The gnarled, living corpse of the vampire lord hangs over me. The bright red moon frames his haunted face as he stares down with those burning, unnatural eyes—all black save for the bright, yellow irises.
“You’re a truly tenacious beast,” he growls, the words spoken around those razor-sharp fangs. His mouth is not like a normal vampire’s. Most of his teeth are humanlike. Only his canines are elongated.
My mind races as I try to think of a way to escape his hold. The time is drawing near. I can feel it. He will take me into his arms and will drink from me until I am dry. Then, he will use my face to infiltrate Hunter’s Hamlet.
Mother, forgive me. I don’t even have a collar to stop it.
“But, damn it all, Callos was right. You will serve for what we need,” he proclaims.
Before I can process what he’s said, mist envelops us.
I inhale and choke, sputtering, coughing. It tears at my lungs, rips through my veins and threatens to explode out my flesh. I am undone and remade in a blink.
We are no longer in the ruins, but back on the main road of the marsh.Are we closer to or farther from town?I barely have time to wonder before I am ripped apart again. My ears pop, the night collapses on me, condensed by magic. I am nothing more than a thought in a void.
Red light once more. We’re elsewhere again. We stand on the crest of a foothill, the fogs of the marshes thinning. It swirls around us like an ocean. We must be at the highest point in the Fade Marshes. Far, far in the distance is a lonely point of light. It is Hunter’s Hamlet, made small by how far we are. Everything I’ve ever known, every comfort I’ve ever had or scrap of hope I could even dream of, is being swept away as I’m pulled farther and farther by this monster.
Yet again, just as I catch my bearings, we move. I grit my teeth to keep myself from letting out a shout. Every time he drags me through space with him is more painful than the last. Every time I am more winded. Living magic surrounds me, an endless tunnel of night. We pass by faintly glowing stone markers that look like a graveyard before it all becomes too much.
I press my eyes closed. The air shifts and I inhale sharply. The lord glances back as we materialize at the foot of a mountain I have never seen.
Where are mountains?I have never heard any of the hunters speak of mountains. I spin, looking behind me. A splintered coast dots a tempest sea. Waves crash foam against jagged rocks that dot between islands like stepping stones. Ocean spray mingles with the low clouds that carve against the horizon, blocking everything beyond from view.
I’m at the sea. Finally, at long last…and it’s because of this monster.
A lonely, crumbling bridge stretches across the waters, suspended on those islands, connecting the wall of magic smoke to a heavy portcullis blocking the tunnel before me.
The walls of Hunter’s Hamlet extend toward the sea to keep the vampires in their lands. Seeing this ocean has only ever been a dream—now turned into a nightmare. I look back up to the mountain, outlined by a crimson moon that hangs low.
“We’re not far now,” he murmurs, almost reassuringly. The tone is a jarring contrast to the monster I have been fighting.
Not far from what?I’m reeling. It doesn’t matter where I am. I have to—
I’m plunged into darkness once more and ripped through time and space by the vampire lord’s magic, pulled along at his side, kidnapped. Yanked deeper into what I know with certainty, despite all odds, is the land of the vampire.
The world rematerializes and frigid wind rips through me as we stand in almost knee-deep snow on a mountain ledge.Snow, in summer. We only spend a second before moving again. Every step the vampire takes feels longer than the last, the darkness more permanent. My muscles scream with an agony I have never known.
Will he pull me to the edge of the world just so that he can push me off of it? I must escape. The next time we blink back into existence I yank myself from his grasp. The vampire lord lets out a startled grunt as he spins to face me. We are higher still up the mountain. My feet are instantly numb and slide on the ice hidden beneath the layers of thick snow.
He reaches for me, and I dodge out of his grasp. The elixir is still in my veins, numbing what must surely be excruciating pain. Keeping me sharp. The lord purses his lips, eyes shining with anger as I reach for an icicle hanging off a nearby ledge. My skin burns at the brutal cold, fusing to the ice as I yank it off.
The lord arches a pale brow at me. “Do you think you can kill me with that?”
I stand my ground wordlessly. My weapons are long gone. He has taken me to an arena of his choosing and I have no other options. But I amnotgoing down without a fight.
“You couldn’t kill me when armed with two of your precious silver sickles. What do you honestly think you could do with that?”
I hold up the icicle in a silent threat.
“I’ll grant you that with the blood lore, you’re strong. Tenacious, certainly. But you clearly are not quick-witted.” Let him think what he wants; all I need is for him to take just a few more steps. I brandish the icicle a little higher. “Let’s say you actually do manage to kill me,hmm? What then? Where will you go? You can’t escape this place without my help. I am going to present to you a unique opportunity, stop threatening—”
The lord moves to rip the icicle from my grasp. I pull it toward me instead and, thanks to the elixir, I have the strength to pull him along with it. I wrap my arms quickly around his armored shoulders and tighten the muscles in my lower back. I hoist him like a massive bag of coal. We tip backward, and I push off with both legs, using every last bit of my strength.
My teeth rake against the shell of his ear as I snarl, “I wasn’t trying to escape.” The wind howls around us, nearly stealing my words. There is no coming back for me now. If it’s not the madness of the elixir that gets me, I will certainly die at the hands of the vampire lord. And if I somehow manage to kill him, his legions will take me. There’s no way out for me now, not when we’ve come this far. “If I’m going to die, I’m bringing you with me!”
We fall into the open air. My arms are around him, holding him as tightly as possible. The moon spins overhead. The air screams in my ears.
With a clamor of steel and flesh, we meet unyielding stone.
