Page 43 of Bitten By Bloodmoon
“I don’t need to prove anything.”
“Not to me. But you do to yourself.”
She hesitates, thinking it through, but I know she still wants to kill me. She still dreams about it after Rowena’s death.
“Take your revenge,”I say in her head.
That does it. Her rage overwhelms her thoughts as she runs for me. For a second, I’m not even sure she bothered to pullher weapon from where it was tucked between her hip and her leggings, but she does. Pulling it free from the sheath, she leaps toward me.
I don’t move. I let her attack. I want her to see the damage she can do, but also how much more she could do with proper training. Despite her wanting to be independent and fierce, she’s going to need me and my pack to teach her how to live that way.
She does have one thing I don’t have to teach her—guts.
Her blade slices down hard as she aims for my neck, but the angle is all wrong, and the swipe of her forearms sends the blade against my shoulder, slicing into my deltoid muscle rather than across my neck. She yanks her arm back, aiming for my chest. She doesn’t hesitate; she drives the knife down with both of her hands through my heart.
She releases her blade with a heavy breath before looking me in the eyes. She blinks several times, as if she can’t believe what she just did.
“I’m—I’m so sorry. I’ll grab Riven. You’re going to be okay. Just—”
She tries to pull away, intending to hunt down Riven, but I catch her wrist before she can climb off me.
I grab the handle of the blade and yank it out with a hiss before tossing it on the floor. The wound immediately starts healing itself. The mix of vampire and wolf shifter blood in me is tending to my wounds. I rarely, if ever, need a healer for my body to heal.
“Lesson one—don’t ever sink your weapon into an enemy unless you are sure it will kill them. Lesson two—only a stake through the heart can kill a vampire.” In the next blink of the eye, we’ve switched positions. She’s beneath me, her warm body melting my icy exterior as I press my canines against her throat, giving her a view of the wound that is already mostly healed.
“You’re brave. Possibly the bravest of us all. And you’re mourning. You want revenge. You want to make all the pain go away. But letting me or another vampire or witch kill you isn’t the answer you’re looking for. That’s just letting us win.”
Her heart thunders in her chest as she stills with my sharp teeth brushing against her flesh. She swallows as if taunting me, like she knows I won’t actually bite her. She doesn’t know me very well.
“We both need each other—”
“I don’t need you,” she protests.
“You do if you want to stay alive. If you want your wolf back. If you want to be able to back up that bark with some bite and teeth of your own.”
She growls.
I grin. “I want to make a deal with you, one we cast in blood this time.”
“No, I’m not making any sort of magical deal with you.”
“Even one that assures I won’t kill you? That gives you back some of the power in our dynamic? And that ultimately ensures you have the power to survive in this world?”
“No deal can give me all of that.”
“I need the information to break the curse. You need that knowledge as well—it will give you back your own power. Power to control your own fate again, instead of Ambrose or me assuming you are our mate. And you want your wolf back. We agree to share any knowledge we gain about the curse or how to get your wolf back, through our visions and by consulting other seers together. We won’t stop until we find out how to break the curse and you have gained your wolf back.”
“It’s not enough.”
“I vow to protect you, no matter the consequences. I will do everything in my power to keep you alive, including sacrificing myself if it comes down to it.”
“And I would have to do no such thing for you?”
I chuckle. “No, you don’t have to protect me. In fact, you can continue to actively try to kill me.”
Her lips curl up at that. “What happens if we don’t honor this deal, if we seal it with blood?”
“Depends on the transgression, but usually the magic of the deal would try its best to force you to honor it. If you still didn’t, then it would cause you physical pain. And if you really broke the deal, you’d die.”
