Beautiful Death (35 page)

She put her arm around Lilith’s shoulders. “You are an enigma in yourself, Ryōshi-san.”

“That’s not an answer,” he grumbled. He looked to the little girl even though she couldn’t see him through that blindfold. Why was she even wearing it? “Do you know, Lilith?”

The little brunette said nothing, only moving her head up and down slowly once.

“Really?” Excited, he took a step towards her, Ash heavy on his arm since he refused to let go of her hand—a comfort of any. When Lilith said nothing more, he asked, “Well, um, do you mind telling me?”

“Sorry, Ryōshi-san,” Yuki said, “she will not speak.”

“Since when?” Ash asked a little too quickly.

Yuki tilted her head to the side, lips tight with something that might have been apprehension. “Shortly after I took her from Malik. The child spoke a cryptic message of crow, night and death... Since then, not a single word has been uttered...” Yuki reached behind the girl’s head, untied the blindfold and let it drop away. Ash and Tristan gasped together, their clasped hands squeezing tighter. “Two days later, I found her like this.”

“By the Goddess,” Ash whispered. She tugged on Tristan’s arm, pulling him against her side. Her free hand came up and held onto his arm a little too tightly. “She… she did this to herself?”

Yuki nodded, looking as dismayed as Tristan’d ever seen her.

The skin around Lilith’s eyes was jagged pink edges of healing flesh, her eyes were missing. Yuki had been kind enough to sew the damaged skin back together but it still looked raw and painful.

Yuki’s voice was soft and sad when she answered, “
Hai
. She tore her own eyes out with her fingers. The same day, she refused to speak again, and she will not leave my side, not even for a moment. She will not even heal the damage with a spell. She’d rather walk around like this. I had to sedate her just to sew the holes closed…”

Ash was moved to nearly tears. For all the time she knew the girl, she never imagined this would be her fate.

“Why?” Tristan asked softly. He was more disturbed than should have been and couldn’t say why. Only just that it
really
bothered him, on a personal level. He felt like he needed to cry for the girl though he didn’t even know her.

Yuki shook her head, her eyes shutting for a moment in remorse. “It is just something that happens to all pythia, in time.”

“What...” Ash had to stop to collect herself. “What were her words? What did she see?”

Yuki tied the blindfold over the girl’s missing eyes again and straightened, looking from Tristan, then to Ash. “The raven flies. The flower blossoms. The star falls. The earth shudders. Darkness awakens.”

The room was unnervingly silent as the others processed the words. To Tristan, they just sounded foreboding and ominous. For Ash however, she knew enough about the pythia to not jump to any one conclusion as their words could be taken in multitude of understandings. Ash wanted to believe the foretelling wasn’t as dark as it sounded. She could ask the girl and of anyone, Lilith would speak to her, she knew this without a doubt. But if Lilith was no longer speaking and no longer allowing others into her mind, what words could be had?

Tristan let out a long, shaky breath and whispered, “What the shit does that mean?”

“That, I don’t know.” Yuki smiled even as she shrugged lightly. “I don’t speak pythia.”

“Is this why you came, Yukihime?” Ash asked in a tiny voice.

The old vampire made a flippant gesture with her hand. “No. I thought perhaps that Lilith here could do with a change of scenery.”

Tristan frowned. Change of scenery? The girl couldn’t even see. And she did that to herself.

“
You’re being cruel
,” Ash whispered in Greek, sounding as if she might cry.

“Am I?” Yuki answered in her own language with a high lit to her tiny voice and shrugged again. “If you really want to know, why don’t you address her yourself, Asta-chan? She is still of her mind and such.”

“Dammit, Yuki,” Tristan snapped harsh enough to make Ash flinch. He didn’t understand what was going on or what they were saying without including him, just that he didn’t like it. “Quit fucking around. Tell us what you want and then get the hell out.”

He gave up long ago on being overly polite with the Snow Princess. The night he and Ash killed Malik, Tristan flicked off the old vamp and said more than a few rude things to her and she never retaliated. Yuki didn’t want him dead. Besides if she did, well, there wasn’t a hell of a lot either him or Ash could do about it then, was there? He accepted whatever was going to happen to him would happen. Besides he wasn’t going to put up with Yuki’s bullshit. He wasn’t afraid of her.

Yuki tossed her head back and laughed. “Ryōshi-san… brave brave Ryōshi-san. So you don’t fear me any longer?”

Feeling confident again and able to let Yuki distract him completely from the blind pythia, Tristan took his hand back from Ash and crossed his arms over his still bare chest, looking defiant. “No,” he answered plainly and honestly. She only creeped him out, that was a
very
different emotion from fear.

“
Sō ka
.”

There was a whirl of motion around him seconds before something solid made contact with his upper body. His middle lit with cold burning energy, warning him that a very powerful vampire was way, way too close. Tristan took in a sharp breath, feeling the air fill every inch of his lungs, and blinked up into a face he never liked seeing so close. Yuki grimaced all fang at him, hot fingers pinching around his Adam’s apple, choking him. His eyes widened as he started to gag for air.

Next to him, Ash made a small, strangled sound. Tristan flinched and tried to look towards her, but the pressure on his windpipe kept him in place. Out of the corner of his vision he could see her pinned to the floor at his side, Yuki’s steel grasp immobilizing her. They were both at the mercy of the fickle, ancient vampire.

“What about now? Brave, brave, Uruwashi.
Mattaku
, you smell so...
totemo
oishii
.” Yuki licked her lips, wetting them. Her expression shifted from hungry to put-off again. She harrumphed, tightening her fingers so that she cut off his air completely. “Do you fear this mad, old vampire now? Is the
Uruwashi
frightened yet?”

Tristan bucked under her, straining for air, his vision fogging already. He wanted to lift his arms, fling them outward and hit her, punch her right in the fucking face and deal with the repercussions later. But, for such a small person, she proved to be stronger and he couldn’t lift his arms from under her legs where she’d pinned them to his sides. He was helpless, like a butterfly to the flame against an eighty pound girl. And she was going to kill him if she didn’t let go soon. All she had to do was pinch her two little fingers together and crush his trachea, then dead Uruwashi on the rug.

“Yeeees, Ryōshi-san. You’re so very right. All I have to do is squeeze and your life would be mine... Mmmm, and I bet you taste...” She shuddered hard, her eyes fluttering.

She really did want to kill him.

“Yukihime!” Ash managed to scream with the sudden lessening of fingers pinching off her voice box.

The Uruwashi blood in Tristan suddenly shifted, the way he felt was the same, yet different. Something was about to happen, he just didn’t know what. Yuki’s fingers on his throat became impossibly cold, as if they were made of ice. Then, as if confirming his last thought, a thin layer of frost spread out around his neck, radiating from her hand. Tristan tried to suck in a gasp, shocked. Instead, he kicked, bucking under the vampire, his eyes wide and wild as the ice started to enclose his entire neck all the way around. He could feel the cold all through his throat and into his mouth. His chest started to burn from the inside out.

Next to him, Ash’s writhing doubled. She tried to kick out, take the Master vampire in the head, but Yuki saw the move coming and blocked it. She warned Ash in gravelly Japanese to mind her manners or she’d be under Yuki’s scrutiny next. Reluctant, having to believe that Yuki wouldn’t really kill Tristan, Ash forced herself still, eyes welling with frustrated tears.

The small vampire gave a little huff. “
Tadashi…
,” Yuki drawled out, looking whimsical as the ice ceased to spread, “if I were to do something as silly as kill you, I think perhaps I could find much more interesting ways of doing so.” She smiled and leaned over Tristan, letting her top sag open, showing him that she wasn’t wearing anything under the thin fabric. Not that there was much under there to show off.

He groaned, his eyes starting to roll back. His whole face was tingling now, the pull of unconsciousness just moments from winning. Yuki huffed, pouting her lip out in an over-exaggerated display and opened both hands as she pulled to her feet over him. Tristan drew in a deep, gasping breath, the air burning all the way down his throat, pulling fire made of sharp ice into his lungs. Yuki stepped away and he coughed a few times as the fresh air filled him and rolled to his side, curling up into a ball.

Ash immediately reached for him, touched his face. “Are you okay?”

He nodded, unable to speak just yet. He’d live anyway.

“You are sure?” she asked a little more gently and he looked up finally, meeting her gaze. There were unspent tears lingering at the corners of her eyes. No matter how many times Tristan’d seen it, twice now to be exact, he was sure he’d never get used to seeing the red-tinted tears of the vampire. They literally wept blood.

“Yeah,” he answered in a scratchy voice. “Thanks.”

She gave him a small smile and sat up. And he said a silent thanks that she was okay, not even breathing heavy. Two months around vampires and Tristan wasn’t sure if they really needed to breathe or if it was just for show. He was starting to suspect the latter.

Tristan rubbed at his sore throat. The thin layer of ice brushed away easily, coming off in his hand. He stood, putting his back to the room and grabbed his shirt from where he’d dropped it on the empty computer desk and pulled it on. It didn’t make him feel as safe as he wanted.

When he turned around again, Yuki had taken up her seat again next to Lilith, looking statuesque, albeit smug. Tristan couldn’t help but glare at her as the last of the pain in his lungs dissipated. His throat throbbed with cold burn, but he wouldn’t give Yuki the satisfaction of letting it show.

“Okay,” Tristan said with his irritated voice. “You’ve made your point.”

The little vampire raised a single white eyebrow at him. “
Honto ka
?” For once her normal bantering tone was replaced with something dry and sharp.

He sighed and leaned into Ash when she wrapped an arm around his waist.

“Well,” Yuki said, “I hope my point is perfectly clear to you both because I have a job for you.”

“Pass,” Tristan answered without a second’s hesitation.

Yuki titled her head. “You have yet to hear my request.”

His posture shifted to stand-offish again. He was growing indignant, he couldn’t help it. Yuki just pissed him off. “I’ll listen, doesn’t mean I accept.” He was just lying to himself. If there was a vampire out there hurting humans, he’d feel obligated as the last Uruwashi to take care of the problem. Even if it killed him.

Yuki sat back against the couch and crossed her legs. Next to her, the pythia suddenly moved, mirroring the Master vampire’s gesture. Nothing could have freaked Tristan out more than that one little motion. Yuki smirked. “I think you will both thoroughly enjoy this hunt.”

Nothing with Yuki was exactly as she said. There was always a hook and maybe even nasty teeth too. There was always a catch. Something she says they’d enjoy was more likely to mean something that she’d enjoy watching them struggle with.

Tristan heaved a deep sigh and muttered out, “Christ, I’m going to fucking regret this aren’t I…?” Straightening, he asked, “Who?

The old vampire put on a broad grin. “Lucien.”

The Uruwashi Series

Beautiful Death

Bête Noire

Moon Child

About the Author

SOMETIMES
known as Stinna (pronounced Steena)
,
Christina Moore
just so happens to be her real name. Her writing career started under a pseudonym in the romance genre. But her true love has always been the paranormal. Vampires, werewolves, demons, faerie and everything in between, she loves them all—the allure of the unknown. The birth of the Uruwashi series started many years ago with a daydream sparked by a very special voice of a certain bad-ass vampire in her favorite anime. Little did she know then that the story of the Uruwashi would morph into what it is today.

When not writing or chasing her toddler, Christina loves to read, garden, cross-stitch, and play video games. A Maryland native, she lives just outside of beautiful historic downtown Annapolis with her husband, daughter (a.k.a. Tiny Boss) and two Australian Shepherds, Deunan and Aydin. Growing up riding horses to show in dressage and cross-country, later moving on to racing Volkswagens and then finding a career in the architecture industry as a graphic artist/mother hen, she’s never been a real expert in any one thing. Christina has a passion for diversity and enjoys many types of music, film and literature that sometimes clash with the norm. She's often said she's going to marry Spike Spiegel when she grows up—her husband understands. 

For more Uruwashi series information, go to www.thebeautifuldeath.com.

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