The Blood Rite

Chapter Fifty Five

The wound was healed when she woke the next morning. She'd been in and out of sleep. At one point she'd seen Emelia sitting on the side of her bed, putting the straw of a blood bottle to Ruby's lips.

"Drink," she'd urged, lifting Ruby's head with surprising gentleness. Ruby had obeyed a few long gulps before falling into the darkness of sleep again.

When she broke through the fog of fatigue, it was the evening of that day and she was all alone in her room. She didn't move for a long moment. The memory of the night before was tickling the back of her mind. No, she thought, just forget. Forget.

It didn't work like that. Thinking about forgetting it, only brought the memory tearing down her shield and invading her mind. She jerked up and off of the bed with a sharp gasp. The carpet spun beneath her feet. She dropped, her knees banging to it.

Orpheus had tortured her. The man she'd kissed, who she'd thought she was slowly falling for and whom she thought was falling for her. Worse than that, he'd done it with a smile. As she'd screamed, as she'd cried and begged.

Ruby gagged, choking on invisible blood. She remembered the pain vividly. It had felt like it would drive her over the edge and it nearly did. She couldn't do that again. Ruby couldn't handle the pain.

Tears raced down her cheeks and she pulled her knees to her chest, sobbing into her legs. She wanted to be tough enough to fight him, to brave the pain to protect those she loves. Not only those she loves, but the entire vampire and human race. But if she can't stop him, the supposed most powerful vampire, then no one can.

Ruby didn't know how long she sat there on the floor, tears rushing out of her until the banks were dry before a hollow, aching numbness settled over her. Surprisingly, the darkness inside the chasm in her was calm. It wasn't trying to consume her.

She thought of how Orpheus controlled it. What had he meant in the stone building? Because she didn't claim it, he could? How? Had he claimed his? He'd told her he hadn't and yet, he'd lied about so many things already. Surely he hadn't been born so wicked.

She took a long shower, finding herself zoning out throughout. Her own screams and the screams of the hunters rang in her mind. They were all dead because of her. Orpheus had come for her and killed them all because she'd wanted to warn them.

And Talon. . .

Her heart squeezed painfully. He's alive. Halle's alive. But she missed them. Out on their own, they still had the Shadows and hunters to worry about. Despite Halle's promise, Ruby would never see them again. If she wasn't dead before she could, she'd be far from the person they knew.

Once the hot water had run out, Ruby dressed as if in slow-motion. She sat down at her vanity, unable to walk the rest of the way across the room to her bed. Hesitantly she lifted her eyes to the mirror. The girl who looked back was unrecognizable. Her eyes were not as glittering as they'd once been. Music had left her soul and she wore a permanent frown. Even her hair seemed limp.

She sighed and tore her gaze away.

The doors to the room blew open and Orpheus strode in, already wearing a smile. When his eyes fell on her haunted expression, the fear shinning in her gaze, his lips stretched wider. He wore a long black velvet coat with more black clothes beneath and he was adjusting his cuffs as he strode up to her, "Ruby."

She stiffened as he moved to hover over her. Her mind raced, her legs itching to take her far from this room and him. He leaned over her shoulder, splaying his hands on either side of her, "We move tonight."

Her eyes jerked up to his in the reflection, "Tonight," she breathed, "what do you mean?"

"We are launching our attack tonight. Emelia will get you ready."

The breath knocked out of Ruby's chest, "Who are we attacking?"

"Well," he said, stroking a finger down her cheek, "the ones who kidnapped you, dear."

She flinched from him. Somehow, his touch made her mind go blank, the drumming of panic mixing with the numbness of shock to keep her trapped on this seat. The hunters. He'd just killed twenty plus and now he wanted to kill more?

"How many?" She gasped out.

The side of his lips crooked, "It doesn't matter." Again, that finger brushed down the curve of her cheek, the hollow of her jaw and trailing down her neck, "This is your blood rite, Ruby."

"The Shadows won't touch my blood."

"No," he said with a smile, "they won't."

Ruby sat still as he continued to stroke her skin, feeling her insides screaming. As her lips began to quiver she clamped them tight. She wanted to fling his hand off of her. To kill him. Ruby didn't mind having another's blood on her hands if it was his. Then she'd destroy the Shadows.

How would you be better than him then? A voice hissed inside of her. She wanted to destroy an entire group of people that she saw as a threat to her and others' safety unlike Orpheus who wanted to kill and doom thousands of soul for greed.

When he decided he'd shaken her enough, he took a small step back. Cool air rushed in and Ruby drank it greedily. She felt his eyes on her in the mirror but she couldn't look at him. Hoping he'd leave, she didn't say anything.

In a decievingly gentle voice, he said, "Give in to the darkness and this will all be easier. Give in and forget."

Her eyes flew up to him then. Forget. Hadn't she wanted to forget only moments ago? Why now, that he was giving her a way too, was she suddenly opposed to it?

She held his gaze for a long moment before he turned and strode from the room. The second the door clicked shut she relaxed, slumping in her seat.

Ruby was going to take part in a mass murder. Maybe more than one. And she was going to be a key part in it. Her heart was racing so hard she felt like she couldn't breathe. She'd never survive like this and she had to do it tonight. Emelia would be there soon.

Again, her eyes rose to meet the girl's in the mirror. Give in and forget. She couldn't. She'd become just like him and maybe worse.

But what if you didn't?

Ruby would no longer be the girl Talon and Halle loved. No longer the girl that her grandparents could be proud of or the girl who sat before a mirror just like this while Lexi put fake red hair color through her hair. Her teeth dug deep into her cheek.

If she did this there was no going back. What do you have to go back to? She'd never see anyone she loves again and even if she did, she'd either been too messed up from the kills she commited or she'd be proud. Either way, she was on her own and stuck with Orpheus.

Ruby grabbed the brush on the vanity, taking deep breaths, and clung to it for her sanity. She focused on the chasm inside of her, allowing some to rise up just enough for her to feel it. Her mind continued to race. Softly she brushed an invisible finger down the lips of the chasm and said, Don't destroy me. Help me to destroy him.

She closed her eyes and let the years of her past life playout before her. Ruby clung to every laugh, every tear. To her friends' faces. Halle and her at the dance sitting together and laughing for what had felt like the first time in months. Stopping only when she got to the memory of Talon and her's kiss.

A single tear rolled down her cheek. She scrubbed it away and sniffed. Stroking the darkness again she released one more deep breath and fell in to the torrent of darkness. It consumed her. It swallowed every memory, every touch and taste until there was nothing but that darkness and hunger.

A deep hunger for revenge.

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