Crave the Night (19 page)

"No!" Melusine lowered her tail and whacked
it against Nolan's cage, sending it, and the dragon still curled
around it, flying. The chain anchoring the cage in place tightened,
and the cage jerked to a stop. Nolan slammed into the bars,
releasing a grunt as he did.

Holding onto the bars, he forced his body
into a vertical position and stared at his captor. "Outbursts won't
change the truth anymore than a lie. The world knows you as a hag
and a monster, and it appears they are right. Melusine, whoever she
was, is dead. This is what you are now."

"No!" Melusine dropped onto his cage, her
tail wrapping around it and her hands reaching inside to grab
him.

"Truth," he yelled. "You will never find a
man to love you and break your curse. No man could love what you
have become."

"Then more men will die," she muttered, her
hands groping for Nolan, while her tail continued to squeeze the
cage.

The kelpies and the dragon had backed away.
They floated at a distance now, watching as Melusine raged and
clawed, trying to reach Nolan to silence him.

Metal creaked, and Melusine smiled. "I will
crush you in this cage, vampire."

"And you will still be alone," he replied,
his gaze shifting to the corners of the cage and the metal that was
beginning to bend...to weaken.

If the cage broke, he could get free, but
could he escape? He hadn't fed in a week.

The tip of Melusine's tail poked through the
bars, jabbing the water, searching for Nolan.

Blood. He needed blood.

Not allowing himself to think further, he
kicked his legs and propelled himself forward. Wrapping his arms
and legs around the sea hag's tail, he sank his fangs into her
flesh.

Her blood was cold and thick, and tasted of
salt and oil. Nolan's first instinct was to spit out the vile
liquid, and pull away, but something told him to hang on and drink
as he had never drank before.

He did, guzzling until he thought he would
be sick.

Melusine screamed and thrashed, trying to
free her tail from his fangs. She slammed his body against the
bars, but the more he drank, the stronger he felt. Until he looked
out at the sea and saw things differently.

The kelpies morphed, not horses, but women,
bound in chains of seaweed with their mouths gagged. And the
dragon, was a merman, tied in the same bonds as the kelpies but his
entire body wrapped in the stuff so his arms were pinned down and
he had no choice but to undulate his body like a snake's.

She's trapped you, he thought. And the
dragon lifted his head. A new understanding...hope shone in his
eyes. The kelpies moved too, their eyes wide and filled with
fear.

Re-energized, Nolan kicked his legs against
the bars. They creaked and bent. He kicked again. He felt them
give, but Melusine did too. She reached inside the broken cage and
grabbed him with her tail.

Then she squeezed and squeezed some more
until Nolan heard a new noise...his ribs and spine breaking. His
heart would be next—not pierced, but crushed. It would have to have
the same effect.

Blood dribbled from his mouth and his senses
dulled.

Wishes do come true, he thought. I'm
dying.

Allera swam by Sarina's side as they
returned to the sea hag's home. Sarina had told her sister how she
got the soul, but she hadn't told her everything. She hadn't
admitted that she loved a human, or what the mermaids would see as
a human.

"Why are we returning?" Allera asked as she
brushed aside a school of fish that had surrounded them. "Does
Melusine have more souls?"

"Perhaps." It had occurred to Sarina that if
the sea hag had found Allera's soul she might have found others
too, but that wasn't why Sarina was swimming until her arms and
tail ached, why she hadn't stopped to sleep or eat since leaving
the sea hag's realm.

She was going back to find Nolan—to save
him.

She knew their love was lost, knew there was
no way he could forgive her for what she had done to him, but she
also knew she couldn't leave him to the fate the sea hag had
planned for him.

"We should have brought the others," Allera
added.

"They wouldn't come."

"For the promise of souls they would
have."

Perhaps, but soulless mermaids were too
undependable and unstable. They could have been captured by the sea
hag and turned into man-hunting monsters in her quest for the love
that would free her from her curse.

"We can take the souls to them," Sarina
said. She'd tried to get her sister to stay behind, but Allera had
insisted on following. At some point she would learn Sarina's true
reason for returning to the sea hag's world, but not until Sarina
had Nolan in her sights—when it would be too late for Allera to
fight her.

It took them another hour to reach the area
where the dragon had attacked them. Sarina slowed her frantic pace
to a steady flip of her tail.

Allera slowed too. "Something is...off," she
murmured.

Sarina nodded and slowed to a stop. "I
smell...blood," she said.

Without waiting for her sister to reply, she
dove forward, following the scent as quickly as she could—three
times their previous speed.

"Sarina!" Allera called, but Sarina had
already left her sister behind, and her focus had already
shifted—to a scene of mass destruction such that she could never
have imagined.

Cages were strewn over the floor of the sea
like broken toys. Bones occupied most, or fell from them onto the
sandy floor.

Sarina's hands fisted as she tried to stay
calm. The bones couldn't be Nolan's. She hadn't been gone that
long. He'd survived her test, survived the dragon's too. He
wouldn't have drowned, and Melusine wouldn't have killed him. He
was too valuable to her; he held too much potential.

"Your vampire wasn't up to par. I want a new
human or my soul back." Melusine wove her way through the wreckage.
She was alone, no sign of her kelpies, the dragon or any other
creatures she might have enslaved to her service.

"Where is he?" Sarina asked, pulling herself
upright to face the water spirit face to face.

"Gone." Melusine fluttered her hand. There
were gashes in her tail and the human part of her body bore
bruises.

"It's your blood I smell." Sarina lifted her
eyes and stared the sea hag in the face. "He fought you."

"He insulted me." Melusine's eyes narrowed,
and her tongue flitted out of her mouth. Then her gaze shifted, and
a smile curved her lips. "My soul. You brought it back to me."

She raised her hand and kelpies surged
forward, like green water pouring from a tap.

"Get the soul!" Melusine yelled.

"No!" Sarina threw herself toward the sea
hag, but the kelpies flowed between them separating them.

"The dragon has your man."

Sarina spun, unsure where the words had come
from.

A blue-green kelpie raised its head to catch
her gaze. "The sea hag has us bound so we can't shift or speak, but
your man weakened her hold." The horse-shifter glanced over its
shoulder, toward Melusine. "She doesn't realize her power over us
has weakened."

"He weakened her?" Sarina didn't realize it
was possible to weaken a water spirit as old and powerful as
Melusine.

"Bled her and ingested some of her magic,"
the kelpie replied, but Sarina could tell talking with her was
making the creature nervous. It shook its head, nudging her with
its nose. "Go to the dragon."

"But my sister—"

"Her soul is safe." The kelpie whinnied then
and reared up on its hind legs. As one the herd began to move, and
Sarina was swept along with them. Afraid of being crushed or left
behind, she grabbed hold of the nearest kelpie's mane and hung on.
A few yards away, Allera did the same.

The kelpies cut through the water faster
than the fastest ship, or even the fastest mermaid. Sarina closed
her eyes and hung on, praying she was doing the right thing,
praying the kelpies weren't leading her astray.

Outside a massive sea cave, still within the
sea hag's realm, the kelpies slowed.

Sarina loosened her hold on the mane she'd
held and floated to a stop.

"The dragon," the kelpie who had spoke to
her said, then whinnied to the others and turned to leave.

Allera swam up to her looking dazed and
uncertain. "What happened?" she asked.

Sarina shook her head. "I don't know. One
told me—" She broke off her response. She hadn't told her sister
about Nolan. "One told me, the sea hag had bound them so they can't
shift or speak."

"But they took us away from her."

"And she won't be happy." Sarina hoped the
kelpies could handle Melusine, but the creatures had given her and
Allera their assistance of their own free will. She had to believe
they knew what they were doing when they did. And now she had other
issues.

She turned to Allera. "I have to tell you
something."

"Do you?" Her sister's eyebrows lifted.

"There's a man...a vampire...I traded him to
Melusine to get your soul. And now I have to get him back."

"A vampire? They are real?"

"Yes." Sarina was surprised Allera knew of
vampires, but, she realized, she hadn't seen her sister in a very
long time. They hardly knew each other anymore.

"And you are risking yourself to save
him?"

There was no censure in the question, just
curiosity, but still Sarina looked away. "I have to."

"I see."

And maybe Allera did. The young mermaid
she'd been when the pirates stole her soul couldn't possibly have
understood, but this Allera was older...changed.

And so was Sarina.

She placed a grateful hand on her sister's
arm and swam into the cave.

The place was dark, darker even than the
deeper part of the ocean where Melusine's cages had been. Sarina
sensed the rock formations that jutted from all sides of the cave.
She swam around them instinctively while her other senses stayed
alert for other living presences.

She quickly sensed one...a large one...the
dragon.

It was curled into a spiral at the back of
the cave.

"Mermaid," he said. "You've come for my
treasure."

"Treasure?" Sarina paused. "No. The kelpies
said you have the vampire." Her eyes roamed the area around the
dragon, but there was no sign of Nolan, no sense of him either.

"Treasure." The dragon lifted one loop of
his body. Nolan lay tucked against him like a baby. "He's
dead."

"Dead? No. That can't be." Sarina rushed
forward.

The dragon's tongue darted out of his mouth,
brushing against her chest. "He gave me the strength to swim
away."

"You too?" Sarina edged sideways, wondering
if she could call Allera, wondering more what good it would do. Two
mermaids against a dragon that equaled fifty of their kind in
weight.

"But I'm not free, not completely. I thought
if I brought him here, I could save him—so he could finish what he
began."

"Finish?" Sarina paused. The dragon didn't
want Nolan dead. It wanted the vampire alive. She moved forward a
foot. The tongue pressed against her chest again. "I can save him."
Her hand moved to her vial.

Nolan wanted a soul. She couldn't give him
Allera's because it wasn't hers to give, but she could give her
own.

"A mermaid soul," the dragon muttered,
causing Sarina to hesitate. Dragons were dumb creatures motivated
by base needs and greed. They didn't know about souls or
mermaids.

This dragon wasn't what it appeared.

Before she could ponder the thought more and
think of how she might use the realization, a voice called out
behind her.

"Stop!"

Allera stood in the opening of the cave.
Realizing her sister had figured out her plan, Sarina spun.

"You can't understand. I have to save
him."

"Because you used him to save me."

Sarina shook her head. Her hair streamed up
and outward. "Because...because I love him."

"Love?" Shock was clear on Allera's
face.

Sarina bit her lip and turned back to the
dragon. Allera could judge her, would judge her, but it didn't
matter, because soon, without her soul, Sarina would be like every
other soulless mermaid—an unfeeling shell devoured by hunger and
knowing nothing else.

Again Sarina reached for her soul.

Allera raced forward. Arms outstretched, she
knocked into Sarina, sending the mermaid flying into the cave's
wall.

"Allera, I—"

Allera stood in front of her, her hand
raised in a stop gesture. "You'll kill him."

"No, I...." Sarina glanced from her sister
to Nolan.

"You said he's a vampire. Vampires are
immortal, or close to it. If you give him a soul in the state he's
in, he will be human. He will die."

Sarina rose onto her arms, then slowly,
pushed herself upright. She swam forward, closer to the dragon.
This time the creature, its attention shifting between the two
sisters, allowed her to approach. She lowered her body into a kneel
and placed her hand on Nolan's chest. No heart beat, but there was
something else....

"He's alive," she murmured, to the dragon,
her sister, herself. She just needed to say the words, but she
couldn't keep from admitting the truth either. "Barely."

Allera blew air out of rounded lips. "He
needs land. Just surviving here has to be draining him—too much for
him to heal."

Land. It was an idea. Nolan wasn't a
creature of the sea, and despite the fact that he'd been able to
tolerate staying so long beneath the water's surface, it made sense
that he would fare better on land.

She looked at the dragon.

The creature's tail closed back over Nolan,
hiding him.

Holding very still, Sarina waited. The
dragon had said he wanted to save Nolan, but he had also called him
a treasure. Dragon's didn't hand over their treasures lightly.