The Grand Duchess touched her cheek and Victorija fell to her knees. All of Victorija’s memories from when she was younger ran through her head. Every friend she’d ever made, her father killed, her first and only love as a young vampire, who made her heart feel again, whom her father compelled to suicide in front of Victorija. The pain of losing her, and a childhood of mental abuse, taught her to shut off her feelings, exactly as Gilbert wished.

A tear ran down Victorija’s face, and Lucia said, “There is no special incantation I can tell you. The spell was never taken from your family, Victorija, but it only works when you truly feel love for another person, someone who you would die to protect. That is how I devised the spell, and how your grandfather and I planned the future of the clan. Your father once loved your mother, and had you, but after his brother inherited the clan, his heart grew dark and his soul blackened. The light died inside him, and he became the most vicious vampire there has ever been. He could have no more children, because he couldn’t feel love, but you can, Victorija. There is a glimmer of light in your dark soul. I can see it.”

Victorija plunged her hand into her grandmother’s chest and grasped her heart. “Shut up! I don’t want to feel. At least I can kill you like my father never could. You and your perfect Debreks left me with that monster, and guess what? He created another monster. Me.”

Lucia gasped and breathed heavily. “The chink of light? It is in there. Even if you kill me here, Victorija, there is still hope. Never give up hope.”

Victorija tightened her grip on Lucia’s heart. “My soul is drenched in blood because of my father and because my grandparents, aunt, and uncle abandoned me to him. Even when my mother was killed, no one cared about little Victorija, did they? No, you were all too busy living your perfect life, and running the world.”

“Victorija, I’m sorry. We couldn’t—”

“You’re over five hundred years too late, Grandmother. That chink of light is dead, and what’s left is a bloodthirsty monster who would kill her own grandmother.”

Victorija pulled the heart from Lucia’s body and crushed it in her hand. She heard Byron shout, and knew she would be upon her in seconds.

“Retreat, now!” Drasas shouted.

* * *

Byron ran as fast as she could, but as she neared Lucia’s body, she had to choose to pursue Victorija or stay by Lucia. She stopped, fell to her knees, and cradled her great-great-grandmother in her arms. “Lucia? You shouldn’t have done this. We would have found a way.”