A Shade of Vampire 84 A Memory of Time - Bella Forrest Page 0,76

while Kelara stood by the fire. Soul walked up next to me, smiling.

“I do like some good old-fashioned violence once in a while,” he said, clearly amused.

“That was awesome,” Amane added, giving me a playful wink.

“Who the hell are you?” Ramus croaked, nervously eyeing the weapons.

Kelara sighed. “Give him a minute. He’ll catch on.”

“Oh no.” His eyes bulged with horror. “You’re the outsiders.”

“There we go,” Kelara replied dryly.

“You’re coming with us,” I told Ramus, but he shook his head.

“No. You’re going to kill me, and I don’t want to die,” he said, sweat dripping from his pale face. “I know three of us are dead already. Danika’s coming for me. If you were able to find this place, then so will she. I have to leave.”

“We can protect you,” I insisted, though my crew knew I was lying. We had no intention of keeping him or any of the other Whips alive for much longer. Spirit’s soul shards had to be retrieved, so the other First Tenners could find a way to destroy them before anyone could use them for nefarious purposes. The only shard that would survive was Thayen’s. The boy deserved a better life than what he’d been forced into so far. “Come with us, and Danika won’t be able to touch you.”

Ramus’s eyes turned to dark slits as he looked at me. “I heard about your mistakes in Dieffen. How can I possibly trust you with my safety? This whole thing has already gone far enough, and I refuse to die for the Spirit Bender. I’m a devout Darkling, but… this is too much.”

“Then tell us how to stop Danika. She’s got three shards already,” Trev said. “If you help us, we can help you.”

“Danika hasn’t caught us yet,” Amane added. “Dieffen didn’t go as planned, but we survived it. We got out. Even now, your Master of Darkness is looking for us. Trust me, we can hide you well.”

Ramus blinked rapidly as he tried to take it all in. He couldn’t stop looking at the pulverizer weapons, and Trev caught on to his obvious curiosity. “This will turn anything to ashes in an instant,” he said. “Ramus, we have the means to keep you safe. Work with us, and we’ll find a way for you to survive this war.”

“What… what do you want to know, exactly?” Ramus asked, though he had yet to surrender. I wasn’t sure he’d be foolish enough to try attacking us, but I wouldn’t put it past him, either. A cornered animal was unpredictable and dangerous. I had to treat Ramus accordingly, so I took several steps forward in a bid to assert myself.

“How do we stop Danika from resurrecting the Spirit Bender? Can the soul shards be extracted or destroyed in any way? Do you know where the other Whips are? And last, but certainly not least, we’ll need to know all the death magic spells the Whips and the Master of Darkness have access to. The more we learn about the enemy, the better prepared we’ll be,” I said.

“You want to go after my people,” Ramus retorted, suddenly alarmed.

“Your people are the ones who are trying to kill you, Ramus,” Kelara interjected. “We’re only looking to help, provided you help us first. Doesn’t that seem like a fair deal?”

He thought about it for a few moments, his gaze never still for longer than a second. I didn’t like the extreme agitation he was displaying. The sweat and the heavy breathing. For someone who’d been sitting quietly in front of a crackling fire, Ramus looked as though he’d just run a marathon up and down the mountain. Something was off.

“Yeah… I’ll tell you whatever you need to know, just don’t let Danika get to me. I heard whispers about Danika having put her shard in someone else, but I’m not sure how that’s done, and I don’t have any time left to figure it out. She’s coming for my piece.”

“And you like living too much to get killed over this, right?” Soul replied.

Ramus nodded, wiping some of the sweat from his face with a perfectly folded handkerchief he kept in his velvet vest pocket. “We’re all still reeling from what happened. I mean, we all knew this day might come, but we never thought it would… you know, actually come. The Spirit Bender was invincible.”

“Meh. Not really,” I muttered. “I’ll give credit where it’s due. He was very good at his schemes, and he really hit the jackpot with Death and