Karizma

Chapter 33

Kristopher felt his heart rupture as it broke. The remnants shattered into the pit of his stomach that was beginning to fill with bile. That cannot be true, he thought as he studied the woman before him. The woman that he had given himself completely over to. The woman that made his glacially mute heart warm itself enough to melt the ice, to allow him to experience feelings that he had not felt in centuries. The woman that had accepted him completely. "No," Kristopher croaked out softly. "No, it isn't true."

"Listen to her heartbeat, Kristopher," Nathan answered. "She does not lie."

"Say it again," Kristopher demanded suddenly.

"I do not love you," Ryleigh spat at him. "You are just another vampire."

Ryleigh's heartbeat did not so much as flinch from its rhythm, its steady beat shattering Kristopher's heart more and more with each beat. Her heart is not lying, Kristopher thought to himself. She is telling the truth. No, he immediately argued with himself. No, she cannot be. What if this is a trick? She knows that they are listening as well. "You're not another witch," he caught himself whispering, reciting his words from the night when she revealed herself to him.

"You're right, I'm a Karizma," Ryleigh said. "I have mastered hiding myself and bending the world to my will, and that includes you. I knew that you were a vampire, and I had to have one in my pocket to protect myself. You failed at that, clearly," she added as she nodded to the chains above her. "Waste of a spell."

Kristopher staggered backwards as his auburn eyes brightened in agony. Never skipping a beat, he thought as her heartbeat continued to fill his ears. Not a fucking beat. He did not know how he was going to rescue her, but he had every intention of fighting the Master and the Mistress if it came down to it. But now? Fighting them for a lie? Kristopher growled against the bile that rose in his throat and forced it back down. Her words cut him so deep that he felt his blood weep, he felt the void in his chest that was once his heart echo with nothingness. The first person in centuries that he allowed in, and it was all a lie. All of it. "None of it?" he whispered.

"Jesus Christ, no," Ryleigh said exasperated. "You're relieved of duty. If I had my magic, I'd lift the spell my damn self. You failed your mission to protect me."

"And you failed your mission to kill the remaining Karizma, but do you understand why you would not be punished?" Nathan asked Kristopher suddenly. "Out of all of the Karizmas that you killed, it only makes sense that the final Karizma would be the strongest one. So strong that she bewitched our best hunter. You had no choice but to keep her alive, quite literally."

"We cannot kill one of our kind for doing something that he literally had no control over," Mistress said soothingly.

Kristopher finally broke his trance on Ryleigh to observe the Mistress. He had never met her before; he was only her hitman over the years, and he had never asked what happened to the bodies of the Karizmas. Looking at her now, he knew that she ingested them. She was the spitting image of a Karizma, and he could feel the power beneath her skin, despite the warding on the building. The amount of magic in her blood was only dulled by the warding, not nonexistent like Ryleigh's was. Kristopher understood immediately why Nathan had kept Naomi hidden all of these years; a witch, a Karizma, nonetheless, was ruling the vampiric race. It was dangerous, but it was also genius. The vampiric race had a secret weapon that was being fueled to the brim, as much as the weapon could handle every twenty-three years. Power on top of power. It was genius, but it was also terrifying.

"Beautiful, isn't she?" Nathan whispered. "Her name is Naomi. You must understand why I did not introduce you two sooner, Karizma Killer."

"I do," Kristopher nodded. "And why you are introducing us now." Lukas may have found the building, but Kristopher did not doubt that Nathan knew that he was coming. Vampiric senses were heightened, which meant that the Master Vampire's surpassed any other vampire's senses. Nathan knew that Kristopher was on the premises; he could have easily hidden Mistress from Kristopher once Nathan knew, but he did not. Which meant that he had a plan.