red-eyed vampire, I am glad that I did.'
'You've encountered them?' Sebastian asked.
'I've warred against them. We are gaining momentum.' Nikolai steepled his fingers. 'Sebastian, I've always respected your intelligence. We would welcome your counsel gladly. After the Hie, naturally.'
After experiencing Kaderin's dreams, fighting against the Horde began to have distinct appeal, but Sebastian planned to take Kaderin somewhere away from constant war and death. The last thousand years of her life might have been hellish, but he'd be damned if he'd allow the next thousand to be. He said simply, 'Don't plan on my participation.'
Nikolai nodded, but Sebastian knew this was far from over. 'About this competition, and the rumored prize,' Nikolai began. 'Have you thought about using it to save our family?'
Of course, Sebastian had. Even after all this time, the guilt was unrelenting. When called to protect his family, he'd failed—five successive times. 'I don't believe it will work,' Sebastian said. But if it would, if he could somehow undo the past...
It wasn't reasonable to blame himself, it wasn't logical, but he couldn't seem to stop. Conrad had felt the same—before he'd lost his mind, at least.
The aristocracy of Sebastian's culture was raised to revere the military and to fight. Yet fate had given him an invisible enemy bent on wiping out his family, for which there was no defense, no battle. He'd had to sit, watching impotently, as everything he loved died.
Sebastian had been a favorite big brother to four younger sisters. He'd been nearly old enough to be their father and was essentially more of one than their own preoccupied father. With each of their little crises, they'd run to Sebastian. He'd plucked splinters and dried tears. He'd taught them science and astronomy.
When they fell sick and their young minds had comprehended they might actually be dying, they'd looked to him to fix it.
And seemed bewildered when he couldn't. As if, instead, he wouldn't.
'You can't go into the past to change the future,' Sebastian said absently. 'Not without creating chaos.' Part of him had wanted to believe in the key even though it flew in the face of reason, and even though the goddess had no evidence that time travel was possible.
But if Sebastian allowed himself to believe he could get his family back and then had his hopes disappointed... He didn't think he could take losing them twice. To this day, he couldn't bear to remember the night they'd died. Seeing the despair in their eyes, and then, when he and Conrad had fallen, to hear their faint, terrified cries.
Both he and Conrad had wanted to die that night with their family. The country was in shambles, wracked by plague and famine. They were done. They'd fought, they'd done their best. They should have been allowed to die.
And their sisters? They'd been as delicate and fair as the four older brothers were dark and fierce and would have starved before they voluntarily tasted blood. They couldn't even have contemplated it. 'Why did you try to turn the girls?' Sebastian asked. He had no anger in his tone, but now that he was steady and rational, he wanted to hear Nikolai's reasoning. He wanted—for the first time—to understand it.
'I had to,' Nikolai bit out, averting his gaze, but not before Sebastian saw his eyes had wavered black. 'The thought of them dying so young tormented me.'
'They might have been frozen into perpetual childhood, never to see the sun again.'
Nikolai faced him. 'We do not know that they wouldn't have aged to adulthood, as natural-born immortals do. It was possible.'
'And our father?' Sebastian asked. Their father had been longing to reunite with his wife from the day she'd died in childbirth eleven years prior.
Nikolai's expression grew weary. 'I've never been noble like you, Sebastian. Survival and living are what I revere. They might have lived—to me, the rest is incidental. And after all this time, I see we still disagree on that subject.'
Sebastian stood to leave. 'We do.'
Nikolai stood as well. 'Think about the order, Sebastian.'
Sebastian supposed he should get this out of the way. 'I can't join your order.' He shrugged nonchalantly. 'I didn't quite forbear, as it were. I've tasted blood from the flesh.'
21
W ith the blessing gone, Kaderin had been helpless to move, to attack Bowen, to flee, only wanting to behold the stones and faceted lights. Even now, as she petted them, her heart ached to see them shining again.
The basilisks' hissing, wet roars made her shake herself. The beasts were miles down, far away from the bright entrance, but clambering toward it now. They'd be in no hurry, though, likely thinking that Kaderin was a sealed-in sacrifice.
With a shuddering exhalation, she forced herself to toss the necklace away, then rose and surveyed her predicament. The bastard had done a fine job of barricading the entrance.
Even with her strength, she couldn't budge the boulders. She ran into them, tackling them, shoving her shoulder against them. Nothing. She couldn't use her sword. It was not thick and weighty like Sebastian's. She'd have to dig.
She figured she'd lose her claws with every four inches she dug into the rock. She would grow them back within a few hours. The top boulder's diameter was at least sixty inches.
Ergo... let's do the math... I'm screwed.
Worse, the chamber's darkness had begun weighing heavily on her—the way one felt when saddled with a ponderous hex. She gave a bitter laugh. She was now officially a vicious Valkyrie assassin—who was scared of the dark.
The wraiths had never creeped her out, she found the basilisks kind of endearing, and she could be thrown into a cage with a thousand contagious ghouls and not blink an eye—as long as the cage wasn't gloomy and oppressive.
If she had action, she could ignore her fear, but simply sitting here with nothing to do but contemplate it...
She had two alternatives. She could wait for the vampire, hoping he ignored her last irate demand that he leave her alone. But even if he did come to the rescue, he wouldn't be able to trace her where she needed to go— which was mere feet beyond these boulders. She'd wager that Sebastian hadn't previously visited any Argentinean cave entrances.
Besides, how long could she wait for him to save her? Sooner or later, the basilisks would make their way to the surface.
Her second alternative was to begin digging. These rocks are the only thing standing between me and that prize. She dropped to her knees once more and stabbed her claws into the rock. Two inches down, she lost her first, then another. Damn it, this was futile. A wasted effort in a dark, foul place. She was about to lose those thirteen points.
The rock dust made her eyes water. Yes, the rock dust made her tear up—
'Well, well,' a rumbling voice said from behind her. 'I'll wager you are happy to see me right now.'
Sebastian. Kaderin whirled around. Though the space was pitch black, she knew he could see perfectly, because he was studying her expression. Then his gaze fell to her claws before she eased them behind her back. There was no hiding that she was shaken.
'Clawing free, Kaderin?' He strode to her, and helped her to her feet. 'How long have you been trapped in here?'
She brushed her knees off. 'A couple of hours.'
'How did this happen?'
'Bowen pulled down the rocks when I was inside.'
'MacRieve?' Sebastian clenched his fists. 'I will kill him for this.'
She shrugged. 'Promise? Because that would eliminate two competitors.'
