Part 8 (1/2)

Dominique followed, the position unnatural to her. It wasn't that she had never followed anyone else-but the last time she had, her guide had been unwisely chosen. That path had ended with a knife in her hand and the body of a fellow hunter in her arms.

As she watched the next generation file out, Adianna in the lead, she wondered if perhaps, just perhaps, it was was her fault that her daughters seemed to be treading that same dark road. her fault that her daughters seemed to be treading that same dark road.

CHAPTER 12

SAt.u.r.dAY, 8:21 A.M. A.M.

NIKOLAS WAS IN WAS IN a towering rage. It should have frightened Sarah-his fury, after all, had directly led to her death-but she could barely focus on it. He was pacing and kept grabbing her arm and occasionally shaking her and shouting, but it was like that only added colored lights to the kaleidoscope of her thoughts. a towering rage. It should have frightened Sarah-his fury, after all, had directly led to her death-but she could barely focus on it. He was pacing and kept grabbing her arm and occasionally shaking her and shouting, but it was like that only added colored lights to the kaleidoscope of her thoughts.

She couldn't hold on to any single image long; they all slid into each other-one, then the next. Someone was crying across the room, with quick little breaths that made the air quiver. Then there was Nikolas, who was black and white and red.... She giggled, reminded of that stupid joke about the newspaper, and he stared at her, but then his features blurred again.

Her skin was buzzing, and her ears ringing. The world was too too vivid, all light and sound and sensation. vivid, all light and sound and sensation.

”You have to focus focus now!” Nikolas's anger was tainted by terror, and seemed to make the world roll. ”Sarah, now!” Nikolas's anger was tainted by terror, and seemed to make the world roll. ”Sarah, please! please!” he begged. ”I know what you're feeling right now. It wasn't just your first feed on live blood, but it was witch witch blood. It's intoxicating. Kristopher and I have both been there before....” blood. It's intoxicating. Kristopher and I have both been there before....”

The words disappeared from her attention. He was still talking; she just wasn't hearing. Nikolas's voice had ceased to have meaning and had blended into patterns of rising and falling noise.

He grabbed her shoulder and shook her yet again.

”Sarah!” She managed to focus on him for a moment, only to have him throw her across the room. ”Is there anything you can do?” he demanded.

She landed on...Oh, G.o.ddess. She shrieked, because for an instant, in her state, she was on her father's corpse again. There was blood on her hands. Was it his blood? Then the reality came clear, and it was Kristopher lying still and silent on the ground, a ragged wound from Michael's knife in his chest. It hadn't been a heart blow, and the Arun magic wasn't quite as poisonous as a Vida's, but it was killing him slowly nevertheless.

She had to draw out the magic. She could do that. Her powers didn't work the same now as they used to, but they weren't entirely gone gone. She...

She glanced up and found herself staring into wide, frightened eyes. Sarah's heart wasn't beating, but someone else's heart was racing racing, pounding, matched by her ragged breaths and the trembling that rippled across the surface of her skin. Nikolas shouted something, and the girl stood and bolted out of the room. Sarah started to rise to follow.

Nikolas grabbed her by the arm and hit her, the blow hard enough that it might have broken her neck if she had been human. Now it was barely enough to get her attention. He snapped, ”I swear, if you let my brother die here-” He broke off and shook his head sharply before saying, apparently to himself, ”You're going to hate me for this.”

What did he- She couldn't complete the thought. He grabbed her, and then his fangs were in her throat.

And it hurt hurt. The buzzing across her flesh turned to wildfire, and her blood turned to lava. The white noise of the world turned to screaming, and the voice behind the screams was hers, until Nikolas threw her away again.

He staggered under the power he had just stolen from her, but he had more practice. He had ripped apart her giddy drunkenness, and now she existed in a cold reality where all she could see was Kristopher's form.

She put a hand over the wound and tried to reach for her magic. Vampiric power wouldn't help her with this. She needed a witch's power, but her Vida magic had fled deep inside, hiding from the new blood.

”I tried to get him to feed,” Nikolas said. ”That helped when Elisabeth nearly killed us, as if her blood combated her magic. But he wouldn't. I fed for him, on the witch who had attacked him, but I couldn't even get him to take blood from me.”

She nodded. The power was already too deep inside Kristopher for him to rouse enough to feed. Sarah didn't know if she could find her Vida power in time to pull Michael's power from the wound, but Nikolas was right that such power could be drowned with more of the same-normally by taking blood, but there were other methods.

”Come here,” she said. She didn't have to say why or ask permission. As soon as Nikolas was near enough, she put her left hand on his throat. He tensed a fraction but did not draw back, even when she pulled at his power. He clenched his jaw; she knew it hurt, what she was doing, but she also knew that Nikolas would never argue against any measure that might save his brother.

Besides, he had taken her blood; he could hear her concerns in her mind. He knew perfectly well that she didn't know how to control her magic anymore, and that she could easily mangle his power through clumsy fumbling, killing both or all of them.

She used herself like a wire to funnel power from Nikolas into Kristopher. She transferred to Kristopher the power Nikolas had taken from Michael, which would temporarily fool the magic of the knife into thinking this body was not an enemy but a friend. It wouldn't completely heal him, but it would slow the damage, like a shot of epinephrine delaying a fatal allergic reaction.

Only when she had given as much power to Kristopher as she dared did she put both hands on Kristopher's chest, one over the wound and one over his heart. She closed her eyes and struggled to find the blade's magic, which she knew almost as well as her own. She and Michael had grown up together. They had trained together. She had helped him form the link between his power and the centuries-old Arun blade.

Bit by bit, she subdued the poison. Now that Michael's magic was feeding Kristopher instead of killing him, Kristopher's own power was able to help heal the wound.

At last, Sarah turned to Nikolas to say, ”He'll live. He'll need to rest, and feed when he wakes, but he'll live.”

Nikolas nodded, and then it was like that wasn't enough. He pulled her close and kissed her. Through Kristopher, whose mind was still open to her and tightly linked to his brother's, she could sense the overwhelming wash of emotion: protectiveness, grat.i.tude, relief, maybe even love. It was like a reflection on a stream, not as clear as the thoughts she could normally hear from Kristopher, but a background hum Nikolas wasn't trying to hide from her. She didn't want to shut it out, because in that instant she was feeling exactly the same way. Whatever she felt about Kristopher, she did not want him to die for her.

And whatever she felt for Kristopher, she probably shouldn't be kissing his brother.

”Thank you,” Nikolas said when she pulled back. There was no sense of guilt in his mind about the kiss. Did he know something she didn't know about Kristopher's feelings for her? Or did he just know that Kristopher wouldn't mind, regardless of his relations.h.i.+p with Sarah?

She had to block out the echoes of thought. It was too much to think about and try to dissect these relations.h.i.+ps in the middle of everything else.

”It was my fault Kristopher was hurt,” she said.

”It was our choice to come for you,” he replied. ”We argued over whether or not you had the right to end your own life. We decided it didn't matter if you did have the right. We weren't going to let you go through with it.”

Argued. These brothers did not argue, not with each other. Their paths had diverged only once, when Kristopher had chosen to stay with his sister to help her through a difficult time. Otherwise they were always so similar. Sarah's impression had been that Nikolas tended to defer to his brother.

”Out of curiosity,” she asked, ”what side of the argument were you on?”

Nikolas hesitated. Maybe he thought she might think less of him for believing that they shouldn't ride to her rescue.

”I argued that it was selfish and cowardly to turn yourself over to the hunters,” he said softly. ”You are a protector. You are not a Vida anymore, but you are still a guardian to those who need you. Your despair is not sufficient to erase that responsibility.”

”That wasn't why I did it,” she responded. ”I would never abandon a duty just because it was hard hard. I didn't want other people-”

”I've seen many people die in the last century and a half,” Nikolas interrupted. ”The one thing I know for certain is that after you are gone, you lose any power to decide what other other people do. Will they kill for you? Will they die for you? Will they fight to avenge you? That is never your choice.” people do. Will they kill for you? Will they die for you? Will they fight to avenge you? That is never your choice.”

It was the people who might kill or die for her if she lived lived who worried her. ”What about the humans who come to you and Kristopher to die?” she asked. ”Do they get the same talk about whether they have the right to end their lives?” who worried her. ”What about the humans who come to you and Kristopher to die?” she asked. ”Do they get the same talk about whether they have the right to end their lives?”

”They come to us because they see no other choice,” Nikolas replied. ”When we can, we give them options. I have counseled plenty who come to me seeking an end, sent many home, and given others new lives. Some I can only help one way.” He shook his head with a sigh. ”Do me a favor, Sarah. If you must end your life, at least do it yourself. Do not force your once kin to slay you, and do not force my brother and me to decide if we must take on the entire race of witches to avenge you. And do it somewhere that I will find your body, instead of my brother. I cleaned up my father's b.l.o.o.d.y corpse so Kristopher would not see. I can do the same for you.”

Only from Nikolas could those words sound sincere, instead of like a ploy to elicit guilt and submission. Sarah knew he meant every word.

At last, what he had said earlier sank in. Kristopher and Nikolas had come to save her, despite knowing she had chosen her death. Would they have avenged her even though she had been willing to give up her life? Would they have either slaughtered or been slaughtered by those she had once called family?

Worse, Nikolas and Kristopher had allies-not just Nissa, but powerful figures like Kaleo. Even if the twins respected her decision, Kaleo had made it clear that Sarah had his protection, yet he was far less likely to care what choice she had made. Would he have joined the fight?

How many bodies would have joined hers on the floor?

She had thought she was doing the right thing. Was Nikolas correct that she had just been doing the easy thing? As he had pointed out, once she was dead, she didn't have to make the hard decisions anymore.

”What was Kristopher's opinion?” she asked softly. Nikolas had made it clear that his decisions after her death would not be affected by how she chose to die. Kristopher claimed to love her. What would he have done?