Did the early hunters really do this? Even if they did…and even if Ruvan is right and King Solos treated a group of early humans as little more than animals to be experimented on and killed for our blood…those were the actions of one man. How much longer must these people wait until their dues have been paid? How much suffering should be inflicted upon them until it is enough?
Who were the real monsters thousands of years ago? Who are they now? I was once so sure of that answer and now I have no idea.
“Here,” Ruvan says softly, stopping before a broken husk of dark ruby. I stand next to him. Something compels me to wrap my arm around his. Our sides are flush. I examine his face in profile as I wait for him to be ready to say whatever he clearly has locked away. “This was where I was.”
“How long ago were you awoken?” I stare at the empty shell. The broken stone, dull without his magic to fuel it. This was mentioned at some point, I think, but it feels like years ago that I first arrived. I wasn’t the same woman then as I am now and heard things—or didn’t hear them—differently. My world was still simple.
“Only about a year ago. The last lord held on a long time to wake us just before the Blood Moon so we would be at our peak strength. Enough time to acclimate, read the records of the previous covenants, hone our skills, and shake off the dust; but not long enough that we’d languish or, worse, succumb to the curse.”
I see Ruvan in yet another new way. He was born in a different time. He, all of them, grew up in a Tempost that was in the midst of its fall. They encased themselves in ruby as their world was crumbling, not knowing when, or if, they would ever wake up…or what they would wake up to.
“The first thing I did when I awoke…was kill the last lord.” Ruvan’s arm trembles slightly. He stares at nothing, no doubt looking straight back to that night a year ago. “He was succumbing to the curse but holding on because the rest of his vassals had already fallen. He had to be the one to wake us. He pushed himself to the brink to do it. And I had to be the one to kill him.” Ruvan covers his face with his hand, looking away. “Yet every night, I still think of him. His dark eyes. Covered in his blood. And I—I—”
“It’s all right.” I tighten my grip and shift my weight from foot to foot. Without thought or hesitation, I rest my fingertips on his chin and guide his face back to mine. His hand falls away and he looks at me with those eyes of his—haunted and bright. “You did what you had to.”
“I know. But it… I was the one to carve out his chest and yet mine is the one with the hole in it.”
My hand drops to rest on the center of his breast. “There’s no hole here,” I reassure him. “Just the strong heartbeat of a good man.”
His hand wraps around mine, holding me to him. Without looking around for where Ventos might be, Ruvan tilts his head down and presses his forehead against mine. His eyes dip closed and mine do as well. For a moment, we breathe together. We lean on each other and my thoughts melt away.
“Thank you,” he whispers.
“For what?”
“For not being the hunter I thought you were.” I can hear the smile on his lips without opening my eyes. “For giving me—all of us—a chance.”
I laugh softly. “Even the strongest steel can bend…with enough patience, time, and force.”
Ruvan pulls away with a small grin. The moment slowly dissipates. It’s not a breaking or snapping feeling. It’s not abruptly undone. But it fades. Settles. There is a new feeling between us now. Every emotion deepens the more I understand him and the more he understands me.
“We should go back.” He eases away. I release him, but it’s harder than it has ever been. And not as a result of some deep desire. But a quiet yearning. A want to be near. “It’s getting late.”
“We don’t want the others to come searching,” I agree. I’m ready to crawl back in bed with him and, hopefully, tomorrow morning I don’t need to escape.
Ruvan scans the room, squints, and starts in a direction other than the door. Ventos stands before another encapsulated vampir. His hand rests lightly on the crystal.
“Is that a future guardian? Or lady of the vampir?” I lean in to ask Ruvan under my breath.
He slows his step. “No. She’s not one of the leaders, and didn’t sign up to be a guardian. She wanted to, but Ventos wouldn’t let her…”
“Who is she, then?”
“His bloodsworn. His wife.”
I blink. Several times.
Bloodsworn…wife?
