At the doorway, Mikhail stopped, the fury cooling, replaced with hollow-souled grief. Kneeling beside his blood brother, he looked into the lifeless eyes of Aleksei one last time before closing them for good. His body was already cold. The bitterness of it, of a man who’d made him laugh so many nights around the fire, who’d fought beside him and shed blood with him time and again, his last act to give his life for the princess. Then he stepped over him to the Black Lily soldier, Ivan.
Aleksei and Ivan had always gotten along so well, with their mutual love of good ale, fine women, and warm laughter. The sight of his vampire guard and the human soldier side by side in death reminded him what this war was all about, what they were fighting for. And how much they had to lose.
“Oh, God.” Mina knelt beside Aleksei. “They’d come to protect me.”
“Aye,” he agreed, glancing at the six bodies they’d felled before they breathed their last. “They did their duty,” he said gently, not meaning for it to sting, though it did. “Not out of obligation, but because it is who they are.” He glanced down, a lump swelling in his throat. “Who they were.”
Mina’s eyes pooled with tears but didn’t drop until she leaned over Aleksei and placed a kiss on his forehead. Then she moved to Ivan and did the same.
“Come,” he murmured, anxiety riding him to find his brother. But first, he must see to it that Mina was in safe hands.
They ran through the brush, off the trail, the shortest route to the front door. They quickly passed the dead bodies and followed the mournful sound of Brennalyn coming from the children’s room.
Brenna sat on the floor next to Beatrice, the limp body of little Denny in her lap, his dark head against her chest as she combed her fingers though his hair. Gregoravich stood over her, guarding. The two dead Legionnaires were piled against the far wall near the door.
Mikhail knelt onto one knee next to Beatrice, checking her pulse, when two pairs of light footsteps and a set of heavy boots sounded up the hall. Helena, Sienna, and Nikolai rushed into the room, all three battle-worn. Helena’s pale face bore a purpling bruise on her cheek, her black hair falling in wild disarray. Sienna’s eyes glinted gold with her fire magic, the residual scent of it like charred honey lingering in the air. Nikolai carried his sword, bloodied from his kills, his face a mask of tamped rage.
“Oh, Mimi!” Helena fell down onto her knees, cradling Denny’s face.
Brenna swallowed the grief she’d been pouring out through tears and sobs as Helena wept instead.
“Not Denny, Mimi,” she cried, shaking her head. “Not sweet Denny.”
“Oh, my darling.” Brenna brushed her hand over her head and pulled her close. They clung to each other with the boy’s lifeless body between them. “He’s with the angels now, my love.”
Brenna’s voice cracked as she tried to comfort her daughter with words that could never alleviate the pain of this innocent’s untimely death.
“Where’s Friedrich?” Mikhail asked Gregory.
The somber giant nodded toward the crashed-open window. “Went after you and Grant after he gave Denny his elixir.”
Mikhail knelt beside Brenna, noting Friedrich’s elixir wasn’t strong enough. Without even thinking, he gently pried Helena back and eased his arms around Denny.
“Let me have him, Brennalyn.”
She shook her head. “Not yet. I need another moment with him.”
“I may still be able to save him. Let me have him.”
Brenna’s night-dark eyes, glassy with tears, fixed on him. Shaking her head softly, she whispered, “You can’t. Friedrich tried. His heart has already stopped.”
Mikhail slipped his hand beneath the boy’s slim nape, then firmed his voice. “His blood is still warm. Give him to me, Brennalyn.”
She let go at once. With the frail child across his lap, the lifeblood staining his chest, Mikhail ignored the tense silence as everyone watched him. Tearing open Denny’s shirt, he bent and sank sharpened fangs into his jugular, releasing the potent elixir that poured through his veins. A powerful potion he carried from his family’s secreted lineage—more powerful than Friedrich’s, a grandson of the original Varis vampire.
After a breathless moment, he heard and felt against his lips the soft murmur of a birdlike pulse, then another. He pulled out his fangs, sealing the wound with a swift lick, then pressed his fingers to his throat. There again, the soft flutter of a heartbeat. Raising his head, heaving from the intensity of the moment, his gaze swept the room, everyone watching in awe.
Mikhail avoided Mina’s questioning gaze and landed on Brenna. “He is alive.”
She gasped and cried, pulling Denny into her arms gently. “Oh, Captain. How? How did you—?”
“Best get him to another room, keep him warm. I’ll see to Beatrice.”
Brenna was on her feet, carrying the boy to her own bedroom with Helena on her heels.
“Let me help,” said Mina, hurrying with them.
Mikhail scooped Beatrice into his arms to take her into her bedchamber next door.
“Oh, Helena. What about the boys?” Brenna asked from the next bedchamber, panic gripping her again.
“They’re fine. They’re all okay. They were with me and Dmitri. And Marius and Arabelle, too.”
“Marius, Arabelle, and some of the Black Lily are with the boys at our cabin,” added Nikolai, now standing in their doorway.
“Where’s Dmitri now?” asked Mikhail, stopping beside Nikolai and peering into the room.
“He went looking for you,” Helena answered, sitting on the edge of the bed where Brenna brushed Denny’s hair away from his face and Mina pulled the quilt up tight.
Gregoravich cleared his throat behind him. “Captain, he came here with Yuri and Gavril. I told him you and Grant, then Friedrich went after Radomir. And…the girl.”
Mikhail noted that his bear-size friend couldn’t even say her name. He was fond of Izzy. Everyone was. The girl had wrapped every member of the Bloodguard around her sweet, pudgy finger. Why in heaven’s name did the queen kidnap her?
Helena gasped. “Girl? Where’s Izzy?”
Brenna just shook her head, unable to speak it aloud for a moment. “They took her.”
“No. No. No.” Helena shook her head, as if she could change reality if she denied it enough. Brenna pulled her back into her arms.
Everyone knew what Helena had suffered at the hands of King Dominik’s men when she was imprisoned at Dragon’s Eye. The constant abuse as their bleeder, the neglect, the terror. But a little girl couldn’t be used as a bleeder for long before she died. They would’ve taken Beatrice if that were their goal. She’d last longer as their blood slave. No, it was some other reason.
Mina had remained silent all this time, until now when she sucked in a sharp breath. The pain emanating in this room was palpable, a raw scraping against the skin. Mina stood beside Helena and Brenna, placing her hands on their shoulders. He couldn’t see or smell anything different, but the air changed all the same. A wave of numbing peace radiated from her, spreading like morning mist. He’d heard of some empaths with the gift to impart a healing kind of serenity. Brenna and Helena continued to weep, but the grief seemed to subside to a bearable pain as Mina wrapped them both in her arms. She murmured low, soft words of compassion to ease this ungodly weight.
Mikhail had to get out of there and find Dmitri. He glanced at Gregory. “You’ll stay here.”
“Aye, Captain.”