The Sacrifice Read online

  “Sanchez said something about the ‘Council’.” Lexy sends back and I realize I have let the last thought slip past my mental barrier. “Do you think he meant the Vampire Council?”

  “I have no idea. I hope not.” I can’t imagine being brought before that most ancient and powerful ruling body. Why would they want to see me?

  We mind talk back and forth together over the twenty more minutes the van is in motion but neither Lexy nor I can solve the mystery. We do, however, make a plan of escape. Having our hands bound and our mouths gagged rules out casting a spell. But we can still kick our captors in the balls when they open the van. We wait, lying on our backs, tense and terrified but determined to do whatever we can to get out of this situation.

  The van has been moving smoothly up until now but suddenly there’s a lurch and it starts rocking and jouncing over uneven ground.

  “We’re going off road,” Lexy sends, her eyes wide with fear. “They’re taking us into the wilderness somewhere.”

  I want to protest that there isn’t a whole lot of wilderness around Tampa but apparently our captors have found some. We jounce around, being thrown against each other, unable to brace ourselves because of our bound hands. I’ve always been prone to motion sickness and the violent motion makes me nauseous. Then Lexy bumps her head and gives a little cry behind her tape gag.

  I’m still trying to crawl over to her and see if she’s okay when the van stops with a jolt and the back doors swing wide.

  “C’mon out now, girlies,” Sanchez says, reaching in to haul me roughly to my feet. “No funny business or—”

  I kick out and catch him squarely in the balls.

  He goes white, then green, then his face turns a dark shade of purple. But through it all, he somehow manages to hold on to my arm. I couldn’t get away anyway, I realize with despair. I can’t leave Lexy here alone and she seems stunned and woozy from the blow to her head. All I have done is succeeded in making my captor even more angry.

  “You’ll pay…” Sanchez finally manages to wheeze out, pinching my arm viciously until I yelp in pain. “Maybe not now but you’ll be sorry. I’ll make you sorry.” He raises his hand, no doubt to hit me again.

  “We don’t have time for this.” The warlock, Grant, is suddenly there looking worried. “The ceremony has to start as soon as the moon is directly overhead. Come on.”

  “Fine,” Sanchez growls. He and the other satyr pull Lexy and I out of the van and follow Grant, who is leading the way.

  What ceremony? I think wildly, trying to look around as we stumble over the uneven ground. Unfortunately, it’s pretty dark aside from the quarter moon rising overhead. All I can make out is that we seem to be in the middle of a field with trees on either side. There are no landmarks, no way to guide myself even if I could break away from the satyr’s punishing grip.

  They drag us up a gently rising hill and through some trees. Suddenly we’re standing in front of what looks like a miniature castle. That’s crazy though—there aren’t any castles in Florida! Except here one is, right in front of me.

  There are torches burning in holders at the rounded front entryway lined with jagged metal spikes. What’s that called? A portcullis? my mind babbles as we are dragged through the gates.

  Inside, the space opens into a narrow courtyard. At the end of it is a single black door with no knob. For some reason, the very sight of that door makes me cold with dread. No, not behind the black door! Anywhere but there! It’s almost as though I’ve been here before. But I know I never have. I’m just afraid of the door because I don’t want to see who or what is on the other side of it. Right?

  Sanchez raps almost gently on the door and calls in a surprisingly respectful voice, asking for entry. Slowly, the door swings open and Lexy and I are shoved into a large, stone room, our reluctant footsteps echoing as we stumble in.

  It’s almost as dark inside as it is outside. To one side of the vast room a fire is crackling in the fireplace. But the room is so huge it barely illuminates anything. On the stone floor, a circle about eight feet in diameter is drawn. No, not drawn, I realize—carved. There is a half inch deep circular trench gouged into the flagstones. Who the hell could have made it so perfectly round and why do I find the long curving, empty groove so disturbing?

  “Watch out!” Lexy gasps in my head. “Don’t step into the circle—it’s a trap. Can’t you feel it?”

  I do feel it now—the familiar prickling sensation of magic—very strong magic, crawling over my skin. But before I can step back, Sanchez has ripped the tape off my mouth and shoved me over the circle’s lip. I stumble and come to a halt in the empty center, feeling like I have somehow come to rest in a dangerous place—the eye of a hurricane that may whirl me off my feet and into an abyss at any moment.

  “Emma Krist,” a low, hissing voice whispers from the perimeter of the circle. It sounds to me like what a snake would sound like if it could talk.

  “Who…who are you?” My voice is shaking. I take a deep breath and try to sound a little less like a frightened rabbit. “What do you want with me?”

  “We are the Council,” the voice replies.

  We? Who the hell are 'we'? Looking out around the edge of the circle, I get my answer. There are eyes out there. Vampire eyes. They gleam in the flickering firelight like the predators they are. Like wolves around a campfire at night, waiting for the flames to die down enough to attack. I count twelve pairs staring at me from all around the strange, circular groove that has been carved into the solid stone floor. Every once in a while one of them will lean forward, giving me a glimpse of porcelain white skin, but for the most part they are just eyes, watching me…waiting. But waiting for what?

  I decide to try again. “What do you want from me?” I ask, looking around the circle, trying to meet all their eyes in turn. It’s not easy—they don’t move or twitch occasionally like humans. They stare, unblinking like snakes. Why have I never noticed these traits in Aiden during the time we’ve been together? Is it because he’s been making an effort to seem more human, less predatory, less frightening? Or is it because he spends the majority of his time with mortals like me, away from his own kind?

  “Tell her,” whispers the one with the snake voice.

  Grant steps forward. “Emma,” he begins, steepling his long fingers and looking at me intently. “Do you know about the spell of binding that holds our supernatural community together?”

  “Yes,” I say, nodding.

  Grant looks surprised but pleased. He nods. “Not many do. But I take it Aiden James—the Sovereign vampire—has told you? How it was first cast by a witch called Katherine and has been in effect, binding us all together, ever since?”

  Slowly, I nod. “Yes. But I don’t understand—”

  “The spell is old—it’s losing power,” one of the vampires from around the circle says. “You might say it’s fraying around the edges. If it’s allowed to unravel completely…”

  “The whole community will come apart like a badly knitted sweater,” another says. “There will be fighting, corruption, unrest between the different supernatural races—we can’t afford that.”

  “It will draw human attention,” the one with the snake voice says. “This must not be!”

  “All right, I get it.” I raise my hands in a gesture of acceptance. “But…what does that have to do with me? I mean, other than the fact that I’m this year’s Sacrifice?”

  “You are a direct descendant of Katherine, born on the same day of the same month that she died, over a hundred years apart,” Grant says. “That makes you her heir—and the only witch who can renew her spell.”

  “What?” I stare at him, uncomprehending. He’s joking—he has to be joking, right? Aiden never told me this. Never told me that I was related—intimately related—to his long lost love. That’s the only reason he wants you, whispers a nasty little voice in my head. Because you remind him of Katherine. Because you’re the closest thing he can get to her now that she’s d