When I was dragged from my father’s compound and tossed in a car to be delivered to Malachi, I never thought to return. I wasn’t supposed to live this long. I can admit that now, crouched precariously high in a tree and looking down over the familiar walls and buildings.
He planned for me to die by Malachi’s hand. A convenient snack that got his powerless dhampir daughter out of his hair and kept the trapped bloodline vampire alive. Malachi and I were never supposed to get along, to fall in love. We were never supposed to join up with Wolf and Rylan and break the blood ward, awaken the powers no one thought I had, and come for my father’s head.
It’s happening now.
There’s no going back.
“Can you make the shot, Lizzie?” Malachi’s hand is warm where it’s wrapped around my bicep. I’m not in danger of falling, but he’s taking no risks. I don’t move with the same supernatural grace as the vampires, but my balance is better than it’s ever been. A good thing, that. I’m going to need every advantage I can come up with for the pending confrontation.
Lizzie is in the next tree over. She’s wearing high-end workout leggings, a long-sleeved shirt, and a puffy vest. She’s added a soft headband to her ponytail today. She looks like she should be jogging in some carefully curated park…except for the rifle slung across her back.
She narrows her eyes at the compound. “I can make the shot. This is well within my range.”
I blink. I know this is why we risked asking for her assistance, but the compound has to be a mile away. Maybe more. “Even for your powers?”
She smirks. “Yes, little girl. Even for my powers. You get him where I can see him, and there won’t be much left of his throat when the hit lands.”
We estimated timeline based on the worst-case scenario. Even so, getting my father out into the courtyard is going to be a risk. He’s going to compel me. That’s the one thing we haven’t spoken about, that no one’s addressed directly. To keep my father complacent enough for Lizzie’s attack to land, I have to lose. There’s no guarantee that his power will break when his concentration does, but I’m not one of his followers, happy to follow his instructions and open to compulsion. I will be fighting it every step of the way.
It will break.
It has to.
And that’s when I’ll strike.
“Then we move.” Malachi scoops me into his arms before I have a chance to tense and drops down to the forest floor. Rylan and Wolf land soundlessly on either side of him. There’s no need to speak. We went over the plan one last time before leaving the house. They’ll deposit me just outside the sentry lines and I’ll wait ten minutes while they circle around to their respective locations.
At that point, I walk into the compound to surrender myself and seek an audience with my father. Then the fires start. That should draw the extra soldiers away from the courtyard. My father will suspect the truth—that the three vampires are attacking—but he still views me as a powerless dhampir. He won’t have reason to keep security around himself because he’s never needed help to deal with me before.
I’ll only have one chance.
The first faint hint of sunrise is fighting back the dark of the sky when Malachi sets me carefully on my feet. He hugs me tightly. “This isn’t goodbye.”
It might be. It’s easier for things to go wrong with this plan than it is for them to go right. None of that matters now. We’ve come too far to turn back, which means this isn’t the time or place for doubts. I pull him down for a quick kiss. “I’ll see you soon.”
He steps back and then Wolf is there, whisking me into a dip and planting a kiss on my lips. “Give them hell, love.”
And then there’s Rylan. He takes my hands and looks down at them for a long moment. “Fear and pain can help motivate a change. Not panic, though. It’s a fine line.” He squeezes my hands. “You are never defenseless, Mina. Not with our powers flowing through your blood. Trust them and trust yourself.” He kisses me quickly. “Stay alive.”
There’s a beat of hesitation, as if we’re all waiting for someone to speak up, to call the whole thing off. The temptation is there—I won’t pretend it isn’t—but I stay silent and so do the men. One by one, they turn and melt into the trees. I track the growing distances between us for a few moments and then turn toward the compound.
I breathe the cold mountain air and allow myself to feel all the conflicting emotions being back in this place brings. Anger and sorrow and a strange sort of bittersweet nostalgia. Things were more bad than good while growing up under my father’s tender care, but there were small spots of light in those first twenty-five years of my life.
My mother is a hazy, distant one. She died when I was still young, one of my father’s many mistresses to be felled by the very purpose he had them in the compound to serve: birthing another dhampir. My father is obsessed with his progeny, with his bloodlines.
It’s why he took my failure to manifest powers personally. That and the fact I was determined to push back against his authority every chance I got. I smile a little, though it feels wrong on my face. We’ve been working toward this end game since I was born. Now that it’s time to act, my nerves ease and my path remains clear.
If I fail, I won’t be the only one to pay the price.
I press my hand to my stomach. So much has happened in the last few days, there were moments when I actually forgot I was pregnant. It’s far too soon to see physical changes, and with Azazel’s temporary shield in place, most of the worst of the side effects have passed.
Should I get pregnant again, I’ll have to figure out how to shield on my own. I shake my head and check my watch. I’ll worry about the future tomorrow. Right now, I can’t afford to be distracted. I take one last breath and start walking toward the compound.
I expect to be stopped. There aren’t many sentries outside of the walls, but only a fool wouldn’t post at least a few people in the forest surrounding the compound. Vampire senses only stretch so far, after all, and an early warning system can mean the difference between life and death in a confrontation. My father is many things, but a fool isn’t one of them.
He must really see me as less than a threat. It’s the only explanation why I’m able to walk up the dirt road to the compound gates. They’re large enough to drive a truck through…and they’re ajar.
“Quite the welcome,” I murmur. The urge rises to turn and flee. If we meant to set a trap, my father certainly intends the same.
I lift my chin and push open the gate. Inside, it’s exactly the same as I remember. Low square buildings, all in a uniform gray. Nearly indistinguishable from each other. Rationally, I know a year hasn’t even passed, but it feels like several lifetimes since I last moved about in this place.
Since no one appears to stop me, I walk through the low buildings that serve as gatehouse and a place for the wall guards to rest between patrols, especially when the weather is intense. Both seem to be empty.
I see the smoke before I scent the burning; three large plumes stretching to the heavens. All three of my men have their shields locked up tight, so I only get the faintest impression of fighting as I step into the courtyard. I turn my focus from them. Now’s not the time to be distracted. Not when I have my own part to play.
I stretch out my arms. “Where are you, Father? I’ve come to negotiate.”
This all hinges on him coming to me. If he goes to fight one of the men first, we’re in trouble. He could compel them to fight the rest of our group. It would hamstring the other two men because of their desire not to hurt the compelled person. It would ruin any chances I have of succeeding because I am no match for any of them. No, I have to make sure he comes to me instead.
I turn a slow circle, arms still outstretched. “I’ve come to take my place as your heir. You got your wish.” I raise my voice. “I carry a bloodline baby. Will you honor your terms, or will you take the coward’s way out?”
I feel him before I see him. He’s circled around behind me, which is exactly where I want him now that I’m facing the front gates. I turn slowly as he walks out from between two buildings. For such a monstrous man, my father looks nearly as normal as Lizzie does. Silvering brown hair, vaguely attractive features that would be forgettable if not for the charisma he exudes wherever he goes. He weaponizes it now. It presses against me with a force that nearly sends me to my knees, getting stronger with each step he takes in my direction.
He smiles benignly. “Come now, Mina. You must know that you can never be heir. My people will never follow you.”
“Let me worry about that,” I grit out. He’s not even compelling me, but it’s hard to speak. Each breath burns as his magic seems to seek a way inside. I hate that feeling, like each inhale gives him a little more power over me, like even now he’s worming his way into my brain. “Will you keep your word?”
He shakes his head and tsks. “How am I to even know you’re my child? You have no bloodline powers to speak of. You look exactly like your mother. Who’s to say she didn’t betray me with some other man to beget you? None of my children are such a constant disappointment.”
How can his words still sting after everything he’s done? I drop my arms. “So you’ll break your word.”
My father moves closer. His expression remains benevolent, but his words only get uglier as he lowers his voice. “I don’t know what game you’re playing at, you little bitch, but it won’t work. Losing the three bloodline vampires was a temporary setback, and now you’ve returned them to me. If you truly are pregnant, then I’ll happily cut that baby out of you the moment it can survive on its own.” His smile drops. “You, of course, will not survive the process.”
Over my dead body.
I glare. “You’re making a mistake. Name me as heir—”
“Kneel, slut.” His power slams into me, forcing me to my knees. “I don’t know how you managed to find three of them, but I commend you on being so willing to open your legs to fulfill my aims. I suppose we’ll find which is the father once the child is born.’’ He leans down a little, more power infusing his voice. “Are you actually pregnant? Be honest.”
“Yes,” I bite out. I couldn’t have lied if I wanted to. I hate this feeling. Like I’m a puppet to his whim. I’m screaming inside my head, but no sound leaves my lips except what he wills. It doesn’t matter that he’s done this to me before; it’s not something I’ll ever get used to.
If our plan succeeds, I’ll never have to experience it again.
“The fires. Your men are responsible?”
I clench my jaw and he drops the charming act, his brows drawing down. “Answer me.”
“Yes.”
“What is their plan?”
I was still a teenager when I learned the trick to dealing with his ability to use glamour to wrest answers from unwilling mouths. With most people, he seems to make them want to tell the truth so that they surrender their knowledge willingly, to please him. With me, he’s always used brute force. It hurts, but there is some room to maneuver, depending on how vague his questions. “Start fires.”
He stares down at me as if he wants to rip my head from my shoulders. “What is their plan? Be specific.”
I fight against the push of his power. To do anything else is out of the question. I don’t know what Lizzie is waiting for, but I will buy as much time as I need to. I taste blood and grin up at my father. “To start fires,” I repeat.
He clenches his hands into fists and releases them slowly. “And after they start fires?” He bites out each word like he wants to rip into me with more than power.
“Fight.”
“I swear to the gods, I will kill you now, child or no, if you don’t stop being so damned difficult.” When I don’t answer, he throws up his hands. “Well?”
“That wasn’t a proper question.” A little bit of blood leaks from the corner of my mouth. I’m not sure where it comes from when he does this. There’s no cut or obvious injury, but I always bleed when I fight him.
I sit back on my heels and look up. A wave of dizziness passes over me, but when it clears, I nearly sob with relief. A little red dot appears on his throat. “Father?”
“What?”
“I hope this hurts.” My hand goes to my boot, to the long knife in the sheath there, both courtesy of Grace’s bag.
“I changed my mind. You die—”
His throat explodes.
