Page 95 of The Serpent's Bride
What was she going to do if Raziel decided to go against his mother’s wishes and “turn” Monica? Of course, the vampire would choose to simply sacrifice his inconvenient human wife and obey his matriarch, not keep her around. He’d drain her dry on some altar and throw her corpse into some pit with the remains of sacrifices past.
Nadi hadn’t really expected him to consider turning her, so she hadn’t ever really planned on what to do if hetried.The mental image of trying to pretend to turn into a vampire in front of him almost made her laugh in a way that would be entirely inexplicable.
Raziel let her climb the stairs first, gesturing for her to lead the way.
She started up the stairs, smiling to herself. “What a gentleman. Or are you just enjoying the view?” The steepness of the climb put him at a perfect line of sight to enjoy her ass.
“It can be both.” When she glanced back at him, he was smirking at her.
When they reached the top, she stared up at the grand castle and felt dread roll over her in a wave. It was made out of enormous stacked and carved stone blocks that had been overgrown with Wild vines until Ivan and the crew had charred and chopped enough back to allow them entry.
Vines were slowly attempting to disassemble the stone and iron walls that had been erected to keep nature at bay. Some things were slow going—but inevitable. The Wild would win, in time. It always did. It was just a matter of how many years it took.
“Did you grow up here?” Nadi couldn’t help but stare at the enormous structure.
“Hardly.” Raziel huffed a laugh. “The Wild made that impossible.”
The structure soared high overhead, the looming black windows once holding glass now largely shattered and empty. The building was far, far older than anything in the metropolis—and in fact, any of the human buildings she’d ever seen. She wondered suddenly about the history of Runne. About how much of it was fiction and how much of it was fact. Once they reached the top of the stairs, she put her heels back on.
“Look.” He stopped her before they went too far away from the cliff’s edge, and pointed toward the ocean. “Not often you get to appreciate a sunset quite like that.”
Turning, she let out a breath. He was right. It was something else. She’d never had the chance to see a sunset over the ocean. The light was glimmering on the blue waves in stunning reflections of white and gold.
Not a bad last sight, if she was about to die. “That’s beautiful…”
“Indeed.” His mood deflated quickly. “My grandfather was the first vampire who helped overthrow the fae and drive them underground where they belong.” Raziel was walking beside her as they headed into the cavernous, almost castle-like estate with its weatherworn gray blocks.
“And it was from here that he made those first pacts with the humans.” The front door was stuck ajar, the large metal slab long since trapped at an angle, vines and rust ensuring it would never move again. Raziel went in first, stepping over a vine, before offering her a hand over it.
But all the privacy was bothering her. It felt…wrong. She knew she was harmless little Monica—just a pathetic little human who could be mind-controlled into doing anything—but it still feltodd.“If you aren’t planning on doing the sacrifice tonight, why not just eat on the yacht?”
Raziel was bringing her toward the back of the house, the golden rays of the setting sun casting sharp shadows across the once-grand wooden floor. Now, it was covered in detritus—dried leaves, bits of flaking paint and plaster.
His expression was unreadable. “Now and again, isn’t it nice to be…who we truly are without pretenses?”
Fear pricked at the back of her neck.
Turning to her, he smiled faintly. “I am not a good man, my little murderer. I enjoy the terrible things I do to people. I won’t make excuses or blame what I’ve become on my family or on the world at large. But sometimes, justsometimes,I wonder…” He turned his gaze back to the direction they were walking. “What I would have become if they didn’t make me into a monster.”
There was an emptiness in his face. A hollowness that suddenly made her heart ache. Was he playing her like a fiddle?Or was this real? Frowning, she stepped closer to him, and wove her fingers into his. She didn’t know what else to do.
His hand tightened slightly around hers. “Lilivra Nostrom. My dear oldgrandmother.The oldest vampire still ‘alive’ in all of Runne, who pulls the strings of all humanity and vampire kind alike.” He rolled his eyes. “From the very beginning, she whispered to my mother that I would be a great ‘asset’ to the family, but an asset to be kept on a short and spiked leash. Volencia told me thisverbatimwhen I was a child. That I was blood-mad, that I was a murderer, that I was destined to be what I am now. So…was it destiny? Or was it the work of two women who crafted a child into a weapon because they wished to stay in power?”
After a long pause, Nadi let out a sigh. Raziel was forcing her to admit something out loud that she very much didn’t want to. Because it made everything messy—complicated—and that was something she didn’t need. “Everyone has reasons to be the way they are. Everyone is a product of their context.”
It would be easy to believe Raziel was pure evil. Once she had believed just that. For a very, very long time, in fact. And maybe he still was. But she was beginning to see what he was in a new light.
He was a monster. He didn’t feel remorse for killing. He would keep on doing it. His whole bloody family would leave a trail of bodies in their wake unless someone stopped them.
Nadi was going to kill him. She wanted her revenge more than ever. That hadn’t changed. It wasn’t a lie. But when she picked up his hand and placed a kiss to his fingers, and knew it came from a place of affection…that wasn’t a lie either.
“Enough melodrama.” He huffed, shaking his head. “I’m too sober for this bullshit.”
“Seconded.” She chuckled.
Turning to face her, he tilted her chin up to look at him. “I realized something, earlier today—you have not truly felt what it’s like to be bitten by a vampire. You fainted the last time.”
“I didn’t f—” She went to argue.
