbook. Is that why you appeared in Arik’s library?”
“I visited his traitorous profession”—Agana spat the word with such scorn that it felt like a slap—”because he owed me information.” A smile entered her accented tone. “Don’t look so betrayed. He wasn’t expecting me. It was years ago that we agreed upon his relinquishment of knowledge. You being there at the same time is purely coincidence...”
Agana’s voice drifted into quiet. Dread trickled down my bones. Slowly, she turned to look at me with such icy displeasure that I forgot how to speak. “Or is it?” she whispered. “You destroyed Redfang, heir of the Black Lord,” she continued, her attention locked on me instead of Tess. “What information were you looking for? What do you know?”
I blinked, and suddenly, Agana’s bloody face was inches from mine. “What. Do you. Know?”
“A way to foil our plans,” the witch, Ena, said. “They were going for the same information we were.”
They already know about the eclipse. What else do they need to know? What are they planning? And what do they assume we know?
I didn’t have to wonder too much.
“Those idiotic Redfangs must have blabbed,” Agana said roughly. Looking between me and Tess, she continued, “You discovered the eclipse.”
I hoped my expression was as blank as Tess’s, but even if it was, our heartbeats gave away our fear.
Agana’s laugh was a hissing wheeze, an ugly sound from someone as supernaturally beautiful as her. “Little mice hearts,” she sneered, prodding my chest with a harsh jab. “I’m not going to kill you over it.”
“You’re not?” I blustered.
Her eyes narrowed. “Unless you want me to.”
“No!” Tess and I blurted.
“It depends,” she purred, looking between us again, “what you can offer me in return for your lives.”
Tess didn’t hesitate to say hastily, “I am a relative of Galen Shayla. I can help you find it and unlock it. Only her blood can release the spell that seals it shut.”
I turned my hearing to Tess’s vitals, probing for evidence of the lie. But her heart was already racing; it was impossible to tell if she was telling the truth or not. I was impressed with how well it was delivered.
“I wasn’t aware of the seal,” Agana mused darkly. “Ena, confirm.”
My impressment was gone in a dash. Why did you reveal that, Tess?! That was our biggest secret!
“Many powerful spellbooks are sealed,” Ena said, gold-brown eyes boring into Tess’s. “It doesn’t shock me if this is true.”
“But there is no way to fact-check, is there?”
Ena shook her head at Agana’s growled question, then added, “Gideon is her relative.”
Agana went board-stiff, the gleam of an idea in her irises blinding with savage delight. “Oh,” she drawled with a deep hum of satisfaction, “this is a perfect opportunity.” She flicked her gaze on me. “What is your opinion on your sister?”
Anger rushed me like a flood. I bared my fangs. “I want nothing to do with that psychopath.”
“Good,” Agana simpered. “No issue there. I have a use for you, heir.” She nodded to me, then looked critically over her shoulder at Tess. “You, I have no use for. You do not share Shayla’s blood. I have no space in my coven for liars.”
“I don’t have any tokens to send me back,” Tess said, her voice impressively steady.
Agana clicked her tongue. “Indeed, a shame. What can you offer me? In exchange for your life?”
Tess swallowed hard again and looked at me helplessly. I jolted at the plea in her gaze. Why was she looking at me for ideas? She was the plan person! I was the barge-through-chaos-and-hope-for-the-best person! I couldn’t just whip up something—
“I can make use of her, Lady Agana.”
We all looked at Ena, who didn’t balk at the attention. She was dark-skinned and black-haired, lithe, but seemed unshakable. Her expression was neutral.
“I can sense she is talented,” Ena said, “and I advise against killing her if she can be of use to me. Besides,” she added with a flat tone toward me, “she will be our leverage for him. They care for each other. If the heir acts up, it will be the witch’s life at stake to keep him in line.”
Agana’s gasp tore through my body like a knife. Tess and I stared at each other, terrified out of our wits. We thought we were in danger around Thana and her coven. No. That was nothing compared to this—compared to Agana Kirsi, the Bone Jeweler of Sanlow.
We were royally screwed.
“Excellent idea, Ena,” Agana breathed delightedly. “This little mouse-heart witch knows something about the spellbook. We’ll tear it out of her if need be—”
“No!”
Agana whipped around to bare her fangs and hiss at me. I clapped my hand over my mouth. In a blink, she had my face in her hand, crushing my jaw. I barely heard Tess’s whimper of protest. “Every sound you make from now on, I will hurt her. Each mistake you make, the worse her wound will be.” Her snarl transformed into a sickeningly sweet smile. “How does that sound? Perfect! Let us speak later.”
Before I could do anything else, she grabbed my head, and I knew with a bolt of panic what she was going to do next—
I blacked out a split-second after I heard my own neck snap.
