Night and Day

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"Funny, seems to me like games are what you excel at." Ebony replied thinly. She too was aching, but Frost's magic was already corrupting her feelings. Love had been twisted into nothing more than animal desire.

"You wouldn't be a danger if you drank a little each day." Glenda replied. "Take care of yourself, and there is no danger."

"He's here?" Ebony hissed, her pale grey eyes glaring up at Alma. "He was supposed to have followed my vapid mother home like a good little puppy!" She added with a snarl. "This isn't his business!"

"When has you pet ever been a good little puppy?" Alma asked, shaking her head. "There are too many. He won't survive it. No worries. Perhaps you two will meet in the afterlife." Gently she removed her hand and sat back. "That dress fits you somehow. I don't know why the fools want you to wear it." 

Julian had reached Katie's cage and Bartlow, covered in blood. The half vampire sensed him first and began to hiss angrily.

Ebony was finally able to sit up and stared down at the dress she was wearing hatefully. It was a long and sweeping gown, not the kind of thing she would ever have worn. Not since Julian had made fun of her for attempting to attend the the last ball at the school before all this began. "I am going to kick that dogs ass so hard he'll be sucking on my toes for a month!" She declared as she got to her feet.

"Well now, come for a front row seat?" Bartlow sneered as he looked Julian over.

"The door is enchanted. Even I cant get out until it's been opened from the other side." Alma said. 

"I've come to rip your throat out." Julian snarled. "Where is she?"

"I'm not just going to sit here and let that idiot get himself killed!" Ebony huffed, walking over to the door anyway. "Who are these freaks?!"

"The vampire girl everyone is so obsessed with? Right there, fool." Bartlow snorted, though he knew full well who Julian meant.

"I don't really know much. Only that they want to steal the hearts of witches and have been doing it for quite a while. The leader is bitter because your mother was picked for the guild and he wasnt." Alma said with a snort. 

"You know who I mean. Ebony! Where is she?!" Julian demanded with a gutter all snarl. "If you've hurt her, I'll kill you. And I don't give a shit about the blonde!"

"Well there's a surprise... someone who wants what my mother has..." Ebony snorted, seeming rather bitter herself.

"Hurt her? Why would I hurt my most precious sacrifice?" Bartlow breathed reverently. "She will be adored by all, you'll see!"

"Indeed." Alma too had never forgiven Marie for abandoning Brock when she was needed most. She truly hoped that the red haired woman suffered greatly. 

"I don't think so!" Julian pounced but made it halfway. The shotgun blast rang out in the deafening silence and he fell to the floor, his blood already pouring out. 
And still he managed to get to his feet. He gripped his stomach and stumbled toward Bartlow. He was no longer able to see him. For some odd reason he was seeing his old friend Brock. "Been a while..." he slurred. "You still owe me twenty bucks."

Ebony was pulling on the door handle, though she froze suddenly when she heart the shotgun blast, and then the animal growl.

"Stay back, dog!" Bartlow warned. "I don't want you dead yet! I want you to see her in all her glory when our Queen finally awakens!"

Alma didn't tell the young woman what she knew. It was best left alone. Knowing about a lover's death while it was happening would only make it that much worse. 

Julian ignored him and kept coming. "How about you pay me in beer..." He slurred, feeling more than blood against his fingers. "I've missed you, man. There's so much to tell you." Another shot from a terrified soldier. This one a plain silver bullet and sliding neatly into his ribs.

Ebony didn't need to be told what was happening. She could damn near feel it liek it was happening to her. The young woman slammed a small fist against the door, the wood and magic that had bound it suddenly shattering. "If anyone is going to put the dog down, it will be me!" She vowed, though her voice shook.

"I said I didn't want you dead, that doesn't mean it can't happen." Barltow sneered, kicking Julian's bleeding form to the ground. "You will lose both your witches, boy. One will simply die, the other will live in torment for the rest of eternity."
"Always so dramatic?" Frost had felt her pet's pain, and foolishly come to save him. She was a coldhearted woman, but ultimately it was her heart that was about to get her killed.

"Ebony, don't!" Alma didn't know why it was so important to her to save this young woman. It wasn't like it mattered. She was supposed to hate humans of all sorts, right?

Julian lay on his side, gasping in pain. All he could hear was Frost's voice. Despite everything she'd come to save him. He couldn't believe it. "Brock owes me twenty." He grunted at her. "Don't kill him"

"I don't care what kind of asshole he is... I can't just leave him to die!" Ebony insisted, muttering a string of obscenities as she tripped over the flowing dress she had been made to wear.

Frost wasn't looking at Julian, she was watching Bartlow closely. "You've taken to kidnapping strays and children now, have you?" She sneered, not understanding just how dangerous this man was to her.
Bartlow smiled thinly, then pointed upwards as Frost took another step towards him. "Wiccan trap." He purred, gesturing to the runes that were painted on the ceiling above her.

"You will regret it." Alma breathed, disappearing. 

"Frost..." Julian was breathing his lovers name but there was nothing he could do to help her. He was far too weak to even move. "Brock...fight this...don't hurt anyone..."

Ebony closed her eyes and sucked in a deep breath as Alma disappeared. She was still weak from what Tobias had done to her, even more so after exerting herself to break the door.

Bartlow was the one to step forward now, still smiling as he circled around Frost. "You gained your power from inflicting misery on others. It seems almost offensive to us you as a part of this sacred moment, but the ritual does call for an undying heart of great power."

"Leave her be." Julian dragged himself to her side, some how managing to pull himself to his feet. "I will kill you, fool. Are you really prepared to die?"

Bartlow looked down at Julian and shook his head. "You would protect the one who enslaves you?" He asked, clearly not understanding this one bit.

"I am doing more than that." Julian said proudly. He could see his friend somewhere inside that man. He knew that his friend would not want to kill someone else. Even if it would free his friend. Brock would calmly tell him that he'd made his own bed and to lie in it. "Come for her and  I will take you down, Bartlow. You are worthless. You always have been."

"And you are already dead, boy." Bartlow sneered. "You can't save your master and your whore." The other man had nothing on his mind but murder and power. He was certain his 'Queen' would reward him handsomely.

A part of him knew the other man was right. The blood that poured out of him was lessening now but that meant verry little. He was dead. His mind just hadn't caught up yet. "I'll kill you, asshole. You hear me. I know you do."
Alma appeared as well, standing behind Frost. The demoness was tempted to take the witch's heart herself. If she took it then all of this trouble would be irrelevant.

"No, you'll try. If you do try, I'll make sure your whore's pain isn't brief. She will cry and beg for you long before it is over!" Bartlow swore. "I'll let Tobias be the one to rip her heart from her chest as she screams your name, after all... he was the one who brought her to me."

"Tobias is a true monster. The master vampire wasn't going to let you have either of them." Julian grunted. His weakening state forced him to try and regain his footing. "I'll take care of the boy as I should have years ago. But you..." he glanced toward Frost. "You have any use for his heart? Or can we just crush it?"

"His heart is too black even for me." Frost assured Julian.
"I wanted to do this nicely, allow you to say good bye... But you pushed me to this." Bartlow remarked, as though they were speaking of breaking up with someone, not ending two lives. As Frost was held in place by magic, Bartlow shot her through the throat, watching the witch drawn on her own blood as he took his knife and slowly began to cut into her chest.

"Bartlow, stop!" It wasn't Julian pleading for Frost's life but Alma. She was beside the witch now, her hand resting over the large one on the ornate knife. "Don't do this. The ancient witch is not worth this. Make a future for yourself not a past." 
Julian tried to move but something held him back. Perhaps it was the part of him that had been longing for this for so many years.

"The Queen is my past, present and future!" Bartlow insisted. "You'll see... She will save us all from mediocrity!" If possible, the well built man seemed even more deranged now, his green eyes wild and crazed as he looked down at Alma.

"Mediocrity?" Alma echoed, confused by the word. "Are you saying you are bored? Why not get a puppy, you idiot!" Her fingers wrapped around his and she began bending them off the knife, the bones snapping loudly in the silence. "That woman will kill you. If she is allowed to return, she will murder you all starting with you!"

"You think this world is fine the way it is?" Bartlow growled through clenched teeth. "It's a mess! Goddamn vampires and werewolves wandering around? The queen will cleanse them all!" He added, using his free hand to slam his palm into Alma's fragile looking nose.

Though there was now blood flowing freely down her face, Alma didn't let go. In fact, she squeezed harder. "Your queen will raise herself up as their god. She will feed you to them in pieces."

"And what god do they have now?" Bartlow sneered. "Let her do what she wishes with me, I will still be the one who raised her when no one else could!"

"No wonder they didn't let you become a hunter. You are a coward. A weak minded fool. Like so many of your kind." Alma snarled. His wrist broke then, the bones shattering into a million pieces. 
Julian saw Ebony enter the room and shook his head. "Dont..." he pleaded. "Run, kiddo. Leave while you still can..."