Page 42 of Cursed By Darkness

He killed our mate, I tell him, and my dragon knows what to do. The wrath coursing through our veins is worse than venom, more painful than acid. The memory of her in my arms, the taste of her on my lips. I remember how she smiled at me, and the way her cheeks flushed when she neared her climax. Every image that flashes across my mind is new fuel to this fire inside me.

My dragon throws his head back and roars so loud it shakes the ground. I will fucking kill Kayn.

“Apollo, wait!” Donatello cries out, but it’s too late. I jump on Kayn, jaws snapping, and the vampire merely steps to the side. A smug grin stretches across his lips. I know this motherfucker is old, but that won’t stop me from ripping him to shreds.

I change direction, my dragon body too big and fucking clumsy in this small space. My tail hits a chair, my wing a bookshelf. I whirl around and snap my jaws in the air again, aiming for his fucking head and missing it.

“Did we hurt you this bad?” he asks, waltzing out of the way as if this is a fucking joke. His smile stays there, plastered on his face, his eyes glinting with evil mirth. “I can’t believe that’s as mad as a dragon gets for getting his mate killed. Oh, wait. She wasn’t really your mate if you weren’t bonded.”

I had no idea it was possible, but a fresh wave of blinding rage washes over me, making me gag. Fire burns up my throat, and I pull back to throw it all over him.

Tristan pounces, and the first flames that escape me hit his shoulder. Fuck. I close my jaw, widening my eyes when I see Kayn has moved yet again. He almost made me burn the others. He almost made me kill all the others. If Tristan hadn’t stepped up, I would have…

Tristan slaps his shoulder until the fire dies out, his eyes trained on Kayn. “You won’t escape,” the gargoyle says, his body dark and craggy like stone, wings closed tight behind his back. I imitate him, tucking my wings so they won’t get in my way. “Not after what you did to Cass!”

Kayn dodges Tristan as the gargoyle makes his move, then I jump on him, only to have him waltzing away again. Footsteps echo in the distance. More vampires joining the fight. More than we can handle. This has to happen fast. We can’t stay here.

Tristan misses Kayn, then I do, too. Oreo snaps at his ankles and gets kicked away. Donatello stumbles into the fight, his eyes an unnatural angry-red. He bares his fangs, and the wrath pulsing inside me is reflected on his face. His veins throb, climbing his neck and his jaws like living vines. I watch him move to jump on Kayn, then the vampire lord moves away. Donatello was already waiting for that, his first move merely a ruse. He shoots out both arms and his fingers close around Kayn’s shirt. The shock on the lord’s face is the most beautiful sight I’ve had in days.

Still, Donatello is weak, and Kayn rips himself away easily. His brows bunch over his nose. He’s worried now and definitely pissed…

Kayn smiles. “How cute,” he spits at Donatello. “How adorable to watch you joining the fight when you know I could command you to kill your friends.”

This makes us pause. Shit. We were so desperate to find Cassandra we completely overlooked that possibility. He’s done that before. It almost fucked us up.

“I won’t,” Kayn says. “I don’t need to. You will see my point. You caused her death,” Kayn spits, “and now you want to make sure the powers of the Shadow Mage remain forgotten? That makes no sense.”

I roar, and it’s Tristan who mouths my thoughts. “You can’t use her powers,” he says. “She wouldn’t want that.”

“Cassandra was ambitious,” Kayn says, shaking his head as if we’re stupid. There’s a quality of madness to his eyes, contradicting the rational man we’ve known. “She survived all those years by herself, making her way through the filth of human society, because she’s ambitious. She’s strong, and she deserves to reign, even if her mates can’t see that.”

The anger bubbling inside me makes fire race up my throat again. I clench my jaw, digging my talons into the ground. This motherfucker. He’s been chasing her ancestors for centuries, killing them off, andweare the ones to blame for her death? I will take the blame for not protecting her properly, but I will not let him turn the tables like this.

Kayn is not innocent, no matter what he’s selling. No matter what he believes.

“She is dead,” Donatello spits, the anger in his face the same that buzzes in my bones. “We will never know what she could have been because of your endless hunt of the Shadow Mages.” He shakes his head, cloudy eyes revealing how this fucking hurts. “And it definitely isn’t up to you to decide what happens to her body now. Her powers die with her.”

“You have no idea what she could do,” Kayn roars, lunacy on his face. “How powerful she could be. The Shadow Mages ruled over the Dark Realm for centuries, creating rules and safeguarding them. Cassandra could correct all the wrongs in the Light Realm. You’re the only ones who can’t see it.”

“A wrong in the Light Realm is that people like you and the Collector exist,” Ren says, standing to my left in his human form. There’s a mix of pain and anger on his face I’ve never seen before. He’s always been the sensitive one, the one Cassandra would go to for a hug. To see him mad like this is a sign that we’re all in this together. All for her.

And it’s the look on his face that makes it dawn on me. We can’t attack Kayn like this. He’s too fast. He’ll keep on dodging. We have to work together, because we came into this together and, if we’re dying for her, we’re dying together.

It’s a struggle, but my dragon peels away from me. He wants blood. He wants to drink from Kayn’s dying breath, but I push him down. I keep him at bay as I follow Ren into my human form. I close my hands into trembling fists and step around Kayn until I face Donatello. The vampire meets my eyes and nods an inch. He knows what I’m trying to do. With the four of us, we can surround him. We can stop him.

And Kayn is so mad he might not notice it. “Cassandra was doomed from the moment she met you,” he spits in Donatello’s direction. The latter trembles, the words hitting him the way Kayn expected.

“And you think I don’t see what you’re doing,” Kayn says with a laugh, “but you forget I am older than you’ll ever be.”

In the space of a heartbeat, he’s disappeared. I blink, and Kayn’s standing next to Ren. My mouth drops open in warning, but the wolf is not looking at me. Donatello moves, but he’s too slow. Kayn opens a cruel grin, kicks Oreo into the corridor, then hits Ren with a sucker punch.

Ren flies off, and I turn to follow his fall, but there’s no time. Kayn comes at me next, and I raise an arm to block his attack, but he moves again, punching my side so hard I hear the crack of several ribs. Pain shoots up my body, and I clench my teeth so no sounds escape. I move my hand to grab him, but he’s moved once more. Kayn dodges Tristan, then goes to Donatello. The latter was already expecting it. He’s slower than Kayn, but he knows his move set. Donatello parries the first attack, but Kayn kicks him in the knee, and Donatello makes to buckle. Tristan rises to the challenge and lands a blow to Kayn’s head.

The vampire lord drops, but he gets back up in a second. Ren and I do, too. We’re hurting and limping, but we know we have to attack together. We exchange a glance, and the four of us pounce. Donatello moves to stop Kayn’s escape. Ren squares his shoulders and advances, a wall as tough as he can be. I don’t leave them by themselves, calling my dragon as close as possible, letting my nails become his talons, the scales popping out of my knuckles. His fire burns inside me, the fire of vengeance, and I bite down on the smoke billowing past my lips.

Kayn thinks he can stop us, but we’re unbeatable together. He struggles and fights to stay out of our clutches, but no matter how fast he is, we close the circle tighter by the second. He lands a blow to my wounded shoulder, a kick to Ren’s knee. He doesn’t dare attack Tristan—he knows he isn’t strong enough. The look on Kayn’s face changes. His eyes widen, his jaw tightening with mad certainty.

He sees it at the same time we do. Ren punches him, Tristan grips and twists his arm. Oreo jumps, biting into his thigh, and I land a blow between his shoulder blades. He won’t make it. He can’t survive the four of us, not the four wounded lovers of our dead mate. I let a smile stretch my lips, even when the taste of blood mixes with my saliva, even when my broken ribs cry with sharp pain.

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