He zeroed in on the vial. “His sister. She’s given him something. I couldn’t stop herandhold them.” He pointed at Sekou and Lyle, who ducked away with every careless wave of his gun.
Simon studied the vial, his greed quickly replacing his fear. Slowly, he inched closer to his niece and nephew as if a lion were in front of him.
Effie stared at the vial, disbelief clouding over her face, then her head snapped around, zeroing in on Hailey, who shrank beneath her glower.
“What,” she growled, “did you do to him?”
“She gave him a taste of my elixir,” Nana Ama answered from the other side of the room. Naira yelped, her hands clamping over Effie’s where it gripped her hair and pulled.
“You think you are still the healer and I the warrior as Father and the undergods would always say? You think the Adinkra etched on you means anything? Father would disapprove of you giving them your essence in this elixir of yours. We are not supposed to intervene, remember? You gifted the humans longer life, yet you let your sister die.” Effie laughed, and I detected hurt and betrayal in it before her brief exposed emotion calloused over and her voice hardened. “Well then, dear sister, heal this one too.”
There was nothing I could do to stop her even when I screamed for her to stop. But Effie held me fast in a vise grip with one hand while pulling Naira to her opening mouth, her saber teeth unsheathing, terrifying even me. She sank her teeth deep into Naira’s neck. Naira howled, her body going rigid. Her hands seized and her body began to shake violently in reaction. Effie pulled from Naira’s neck, blood spraying from the extraction, and flung Naira as if she were a balled-up paper towel.
Ama reached out, bracing herself. Naira crashed into her. The momentum of Effie’s throw and Naira’s weight were too fast and too much. In Ama’s weakened state, the two of them smashed onto the floor in a jumbled heap, rolling head over heel. Ama took the brunt of the throw, but Naira’s forehead still cracked hard against the edge of the wall in a sickening thud. She lay there unmoving as blood began to trickle from the open wound in her scalp and from Effie’s bite on her neck.
The smell of fresh, hot, pungent human blood permeated theair, filling my nose. To my horror, my fangs descended. My stomach rolled in enticement and my mind filled with nothing but thoughts of delicious blood and my increasing need to have it for myself.
Effie’s breath warmed my ear. “That’s it, my girl.” She took a deep inhale, her mouth twisting to a lecherous, bloody grin. “What you smell is your life force. What you smell is our power over these humans.”
I struggled to fight against Effie and against the adze needs battling inside me to dive down and lap up the wasting human blood.
Sekou jerked, attempting to make a break for Naira, but Franco hit him with the butt of the gun and Sekou stumbled into Lyle, who saved him from falling through the splintered wood beneath their feet.
“Be still,” Franco yelled, his gun trembling. “Don’t be a hero.”
Another voice rose up above mine. It was weak and gravelly, as if it hadn’t been used properly in a long while.
“Naira!”
Hailey cried Luke’s name, grabbing at him as he attempted to lunge in Naira’s direction.
Ama looked down at her and at the blood. Her nature to feed and restore herself gaining strength over her duty to heal and protect.
“Heal the girl,” Effie said simply. “Or feed and heal yourself and regain your strength. Be who you are. My gift to you.”
Ama looked at her sister, defiance blazing like lasers from her. “I will not.”
Effie’s face slipped, revealing her surprise and dismay at the rejection. A second later, she swallowed that moment of weakness, hardening again.
“You see?” Effie turned to me. “After all she’s done, betraying me, leaving me to those hunters, burying me to make sure I was dead, and stealing my child, she still refuses me. She still refuses to embrace who we now are. She is ashamed of herself. Ashamed of me and of you.”
Ama worked quickly, biting the inside of her wrist, and allowing droplets of her blood to land on Naira’s lips while we all watched. This was what Effie must have done with me. Only the outcome would not be the same. Ama could heal. Effie could only destroy.
“This was not the way we were meant to be. Not killing humans or enslaving them ourselves. That was not our father’s teachings,” Ama said.
“Yet the humans taught us differently. This world, dear sister, has taught us that there are masters and there are those who are mastered. You would choose to be the latter?”
“I would choose life, yes.” Ama inhaled the scent of Naira’s blood. “I would choose it again and again.”
“Human life over that of your twin?” Effie growled, the energy around her crackling. “Over your own?”
“If it means I do not become a monster like those who stole and enslaved us were—like you have become—then yes.”
Effie gripped me tightly, practically lifting me to the tips of my toes. “Make your choice, Addae. Your rightful grandmother. Or the impostor.”
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
Drop!
