A Shade of Vampire 84 A Memory of Time - Bella Forrest Page 0,34

with my arms stretched out as I welcomed the filtered sunlight’s embrace. Once this fresh hell was over, I’d go back to The Shade. I’d step onto Sun Beach, and I’d feel the full blast of summer on my skin without burning up.

“It works. It friggin’ works!” Rose said, restless and giddy.

Caleb grinned. “Amal, Amane, you two are amazing. It’s time to expand the test group. Hook Rose and me up, will ya?”

“As soon as we settle in Roano, we’ll prepare more doses,” Amal said with a glance at me, unable to stop herself from smiling. “We’ll strengthen the formula as well, so the cure can act faster. Now that we know it’s working properly, we can intensify the treatment.”

I couldn’t help myself. I took the Faulty twins in my arms, hugging them both with all the love and gratitude I could muster. Enough time had passed since I’d gotten a dose, and it seemed to have worked beautifully. It had bonded with my genes, and all I needed were a few more shots to make sure the process was permanent and irreversible. My heart swelled with pure, unadulterated joy, but it was short-lived.

Damn… every good moment we’d had on Visio had a crappy expiration date. I turned to Lumi and Sidyan. “Please bring my Derek back to me,” I said.

They both nodded, and Sidyan took Lumi’s hand, his scythe lighting up white. A split second later, they were gone, and the rest of us turned our attention to reaching Roano. We’d survived the Darklings’ attack. I was pretty sure we’d lost them somewhere beneath the Nightmare Forest when the Reapers teleported us out of there. We’d made the day-walking cure happen, and we’d kept Thayen and the Visentis boys safe. It didn’t feel like a clear triumph, but at the end of the day, it was a victory.

The war had yet to be decided, but this battle had been won.

Shortly after Lumi and Sidyan’s departure, the Reapers took us to Roano. There wasn’t much left of the old city except dusty foundations, wall fragments, and four decrepit towers at the north, south, east, and westernmost points. The ocean raged against the rocky shoreline beneath, waves crashing and foaming over the jagged dark gray stones. Toward the mainland, I could see the outskirts of the Nightmare Forest, its trees tall and crooked and gnarly beneath the emerald canopy. Behind us, a cobbled road snaked along the coast to vanish behind a cluster of vertical slabs of white marble. Silence reigned supreme. The memory of the horrors this place had seen still lingered, deeply embedded in every inch that remained standing.

Roano must’ve been a beautiful city in its day. The ghost of it had retained some of its original elegance, and the towers sulked against the hazy, reddish sky, as though waiting for someone to climb them again after two million years.

“The Darklings committed a massacre here,” Tristan said. “Valaine and I saw it.”

Kalla and Arya led their respective people through the city, helping them find shelter and assisting with the settlement as best they could, while Trev guided the horses to a naturally formed pond somewhere on the lower east side near the fractured defense wall. Seeley left Rudolph in charge of the ghouls, and the creatures ran off, eager to hunt in the nearby Nightmare Forest.

“You had a vision in the tunnel?” I kept my voice low. “What exactly did you see?”

“The Seniors were framed that day,” Valaine said. “Mira and Kemi and their people were trying to save me, but the Master of Darkness at the time —a Visentis by the name of Endymion—got to me first. Well, I got to him, actually. I sacrificed myself, thinking it was the only way to save the Aeternae.”

“Eliana was always stubborn.” Mira sighed. “Kemi and I did our best to protect her once we realized who she truly was. Our mistake was that we didn’t tell her the whole truth from the very beginning. Endymion poured poison in her ear, and in the end, she believed him. We were too late.”

“By the time we got to her, Endymion had already killed Eliana,” Kemi added, his voice low, his every word cutting through me like a hot knife. Few understood his and Mira’s pain like I did. I’d lost Ben twice now, and I would never forget the agony of his death. The emptiness it had left behind.

“The Lord Supreme had sent us to Roano because it had been overrun with