Their cries echo through the chamber, added to my weeping. I can’t help it. He came for me. My hero. My savior once again.
“Aefre!” he shouts but turns as a flood of Hunters approach from behind him. Devon storms the cell, taking them out left and right, some with magick, some with good old Vampire claws and fangs.
“Get her!” Constantine shouts at him and he makes a beeline straight for me, ignoring everyone else. He knows that Constantine has got this.
“Him!” I scream above the melee. “Him!” I gesticulate wildly with my left foot at the Hunter with the light blonde hair who has been the ringleader for this event. “String him up and kill him!” I snarl like a rabid dog, pulling on my chains, causing them to rattle ominously.
“Be still, Lizzie,” Devon mutters as he tries to take the cuffs off me. In the end, when he realizes they won’t budge, he just unhooks the chains from the wall and catches me as I drop to the floor. I come face-to-face with my captor, the terror in his eyes not quite masked by the arrogance and defiance.
“You can kill me, but there will be others. There will always be others!” he cries, before Constantine removes his head from his body in a satisfying crunch and a spray of blood that burns my tongue as it hits me in my open mouth, panting as I am.
“Aefre, my love,” Constantine says gently as he gathers me up, holding me close to him as he aims for the doorway.
“How did you find me?” I croak out, forgetting all about the battle still raging around us, knowing that Devon can take care of it now that he is here with my husband. Neither of them will let anything happen to me now that they have me.
“Our daughter,” he says to me with a smile, which I return before I place my head on his shoulder and close my eyes. Just for a second, as his battle cry echoes in my ears and the flash of his magick heats up my cold skin.
Chapter 17
Ponte, Italy, February 2015 - Aefre
Fire. So much fire. Red smoke and fire. I have fallen asleep in Constantine’s arms, but am jostled awake to be handed over to another. A familiar, comforting pair of arms encircle me.
“I am trusting you,” Constantine says urgently. “Keep her safe or it is your life.”
“You don’t need to worry,” Frederick says back just as urgently. “I will keep your wife safe now.”
He says the words “your wife” with a tone I can’t, in my muddled brain comprehend. Jealousy? Wistfulness? I don’t know.
“Go,” Constantine orders and I crack open my eyes to see him.
“Wait…” I murmur, but he can’t hear me over the cacophony of battle. All I can see is hundreds of Vampires fleeing for their lives, screaming, crying out in pain, and Constantine. My savior, throwing himself into the fray.
“He will get that bitch,” Frederick says to me, I think.
Fire. So much fire. Red smoke and fire.
I shut out the noise and close my eyes again. I trust Frederick to get me out of here. He will take me home.
“She’s waking up,” I hear Devon’s voice through the haze of my dream. Or the memory. I’m not really sure.
“Gurr,” I mutter and feel a glass pressed to my lips and soothing, cool water flooding my mouth. I swallow quickly and then again.
“We need to get those cuffs off her,” growls Frederick. “Look at the state of her arms.”
“We can’t get them off,” Devon replies.
“Break her fucking fingers, goddammit,” he says, and I feel strong hands take mine.
“Don’t you fucking dare hurt her,” Devon threatens him.
“These are doing far worse to her. She can’t heal.” The urgency is back in his voice.
“No,” I whisper as I feel the pressure increase on my hands. Somehow, after the Hunter has stomped on my fingers and broken them, they have healed to a point. They must have let me partly heal while I was unconscious, precisely so that I didn’t slip my cuffs. Bastards. “Hurts.”
“I know, love. I’m sorry,” Frederick says to me gently.
I scream as I hear the crunch and feel the agony of the many bones in my hands breaking.