The Relic (Cradle of Darkness 2)

My daughter and the man who had delivered to a demon for torment because I had broken an unknown law joined hands.

Beautiful side by side, Jade caught up in her husband’s eyes. Even the fool I was could see plain as night that nothing existed to her in that moment but him.

If she loved him, so would I.

Behind me, Vladislov muttered, “Ugh, you’re far too gracious.”

“I forgive him.” And it was really that simple.

Malcom, as if he heard our whisperings, let out a pent-up breath. I don’t know why I sensed it, but I felt in that moment that he wanted to glance my way, just for a second. Just to acknowledge what seemed like a gift.

“It was a gift. His entire bloodline was at stake should you have refused. I had only granted him five years with Jade before the culling might begin. Now I’m in the mood to reconsider.”

Lately, it had become simple to forget just who I was with. An ease had grown between us, even laughter. Passion that seemed to rewrite the very fabric I’d been cut from.

It would just slip my mind in tiny moments.

“Five years was generous and only granted because he led me to where Darius had hidden you away. Had I found the memory in his head, had he tried to hide it, an eternity in a tomb was only the beginning of what he might have suffered. But he came to me, he knew there was something vital in so small a memory. He knew, because Darius ripped out his heart, so Jade ripped out the heart of her father and put it in the chest of the man she loves. Darius lives in him in a significant way, so rethink your easy forgiveness in a sentimental moment.”

“No. And you cannot tempt me from my decision either, demon.”

“Fine.” A brisk, irritated fine.

“And you will allow him to look at me, and speak to me.”

From annoyance to amusement, a snap in temperament from one to the other that kept me on my toes and him interesting. “And here you thought to pretend you were meek.”

Chapter Sixteen

Vladislov

My will poured over the gathered guests at the wedding party in such a way that Pearl was clueless as to my designs. I deigned who might hear us, who might so much as see her. Each glance she garnered was at my whim for a specific purpose. Whether it was to announce to other females with whom I had shared physical pleasure not to think to proposition me for more. Or to dash the hopes of those who clung to the idea that someday I might return their ardent affection. Or to ordain that this is your goddess and I am her slave. Or so males might know just what would become of them should they brush against her or think to tempt her from me.

And they would. That was the game amongst our kind. They didn’t know I wore a plain face for a purpose. I didn’t flaunt my riches. Why should I? Their riches were my riches. The very blood in their veins, regardless of their sire, came from me.

I knew what I had created the first time I was tempted to set my vein to the mouth of a near-dead mortal. It was as if the world had unfolded before me. A scroll accounting family trees, impossibilities, eternity, joy, sorrow, fascination to end my loneliness and agitation at how difficult my children would be.

Those first vampires, my bright-eyed babies, were all dead.

I ended them, one by one, after they had left my flock and begun flocks of their own. Their purpose had been served—propagation. Their egos, titles, the worship of them in temples… it was too much and far too gaudy.

Never did I request temples to my name or call for minions to hear my gospel. Not that temples didn’t exist. And it would be an outright lie to claim that several of my names were not called out in vain by those foolish enough to think I might give them power. But unlike my son and his faulty religion, I had been born a living god to my people and understood exactly the flaws with such a path.

Worship led to tragedies like my poor Pearl, her hammering heart, the way she clutched at the rosary I slipped into her fingers—one she didn’t even realize she held.

I would be picking apart that knot in her life for eons. On the day when Pearl’s eyes truly opened to the way of the world, she would be…

Inconsolable.

My poor darling. Maybe it was a kindness that my son had filled her head with false ideals. The longer she held to some sort of faith, the more time she would have to see that all along it truly had been I fulfilling her needs.