Death by Tara Brown Page A

my
father had in Rio. It was full of young teenage girls. I can't watch it."
My hands tremble.
    He grabs me and pulls me into him. His warmth and mass surround me.
    It's silent.
    I look up to see greenery everywhere.
    "Where are we?"
    "Peru."
    The air is warm and wet, rich almost. Breathing it in makes me feel high.
    "Where?"
    "The Andes. There is a village down the hill where I once hid for
five years."
    I look up into his beautiful face and smile. His blue eyes almost kill
me. "Why?"
    He kisses my lips softly. "To hide from your father." His words
are a warm breath against my lips.
    He takes my hand and pulls me through the bright green forest. "He
was crazed. His gifts were meant to pull the sickness from the blood. That’s
how he was to use them. We were each given something as a gift from our father
as we fell. Mine was used to pull sadness and misery from the soul. Emotional
pain. When I went dark with your father, I grew to love the taste of them dying
in my arms." I pull back a bit, but his huge hand envelope mine and pull
me along the hillside. I am afraid of him. I feel the natural magic inside of
me brewing.
    "I couldn’t stop myself anymore. I pulled and sucked until they died
every time and I never gave it another thought. Your father is, well,
charismatic. He had me believing that we were better than them. Dorian too. We
had fun, a lot of fun. But then Dorian and I met a young man named Marcus. He
was also a charismatic young man, sarcastic and funny though. Not snobbish like
your father."
    He pulls me to a huge tree. It's the most incredible thing I have ever
seen. He covers my eyes with his hands and I feel the air move. When he takes
them from my eyes we are high above the ground. My heart beats widely. I grip
the rough bark of the tree. I can see for hundreds of miles. The mist is
settled in amongst the mountains and hills.
    "Wow."
    "I know." He points to the village. "Marcus was smarter
than the other humans we had been around. He caught on to what we all were very
quickly. He wanted the immortality and the power. He helped Jonathan convince
Ethan, Henry's brother, that the dark magic was the only way to punish the man
responsible for his daughter's death. Once Ethan turned dark he made many mistakes.
One was teaching Marcus and Jonathan how to enslave his own brother. Marcus
wanted the magic of the Fae, he wanted the immortality. Jonathan offered him
his blood and swore he would make him the highest of the vampires. Marcus
didn’t want to be below Jonathan. Instead he went after Henry. Dorian was tired
of the evil ways of Jonathan and went back with Lorri. Marcus used the guilt
Dorian had over his dark deeds, to convince him going after Henry's magic was
the only way to kill Jonathan. That was how we met Aleks. Well after he died,
we met him. Marcus told Aleks that taking Henry's heart was the only way to get
the power to kill Jon, Aleks's father. Henry, thinking he was much older and
considerably smarter than them, caught them in the act and cursed Marcus. He
didn’t realize what he had given him, was the very thing he wanted. Realizing a
mortal had tricked him, Henry was livid. He found his brother and murdered him,
taking his magic."
    I shake my head. "That’s sick. Marcus is a bigger shit than I
imagined."
    Oliver smirks. "He is incredibly smart and wicked. His brain is
ridiculous. He is a doctor, a chemist, a botanist, a pharmacist, a lawyer, my
god I can't even imagine them all. I know he's written novels under assumed
names. It's frightening really. Anyway, we all had more respect for Marcus
then. Jonathan wanted him dead. Somehow he convinced Dorian and Aleks that
Henry's loyalty was of great importance. Henry was on a rampage and ready to
kill them all and Jonathan wanted them dead. So they used the things they had
learned from Ethan and stole Henry's heart. His heart is inside of Marcus, as
we all know. Henry doesn’t know it, thanks to Ari."
    "We should free him."
    "No. He is volatile. He