Crimson Debt Read online

  I followed her, noting that I had obviously gotten her out of bed. She was wearing a long nightshirt with Tweety Bird printed on it and purple and black striped socks. Tweety was saying, “I taught I taw a puddy tat!” Again, not very witchlike—but who was I to say how witches had to dress for bed? Besides, right now I was more concerned with vampires.

  “Tell me about the stake,” I said as soon as we sat down on the creaky old swing. “What is it doing to Corbin? What’s wrong with him?”

  She frowned and crossed her arms over her chest. “There is such a thing as client/witch confidentiality. And Alec Corbin is strong enough to tear me apart if he finds out I told you something he doesn’t want you to know.”

  “He won’t touch you,” I promised. “I, on the other hand…” I poked the stake at her again and she flinched. “You’re going to tell me everything,” I said. “And start at the beginning.”

  She sighed. “Fine. It’ll be too late for him to do anything to me soon anyway.”

  That sent a cold chill down my spine but I simply nodded at her. “Go on.”

  “He came to me about a week ago—the night before you saw me, actually. He said he wanted something to kill a vampire. A really old and powerful one.”

  “And what did you tell him?” I asked, thinking that Corbin must have gone directly to see her after our second encounter where he had “healed” me.

  She shrugged. “I told him it was impossible, of course. Vamps that old are really hard to kill.”

  “Tell me about it,” I muttered. “But he used this stake to kill one—I saw it with my own eyes. How did he do it?”

  She looked uncomfortable. “I spelled it for him. The only way to kill a vamp that old is with a major sacrifice. So, well…”

  “So what?” I insisted, frowning at her. “What did you do?”

  Gwendolyn looked at me angrily. “It’s dark magic, all right? I shouldn’t have done it—Grams would die if she knew. But I needed what he was offering too much to turn him down.”

  “Which was?”

  She sighed. “A vial of his blood. Do you know how powerful four hundred year old vampire blood is? The spells you can work with it, the revenge you can take—”

  “Okay, I’m not interested in hearing how you used Corbin’s blood to get back at the nasty cheerleaders from high school who were mean to you,” I snapped. “Just tell me about the sacrifice part of it—that doesn’t sound good.”

  “It’s not,” she snapped back. “It’s ugly all the way around. I told him it would be fatal but he said he didn’t care. That it had to be done to protect the one he loved.”

  “Fatal?” I almost put a hand to my heart and then remembered I was holding the hateful stake. “What are you talking about, fatal?”

  “The sacrifice is a life for a life,” Gwendolyn explained slowly, as though she was speaking to a two year old. “The only way he could kill the other vamp was by giving up his own life to do it.”

  “Oh God…” I remembered how Corbin had stabbed Roderick with the stake and then stabbed himself with it as well. “So he what…he gave the stake Roderick’s blood and then his own?”

  Gwendolyn nodded. “That’s how it works. Once the stake has tasted the blood of the victim and the blood of the killer, it takes the victim at once and the killer more slowly.”

  “So Corbin’s dying?” I couldn’t believe it—didn’t want to believe it. It couldn’t be true—it just couldn’t.

  But the witch was nodding her head. “Yeah, he is. In fact, I’m sort of surprised he’s lasted this long.”

  “What?” I wanted to strangle her. “You mean he’s going to die now?”

  “Well, probably not tonight.” She looked at the stake which was lying in my lap, still partially wrapped in my jacket. “I’d say from the color of the blood on the runes he has at least one more night.” She looked up at me. “So at least you have time to say goodbye.”

  “You listen to me…” I grabbed her by the front of her Tweety Bird night shirt and yanked her close, shoving my face into hers. “I’m not saying goodbye to Corbin. I’m not saying goodbye because you are going to fix this.”

  She pulled away from my grip, a pissed off look on her delicate features.

  “Keep your voice down! I can’t fix it—it’s dark magic. A binding spell.”

  “Well, unbind it,” I demanded. “Look, you said it had to do with sacrifice, right? What would happen if I…” I took a deep breath and looked down at the stake in my lap. “If I shoved it into my chest too?”

  “What do you think would happen if you shoved a stake in your heart? You’d die,” she said flatly. “The stake has already done its magic—there’s no reversing it that way.”

  “Well how can you reverse it?” I shouted. “Damn it, there must be a way!”

  “What in the world is going on out here?” Suddenly a white haired old lady wrapped in a faded blue bathrobe came out the front door. She had creamy brown skin a shade darker than Gwendolyn's and looked to be in her seventies but her eyes were sharp. “Gwendolyn Marie LaRoux,” she said, hobbling toward us. “I asked you a question, what is going on?”

  “Nothing, Grams.” Gwendolyn suddenly looked guilty and much younger than her actual age of twenty-five.

  “I can see that’s not the truth, Gwendolyn.” The old lady’s sharp eyes suddenly fell on the stake still lying on my lap. “Oh, no,” she breathed, shaking her head. “Who is responsible for this? Gwendolyn, what did you do?”

  “I did what I had to do.” Gwendolyn crossed her arms over her chest and lifted her chin. “He’s a really old vampire and I needed what he offered, Grams. If we’re ever going to get vengeance—”

  Her grandmother sighed heavily. “Child, how many times do I have to tell you to let it go? The world turns on and the Goddess takes her due. He’ll get what’s coming to him.”

  “Excuse me,” I interrupted. “I don’t know why she did it and I don’t care but it seems your granddaughter has given a man I care for the means to kill himself.” I nodded down at the stake. “Now, she’s claiming there’s no way to reverse the spell but if you’re a witch too—”

  “I am.” The old lady nodded in a stately way. “I am the leader of our coven.” She glared at Gwendolyn. “Which happens to be devoted to white magic.”

  Gwendolyn shot me a dirty look. “I’m sorry, Grams, but white magic wasn’t going to get this job done.”

  Her grandmother shook her head. “You’ve given the darkness a hold in your heart, child—you've put your foot over the threshold of the Shadow Lands. Don’t you remember the rule of seven? You’ll have this come back on you seven times as bad as what you’ve done sometime in the future.”

  “She’s going to get it back right now if somebody doesn’t tell me how to save Corbin,” I snarled. “I mean it, lady, I want answers and I want them yesterday.”

  “Let me see it.” The old lady held out her hand for the stake and I gave it to her, wincing when I saw it touch her bare flesh. She held it carefully, as though it was a snake she wasn’t quite sure was dead, and examined it.

  “A soul eater,” she said at last and gave her granddaughter another piercing look. “You made him a soul eater to use. Gwendolyn, how could you?”

  Gwendolyn shrugged, looking guilty. “It was what he wanted.”

  “A soul eater—that’s what it’s called? How exactly does it work?” I asked anxiously.

  “It killed his enemy and now it’s slowly eating away at his life force—his soul,” the old lady said. “When it finishes sucking away the last little bit, he’ll die.”

  Hearing the old lady confirm Corbin’s fate was almost more than I could take. I had been hoping against hope that she was a more powerful and experienced witch than Gwendolyn, that she would tell me everything was going to be all right. But now…

  “I don’t want him to die. He can’t die.” I felt hot, helpless tears rising to my eyes and rubbed them away angrily. “He can’t because…because I