Page 45 of Bloodgrove

The shadow leaped at him, and instincts from his days in the fencing club took control of his body. At the last possible moment, he dodged and raised his hand to parry the attack. A rapier of silver light drove into the monster’s shoulder.

The shadow shrieked.

Mr. Lake screamed.

With another strike, Will forced the creature back. He nearly laughed. His grip tightened around the cool moonlight as panic and courage blended into an intoxicating drug.

Beside him, he saw the shadows pin Elodie against the wall beside the open door. She had nowhere left to go, and Mr. Lake, clutching his shoulder, realized it. He grinned broadly and tensed for one final attack.

Will reacted in an instant and threw himself at him. He rammed Lake with his shoulder, and together they staggered farther back. Mr. Lake fought for balance, and only then did his gaze fall upon the shining rapier piercing his hip.

With an enraged cry, Will tore the blade free and kicked him, sending Mr. Lake stumbling backward. The abyss yawned behind him. The mage understood his fate too late and flung out his arms as though the creatures of darkness and nothingness might save him.

But moonlight flooded the room.

He fell into the depths, his arms spread wide in search of help.

He struck the rubble below with a dull, wet impact.

The shadow screamed and was torn away by a whirlwind. Its tentacles scattered and dissolved, becoming part of the night from which they had been born.

Chapter 26

Silence fell.

A ghostly silence, though not cold or alien, but alive with the ancestors who had spent their lives here. Will tasted their bitterness on his tongue and felt their disapproving stares against the back of his neck. But that was an enemy he knew.

“Damnation,” Elodie breathed, stepping to the edge of the drop.

Will could not help laughing as he looked over her shoulder at the broken corpse below. Lake’s spine had struck a support beam left on the floor from the demolition, and his ribs jutted from his chest. His arms and legs bent at unnatural angles. In the cool moonlight, his shadow once again obeyed the laws of nature.

Elodie hurled her blood daggers at the man and sliced away half his head. The crown of his skull slid aside, and brain matter spilled across the stones.

“Is it over?” Will asked cautiously, taking a step back. Some bureaucratic corner of his mind noted that he should secure this doorway tomorrow. The rest of his body screamed with adrenaline, hot as magma as it pulsed through his veins with every heartbeat. He could almost taste it where it mingled with blood and salt.

Elodie laughed weakly and sank against the paneled wall of the corridor. Her head fell back, and every trace of tension drained from her. All that remained was the glorious chaos of her appearance.

Only then did Will notice the torn collar of her nightgown, which exposed the milky swell of her breasts. Blood ran from her chin, smeared wildly across her lips and cheeks, and traced a path down her bare throat, tangling with the disheveled curls spilling over her shoulders.

Will stepped closer, hypnotized by the sight of her. In the faint light, her eyes were like storm clouds hanging low.

She was beautiful.

The opposite of the perfect, sensual vision she had been all those weeks ago. Then, she had seemed untouchable. Now she was raw and wild. He had admired her beauty, fought against her will, tasted her blood, and now all of it became one.

Slowly, as though his body knew every step was a mistake, he approached her. He took her bloody hand and turned her palm upward. The bite wounds had stopped bleeding, leaving only the half-dried blood behind. His last concern fell away and carried the final remnants of reason with it.

He licked across the wound, not cautiously as he had before, but completely, filling his mouth with the feel of her soft, torn skin and the taste of her blood.

Slowly, he exhaled and sought her gaze, waiting for a rejection.

None came.

In the next instant, he was against her, pressing her into the wall, her arm still in his hand and now pinned to the wood. His body covered hers, his face only inches away. His breathing was heavy, but it found the rhythm of Elodie’s as her lips parted. She did not push him away. No, she smiled faintly and opened herself to him, allowing him to step between her legs. Piece by piece, his body found its match in hers.

The scent of incense and lilac consumed him, but he hesitated. She was a lonely woman in a vast, empty house, barely tall enough to reach his chest.

Gods, and he was pinning her to a wall.