She stabbed him in the chest several more times, his body jerking under her assault. The crown hit the ground and rolled around in a circle.
Apep activated the vampires, sending the two in chains at Vivien, and the two sentries behind him at me. Despite their eyes being hidden under leather masks, they knew exactly where we were. Before they got to me, I gripped the two vampires in my power and threw them across the room, where they slammed into the wall. Their skulls cracked, and when they hit the ground, they didn’t get back up. It would take time for them to regenerate.
My power. It was so much more than before. I hadn’t known my own strength, and I still didn’t.
The chained sekhors clawed at Vivien, trying to rip her off their master. My hand shot out, and the two of them stilled as I gripped them even from a distance. I jerked them back from Vivien, their bodies hanging in midair before I slammed them into the floor. This time, the crunch came with blood pooling around them.
A shriek of pain cut through the room. Black and gold swaths of magic shot out, surrounding me.
Vivien.
My heart pumped faster, but before I could do anything, something flopped on the ground. Apep’s most prized appendage. “You monstrous piece of crap,” Vivien screamed. “If you want your dick sucked, do it your goddamn self.”
When I drew near, I found Apep’s features had mottled and swollen. Stuck halfway, turning into his god-likeness of a snake monster, but Vivien had nearly cut all the way through his throat, stopping his transformation.
His pale flesh turned rubbery, and his now-red eyes bulged unnaturally. His massive fangs elongated, too big for his mostly human face and dripping liquid.
Blood covered Vivien’s cheeks and her expression bore down on Apep with a ferocity that rivaled any god’s power. Since the moment I met her, she’d been a force to contend with.
Despite myself, a tendril of arousal curled in my stomach, not allowing my still-hard length to soften. Though I’d prefer not to have her take me in her mouth in such a place, her tongue and lips could bring me to my knees under any circumstance.
She was more powerful than even she knew.
“So, we just rip off one of his fangs?” Vivien snarled. “Or do we have to milk him like a venom cow?”
Without waiting for an answer, she ripped a fang out. Apep’s scream came out half muffled with her hand in his mouth.
As Vivien investigated the tooth, red eyes rolled over toward me. Apep shot me a look of pure hatred, then it smoothed into an expression that communicated a silent message.
Payback’s a bitch.
Panic crept along my skull as I searched for the source of his smugness.
While one of his legs appeared to be a boneless piece of melted wax, the other had elongated into a serpent’s tail with a large spike on it. In one quick move, he slammed his tail up against Vivien’s back, spearing her.
Vivien stiffened under the blow even as a strangled gasp came out of her mouth. Apep wrenched his tail free, and she jerked with the movement. Before she could fall back, I caught her. Panic raced through me. A spike that big. He could have decimated her heart beyond a vampire’s regenerative capabilities.
“Vivien?” I asked, anxiously searching her face, feeling her blood coat my arms.
Her eyes rolled toward me, and her pallor turned ashen. She struggled to get her words out in between harsh gasps. “I’m o-okay. I just need a minute, i-if that’s alright.” He’d likely destroyed her lungs, but it looked as though her heart hadn’t been damaged too much.
I dropped a kiss on her forehead, and gently set her down so she could sit upright against a wall, since there was no seat available. I held her hand, assuring myself she wasn’t going anywhere.
A gurgling sound caught my attention. I stood and turned to see the skin of Apep’s throat knitting back together. The energy it required to heal himself forced him back into human form.
Reactive emotion took hold of me. Black clouds exploded around me, skulls pushed their way out before receding into the mass. Apep’s red-rimmed eyes blinked, fear written on his face.
“You touched my mate.” My words came out in a low, sonorous layer of voices. “You hurt her. And now, what she’s done to you will be the least of your pain.” My fist clenched shut as my entire being vibrated with outrage.
My death mask flickered, then remained. I wanted him to see who he was dealing with. He would learn why Anubis stood on the right side of Osiris.
With the flick of my finger, the black magic surrounding me shot at him, careening into every orifice of his face, eyes, nose, mouth, even his ears.
He jerked like a marionette with tangled strings. Something resembling a scream tore from Apep’s throat as he continued to feel the brunt of my darkness ripping him inside out over and over again.
Then I stretched out my hand, calling back the darkness from his body. It formed into the scythe that so many came to associate and fear with my presence. With one swing, Apep’s head flew across the room.
The scythe disappeared from my grip in a puff of smoke.
