Page 77 of Dark Souls

“No one is beyond saving,” she replied softly as I held her gaze. “Not if they want to be saved.”

We stood in silence, the weight of her words shifting something inside me. I had long given up hope of ever being saved from the hell I was living. Hope was too dangerous of an emotion to allow. Anger and hatred were far easier to live with.

“I have her phone.” I said bluntly. Maddy’s features twisted with confusion. “If she wants it back, I have it. And her dagger.”

“Okay,” she replied slowly, catching on to the hidden meaning of my words, even though I wasn’t sure what I was saying myself. “I’ll tell her when she gets back. Is there anything else I should tell her?”

I shook my head once. Rubbing my hand over the back of my head, I looked down at the ground. There were a million words trying to force their way to my consciousness but the block on my emotions shoved them down. “No. Just…”

“Yes?”

“How will I know?” I asked, narrowing my gaze on her as she peered back at me. “How do I know she can handle who I am without it destroying her? What if I’m not worth it and I only cause her pain? She deserves more than what I am capable of giving her.”

She sighed. A sad smile appeared on her face and her eyes seemed to glisten under the moonlight. “Only she can answer those questions. And only she can decide what she deserves. Don’t make that decision for her. She’ll surprise you and you might even surprise yourself. It won’t be easy, but I promise you won’t regret it.”

I grunted in response before turning my back and strolling away. I paused, spinning back quickly before I changed my mind. “Tell her… tell her my name is Luka.”

“Luka,” Maddy repeated with a beaming smile. “I’ll be sure to tell her that.”

I lifted my hood, hiding my face once more. I left abruptly, disappearing into the night but already knowing I’d be back again tomorrow and every night after until she returned. Because I was nothing if not a sucker for punishment.

CAPS

“Mama,youmusteat.Please,” I begged, prying open my mama’s ice-cold hands and placing the bloody carcass of the fox I’d hunted for them. I wished it was more. But I had grown too weak myself to attack anything bigger so close to the village without risking being seen. Feeding Hana and mama first would always come before my own insufferable hunger.

Her vacant eyes tore right through me. My desperation pushed me to the brink of tears. “Mama, please.”

When she made no attempt to acknowledge me or the offering I’d killed for her, I fell back onto the forest floor and hung my head in my hands. I didn’t know what to do anymore. It had been three weeks and she hadn’t fed or eaten once. She hadn’t spoken. She just screamed in the dead of the night, the images of her soulmate being brutally murdered haunting her nightmares. And when she was awake, she was this way. Completely broken.

“Why is mama not eating?” Hana asked in a quiet voice, watching her own mother with intense worry and anguish on her dirty face. Such intense worry and anguish that no nine-year-old child should ever have to experience.

I shifted my attention to her fragile frame, swamped in a torn, grubby blanket I had stolen from the back of a carriage days before. From the bluish tinge of Hana’s lips, it still wasn’t enough to keep the beginnings of the Serbian winter chill away. I moved next to her, pulling her under my arm and rubbing my hands up and down her body to warm us both.

“Mama is just not feeling hungry now. She will eat later.” I sighed, trying to bear the stress of it all myself. But as much as I tried, I couldn’t hide the truth from my little sister. She wasn’t stupid, and she could see it with her own eyes. Mama had given up. She was alive in body but not in soul. I glanced up at the darkening sky, feeling that same dread that came every night. Where would we sleep tonight? Where could I keep them safe from the elements but also from the world? From everyone that wanted us dead. We were being hunted like cattle. So we could never stop moving. We could never stay in one place for too long. But with mama’s refusal to eat, she had grown too weak to use her vampire speed to travel and Hana had yet to come into her full abilities. I had carried them both for as long as I could but now, the hunger and lack of blood was affecting my strength.

“I’m c-cold, Luka and so tired. I don’t want to walk anymore. Can we just stay here tonight?” Hana shivered in my arms and my heart lurched. I peered around the darkness of the forest and down at the small fire I had made to warm us. I’d have to put it out soon to avoid being found. Shrugging my jacket off, I wrapped it around Hana’s shoulders and smiled before pulling her back into my body. She rested her head against my chest and closed her eyes.

“Won’t you be cold?” she whispered.

“No. I will be fine. You will keep me warm, little one.” She hugged into me tighter as I attempted to fight the chatter of my teeth when a freezing wind picked up through the trees. Leaning back against the trunk of the tree, I let Hana sleep and fought the exhaustion that clawed at me, too. The need to keep Hana and mama safe forced my brain to stay alert, listening to every tiny crunch of leaves from an animal nearby or groan of the branches ahead.

When the moon was settled high above our heads, mama slowly blinked and a single tear slid down her cheek. The rare moment when life seemed to return to her had my heart racing. She peered down at the dead animal in her hands, her fangs unsheathing. Hope rose in my chest as I prayed for them to sink into the corpse. After a few moments, she moved her head to the side and looked straight into my eyes. My body stilled at the heart-wrenching pain and anger that lived in them.

“I’ll never forgive you,” she said with a chilling coldness that was so different from the usual warmth I had always known. My eyes watered and lips trembled as that crippling guilt and pain that now lived within me came to the surface once more. “I love you. But I will never forgive you, Lukas.” She threw the fox and it landed at my side as silent tears fell from my eyes. “You should both eat that. I have no use for it.”

“Mama,” I choked as she turned her head away from me and stared out at the distance, her eyes glossing over with numbness once again. “I’m sorry.”

The chime from the old grandfather clock that stood in the corner of the eerie dining room jolted me from my sleep. Each strike reverberated around the empty room, echoing off the barren walls and causing my heart to thump wildly in my chest as the memory faded. I rubbed my eyes, dropping my boots off the once polished and grand table, which was now dulled by a thick coating of dust, and sat up with a heavy sigh.

The mournful melodies echoed through the heavy, stale air and announced the passing of another hour. I glanced at the many empty chairs around the table and then narrowed my gaze on the clock face. As the last chord chimed, I picked up Ilaria’s dagger and scratched another tally mark onto the wooden surface of the table. Forty-one hours. That’s how many hours it had been since I found out she’d left this realm. The rhythmic ticking of the clock only amplified my restlessness, but it was better than the oppressive silence I faced down in the cellars, staring at the blank walls.

I clicked my tongue as I stared down at the black screen of her phone, willing it to spring to life. Of course, there was the possibility that she was already back from Heroux and just didn’t want to contact me. That she would listen to my warnings and keep her distance even after hearing about my meeting with her Grandma. The memory of Ilaria telling me with so much spirit that she was a controlling man’s worst nightmare came to mind. She had said if I told her to do something, she’d do the opposite just to spite me. Well, I seemed to hold on to those words now. But I wouldn’t blame her if she never wanted to see me again. After the way I’d treated her from the moment we met, she had every right to tell me to fuck off. I just wanted to know she was safe. Alive. It seems I could barely function without that knowledge.

Standing up, I marched over to the drinks cabinet and poured myself a fresh vodka. It was only midday, which meant I had hours to waste alone in this prison until the sun set and I could finally escape the silent torture of my mind.

As I sat back down and took a sip, the strange restlessness that I’d felt ever since my meeting with Madeline Romano intensified to a sharpness that was extremely uncomfortable. Painful almost. I leaned forward, placing the glass on the table and closing my eyes as I fisted my top against my chest. I suddenly felt… uneasy. No, it was more than that. Something wasn’t right. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but I just knew… Ilaria was in trouble. The deadly kind.

I stood up abruptly, causing the chair to screech against the wooden floorboards and zoomed to the front door of the manor, yanking it open, only to be flung back by the magical force that kept me bound inside. I roared, hissing through my teeth as I used all my speed and strength to attack the force field once more, only to find my body catapulted across the entrance hall again and slamming into the crumbling wall. My chest heaved with frustration and that red haze cast over my vision as I lost my shit.

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