Sweet Nightmares Book 5

Don't It Just Break Your Heart

Klaus and Marcel had gone hunting for the owner of the coin, while Morgana stayed behind to prepare the dungeon for the torture session that was sure to follow. When Klaus came back with Greta Sienna in tow, she couldn't say she was terribly surprised. Morgana wasted no time in chaining her up and nailing those chains to the floor and starting to drain her blood.

"You know," Klaus said. "For someone who organized this little summit, you're woefully short on details. So I'm going to ask you one last time. Where are you keeping Hayley?"

Greta stayed silent.

"You knew we'd have this chat. No doubt you binged on vervain until your throat was red and raw. And now, sadly, drip, drip, drip, all over the floor it goes."

"Sein mangel an vision wird sein untergang sein," Greta said.

Morgana raised an eyebrow. German?

"His lack of vision will be his downfall," Klaus translated.

"That's what he always said about you."

"He?"

"You and I have a friend in common."

"I sincerely doubt that."

"It's true. August Müller. I don't blame you for forgetting. It was a long time ago. Rostock, Germany, Spring 1933."

Morgana glanced at Klaus. He wasn't quite as smug now.

"Do you remember him now?" Greta asked.

"As an elephant considers a gnat," he replied. "Merely a trifle."

"That trifle is my Bodhiharma, my Guru Nanak, my Jesus!" Greta snapped. "August is the touchstone of everything I believe, and the reason my friends and I have taken your sweet Hayley."

Morgana called on Fire and turned the nails hammered down into Greta's hands hot enough to turn red. Greta let out a screech, and Morgana let the nails cool back down.

"Your daughter is dangerous," Greta said after a long moment. "A menace, a threat."

"My daughter is a child," Klaus snapped.

"A child born of werewolf blood, who can create hybrids at will. Her defect must be corrected."

"Her defect is my defect! Say that again, I'll pluck out your eyeballs and eat them like olives off my fingertips."

"I'll call it what it is: a dirtying of my species, which diminishes the pure and superior nature of vampires."

Morgana heated up the nails briefly as a warning. "Get to the point, you purist bitch."

Greta glared at her, then looked back at Klaus. "Your daughter will purify herself, submitting to the same spell your mother, Esther, used to bind you. Once her werewolf side is sublimated, Hope will no longer be capable of creating her abominations."

"And if she doesn't, Hayley will die," Morgana guessed.

Greta smirked. "Clock is ticking."

They left her sitting there and met Marcel back upstairs in the compound.

"Who the hell is August Müller?" Morgana asked as Grendel climbed up to her shoulder. She reached up and scratched behind his ears.

"The man was a forgettable artist," Klaus replied. "A virulent fascist, and a murderous slob who slaughtered werewolves by the pack."

"And what did you do to him?"

"What makes you think I had any piece in this?"

"A couple hundred years of history," Marcel replied.