The dhampir pulled violently away, a shout of pain bursting from his lips as his back bowed off the floor. Mikhail called for Jenner and he burst through the doors, his brow furrowed at the scene unraveling before him. “Fuck.”
“Take him upstairs,” Mikhail said through pants of breath. “And stay clear of his fangs. I’ll be up in a moment.”
Jenner didn’t ask a single question, didn’t utter a sound. He simply nodded in acknowledgment and did as instructed. A fine male indeed.
Mikhail collapsed on the floor, his strength that of a child in comparison to what it was moments ago. He needed Claire. Needed her to replenish him, to give him strength. Where are you? his soul called out to hers in desperation as his eyes drifted shut.
The last of the Ancient Ones no longer. That was, if Ronan managed to survive the transition.
CHAPTER
19
Fire raced through Ronan’s veins. Blistering heat scorched his skin and his throat was a raging inferno that no amount of water could quench. Pain radiated through every inch of his body as his muscles seized. His jaw locked down tight and his fangs punctured his bottom lip, the heady scent of his own blood sending him into a frenzy of thirst and lust. Something held him down, bound his wrists and ankles. A familiar panic surged, and he thrashed against the restraints, a low, dangerous hiss issuing from between his teeth.
At the center of his being, a great cavern opened up. Everything he was, everything he had been, rushed into the darkened void, sucked away from him like water down a drain. The emptiness was all consuming, the hollowness more than he could bear. His sense of self evaporated, and try as he might to hold on to that part of himself, it slipped away until there was nothing left but a husk. He was now one of the soulless. Untethered. Vampire.
Ronan fought to free his hands: There were few things that enraged him more the being bound. Blood pooled in the seam of his lips and his tongue flicked out as he lapped desperately at his self-inflicted wound.
“Calm yourself, Ronan.” Mikhail’s voice was like a beacon of light in an endless night, calling to him down the length of a tunnel. “If you let yourself succumb to the bloodlust, you’ll go mad.”
He ran through the darkened streets, desperate. The thirst was too much, the transition too violent. He could think of only two things: feeding and fucking, and it didn’t matter which came first as long as he was sated. In the distance, the scent of blood called to him, maddened him. Drove him to a place of need that extinguished reason. Like an animal, he lifted his nose to the air, inhaled the sweet aroma, and changed his course. At the end of a dark alley he found her, huddled, shivering on the cold cobbles, covered with nothing more than a tattered blanket to shield her from the elements.
Her eyes grew wide when she spotted him, and the tang of fear sullied the delicious aroma of her blood. He pounced on her in a blur of motion, his fangs buried in her throat before she could build up a scream. The first gush of blood was a cool salve, banishing the dry heat that licked up his throat. He bit down harder, crushing her windpipe in his powerful jaws, the air choked from her lungs before her heart even had a chance to stop beating—
“No!”
Ronan thrashed, arched his back high, and pulled at his restraints. Eyes wide, he took in his surroundings, his disorientation only heightened by the memories that assaulted his mind. The colors were almost blinding despite the darkness of the room, and every particle of dust in the air created an individual scent that melded into an olfactory overload that both confused and infuriated him. The sounds—louder, sharper, with dimensions he’d never noticed before—buffeted his ears and he wanted nothing more than to clasp his hands over his head to block out the offending noise. He’d thought his senses were keen before … but gods, this was unbearable.#p#分页标题#e#
“You can feed. But only if you can control your frenzy!”
Mikhail’s voice boomed in Ronan’s ears as he talked to him like he was three years old—or the family pet. “Stop fucking shouting at me.” Ronan’s own voice seemed amplified, roughened by the fire in his throat. “Untie me. Now, damn it.”
“That’s not going to happen. You’re still too volatile.”
He wanted to look Mikhail in the eye, but his own refused to focus, darting from one focal point to another until he became dizzy. His stomach heaved and Ronan swallowed against the dry spasms working in his throat. Fuck, he didn’t even have an ounce of bile to choke up or a bit of saliva to swallow his sickness down.
“Ahhhhhhhh!” The shout burned all the way up his throat as he began to thrash anew. The heat, the sound, the sharpness of everything, coupled with the panic caused by his restraints was slowly causing him to unravel.