Blood Lust - Alexandra Ivy Page 0,110

and larger. Was this some freakish magic? She struggled to breathe as she watched the pretty young woman morph into a pale, formless creature who was staring at her with pure white eyes.

“What the hell?” she breathed, stumbling backward. “What are you?”

He, or at least she assumed it was a he, allowed his lips to twist into a smile that made her stomach clench with dread.

“I know it’s tediously clichéd, but I truly am your worst nightmare,” he informed her.

She agreed.

He was a nightmare.

A big, larvalike beast who was denying her the destiny that’d been promised.

“Where’s my weapon?” she screeched, unable to accept that her glorious fate had been snatched away.

He gave a sad shake of his head. “You are the weapon.”

Frustration clutched her stomach, along with a sickening sensation of doom.

“Don’t screw with me,” she snarled. “I was promised . . . promised . . .”

Her words stumbled to a halt as her tongue swelled, making it almost impossible to speak.

The creature stepped forward. “What were you promised, Stella?”

She blinked, feeling a wetness coming from her eyes.

It couldn’t be tears. She never cried. Never.

Lifting her hand, she brushed her cheeks. They were wet. She pulled her hand away to discover the tips of her fingers coated in blood.

“Greatness,” she mumbled, befuddled by the red staining her skin. A shrill warning was sounding in the back of her mind, but it was too difficult to think through the fog. “I was promised greatness.”

“Greatness is earned, not stolen,” the freak said, as if she were a five-year-old in need of a lecture.

“I stole nothing. I earned it.” She clenched her fists, desperately trying to ignore the escalating fever that scoured through her veins. Christ. She felt as if she was being burned alive. “All those years giving my body to disgusting men. Pretending I gave a damn about the crazy-ass Brotherhood. I deserve my fate.”

The white eyes blazed as the male held out his hand, revealing the ball of churning energy he’d fooled her with before.

“Fate is a fickle thing.” With a wave of his hand the ball disappeared. “Seen from one angle it can look like success, and seen by another it is failure.”

Failure . . . failure . . . failure . . .

The word whispered through her fuzzy mind.

“There is no weapon, is there?” she spat out. She had to get to the door. If that little brat could get out, then so could she. Right?

“I’ve told you, you’re the weapon,” the man murmured, something that might have been pity twisting his blob of a face as she struggled to take a step forward.

She blinked away the blood, trying to force her shaky legs to carry her forward.

“How could I be a weapon?”

“Easily.” He shrugged. “You’re a high-blood who possesses an extraordinary gift.”

“High-blood?” She gave a sharp laugh, her lips cracking as she came to an abrupt halt. “That’s not possible.”

The creature waved aside her protest. “Believe whatever you want, Stella. But the truth is the truth. You’re a carrier who must be contained for your own safety as well as others’.”

High-blood. She was a high-blood.

She wanted to deny the claim. To call him a bald-faced liar. But there was more than just heat and pain that was sizzling through her body.

There was . . . a magic that was threatening to destroy her.

A wild laugh at the sheer irony erupted from her throat before it was changing to a hiss of pain as the flames beneath her skin became unbearable.

“No.” She fell to her knees, the grinding agony becoming unbearable. “What are you doing to me?”

The creature’s white gaze moved to study the huge boils erupting over the skin of her arms.

“It seems your powers aren’t entirely stable.”

“Make it stop.” She glared at the freak. Didn’t he realize that she was dying?

“I can’t.”

“Liar.” She coughed, not surprised when blood sprayed over the floor. “I swear I’ll be a good high-blood,” she muttered, willing to promise anything to stop the torment. “I’ll do whatever you say.”

She thought she heard him heave a faint sigh. “It’s too late.”

“No.” Genuine fear thundered through her. All her plans, all her plotting, all her sacrifices . . . It had to be worth something, didn’t it? “Help me.”

There was the rustle of robes as the man stepped backward. “There’s nothing I can do.”

Stella groaned, the world slipping away as she realized she’d failed.

“This isn’t how it’s supposed to happen. . . .” she rasped. “I was supposed to win. . . .”

*