Sharon Page - Blood Curse

It drove into Raven’s chest, and protruded out the back.

He collapsed. Ophelia swayed on her feet, then forced herself to run forward. She dropped to her knees at his side.

He wasn’t moving. His eyes were open, staring glassily.

“Raven?”

No response. No twitch of his body, no attempt to move, no life in his eyes. Dear God, no.

A rough, harsh laugh echoed in her ears. The man stalked to her, grasped the collar of the shirt, and hauled her to her feet.

The floor tilted beneath her as the man shoved her forward. In the few seconds she had been at Raven’s side, this monster had reloaded his crossbow and prodded her back with the arrow to make her move.

Surely Raven would get up and pull the arrow out of him and he would be healed. Her heart poised in its beating, and she strained to hear him groan, or hear him get to his feet.

Nothing. Just cold silence broken only by the horrible fast breathing of her captor.

She couldn’t see Harry or Mrs. Darkwell. Had Brookshire and de Wynter brought men?

What did it matter? If Raven was dead, she didn’t care if he killed her now. She didn’t want to live.

“Why don’t you just shoot me?” she spat.

“Think you’ll be reunited with him?” The fiend’s laugh was harsh. “He’s got no soul. Destroyed, he lives in purgatory. Don’t know where you’ll go. You’ve got a soul, but it’s a witch’s one.” He pushed her out to the front steps of the church. “Go to that carriage over there,” he snapped.

Should she try to run? Fight him? Do something so he would shoot her and this would be done with?

Ophelia, don’t try to run, for God’s sake. I’m going to come after you. I need to get this arrow out so I can heal . . .

Raven’s voice in her head. He wasn’t dead. She had to follow his orders, she had to stay alive.

The carriage steps dropped, and her captor pushed her up them. She lost her balance and sprawled on them. She scrambled up. He held the crossbow pointed at her, then he hauled a pistol from his pocket and kept it in his left hand. “Where are you going to take me?”

“To Darkwell’s. She will help me,” he muttered. “She will have to. I will not allow my mother to ignore her duties to me. Otherwise those damned Society vampires will kill me.”

“Your mother? Mrs. Darkwell is your mother? Who are you?”

“My name is Valde. I am part god, spawn of a mother who is a daughter of Aphrodite. I have powers of my own, you know. Powers you cannot comprehend.”

He spoke like a sulking boy. “I am sure you do,” she said. “But we do not need to go to Mrs. Darkwell. She is here.”

No one responded. She had hoped for a dramatic entrance of the demi-goddess. But there was silence, except for the whinnying of the four horses hitched to the carriage.

Her captor laughed. “A good attempt at distraction—”

“She is here, you fool,” Ophelia snapped. “But she now seems to have gone away.” Which meant she could not rely on Mrs. Darkwell, the demi-goddess, to rescue her.

How could she rescue herself? “Does my touch hurt you?” she demanded.

“No, because I am part god.”

So much for that idea.

A twanging sound came from behind her. Valde jerked around as a crossbow bolt slammed into the carriage between them.

It was not Harry, but the older gray-haired man of the Royal Society, Cartwell, along with young, pimply-faced gentlemen carrying a variety of weapons—pistols, blades, a crossbow.

“Stop, Valde,” Cartwell shouted. “No one man can claim her power. Your lackeys believed your rubbish and tried to help you, but they were wrong. No one can have such power.”

“I can, you bloody fool.”

In the shadows, Harry was approaching the Royal Society men from behind. But Valde lifted both his hands. Lightning bolts shot from his hands, like Mrs. Darkwell’s, yet much weaker. But they struck the men and knocked them back.

“Stop right there.” Harry came forward, pointing his bow.

Lightning flew at him, and she screamed.

The bolt exploded in midair, and the lightning burst against Harry’s chest, driving him back.

“Stop!” she cried. “I will give you anything.”

Valde lifted his hands, palms pointing toward her. But as the streak of light burst from his hands, it exploded in a brilliant flash in front of Ophelia’s eyes. Valde screamed, and when Ophelia could see again, she saw Valde on his knees, wailing with pain, his hands over his eyes.

“You foolish boy.” Mrs. Darkwell stepped forward, pain etched in her beautiful face, making her look much older and haggard.

“Ophelia!”

Ravenhunt’s voice! She looked up. He was limping down the stairs, with Guidon’s arm flung across his shoulders, and he was carrying the smaller vampire. Thank heavens they were both . . . alive. He set Guidon on his feet and ran to her.

Mrs. Darkwell turned to her. A tear trickled down the smooth, perfect cheek. “I am sorry, Lady Ophelia. My son wanted your power. I foolishly let him learn about it. He has never been content because he is considered to be even less than a half-blood. He resented his lesser place, and that he is not accepted amongst the gods.”

“Damnation, Mother, you have blinded me,” Valde howled. “How could you do such a thing to your own son? But it doesn’t matter—I can see with my senses, with my powers.”

Mrs. Darkwell cried out and rushed toward her son. “No, my dear. Stop—”

Lightning shot from his hands. A stream of it shot into Ravenhunt, ripping into his flesh. Ophelia screamed, then a vivid shot of light hit her.

Terror. Agony. Wild, awful screams tore from her lips.

She was burned. Bleeding.

But Ravenhunt was on his knees, and he was—

Oh, it was awful.

She hurt, but he seemed to have been torn apart. It made her sick to look at him. He slumped to the ground.

Dimly, she heard voices—many voices. Brookshire and his men had arrived, but they were too late. As if through a thick fog, Ophelia heard Mrs. Darkwell cry out, “You must carry them inside. They will be destroyed. I will punish my son, but you must take them into the church.”

She couldn’t let Raven go. She wouldn’t.

Warm, soft hands caressed his face. His head rested on a place as soft as a silken pillow.

Raven opened his eyes and saw Ophelia’s pale, terrified face hovering over him. She was cradling his head on her lap. His blood soaked his trousers and his shirt, and cold seeped into him as fast as his blood leached out. The power that Valde, the demigod, had thrown at him had almost torn him apart.

The bolt of energy had struck Ophelia, too. She needed him—he should be tending to her, not lying in her lap. But his strength seemed to have exploded out of him when the bolt hit him, and he could barely move.

“I can save you if you turn me,” she whispered. Her breath was blessedly warm by his icy ear. “Please turn me.”

“No,” he said weakly.

Mrs. Darkwell got to her knees at his side, her black skirts flowing around her. The woman’s pale face looked almost ghostly, her expression as stern as a schoolmistress. “Why won’t you change her, Lord Ravenhunt?”

“I—” Raven fought for strength. “I would be condemning her to the hell of being a vampire for eternity.”

“Is it truly hell, Ravenhunt?” the woman demanded. “You have seen the vampires of the Royal Society. Do they look as if they are in hell? You were in hell, Ravenhunt, because you did not have love. Now you do. Stop being so foolishly noble, and save the woman you love. I will slap you if you do not hurry up.”

Felie managed a smile at Mrs. Darkwell’s angry order.

“My son told you her power will destroy her, did he not?”

“Yes,” he croaked.

Mrs. Darkwell turned to Felie. “You can destroy your power if you have the strength of a vampire. The only way to save her and yourself, Ravenhunt, is to change her.”

“All right, woman.” He found the strength to snap at her. “Then leave us in peace. I want this to be special between Felie and me.”

“Of course, my lord.”

Out of his dimming sight, he saw her rise. Gruffly he added, “I owe you my life. Do not call me ‘my lord.’ I am not one anymore, and I am your servant.”

A glowing smile transformed Mrs. Darkwell’s face into something extraordinarily beautiful, with skin that shimmered and enormous eyes that were a vivid blue. She inclined her head gracefully, then retreated.

Leaving him to change Felie.

“I’m sorry if this hurts,” Raven whispered. “You’re going to have to bend down to me so I can bite you.”

He brushed hair from her neck, cupped his hand around the slender column. Then he frowned. “You’re cold.”

Ophelia struggled to give him a weak smile. Sight and sound grew more indistinct as if layers of muslin were being tossed on her head. Her fingers . . . her feet . . . she couldn’t feel them anymore.

“I was shot, too,” she whispered. “Just after you fell. I didn’t want you to know.”

“I have to turn you. To save you.”

“Don’t care if it hurts,” she murmured. It was getting hard to speak. “Do it.”

Raven’s hand stroked her neck. “Oh angel,” he muttered, then his hair tickled her neck and her chest as he drew her neck down and his face lifted to her throat. Something cold and sharp touched her skin just below her jaw, and she caught her breath. Stupid to be afraid of pain when death lurked just behind them both, waiting to drag both of them away.