Fangs of Desire (Book II) (Completed)

Chapter XXIII

Silence. For a while there wasn't a single sound as Tristan pulled his scythe back from the hole he had created in Dominic's chest.

"Dominic!!"

He looked up with Emma's voice, showing a sad and tired smile before losing his balance and falling down, his eyes losing focus as he fell limp, his blonde hair getting stained with blood that was pooling under him. Tristan looked up and their eyes met with Emma.

"I am not here to kill anyone other than you Emma."

He turned towards her and slowly started walking closer.

"And with each second you resist, someone else will die."

Emma looked over at Dominic again, wondering if she could get to him in time. She knew what had just happened, she knew the possibility of him being alive was little to none, but it felt numbingly unreal to see his eyes looking empty like that.

She looked down at the sharp and broken edges that were still holding onto the window frame, then looked at her hands again, remembering Marius's words. Her ancestry was still in there somewhere.

"Guide me... If you're really there, guide me, Hysteria."

She whispered to herself before jamming both of her arms onto the lines of broken glass, hissing with the pain, then pulled her arms out again and let the blood gush out from the deep wounds.

"Guide me."

She repeated, focusing on the blood running down from her arms. Tristan was getting closer, getting ready to attack again.

"Hysteria!"

She yelled at the top of her lungs and felt a shocking sensation in her body. Her muscles froze as if she had been struck by lightning. She fell on her knees and held onto the jagged edges of the window, groaning in pain as the glass cut into her fingers. She could feel every single drop of blood that was leaving her wounds and running down her arms. The door behind her was slammed open once again, she couldn't turn to see who it was but she could make out the voice,

"No!!!"

It was Camille, running to the window to see Dominic laying on the ground. Her voice was full of disbelief and pain. She ran back out, footsteps echoing through the halls as she went to get more kindred for help. Ever since Jacob's death the number of residents in the mansion had gone down tremendously, mainly because Jean didn't care to have so many kindred around, but she knew they still had supporters that were roaming the city and ready to come for help if called.

As the pain intensified Emma closed her eyes and swallowed, the sounds around her drowning out as if she was under water, her view blacking out.

'You use my name unceremoniously, child'

A voice echoing through the darkness. Emma recognized it, she was sure she had heard it before but couldn't remember where. The pain on her fingertips were numbed as she held tighter onto the broken shards of glass. Then just as it hit her, the shock of the pain passed and a surge of energy flowed through her veins. She gasped and choked on her breath, opening her eyes as her vision started coming back. She pulled her hands back and looked at them. The blood was not gushing out anymore, the drops not falling from her skin. It was as if every single drop of blood in her body was frozen in time, not circulating through her veins anymore unless she commanded them to do so.

Emma stumbled before pushing herself up, collecting all of the blood that had stained her skin and making them into a puddle in her palms. What she went through had felt like forever, but outside Tristan was still not close enough to attack her. She stepped up and jumped out of the window without hesitation, falling onto the grass ground with a sommersault as she free fell the two story heigth. She didn't stop, collecting her momentum and running towards Tristan. He had an annoyed smile on his face as he readied his scythe, jumping to the side and aiming straight for Emma's chest as he swung it. She hit the blunt edge of the blade with her palm to divert it's route down before holding onto the handle, pulling it off Tristan's grip and hitting it on her knee to break it. She almost broke her own leg after hitting the scythe on it, it felt more like titanium than wood, tough as if it was invulnerable by any mortal means. The scythe disappeared from her grip in a cloud of dark mist and appeared back in Tristan's hand.