“You run,” Cain says. “You keep moving. Don’t stay in one place for more than a month.”
“We ain’t running,” I retort.
“Then you’ve signed your own death,” Cain bites back.
“We’ve been here for hundreds of years. We keep our heads down, and we’ve not had any trouble. Where has this Anathema been if they can hunt all of us down?” I demand.
Cain shakes his head, his jaw tight. “That, I don’t fucking know.”
“How many of them do you reckon there are?” Hex asks, leaning forward as he flips through his journal, pen poised.
Cain shrugs. “No one knows. Only a few have been left alive to tell the tale, and I swear they only allow those to survive to spread the fear. To let it seep into every coven, every den. Makes the hunt more exciting for them.” His gaze drops to the table, lost in some old memory.
“Fuck,” Shade sighs. The vampire of few words says exactly what we’re all thinking.
“Where we were given hunger and flesh,” Cain continues, his voice distant, “Anathema was given will. Tasked with one purpose: erase the error.” It soundslike he’s reciting from an ancient text, still half-lost in the past.
I look to Viktor. “Search all the tomes, every story, every myth ever written about them. I want to know it all. There has to be something in one of those old stories that can help us.”
Viktor nods and gets to his feet. Hex stands, too.
“I’ll help,” Hex offers.
I nod. “Everyone else, keep low. Feed undetected. Shade and Talon, scope the area. Keep low, keep hidden,” I order. “The rest of you, go about your usual shit.” I flick my hand in dismissal, ending court.
“I guess Prez was right about the female mortal being unimportant,” I hear Echo mutter to Rook as they leave.
Cain’s gaze snaps to mine, one brow arched.
I sigh and shake my head. “Don’t you start. Come on. After that, I need a drink,” I say, clapping a hand on his shoulder as I pass.
“So, she’s mortal?” Cain asks, taking a swig of his drink. He lounges in the leather armchair, one leg draped casually over the other, the roar of the fire highlighting his sharp, deadly features.
I look away, staring into the flames asI sip my own drink, the warm burn of alcohol-laced blood loosening my muscles. “She is something I am not willing to discuss.”
“Shit,” Cain exhales. “What about the laws?”
I clench my jaw, my grip tightening around the glass until it cracks. “No law has been broken, and it will stay that way.”
Cain stands, walks to the bar, and reaches over it to grab the bottle. I down the rest of my drink before the glass can shatter completely. He hands me the bottle.
“It’s going to take a lot more than one drink to ease your troubles, brother,” he says.
I throw the cracked glass into the fire, where it shatters into tiny pieces. I take the bottle from him, yank the cork out, and glug back half of it.
“Fuck,” I breathe, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. I offer the bottle to Cain, and he takes it, drinking deep.
“She is nothing but a toy. A plaything. My pet,” I say.
Cain smirks. “So, she’s your familiar.”
The thought of her being my servant—cleaning up after me, tending to my every need—isn’t unappealing. But the ways I want her to serve me are not what familiars are for.
Cain lets out a roar of laughter. “I know that lookall too well. That look, my brother, is not how we think of our familiars. Tell me, when was the last time you had company?”
It’s my turn to arch a brow. “Human or vampire?”
He shrugs. “Either. As long as you were satisfied, it doesn’t matter.”
