“Wouldn’t count on that.” Dacian lifted Stephan high in the air before slamming him down onto the dirt floor. Then he held him there.

“You can’t kill me.” Stephan glared up at him. “Rabid, bring on the rage. Get this bastard off me.”

A quick glance showed Dacian that Rabid had his own problems.

Suddenly, Taurin was by his side. “He can’t kill you, but I can.” He grabbed a sword from Eric, who stood behind him with four other vampires.

Stephan screamed as he saw his centuries-old existence was about to end.

The audience screamed with him.

Dacian watched, amazed, as his little brother lopped off Stephan’s head.

“That’s for my brother and two hundred years of hell.”

For just a moment, there was dead silence from all the humans as they watched the spurting blood, and then the reality of what they’d witnessed sank in. You couldn’t fake a head lying a foot from its body. They scattered, their screams fading away as they disappeared into the night.

Ganymede barked out an order. “Eric, track them down and change their memories.” Then he got back to what he’d been doing.

Eyes glowing in the darkness, he stalked Rabid. “Take a last look at the night, bastard, because you won’t be seeing any more of them.”

Rabid laughed. “And you won’t be seeing your woman anymore either.” He hooked a thumb at Sparkle. “She’s dying. Pretty soon you’ll be lying there next to her. I couldn’t take you last time, but that was thousands of years ago. I’m more powerful than you now.”

“You have no idea what real power is.” Ganymede’s voice was a harsh whisper. “I’ve created black holes millions of miles wide, so I don’t think I’ll have a problem with a tiny asshole like you.”

Rabid started to draw his power to him, and Edge spoke for the first time. “Need any help?”

“No.” And then Ganymede’s power exploded from him.

The ground rolled in waves like the surf beyond the seawall. Dacian reached Cinn in time to keep her from falling. They both clung to an upright from the greenhouse that still stood.

He pushed her behind him. “Don’t watch.”

She didn’t fight him.

Flames rose up around Ganymede, swirling, snapping, and sizzling in a mad dance. Tongues of fire coated the ends of his hair in vivid reds and oranges, and as he stared from the flames with eyes as old as the universe, he looked like some demonic destroyer.