Vanquished Gods (Hallowed Games #2)

Chapter 30

CHAPTER 30

I paced the room, my legs shaking as hunger curled around my chest. I touched the magical butterfly pendant at my throat, and its power hummed against my fingertips.

It had been a week—seven long days—since I’d turned into a vampire, and I hadn’t yet tasted blood straight from a vein. Something stopped me from sinking my teeth into a person’s skin. If I started to drink straight from someone’s throat, I worried I’d never go back. That I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from going after every human’s throat once I started.

Sion said that as a vampire, you became more of what you once were, the more time passed. So, what if—as a vampire—I turned into a death-hungry monster?

My eyes drifted to the glass I’d stopped in front of, which reflected a stranger’s face. Pale skin, red lips, the wild glow of hunger in my eyes. I hardly recognized myself.

I ran my tongue across my fangs, imagining the sweet, pulsing taste of life flowing fresh from a human’s throat.

Then I pushed the thought away. I had more important things to think about than my own hunger.

Sion and I had been training night and day, readying ourselves for the oncoming invasion. I couldn’t bear to think about what would happen to every person on this island if the Order succeeded. If I failed.

Fortunately, my magic felt stronger than ever, a dark power coursing through my veins. Together, Sion, Maelor, and I had managed to bring up walls of magic like storm clouds of death. Sion’s magic felt like a sensuous, velvety cloak against my skin. Controlled, slow, seductive. Maelor’s felt untamed, like a cold wildfire that could switch directions at any moment. I’d grown used to the feel of both.

I moved to stare out the window again, where dusk darkened the sky, a lurid red bleeding into the clouds.

That day, I’d visited Leo at Veilcross Haven. I’d found him playing, laughing among the other children, blissfully unaware of what was coming for us. I’d tell him closer to the time. But there was no need for him to spend days being terrified. I didn’t need him thinking about me as the only thing standing between the Order and the brutal deaths of everyone here. Leo deserved to stay in that carefree world a little longer. So, I’d kept my silence. Enjoyed our time together.

I closed my eyes, envisioning the oncoming army.

But something tugged at me, the cloying scent of bruised roses twining through the air. My chest tightened. Rowena. Her scent lingered in the room like a sickly sweet miasma. But why? Why was it so strong?

I inhaled again, deeper, trying to push down the unease that nagged at my thoughts. The scent drew me to the bed, where it clung to the sheets. I always made my bed, always kept things in order. What was she doing messing around my bed?

My thoughts raced as I crouched, pressing my nose into the fabric, the smell overwhelming. Panic prickled at the edges of my mind.

I ripped the blankets away, heart hammering in my chest, and slid my hand under the mattress to the spot where I’d hidden Bran’s pendant. My breath hitched. My hand grasped at nothing.

Gone.

She’d found it.

A cold wave of panic slammed into me, making my hands shake. I continued to scramble, searching frantically for something that wasn’t there. No, no, no.

It was then I heard it.

Armor clanged outside, snapping my focus. Footsteps—heavy, rhythmic—moving closer, so loud that they boomed through the stone. Soldiers. They were coming for me.

The door burst open in the next moment, the force shaking the walls as six vampire soldiers stormed inside. I spun, baring my fangs in a low, guttural snarl. “What are you doing in here?” My voice trembled with fury, but I already knew. The answer was written in the cold indifference of the vampire leading them, his pale face framed by dark, slicked-back hair.

“You are under arrest for the murder of Master Bran Velenus.”

A growl rumbled deep in my chest as I watched the soldiers. “Where is Sion?”

They didn’t answer. Instead, they encircled me, stakes of hawthorn gripped in their hands, ready to strike. Tension coiled through my muscles as they surrounded me.

And then the pain hit, sharp and blinding as a stake pierced through my back. I gasped, the agony ripping through me like fire. Darkness swarmed my vision, dragging me under.

I woke to a searing ache in my arms, which were wrenched behind me in chains, the sharp metal biting into my wrists. My vision swam, blurred and thick with the fog of pain, but slowly, the world sharpened around me. Iron bars enclosed me, cold and unforgiving, and beyond that, nothing but the yawning darkness of a cavern. It was damp, the air thick with the smell of wet rocks. From the oculus above, moonlight poured into my cage.

They’d taken my butterfly pendant. My gaze flicked up to the top of the cage, which was covered in iron. There might be just enough shadow cast by the roof of that thing that I could avoid getting burned, but I wasn’t sure.

Hollowness carved through my chest. The pain in my shoulder spiderwebbed through my body from where they’d jammed the hawthorn stake into me.

It wasn’t anywhere near my heart, so it wouldn’t kill me—but gods, the toxins slithering through my body felt like poison. My veins burned, and the hunger made it difficult to think straight. I swallowed hard, trying to think clearly.

Was there a way out of this?

I forced my gaze to the cavern walls. Symbols were carved into the stone, worn from the centuries, etched with the weight of old magic. I remembered reading about symbols that had been carved generations ago, well before the Tyrenians came, when people sacrificed to the gods. Bones lay scattered across the rocky floor, bleached white and brittle with age. This place wasn’t just a prison—it was the shrine to the death god. I was trapped in the pit, not far from where I’d practiced magic with Sion.

Before he learned what I’d done.

I leaned against the iron bars of the cage, trying to force the panic down.

I couldn’t afford weakness now.

I closed my eyes, imagining myself in a cozy cottage with Leo. The light of the setting sun streamed in through the windows, casting a golden warmth over a kitchen of rough-hewn wood. The scent of fresh apples filled the air as Leo carefully worked on his honey glaze for the tarts, his expression beaming. Lydia and Anselm would be over soon. The table was set, and distant laughter floated on the wind. Through my window, I had a view of the sparkling sea.

For a moment, it felt so real, like I could reach out and touch it. Then I opened my eyes, and reality hit me like a punch to the gut. My breath caught, gasping for air that suddenly felt too thin.

I closed my eyes again, fighting the tears. If I were going to survive this—if I had any hope—I’d have to stay in that imaginary place. I tried again, forcing myself to imagine something better than this cage in a pit.

This time, the image that came was different. I was in the forest with Sion under the glow of the stars, bathed in the crackling warmth of a fire. The shifting light illuminated his perfect face, and his golden eyes sparked in the firelight like twin flames. I’d never seen someone so beautiful. I never wanted to leave him.

“I made you something,” he said quietly.

My eyebrows arched. “You did? For what?”

Sion leaned in, close enough that I could feel the heat of him. His lips curved into a faint smile. “It’s only fair. You’ve been feeding me for days.”

“You didn’t eat any of it.” I frowned at him. “How do you survive without eating?”

“No, I didn’t eat it. But you have no idea how much it meant to me that you tried. You might be the first person who’s ever really tried looking after me.”

He reached into his cloak and pulled out something small. When he handed it to me, I saw it was a delicate wood carving, intricately worked with the designs of poppies and stars. The craftsmanship was so fine, so detailed, that I sighed.

“You made this?” My fingertips brushed over it. “You know I love white poppies. I had no idea you were an artist, though.”

He shrugged. “Well, I’m not. But maybe you inspired something in me, and there’s fuck all to do out here, isn’t there?”

I felt myself glowing in the firelight.

I didn’t want to ask the next question, but it slipped out before I could stop myself. “Are you well enough now to return to your family?”

His eyes darkened, and he held my gaze. “Yes…maybe. Maybe I should go soon. But strangely, I’ve started to like it out here, living in my cave in the woods.”

Hope sparked. “You can always return.”

The vision slipped away again, leaving me in the cold darkness of the pit, and the pain and hunger came slamming back into me.

Was I losing my mind, or had that vision felt like more than a vision? Was it a fantasy—an incredibly vivid fantasy—or a memory returning to me?

I shifted my body, trying to lean more comfortably against the cage.

I desperately wanted to explain things to Sion in person, to tell him the truth, to make him understand. But how much of a chance did anyone really give another person when it came to the murder of someone they loved?

I closed my eyes, desperate for someone, anyone, to come down. Why was I even still alive? I could already imagine my future—dragged out to the morning light, arms bound.

Maybe they’d let me burn in the sun.

Bran was probably well-beloved here, based on the stories I’d heard, and they’d surely delight in seeing his murderer punished.

I didn’t want Leo to be there for that.

The thought twisted my stomach, and a wave of nausea rose.

Just outside my cage, I could see a rough, ancient set of stairs that led up to the temple. Panic struck, and I gripped the iron bars, trying to push the door open, but I couldn’t budge it an inch. I grunted, rattling at the bars of the cage until my fingers ached.

How long until Sion came down to confront me? To scream at me in person for what I’d done? Centuries of friendship he’d shared with Bran…

Centuries.

I hadn’t even been alive half a century. What was I to that kind of bond?

What had made me think that coming there was an option at all? Maybe I hadn’t had much choice at the time. I’d been desperate to keep Leo away from the Order.

Now, I was starting to see how this option had been doomed from the start.

Pain flared through my body from my shoulder. My fingers curled into fists, the iron cuffs cutting into my wrists as I flexed against them. The metal was cold, unforgiving, just like that place. Just like him.

I couldn’t remember how long I’d been in that cage. Hours? Days? Time had become meaningless down there, where the only company was the skull carvings etched into the walls. I’d named them: Tybalt, Ysualt, Baldwin…

They were not amazing conversationalists.

I lay slumped on my side, too weak to move, staring at the ancient stairs that curved up to the temple. The hunger had passed from an unbearable ache to something worse—a hollow emptiness that seeped into my bones. My blood felt like poison, burning through my veins, and the darkness inside me churned like a storm.

And as the world around me started to grow lighter, fear wrapped its icy fingers around my heart, forcing me to find some way to stand. Dawn was breaking—and there, in the pit, I was directly beneath the oculus, with only a small roof to protect me.

The first rays of dawn crept over the sky above, a sliver of light piercing the gloom. It crawled across the stones, slowly washing them in gold. It slipped down over the intricate skull carvings, making it seem as if they were coming to life. Tybalt’s hollow eyes caught the dawn light first, his empty gaze staring at me.

With every inch of light that shifted across the wall, I managed to scramble farther back to the center of the cage, dragging my body across the cold iron, shrinking into myself.

When I reached the opposite side, I pressed myself against the bars where the shadows still pooled thickly. My breath caught as the sunlight stretched toward me, relentlessly marching on.

I slumped back down on my side, too weak to move, once again staring at the ancient stairs, curling up into a smaller ball to stay away from the sun. The darkness that lived inside me writhed, desperate to escape.

But there was nowhere to go. There was just the light advancing and the shadows shrinking beneath their onslaught.