I should have killed him, I thought. Did I let him go only to come back and hurt us again?
I couldn’t come to accept my feelings or this situation. It had all grown to be too much for me. This magic, misunderstood, still coursed through my veins, and I still didn’t know what to do with that. Right now, all I could see was being here, waiting for Lex to heal. Past that, I didn’t know, and suddenly on overload, I didn’t care. It was all too much to reason out, especially in the state I was in, full of shock, fear, sadness…
My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of quiet footsteps. I looked toward the noise, readying myself to deal with whoever it was to protect my man. What I saw, though, was Nira, followed by two other vampires. Their hands and faces, as well as their clothes, were all covered in blood.
“You’re alive,” I exclaimed, the knot in my stomach loosening a touch, only to have it flip, and tighten again, but in a different way. I reeled a bit, lightheaded, as I’d sat up too fast.
“He’s alive,” Nira said. When I only nodded, my brows knitting together, she continued, “I can hear his heart beating.”
I nodded. “The others? What happened down there? It sounded like the world was coming to an end.”
“I could say the same about up here. I could hear the hissing, the windy sounds of what I assume was your magic. Where are Vivian and Lex? Who was guarding Lex? What happened to him or them?”
I managed only to nod my head in the direction of Vivian and Riker’s bodies as fresh tears fell from my eyes. Nira looked over before she took a few steps toward them. I watched her stand there, her head bowed as if in reverence.
“They were such good people. I’d worked with them both before. They accepted everyone, would fight for anyone. Both were kind, and in moments outside of battles, funny. She was easily everyone’s friend, and had visited us before, just as a friend. I will miss them both. This is going to be such a crushing blow to the Royals, all those they lost in their magical pack, but also Vivian, who was not only pact, but also family, her own decision to be both.”
“Is no on left downstairs, then?” I asked, assuming this to be the case from the way she’d spoken about the loss.
“No. We are the only survivors of that battle sadly. We lost a few of our own, but those wolves, they fought to the death, I fear, until they were all bleeding, until they were all dead. I’m—“ she left off, her voice cracking on the last few words she’d gotten out.
“I’m sorry. I feel this is all my fault,” I cried, the tears becoming normal, not sobbing, but just having a steady cry that seemed to have no end.
I did look down at Lex for a moment as he took in a deeper breath than he had been taking in before. He moaned faintly. I was sure that as he came back to consciousness the pain would increase, at least to him, until he healed more.
“His heart beats stronger already. He will be fine. He just has to get through the transition period. Who was here, Christina? I heard the fight, or whatever happened. Where are they now?”
“The man in the black suit had him. He had been cutting him. He still held the knife that dripped with his blood when I got here. He had him in magical binds that were preventing him from healing. He promised to let Lex free to heal if I gave myself to him. I can’t really explain what happened after that. I was beside myself with fear and grief, and I don’t know what else. The magic, it got the best of me. And, sadly, for the first time in my life, I felt I could kill someone. I didn’t want to act on it, as I didn’t know how it would be afterward, to have taken a life, this is all still so knew to me, but the power coursing through me... I couldn’t control it anymore. It was like a light show was coming from my hands, and things started to move, like the man in black’s knife that he had at Lex’s throat. It flew across the room.”
I stopped to take several deep breaths, relaying the story like it was fiction, and as if it had not really just happened to me. My hands shook, and though they didn’t glow, my hands grew warm again, as did my core.
“It’s okay, dear. Everything that happened was natural. You can’t chastise yourself for loving Lex so much that you’d do anything to save him. Where is the man in the black suit now?” she asked.