Page 149 of Blood Lovers

“Isn’t it? The Darkness has already chosen you, Syrsee. The Darkness let Josep feed, and then I fed on Josep, and then you fed on me, dear sweet. Don’t you see? You’re one of us now.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Didn’t I just spell it out for you?”

“What does it mean, asshole!”

“Mean? It means you are special, Syrsee. You have the Darkness inside you now. It’s flowing through your veins this very moment. It will stay there forever. You will feed it to Ryet, and I will take some every now and then, and…” He actually pauses to sigh. “And then it will propagate in this world through you now, love. You are the new mother of all demons. You are the dark now too, Syrsee. And from here… we rule the world.”

My mind is spinning through all that bullshit. The whole forest is spinning. And the purple—holy fuck, there is so much purple. Images begin flashing through my mind.

A clearing. A man and a baby. The fur, the snow, the tree. The Darkness, whatever that really is. The blood, the teeth, the claws, the wings.

The future.

And me. And so many, many babies.

Who are not really babies, but demons.

I almost snort out a laugh. And then I make a decision.

No. I say it out loud, just so I’m clear. “No.”

Lucia is in my head, whispering, “Now, Syrsee. Now.”

And the cloak, the soft, soft cloak of fur that Paul draped over Ryet’s shoulders, is already in my hands. I stand up and I throw it over top of Paul. He puts his hands up—maybe out of instinct, but then again, maybe he knows who I am and what I can do with the purple.

But it doesn’t matter. The cloak is my power because I made it my power.

Lucia is chuckling in the background, her words drifting through the misty, lavender forest. “That is very literal, darling.”

As soon as the fur cloak touches Paul’s hands, they disappear. When it covers him, he disappears too. And then, before I can even come to terms with what is happening, it’s just a fur, on a log, in the middle of a snowy forest.

Paul is trapped here now.

Can I find him again? Is this forever? Or is there a way to bring him back?

I don’t know. I don’t care.

Ryet is gone as well. But he wasn’t really here. That was Paul’s magic. He’s back on that bed and that’s where I need to be too.

Because Lucia was right.

Ryet needs to die.

Even if I have to kill myself to do it, he must die.

Maybe the Darkness wins. Maybe the Darkness takes over the world. Maybe some woman really does pop out a bunch of evil demon babies. Maybe that’s really how all this ends.

But I swear to that good-for-nothing God above, it’s not gonna happen that way because of me.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN – RYET

Absolutely nothing.

One moment I am drinking, Paul’s blood flooding my mouth, and the next there is nothing. Not even the taste of him on my tongue.

What the fuck? I turn, trying to open my eyes, but when I finally manage that, I’m not lying down on the bed with Syrsee and Paul, I’m in a church.