Page 38 of Bitten By Chaos

My head snapped around as a door to what I’d assumed was his bedroom flew open, and three bodies stumbled out, sending my stomach plummeting to the floor.

No. No. No. No. No. No.

Three walking corpses. Three sets of vacant eyes. Three familiar faces that made me want to both vomit and rage. Carmichael and Silas had been sewn back together with coarse threads of silver. But my past vampire tormentors were nothing compared to the horror of seeing my own mother lurching her body at odd angles and gnashing her teeth.

“You fucking asshole!” I screamed, lunging again.

Merl snapped as I tackled him, fangs out and no doubt throbbing dark veins covering my face and neck. The Silas and Carmichael zombies took hold of either of my mother’s arms.

“Do it, and they’ll rip her apart again. She’s in there somewhere, Char. You know it. You can feel it. And I’m not releasing her until you’re ready to make a deal.”

“You’ll release her because you don’t want your fucking neck snapped,” I growled, tightening my fingers around his throat.

His pulse beat against me, fast and strong with fear.

He snapped and the corpses pulled, my mother’s arms coming off as she screeched a horrible noise. In a flash I was across the space, tearing Silas’ head from his body just as Julian had done. I repeated the move, taking off Carmichael’s head. Both of their bodies continued moving, flapping their limbs like they were in the dark.

“Mama,” I cried, pulling her toward me, yet avoiding her bite. I reached out with my senses, trying to feel if what he’d said could be true. Had he trapped her in there? How could I do what had to be done if she was?

“I lied,” Merl said over my ear as he snapped a silver cuff onto my wrist. “It’s just a shell. I’m a wizard not a god.”

Kill was the only word in my mind, but a dense fog had rolled over me, taking my will to move as my eyelids grew unbearably heavy. The pain encircling my wrist spread to the other one just as I lost consciousness.

Chapter 13

Every Last Drop

Icame to with a light in my eye, blinding me, as someone held up one of my eyelids. I groaned, opening my other eye to find myself strapped to the wall beside Lydia, silver searing my skin like hot coals.

I snapped my teeth at the bastard in front of me, but he easily avoided it then motioned with his finger, making more silver blossom to squeeze my throat and forehead as it held me still against the wall.

“You won’t die, you know,” Merl said, dropping his little flashlight in a leather bag and fishing around for something else.

“Excuse me?” I growled.

“When I drain you. You’ll still be a vampire, just won’t be more than a pile of animal instinct and bones until you’ve fed enough. You’ll be back to your shiny, redheaded self in a month or so.”

“I’m not killing my friend.” I strained to try and see her, still unconscious next to me based on my earlier glance.

“So picky. Fine. Then we’ll leave her chained in silver, and you can mind-bend her first into allowing me to drain you. Your choice. Ah, here we are.” He lifted a small scalpel from the bag, holding it up to the light.

“What are you doing?” I asked, staring at the fine edge of the instrument.

“That’s question two, I believe.” He turned toward me and raised it to twirl between us. “I am going to cut myself to drive you into a frenzy. It will be far easier to control you and your friend when I wake her if you are in that state.”

“It won’t work,” I said quickly. “I’m well fed on fae blood.”

“That does prove challenging,” Merl said, dropping his hand with the instrument to his side. “It means I have yet one more step in my process. Thank you for clarifying.”

“Wait, what?” I yelled as he turned away.

“Last question.” He smiled over his shoulder. “I need to bring you Bres to drain so you won’t lose the fae magic when I drain you the old-fashioned way. After which, you will absolutely go into a state of frenzy, even if I don’t spill my own blood. Then I wake Lydia, make her turn me, let you drain my blood from her since you’ll be in no state to mind-bend, and voila, you’re filled with plenty of blood for me to drain once again using my fangs. Then I take the cure, and say it with me—” he paused, but I stayed silent, staring until he shrugged. “I win. As always.”

“Fuck you,” I yelled, scraping my throat with the words as I struggled against the silver burning my flesh.

“I won’t say no to that offer. I’d be happy to do that while I feed on you.”

No more words escaped me, only guttural growls as I wriggled against my bonds.

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