“Black magic… nothing like mine,” he interjected when my mouth opened to ask, even though his gaze seemed lost somewhere in the night. “If I had to guess, they used a Necromancer to search through the spirit realm, and once he suspected you were here, your uncle sent his hunters to find you.”
The spirit realm? My mind whirled with the information. “Kellan said they found Ryker half dead, and my uncle had a Witch trying to keep him alive.”
“That solidifies my suspicion. No self-respecting Witch would mess with the dead, and there is only so much healing magic or potions can mend. If he was found on the verge of death, only a Necromancer can bring him back.”
What the hell was anecromancer? I hated feeling so ignorant about so many things, there was so much I didn’t know about the real world.
“Necromancers deal with the spirits of the dead. They can communicate with them and ask for guidance, send messages, or even make covenants to bring people back to life. And/or stop others from dying—for the most part,” Dante explained, sensing my curiosity. “They are the only beings with open channels to the spirit world, which facilitates their dealings. Only spirits can travel such distances since time and space are not the same for them as they are for us.”
He paused for a moment, considering something.
“You could say that, in a way, their connection to the spirit realm, is like Bjørn’s connection to the energy veil of our universe. He can tap into it at any point. It’s how he searches for Isis even when he is here with us. He’s always linked to the universe’s source, scanning for anyfeelof her energy. Regrettably, some necromancers are malicious, using their magical gifts to take lives away or bring back creatures that have no business in our world for nefarious purposes. They care about nothing but power, and they will sell their soul to get it, giving their gifted brothers and sisters a bad name.”
Whoa. That sounded both unbelievable and frightening.
“Are the Hunters gone now?”
Dante’s gaze lowered to mine, his eyes once more shining with the power of the moon, beaming in the night. “We took care of them.”
My stomach twisted with his statement, the memory of Ivara’s floating ashes returning. “Did you kill them all?”
Lips pressed into a fine line, he slightly shook his head. “No. I did not.”
“But you killed Ivara…” I reminded, swallowing.
A burdened breath expanded his chest while he searched my eyes, cautious of my reaction.
“I killed her.” Shadows swirled around his eyes, dimming them, hardening his features, and obscuring his face. “And if D and Vanessa hadn’t stopped me, I would have killed the rest too. I would have ended them all for daring to even touch you—for threatening what was mine. I would have slowly engulfed them inTwilight, and bask in their screams as they disappeared in the all-consuming darkness until there was nothing left. Until their very essence was erased, like never existed.”
Conflicting emotions fought within my being with the intensity he held in that moment. I couldn’t support killingthem, even after what they’d just put us through. However, it was the possessiveness exuding from his eyes, the hurt and hopelessness hiding in his voice, and the irrevocable certainty written on his face as he called mehisthat incited new and unrecognizable feelings to whip through me like the wild gusts of a powerful storm.
My wolf pushed against my skin, aching with the raw emotion coursing through us, and I lifted my hand to his cheek, enjoying the feeling of his sculpted cheekbone under my touch. “Don’t ever lose yourself to the darkness for me, Dante. I won’t ask you to sacrifice something you can never get back… I’m not worth it.”
Reaching for my hand, he turned his head and placed a meaningful kiss on my palm before bringing it down to rest over his heart. “You are wortheverything,Cuore mio.Everything. I will protect you even if I destroy myself in the process. Two hundred years of life don’t mean anything if I can no longer have you in my arms; if I can no longer feel you breathing.”
His muscles jerked around me as Dante cradled me against him fiercely.
Tears stung my eyes as the tempest raging inside him captured my heart, as though we were connected, the powerful truth in his words and the strength of his emotions marking me. No man had ever revered me like this. I hadn’t known emotions this intense existed, or how it was possible to feel them without falling apart. How could I experience so much for someone who should have been a total stranger but felt like my true home… I experienced all of that with him.
Dante was seeded so deeply within me, that I couldn’t remember what it felt like without him.
I gently caressed his chest, until the tension caused by the vicious instincts the darkness awoke in him began to fade with my touch, and my wolf rustled. She liked how protective of ustheLord of Twilightwas, even if it quivered at the edge of insanity.
Unfortunately, reality broke through the sensual haze he brought over me each time. The Hunters were still out there, and though I had the Dark Witch by my side, fear still gripped me. “They know where I am now, they’ll find me again?—”
“They won’t remember. D took care of that after we brought you here.”
“He went back?” I breathed, disbelieving.
“Well, we couldn’t exactly leave a small pack of giant wolves and a few dead assholes on an alley in the middle ofNew York City.”
“Kellan died?” I asked, shocked by Vanessa’s true strength.
Dante somberly nodded. “So did Barret and the other idiot who attacked Vane. But she did it in self-defense,” he promptly added, not wanting the act to change my opinion of her. “Also, a couple of the shifters didn’t survive her sonar attack. Nevertheless, Bjørn sent them all back to where they came from.”
The image of her as a fully-fledged Vampire returned, and I swallowed, no longer sure what my opinion of her was.
“She defended you, Natasha.” Dante’s words were gentle, but also unwavering. “She may be a Vampire, and I know it’s hard to deconstruct what’s been seared into your heart about that, but?—”
