Chapter Fourteen
Kira tried to still her beating heart, not wanting the vampires in the room to feel her nerves. She had been waiting for this moment for a long time. Tonight she would find out the truth about her mother and tonight she would end Diana once and for all.
"What's a party without some crashers?" Luke said smoothly. He walked past Kira to stand next to Tristan. Both boys leaned casually against a tall bookshelf, but Kira saw the aggression in their eyes. They were alert as ever and ready to nab Diana if she tried to run.
For her part, Diana looked completely at ease. She wore a long, midnight blue shift dress that fit snugly against her body, leaving very little to anyone's imagination. Strings and strings of pearls dangled from her neck and a feathered headpiece decorated her hair, clipped to keep the long black strands from falling over her face. Mostly, Kira took in her attitude. Diana exuded arrogance and smugness, like everything was going her way rather than the other way around. Even the manner in which she reclined over the desk suggested she was in control. And all Kira wanted to do was wipe the smirk from her face.
So, she got right down to business: no witty comments and no games. Kira stretched out her hand, sending a wave of Protector flames at Diana. Immediately the vampire catapulted off the desk and slammed against the wall, cracking the painting that had been hanging there. Kira walked slowly across the room, not letting up until her thighs hit the curved edge of the desk.
Finally, she dropped her powers and let Diana crash to the floor. "Where is my mother?"
Diana stood slowly, smiling as if nothing had happened. But, Kira saw the angry flash in her eyes, how the blue of her iris lit up for a moment.
"Oh Kira," Diana sighed. "You got a little bit of training and now you think you're my worst nightmare. Well, don't get too full of yourself sweetie because tonight I am untouchable."
"If I were you, I would listen to my own advice. You have no idea what I'm capable of, Diana." No one does, Kira thought remembering the pages she had read. No one in the world, not even Kira herself, knew what she was capable of. Diana may have Punisher blood running through her veins, but that was not the same at being invincible.
"Yes, well, whatever you say," Diana smiled sweetly at Kira, looking down on her like a child before turning her gaze to Luke. "You look wonderful for a corpse, Luke. Didn't I kill you months ago?"
"People just can't seem to stay dead anymore, can they? It's an epidemic," Luke replied with a nonchalant shrug.
"I have always liked a challenge," Diana said while twirling her beads around her pointer fingers.
"Drop the attitude Diana and tell us what we want to know," Tristan said, "it is three against one if you can't see that already."
"And what? We can do this the easy way or the hard way?" Diana said, laughing. Tristan crossed his arms and raised his eyebrows, responding to the challenge. It was Diana's choice how all of this went down.
"Do I need to throw you against another wall?" Kira asked while placing her palms on the desk and leaning over in an attempt at intimidation. "Tell us what we want to know — where is my mother?"
"I'd rather not say."
In the blink of an eye, Tristan had grabbed Diana by the throat and lifted her against the wall.
"Spit it out, Diana," he yelled. He squeezed her throat tighter. At first, Diana pulled against his hands and kicked at him, struggling against his grip. But the tighter he squeeze, the stiller she went, until his fingers dug deep into her body ready to rip her head off. Just as Kira was about to speak out and tell him to stop, tell him that they needed Diana alive, Tristan dropped her.
From the floor, Diana breathed heavily and looked up at Tristan. She stood, still looking him in the eye, and ran her hand up the length of his arm. "I love it when you play rough," she whispered, loud enough for everyone to hear and soft enough to come off as sensual.
Tristan shirked her hold and stepped back, blinking away the lethal look in his eyes. Kira clearly wasn't the only one who wanted Diana to pay.
"What is it going to take for you to tell me more about my mother," Kira asked and ignored the lusty look Diana was throwing in Tristan's direction. They didn't have time for all of this. A group of immensely powerful vampires was in the room next door and they could bust in at any moment. All it would take was for one of them to notice that Diana and Tristan had disappeared, for one of them to go searching, and then the jig would be up. She needed answers now and all three of them needed to move fast if the conduits in the woods were going to have any shot at a surprise attack.
"The only thing I want is to ruin your life," Diana said. Kira rolled her eyes.
"Yes, I got that from all of the vampires you've been sending my way and by the fact that you tried to kill me. Is there anything else you want?" Kira hated this, she wanted to burn the answers out of Diana, but Diana was immune to those flames. Her Protector powers wouldn't be enough. Tristan had told her one time about how different the two flames felt. Punisher fire, he had said, burned him to his very core, lighting his body up like a bomb about to explode. Protector powers felt different though, less painful and more solid. Rather than burning a vampire, it acted like a wall pushing the vampire away — weakening but not lethal.
If her flames weren't burning Diana from the inside out, they wouldn't be effective in getting answers. All three of them had been naive to think that Diana would just give everything up without a fight. And a physical battle wouldn't accomplish anything right now. Well, Kira thought, at least throwing Diana against a wall again would make her laugh. But no, Kira stilled her hand in midair, she just had to play whatever game Diana wanted to for the time being.
Diana sat down in the desk chair, lifting one leg over the other and folding her hands in her lap. Kira's stance over the desk hadn't affected Diana at all. She was the picture of ease. "I want to play a game."
"Darn," Luke said with a smile, "I knew I should have brought Monopoly with me."
"A game?" Kira asked, ignoring Luke. She did not like where this was headed. Why wasn't Diana a little more afraid? Sure, she knew they wouldn't kill her right away, not until she told them what Kira wanted to hear, but the girl didn't even look frightened at all. It was like she knew they couldn't touch her.
"How about a game of truth or dare? Girl to girl? I'm sure the boys wouldn't mind."
Kira looked across the room at Luke and Tristan where they stood next to each other, backed by the wall of old books. Each boy was just as confused as Kira was. What was Diana's angle? Tristan nodded at her, telling her to go with it for now.
"Fine," Kira said, sitting down across from Diana in an armchair next to the desk.
"Excellent," Diana said, "I'll go first: truth or dare?"
"Truth," Kira said. No reason to let Diana dare her to bust into the other room or something. And it wasn't like she had anything to hide.
Diana let her gaze rest on the two boys, each one staring intently at Kira. With a smirk and a cocked brow, Diana asked, "Have you ever lied to Tristan?"
"No, of course not," she said immediately. But her body betrayed her. A rush of blood filled Kira's cheeks, warming them to a slight blush. A jolt in her heart brought a hammering sound to her ears. And, from the corner of her eye, she watched Tristan shift the weight from one foot to the other. He knew she had lied.
"Spare me, Kira, I know you're lying right now," Diana said lightly. She lifted her hands, wove her fingers together and rested her elbows on the desk. "If you're not going to play by the rules..."
"Fine," Kira shifted in her seat, totally uncomfortable by the change of events. "Yes, I have lied to Tristan. Well, not so much lied as hidden parts of the truth."
"I've been alive for hundreds of years Kira and that distinction still feels old to me. Care to share with us all?" She rested her head on her hand, staring at Kira with an innocent yet almost cunning expression. Her eyes were open like a child's, but her smile was razor thin. "I mean we're all friends here, aren't we?
Kira really wanted to slap Diana in the face — no, not slap, punch her so hard she doubled over. But instead, she looked at Tristan and played along with Diana's game. He looked so handsome in his tuxedo, but so sad. This wasn't how it was supposed to happen. This wasn't how he should find out about Luke's connection with her or their almost kiss. And, Kira suddenly realized, there was no reason he had to find out now. She had another lie, something she had hidden from both boys and had been meaning to spill. She took a deep breath and fixed her eyes on the them
"There's something I haven't told either of you, something that I found out about myself." She paused to meet their eyes. Tristan's held concern and confusion. Luke's confusion and a hint of anger, letting Kira know he had been hoping she would spill the other secret. "I found the missing pages. Well, actually my grandfather gave me a copy, but I found out that the immunity isn't really the reason mixed breed conduits have been forbidden." Kira gulped when Diana leaned forward in her chair, listening intently to this secret piece of otherwise lost information. "Ancient conduits used to be uncontrollable and dangerous. They used to kill more than just vampires. In moments of madness, they burned human beings too. And that's the real reason the species separated, to keep from ever having to sentence one of their own to death."
She gulped and raised her eyes back up, meeting Luke's first. It would hit him harder because he understood better than anyone else what she meant. All of those times he had pulled her back from insanity had much stronger implications now. And he knew it too. Kira saw the realization pass over his features: curious tilted head to furrowed confused brows to wide shocked eyes to a hard and knowing frown.
Tristan on the other hand looked relieved in a way, which Kira found darkly humorous. If anything, this realization only brought them closer together and made them more similar. The worse her fate got, the more he could be there for her in a way Luke couldn't. Or maybe he was relieved because he, like Diana judging by her shocked face, was expecting a different confession. And Diana was clearly disappointed. She had obviously been hoping to create a rift between Kira and Tristan, but the fact that her plan backfired only made Kira feel better.
Kira did make a quick mental note to be more truthful. Not that she ever thought she would find herself playing truth or dare with a vampire ever again, but being a pathological liar wasn't exactly on the to-do list.
"My turn," Kira said, this time crossing her legs and looking snidely at Diana. "Truth or truth? I don't do dares."
"Truth then, Kira."
"Where is my mother?"
"I don't know," Diana said with a shrug. Kira stood, struggling to keep the power gathering in her body at bay.
"What do you mean you don't know?" She fumed.
"I don't know where she is," Diana smiled, "I only know who has her. But, those are two very different questions and it's not my fault you wasted your turn."
"Tell me," Kira yelled, not caring anymore. She was done with this, done playing games and done with Diana.
Diana leaned back in the leather chair, chuckling quietly to herself and smiling at how visibly angry Kira was. Her teeth had elongated during her mirth, making her look more evil and more deranged.
"I'll tell you something Kira. You are a fool. All three of you are fools," Diana said, twirling her black hair absently through her fingers as if bored. "Do you really think we didn't know you were coming?" Diana's gazed traveled sidelong to Tristan. "As soon as you showed up on Bronson's doorstep, I knew Kira was with you. I knew you wouldn't be able to resist dropping in uninvited. And I knew you would be idiotic enough to think you had gotten the best of me. But," she said while rising, letting the long train of her gown cover the floor behind her, "one scream is all it takes for me to have the entire party in this room. And you know how fast vampires can be."
Diana raced forward, reaching for Kira's throat before she could register the movement, but Tristan got there first. He caught Diana's hand in midair, easily keeping her at bay.
"Who else knows we're here?" He asked in a menacing deep voice.
"I told Bronson my suspicions," Diana said, finally a little afraid. Even if Kira couldn't kill her, Tristan could and the look in his eye was deadly.
"And why here? Why this ball?" He questioned.
"There was someone I've been meaning to find and I thought I'd find him here. And old friend I've lost touch with." Diana smirked
"Who?" Kira asked, not liking the dark look slowly gathering in Tristan's eyes.
"Oh, Tristan, you finally understand," Diana said and patted his cheek with her free hand while slipping out of his now loose hold.
"Is he here?" Tristan asked. He still had not moved.
"Of course, Tristan. He's been here for hours, enough time for us to catch up and chat. You must have missed him outside," she pouted for effect.
Tristan finally moved. He grabbed Kira's arm, lifting her easily into his arms as he flew towards the open window. Diana blocked the exit, and for a second Kira thought he was going to bowl her over, but Kira still had questions and she didn't intend to leave without answers, no matter what Tristan wanted.
"Tristan!" She said while struggling to break free of his hold. "I'm not leaving without answers."
"But," Tristan started and she cut him off.
"No!" She shouted, tired of all of this. The two boys might have been doing this whole mortal enemies thing longer than her, but they weren't the only ones who could make plans. They weren't the only ones who had a say in what happened. She forced herself out of Tristan's hold and stepped closer to Diana. "Tell me who is here and what you know and who has my mother."
"Or what?" Diana challenged back while looking down her nose at Kira with an obviously superior expression.
And with that Kira broke. All of the stress she had been carrying for the past few weeks released like a floodgate: Luke for trying to kiss her and awakening those feeling inside of her, her grandfather for not welcoming her with open arms, Tristan for picking the wrong time to be macho, Diana for being Diana, and the historians for writing down truths about herself she didn't want to hear.
Her rage flew out in the form of flames, blasting Diana's skin. Diana laughed at the slight pain.
"I told you before, I'm immune," she smiled, but she couldn't move from the corner Kira's Protector powers had pressed her into.
And Kira? She ignored Diana. Her powers pushed her beyond words. But, Kira sensed a difference this time. She was focused and controlled, she wasn't mad. She knew exactly what she was doing and for the first time, she was perfectly content with her desire to kill. Diana had to die and if it took all of her strength, Kira would find a way to make it happen.
She pushed out her Punisher fire, feeling for the walls around Diana that kept her protected. Every vein in Diana's body was covered in an invisible shell, some sort of magic Kira couldn't break through. She felt along Diana's body with her powers, searching for a weakness, but there wasn't one. She encased her heart in flames, trying to dry it out, but nothing would stick. The fire rolled around Diana. It slipped past her, unable to find anything to hold on to.
Diana still sat crumbled in the corner grinning at Kira's failed attempts.
But she didn't realize that Kira was reaching that point, that place where she started to shut her powers off out of fear that she would never return to herself. Kira wasn't afraid this time.
Two images flashed through her mind, one of Tristan bloodied and broken being forced to swallow her blood and a second of Luke ashen and lying immobile on the ground. Like a broken film reel, the two images flashed in her mind, one to the other, back and forth until Kira couldn't tell what she was seeing. She could only remember the excruciating pain of her heart ripping from her chest in each moment.
She funneled the pain into her flames and rode on her emotions, no longer searching for a weakness and instead throwing everything she had into her power. She was too focused on killing Diana to feel the walls around her powers come down. All she felt was the extra burst of energy, the new scars burning into her palms as power forced its way out.
Distantly in her mind, Kira heard Luke call her name, but she shut him out. He wasn't going to stop her this time. She didn't need saving. She wasn't falling into madness — she was walking there willingly.
And that's when Diana stopped laughing.
They both felt it: the immunity waned. The invisible wall wobbled against Kira's flames. The heat warped whatever magic was there and melted it away. And then, as if Kira were watching a movie in her head, a crack formed in the shell encasing Diana's heart.
"Stop! I'll tell you everything," Diana cried, trying to stand, but unable to move even a muscle. "Kira! It's Aldrich. He has your mother. He's here. You can go find him." She screamed with tears forming in her eyes. "He's had her for years. I saw her with him ten years ago. She's alive!"
But it was too late. Kira was beyond stopping and her flames unrelentingly continued.
"She's with Aldrich! Aldrich!" Diana yelled and those were her last words, because the wall shattered like glass and Kira's fire greedily swallowed Diana whole.
When it was done, Kira's mind snapped back into focus. She had accomplished her goal and it was time stop. Forcefully she shut her powers off and pulled all of the flames back into her body. When the black spots receded and she regained her vision, Kira noticed that scorch marks traveled up the walls and across the ceiling. The curtains were burned apart. Giant holes, black around the edges, spotted the fabric. A pile of dust sat in the corner, a mixed of Diana's ashes and burnt paper.
Kira swallowed. She had done it. She had broken through. She had killed Diana, but at what price? Her fire had touched more than the vampire; it had burned more than Diana's skin. Kira had willingly stepped right into the destiny she never wanted.
She stumbled back, off balance by the realization that the ancient conduits had been right. She was dangerous. The thought pierced her like an arrow sinking deep into her chest and she spun around, needing Tristan or Luke to say something, to make her feel like this darkness suddenly sprouting inside her, wrapping around her like a vine and suffocating her, would go away.
But there was no solace in the scene behind her. When she looked up for comfort, both boys instead jumped away in fear.
Fear of me? Kira thought, confused. She looked down at her hands, expecting to see starbursts on her palms, but instead there were burns up to her wrists. And not just redness, but raised boils like a mountain range on her hand. Strange that it didn't hurt, she thought. Still, Kira lightly touched her healing powers and watched as the burns faded to a dull pink and then disappeared all together. She twisted her hands, stretching soar muscles.
Again she looked up at Luke and Tristan. They cringed with wide eyes.
"What?" Kira tried to say. It came out as less than a whisper. Her throat ached from the effort. "What?" She said more forcefully, slowly pulling her body back together. She used her own strength to force the black doubts clouding her mind away.
"Your eyes, Kira," Luke said, walking towards her.
"They're blue," Tristan finished the thought.
"What?" She asked, still groggy and confused, not yet fully recovered from using her powers. Had she heard them wrong?
Tristan reached her first and put his hands on her cheeks.
"Your eyes are blue," he said while staring into them, searching for something. Searching for me, Kira realized. But he recovered from the shock and he still gazed at her with love sparkling in his eyes. It helped ground her, helped pull her mind back to reality.
"How is that possible?" she said, feeling more like herself with each passing second.
"I don't know." Tristan dropped her face, letting Kira look behind him at her best friend.
But Luke wouldn't come any closer. Tears welled in Kira's eyes and she reached her hand out to him. She couldn't stand the look on his face, the one that regarded her as a stranger.
"Luke?" She asked, her voice cracking. They looked at one another in a standoff: Luke finally realizing Kira was sometimes beyond his saving and Kira finally realizing what it felt like to lose his love even if only for an instant.
Like they always do, the moment passed. Luke stepped over offering her a hug, stiff but still a hug. Kira returned it, holding him tight against her body.
"Just don't turn into a Smurf on me, okay?" He whispered into her hair. Kira laughed into his shoulder. Everything was going to be fine.
And then the door behind them burst open.
Kira, Tristan and Luke turned around instantly.
Two vampires stood in the massive wooden doorway. Kira recognized Bronson from the other day in the park. His crooked nose gave him away, but the man next to him was a mystery. His light brown hair was slicked back. His eyes were such a dark blue that they seemed all together black. He was tall and thin, making the shorter Bronson look stocky, and each man had on elegant tuxedos. But while Bronson searched the room, his eyes darting in circles, the other man looked only at Kira.
Tristan jumped in front of her, blocking her view of everything but the curve of his back, and he held her there with his arm.
"Aldrich," he sneered.
"My dear Tristan," Aldrich said warmly, "it's been far too long."
"Where's Diana?" Bronson interrupted in a deep voice.
"If you mean the pile of ash formerly known as Diana, she's in the corner," Luke said, moving to stand next to Tristan, effectively blocking Kira completely.
"Pity," Aldrich said, but Kira heard no remorse in the words.
"How is that possible?" Bronson asked with a quiver in his voice, "I gave her the blood myself."
Kira put a hand on either boy. She pushed Luke and Tristan to the side as if they were curtains. Feeding off of the dramatic effect, Kira said, "I killed her. And I will kill you both if you don't tell me where my mother is."
Aldrich stepped forward and walked up to Kira, who held Tristan and Luke at bay. He cupped her chin, tilting her head back so he could look at her eyes.
"Marvelous," he said with a grin, as if he had been expecting them to be blue.
"My mother?" Kira asked.
"Safe and sound," he said.
"I seriously doubt that." Kira slapped his hand from her chin.
"I'm not keeping her prisoner, Kira."
"You're lying," Kira said. She couldn't help it, the obstinate words popped out unwittingly. She wouldn't believe his lies, even if something in his voice sounded strangely sincere.
"Spoken like the child you aren't," he chided her.
Before Kira could think up a snappy retort, another vampire suddenly appeared next to Aldrich, jerking him away from Kira. She recognized the blonde in the pink high heels, the first vampire she saw enter the party.
"We have to leave," the woman said urgently while yanking him away. Aldrich pushed her aside, throwing her against the books on the wall. Bronson just watched it happen, uncaring.
"You step above yourself, Clarissa. You may have finally landed an invitation to the red rose ball, but you do not order me around."
"I'm sorry," she said, bowing her head. "It's just that—"
And then the windows shattered, throwing glass everywhere. Flames rolled past Kira and Luke, smacking into all four vampires and sending them flying.