Winterly (Dark Creatures Book 1), стр. 118
“What about the prophesy in Vampyris?” She could never forget those awful last words: From the grail is darkness borne. “I am the Grail—from my womb will come the blight of mankind. Can you deny it?”
“Of course I deny it!” he snarled. “I care nothing for biased records and fear mongering prognostications. Prophesies and histories written by my enemies are like dust to me, and the words shall scatter, weightless, at the slightest breath of truth.” Then, just as quickly as his rancor had surged up, it ebbed. “Cleopatra’s life was chronicled only by her enemies in Rome, thus she remains forevermore the great whore of Egypt. And thus am I the great dragon that fell from heaven’s grace; the night adder cursed to stalk the darkness forever.”
That savored too much of biblical prophesies, and Emma was loath to revisit the sorcerous hallucinations she’d experienced after Tanith’s attack. She reminded herself again she was no harlot of Babylon—no symbol of corruption. Markus had convinced her of that much at least. She was merely plain and simple old Emma Rose: the morbid girl who’d fallen in love with a vampyre. What possible future was there to be had with a vampyre?
And how was she to make sense of Ana’s being the sister of a snake? Ana, who had been so good and kind to her—a witch. What was her familiar, she wondered? “So am I to understand that because you broke this ancient covenant, liberating me from this Nekromantis, Tanith and her sisters sought retribution?”
“Not exactly,” he said. Something in his expression raised a knot in her belly. “A bargain was struck soon after I claimed you for myself.”
“What sort of bargain?”
His face darkened. “Your sister’s life in exchange for yours.”
After the horror had sunk in, Emma hurled herself at his chest. “How dare you! You know I value my sister’s life above my own!” Her fingers were like claws as they raked his flesh. “You beast, you had no right! Where is Milli?! We struck the same bargain! My life for Milli’s! Give me back my—!”
Markus wrenched her claws away from his face. “What do I care for Milli?” he said, his words mingling with her ragged breaths. “She is nothing to me.”
“She is my sister! My own flesh and blood!” Emma tried to jerk her hands free, but the effort only brought her face closer to his. “If you truly love me then you must love all of me, even Milli.” She searched his coal black gaze. “Tell me my trust in you is not in vain.”
He released her. “Your sister is tucked away in a nunnery, as per your direction.”
“Then she is safe?”
“Not exactly, no. I have broken trust with Malach a second time and, I assure you, there is no more bargaining with him. Tanith’s attack on you—on Winterthurse soil, no less—was rather a clear declaration of war.”
“I must go to Milli! She must be protected at all costs!”
He shook his head. The pall across his brow stilled her instantly. “I’m afraid it is too late for Milli—her fate is sealed.”
“But you said—”
“She has already been bitten, Emma! There is nothing I can do now to change her destiny.”
“Bitten?” Emma’s teeth nearly cracked against each other. “Was it Victoria? Did my sister drink the vampyre blood?”
“No, but—”
“Then there is still hope!” What was more, Milli did not die with the vampyre blood and venom in her veins.
“Emma, listen to me.” Markus held her fast when she would have leapt from the bed. “It was not Victoria that bit her. It was not vampyre venom!”
“Then you must give her your blood again!” She besought him with eyes swollen with tears. “You saved me from the witches, you can save her too!”
His fingers tightened painfully over her arms. “My blood is of little use against Valkolak venom; wehr-wolf venom, Emma! And the one that bit your sister did so under a black moon.”
Chapter Fifty-Five
The Incurable Heart
Markus released her, hating the way her eyes cut him.
“Bitten under a black moon?” Emma shook her head. “I don’t know what that means!”
“Milli was bitten by a black wolf.”
Her heart was like a furious drum beneath her breast. “You never mentioned wehr-wolves,” she said and threw her legs over the other side of the bed, as though to escape him.
He followed her with his eyes as she padded to the window, her skin aglow with moonbeams as she stood naked between the drapes.
“The howling,” she said, glaring out over the moors. This was followed by a strange laugh—desolate as the cold night. “The dogs, you told me.”
“Yes.” When he had mentioned the dogs as being the source of the howling her first night at Winterthurse, he had never imagined that things would escalate to this. And he hadn’t lied, not really—wehr-wolves were, after all, canids. At any rate, there was really no appropriate moment for a vampyre to warn a mortal of wehr-wolves.
Gabriel was to have kept his hounds leashed. Markus gnashed his fangs, frustrated. If only the youngest Rose had not been so stupid! Had she heeded the warning not to go outside at night, he’d not have to weather these glacial looks from Emma. Markus had been dreading this confrontation with her and he detested the guilt she evoked.
“Not quite a lie,” she said. Her thoughts appeared to be running in uncanny parallel to his own. “You have ever used your words carefully and cleverly, Markus.”
His jaw tightened. Would that she’d called him vampyre instead, he cared little for the way her lips dislodged his name. “My brother’s secrets are not mine to divulge.”
Emma turned around to face him. “What do I care for Gabriel and his secrets! He is nothing to me.” His own words thrown back with redoubled vehemence.
“Emma—”
“No more clever words! Tell