The sight was sickening, but despite my mortification over the sheer magnitude of death surrounding me, my prime concern was Derek Novak.

I can’t lose you.

The mere thought of losing him made breathing a struggle. I looked around and gasped at the sight of him ripping the heart out of a vampire from the Maslen clan before moving on to breaking the neck of another hunter poised to attack him. He was headed straight for Borys Maslen. Fearing for Derek’s life, I stumbled forward. As I weaved through the chaos surrounding me toward my beloved, someone grabbed my arm and pulled me back.

“Get her out of here!” My father, Aiden Claremont, was pointing toward the exit. He was speaking to the stranger gripping my arm. The sight of my father still confused me. What is he doing here? After all the years he abandoned me and left me under the care of his best friend, Lyle Hudson, he seemed out of place in this world—my world. His attempts to protect me were irritating. He had no business interfering with my life, not after all those years of ignoring me. Still, his presence moved me beyond words. He was still my father and I wanted to run to him and embrace him, feel his strength surround me, hear whispers of assurances in my ear—assurances that would answer my questions about why he had abandoned me.

But war was being waged all around us and the only thing that mattered at that moment—reaching Derek—was being kept from me. I struggled against the hunter’s grasp as he dragged me in the opposite direction. He was far stronger than me and I couldn’t break away from his grasp until he was tackled to the ground by a familiar vampire. Claudia.

Her mass of blonde curls covered her face as she let out a scream before ripping the man’s heart out. Her big brown eyes then turned toward me, a manic smile forming on her face.

“Hello, Sofia.”

I shivered as I looked into her eyes. A broken creature, she embraced darkness like no other and had become one of the most wicked beings I’d ever come across. She surged forward and pinned me against a wall with her bloody hands.

“This is my gift to you,” she hissed before sinking her teeth into my neck. I’d been bitten by vampires before, but I felt right away that what she was doing was different. She wasn’t simply feeding on me. She was trying to turn me.

“No!” I gasped, trying to push her away. “Claudia, don’t…please…”

Before I could fully wrap my mind around what was about to happen to me, I saw my best friend, Benjamin Hudson, hurtling toward us. His blue eyes screamed bloody murder at the sight of what Claudia, the vampire who broke him in many ways, was doing to me. He aimed his gun at her, but she must’ve sensed him, because she whipped around and tackled him to the ground.

“Did you really think I wouldn’t sense you coming to her rescue? Your blood still pumps through my veins, Ben…”

Claudia’s hands rose in the air and claws came out of her fingers, poised to wound Ben. I threw my entire weight against her, hoping to push her away from my best friend, but she easily threw me back and I crashed to the ground. I cast my eyes away in desperation and scanned the hall, only to be met with another bone-chilling sight.

Across the vast hall, Derek stood bleeding and weakened as he faced off with Borys Maslen and three other vampires. And, in another corner of the room, a vampire was poised to attack my father who was fumbling to reload his gun.

Watching with horror as the lives of three of the most important men in my life hung in the balance, I felt an overwhelming sense of loss. Somehow, I already knew that this was going to happen, that the loss of life was inevitable, but finding myself right in the middle of it was something I wasn’t prepared for.

A voice echoed in my mind—the voice of a friend who sacrificed her own life to bring me back into Derek’s arms. I could almost hear her—Vivienne Novak, Seer of The Shade—speaking to me. Her words not only confirmed my worst fears but painted a future I wasn’t sure I wanted to be part of.

The memory of her spoke to me and said, “Blood will be shed.”

And just as the memory flashed through my mind, a vampire had me pinned to a wall. Lucas. “Hello, Sofia. I’ve been looking for you.”

CHAPTER 54: BEN

Amidst all the bedlam surrounding me, I was certain of one thing and one thing alone. Claudia had reverted to her old mad and twisted self. I knew it the moment she attacked Sofia and sank her fangs into her neck.

“What is wrong with you?!” I hissed at her after seeing her claws come out, ready to put me through another painful ordeal.

“She’s safer as a vampire than she is as the pathetic little twig that she is,” she told me. “I was doing her a favor.”

She wasn’t feeding on Sofia. She was turning her. I couldn’t even begin to imagine what was going through her mind. “This place is filled with hunters. Nobody is safe, you crazy bitch.”

Her claws retracted and she pressed her palm over my chest to keep me down. “You were going to shoot me,” she accused.

“You were sinking your bloody teeth into Sofia’s neck. Of course I was going to shoot you.” I pushed her away from me and was slightly surprised when she actually backed off. I searched for Sofia in time to see her pinned to a wall, Lucas licking the blood off her neck. I scoped the room for help. Derek and Borys were still at each other’s throats. Reuben, on the other hand, was already poised to shoot at Borys, but Ingrid was on her way to keep her former husband from doing it.

They’re pre-occupied. I looked around for my gun. I couldn’t find it. Claudia had knocked it off me when she tackled me to the ground. A Maslen vampire began to approach me. Claudia found herself distracted, battling one of her own kind.

Thus, I was left with a wooden stake and one chance to take Lucas Novak down. I ran toward him. I reached him in time to hear him whisper to Sofia, “If I can’t have you, no one will.” His intent was clear. He wanted to kill her.

Over my dead body. I lifted my stake, ready to drive it right through his back and into heart, but I quickly realized that I should’ve learned my lesson. Never underestimate a Novak. I was just about to make contact with him, when he unexpectedly turned around and drove his claws right through my gut. I could feel the blood trickling from the open wound and I knew then that nothing could save me. I felt little pain and for that, I found myself thanking Claudia for the first time in my life. She had numbed me toward physical pain, but not to the pain of seeing Sofia’s face when she realized what Lucas had just done to me.

Lucas pulled his hand away from me and watched as I stumbled backward. My back hadn’t yet hit the ground when a UV bullet hit Lucas right in the forehead. I strained my neck to see who had shot him and saw Reuben standing with his gun. I turned my eyes from the grotesque sight of Lucas Novak bursting into flames and focused on Sofia who was now kneeling by my side.

“Ben…” she gasped, tears flowing down her cheeks. She stared at my wound in horror. “No…no…no…” she sobbed.

I was fading in and out of consciousness. At one point, I saw Reuben rushing to me, Zinnia trailing behind him.

“We’ve got Ingrid!” she announced. “Now what?”

Reuben’s eyes darkened. “Take her to headquarters,” he instructed after giving Sofia a quick glance. I knew even then that had Sofia not been there, he wouldn’t have hesitated to have Ingrid killed instead.

Everything once again blurred and when I came to, Derek was kneeling over me, blood dripping from his palm. Sofia had a hand under my head and was lifting it up. “Ben, you have to drink.”

I shook my head and panted. “Never. After what Claudia put me through…I vowed to never drink a vampire’s blood again.”

“You have to, Ben…” Sofia cried. “It’s your only chance. Ben, please…”

I looked up at her and reached out to wipe the tears from her face. “Derek will take care of you, Sofia. Tell my family I love them, okay? And know that I loved you from the moment I first met you. Vivienne was right. I see the world through your eyes now.” I smiled, resigning myself to my fate. “And it’s beautiful. Just like you.”

CHAPTER 55: SOFIA

Ben’s eyes slowly closed and I knew without a doubt that it was the last I would ever see those beautiful blue eyes of his. It was the last I would see him smile, the last I would hear him speak. I’d lost people who were dear to me before, but the immensity of the anguish that I felt upon losing Ben was more than I could handle.

I stared blankly at his still form for what seemed like an eternity, knowing that everyone around me—heads bowed in deference—could sense the pain that losing Ben caused me.

Tears flowed down my cheeks. I began to shake his motionless body, fooling myself that he might actually wake up. “Ben…no…” My sobs filled the air and suddenly, everyone else was deathly still.

I could sense Derek’s eyes on me, his gaze a soft, concerned caress. Even his presence couldn’t provide me with a shred of comfort. He motioned to touch me, but I shied away from him. I clung to Ben’s lifeless form, wishing that I could somehow bring him back to life.

He was too young, too full of potential…he didn’t have the right to just give up like that.

No one dared touch me. No one dared speak. Until my father decided that I had been given enough time to grieve my best friend’s passing.

“Take the boy’s body,” he ordered one of the hunters. “We have to go before more vampires arrive. The sun is setting.”

“No…” I sobbed, still holding on to Ben’s still form, his blood soiling the white dress I was wearing.

“Sofia, we don’t have time,” my father insisted.

“We can spare her a few more minutes. She just lost her best friend.” Derek. I adored him for that.

The hunters who were ordered to take Ben’s body hesitated from prying me away from him.

“I should kill you,” my father told Derek.

“And give your daughter another loved one to grieve over.”