Regina Jeffers - Vampire Darcy's Desire

“I seem to have left all my honor at Wickford Manor,” Wickham taunted. “Hopefully, you will forgive me for taking the advantage.” He pretended to bow to his opponent.

Darcy needed a few more moments for Elizabeth to be in place. He watched out of the corner of his eye as she moved closer to the nearest mound. He stalled Wickham. “You call what you did at Wickford honorable?” he challenged. “Sending a cauldron and the plates and the antlers …and even the snakes spinning around my head?”

Elizabeth heard the emphasis on the word and knew Darcy reminded her of her dream of driving the deer’s rack into Wickham’s body. Now, if she just knew exactly what else he wanted.

Wickham laughed lightly. “The snakes were a nice touch, do you not think, Darcy? And the cauldron nearly knocked you out of the picture.”

“No more so than when I speared you with the horns. I have learned to control my energy .” Darcy noted thankfully that she understood, because Elizabeth surreptitiously worked the stave from its place.

“Yet your powers are but half as strong as mine, for your weaker human half is a detriment.”Wickham quit playing with the sword and set his chin with determination. “You, for example, have not mastered the power of the change, but I have.”

A split second later, the sword lay idly on the ground, and Wickham was the vicious wolf advancing on Darcy again. However, Darcy did not balk, nor did he give any indication of what he planned. His eyes and facial expression betrayed nothing. Only Elizabeth observed the slight shift of his weight.

When Wickham sprang, she heard Darcy’s “ Now! ” and she tossed the ash stave into the air.

Instantaneously, Darcy’s arms rose and time slowed. Wickham, as a wolf, rather than a vampire, came under Darcy’s control, and the animal pawed the air in slow motion, its unyielding jaw open in preparation for the attack. Slobber dripped from its gums, while the tongue lolled to the side. Coal black eyes widened as the energy sustained its flight. Sharp fangs lengthened in anticipation of finding its prey.

The wolf moved in a straight line towards the sharpened stave pointed at it, and nothing the animal did could change that fact. They were on a collision course, and, for a moment, Wickham fought the reality, and then he relaxed into the movement, accepting what Fate gave him.

Darcy watched with satisfaction as it all came together in a perfect crescendo. When the point of the pikestaff tipped for its Twank! The stave pierced the animal in the center of its chest, impaling it as if it were a butterfly specimen. And then Wickham abruptly fell upon the grave of what was once one of his followers—his twisted body broken and deformed.

“How did you learn to do that?” Damon’s voice came from somewhere behind him. A heartbeat later, Elizabeth was in Darcy’s arms, kissing along his chin line and sobbing his name. Recognizing the finality of the act, Darcy breathed out heavily and collapsed, sinking to his knees. Damon caught him on the way down, hoisting Darcy’s arm over his shoulder and leading him to lie upon one of the benches lining the gravesites.

“I need to get some bandages,” Elizabeth called over her shoulder as she ran in the direction of the church.

“It is finished, Darcy,” Damon assured him as he unbuttoned Darcy’s coat and waistcoat.“We will get you to a physician.”

“Thank you, Damon.” Darcy’s words were breathy and a bit slurred.“For everything.”

Damon ripped Darcy’s shirt to see the wound better. “No thanks are necessary.We have always been more than cousins.”The colonel touched Darcy’s side. “This one seems to be a surface wound.Anyplace else?”

“Just my arm.” He touched the colonel’s shoulder. “And you, Damon?”

“More bruises and lacerations than I care to know about, but I will be well.” Damon continued to check for other possible wounds.

Darcy’s voice asked for the truth:“How did Elizabeth fare?”

“Mrs. Darcy did what was asked. There were a few close calls, but I tried to spare Elizabeth the enormity of what we did. I feared for how it might affect her disposition.”

Darcy swallowed hard. He had never even considered how such destruction might affect his wife. Her personality always seemed larger than life; he had never thought that anything could put a dent in her armor.

“I could not have finished this without her.” Darcy ran his hand in frustration across his face. “Elizabeth is everything right in my world, Damon.”

“I know, Darcy.”

Elizabeth’s hurried footsteps ended the conversation. “I found some sashes in the priest’s quarters,” she said as she approached the bench, but then Elizabeth went rigid, staring off into the cemetery, and Darcy followed her gaze to see George Wickham standing ten feet away—a broken lance still embedded in his chest.

Realizing the contest still raged on, Darcy struggled to sit up, and as Damon supported his back, he whispered,“My right boot… gun…one shot…hit his heart.” Damon helped Darcy swing his legs around to a seated position and then backed away.

“I will not make the mistake again, Darcy, of changing into something you can control,” Wickham hissed. “Luckily, one of my powers is rejuvenation.A night’s sleep will heal these wounds.”

Darcy forced himself to his feet. “Your coffin is destroyed, Wickham.Where will you find such sleep?”

“I will sleep with Lady Ellender.” Wickham took a menacing step towards Darcy, and, immediately, both Elizabeth and Damon stood between them. “We do not have to do this again, do we, Darcy?”

“You will need to go through me, Sir, to reach my husband.” Elizabeth reached into her pocket for the small bottle of holy water the priest had left for Darcy in the back of the church. She had planned to use it to help clean his wounds. Now, she moved her thumb to uncork it.

“And through me, also,” the colonel contended as he carefully cocked the gun he palmed in his hand.

“As you see, Wickham, even humans have loyal followers.” Darcy smiled at the show of defiance.

Wickham bristled with anger. “I will not have this!” He strode forward, his right arm extended to bring forth his power, when, suddenly, in desperation, Elizabeth released the vial, showering Wickham with the blessed water.

A cry of alarm filled the air as the being now controlling Wickham’s body covered his face with his hands.The smell of burning flesh filled the air as the colonel lunged to bring Wickham directly in front of him. The shrieks continued, but, undaunted, Damon placed the short muzzle of the gun to Wickham’s chest and pulled the trigger.

The sound of the gun momentarily drowned out the shrieks, and then total silence reigned. Gunpowder mixed with the stench of death surrounded them, and this time when he fell, none doubted that Wickham would not stand again. His body shriveled to skin and bones. No one spoke. Darcy, Elizabeth, and the colonel stood transfixed by the sight of the rotted corpse of the creature who had plagued them and theirs for two hundred years.

“Mr. Darcy?” the softly accented speech of Ellender D’Arcy shocked them all.“Is he gone forever?”

Darcy found his voice first. “Seorais Winchcombe is no more, Lady Ellender.”

“I am not sorry to hear it. It is time. I should never have traded Seorais’s life for Arawn’s, but I knew of no other way to save the man I loved.Yet nothing was the same after that. It affected my dear Arawn in ways to which I cannot put words.” Pure sadness crossed her face.

Elizabeth edged forward and spoke to Ellender as though she were a troubled child.“Lady Ellender, it is nearly dawn; you should return to your bed.”