Brink of Eternity (Guardians of Ascension #2.5)(25)
Author: Caris Roane

When he arrived, ready to do battle, he froze at the sight of the death vampire holding Elise, her back to his front, a knife at her throat. A small lantern on the floor of what appeared to be a dark cavern provided the only light. “One step, warrior, and I’ll slit her throat.” He waved his knife around the cavern. “Then we’ll all just take turns drinking. Your choice.”

At least a dozen pretty-boys stood around, apparently ready to enjoy the show.

Gideon saw it all, the ruse, the trap, his death and hers.

As death vampires gripped him by the arms, he met her gaze and sent,I’m sorry. This whole thing was a setup.

I know.

In two hundred years, Gideon hadn’t known this kind of sudden despair, as though he had fallen into a hole that had no end. He expected his death to be swift, for a blade to simply slide through some vital part of his body, perhaps even through his neck, but no such horror occurred.

Instead, rough hands pushed him to his knees, bound his hands behind his back, then did the same to his feet, joining both with a rope.

The death vamp used the point of his blade and pierced Elise’s throat, just deep enough. Her small cry pierced Gideon’s heart. He leaned down and licked the flow of blood, then turned to look at Gideon.

“She tastes of power. When I drink her to death, my friend, my power will grow, then we’ll see what kind of war can be waged.”

Gideon saw red, a deep crimson sheen over his eyes. He pulled on the ropes, but whoever had bound him knew a thing or two about fashioning knots.

The death vamp leaned close to Elise. “Did you know one of the vampires he killed in a recent foray was a woman?”

“Yes.”

“Think less of him, Elise? Your woman-killer?”

“A death vampire, despite gender, still drinks people to death.”

“True. We wouldn’t want to discriminate, now would we? But don’t you want to know why I’ve brought you here?”

“I assumed it was because Greaves wants me dead, because of my level of power.”

“Greaves,” he snorted. He sounded disgusted. “What do I care about the Commander?”

Gideon watched Elise frown. She shifted slightly trying to look up at her captor. “Then if you aren’t in league with Greaves, what am I doing here?”

“You have to ask Warrior Gideon that question.”

She looked back at Gideon, still frowning.

Gideon shifted his gaze to the death vamp and enlightenment dawned. He’d never thought of death vampires as retaining any degree of their humanity. He had known plenty of monsters who did rage the earth, killing without conscience, hurting as many people as possible.

But there were always a few who had fallen into the lifestyle, perhaps unaware of the consequences, perhaps with a partial immunity to the full breadth of the addiction. He believed that was what he saw now as he met the death vampire’s gaze, in the deep shadows beneath his eyes, the crevices beside his mouth. He saw pain. A lot of pain.

“I killed the woman you loved,” Gideon said.

“Bravo. Give the warrior points for having at least some intelligence.” He pressed the point into Elise’s throat, broke skin, then dipped down to lick once more.

Gideon growled and strained at the ropes.

The death vamp laughed. “Elise, now you will learn something that all your precious warriors have failed to tell you. Did you know that many of us take wives and try to live out our lives as best we can? My wife wasn’t doing any harm. In fact, we were helping Mortal Earth by ridding it of criminal elements. We preyed on the drug and human traffickers in Mortal Earth Phoenix. My wife had been adamant about that. She was good for me. Now she’s gone and now, Gideon, I have what you love. But unlike you, I’m going to give you some time for a farewell, and I’m doing that because I loved my wife. She would have insisted on it.”

He waved all the other death vamps away, and like a dark fog, they slipped into the shadows and hidden pathways of the cavern and disappeared. When they were gone, he released Elise, giving her a shove so that she fell forward, hitting her knees hard.

She was on her feet almost as fast. She crossed the space between and lunged for Gideon, grabbing him, pressing herself up against him, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Fold us out of here,” she whispered.

He tried, but nothing happened. “Can’t. There’s some kind of blocking mechanism, which means that no one else can get in here either.”

Elise drew back and looked at him, at his longish dark blond hair, messed up from the battle; at his dark blue eyes, which she loved so much; at his strong cheekbones and jawline; at his fierce expression.

There was no way out.

Reality struck hard that this might just be the last time she would ever look at Gideon. Funny how she had been thinking in terms of decades and even centuries, when in reality all she really had was this moment with him.

She sat back on her heels and stared at him. The past two years at the Blood and Bite flowed through her mind, the many times she had made love with him, how their time together often turned so beautifully wicked.

At the same moment, she recalled being under her bed as a child, lying on her back, plucking at the super-thin fabric that covered the bottom of the box spring, afraid of who she was, afraid of her emerging powers, alone in her struggles.

She had always been alone. Until Gideon.

Did it all end here? Was Gideon to die because he’d cared for her enough to follow her trace into this cavern, this trap?

In all the time that she’d been with him, she’d never understood the most remarkable truth of all—that she loved him. She loved his ferocity and his attentiveness, she loved his dedication to his men, to the fighting Militia Warriors, she loved his devotion to his sister. She loved him.

Without knowing exactly how it had happened, for the first time in her life, she had fallen in love.Gideon, she sent, just a whisper through his mind. Then she put her lips to his and she kissed him.

For some reason, the thought that he was to die, that his wonderful service as a Thunder God Warrior was to end tonight, became utterly unacceptable. She drew back and ran her hand through his hair, savoring the sight of him, longing suddenly for all the years they wouldn’t have together.

She had been foolish, even reckless, with what had been given to her. She had denied what was right beneath her nose for the past two years, that by some miracle love had found her. Could a woman have ever been more obtuse?

But what would have been different for her if she had known? She looked into his eyes and willed him to understand just how much she loved him.