If there’d been one chance to get close enough to Victoria, he’d have lashed out, sliced her with it, eradicating Lilith’s opportunity for entertainment.
Damn you, Victoria. Why didn’t you stay away? It could have been over by now.
He didn’t want to look in the pit, yet he could not keep from doing so. You’d be safe. It was a mass of snarling teeth and writhing fur, slender white limbs, flashes of pale skin and fabric. Victoria had her stake; he saw it rise and plunge, awkward and desperate, even as the dogs snapped and bit and surged. He cringed at her gasps and cries, and hoped when there was a canine squeal or shriek. God, he hoped.
Rather than mauling her all at once, the mastiffs seemed to come in waves . . . one after the other, lunging, biting, snarling, scratching, then rolling or dodging away in the pit to let the next come. The attack was so fast and relentless that Max could make out no details . . . only that Victoria had not been able to rise from beneath them. And her stake had not yet been effective.
He didn’t realize he was jumping forward, down, until a horrible jerk on his wrist manacles whipped him through the air, then slammed him back onto the ground, fairly yanking his arms from their sockets. Rough stone tore his skin raw as he skidded across the dirt and rock. Blood oozed from his wounds as he crawled rapidly back to the edge of the pit, feeling the strain of hard breathing coursing through him. If he could get down there, he needed only a moment, and the ring would do its job.
But another powerful drag pulled him back, sending him sprawling onto his spine, head whipping back hard onto the stones. He breathed heavily, looking up into the furious face of Lilith. “Do not try such a foolish thing again,” she said. “Or I’ll release them fully. ”
Max clambered to his feet, head pounding, fists clenched. He wanted to beg, his mouth formed the words, he drew in the breath to plead . . . but he knew it would do no good. Lilith would lap it up like her vampire dogs and stroke him like the pet he was . . . and she would do what she wanted anyway, reveling in his pain and using his weakness to control him, to destroy them both.
Christ Almighty, his weakness was two bloody women. The vampire and the Venator. The seductive evil incarnate and the feminine warrior.
There was a sudden sharp squeal and a soft explosion. Then quiet.
He surged to the edge again, looking back down into the blackness, hoping. . . . Her white fingers were there, bloody, digging into the small cuts on the side of the pit, pulling her battered body up . . . not so far from the edge, and Max plunged his chained wrists down to help drag her up, heedless of Lilith standing behind him, of her triumph in seeing his weakness. There were no dogs left . . . only the smell of vampire dust on the air.
Victoria collapsed onto the ground at their feet. Her clothing was bloody and torn, her eyes glazed, her loose hair in a long, witchy tangle about her, red-streaked fingers still clutching the stake. Yet she pulled raggedly to her feet and blinked hard; Max could see her struggling to maintain her composure, to clear her vision.
He saw it . . . he recognized the struggle going on beneath her skin, deep within. The need to go on, to destroy, to annihilate. His fists tightened. There was nothing anyone could do for her. She had to fight through herself. Wayren had told him all of the details that Victoria had not.
Holy God, let her be strong.
She drew a deep, shuddering breath and faced Lilith. Her eyes burned with anger, yet there was no red. Not yet.
Thank God, not yet.
Then, suddenly galvanized and hopeful, he fumbled with the ring, reaching toward her, ready to end it before she had to make the fatal choice . . . before she was battered any further, tortured, maimed, beaten . . . pushed over the edge.
But his chains were yanked again and he lost his fingering on the ring as he was forced out of reach of Victoria, tripping and stumbling into a heap. He closed the signet quickly before it cut his own flesh. There was only enough for one of them.
“Marvelous,” said Lilith, speaking to Victoria. “Absolutely marvelous, but nothing less than I’d expected from you. And quite efficient as well. I rather thought you might take longer than you did. Although I shall grieve for the loss of my companions, the outcome will be so much more valuable. And besides,” she said, her fangs pressing into her lip as her smile returned, “I have more to spare. ”
As if that were a signal, the door on the other side of the pit opened and in walked the man Max recognized as Bemis Goodwin. He was holding the leashes of four more slavering canines, their ears pricked forward, their eyes burning red as they scented the blood.
“And now we shall finish this,” said Lilith.
Her eyes burned with excitement, and Max felt as though he were going to vomit. The room shifted and he tried one more time to lunge toward Victoria, releasing the tiny lethal blade of his ring . . . he needed only one small cut, just the barest nick. . . .
But something caught around his foot, pulling back, and he slammed into the ground.
And then a woman screamed.
Twenty-seven
The Choice
Victoria was barely aware of Max slamming to the ground at her feet. She felt the need, the anger pulsing through her . . . red burning her eyes, blazing through her.
Her heart still pounded, sweat poured down her back and underarms. Lilith’s red eyes glowed at her knowingly. Reveling in the battle as it billowed and surged inside her. She drew in a deep breath, touched the amulets beneath her torn tunic, and gasped with the power: pure, clean power.
The red faded, the rampant violence eased, she felt as though control was in her grasp. Triumph blasted through her. Lilith had been wrong. She’d underestimated Victoria, and now she’d come through whatever this test was—
And then she saw the four dogs. And Bemis Goodwin, standing on the other side of the pit. The dark, deep, horrible space. Slicing teeth and deep claws, the smell of evil, wet dogs as they came at her again, and again. Not to kill . . . to maim, to torture, to tear into her, but not enough for relief. Not enough to kill. Victoria couldn’t hold back a shudder. It rattled her, made her weak-kneed and dizzy and dry in the mouth as she remembered fighting them back, and back, and back. . . .
She felt the brush at her feet as Max tried to lunge back at her, and she focused on him, saw the blood and scrapes on his shoulder and chest, the torn flesh at his wrists. Yet her world was vague, and she moved as if in a dream . . . as though underwater, fighting through heavy waves, struggling to breathe . . . and then a sharp scream cut through the air.