“What would you recommend?” Edmund asked me. I was so stunned that I nearly lost my footing. The man who once made me into a slave was now asking my opinion?
I stood up a little straighter. “As you know, Victor gave me the gift of crowning magic when Tobias turned me.”
That might not have been the best thing to start with because everyone in the room except Edmund took a giant step back away from me. I even heard a few gasps.
Arthur’s wife sent dagger eyes in Eli’s direction. “You brought a vampire with crowning magic into our home?”
Eli hung his head for a moment before speaking. I knew then that he had committed some sort of heresy among vixra witchlings. Or worse, he angered his mother.
“Do you have any idea how dangerous this woman is?” she snarled.
“Yes,” Edmund answered her. “And she’s the best chance we have of containing this, so hear her out.”
Edmund not only asked my advice but he also defended me all within the same minute. I was nearly too stunned for words. Had I somehow earned this man’s respect? Or was he hiding the fact that maybe he was slightly in awe of me? Or even a little apprehensive in my presence.
“Tobias says some of his contacts in Washington D.C. may be compromised,” I continued. “And that Gandira has their own agenda that doesn’t involve the current administration. It’s clear to me that Gandira is the real problem here. When Tobias and I broke into one of their facilities in Telluride we met a man named Tusker. I suspect he might be the one pulling the strings in Washington. Give Tobias and me a chance to find the other facilities and to locate Tusker. If we find him and manage to pry some information out of him, we can potentially find out just how deep the problem goes. And if there’s anything we can do to contain it.”
“Contain it?” Arthur finally chimed in. “Your face is on international television. And that blonde vampire-”
“Liza,” Tobias interrupted.
Arthur hesitated to speak again, shocked that a vampire who once bowed to him dared correct him. “Liza revealed vampires along with elemental magic to the entire world,” Arthur said. “How are we honestly supposed to contain this mess?”
“By knowing what Gandira knows and staying a step ahead of them at all times,” I answered. “Between finding Tusker and discovering his contacts inside the United States government, we’ll know where to set our cross-hairs. Until then we’re in the dark.”
I saw Artur’s wife take his hand at the corner of the table. Something passed between them. A softness that I figured was essential to their relationship. She was trying to calm him. And maybe she was the only one in the world that could.
Arthur sighed and took a seat. It must have been some sign to the others that it was safe to do so because everyone else soon followed.
“Come finish your meal, Eli,” Arthur said. “Our guests will be leaving soon enough.”
Tobias and I stood there in silence, waiting for some sign if what I had said was a good or bad idea. If Edmund thought it would work or if I was a step away from him handing me over to the vixra council on account of stupidity.
“I trust you to remain in constant contact with Eli while he’s in Denver,” Edmund said. “If you make any progress I want to hear about it.”
I gave a nod of my head and watched as they all waited in silence. Not for me to agree but for the two of us to leave.
“So sorry to bother you during your meal,” I said softly before taking Tobias’s arm and leading him out of the formal dining room. I didn’t say another word until we were back outside and headed for the open space through the thick woods and down the gravel path where we entered.
“That went better than I expected,” Tobias said.
“If you expected worse why did you bring me here?” I asked. “He’s right. I could have just written to Eli in the notebook he gave me.”
“And miss the look of utter shock on their faces when they realized they could no longer control either of us? Don’t tell me you didn’t enjoy it. Few things in this world make a vampire so content as seeing a witchling slightly unhinged.”
I rolled my eyes and stopped him once we reached a big enough space. “Go on,” I said.
He lifted his hand and carved an opening to a vixra tunnel in the air. I watched as the glow pierced open from nothing and he stepped inside. I took one final look at the Matthews manor behind us before following him.
This was far from over. And yet, I felt a chapter close in my life. The chapter that always followed when I came to see the Matthews and received orders. I belonged to no one. And I wasn’t leaving to follow orders. I was leaving to protect what was mine.
15
There were a few things I missed about being a kruxa. The sense of knowing my place and that I belonged to a long line that came before me. The warmth of a hot meal. Pasta. The heat from a fireplace after a long day running in the cold winter weather. And the crazy part was that I would give it all up again for this. The sensation of running through the woods outside Colorado Springs, leaping over ravines, and slowly descending back to the earth with a soft landing that I barely felt beneath my feet. I spent so long thinking that every single facet of being a vampire must be barbaric beyond any sort of fulfillment or enjoyment. I was wrong. So very, very wrong.
“She went to the left,” I hollered.
“I see her.” Tobias launched forward and passed me, chasing our prey through the heavy woods and eventually coming alongside her.
Liza saw Tobias from the corner of her eye and barely had time to stop before he grabbed her and tackled her to the ground. I heard her roar in anger as he wrapped his arms around her body and held her down. He lay on top of her and pinned her arms above her head, knocking her rifle out of her hands before she could even draw it up. He was older than her. Faster. Stronger. And as far as I knew he trained her. She didn’t stand a chance. That didn’t stop her from showing some of the dazzling attitude I became relatively familiar with in such a short time span.
“Put your fangs away right now!” he ordered her.
She closed her mouth but didn’t quit struggling against him. “I won’t stop,” she said. “I don’t care what you do to me. I have to get Ryker back.”
“Who said anything about stopping you?”
That got her attention.
I slowed down once I reached them and watched as her entire body language changed. She stopped fighting him. For a moment. She let him believe she was calming down. I knew better. She was waiting for him to let his guard down.
I rushed behind her and picked up the rifle. The magazine was still full of the magic-laced bullets.
“Not a single shot fired,” I said as I opened and loaded it. Then I aimed it right at her head. “It would be a shame to stain those golden locks, Liza. I suggest you listen to your coven masters and stop fighting.”
She begrudgingly quit struggling. Once Tobias thought she was able to contain herself he backed away from her. She stood up in a flash and for a second I thought she might run. But she didn’t. Good thing too. I had my finger on the trigger, ready to fire away and paralyze her with the magic inside the bullets if that was what it took.
“I don’t want Ryker locked away in that facility any more than you,” Tobias told her. “I made the both of you. I’m in your blood. You don’t do anything without my say so.”
I didn’t let the surprise I felt show on my face. I knew Tobias had to have made many vampires over the centuries. But I didn’t know he made Liza and Ryker. That had to mean something.
“Yes, master,” she said with a slight bow of her head.
“Have you done any reconnaissance?” he asked. “Enough to know he’s deep inside the Cheyenne Mountains.”
Tobias wasn’t one to let too much intimidate him. But he couldn’t hide his emotions from me. He knew getting Ryker out wasn’t going to be easy. If what Liza said was true and he killed the president, they weren’t going to let him go with ease. Breaking in would be a ni
ghtmare. And Tobias was already skeptical if it would work.
“Did you honestly think this was something you could do on your own?” I asked her.
She didn’t answer. If anything she was frustrated by the reality I was forcing her to face.
“Don’t say such things to me,” she spat. “I know it might be true but don’t say it. I have to get to him. I have to find a way.”
“There’s a way,” Tobias said, slowly circling Liza like she was a misbehaving child about to receive a scolding. “But not tonight. Getting him back will take time and effort. We will have to form a strategy. Perhaps even a trade. We have to acquire something they value.”
“What’s that?” she asked bluntly, not believing he knew for a fact that such an item of worth existed.
“You know as well as I do the one thing men of power desire most of all. More power.”
“How do we offer them power in exchange for my brother?”
He took her by the back of the head and latched his fingers through her hair, forcing her gaze to meet his. There was nothing tender about it. His eyes were downright threatening. “With the greatest power of all. Magic.”
She seemed stunned by his response. And not at all convinced. “I want my brother back. They’ll kill him. You know they will. They did experiments on me. They tried killing me in several ways. They tested every weakness I had. I know what they’ll do to him.”
“I don’t doubt that you suffered,” Tobias said. “I also don’t doubt that your lust for revenge is shadowing your ability to see reason. But you will do as I say and wait. I will help you get your brother back alive. I give you my word.”
She was silent as he let her go. The words of her coven master were final.
“And please try not to appear ungrateful,” I said, refusing to let my aim with the rifle off her head just yet. “The vixra wanted you for themselves. Tobias convinced them you were better off alive and in our hands. If we let them have you, Ryker wouldn’t stand a chance.”
As much as it pained her, she took a knee before Tobias. I had seen vampires kneel in this way before. It was how they asked for forgiveness. Or in Liza’s case, how she was begging for forgiveness. Not only did she bare her fangs at her coven master but she abandoned him just as he gained the upper hand over Victor in battle. She wasn’t worthy of forgiveness as far as I was concerned. But it wasn’t up to me. Even as Tobias’s partner in leading the coven, he was still the vampire who made her. It was up to him.
He set his hand atop her head and let it rest there for a moment. Then he removed it and took a step back. “Arise,” he commanded.
She did so but kept her eyes directed at the ground.
“Don’t be disheartened, Liza,” he said. “It’s looking more and more likely that war will be upon us in a short matter of time. And I will need my brightest warriors with me. Particularly ones like you and your brother. You’re two of my most lethal killers. Don’t mistake my need to consider the necessity for apathy.”
Watching the exchange between them was as instructive as it was mystifying. The way Tobias took control, how he let her be submissive toward him, and the emotions that passed between the two of them. Tobias was right all along. Getting the vampires to cooperate with the vixra was never going to work. Vampires could only be persuaded by their own.
And I would never be persuaded to leave Tobias’s side. As long as he wanted me in this fight, I would be there. Even if it meant working with Liza. The initial cause of all this grief.
“Go back to the nest,” he ordered her.
She was gone in an instant.
I inched closer to him, wondering why his emotions switched from overpowering to a sense of dread. “What is it?” I asked.
“I try not to make promises to my warriors that I can’t keep.”
“And did you?”
“I’m not sure. Because I don’t honestly know if I can get Ryker out of there. Not without taking risks I’m not accustomed to taking.”
I slung the rifle across my back with the strap. “Isn’t that why you turned me? So you wouldn’t have to do things alone?”
I flashed him a smile and rushed away, leaving him wondering.
Kitty flew high in the sky above me, trying to keep up as I ran over broken branches and swept away from the trees. “You seemed mildly flirtatious,” she scolded me.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “The man is used to women falling at his feet. For a vampire, he needs to learn how to hunt properly. I won’t make it easy for him.”
THE END OF BOOK TWO
Witchling Wars Glossary
CATACH-BRAYIN = ka-tesh brae-yin
Once the most powerful vampire coven in the Western world and lead by Tobias Vallas. Former members remain scattered across the continental United States.
THE CHANGING
In ancient times of northern Europe a coven of luxra witchlings called the Roganach-Ciar entered a pact with a group of kruxa witchlings. The luxra coven cast a spell granting the kruxa more magic that had been lost due to years of breeding with humans. The spell went wrong and quickly turned into a curse, causing the kruxa to feed on magical beings for their magical blood and soon turning to humans to satiate their thirst. Those affected became known as vampires. The next few centuries were spent hunting down the vampires considered a risk in exposing witchling existence to mankind due to their lack of control over their cravings for blood and their senseless disrespect for life.
CROXA = crock-sha
A deceased human whose soul has turned rabid, often the result of consuming vixra blood. These ghost-like creatures feed on emotional fears and haunt humans and witchlings alike. Stuck between worlds, they are not living or entirely dead. Their appearance if often distorted, rotted, and very frightening.
DAY WALKERS
Vampires who have killed a kruxa and absorbed a small portion of their magic to gain the ability to walk in the sunlight by drinking their blood.
KRUXA = crew-sha
A low-tier witchling with very diluted magical powers. Their magic is often unpredictable and very difficult to control given their ancestors chose to mate with humans, therefore diluting the magic in their offspring’s blood. They are not well-respected in the witchling world and many live in exile after years of being hunted by vampires for the ability to walk in the sun after having killed a kruxa witchling.
LURING
An ability vampires have that allows them to place thoughts and memories in the minds of humans and sometimes witchlings. Humans are most susceptible to luring.
LUXRA = loo-x-ra
A middle-tier witchling with diluted magical powers but substantially more magical ability than kruxa. They can tap into the supernatural and wield their magic through wands for better control. They do not have complete control over their magic given their ancestors chose to mate with humans, therefore diluting the magic in their offspring’s blood.
MARKING (known to vampires as scarring)
A process in which the magic in a kruxa’s blood attaches to a vampire, causing the vampire to slowly turn into a mortal. The spell surrounding kruxa witchlings marking vampires was created by vixra as a long term to plan to eventually rid the world of vampires in a peaceful manner so they live out one mortal life then die. The process frightens most vampires and many spent the majority of the middle ages hunting down kruxa and killing them to minimize the risk of being marked.
THE PROPHECY
Over a thousand years ago, a very powerful vixra witchling foresaw of a time when humans and witchlings would be at war. The results of the war were unclear as only the cause and conflict were ever recorded in written and oral memory. The prophecy spoke of a young red-haired kruxa witchling of inferior magical ability who would mark a vampire and cause witchlings to be exposed to the whole of mankind. If in a single life this burden was not realized, she was would reincarnated every two centuries until the prophecy is fulfilled.
VAMPIRE = vam-pyre
A magical
being that feeds on both witchling and human blood for survival. They are considered the lowest of magical beings and not respected or trusted by any echelon of witchlings. Most are so consumed by their desire to drink blood that they turn rabid and have little to no control over their impulses. (See ‘The Changing’ for details on their history).
VIXRA = vicks-ra
A high-tier withchling with nearly 100% pure magical powers. They have complete control of their magic and the power to rule over all other witchlings. They hand down laws that all must follow or risk severe punishment. They are considered the royalty of the witchling world and age one year for every five human years making them the oldest living witchlings in the world.
VIXRA TUNNELS
Magical tunnels built with vixra magic for quick ease of travel anywhere in the world. They can only be opened through vixra witchlings or the consumption of vixra blood.
About the Author
Before Shawn was a writer, she was a history teacher who spent all her spare time reading historical novels and tales of fantastical worlds, past and present. After years of classrooms and countless hours in university libraries, she decided to pen down her own imaginary worlds in novels.
She write urban fantasy books.
She lives in Georgia with her husband and pet Yorkshire terrier.
To learn more visit ShawnKnightley.com
Also by Shawn Knightley
KRUXA ECHELON SERIES
Blood Marked
Fated Realms: (Witchling Wars: Vampire Echelon Book 2) Page 16