Page 97 of Blood Oath
“Forget about progress,” Silas says darkly. “You just ruined any chance at anything with Maven. None of us will ever forget this.”
He stalks away, and Crypt drops the broken glass to deliver a brutal punch to the side of my face. I shout, and instinctively, a wicked-sharp blade of ice forms in my hand that I drive through the wrist of his hand still wrapped around my neck. Blood gushes from his wound onto my face, and he finally sneers at me, clearly deciding that locating our betrayed keeper is the priority.
“Sleep with both eyes open,” he warns before vanishing back into Limbo.
I’ll be sleeping with a dozen dreamcatchers standing guard. No one wants to face Crypt’s wrath in the dream world. I’ve never been through that myself, but I know what happened to Silas’s family, and I don’t want a taste of that.
Wiping his chilled blood off my face, I stare up at the sky. The first stars are starting to come out, and the night is growing colder by the second as the aching loneliness starts to influence my power.
I would never admit to the others how much their hatred has always hurt. Legacies like us are all about power and strength, and showing any kind of weakness is like an animal baring its throat in the wild. Even in our own families, it has always been fight or die. Especially mine. Which is why I have desperately wanted anything that is truly safe in my life.
Like Maven. Being in her quintet, all of us watching each other’s backs and bound together by the mercy of the gods…that would be safe. Then, I could finally open up to someone else and be vulnerable for once. I’m so damn tired of keeping up my cold facade.
I want our quintet more than I’ve ever wanted anything.
But that’s exactly what my curse will ruin.
Although…maybe Silas is right. Maybe I did just permanently ruin any chance at the only thing I’ve ever wanted. And even if it does work out, I’m not sure they’ll ever get over hating me.
The prophecy I got from the gods never specified that.
I mutter a prayer to Pheli, the god of the dark sky above me…who is also the god of hope and change. Maybe he’ll have mercy on me when nothing else seems willing to.
29
MAVEN
The club pulses with light that hurts my eyes and music so deep it rattles my skull. I slip through the throng of humans grinding on one another, carefully avoiding contact with anyone as I keep my focus trained on the dark VIP doorway.
When I reach the door, a large human bouncer steps in front of me, folding his arms in a futile attempt to appear more menacing. He glances over my baggy clothes and expressionless face and snorts. “No smile? You could at least try flashing me your little tits. If they’re good enough, I’ll think about letting you in. Otherwise, get lost. Only prime meat gets admitted.”
Ew. I’ll never understand misogyny.
Normally, I might offer him another chance, but I’m far from a merciful mood.
I’m pissed off, and he’s in my way.
So when he reaches toward me to manhandle me, I break his hand in four places, punch his throat to collapse his trachea, kick him aside, and leave him crumbled on the ground, fighting for breath while I snatch the security card from his pocket and slip through the VIP door.
It leads to a dark upstairs section that overlooks the rest of this club with one-way glass. The only people occupying this sultrily decorated space are my wolf shifter target, two of his pack betas, and three human women who are having a terrible time.
One of them is clearly trying to hold back tears as a shifter gropes her chest, not letting her off his lap. Another half-naked woman is on the alpha’s lap, staring off into space in a way that tells me she’s mentally checked out to get through tonight, while the third is stripping for the leering male shifters with trembling hands as they wait for the party to get started.
Assholes.
I step out of the darkness, and the shifters glance my way. The fact that they left nothing but a human bouncer down there and don’t even get up when they see me tells me their survival instincts are severely lacking. But then, I suppose that’s the point of me. I’m not supposed to tip off anyone’s danger senses until it’s too late for them.
Lykoudis’s nose wrinkles. He has dark skin, scars all over one half of his face, and a voice dripping with annoyance. “Who let your ugly ass in here?”
I glance at the stripping woman. “Dress yourself and leave. Take your friends.”
She hesitates, visibly trembling as her attention flicks back to the shifters. She knows how dangerous their kind is, and she’s only human. All three girls in this room seem hyper-aware of the power imbalance and the fact that these wolf shifters could snap their necks and get away with it.
Lykoudis scoffs. “Well? Take the rest of it off, slut. And you, bitch? Get the fuck out of?—”
Before the words are out of his mouth, I slip a large silver dagger from my sleeve and send it straight into the forehead of the third pack beta. His neck snaps backward, head hanging at a broken angle as the blood gurgles from his face, his body twitching.
Instantly, a buzz fills my veins, and I take a deep breath.
