Page 64 of The Sanguine Selection
I turned my back on Navar and faced my kings, neck craning to see their faces. “Don’t make me do this,” I pleaded in whispered words but their faces become inhumanly impassive.
Mikhail lifted his hands and gripped my shoulders. The usual awareness in his eyes was muted, even his scent was slightly off. I can’t even put the shift into words. “It is just a chair, pet. It will not bite you.” His words were cold as he spun me around and guided me to the throne. It just feels wrong, like a snake coiled to strike. He turned me again and practically pushed me into it.
I waited with bated breath, sure that some harm would come to me but nothing happened.
Lord Navar began to clap and I lifted my gaze to his, instantly regretting the emptiness in his gaze as the resounding applause became almost deafening. Navar beckoned to someone off stage and a human servant rushed forward with a golden tray perched on gloved fingers. Three chalices filled with what I can only imagine is blood, are offered to him, then the kings who all take their cups.
Navar lifts his glass. “I propose a toast.” I expect him to drone on about the kings and loyalty and blah, blah, blah, but he turns his attention on me. “To the newest Blood Slave. May the power in her blood awaken us all.”
Marek and Mikhail let their eyes linger on me as they sip from their own glasses. But something happens as the blood touches their lips. Their eyes widen in what appears to be shock, but as quickly as it comes, their expressions smooth into blank stares.
“The time for change has come!” Navar practically shouts, shifting my gaze back to him. “Libarynn has always been a coven of power. Created long ago by legendary vampires, Alrick and Vastryn Novikov, whose blood has been shared with us all. We areallpart of their family now, perpetuated by the sharing of the blood of the kings.”
“Here, here!” someone in the crowd shouts and that tension I’ve been feeling begins to grow, pressing on my chest, pushing me further into the throne til my spine is against the crimson fabric.
“Most of you do not remember Alrick, but I do.” Navar’s gaze moves along the coven and stops on a vampire I’ve seen twice before. “Rikkon, I know you remember,” Navar says with a laugh and Rikkon lifts his own goblet before taking a sip. “Alrick was a fierce vampire who, above all else, valued power. Cruel as a leader, ruthless as an enemy, he led with a sternness which was never questioned. He was almost tyrannical, but effective. Our enemies were few and those that were too ignorant to bow before them were swiftly disposed of. He left no room for argument, no room for consideration. He acted as he saw fit, almost instinctively. Nothing mattered more than the continuous rise of Libarynn. Alliances did not matter. And why would they? Back then,weheld all the power. Any allegiance made would do us a disservice. He saw that, recognized it, and ruled the coven with a heavy fist making our coven the most powerful it ever was.”
I turn to look at my kings, to see their reactions to all of this. They stood almost emotionless, unmoving, not even blinking as Navar walked back and forth across the front of the stage.
“My kings,” I whispered, trying to get their attention, but it’s like they can’t even hear me. Like I’m not here at all.
“And let us not forget about Vastryn, the seductress who wormed her way into the heart of Alrick, a merehuman.”
My eyes widened at this, to learn one of the founders of Libarynn was human, like me.
Navar paused, sipping from his chalice. “Yes. Her blood is the single reason our newest Blood Slave sits in the very throne where all who came before her sat. Alrick’s lust for her grew and grew until he no longer saw things clearly. Until the slave became his equal, a blasphemous consideration for any vampire king or not. So much of her blood King Alrick had consumed that more of hers filled his body than his own. And thus, the first Blood Slave was also born, and with it, his existence was bound to her own.”
I swallowed hard, not liking where this was going. “Marek,” I said a little louder. “Mikhail, please. Look at me.” My gaze darted from them to Navar, terror creeping along my very bones. They just stood there, staring into oblivion.
Navar takes another sip from his glass then plucks my leash from Marek’s hand. Something in my chest cracks at the ease in which they gave me to him. “Of course I saw her for what she was—a weakness. But how were we, the members of Libarynn, going to get around that little problem. How are we going to move forward? Alrick lost his life to Vastryn. After years of feigning love and adoration for the king, she stabbed him right in the heart as he slept then fled the kingdom. Her whereabouts were never located.”
“Marek!” I shout this time, uncaring who hears me. My unease is suffocating, and I push off the throne but am instantly propelled back as a pair of gold shackles clamps down on my wrists.
No. No. No!
A length of chain affixed both shackles is threaded through two holes in the stage floor. Panic rises as I try to lift my hands, but the weight is so heavy, forcing my arms down onto the armrests of the throne.
“Mikhail!” I scream. “Help me!”
The kings’ chalices drop to the ground, and Navar cackles, head thrown back as one by one they fall, literally crumpling to the ground.
“No!” I tug at the binds, fear now a bitter taste on my tongue. Commotion in the crowd rings in my ears, the clash of weapons, hisses and snarls.
An attack.
Suddenly the throne tips backwards and I’m falling, falling, falling, screaming as I drop into darkness.
For a moment, I’m sure I’ve died but then the muffled sounds of the fighting above become clear again and my eyes start to make out images in the dark. The pulsing sound of my blood rushes through my ears and the clinking of the chain as I try to move but can’t.
I’m trapped.
A whoosh sounds and the room blazes to life. Two huge, black candelabras each housing a dozen pillar candles ignite at once. I regard the room, taking it all in, twisting as much as I can to see all around me. Gray stone walls rise above me, and my throne sits in an alcove with a little arched ceiling just above it.
I realize now the throne is on a platform and just beyond the light of the candles are two rows of four benches, facing towards me. My stomach plummets.
It’s an altar.
Movement from the shadows has me jerking my head to the sound of footsteps. Navar appears unscathed and ominous. He narrows his black, beady eyes on me and stalks over to the throne. My whole body tightens at his closeness, at the desire blazing in his eyes.
