"All those books in your collection - ruined. What a pity. I know how much you valued them."

I cluck-cluck-clucked my tongue, and the vampire's face contorted with rage. He reared back and threw another blast of Ice magic at me, but once again I ducked out of the way at the last minute.

"Is that all you've got?" I asked.

Another ball of elemental Ice came my way in reply.

Again and again I taunted Dekes, and again and again he threw his magic - my magic - at me. I retaliated by tossing a few of my knives at him, along with all the books I could pull off the shelves. Of course, Dekes used his stolen Air magic to fling my makeshift weapons away before they so much as ruffled his hair, or incinerated them outright with his Fire power, but that was just fine with me. I didn't really expect to hit him, and I didn't really need to anyway.

From her spot on the floor, Vanessa looked at me like I was crazy, antagonizing the vampire so. She didn't realize that Dekes was doing exactly what I wanted him to, exactly what I needed him to do.

Finally, though, I ended up back in front of Vanessa. This time, I couldn't stop her from getting to her feet and standing behind me as I turned to face Dekes for the last time.

By this point, the library looked like an Ice bomb had gone off inside. Long, jagged icicles stuck out of the walls, the books, and even the green leather couch in front of the fireplace. The temperature had dropped ten degrees, and just about every surface had an inch of elemental Ice on it now. I'd give Dekes credit. He could fling my magic around just as well as I could.

"What's wrong, Gin?" the vampire snarled, spittle flying out of his lips. "Did you finally run out of room? No matter, I'm tired of playing this game with you. This ends right now."

"You're damn right it does," I muttered.

Dekes reared back a final time, and once more, a ball of elemental Ice formed in between his hands. The vamp studied the silvery magic shimmering between his fingers, looking at it with undisguised glee and hunger, before raising his eyes and giving me a sneering smile. Then he threw both hands forward and shoved the raw, pulsing ball of power at us.

Vanessa gasped again. Behind me, I felt her take a step back, even though it was already too late for either of us to get out of the path of the magic roaring toward us. We wouldn't escape it - not this time. Dekes had meant it when he'd said that he didn't care what kind of shape I was in as long as I was still alive, because he'd put every last bit of power he had into this final blast. It wasn't a kill shot, but it was meant to cripple in the most brutal, painful way possible.

The magic streaked through the library, seeming to gain more force and more power with every molecule of space it gobbled up between us, just like Vanessa's elemental Fire had earlier in the hallway. At the very last second, I stopped twirling the silverstone staff that I'd been holding on to this whole time and held it out in front of me like a spear.

A moment later, the Ice magic hit the end of the staff - and stopped cold.

No, stopped wasn't the right word. The staff didn't really stop the Ice magic from hitting me and Vanessa - the silverstone that it was made out of did.

Elementals had rings, necklaces, watches, and more made out of the magical metal to hold bits and pieces of their power, but the shapes didn't matter at all - it was the metal itself that made the difference. That's what I'd realized when I saw my silverstone knives on the fireplace mantel soaking up Dekes's earlier ball of Ice magic - that the staff in my hands could do the exact same thing, only on a bigger scale.

All I had to do in the meantime was level the playing field between me and the vampire by getting him to waste as much of his magic - my magic - as possible. That's why I'd been flinging myself across the library and ducking Ice blasts for the better part of three minutes now. I'd had to get Dekes to fritter away most of his stolen magic so that the staff could soak up the rest.

Randall Dekes had spent three hundred and some years stealing blood and magic from elementals. To him, there was an endless supply of both, and when he used up one elemental, he simply tossed her aside like trash and found another to take her place. But even the strongest elementals could completely exhaust their magic in a fight, something that I'd learned when I'd killed Mab, something I'd realized again tonight when I had to struggle to make two simple Ice picks.

Something I'd just made Dekes do without even realizing it.

In a second, it was over. Instead of skewering me and Vanessa with icicles, the silverstone staff soaked up every bit of the Ice magic that Dekes had thrown our way. Now the long metal rod hummed with cold power. My power, my magic, back in my hands, right where it belonged.

Surprise and confusion filled Dekes's face before melting into anger once more. He reared back his hand again, but this time, only a few silver sparks filled his palm, instead of the pulsing orb of power he expected. The vamp stared down at his hand like he couldn't believe he didn't have any more magic left. Arrogance will get you, every single time.

"But how - and why - "

I cut off his sputtering. "Didn't I tell you? This staff is made out of pure silverstone. You know about silverstone, don't you, Dekes? How it stores and absorbs magic? All forms of elemental magic? I'm sure you have a piece or two of it in your collections somewhere. Now this staff is full of all that lovely Ice magic that you just threw at us. My Ice magic. And unless I'm mistaken, you're all out of juice, Randy. And out of time too."

The vampire's eyes widened with understanding, but I didn't give him a chance to do anything but die.

"Now, Vanessa!" I screamed.

She didn't hesitate. Vanessa stepped out from behind me and threw every scrap of Fire magic that she had left at Dekes. The vamp wasn't expecting such a quick counterattack, and there was nothing he could have done to stop it anyway. Not now, with all his stolen magic gone. He raised his hands, but it was already too late. Vanessa's flames slammed into his chest, and this time, Dekes was the one who flew back against the fireplace and thumped to the floor, flames licking at his clothes and skin.

I didn't give him a chance to get back up.

I raced over to the vampire and cracked him across the skull with the silverstone staff, forcing him to roll over onto his back. The movement smothered most of the flames sizzling on his body, but I didn't care. I was more than happy to finish the job they'd started myself. I raised up my boot and stomped down on his chest, feeling his ribs crack under the sharp, heavy blow. Dekes groaned, but I didn't stop. I slammed my foot into the stab wound on his calf, then put my boot over his face and crunched down as hard as I could, like he was a bloodsucking tick that I was squishing into the ground. In a way, I supposed he was.

In another second, I was in as much of a frenzy as Dekes had been last night, when he'd gone crazy at the amount of raw elemental power in my blood. I could have stood there and kicked and punched and beaten the vamp all night long, letting out all of my rage, frustration, and fear, but I forced myself to come back from the edge and finish the job.

Breathing hard, I dropped to one knee beside him, grabbed another one of my silverstone knives from a pocket on my vest, and shoved it into his heart as hard as I could.

Randall Dekes threw back his head and screamed - and he didn't stop. He drew in a breath, and I clamped my hand down over his mouth. As much as I enjoyed the sound of his pain-filled cries, I wanted him to hear my last words to him - the last words he would ever hear. The vampire looked at me with wide, panicked eyes. I just tightened my grip.

"You know what, Randy? You forgot one thing. No matter how much stolen blood you have running through your veins, no matter how many elementals you drink from, no matter how powerful you think you are, there's not a fucking thing you can do about a knife in your heart," I said. "Especially when the Spider is the one who put it there."

I used my free hand to twist the blade in deeper.

Dekes arched his back, trying to get away from the knife, trying to get away from the pain, trying to get away from me.

I didn't let him.

Blood covered both of us by that point, pumping out of his heart with every slow twist of my knife. Finally, when I'd pushed the blade all the way down to the hilt in his chest, I ripped it out just as brutally as I'd stabbed it in. I drew my hand away from Dekes's mouth, letting the vampire scream as much as he wanted to now, even though his voice was already dying down to a raspy whimper and his green eyes were glazing over.

Then I leaned down and cut the bastard's throat, just to be sure.

Chapter 25

I climbed to my feet, stood there, and watched Randall Dekes bleed out. It didn't take long, considering the vicious wounds I'd inflicted on him, but it was immensely satisfying all the same. Vanessa came to stand beside me. The diamonds and pearls in the choker around her neck and the ones in the matching cuffs on her wrists gleamed like teardrops underneath the library's lights. They matched the glitter of the elemental Ice on the books and walls.

"You killed him," she whispered in an awed voice. "You did it. You really killed him."

"I told you that I would," I said, giving her a crooked grin. "I always like to keep my promises. And don't sell yourself short. You helped - a lot. A whole hell of a lot. You saved me from him, Vanessa."

She nodded, although I didn't think she'd really heard my words. Her lips pressed together in a thin line, and she kept staring at Dekes with wide, unblinking eyes, as if she couldn't quite believe he was gone and that she was finally free of him.

Another popular myth about vampires was that they could come back from the dead or that they were even dead, or undead, to start with. But I'd killed enough folks over the years to know that nobody could get up from that last, fatal slice I'd made across Dekes's throat - vampire or not.

Still, despite what Dekes had done to her and her sister, I thought Vanessa would be okay in the end. After all, the Fire elemental had been strong enough to stand up to the vampire when it had really counted. Instead of leaving the mansion with Owen, Victoria, and the others, Vanessa had come looking for me instead - and Dekes.

She'd had to face him the same way I'd had to, and the Fire elemental was the reason that I was still standing and the vamp wasn't. If she hadn't come in and distracted Dekes with her magic when she did, I would have woken up bound, gagged, and at the vamp's mercy - at the very least. I owed Vanessa for that, whether she realized it or not, and I was going to do whatever I could to help her.

I let the Fire elemental stare at Dekes's cooling body while I went around the library and picked up all my various knives. I put the extra weapons into the pockets of my vest, but the knives that Owen had crafted for me went into their usual slots. My five-point arsenal, back where it belonged.

I also grabbed Owen's staff, which still hummed with my Ice magic, just like all my knives did. Of course, the knives had soaked up my power during my final fight with Mab all those weeks ago, but now they contained even more of my magic. I wasn't quite sure what I'd do with the power that was stored in the weapons, but I was certain I'd find some use for it sooner or later.

When we were both sure that Dekes was rotting in hell where he belonged, Vanessa and I left the library and stepped out into the hallway. I went first, keeping an eye out for any giants who might be left in the mansion, but the men's hoarse shouts and the sounds of their heavy footsteps had vanished from the house like they'd never even been here. I didn't know if it was because Finn and the others had killed all the guards or if maybe some of the giants had gotten smart and slipped out of the mansion. Didn't much matter. If one of them popped up and tried to stop us, I'd put him down just like I had his boss.

While we'd been fighting Dekes in the library, something else had happened - Vanessa's elemental Fire had spread through the mansion, leaping from one hallway to the next. The flames burned through the structure unchecked, and most of the west wing was already fully engulfed, with the rest of the house soon to follow. We headed toward the main staircase to go out the front door but had to turn back because of the smoke and intense heat.

Vanessa stood there, watching the flames lick at the walls in front of us. The fire had already engulfed the rooms on either side of the hallway, the ones that housed all the things Dekes had collected over the years. The models, the lockets, the antique dolls. The bright glow matched the fierce emotion in her eyes.

"Burn, baby, burn," she muttered in a hard, satisfied voice.

I cleared my throat. "As much as I hate to interrupt the supreme satisfaction you're taking in watching the mansion blaze to the ground, I'd really like to get out of here before the whole house collapses on top of us."

Vanessa gave me a chagrined smile. "This way," she said, leading me down another hallway.

The flames seemed to chase us through the house, moving almost as fast as we did, and we were coughing and choking on smoke by the time we finally stumbled out of one of the side doors. We stood there a moment, getting our breath back and letting the night air clear our lungs, before walking around to the front of the mansion. My cell phone had been broken during my fights with the last giant and Dekes, but I knew that the others would be there waiting for me, just as I would have been for them.

My friends, my family, stood on the front lawn, a safe distance back from the burning mansion. Owen, Finn, Bria, Sophia. They stared up at the flames, waiting for me to walk out of them, waiting for me to come back to them the way I always did - the way I hoped I always would.

Nearby, Jo-Jo was using her Air magic to tend to Callie and Victoria, who were both on the grass even farther back from the roaring flames. Jo-Jo had already healed Callie's minor injuries, and Callie watched while the dwarf worked her Air magic on Victoria. The dwarf had the girl's head cradled in her lap and was slowly stroking her hair, whispering to her, even though Victoria was still unconscious. I could see the power glimmering in Jo-Jo's eyes all the way across the massive lawn, and I knew that Victoria would be alert and awake by the time the dwarf got done with her.