Page 57 of Light Fae's Love
I think now of that Bloodsign Lucca used to save us the night we exploded the Bloodstone. Just making one Bloodsign nearly killed him; even for a Vampire, I can’t imagine the power and energy it would take to write as many as I thought I saw coursing through Arturos’ body right now.
“It must have been my imagination,” I say, though I’m still uncertain. “Maybe a memory from someone dead down here, of something done during their time… just showing up on Arturos’ frame.”
“Perhaps.” Quinn’s dark aura churns now as I feel him run through a myriad of possibilities for what I just saw. I feel from him how impossible it would be for any Master to enslave Arturos like that, though. As Quinn pushes it from his mind, I decide to as well.
Because I know this vision doesn’t help us right now, when we need to focus on the task at hand.
Suddenly, a sound like nails screeching down a chalkboard comes from the tunnel ahead. As it shivers me deep into my bones, I know what that sound is.
The cry of a Vampire Revenant.
Quinn and Arturos are instantly at attention as that sound comes screeching down the catacomb towards us. I feel Quinn listen for more than one voice in that horrible, ear-jarring sound; there’s nothing else, just a single Revenant swirling towards us in a maelstrom as it comes rioting around the bend ahead.
Quinn and Arturos are in action, and I am as well. We went over this part of the plan extensively before we set out; as Arturos whips a Glock from his gear with a knife-sized black Vampire spear, Quinn does the same. Those spears lengthen into cruel black Vampire fighting-weapons, festooned with violet-crimson Bloodsigns as Quinn and Arturos fire two shots simultaneously into the oncoming Revenant.
As I grip my Faeanic spear, lengthening it out into its full blade as Fae runes all down it flare with red and gold fire, the Revenant gives a horrible shriek. Quinn and Arturos’ shots were true; whatever they’ve got in those special Revenant-piercing bullets worked.
The Revenant slows, coming for us in less of a hurtling black wind and more of a roiling sea of madness. It snarls with a shrieking, tortured sound as it nears that we hurt it. It’s still hungry, though, as Quinn whips his Florentine Box from his black satchel and slides it fast across the floor to an open space. He whips out his Fae amulet, gripping it, and making it flare with light until the box is in its proper, full size.
“Ariana!” I hear Quinn and I know my cue. I wield my Fae blade and write sigils for containment in the air, hurtling towards the box and making sure the Revenant follows me. It does. It snaps around as I run—not just from my sudden movement, which puts them on the hunt, but also because I’m the warmest, most alive thing in the catacomb.
Arturos is dead, and Quinn is mostly that way as I feel him make himself as cold as possible, so the Revenant tracks me rather than him. As I rush up into the box, sprinting all the way to the back so the Revenant has room to crowd in here with me, it follows.
Like lightning made into smoke, the seething, furious creature whirls towards me, racing up the open ramp into the box. It’s a lot bigger than other Revenants I’ve encountered; as it enters the cage, it comes towards me with such speed that I hear Quinn and Arturos fire three additional shots each into the whirling, screaming mass to slow it.
It doesn’t slow as it reaches me, however, tentacles of night wrapping around me now from that seething black mass in every direction. It drains me; I feel myself relive all the worst memories of my life now, as those black tentacles of Night pierce through my flesh.
Deep into my very soul.
Everything around me is smoke-black now, churning with terrible Night as I roar, warding the thing away with my Faeanic spear. I write sigils like happiness and Light in the air around me as I try to forestall its taking. I must weather it long enough for Quinn and Arturos to raise a portal to get me the fuck out of here; they feel far away now as all my worst memories from childhood and being teased as a redheaded American living in Florence thunder back.
I haven’t had a hard life, but neither has it been charmed. A myriad of horseback riding accidents in my youth come back now with bone-shocking force; far away, I feel Arturos heave the ramp of the box up to form the fourth wall of the cage, Quinn working his magic quickly to seal up the sigils that lock the ramp in place and fortify the box with his magic.
The Revenant doesn’t care; it only wants to feed as I hear it screech in frustration now. I understand as it screeches that I’m not giving it enough. I’m not reliving memories horrible enough for it to feed properly. Its terrible magic makes me fix upon that night I got skewered by the Summer Fae King then, by Archivolio Bellari’s lance of pure Light.
I scream as I feel that massive lance of Light spear me right through the chest.
Not just once—but over and over and over again.
It’s beyond madness as I fall to the floor of the box, shaking and screaming, dropping my spear. I’m on hands and knees and the Revenant is devouring me; I feel my Light gutter, the Night inside me roaring as it tries to fend off this terrible creature, and fails.
It’s too strong; what we captured was one of the Revenants Quinn warned me about—a loner, one who’s far too competitive with its kind and too strong for others to let it feed with them.
It has no problem feeding by itself as darkness takes me now, deep into my very marrow. This isn’t even Night anymore, it is pure hell as I collapse, shrieking and jerking, feeling that lance spear me endlessly. The Revenant is forcing me to relive this one memory, over and over as it feeds.
Because that’s the most delicious place to take me—as I feel my death approach.
“NO!” Quinn’s voice roars through my torment, even as I feel the Revenant decide it wants to kill me and take what it can from my death. I feel Quinn break the sigils on the box then; he gives a hammering wave of pure Night, and the sigils burst like thunder underground.
Quinn is surging up the ramp. I hear him roar as I feel him slit both wrists with his Vampire blade, making them drip with blood to attract the Revenant. “Take me! Take me, you bastard! I know you want memories of hell! Well, take mine, and leave her the fuck alone!”
It goes. I’m left gasping for breath on the floor of the box as the massively powerful Revenant leaves, jerking in a palsy like a spider in death throes. I’m not dead, but it was a near thing as the behemoth of smoke and darkness rushes towards Quinn now.
And wraps around him—engulfing him in a swirling orb of Night.
Quinn’s scream is diabolical as it eats him. I feel his Night blaze through my very soul as this hellspawn Revenant makes him relive the worst memories he has—of Emiliana DiClario, and all the torturous abuses she used to heap upon him.
I feel Quinn dive into those memories now, even as he throws up a wall of pure iron between us, cutting me off from it. He cuts me off from him as the Revenant devours him instead of me, trapping Quinn in his worst version of hell.