Page 87 of Midnight Kiss
“That’s unfortunate.” He stopped close to me. I could sense him to my right, and I turned my head. “You know, if you’re going to beat your illness, you will need to eat.”
“I’m not going to beat my illness,” I said. “I’m going to die, and we both know it. So why don’t we just move past the small talk and get to the point. What do you want?”
“What do I want?” Karn laughed under his breath, and even that was dry and disconcerting. “What do I want? I want complete control and power. But then, everyone wants that, don’t they? They want the world to work in the way they see it.”
“No, they don’t.”
“No?”
“No. Wanting power and control is evil. It’s?—”
“Ah, hold on, one second, Emily,” Karn said. “You’re telling me that if you had a choice, you, sweet little human that you are, full of ideals and personal beliefs, wouldn’t want the wars across the planet to end? You wouldn’t want peace and prosperity? You wouldn’t want an end to poverty or homelessness or hunger?”
“Of course, I would want that, but that’s different.”
“Is it?” Karn asked, those cold, waxy fingers pressing to my flesh again. “Or is it actually just the same? A projection of the image you want the world to be. A different form of power of control. No, not even different. It’s just the same. You want what you want. And when you don’t get it, it makes you angry like the rest of us. Vampire, human, werewolves—all of us are alike in that.”
“I disagree.”
“You can disagree, but it doesn’t change the facts, my dear. You are as selfish and controlling as the next person. Just because your desires are for the perceived ‘greater good’ doesn’t make you any better than the rest of us,” he said.
His words were toxic. “I don’t want to talk to you any more.”
Karn’s laughter echoed through the chamber.
I had started picturing the space in my mind, based on the sounds I’d heard so far. It was dark. A cube. And there was a door with a barred hatch. I couldn’t see it, but I was weirdly sure of that.
“You don’t have to talk. I don’t need you to talk for what I’m going to do next.”
“Stay away from me.”
A silence.
“I have the book.”
I stiffened. Impossible. Alex took the book. Unless?—
“That’s right,” Karn said. “Your dear Alexander is also in my possession. He has foolishly delivered the book to me. Of course, he will pay either with his blood or his service for ever having left our coven, but that is besides the point. How does it feel, Emily? To know that he’s betrayed you once again.”
I pressed my lips together.
“Does it hurt?” Karn pressed his fingers to my cheek this time. “So warm and beautiful. I’ve had my work cut out for me, keeping the other vampires in my coven away from you. Granted, they listen when I speak, but that is irrelevant. You are glowing. Giving off a delicious scent. They want to bond you and keep you because they know what you truly are.”
No. No, I refuse. I’m not going to be a Guardian.
“You don’t have a choice,” Karn said. “A Guardian. You’re invaluable. And you will serve Sanguine Nox.”
“I won’t. I’ll die instead.”
“I’m going to bring you back from the brink of death my dear. You are seconds away from it, you know.”
I didn’t feel seconds away. I was weak, but there was no “tunnel of white light” or whatever else was supposed to happen before you died. No flashes of memories or that kind of thing. But then, who was I to judge that? I’d never been in this kind of position before.
“Did you know, that if I bring that book in here right now, you will die within a few seconds?”
I tensed. “I—I?—”
“That’s right, dear Emily. You are, indeed, seconds away from your death. And I will bind you to keep you alive.”