Blaise cleared his throat, snapping me out of it.
“So, what do we think the prophecy means?”
“Born by the light,” Kalyke said, “has to mean your being part human.”
Dad launched himself into a coughing fit, but nodded his head. “Soul created in night is referring to how I created your soul in Hell.”
“Returned bathed in blood,” Thaddeus spoke as if he couldn’t contain his excitement about the prophecy.The little nerd.“It must mean your reincarnated soul and you being part vampire now.”
I hummed. “The Crimson Demon. Well, I guess that’s a cool name. Mother of demons is cool too, though.”
“It’s a warning,” Selene said, soft voice gliding around the room. “Beware of lightning in the flood. I’m not sure what that could mean, but it could be abstract for identifying a storm brewing.”
“That makes sense, actually.” I scraped my fingernails along the plush, black fabric of the throne’s seat.
“Balance unhinged means balance is off, but we know that.” Dad glared at Gabriel. “Gabriel knocked the balance off when he killed Lilith for no good reason.”
Gabriel’s sharp jaw ticked. “I had a vision of Lilith bringing Hell on Earth with her demons. My reasoning—”
“—was bullshit, and you fucking know it!” Aziel snarled.
I sucked in a breath.That liar.He didn’t kill me because of a vision. He said it himself the reason he wanted to kill me,to punish me.
“Stop!” Dad’s voice boomed off the pulsing walls. “The realms are collapsing into each other. There has been an increase in natural disasters in the living realm. Balance has been tilted toward evil for much too long. I believe Gabriel’s vision may come true after all.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I snapped.
“Infatuation for Twilight clearly means the balance tipping into dark,” Carmilla said, lips pursing together.
“Contraband’s steady beat spills from flesh,” Dad said, “makes perfect sense considering Viktor’s activities.”
My stomach heaved even thinking about that monster. “What about his activities?”
“Viktor’s been into a more sinister business than we thought,” Titan said with a frown.
Mortala appeared in front of Dad with a stack of folders. “The reports on Viktor, Sire.”
He took them and nodded before Mortala disappeared again.
Dad passed me a black folder, and I opened it.
Viktor: Prior Royal Vampire, Current Abandoned
Threat Level: High
Sentence: Obliteration
Reason: Trafficking humans and transforming them into new-blood vampires to feast on them.
Last Seen Location: Emeraldsville, Alaska
My stomach heaved. I could still feel his fucking piranha-like teeth buried in my flesh as he drank my blood. The thought of him doing that after turning unwilling humans, probably in a fucked up way, had my ears hot with anger.
“Contraband, meaning the humans and him...eating them.”Ugh.“If he’s into trafficking that means there are more vampires involved than we thought.”
“Unfortunately,” Carmilla answered. “The location of the trafficking rings is still unknown. We have been shorthanded due to…”
“You intervening withbothof our hunting clans in the living realm,” Gabriel snapped.
