Nadya’s jaw went slack and she tried to flee, but Ash flicked her hand, and tendrils of light crept over the vampire queen’s body and bound her in place. She kept trying to escape, leaning away from Ash. “No, no, no,” she mumbled over and over, unable to comprehend how things had changed so swiftly. She’d won, damn it. She had won!

Ash smiled, her fangs glistening in the sunlight. She thrust her hands out and repeated the words Eiko had taught her.

As she completed the chant, voice ringing with power, blood streamed from Nadya’s eyes and ears. Ash moved her hands to her sides as she continued to chant, and tendrils of light rose from the floor and licked the tips of her fingers.

Ash whipped one, and it wrapped around Nadya’s throat. The vampire queen tried to free herself, but she was trapped. As more tendrils wrapped around Nadya, Ash opened her hand as if she held a blade of light. As Nadya had done to her, Ash speared the vampire queen’s chest.

Ash then thrust her hand into the wound. “As you can see, I’m a very quick learner.”

Nadya groaned when Ash gripped her heart. “They will never follow you. The Therians will kill you for what you are. You’ll never be one of them, and you’ll never be Luca’s mate.”

Ash shook her head. “My happiness is the least of my worries. Saving an entire race of people plagued for five thousand years by a bloodthirsty bitch hell-bent on destroying everyone is more important. Helping them heal after all that has been done to them is more important. I am a vampire like you, but the similarities stop there. You chose to be evil, and don’t lie. There is always a choice, and you chose wrong. I choose justice. I choose the light.”

Nadya smiled. “We’ll see about that, vampire queen.”

Ash yanked her hand free, taking the queen’s heart with it. As the light drained from her eyes, she murmured, “Maksim.” Luca brought the sword down on her neck and decapitated her.

“That was overkill,” Ash said, amused though she still held Nadya’s bloody, shriveled heart.

Nadya’s head rolled toward the open door. Several Therians stood there, weapons raised but frozen in shock. Judging from their expressions, they had not expected to see Nadya die, let alone at the hands of another vampire and their king.

Screams and wails of pain echoed off the walls surrounding the palace. “Those are vampires,” Ash explained. “Her children must have felt her die.”

Ivanna brushed past the stunned Therians in the doorway to report that all the vampires were experiencing breakdowns and saw Nadya lying on the floor.

“Zia!” Luca exclaimed, naming the only other good vampire they knew about.

Ash’s eyes went blank as she accessed her magic. Then she smiled. “She’s fine. I can’t promise she isn’t going crazy. She was laughing like a loon, but she didn’t look injured.”

Luca grinned. “She’ll be fine. She got what she’s wanted since Nadya turned her.”

His heart was slowing from the adrenaline rush he’d experienced when he’d thought Ash would die and seen his principal enemy defeated. He looked from the love of his life to the Therians in the doorway, his mind whirling with possibilities.

Luca took her hand and pulled her around to face the door. He looked into her eyes and thought about how she had changed and everything she had sacrificed for him and his people. Never again would he deny her. His queen would stand by his side.

“It’s time to introduce you to Therian society.” He smiled. “We have a wedding to plan.”

She looked alarmed, and he barely resisted the urge to kiss her forehead. Just a little longer.

“That name and the good impression you wanted to make?” He gestured at the Therians in the doorway, who had all taken a knee. “Mission accomplished.”

EPILOGUE

Maksim’s crimson eyes snapped open when Nadya’s life force faded, and he roared with the agony of his loss. He had seen her die. As his love’s eyes closed for the last time, she called his name.

Blind rage burned through him, enhancing the new bloodlust that drove him to destroy and feed. Nadya was dead at the hands of those fucking Therians. They had taken everything from him, as his father and Nadya had said they would.

They had to be stopped if it was the last thing he ever did. Maksim vowed he would personally take down the Therian king who’d murdered his sweet, innocent Nadya. She had only wanted peace and had been forced into eons of bloodshed.

Maksim’s fury boiled over, and he jumped off the bed far faster than he’d been able to move before the change. Hunger burned in his throat. The interior of the home he’d shared with Nadya felt stifling, and he headed outside to breathe fresh air.

His skin felt hot, and his bones ached. He stumbled for a few steps, then collapsed in the snow, burning with fever. Maksim didn’t understand what was happening to him, but after his rebirth and the loss of his true love, he was too tired to fight it.

The pain grew, and Maksim screamed. Steam rose from his skin, and his flesh turned a mottled deep red. Agony almost shattered his mind as his body started to change. His bones broke and reformed without the speed or elegance of a full-blooded Therian. He was powerless to do anything but ride the torment to its conclusion.

Then it was over. Maksim shook himself and sat up, gazing around with new eyes. Shock and confusion washed over him when he realized that his head was thirty feet from the ground. He moved his body, and everything felt different. He twisted his head to examine his new form.

It worked, my love, he told Nadya.

Maksim was a dragon for the first time. His body was the size of a house, and his back was covered with dark spines. His scales were a flat black that absorbed the light, and when he flicked his powerful tail, he discovered it terminated in a wicked-looking spike.

Maksim felt powerful. Deadly. He would avenge his love, but he wouldn’t rush into it. He needed to make a plan that wouldn’t fail.

He launched into the air, using instinct rather than talent. Soaring through the clouds, Maksim turned toward home, filled with a dark new purpose.

THE END

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