The three other Liberators advanced on her simultaneously. She pressed her hands together before pulling them apart, pushing her palms towards them as bursts of light beamed into their eyes, partially blinding them.
She ducked as one of them recklessly swung for her and sent a gust of wind towards another, knocking him off balance to the floor. She caught the next blow aimed at her, her hand closing around his fist, and threw him to the side where he landed a few feet away.
The third one circled round her, not making any moves to advance but not running away either. It was as if he were toying with her, and Adriana realised all too late that it had merely been a distraction as she heard the scrape of a blade on the floor behind her.
She turned, realising the bald man had picked up his knife and had been aiming to stab her square in the back. As she tried to move aside, the man struck faster than she’d anticipated, the knife lodging itself into the front of her shoulder
She cried out in pain and swiped her arm sideways, her nails extending into sharp talons as she cut across the bald man’s neck. He stumbled back a few steps before he collapsed on the ground, his hands clutching his throat. It was a deep cut, but notdeep enough to kill him instantly. He would bleed out slowly, painfully.
Adriana stood over him, her black eyes looking down at the growing pool of blood as he stared back at her with pure hatred. She had never been looked at like that, not since she had killed Jonathon.
Everyone stood completely silent around her. She looked up to see the spectators standing still, all the Liberators holding their phones up as they filmed her, capturing the monster in the act.
Her talons retracted back and her eyes returned to their regular colour as she held her hands up, trying to show them she was not a threat. As her arms lifted, she felt the pain in her shoulder from the knife that was still inside her. She went to pull it out but before she could reach it, one of the nearby Liberators swung their fist across her jaw.
She fell on her side, the knife lodging itself deeper into her shoulder and protruding out the back. She bit down on her bottom lip to stop herself from crying out in pain as two of the Liberators started to kick her back, her head, her stomach—anywhere they could. She didn’t fight them, she didn’t even roll away, she just let them hurt her as she stared at the bald man, his eyes boring into hers as the light within them slowly faded… until it extinguished altogether.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, as the other Liberators closed in, their phones angled at her face to capture her tears. “I didn’t mean to, I didn’t want to hurt anyone. I’m sorry.”
She could hear a few members of the public fighting with the Liberators, but she didn’t pay any attention to them. Her mind was shutting down and her body was giving up. She couldn’t do this anymore, she couldn’t be this monster. The exhaustion of running and hiding for over a century seemed to finally catch up with her in that moment, and she let her powers die down inside her.
No more.
Suddenly, the kicks stopped as the men were thrown away from her. They screamed in surprise as their bodies were lifted by a strong wind and thrown back against the nearby wall.
Adriana felt a pair of hands hook underneath her arms and pull her to her feet, before they wrenched the knife from her shoulder. She gasped at the pain and clung to her arm, pressing on the wound to stem the bloodflow.
“Come on, Addie! Get up, we’re getting out of here.”
Adriana looked up to see Cass in front of her. She grabbed her hand and the two of them ran away from the station, using the fight that had broken out between the Liberators and the public as cover.
Chapter twenty
The Girl
Nicolai
Nicolai made his way around the crowded club, his eyes scanning the room as the overhead lights flickered on, signalling an end to the long night. One minute he had been running after the girl Niamh had told him to chase, and the next he was blinded by a flash of light and thrown down the stairs.
He felt a wave of embarrassment wash over him as he took in the sea of shocked faces. A few even stopped to offer their concern as they left the club, before whispering amongst one another. He was one of the strongest Lamiae to ever exist, one of the original Purebloods, and he had been thrown to the ground by an unknown Incantrix in front of dozens of people. An unknownLuciferus.
It was impossible. The last Luciferus had died over a century ago, his brother had killed her and she left no children to pass on her gifts to. Though he had never met Xander’s betrothed all those years ago, he knew what had happened on that terrible night.
Nicolai scratched his head as he tried to think, the throb at the back of his skull from his fall not helping. He knew he should have fed earlier in the private room, but he’d gotten too busy with the… entertainment. The bartender had offered him a glass of blood to help him heal, but he’d refused. It was easier to think things through without the hazy euphoria of blood to blur his understanding, even if staying sober meant having a terrible headache.
He needed answers before they returned home. Who was that girl? Why had they not heard about a Luciferus existing? Why had she run away?
“She certainly showed you up, huh?”
Nicolai rolled his eyes at the gleeful smile on Niamh’s face. She stood beside him with ice wrapped in a towel and pressed it to the back of his head, easing the ache with delicate care whilst her smirk revelled in his embarrassment.
“Oh, piss off,” he said. “I just didn’t expect it, that’s all. She caught me off guard. You didn’t tell me she was a fucking Luciferus.”
“I didn’t know. I didn’t get a good look at the markings on her back other than the Incantrix moon cycle. But you saw the ones on her arms, right?”
Nicolai shook his head as he took a seat at the bar, finally accepting a drink from the bartender as he announced he was closing down. He took a sip of the amber liquid, realising it was a strong whiskey that he was certain he hadn’t tasted in the last century. With a smile, appreciating its ability to soothe his headache, he realised Mitchell had likely ordered it in for himand other older Lamiae, those who could remember what a real drink tasted like.
“She had Nocte brands, Nic,” Niamh said, interrupting his thoughts. “She bore Xander’s markings.”
