Chapter Four
Suspicious eyes seemed all about me, following me wherever I went. Paranoia infected the inner recesses of my psyche, not merely from the eyes of my vampire brethren, but from the very cosmos, as though the world observed each step I took. Scrutinized me. Weighed me and found this new manifestation of myself wanting. It disquieted me, down to the pit of my soul.
I became an inconsolable and belligerent bastard.
Hunting lost its intrigue. Snapshots of my mortal life ebbed into my consciousness with maddening slowness and tainted the thrill with its imagery. I would see manifestations of Lydia while feeding and when the lifeless bodies of my victims dropped to my feet, I saw her face on them. Blinking past the sight did nothing to eliminate the shiver which ran up my spine. A week of flirting with the threshold of insanity brought me face-to-face with the truth. I was a troubled man with half his memories.
Although the prospect of recalling anything else should have scared me away from exploration, I pursued it nonetheless, as much teased as haunted by the gaps in my memory. I spent several nights pondering Lydia’s murder until the distorted memory of the knife sunk deep into her chest caused me to remember ripping her necklace from her throat. I furrowed my brow at the thought. Had I dropped the necklace or carried it with me? Through the haze of trauma, I could not remember either way at first.
It led me to Sabrina one evening. She and I strolled down the corridor, Sabrina tapping her long fingernails against her chin as she spoke. “What did happen to your personal effects?” she asked herself. “Honestly, Peter, I have no idea. Your clothing was covered in blood and the rest were just mortal trivialities.”
We passed another immortal as we walked down the corridor. Sabrina waved to him while I frowned. “Does that mean you threw them away?”
“The clothing, I’m certain, but Timothy might’ve stored away your other items.” Sabrina stopped and turned to face me. “Why do you want them anyway? Is something the matter?”
I thanked heaven my sunglasses concealed my eyes as they shifted away from her scrutiny. Shrugging, I buried my hands in my pockets. “Not exactly, no. I’m just having some issues with my…” I tapped my head twice. “… memories.”
Sabrina raised an eyebrow at me as my gaze returned to hers. “What about them?”
“They’re incomplete,” I said, attempting to guise my unease at what I did remember. “I can remember bits and pieces, but there are gaps that are bugging me.”
“Why do you need to know such things? That life is over.” Sabrina stepped closer to me, far closer than she had since the days of my awakening. Her fingers brushed through my short, brown hair and tousled the locks. “You are not a mortal any longer, dear. Why trouble yourself with the recollection of being one of those inferior humans we consume? You are forming a new life. Let the past lie in the grave.”
“I know, but it’s important to me.” I caught one of my useless breaths in my throat when her fingertips slid past my cheek, her razor nails dragging across the flesh in a deliberate manner. “I… need to fill these blank spaces in so I can move on. Otherwise, they’ll keep nagging at me.” I attempted a disarming smile. “And we don’t want that, right?”
“You concern me, my son.” One finger coasted past my lips, until her hand dropped to her side abruptly. She sighed and looked me in the eyes, nodding. “If it will help you put matters to rest, then I will look for your mortal possessions. Beyond the clothing, what were you carrying?”
I glanced away, indulging in a steadying sigh to calm my spirit past the lingering sensation of Sabrina’s touch. Focusing on my blurred recollections, I played the mental picture of me stabbing Lydia a million times over, studying myself and my appearance. “A watch. I’m sure a wallet. Some keys and … .”
I paused. The image of Lydia’s necklace in my hand shot a tingle through me as I saw my former self slide his hand into his pocket.
“And what?” Sabrina asked.
Shaking off the recollection, I looked at Sabrina again. “And a necklace, I think.” I tried to conceal my enthusiasm over that last object, not having the slightest notion myself why it held my interest. My nervous gaze met Sabrina’s. “The necklace would at least be worth pawning.”
Sabrina eyed me for a few tentative moments before nodding. “Very well. I will have Timothy look for your personal items.” Without any further words given over to the matter, Sabrina turned and walked away from me and within two days’ time, a small bag containing these items found their way to my doorstep. I took it with me into my private quarters and dumped its contents onto my unmade bed. I did not see the necklace right away, though.
Instead, I saw the keys and wallet I expected. The driver’s license verified my identity and my last place of residence It held little interest for me, as did everything else in the sparse collection of mortal items. A small amount of money. Other forms of identification and old receipts tucked into various pockets in my billfold. Sitting on my bed in an exasperated huff, I threw the wallet across the room and slid the other items onto the floor without any further thought. As my eyes shot to the bed, however, I caught sight of something shimmering atop my black sheets.
The thin chain attempted to disappear within the folds of bedding before my fingers pinched it and raised it level with my line of sight. Even through my sunglasses, I noticed dried blood streaked across the pendant, staining two hearts with a thorny rose atop. On an impulse, I licked the blood from it, but dropped the jewelry when the remnant burned my tongue. I hissed at it on instinct, leaving it to lie with the other discarded items.
Shortly thereafter, the dreams commenced.
***
These were no mere shadows slipping from behind the veil; full-fledged memories took flight through my mind, painting animated snapshots of my mortal existence in its entirety. I saw twisted metal and death. I felt an ancient ache in my leg, although it was psychosomatic. I saw the youth I once was and bolted awake from a sound slumber on more than one occasion as the defining moment in my life played out in visceral nightmares.
Not that it was the first moment I recalled my parents were killed in a car accident. I remembered telling Sabrina about it in the coffeeshop without recalling all the details. John and Marjorie Dawes gained life inside my mind, however, and lost it just as fast as reverie gave it to them. I was a petrified thirteen year old when they died and their death changed the entire course of the rest of my life.
My father, a service veteran, met my mother in England and they married within months. Home became a farm in the middle of Pennsylvania and together, my parents created an environment of discipline and faith surrounding me, one that possessed the warmth found in television shows and wistful paperbacks. I was a rebellious, headstrong only child, but I never had cause to question my parents’ love for me.
It all ended in a car accident, giving birth to the real Peter Dawes.
The ambulance carried me, the sole survivor, from the scene with a compound fracture in my right leg as my battle wound. The wreck left an indelible mark on me, even after I was sent to live with my father’s sister in the suburbs of Philadelphia. An uncertain future as an orphaned boy with an aunt and uncle he only knew through family-related events left me petrified as it was, but lingering memories of the accident also haunted my thoughts. After the first of two surgeries to repair my broken leg, I found myself peering around the room, recalling the hell of watching two parents succumb to their injuries. I cried once at the funeral, but no more after that. The rest of the time was spent ruminating on a fledgling form of survivor’s guilt.
Had I been a doctor, the possibility existed that I could have saved them. After a day of musing on this notion, my mouth opened with questions for my physician. How did he come to practice medicine? What type of schooling did he receive? The singular motivation to become a doctor possessed me as though I could bring my parents back from the grave, and the saint which emerged from the carnage of a mangled automobile held a religious passion to save souls with a stethoscope and scalpel. Everyone I met from that point forth saw the would-be doctor and extolled my determination.
Now, I murdered the lot of them with my teeth.
The ghosts shouted in louder tones
My mother joined Lydia in the chorus. A transplanted German, she lived in Great Britain for half her life and developed a strange accent in the process; a confluence of Bavarian and British which stretched across the years to accuse me of my sins. “You let the devil in, Peter,” she said. “And now you’ve become a demon yourself.”
My father, looking at me through the sweat of his brow. The man who instilled the work ethic which pushed me through college and medical school. “Have you forgotten what you were?” he asked. “You used to care for people, Pete. Remember what I told you; if you lose your love for others, then you risk losing your humanity.”
I held my head in both hands, screaming past the sound of all the people I knew as Dr. Peter Dawes. “Who are you?” they asked. “Where is the Peter we loved?” I spent nights arguing with them, my wandering footsteps leading me throughout Philadelphia as the vampire sought to feed and the mortal died a little more with every human I consumed. Two months past my awakening now and the dualism had me so at odds with myself, I agonized over every person I stalked as though I could survive without their blood.
When I fed, though, I reveled in the taste again. I wore a wicked smile and drank until the demise of one sated the needs of the other. The fledgling vampire did not wish to give his life and yet, mortal and immortal sides could not reconcile. The voices persisted in their unrelenting mission to silence the bloodthirsty immortal. They might have succeeded if not for one thing.
Their sainted doctor was a hypocrite. The immortal gritted his teeth and issued a response. “An impostor,” I said. “No benevolent doctor kills two people in cold blood, one the woman he was going to marry. He had all of you fooled. The man was as much a murderer as the vampire he begged to become.” When my ghosts could not issue a response, the immortal planted its roots as deep into my soul as my imagined accusers seemed to be. My erratic behavior did not go unnoticed, though.
The coven watched me lose my grip and listened as I carried on inside the confines of my private quarters. I railed and ranted until the walls shook. I fought immortal thirst during nights when the chilling memories kept me indoors. It drove me mad with bloodlust in the process. My violent outbursts sent my housemates clamoring to Sabrina for relief when it got to be too much.
Peter the vampire was going insane. Something needed to be done at once.
***
Ten weeks after my awakening, the whole manic episode came to a head with a knock at my door. It broke me from my internal battle, with another sunset passing only to find the tortured immortal shaking off the relics of his past. Once again, I sat on my bed, fingers tangled in my hair as I shuddered through an escalating craving for blood. Shooting a quick look at the entryway, I furrowed my brow when a voice followed the gentle tapping. “Dear Peter,” Sabrina said, a hint of annoyance in her voice. “Please open up, I wish to speak with you.”
I glanced around my room as I stood and walked to the door, dizzy from the effort, but not about to have Sabrina enter and see the state of my quarters. When I opened the door, I looked through a crack and nothing more. Sabrina raised an eyebrow at me with her lips pursed in a frown. “How long will you do this to yourself?” she asked. “I’ve been told you continue to torture yourself and the people around you and have grown quite irritable in the process. This is becoming a bit taxing, Peter. It must stop.”
I stared at her until I was forced to look downward. “I don’t know what to do about it,” I said, my voice a hoarse whisper.
“About what, dear son?”
I shook my head.
Sabrina grabbed my chin, forcing me to look her in the eyes. “Tell me why you have been in such a foul mood lately or I shall take those glasses away and leave you to writhe in pain in a well-lit room. First, Michael tells me you have been acting snippy with him. Then, you ask for your old personal effects. And now, you have become insufferable. Locking yourself within your quarters. Carrying on; being a nuisance to your brethren, who all clamor at me telling me you have gone insane.” She paused, but her eyes shot flames at me. “I demand a response from you.”
My eyes dove into hers until I could no longer hold back the words. “Ghosts, Sabrina. I keep. . . seeing people I knew when I was mortal. They’ve been torturing me nonstop and I can’t shut them up.”
“So, you become the coven terror.” Sabrina forced the door open and grabbed my hand. “Come now, Peter. We will converse in the common area. You have need of removing yourself from this room before I am forced to hire someone to renovate it.”
After weeks of wrestling, I had no strength to fight her, so I acquiesced to the coaxing, even when I spied a group of onlookers watching from the hallway, snickering at me. I sneered back at them and closed the door to my room. Then I followed Sabrina to the staircase.
Neither of us spoke until Sabrina broke the stillness at the top of the stairs. “Dear son, I told you at your awakening that this would not be easy and, in some regard, I think I took too much for granted when I saw you embrace this new life you were given. Your memories have not been kind. I had no idea they would cause this much pain.”
“There are constant voices, Sabrina,” I said. “Every day. Every time I try to feed or sleep, I see those I used to know, reprimanding me for being a vampire. Sometimes I see their faces on my victims and it sends a shiver up my spine.” I frowned, shaking my head. “I feel like it’s going to rip me in two.”
“Rip you in two?”
“Into this bleeding heart mortal that listens to the voices and the immortal who still enjoys the kill.”
Sabrina nodded, but said no more. Reaching the bottom of the stairs, we turned toward the grand parlor where my brethren once received me with open arms as the newest member of their collective. Now, the reception was a bit different. The other vampires watched me with disdain, provoking me to frown as I gazed away, not apt to make eye contact for the time being. Sabrina, however, received nods and bows of respect, which she reciprocated.
I indulged one immortal a final glance. My eyes met Michael’s when I sensed him studying me from across the room. Suppressing a hiss of rebuke, I looked back at Sabrina. She paused beside two empty chairs.
Sabrina sat and crossed her legs. “I fear you are on the path to self-destruction,” she said sighing, her eyes shifting away. “And such would be a pity, not only to us, but to the vampire collective as a whole, if we were to lose a being such as yourself.”
“What? A brooding, neophyte vampire?” I asked as I dropped defeated into the chair beside hers.
“You do not know all ends to this matter.” Sabrina paused, as if turning a notion around in her mind before nodding to herself and folding her hands atop her lap. “I did not plan on telling you this for some time, but you need a bit of motivation. My child, there is a bit more to your identity than even you are aware of.”
I scoffed. “What the hell does that mean?”
“Your eyes. You have dealt with this infirmity, but have never asked me why they are this way.”
“You mean there’s a reason for this?”
“There is an explanation, yes. Or, at least, this is what I suspect is the case. You are a unique being; it is difficult to know for sure that one matter has caused the other.”
“Sabrina I have no idea what you’re . .”
“You have the Second Sight,” Sabrina said, interrupting me. “Gifts beneath the surface which have yet to emerge. Your infirmity is the sign of something greater.”
“You call this a gift?” I pointed at my sunglasses. “All I see is a curse here.”
“Only because you choose to see it that way.”
“Is there any other way to see it? To see any of it? If it tortures us so much to be vampires then why don’t we all just kill ourselves and get it over with?”
“You are the tortured one, child.” Sabrina frowned at me. “You are the one who has allowed these visitors from your past to dictate what your life is worth and now, you see ill where you should find delight.”
I sighed and studying the rug beneath my chair. “Delight in what?”
Sabrina inched forward in her seat. I looked into her eyes again. “Do you not recall it? The way it felt when you fed from your first victim? Have you not experienced it since then when you have killed? When you have relished the blood of the feed and allowed yourself to experience it as only immortals can?”
“Yes, there was a time, but I can’t even enjoy the kill anymore.”
“Because you look at immortality like a mortal. You are not one any longer, dark son. You are something far better.” Sabrina grinned. “A higher being, if you will. And you, with gifts precious few creatures possess. Bonded to immortal form, they could make you a formidable vampire someday, if you allow yourself to become what you are destined to be.”
Scoffing, I shook my head. “I think you’re telling me what you think I want to hear. I don’t have any special talents.”
“I speak the truth.”
“Then explain this second sight bullshit.”
Sabrina shrugged. “You will recognize it when you see it. But it will never find you if you continue to cower instead of evolving into the killer you are meant to become.”
“Evolving?” I huffed, pointing about the room as I spoke. “I look at the others and don’t see evolution. I see a group of lazy, decadent creatures. They hate me and I hate them, too.”
She smirked. “You are part of a coven. Everything you fire at your brethren will be returned tenfold. They see your inability to assimilate and think you spiteful, Peter.”
Turning away with revulsion, I spoke before I could stifle my disgust. “I hate when you call me that,” I said, muttering the words.
Sabrina hesitated before replying. “When I call you what? Peter?”
“Yes, when you call me Peter. I don’t know who the hell I am now, but every voice inside my head makes sure to tell me that I am not Peter any longer. I get sick and tired of hearing them say that name.”
My brow knitted at the sight of Sabrina’s eyes. The impish orbs of brown danced with amusement and her crimson lips curled in a smile. “Well then, dark child,” she said. “If you dislike this name and wish to distance yourself from this Peter who troubles you, why don’t you change it?”
“Change my name?” I asked. “Because it’s what you all call me. Besides, if I change it, then Michael won’t be able to call me Peter the Blind anymore.”
Sabrina laughed and I could not help but succumb to a quick grin. “You harbor such disdain for him,” Sabrina said. “I have never seen two vampires in the same coven so at odds with each other. But once again, you fail to take note of your attitude, my son. What you dish to him will be returned.”
“I don’t dish anything to him.”
“A proper amount of respect might be nice. He is my second-in-command, after all.”
“Right, sure.” I narrowed my eyes . “Maybe when he shows me a little respect, too.”
Sabrina sighed. “There is much Michael could teach you. You could become fast friends.”
“When hell freezes over.” Looking away, I frowned, moving back to the point at hand. “So, what am I failing to do, then?”
Sabrina touched my face, directing my attention back to her. As our eyes met through the lenses of my glasses, Sabrina sank her gaze into mine as though she could behold the bright, blue irises staring back at her. It unnerved and excited me all at once. She could have kissed me and I would have plunged into the embrace without a second thought. She kept her distance, however, while maintaining an intimate closeness at the same time.
“You are not the same creature you once were,” she said. “You are the vampire who rose and sank his teeth into that mortal girl, regardless of what these shadows of your past try to tell you. You can feel him, can you not, my dark son?”
I nodded in a daze. “I feel him every time I kill,” I said. Thoughts of feeding reawakened the thirst in me, causing a deep groan to ebb from my throat before I could stop it. “Oh, the taste of blood is incredible.”
“Yes, it is, isn’t it?” Sabrina leaned closer still, her lips touching my ear. “That is the vampire speaking, my dear. That is the immortal you are supposed to be. Stop resisting the inevitable and stifling his pulse with the artificial heartbeat of humanity. That siren call is your true self speaking. And when you embrace your nature, you will discover gifts that would make the lot of your brethren jealous.” Sabrina backed away enough to wink at me. “Michael included.”
My eyes met hers. “What do I do then, Sabrina?”
Sabrina smiled. “Find a new identity, my unnamed one. And bid the mortal within to remain dead where we ended him; where you found your escape from the mortal world. Covered in the blood of those who dared to trifle with the dark killer you have become. Peter is dead and you thrive. Silence the voices with the blood you consume.”
I felt her place a kiss on my cheek before she stood and patted me on the shoulder. Walking away with a lithe, carefree air about her, Sabrina looked like a fallen angel and I felt a loyalty to her in that moment unlike any I had experienced before. With a sigh, I stared until she left the room and then, I focused on the others gathered around me.
Regarding them with interest, I admired those bound me as immortal brethren. I studied them, attempting to connect with them somehow while sensing a disconnect from them at the same time. They talked amongst themselves, drinking wine and blood and reclining about plush couches and pillowed chairs as though content to waste away eternity in utter decadence. I frowned. Perhaps I did need a new identity, but I could not abide by the prospect of being such a slothful waste of space.
I stood and recoiled against a slight wave of dizziness, sensing the vampire within clamor for attention. Yes, something had to change. I could not spend eternity scared of my own shadow, ignoring my base needs as an immortal. The hallowed argument resurfaced in my mind and I mouthed the words while snatching a glass of blood from a dark-haired vampiress named Rebecka. “Your doctor was a hypocrite,” I said, drinking the contents of the glass as though starved before wiping the remnant from my mouth and throwing the drained goblet at its previous owner.
Rebecka gasped in horror. I ignored her. The eyes of my coven brethren shifted toward me, undoubtedly wondering what the devil Peter was doing while I continued my argument. “You defend him and you tell me what to be, but none of you bastards can tell me why he killed his girlfriend. I don’t give a shit if he was a saint or not in your opinion, saints don’t slash through two people.” I continued walking until I stopped in front of a set of Japanese swords mounted to the wall beside Asian-themed tapestries. My hand lifted to caress one of the blades without knowing why. I smiled. “Argue all you want, but there’s your real doctor. He’s a killer, just like me.”
“So, he speaks to himself like a madman. What the others say about you losing your mind is true.”
I turned at the sound of Michael’s voice, seeing him stand behind me with his hands inside the pockets of his fine linen pants. The regal, pompous bane of my existence, clad in a suit, his hair tied back once again as though the Victorian era came and departed while leaving Michael behind. “I’m sorry,” I said. “Was that directed at me?”
Michael raised an eyebrow. “I don’t see who else I would be talking to. Unless you have imaginary people to accompany the voices in your head.”
I shrugged and looked back toward the wall. “Doesn’t matter either way. I plan on ignoring them now.”
“You do not have the resolve to accomplish that.”
Turning my head to regard him again, I furrowed my brow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You’re weak,” Michael said. He narrowed his eyes at me. “I’ve known that from the start, when you were writhing on that bed like we’d set you on fire. And you have been utterly useless ever since.”
“Oh, I see,” I said, huffing a chuckle. “So, I take it that you rose and immediately became the king of all vampires.”
“I certainly didn’t scream like a stuck pig.” Michael folded his arms behind his back and paced around as if sizing me up. I turned to face him fully and watched. “Utterly useless,” he repeated, eyes surveying me from head to foot. “Nothing more than a deathless mortal. And an insane one, at that. You will be nothing but a burden to this coven for all of your miserable existence.”
“You have a lot of room to talk, you reject from an antique store.” I shook off a wave of irritation as it surfaced in my consciousness. “You called me a madman? Well, what does speaking with a madman make you?”
Michael huffed. “As if your words could wound me. You are no better than our prey, Peter the Blind.”
I felt my fangs start to peek from their hiding place, and clenched my jaw to hold them back. “I’m going to love having a new identity and telling you to shove your pet name up your ass.”
“A new identity?”
I stepped closer to him. “Yes, I’m choosing another name. Thinking about going for a change of pace.”
“So we can mock another moniker instead?” Michael smirked.
“No, so I can show you just how little you actually know about other people. You’re nothing more than an arrogant prick.”
“And you an ignorant neophyte.”
“We’ll see just how ignorant I am.”
“Bold words for somebody afraid of his own shadow. As though you could show me anything.” Michael laughed. I saw his own fangs slumbering inside a sea of porcelain. “Do you think me just weaned from my mother’s breast? I have lived for many years while you have barely left a footprint on this mortal coil.”
The corner of my mouth curled upward. I stepped closer to him. We regarded one another from the span of mere feet now, and I closed the distance further with another stride. “How old does that make you, then?” I asked.
Michael’s blue eyes held mine steady. “One hundred and one years, with thirty-two mortal years prior to that.”
“And in all those years, you never checked the calendar?” My eyebrow raised in defiance, my eyes affixed on him with tension filling the space between us. “You look like you haven’t left the last century.”
“And you speak as though you were not educated in this one.”
“You don’t know anything about me,” I seethed.
“Let me tell you what I do know about you,” Michael said, a smirk enveloping his countenance that possessed such smugness, it made his words drip with malice. “I can tell you have no clue what you are now. That you have no notion of what it is to be an immortal despite what others have taught you and as such, do not deserve that title.” He paused. “I can tell one other thing, too.”
“Oh yeah?” I asked. I held his gaze and reciprocated it measure for measure. “What would that be?”
Michael’s grin broadened. “That I have an impotent coward of a being standing before me, not having the strength or the genitalia to keep his little girlfriend happy. It is little wonder she sought greener pastures. I would have as well.”
The anger bubbling up inside me burst in a glorious spectacle of fist meeting face. I punched Michael’s jaw before he could dodge the blow and the impact sprawled him on the ground, blood running from a cut on his lip. I had no chance to relish the moment. Michael came to his feet and hissed at me, fangs elongated. I hissed in return.
He wished a fight?
I was more than willing to oblige.
Michael swung for me. I moved out of the way prior to impact, but failed to dodge the other fist when it came for my face. He avoided breaking my sunglasses only by a hair’s breadth and I was not going to give him a second chance. I tackled him and threw another punch, smashing him on the cheek.
A crowd gathered around us. Michael threw me off him. The force sent me flying into a group of onlookers. They remained on the floor while I came to my feet, woozy and wobbly at first from hunger. Rage compensated for what I lacked in nourishment, though, and powered the violent swings I threw in Michael’s direction. He dodged one and captured my hand with the next swing, crushing my fist with all the immortal strength he could summon. I gasped in pain and kneed him in the stomach. The blow doubled him over.
Then, I kicked him on the chin and sent him flying onto his backside again.
Hate shot from Michael’s eyes as he stood, his hair half-hanging out of the ponytail and his suit dirty and disheveled. Hands balled into two weapons ready for their target, he stalked me. The intimidating look in his eyes caused me to step backward. Venom should have been dripping from his fangs. The full measure of a vampire pounced at me and before I had chance to react, he hefted me by the fabric of my shirt and snarled into my face. “I care little for what she says you are,” he hissed. “You were a mistake.”
Michael threw me. I sailed through a wooden door. It buckled and splintered. When I landed on tiled flooring on the other side, the impact knocked my glasses from my eyes. The effect was instantaneous. Light burned my pupils and I wailed in agony while cupping one hand over my violated eyes.
A shiver ran up my spine. I rolled onto my stomach and groped with my free hand for my sunglasses. It took several frustrating seconds for my fingers to locate the frames and slip them over my eyes. No sooner did I come to my knees with glasses on, however, a sharp point touched my throat just above my Adam’s apple.
Opening my eyes, I swallowed hard and looked up to find Michael standing before me, a European-styled sword in hand. “Beg for your life,” he said, “And I might allow you to retain it.”
I was in the perfect position for doing just that. I smiled when I peered around the room, though, noticing the knives and swords, some hanging on the walls and others arranged on display shelves like prized jewels. Sabrina’s armory surrounded me, whispering sweet temptation into my subconscious.
I looked back at my older, more regal brother and sneered.
With that, round two of our fight commenced.
