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Excerpt
Romania, 1476
He was coming for her. She knew it. Esperetta of the house of Dracul
could hear him out in the cold darkness. Unseen. Threatening.
And he was getting closer.
Closer.
So close, she could feel his breath on her skin. See his evil eyes as he
relentlessly stalked her through the night while she ran from him. He
wanted her dead.
“Esperetta...”
There was magic in that deep, sultry voice. It’d always had a way of
making her weak. Of lulling her into a stupor. But she couldn’t afford
that now. Not after she knew him for the monster he really was.
She stumbled through the darkness as the fog seemed to wrap itself
around her, slowing her down. The cry of wolves echoed on the wind that
sliced through her gown and cloak as if she were naked in the woods.
She tripped and fell against a wall of solid steel. No, not steel.
It was him.
Terrified, she looked up with a gasp into those deep, dark eyes that
were rimmed in red. But that wasn’t what scared her. It was the fact
that she was in her white burial gown. The fact that she’d clawed her
way out of her own grave under the weight of the full moon to find
herself alone in the church cemetery. She’d stared down at the tombstone
that had held her name and birth date for almost an hour before she’d
found the courage to leave that place.
No longer in Moldavia as she’d been when she went to sleep, she was
again home in Transylvania. In the churchyard by her father’s castle.
Needing to understand what had happened to her, she’d made her way home,
only to find an even worse horror than waking in her own grave.
She’d seen her husband kill her father before her very eyes. Seen him
gleefully hand her father’s head off to his enemies. Screaming, she’d
run from the great hall, out into the night.
And had run without stopping until now. Now she was in the arms of a man
whose black armor was covered in her father’s blood. A man she’d sworn
to love for all eternity.
But it wasn’t this man she loved. This was a monster. A liar. He might
bear the same imposing height. The same long black wavy hair, the sharp,
aristocratic features, but it wasn’t Velkan Danesti who held her now.
It was the devil.
“Let me go!” she snarled, wrenching herself away from him.
“Esperetta, listen to me!”
“No!” she shouted, moving away as he tried to touch her again. “You
killed me. You killed my father.”
He scowled at her and if she hadn’t seen his darker side for herself,
she might even believe the sincerity he feigned. “It’s not what you
think.”
“I. Saw. You. Kill. Him.”
“Because he killed you.”
She shook her head. “You lie! You’re the one who gave me the poison.
You! Not my father. He loved me. He would never have hurt me.”
“Your father stabbed you when he saw you dead and then he tortured me to
death.”
Still, she didn’t believe him. He was lying and she knew it. When Velkan
had given her the sleeping balm he’d told her that it would make her
sleep so soundly that no one would know she was alive. He’d promised not
to bury her since that had always been her fear. He’d said that she
would awaken in her bed, with him by her side and that they would be
free to stay together forever.
Now, she knew what he’d planned all along. Kill her and her father so
that he could take their lands. Velkan didn’t love her. He’d used her
and like a fool, she’d played into his hands and cost her father his
life.
She ran for the woods again only to have Velkan overtake her.
She tried to pull away, but he held her arm in a fierce grip.
“Listen to me, Esperetta. You and I are both dead.”
She frowned at him. “Are you insane? I’m not dead. I only slept as you
said I would. What madness are you trying to convince me of?”
“No madness,” he said, his eyes burning into her. “When we wed, I bound
our souls together. I told you that night that I didn’t want to exist
without you and I meant it. When your father killed you, I swore
vengeance against him and after he killed me, a goddess came and offered
me a bargain. I sold my soul to her so that I could avenge you and so I
killed him. For you. But because I live, you live. We are joined
together. Forever.” Then he did the most unbelievable thing of all. He
opened his mouth to show her a set of long, sharp fangs.
Her heart pounded in terror. It couldn’t be! This wasn’t her beloved
husband, he was an unholy demon. “You’re in league with Lucifer. My
father was right. All of the Danesti are an evil who must be purged from
the earth.”
“Not evil, Esperetta. My love for you is pure. I swear it.”
She curled her lips at him as she pried his grip from her arm. “And my
love for you is dead,” she spat before she ran through the fog once
more.
Velkan forced himself to stand still and not follow her again. His bride
was young and she’d been through a shock tonight.
She would return to him. He was certain of it. In all the violence and
horror of his life, she’d been the only thing he’d ever had that was
good and gentle. She alone had touched his long dead heart and caused it
to live again. Surely, she wouldn’t stay angry at him. Not when all he’d
done was protect her.
She would see the truth and she would return.
“Come back to me soon, my Esperetta.” And then he uttered the one word
that had never left his lips before. “Please.”
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