“You just keep thinking that, Drasas. A woman like Anka uses people and disposes of them. You’ll be next.”

Drasas launched herself at Torija. Torija caught her arms and started to feel her energy draining. “What’s happening?”

“What’s happening is I am becoming the most powerful vampire in the world.” Torija’s energy was depleting through her arms, surging down Drasas’s arms and into the glowing ring on her finger. She fell to her knees and Drasas taunted her. “You thought I was a joke.”

Drasas punched Torija, and she felt the world spinning. There was virtually nothing left inside her. Then Drasas kicked her in the mouth. Torija spat blood onto the grass.

“You said I was being used and too stupid to know about it,” Drasas said.

Torija lay on the wet grass and watched Drasas’s anger spill out of her. With every moment her anger was building, the louder the thunder got. Her vision was getting slightly hazy, but she saw the black storm clouds gather and start to head this way.

Drasas spat, “I’m going to rule that world out there, the way you couldn’t, and I’m going to kill your sweet Daisy.”

Torija couldn’t even summon the power to lift up her hand or form any words. Drasas’s attention was suddenly turned to the growing black clouds, which appeared to be headed towards her.

“What is this?” she shouted.

Then the darkness came shooting forward into Drasas’s chest. Drasas was knocked flat on the ground and started to shake. One minute later a figure was thrown out of her, onto the grass. It was Drasas’s soul.

“What’s happening?”

Shadowy hands reached from below the edge of the cliff and grasped Drasas’s legs. “No, no. Help me, Principe, please?” High-pitched screams of the dead rang out from below the cliff. Drasas was terrified. “Victorija, help me.”

But Torija couldn’t help her even if she wanted to, which she didn’t. The last Torija saw was Drasas’s hands, trying to grab into nothingness. Drasas fell to her fate below, screaming as she went.

It comforted Torija to know that Drasas would spend eternity along with her, in the place dark souls go. She, at least, was resigned to the certainty of her death.

The last ounces of her energy were seeping away. As her vision deteriorated, she saw a ball of energy knock Drasas’s body through the portal.

Torija’s eyes were shutting. Her long immortal life was ending. Just before her lids shut for the very last time, she heard a voice say, “Look up, Torija.” She would remember that voice forever, but she couldn’t lift her head. Then Torija felt someone touching her head.

“Stand up.”

She felt a surge through her, and then her body felt light as a feather. Torija managed to look up and saw the shining face of Angele.

“Angele?”