Chapter 18 18. Chapter
Elijah
The steel-cold edge of the dagger against my throat—pressed exactly over the pulsing point of my artery—sobering me from the haze of morning in an instant. The anger burning inside me at her rejection was no longer an explosive force, but a steady, hissing fire that cold logic struggled to contain. I saw the pure, stubborn hatred in her eyes. This girl had no desire to die, but she had no intention of surrendering either, not even if her enemy happened to be her only ally.
“Enough,” I said, my voice low but stripped of the earlier roar. Now it was the Sovereign speaking—cold, absolute, unquestionable—though the absurdity of the situation, lying in a motel bed while a human girl threatened me, almost suffocated the words. “Put the blade down, Huntress. If I had wanted to kill you, I would have done it last night, when you were defenseless in your fever. And if you start stabbing now, the slightest movement might trigger the reaction we both fear.”
Her eyes never left mine, not for a single heartbeat, but the dagger’s tip slowly, agonizingly, deliberately withdrew from my skin. Millimeter by millimeter. I pulled back the hand that had been suspended in the air, returning it to the pillow. My arm burned with the temptation of the touch I had denied myself. My fingers still remembered the promise of her nearness.
“Why did you come back into the bed?” I asked, keeping my head still, eyes fixed on the ceiling.
“There’s no other warm place where I can stay awake all night,” Rory answered, her voice hoarse from strain and exhaustion. “If I die, you die. You said so yourself. This bed was the most logical tactical decision.”
That defiance. The cold, emotionless practicality of the statement enraged me instantly, yet also stirred a dark flicker of admiration deep within me. She was right. Survival was her art—one she practiced even while her body trembled from fatigue.
“Fine. Then we’re getting up,” I ordered, bracing my mind and shifting toward the edge of the bed. “We need to leave this place. The spell on the clerk won’t hold through the morning, and our scent… the smell of blood is too strong.”
Our movements were controlled by the dagger. As I slowly sat up, she did too, but her blade immediately leveled at my chest, tracking every motion. Dressing—something simple, human, insignificant—became a lethal, tension-strung choreography.
I turned from her at a painfully slow pace to reach my clothes, which I had thrown to the floor in last night’s anger. My back was exposed, the perfect target. I felt her gaze burning between my shoulder blades—the kind of focus that could slit my throat in a heartbeat if I made the wrong move.
I heard the dagger shift in the air. Instead of getting dressed, Rory readjusted her stance, reinforcing the line she would not allow me to cross.
“Don’t turn around,” she said sharply, commandingly. “I won’t put the weapon down until you’re out of this room.”
I stood tense. The black clothes lay wrinkled and dusty at my feet. I picked up the shirt, and motions that would have taken me less than a second as a vampire became painfully slow. Each button, every fold of fabric, was a moment when my arms and back remained open to her blade. The air itself felt heavier from the tension. Her intoxicating scent curled around me as I dressed, clinging to my skin. I felt the shirt slide over my body, but every one of my senses remained locked on the woman behind me—the woman whose blood still sang through my veins like a curse.
When I had finished dressing, I turned. Rory was fully clothed as well, in the oversized black clothes she had taken from the closet, but her posture was rigid, her dagger held before her like a shield.
“Listen to me now, Huntress,” I said, taking one step toward her—only for the dagger to immediately rise toward my throat again. I halted and lifted my hands, palms outward. “This is the last phase of our survival. By morning, the fanatics may find us. Or worse, the High Council may already know where we are.”
I met her gaze and refused to let her defiance distract me from the truth.
“You cannot be dead weight. You must accept that your blood is my poison, and this situation is hell for both of us. I fight the outside world, but right now, you’re fighting me. Our alliance will only work if your dagger is pointed at our enemies—not at my throat.”
“I don’t trust someone who chokes on a pretty scent,” Rory replied, her green eyes glinting in the morning sunlight leaking through the half-opened curtain. “My dagger stays at your throat until I know which of us is the greater danger.”
Her words struck me. They reminded me of my weakness—of the humiliation of losing control, of my hand on her body, of desire blinding me. Anger flared again, but I extinguished it.
“Our goal is the same: reach a safe place where I can determine why your blood affects me the way it does. If we don’t put distance between ourselves and this motel, it will be both our downfall. Now hand me the cash left in the first-aid kit. I’ll handle our escape.”
Rory slowly, cautiously extended her hand. Crumpled bills lay in her palm—money I had dropped at reception earlier. Even in that small gesture, the depth of her mistrust showed in her taut fingers and white knuckles. I took the money, slipping it into my pocket, careful to avoid even the slightest brush of skin.
“Go to the bathroom,” I commanded, shrugging into my coat and shielding my body from her sight. “We’re leaving this place. And remember: your dagger won’t protect you from the next attack. It only pushes me away. The world outside is far worse.”
When Rory finally backed into the bathroom—blade never lowering—I surveyed the room one last time. The blood-stained sheet, the scattered clothes, the chaos left by desire and violence. The cost of staying alive.
I locked the room behind me, slid the key into my pocket, and made my way toward the exit, leaving the silence and the suffocating tension in the doorway behind me.
The most dangerous path ahead was the hallway leading us back to the outside world—
and the knowledge that my greatest enemy still pulsed inside my own veins:
the desire her blood had awakened.