Page 162 of Blood Mosaic

Except for Zara.

She was wearing a gold dress that looked like the traditional garb of the Athenian court, and her arms were bare. Her hair was long and loose, a coronet of golden brown curls that Luana had adored.

“Do you think she was happy here?” Zara knew Oleg was there, but she didn’t take her eyes from Luana’s bed.

He couldn’t stop smoke from leaching through the air. The emotions she evoked were always so complicated. She could be as mad and as tender as Luana had been.

“She was happy for a time,” Oleg said. “Like you.”

Zara turned to him and smiled sadly. “We were never a very healthy family, were we?”

“I shouldn’t have let her take you the way I did,” Oleg said. “That was my mistake.”

“It was what we both wanted.” Zara shrugged. “But you shouldn’t have interfered.”

Oleg took a deep breath. “She was going insane. She had to be stopped.”

Zara’s expression transformed like a switch flipping on. “She was a goddess, and you are a barbarian!” She drew a curved sword from her dress, swinging it wildly at Oleg before she charged.

“Zara!” He batted her back but didn’t release his fire even though the element tugged at his skin and his amnis went wild at Zara’s assault. “Stop this. I don’t want to kill you.”

She laughed in his face and kept swinging the sword. “I know you don’t. You could have killed me a hundred times and you didn’t.” She laughed again, the sound growing maniacal. “So what are you going to do, Papa? Keep me in your dungeon until I’m a good daughter?” Her eyes were lit with amusement. “Do you really think that’s going to happen?”

“Zara, stop.” He backed out of Luana’s day chamber and into the hall. “What do you want?”

“Where are her jewels?” Zara screamed. “That gold and Luana’s jewels are mine, and I want them.”

“And what about Tatyana?” Oleg saw Zara’s eye twitch. “Do you want Tatyana too?”

“Yes!” She shook her head. “No, I don’t care about that bitch. She’s your slut, not mine.”

Oleg drew Zara toward the landing, knowing that though his druzhina might observe, none of them would harm Oleg’s daughter without his permission.

“We need to talk,” Oleg said. “And I would like an apology for Elene’s death.”

At the mention of Elene, Zara hissed. “Where is Mika? I’m surprised he hasn’t tried to kill me yet.”

“I have more control than you.” Mika’s voice came from the bottom of the stairs. He was staring at Zara with blood in his eyes and Ludmila was standing next to him with a rifle pointed at Zara’s neck.

“Give me a single word,” the woman said calmly. “Her spine will be severed.”

Oleg lifted a hand. “Hold.”

Zara danced down the stairs, staring at Mika and Ludmila with a defiant expression. “It’s so hard to find good help when you’re immortal.”

Mika’s expression didn’t change. “Keep tempting me, and the respect I have for your sire might just crack.”

Oleg held his arms out, backing toward the ballroom with Zara following him. “Come now, daughter. We have things to discuss.”

Chapter Forty-Six

Tatyana was crouched in a corner of the ballroom, an axe from the garden clutched in her hand. Every other vampire around her—all in Oleg’s druzhina—had a weapon. Swords and pikes. One man had a spiked ball on a long chain and a heavy shield. Most carried short blades the length of their forearms, and there were more than a few axes.

The intricately tiled mosaic floor was swimming in blood and gore. Tatyana stayed low so she wouldn’t slip in her bare feet.

She felt naked and exposed in her damp silk camisole and shorts, but no one seemed to pay her any attention. Oksana ordered the other vampires around as they dragged the bodies of the humans and vampires out to the front terrace of the house where the sun would reach first.

The stench of coagulated blood and shit was nearly overwhelming.

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