One of the candle wicks suddenly popped, startling me while neither of the werewolves moved. Dalton picked up the dagger delicately, clutching its smooth onyx handle. He draped a red cloth that had been folded alongside it over his forearm before walking back to where I lay, unable to move on the hard wood surface.
Grazing my ear with his warm lips, he bent over speaking in a whisper, “Are you ready?”
I turned my head away from him, looking instead at the monster that Xander had become. For a moment I thought I sensed sorrow in his eyes before he looked away from me.
A small voice spoke deep inside my head. “I’m sorry.” And as quickly as it came it was gone.
Movement from Dalton captured my attention again. “Je drainerai son âme pour vous, goûtez son sang mon maître. Prendre mon sacrifice et vous répondrez à ma demande pour la vie continue.”
Familiar words rolled off his tongue that made no sense anymore now than they had when they came to me in one of my dreams where my dad was the sacrifice. He repeated the chant before slowly raising the dagger above his head. His eyes began to illuminate faintly, resembling the eyes of a cat.
“I’ll keep you in my heart forever.”
Those were the last words I heard in my mind before Dalton brought down the knife, swiping it deep across one of my wrists. Warm liquid trickled down my arm. A smile pursed his lips as he grazed the knife across my other wrist. I winced in pain, feeling warmth spill down my other arm. My fingers began to tingle as the smell of iron filled my nose. I squeezed my eyes closed preparing for the next infliction he was going to bring to my shaking body.
Tonight, would be the night of my death. The thought brought chills to my body. Blood pooled around each of my arms.
“Le sang sur mes mains est le vin qui vous a été privé.” His voice had deepened.
“Does your demon not understand English? We’re a long way from France, it’s New Hampshire for fuck’s sake.”
He snapped his neck toward me, hitting me hard on the forehead with the base of the knife. I let out a painful squeak, feeling a trail of heat trickle down the side of my head.
“The blood on my hands is the life that was deprived you.”
I immediately wished I hadn’t said anything.
Hearing it in French didn’t seem quite as threatening as it did now that I understood what he was saying. He uttered the words over and over again, like a broken record, lowering the dagger to my chest just below my trachea and pressing its point to my skin.
“No, no, no, no!” Xander’s voice spoke to me again, just as Dalton pushed the point harder, easily breaking the soft flesh.
I gritted my teeth, letting a small moan escape through. I refused to scream and give him the satisfaction that each cut he made into me was excruciating torture. Sharp pain permeated throughout my upper body while he dragged the blade of the knife in a vertical line, stopping directly at the straight neckline of my dress that rested on my heaving breasts.
Fresh blood instantly dribbled down my sides, forming a thin stream out of the puddles that had collected from my wrists and descended quicker towards the end of the table. Each fresh cut was set ablaze in fiery pain, then throbbed in a suffering that wouldn’t cease. My normally fast beating pulse slowed with every ounce of blood that leaked out of my body.
The room went silent for a short moment -or perhaps my own fading mind was making it silent to me- before liquid pelting the empty chalice below severed the quietude.
Dalton’s lips touched my ear again, the moisture from his breath hot on my neck. “Soon you will have bled to death and with the awakening of the angel’s blood that has managed to stay dormant inside of you for all of this time, I will ascend into a higher power while you are left strapped here and nothing more than a short lived memory to your dear vampire.”
I tried twisting away from him. He grabbed my face with one hand, squeezing my cheeks together, forcing me to face him. “But while we wait my lovely, I think we shall have a little bit of fun with you so that your last moments don’t go to complete waste. I’m sure Xander will be thankful for this opportunity.” He signaled with his index finger for Xander to join him.
Xander's appearance had changed, leaving his eyes still a cloud of black, but his body had downsized to almost a man again. He breathed in and out heavily from his mouth, showing sharp wolf teeth that still remained inside. Sweat dripped off his forehead, and his body glistened with perspiration.
Dalton gently spread my legs apart so that he could easily trace his finger along my inner thigh, then circled it around to the outsides of my thighs before firmly grasping them with his hands.
“I want him to finally taste you. The stuck-up little bitch that has been playing with his heart like your own personal puppet, since the moment you met him then threw him out in the dirt for a fucking vampire, the same vampire that isn’t here for you in your time of need. You forgot all about who was truest to you before your new life, a new life that has only proven that it will let you down.”
Is that what Xander told him, and really thought about me? I swallowed the lump that formed in my throat. If this was truly the case then Davin was right and
