The implication of his casual, calm pronouncement shook Caster to the core. “How many have you seen?”
“At first, a trickle. But in the past few months, perhaps a thousand.”
Julian had been right. The witch and his uncle had to bemaking vampires on a massive scale. But why make them only to kill them? “Are you responsible for the witch’s power?”
His stance didn’t change, nor did the calm, even tone of his voice. “I am. It is my greatest regret.”
It was clear what that regret was. Not that she used the power he gave her to threaten the world, but that she’d used it to trap him.
“Tell me about it.”
Pierce looked him in the eye, and for a long moment, they were content to stare at each other. It was as if he tried to break the fortified wall around his thoughts. Caster smiled. He’d have more luck getting out of this trap, and it seemed he’d been here a while.
“When she first summoned me, I was eager, perhaps too eager, to escape my confinement. Witches had reached out to my kind since the dawn of time, and she promised freedom for an ounce of my power, so I gave it to her, showed her how to use it.”
“What is this power? Necromancy?”
He shrugged. “Yes. I am a demon; we feed on death. What I didn’t expect was for her to find a way around our agreement.” He ran a hand through his dark hair, choosing his words with care, perhaps too much care. “She was supposed to feed me the souls of the dead, and I’d share some of that power with her.”
“It didn’t matter how they died?”
If he detected the sarcasm in Caster’s tone, he hid it well. “She must have found a spell, a talisman, or another more powerful demon who didn’t share my aversion to one witchhaving that much power.”
Caster chuckled. “You unleashed the witch and her necromantic power on my family. Nothing you say can absolve you of that.”
“It is not your absolution I seek, vampire. It is your help, in exchange for mine.”
Caster frowned. Until that night when he and Mark had strayed into the witch’s territory, he’d been convinced demons were not real. They were a story told to scare children into obedience. The main moral of those stories: don’t make a deal with a demon. Nothing he offered would be significant enough to risk the price, and the price, in those stories at least, was always steep.
The even tone in Pierce’s voice changed, a tiny bit of desperation coloring the evenness of his delivery. “Your male witch commands enough power to get us out of here. Your wolf makes a good backup plan.”
Every muscle in his body tensed in readiness for a fight. He wouldn’t let this creature anywhere near Mark. “What do you mean?” His voice was a growl that bounced off the indecipherable walls of the void.
“Ah, that’s right. You were not in the room when he found out the reason for Ethel’s obsession with him.” He held Caster’s gaze. “And trust me, vampire. It is a deep obsession. Only he can grant her the immense power she seeks.”
Caster lost his breath. The revelation that Mark was his soulmate and its implications were the last thing he remembered battling before the witch attacked. What had Edie’s spell revealed?
“Your wolf is special.” Pierce continued, oblivious to the battle he waged within. “The male witch can find us here, but if he doesn’t do it fast, this void will disappear into the irresistible pull of the Underworld and then, only your wolf can save us.”
Mark sat at the dining table in the room adjacent to a kitchen so familiar to him, he could walk through it blindfolded. Yet, everything seemed out of place. The chairs were all wrong, as was everyone sitting in them, chatting away as if his world wasn’t crashing around him.
He recognized their fear in their pseudo-joy. His sharp senses could detect the undercurrent of grief from everyone around and the battle they fought to hold that overwhelming emotion at bay. The queen laughed at something Dean said, and he had enough, pushing out of his chair. He needed the outside, something other than the denial.
He was past the front door and on the front lawn before he remembered how cold this part of the world could get. He longed to transform, but he feared he would get stuck in wolf-form without Caster’s sure hand to guide him back. How had this happened? The wolf drew closer, flooding his body with warmth, rendering the cold air powerless.
“You OK?”
Dean’s voice startled him out of the depths of his despair, but he didn’t turn to face his brother. He shut his eyes against the inevitable presence of his brother’s influence in his mind, only to gasp his surprise when it didn’t come.
“I am so sorry this is happening.”
The sadness in Dean’s voice compelled him to turn. “It’s not your fault.”
Dean shook his head, an action in contrast with his words. “I should never have left.”
Mark looked away from the scrutiny in his brother’s eyes. “I don’t regret staying with him. If I hadn’t, my wolf would be gone.”
“You love him.”