Zale's wounds were healing. Before long the skin would heal over it and would be as if Cade's knife had never torn through her. Nora watched her, waiting for any sign of life, but she knew it would be hours before Zale began to revive. Even after she did, she would never be the same. Her life had ended forever on this night, even if she went on living for a thousand more years. Nora could have killed Cade where he stood, standing over his useless pendant.
"Look what you did to her." She hissed, stroking Zale's hair back from her forehead.
"She'll live," he replied, tucking the ruby into an inner pocket of his coat. "It was the only compromise. I didn't intend to kill her, but this way, she can live and decide to die on her own if she so wishes."
"You know the ruby is worthless, right?" Nora said. "There's no way to—"
"It will save Carmella," Cade interrupted, his voice rising over hers. "It was worth any price."
Even after centuries of betrayal and heartbreak, he still believed there was such a thing as happily ever after. Nora didn't know what to believe of his naïveté. "Zale found Lillian's research and notes on the magic of the striga. It's working through Carmella. We can't save her from it, even with the pendant. Carmella is becoming one of the striga, the only way to stop it is to kill her like one of them."
Cade glanced at the girl lying across Nora's lap. "As you said, dear sister, she's basically a child. A child who nearly got herself killed trying to protect an indestructible madwoman, so you'll have to forgive me if I don't consider her an authority on the matter."
Nora set Zale gently down on the cool grass, fighting still raging around them; she was reluctant to let her go for even a moment. She could have been the little sister Nora never had, or even a younger version of herself. The self that Nora had been before vampires and werewolves had chipped away at her family, before the prospect of an eternity full of fighting. Nora stood, trying not to look at the girl at her feet.
"Enough is enough. I'm sorry for your pain, but open your eyes. Look at what your quest to drag Carmella back into the world has cost, think how much we still have left to lose. Our people are dying around us, this stupidity of yours has torn our family apart. Turned good people into madwomen of revenge and petty rivalries into war."
"Don't blame Carmella for your own foolish choices." Cade scoffed. "She didn't force you to poison our wedding feast, to hunt us down on our honeymoon. You've done more than enough to tear our family apart on your own and all over your jealousy of a woman struggling under a curse. If you had ever been on her side and or on my side, we could have resolved this ages ago."
"She shouldn't even be alive!" Nora shouted, losing her patience entirely. "You did all of this for a dead woman! She had her chance at life. It was tragic and pointless and miserable, and I would have done whatever you needed if you had only had the decency to mourn her. Just grieve, like everyone else in the world has to do. Learn to move on."
Cade's hands balled into fists, Nora instinctively edged her body in front of Zale's, shielding her from whatever wrath he still had left in him. "You have a lot of nerve, talking about who is supposed to live and die. Our whole existence is because of celestial entities being fucking bored, Nora. The rules that people must live and die aren't strict, my wife is waiting at home to prove it yet again. With this ruby and her magic, she can have the same chance that we all do and you're crazy if you think that I don't intend to give that chance to her, the same chance our father gave to us!"
It was hopeless. Cade refused to accept that there were things in the world outside of his control, even while he was surrounded by the obvious.
"Of course you'll give it to her." Nora surrendered, changing tack and softening her tone. "Cade, I'm not saying that you must keep the ruby away from Carmella, or that you shouldn't do everything in your power to help her. What I'm telling you is that it's not in our power. The ruby won't help her, neither will whatever magic she's cooking up in your attic right now. I'm not trying to talk you out of this. I'm trying to prepare you for the fact that it will not work."
Something shifted in her peripheral vision, Cade saw it, too. For a brief, hopeful moment, she thought it might be Zale, healed from her horrible wound, but the girl still lay motionless on the grass. Instead, it was her sister who rose. Lillian Krytos jumped to her, her spine and neck snapping straight even as Nora watched in horror. There was a strange red gleam in her eyes, a light that was also somehow a blankness. Cade stepped forward and snapped her neck again. The gesture was almost impatient, as if he were annoyed. Nora realized that he didn't understand what had happened. He didn't know about the beacon, how the magic worked, Carmella would keep calling to the dead magi until they had all returned. Lillian was now a striga. Lillian popped her neck back into place again, lunging for Cade almost faster than Nora could follow. Her hands were outstretched, her fingers curving into talons.
"She's one of them now," Nora shouted, leaping on her back and tearing out her eyes. It was just like Zale had warned her. Dead magi would rise. It must be happening out in the main battlefield, too. The living magi were being reborn as striga. Nora wondered how Aleister and his armies were faring if the dead army kept growing in size. Lillian fought like a demon, whipping Nora around so hard that her skull cracked against Cade's with a sickening sound. Nora caught Lillian by her hair and twisted hard, pulling the magi off her brother and catapulting her through the air toward the open grass of the rolling hills.
"She's mine." Cade snarled, holding up one arm to block Nora from following.
"Abominations belong to everyone." She snapped, shoving Cade's arm down and chasing after the newly risen Lillian. She was just as responsible for Zale's condition as Cade was, maybe even more. He may have struck the blow, but Lillian had created this nightmare and forced them all to navigate it. Even dead she was more trouble and Nora's hands itched for the warm, slimy feel of her heart. She caught the undead magi before Cade could get there, but Lillian swung wildly at her head and Nora ducked, giving him time to reach them. He twisted Lillian's head all the way around, shattering her spinal column for the third time in a few minutes. By now Nora knew it was unlikely to do much good. There was only one way to kill Lillian, at least as long as Carmella was still alive. Nora would have liked to do it herself, but just taking part in the death of Lillian would still be a memory to cherish. Nora grabbed at the dead woman's arms, locking them behind her struggling body and generously offering her to Cade. He plunged his fist into her chest, and for a moment Nora thought she could feel his searching fingers through the skin of Lillian's back. Then he found what he was searching for and pulled, ripping the organ out through the gaping hole in her rib cage. Nora could feel Lillian's body go slack, slumping against her own, a flash of red erupted from the eyes, and Nora dropped her smoldering boody unceremoniously to the ground.
"Well," Cade said in a conversational tone, squeezing the heart until it was like a misshapen towel. "We may have had our differences. But if I have to spend the night tearing hearts from chests, I can't think of any better company than yours."
The thought of having avenged Carmella somehow had brought a sly smile to his face, an expression with which Nora was familiar with. Cade thought he had won, that nothing could stop him now from saving the love of his life from her deadly fate. Nora knew he was wrong with every part of her being, but the sight of him standing there, so happy in the moonlight, softened her own heart until it was nearly unrecognizable as well. There was no harm in letting him try, not really. A few more vampires might die, probably an extra handful of werewolves. But the upside was that Cade would finally realize what she had been trying to tell him all along. There was no magic that could repair all of the damage that Lillian had done. Trying to rescue Carmella from her fate, and failing one more time, might be just what her brother needed to swallow in order to finally realize it was time to give up.
"Go home and try the ruby," she suggested. "I'll take care of things here."
Cade discarded the heart, touched his coat pocket that held the pendant, then turned and ran for the mansion. Watching him go, Nora hoped against hope that somehow she and Zale had been wrong.
YOU ARE READING
Accordia - Book Two
FantasyCade, a year later still stricken with grief is doing anything to get his love back. Aleister, now vampire king of Accordia, keeping his brother's mess cleaned up, and making deals with newly fractured werewolf packs. Nora, still grieving her lover...