Chapter 446: Heart Threatened 2
"I don’t know what else to say. That is all there is to it," August’s eyes went wide with the aggressive insistence of Penelope’s, but she could hardly blame her.
If it were August watching Graeme fighting the vampire, she probably wouldn’t be able to stop herself from launching right into the middle of it to try to help him. But she had to hand it to Zagan—he knew how to fight, and he was definitely holding his own against the terrifying contortionist whose arms or legs would suddenly elongate while his face spread into an abnormally large, toothy grin.
While August’s intention for building the growing cage within the Veiled was to protect them all from the volatile, murderous presence of the intruder, the intention Penelope found alighting in her mind was for her to protect the mate who had never had a chance to truly live.
"What if Zagan gets caught in the cage with him?" Penelope muttered, feeling the terror of this situation growing.
"Then we pull him out, Penelope," August answered. "It is as simple as that. You need to focus."
How could she focus? She squeezed her eyes shut to block out her vision of the males tumbling over each other and slamming each other into the ground, causing it to quake more than it already was. She was a Winter, she told herself. If there was anything she was good at, it was maintaining her cool when she was under a tremendous amount of pressure to use her unique abilities. She had to do it at Eliade, she had to do it in her pack before she fled it... she had to do it her whole life.
This was just like any of those other highly stressful times. If she considered it as but one of many similar times rather than Zagan’s life being in danger—rather than the stunning way his healthy skin shone in the sunlight and rainbows under the lotus as he looked at her like she was the answer to everything he had been searching for, lost in the awe of his thundering newborn heart and blood pumping through his veins, regenerating itself without the need of any blood meal... her eyes snapped open. This wasn’t working. All she could think about was him.
When her eyes found him again, he had pinned the unknown vampire against a tree and appeared to be trying to pull the terrifying jaw with all of its teeth off of its hinges. The intruder’s legs were elongating, attempting to lift Zagan off of the ground, but he rooted himself in place and remained fixed on the vampire’s head—one hand against his forehead and the other pulling on the jaw to try separating it from its body.
"You may have eternity without the ability to speak or drink blood. How does that sound?" Zagan asked, clenching his teeth with the effort it took to keep the struggling vampire’s head gripped in his palm and pressed against the tree trunk. His opponent was squirming, making himself difficult to pin down. And these strange, elongating limbs were most difficult to avoid, but they seemed to be working in Zagan’s favor this time because the long arms could not get a handle on him. They were too long now that Zagan was pressed against him, and they couldn’t shorten enough to get between the two of them to push Zagan off or attack his chest or abdomen.
The other vampire roared in protest as Zagan slammed his head against the tree trunk once again and then tried for a better handle on the jaw, curling a thumb and finger over the sharp teeth and giving a sharp pull. There was a snap, and the intruder’s eyes went wide, his loud threatening roars of battle taking on a panicked whine. His jaw was nearly off. This mortal vampire with a mate was going to rip his jaw from his body.
"That’s right," Zagan snarled, reading his fear. "You will have to have blood injected. Or maybe dumped down your throat. That’s not much of an existence, is it?"
One of the vampire’s arms finally found its way between them, and its sharp fingers gripped the skin over Zagan’s heart. While Zagan was now living with a beating heart, that did not make him human. He was not as fragile as someone else may be in this circumstance. Though it was soft to the touch, his flesh was still as solid as stone.
From where she was, Penelope could see the threat to Zagan’s heart, and her own heart sped up faster than she had ever felt it before. Her eyes climbed the outer boundaries of the cage that August was still attempting to make on her own, and she focused with renewed determination. She could do this. She could absolutely do this. If she could alter thousands of peoples’ memories such that they never recalled meeting or intimately knowing a person, then this cage would be a walk in the fucking park.
August smiled when she felt Penelope finally join her, and the cage she had begun creating sped along, its bars rising the rest of the way to an acceptable height before they turned at right angles to complete the cubed shape. It was working. They were going to do this.
Zagan gave up trying to complete the dislocation of his opponent’s jaw, finally launching him off of the tree trunk and into the air like a heavy missile where the male could no longer have a threatening grip over his heart. This was going to be difficult to win. He would have to incapacitate the vampire somehow, and that was never an easy feat. And then what?
Perhaps it was too early to imagine, but there would always be another vampire hunting him after this one. He was never going to be able to get away. It would take some kind of miracle, else the royals would keep sending more and more after him until his progeny was no longer a threat to their power.
