Circus of the Damned (Vampire Hunter 3)

"They have arranged that the loser be stretched over the altar and staked by you."

"What..."

"Jean-Claude, as affirmation of his power. Oliver, as a gesture to show how well he controlled what once belonged to Jean-Claude."

There was a gasp from the crowd. Oliver was levitating ever so slowly. He floated to the ground. Then he raised his arms, and Jean-Claude floated upward.

"Shit," I said.

Jean-Claude hung nearly unconscious in empty, shining air. Oliver laid him gently on the ground, and fresh blood splattered the white floor.

Karl Inger came into sight. He picked Jean-Claude up under the arms.

Where was everybody? I looked around for some help. The black werewolf was torn apart, parts still twitching. I didn't think even a lycanthrope could heal the mess. The blond werewolf wasn't much better, but Stephen was dragging himself towards the altar. With one leg completely ripped away, he was trying.

Karl laid Jean-Claude on the marble altar. Blood began to seep down the side. He held him lightly at the shoulder. Jean-Claude could bench press a car. How could Karl hold him down?

"He shares Oliver's strength."

"Quit doing that," I said.

"What?"

"Answering questions I haven't asked yet."

He smiled. "It saves so much time."

Oliver picked up a white, polished stake and a padded hammer. He held them out towards me. "It's time."

Alejandro tried to help me stand, but I pushed him away. Fourth mark or no fourth mark, I could stand on my own.

Richard screamed, "No!" He ran past us towards the altar. It all seemed to happen in slow motion. He jumped at Oliver, and the little man grabbed him by the throat and tore his windpipe out.

"Richard!" I was running, but it was too late. He lay bleeding on the ground, still trying to breathe when he didn't have anything to breathe with.

I knelt by him, tried to stop the flow of blood. His eyes were wide and panic-filled. Edward was with me. "There's nothing you can do. Nothing any of us can do."

"No."

"Anita." He pulled me away from Richard. "It's too late."

I was crying and hadn't known it.

"Come, Anita; destroy your old master, as you wanted me to." Oliver was holding the hammer and stake out towards me.

I shook my head.

Alejandro helped me stand. I reached for Edward, but it was too late. Edward couldn't help. No one could help me. There was no way to take back the fourth mark, or heal Richard, or save Jean-Claude. But at least I wouldn't put the stake through Jean-Claude. That I could stop. That I would not do.

Alejandro was leading me towards the altar.

Marguerite had crawled to one side of the dais. She was kneeling, rocking gently back and fourth. Her face was a bloody mask. She'd clawed her eyes out.

Oliver held the stake and mallet out to me with his white-gloved hands, still wet with Richard's blood. I shook my head.

"You will take it. You will do as I say." His little clown face was frowning at me.

"Fuck you," I said.

"Alejandro, you control her now."

"She is my servant, master, yes."

Oliver held the stake out towards me. "Then have her finish him."

"I cannot force her, master." Alejandro smiled as he said it.

"Why not?"

"She is a necromancer. I told you she would have free will."

"I will not have my grand gesture spoiled by one stubborn woman."

He tried to roll my mind. I felt him rush over me like a wind inside my head, but it rolled off and away. I was a full human servant; vampire tricks didn't work on me, not even Oliver's.

I laughed, and he slapped me. I tasted fresh blood in my mouth. He stood beside me, and I could feel him tremble. He was so angry. I was ruining his moment.

Alejandro was pleased. I could feel his pleasure like a warm hand in my stomach.

"Finish him, or I promise you I'll beat you to a bloody pulp. You don't die easily now. I can hurt you worse than you can imagine, and you'll heal. But it will still hurt just as badly. Do you understand me?"

I stared down at Jean-Claude. He was staring at me. His dark blue eyes were as lovely as ever.

"I won't do it," I said.

"You still care about him? After all he has done to you?"

I nodded.

"Do him, now, or I will kill him slowly. I will pick pieces of flesh from his bones but never kill him. As long as his heart and head are intact, he won't die, no matter what I do to him."

I looked at Jean-Claude. I couldn't stand by and let Oliver torture him, not if I could help it. Wasn't a clean death better? Wasn't it?

I took the stake from Oliver. "I'll do it."

Oliver smiled. "You've made a wise decision. Jean-Claude would thank you if he could."

I stared down at Jean-Claude, stake in one hand. I touched his chest just over the burn scar. My hand came away smeared with blood.

"Do it, now!" Oliver said.

I turned to Oliver, reaching my left hand out for the hammer. As he handed it to me, I shoved the ash stake through his chest.

Karl screamed. Blood poured out of Oliver's mouth. He seemed frozen, as if he couldn't move with the stake in his heart, but he wasn't dead, not yet. My fingers tore into the meat of his throat and pulled, pulled great gobbets of flesh, until I saw spine, glistening and wet. I wrapped my hand around his spine and jerked it free. His head lolled to one side, held by a few strips of meat. I jerked his head clear and tossed it across the ring.

Karl Inger was lying beside the altar. I knelt by him and tried to find a pulse, but there wasn't one. Oliver's death had killed him too.

Alejandro came to stand by me. "You've done it, Anita. I knew you could kill him. I knew you could."

I stared up at him. "Now you kill Jean-Claude, and we rule the city together."

"Yes."

I shoved upward before I could think about it, before he could read my mind. I shoved my hands into his chest. Ribs cracked and scraped my skin. I grabbed his beating heart and crushed it.

I couldn't breathe. My chest was tight, and it hurt. I pulled his heart out of the hole. He fell, eyes wide and surprised. I fell with him.

I was gasping for air. Couldn't breathe, couldn't breathe. I lay on top of my master and felt my heart beating for both of us. He wouldn't die. I laid my fingers against his throat and started to dig. I put my hands around his throat and squeezed. I felt my hands dig into flesh, but the pain was overwhelming. I was choking on blood, our blood.

My hands went numb. I couldn't tell if I was still squeezing or not. I couldn't feel anything except the pain. Then even that slipped away, and I was falling, falling into a darkness that had never known light, and never would.

Chapter 48

I woke up staring into an off-white ceiling. I blinked at the ceiling for a minute. Sunlight lay in warm squares across the blanket. There were metal rails on the bed. An IV dripped to my arm.

A hospital--then I wasn't dead. Surprise, surprise.

There were flowers and a bunch of shiny balloons on a small bedside table. I lay there a moment, enjoying the fact that I wasn't dead.

The door opened, and all I could see was a huge bunch of flowers. Then the flowers lowered, and it was Richard.

I think I stopped breathing. I could feel all the blood rushing through my skin. There was a soft roaring in my head. No. I wasn't going to faint. I never fainted. I finally managed to say, "You're dead."

His smile faded. "I'm not dead."

"I saw Oliver tear out your throat." I could see it in front of me like an overlay in my mind. I saw him gasping, dying. I found I could sit up. I braced myself, and the IV needle moved under my skin, the tape pulling. It was real. Nothing else seemed real.

He raised a hand towards his throat, then stopped himself. He swallowed hard enough for me to hear it. "You saw Oliver tear out my throat, but it didn't kill me."

I stared at him. There was no bandage on his cheek. The circle cut had healed. "No human being could survive that," I said softly.

"I know." He looked incredibly sad as he said it.

Panic filled my throat until I could barely breathe. "What are you?"

"I'm a lycanthrope."

I shook my head. "I know what a lycanthrope feels like, moves like. You aren't one."

"Yes, I am."

I kept shaking my head. "No."

He came to stand beside the bed. He held the flowers awkwardly, as if he didn't know what to do with them. "I'm next in line to be pack leader. I can pass for human, Anita. I'm good at it."