I couldn’t let it get to me, not until I had searched every nook and cranny. I tried to trust that she was doing this for a reason. And maybe we would learn something, and I wouldn't feel like such a useless piece of trash.
The dungeons were the last place I needed to check.
I had avoided the area and had only come down here once when I was a simple guard who infiltrated the palace. Vesper had been taken, and even back then, it had been hard to see her tied up and hurt. But I was focused on my job of seeing the prophecy through while trying to ignore my feelings when she was obviously so intertwined with the princess.
Us being together had only been a fantasy then. Now, I had them both. It was very real, and I wasn't willing to let them go.
I snuck down the hall, my eyes skimming over the piled vampire bodies in each cell. My stomach flipped. Bile started rising.
What the hell is all this?
The first cell was bad, but one look at the next one, and I found another pile of bodies. Horror filled my body, and it pushed me further. There was no way each cell could be full of death like this.
But the further I got, the higher the piles of bodies got. There seemed to be no end to them.
Where is he getting all these vampires? Is he culling the Castle family?
Then I felt it. Something that was but a small wisp of magic during my first run here now felt like a full-on tidal wave.
It’s coming from below.
I followed the feeling, going further into the dungeons. It was potent, old magic, not as disgusting as the general’s, but it feltwrongnonetheless.
It wasn’t until I stopped at a large iron door at the end of the hallway that I realized what I had stumbled upon.
Feeling my anxiety, Vesper was probing the bond, but I pushed it away. I wouldn’t get her involved until I was sure.
I found it.
I found what her brother was doing to make him stronger. And it was locked behind heavy iron doors that looked to be centuries old.
A sick hope filled me.
My hands ran over the carvings as I tried to further feel the magic.
And hopefully not get thrown back by an explosion this time.
The smaller carvings depicted the goddess Krae. Some had her praying, some kneeling, but all of them surrounded one huge carving. In it, she was holding her hands out as if inviting me in.
It wanted me to touch it. Wanted me to open it. It was so strong, I could almost hear a chanting in my mind.
When wrongness stirred in my chest, I found myself backing away, my body catching on quicker than my mind.
This is wrong. Something is wrong.
Alarm bells were ringing in my head.
This is unguarded.Why is this unguarded?It shouldn’t be. If anything, the dungeons should be filled with people trying to protect the very thing I was about to open.
Run.
But when I turned to do that, someone was behind me.
Him.
I stumbled back, away from Adrian, as he looked at me with the same expression he had in the throne room.
There’s nowhere to go. I’m trapped.
