come to you for killing one such as me. There is no reason to wait.'
As if this were a matter of conscience! It wasn't. It couldn't be. She had no conscience. No real feelings, no raw emotions. She was coldhearted. After the tragedy, she'd prayed for oblivion, prayed for the sorrow and guilt to be numbed.
Some mysterious entity had answered her and made her heart like ash. Kaderin didn't suffer from sorrow, from lust, from anger, or from joy. Nothing got in the way of her killing.
She was a perfect killer. She had been for one thousand years, half of her interminable life.
'Did you hear that?' he asked. The eyes that had been pleading for an end now narrowed. 'Are you alone?'
She quirked an eyebrow. 'I do not require help from others. Especially not for a single vampire,' she added, her tone growing absent. Oddly, her attention had dipped to his body once more—to low on his torso, past his navel to the dusky trail of hair leading down. She imagined grazing the back of one of her sharp claws along it while his massive body clenched and shuddered in reaction.
Her thoughts were making her uneasy, making her want to wind her hair up into a knot and let the chill air cool her neck—
He cleared his throat. When she jerked her gaze to his face, he raised his eyebrows.
Caught ogling the prey! The indignity! What is wrong with me? She had no more sexual urges than the walking-dead vampire before her. She shook herself, forcing herself to remember the last time she'd faltered.
On a battlefield, an age ago, she had spared and released another of this ilk, a young vampire soldier who had begged for his life.
Yet he had seemed to scorn her for her very mercy. Without delay, the soldier had found her two full-blood sisters fighting in the flatlands below them. Alerted by a shriek from another Valkyrie, Kaderin had sprinted, stumbling down a hill draped with bodies, living and dead. Just as she'd reached them, he'd cut her sisters down.
The younger, Rika, had been taken off-guard, because of Kaderin's panicked approach. The vampire had smiled when Kaderin dropped to her knees.
He'd dispatched her sisters with a brutal efficiency Kaderin had since emulated. She'd like to say she started with him, but she'd kept him alive for a time.
So, why would she repeat the same mistake? She wouldn't. She would not ignore a lesson she had paid so dearly to learn.
The sooner I get this done, the sooner I can begin preparing for the Hie.
Squaring her shoulders, she steeled herself. It's all in the follow-through. Kaderin could see the swing, knew the angle she would take so that his head would remain on his neck until he fell. It was cleaner that way. Which was important.
She'd packed her suitcase lightly.
2
A s a young man, Sebastian Wroth had desired so many things from life, and having grown up wealthy among a large and supportive family, he had expected them as his due.
He'd wanted his own family, a home, laughter around a hearth. More dearly than all the rest, he'd longed for a wife, a woman to be his alone. He'd been ashamed to admit to this female that he'd managed none of those things.
Now all Sebastian wanted was to gaze at the fascinating creature just a little longer.
At first, he'd thought her an angel come to set him free. She looked it. Her long, curling hair was so blond it appeared almost white in the candlelight. Her eyes were fringed with thick black lashes and were dark like coffee, a striking contrast to her fair hair and wine-red lips. Her skin was flawless, light golden perfection, and her features were delicate and finely wrought.
She was so exquisite, and yet she carried a killer's weapon. Her sword was double-edged, with a ricasso, an un-sharpened area on the blade just above the guard. A skilled user would loop a finger over the guard for better control. She confidently carried a sword not made for defense, not made for battle.
The creature carried steel forged to deliver quick, silent deaths.
Fascinating. An angel of death.
He'd considered it an undeserved blessing that hers would be the last face he would behold on this earth.
Yes, he'd thought her divine—until her smoldering gaze had strayed lower, and he'd recognized she was very much flesh and blood. He'd cursed his useless, deadened body. As a turned human, he had no respiration, no heartbeat, no sexual ability. He could not take her, even though he thought... he thought this beauty might actually receive him.
The loss of sexual pleasure had never bothered him before. His experience as a human had been limited— very limited—by war, by famine, by the need merely to survive, so he'd never felt that his turning had deprived him of much. Until now.
He'd never been attracted to small women, because he'd known if he did somehow manage to bed one, he'd dread hurting her. Yet with this one, the most ethereal and fragile female he'd ever seen, he found himself wondering what it would be like to carry her to his bed and gently undress her. His mind began to riot with imaginings of his big hands cupping and stroking her slight body.
His eyes dropped to her slender neck, and then to her high, full breasts pressing against her dark blouse. Now, this part of her was far from slight. He wished he could kiss her breasts, run his face against them...
'Why are you looking at me like that?' she asked in a halting, baffled tone, taking a step back.
'Can I not admire you?' Amazingly, he took a step forward. Where was this coming from? He'd always been awkward and unsure around women. In the past, if he'd been caught staring like this, he'd have turned his face away, muttering apologies as he left the room. Perhaps he'd at last found freedom in imminent death.
Then again, he'd never stared, never hungered, as he did now for this slip of a woman with her lush breasts. 'A dying man's last wish?'
'I know the ways a man looks at a woman.' Her voice was sensual, a voice from dreams. It seemed to rub him from the inside. 'You're not merely admiring me.'
No, he was thinking at that moment that he wanted to rip open her shirt, pin her shoulders to the ground, and suck on her stiffened nipples till she came. Pin her shoulders hard and lick her—
'How dare you play with me, vampire!'
'What do you mean?' He met her gaze. Her eyes flicked over his face as though she were attempting to read his thoughts. Could she begin to guess the battle inside him? That in one instant the idea of being gentle was replaced with the impulse to cover her on the ground?
What is happening to me?
'I know you can't feel this... this... '—she made a small sound of frustration—'you can't feel what you are appearing to. It's impossible, unless—' She gasped. 'Your eyes... they're turning black.'
Black? His brothers' eyes had turned black with sharp emotion. He hadn't known his did as well. Was it because he'd never felt anything so sharply as his desire for this mysterious female?
He felt like he'd die if he didn't act on that desire—
A sudden explosion of sound made him swing his head around, his body tensing. 'What was that?'
She took a quick glance around her, eyes alert. 'What are you talking about?' she demanded.
'You do not hear that?' Another shaking like that, and the castle would collapse. He had to get her away, even into the morning daylight outside. The need to protect her had suddenly become critical, undeniable.
'No!' Her eyes went wide, her expression aghast. 'It can't be!' She backed away from him, moving gingerly, as if he were a snake about to strike.
Another explosion. He traced to just in front of her, and her sword shot up in a blur. He snatched her wrist, but she struggled. Christ, she was strong, but he seemed to be stronger than usual himself, more powerful than he ever could have imagined. 'I don't want to hurt you.' He pried the weapon from her hand and tossed it to his low
