Total pages in book: 55
Estimated words: 50954 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 255(@200wpm)___ 204(@250wpm)___ 170(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 50954 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 255(@200wpm)___ 204(@250wpm)___ 170(@300wpm)
“I don’t want to say too much. I wouldn’t forgive myself if I got anybody hurt. And I owe Maddox my everything. So. If you don’t mind. I might not say anything else?”
Gideon’s smile grew broader still, two sharp sets of fangs flashing. He moved the bowl back to Lorien’s lips. “Drink,” he bade. “You need your strength.”
11
Finally able to escape the house while Gideon was distracted, Maddox could not quite believe what he was about to do. It was a desperate time, and it called for a desperate measure, but still he hesitated before descending into the crypt-like concrete silo buried beneath the ground, a private place he had purchased in order to keep that which could not be kept anywhere else. It was protected by barbed wire, surveillance, all manner of warnings, and an air of foreboding that even the dullest of humans would inevitably sense. This was not a place anybody wanted to be. Even Maddox felt repelled with every step he took toward his most secure prison. A capsule elevator delivered him down the side of the shaft, clanking and groaning on old pulleys and levers. It was a death trap.
He emerged at the bottom of a benighted hole. There were two prisoners here, a wolf and a vampire. Funny how often that specifically twisted and — Gideon would have said — unnatural pairing appeared in Maddox’s life. It was almost as though the universe was trying to tell him something.
There were grunts and groans coming from the dark depths. He heard them before he saw them. His prisoner, Ivan, was forced to reckon with a very cruel captivity, bound not in iron, but moonsilver, a cursed material that caused extreme pain to those of wolf blood and sapped their preternatural strength. Ivan had managed to press little odds and ends between the silver and his skin, preventing the worst of the burns, but the sheer proximity of the material left him weak and likely in constant pain. Maddox did not concern himself with Ivan’s pain. The man had been given many opportunities to make good on his evil past, and at every turn he had made the wrong choice.
Ivan was Will’s father, so Maddox could not kill him outright. He was also of a very old and powerful lineage, so they had that in common. If Ivan were a better man, he would have made an excellent ally, but his insistence on choosing base instinct and cruel acts over any wise or kind course of action had led him inexorably to this point.
Maddox took his time descending the last round row of stairs and crossing the rancid, stinking floor to stand over his captive. Ivan looked a lot like Will in some respects. He had not only given his son the gift of powerful blood. He had given him the same striking eyes, wild hair, and handsome features. Ivan’s were more brutish and wily, though maybe he had looked like Will as a younger man, before the cruelty of the world and his own acts shaped him.
There was a certain barbed feeling Maddox felt inside himself when looking down at Ivan. He missed Will every second of the day and being confronted with a creature so close and yet so far from his boy gave him a certain melancholy.
“What do you want?” Ivan’s opening conversational gambit was not charming. Maddox had wondered if Ivan might beg him for release. The answer, apparently, was no.
“I promised you that you would be interred here as long as you lived,” Maddox said. “However, fortunately for you, the one creature I would consider making a deal with any number of devils to avoid has risen and intends to kill Will. We must stop him.”
Ivan looked at Maddox balefully. “You put me underground with no food save the occasional scrap, no dignity, save for the occasional bucket. You made me weak. You did everything besides kill me. And now you want my help?”
“Will is your son. He needs your help.”
“Maybe he is better dead than suffering a life of vampire predation.”
“I don’t think you mean that, Ivan. I have shown you mercy by saving your life. If you’d prefer I end it, that can be arranged.”
“What about me?” Chauvelin asked. Mad had almost forgotten about him completely. Several months pinned in the dark had been good for him. He had been quite unattractive as a human; however, as a vampire he had a certain dark allure. Not one Maddox found in any way intriguing, but one that might make him palatable to a mate eventually, if he were ever to be freed from this deserved prison.
“You? I hardly see what use I might have for you. I imagine you would immediately ally yourself with Gideon, given you are a simpering little sycophant who yearns for power and loathes me.”