The dripping is incessant. The house is old with solid foundations but abandonment had let the elements take their toll. There's a crack somewhere, a leak – hence the dripping. The noise is a great torture device, should torture be required. Mikhail Tanner hoped it wouldn't be, he wanted this over with as quickly as possible.
His stake is cool in his hand as he rotates it between his fingers, eyes focused on the other person in the room. It had taken a lot of practice and a lot of other situations like this to think of the other participants in this scenario as a 'person'. Not 'lost', not 'evil', not 'damned'.
They are the only two in the cellar of this once grand house in Kyiv.
"You know, for being newly made you were quite difficult to track down." He says, no longer allowing the facade to go on. He knew they were awake and had been for the past fifteen minutes.
The Strigoi is slumped in their chair, 6ft in front of him, and chained. Not chained to the chair because that would be ridiculous and ineffective. The restraints are looped through links in the concrete floor and again, Mikhail is grateful for old foundations but slightly unnerved about what their original use might have been. The chair he'd given as a courtesy. A formality. His partner appreciated such things.
The immobile body comes to life, head snapping up from where their chin had rested on their chest.
"But not difficult enough." Her voice was high and thin as a string, nails slowly raking a chalkboard.
Mikhail does not flinch or cower. "Don't beat yourself up about it."
Bree Sanders smiles at him with a predatory slowness, revealing her fangs. She had been a Moroi at their school. He hadn't had many interactions with her but he knew her by her reputation for her firm but kind hand. One of the children's favourite. He had gleaned enough to know that she had willingly sacrificed herself to allow the children to survive...much like he had. The difference being it was an expectation of him, a birthright, a duty because they came first. The children he taught and the Moroi he would always protect.
"I will get free of this." She says, flexing against the restraints. "And you'll regret not killing me given the chance, Tanner." He raises an eyebrow and she smiles wider.
"If I wanted to kill you I would have."
"So what is this." She spits, the feral animal rearing. "You mean to torture me? Inflict what you must and I will do tenfold to the children we stupidly protected."
He twirls his stake once more drawing her eyes to it and doesn't miss how she cringes. "This is not the usual string of conversation from a prisoner. Where is the 'What is going on?', the 'what do you want from me', the 'whys?'.
Her eyes, ringed with that bloodlust red, zero on his face again and a chill runs down his spine. No matter how many times he faced her kind he always reacted the same.
"I care not." She says.
"Because you can hear the steady beat of my heart pumping blood around my body and when you lean toward it, incensed by it, the metal bites into your wrists with an acid burning pain – and this is is all you can focus on?" She snarls. "I thought so. Should I fill in the gaps for you?"
"I care not." She grits between her teeth, straining toward him further. In the time she had feigned being unconscious she had held her breath, he knew. The smell of blood on a newly Made caused a craze.
It had worked to his advantage when he caught her, moments after she had nearly lacerated his throat.
Their eyes dart to the ceiling above at the same time. A door closing, footsteps.
"You will soon." Mikhail says, unlocking the door he'd leaned against and opening it. He steps aside and waits.
A Moroi enters the room first, dressed in a fine black suit with gold cufflinks - infused with magic Mikhail guessed. He knew his leader was prone to tinkering, and innovation. His ebony hair is swept back from his face, the pallor kin to the inside of an almond. Paler than his countrymen due to his Moroi race. His high cheekbones, his demeanour, his birthright all give him the air of regality and elegance but Mikhail knew better. He is so much more than a Moroi in a suit. He carries his cane in his right hand, his preferred weapon.
He looks at Mikhail and smiles. "Are you well?"
Mikhail nods, accustomed to this Moroi asking after his welfare. It had taken some getting used to, had been insulting at the beginning. Another Moroi male and a Dhampir female step in behind him, both incline their head.
Bree Sanders eyes dart between them all, hunger paining her features and violence straining from her body.
"Have you explained?" The Moroi in the fine suit asks.
"She says she doesn't care to know." Mikhail replies.
"Odd. You have tracked her across three countries, surely that arouses curiosity."
"She has other interests. My jugular artery being one."
This earns a hiss from Bree and the other Moroi in their company flinches back. The Dhampir steps closer to him.
"Easy Robert." The Moroi in the suit murmurs.
"Come here, Robert. I can make you feel better. I can make you feel things like you could not imagine." Bree's voice had taken on a hypnotic lull, a caress.
The Moroi in the suit snaps his fingers at her in irritation. "That is in vain and unforgivably rude. Do not waste your time."
"I have nothing but time." She purrs and then parts her knees. "You have no idea what I can give you. What being Made means, truly means. The power… the intensity of everything. Come here and let me show you."
None of them are moved.
Mikhail sighs. "Let's get on with this. I'm tired."
Their leader nods and steps forward. Bree strains forward and then flinches, hissing again and thrashing at her restraints.
"Bree, I would like to first apologise for what you have been through but your suffering is far from over. There will be more pain but if you are willing to fight through it we will help you."
Bree had stopped in her struggles at his words and now laughs. "My suffering? I have not suffered. The weak have suffered, I suffered when I was weak. Now I am power, now I am kin to God and I am the hunter. Do you know what euphoria feels like? I do and it's in your blood, when I drain the living essence from you I will feel more euphoria than you could find in any woman, in any bed. You may live for a hundred years and not feel in that lifetime what I feel in the minutes it takes to drink you dry. But I can show you. I can make you feel it."
Mikhail twirls his stake again, a muscle flexing in his jaw.
The Moroi presses on, undeterred. "I speak of a way back to your true self. In giving you your soul back. Your suffering will come and it could last days or weeks as you come to terms with your trauma. This is a gift and only one made possible by your former colleague here, Mikhail, as he implored us that you are deserving. Please do not let him be wrong."
Bree growls and returns to her thrashing. The growls give way to animalistic screeching as the restraints burn into her flesh. The thirst taking over her sense, her instincts winning out over her mind – typical of newly made Strigoi.
"Act now, talk later." The female says, her ruby pixie cut glinting.
Mikhail looks to the Moroi, he nods.
In sync the two Dhampirs move toward the Strigoi, who snarls and thrashes with more vigour. Blood drips from her wrists where she's torn flesh, the chains taught. Mikhail pulls out a length of cord from his jacket as he circles behind her. The other Dhampir remained close, poised, ready. The thrashing reaches desperation, a predator knowing they've moved down the food chain. Mikhail wraps the two ends around his hands and slips the cord over her head and around her neck. He pulls.
A wet choking noise fills the room.
Mikhail can only imagine the raw, destabilising fear she must be feeling. Even as Strigoi. He almost feels remorse. She must think they mean to decapitate her, one of the four ways to release her from this immortal hell.
She doesn't see Robert move forward with a stake in his hand and only notices when he drives it into her chest.
The room erupts in light and screaming. Mikhail releases his hold and braces against the wave of pure life and light that radiates from the stake. The sensation of starlight and sunbursts, fresh fruit and sunset, saltwater, and a new spring. It recedes as quickly as it comes.
Robert backs away and the Dhampir moves quickly to support him. Mikhail would thank him again later for this. He knew what it cost him.
He circles back to stand in front of his old colleague, the history and culture teacher who had been lost months ago. She's curling into herself, as much as she can in her restraints.
"Bree?" he says gently.
She shakes her head, her breath coming in panicked pants. The Moroi in the suit comes forward and begins undoing the latches on the floor. Mikhail unfastens the other. Bree pulls her arms tightly around her, chains still shackled to her wrists.
"You're suffering begins now." The Moroi says softly. "But it is worth fighting through. So fight."
Her body is wracked with tremors and sobbing.
"I will stay with you." Mikhail murmurs. "And I will explain everything."
The Moroi has moved back to Robert, whispering low. The Dhampir supporting Robert nods and steers them back toward the door, inevitably where she will have to help him up the stairs. Mikhail comes up behind him and the Moroi draws him close.
"I will contact you in a few days to know of her progress. Where is the camera?"
Mikhail inclines his head to the ceiling in the far corner where he had put the device. "It will already be uploading to your drive."
He nods. "Tell her about us, tell her about our intentions and correct what the students had circulated in whispers. If she stabilises then I will book you both flights."
Mikhail nods, they'd already discussed the plan over and over but there was still something unanswered. "Why Dashkov? We tried in Estonia and it fell on deaf ears."
"But if we convince him to think of how rapidly it would change. How we could turn the tide, Mikhail."
Mikhail's eyes narrow. "There is something your not telling me. There are other Royals."
Yes, there were but none held the esteem or position of Victor Dashkov. Well respected and well connected to the others but he also wanted to be King and that was the antithesis to their cause. Monarchy, an order, a hierarchy, a divine order. How could they persuade a wannabe king to bring himself down from his self-elevation?
The Moroi glances back at Bree but she was lost in her own grief. "I believe he has something of mine."
"Tell me and I will get it back."
The Moroi's features soften in gratitude and he places a hand on his shoulder. "I will tell you but not here. Not now. Now we focus on the goal. If we can show this proof that there are other ways to fight the Strigoi. That we have been and we have done it together, as one, fighting side by side. If I take back what is mine now then we encourage hostility. Dashkov will spin a lie and pull more support behind him. We need to convince him or at least those around him."
Mikhail nods. His task is to help Bree through this, process her trauma, her grief, and her guilt. Then tell her about The Circle, about everything they had achieved. Moroi and Dhampir working together, the Moroi mastering their magic for more than cheap parlour tricks and how this had led to saving whole communities. It had led to the discovery of a new element. He would tell her how they had relocated some of the Keepers, had recruited a few, and had tackled some of Donovan's nests. The one that had attacked the school had been destroyed and how that had carved something on Mikhail's soul. That closure and that retribution had confirmed anything he had questioned about joining with this Moroi.
When Bree was convinced, and she had to be convinced, they would send the video of the restoration to Dashkov. If he ignored it then they would send it to Court and Bree would show herself as living, breathing proof. As would Robert, Dashkov's half-brother, but that would be the last resort as Robert did not want to surface.
"I won't let you down." Mikhail swears.
The Moroi, his friend, his ally, smiles. "You haven't yet."
Mikhail feels in his being this is a lie. Estonia and the attack on the school had felt like his failures. But he knew the Moroi well and long enough now that he would not lie to him and would not patronise him. He saw him as his equal and taking the lead wasn't just a given right – the Moroi had earned it. He was leading because he was a leader and a fair one.
The Moroi hands Mikhail a piece of paper. "The address of your apartment. I have rented the rooms on either side for your...privacy. Should things get heated."
'Hysterical' seems a better word.
"I fly to the states next week. What Dashkov has...I need to find out how it came to be."
Mikhail's brow creases at the sorrow in his voice, the faraway look in his eye – the look he'd caught often on his face in the past month. The Moroi's hand drifts to his breast pocket and runs over it, reassured by the treasure there.
"Stay in the shadows." Mikhail says.
The Moroi snaps back to the present. "Always."
The panting sobs have manifested into long drawn in and out breaths. They both turn to Bree and both are overwhelmed by pity.
"Who – who are you?" She demands, tears dripping from her chin. Her eyes were a clear blue and filled with agony.
The Moroi clasps his hands over his cane. "You may call me Zmey."
Only Mikhail and his closest allies knew his real name but soon he would introduce himself to someone he hadn't known existed. Didn't know was his to protect.