Fatal Harmony (The Vein Chronicles Book 1)

by Anne Malcom

  That got no answer except the echoed bang of the steel slamming shut.

  “That all turned to shit very quickly,” Sophie declared, eyes scanning the pieces of vampire littered around her office.

  I couldn’t shake the chill in my bones from the dark magic; it seemed to have punctured them and settled into my marrow. That and the fact that I was feeling sick over what I’d done. Killed vampires in the protection of slayers.

  That was far even for me.

  The target on my head would increase a lot when that went public.

  Which meant I needed to find Earnshaw stat.

  Which meant laevisomnus needed to be pushed back another day. Not good. Especially if I was going to be doing any fighting, as the longer I went without it, the slower I’d heal.

  Another motivation not to get physical. That and my wardrobe did not need to be suffering so unnecessarily.

  I glanced to Sophie. “You okay, witchy? Minerva mistress of the dark reserved most of her ickiness for me, but she was muttering some ominous-sounding Latin over your sleeping form.” I gave her a weary once-over. “You’re not going to go dark side or grow horns, are you?”

  She rolled her eyes at me. “Eat me.”

  I gave her a look. “Careful there, Hermione. It’s been a while since I snacked and the fight took it out of me. Though I’m not one for wounded meat. Tell me you’re not about to drop dead or anything so I can go along with my undead existence.”

  She grinned. “I’m fine. Takes more than four vampires, four slayers and a bitchy black witch to get me down.”

  “Glad to hear it. Though technically I’m the one who took out the four vampires, and kept the witch busy. You pretty much napped the whole time,” I teased.

  She poked out her tongue at me.

  My mind wrapped around the witch, thoughts unpleasant. The mere presence of her in my mind was wrong, unnatural. “I’m thinking that’s not the last we’ve heard of her. And I’m thinking she’ll be hanging around Earnshaw, who I have to now go and kill because I can’t have him blabbing about me killing vamps to save slayers. It’ll massacre my image.”

  “Your image?” she repeated with a heavy dose of sarcasm.

  I scowled and nodded. “Anyway. Any tips or spelled grenades I can throw at her to stop round two of the mind-rape thing? I wasn’t a fan of it the first time around.”

  The chill that had settled over my bones and the taste of the grave on my tongue was yet to recede. I did not like that. At all. But I had to push through.

  Sophie frowned at me, her emerald eyes turning hawk-like and glowing slightly as she regarded me. “What exactly did she do?” she asked slowly.

  “Got an invisible hot poker, jammed it in my heart, then froze my blood and played Hacky Sack with my psyche,” I told her cheerfully.

  I needed to find myself a snack, stat. Warm blood would do wonders for a chill. My journey to Succor would work twofold: get me a snack and to retrieve my information on Earnshaw. I didn’t usually like the blood whores employed by such establishments, but I wasn’t in the position to be choosy.

  My frazzled mind bright up an image of Thorne, unbidden. More precisely Thorne’s pulsing neck. White-hot desire burned through my body at the prospect of tasting him. Some very foreign part of me was certain his blood would chase away the chill that had drilled into my bone marrow.

  Luckily a less foreign part of me still remembered how toxic his blood was and that such a meal would welcome the grave, not fight it off.

  Sophie stepped closer, still regarding me while I made dinner plans. “I can taste it, her magic. It’ll stick to the air here, imprinted on it for weeks. She’s powerful,” she deduced, her face pinched up. “And what she worked on you isn’t anything I’ve seen before.”

  A gentle warmth tickled at the edge of my brain.

  I stepped back, holding my hands up. “Whoa! If you’re going to probe me with magic, at least take me to dinner first.”

  Even though I trusted Sophie—well, as much as I trusted anyone—I didn’t want any more magic up in the bag of feral cats that was currently my consciousness. I’d had them tamed for close to five hundred years and this witch had set them wild once more.

  I’d rip out her spleen for that alone. It seemed that the corner of my mind that held whatever was left of my heart and cradled those forbidden warm memories had been unlocked. The gritty tang of loss permeated the landscape of my mind.

  I could smell his blood. His death. The faltering of his heartbeat and then the deafening silence that followed.

  “Isla.” Sophie snapped her fingers in front of me.

  I jerked, only half of me coming back into the moment, the other half still held in the clutches of the past.

  “I’m fine,” I spat defensively.

  She frowned at me. “I don’t think you are. There’s something about that spell…. It was blood magic. Death magic. I’m not sure I can understand what she did.” Her gaze went glassy as she looked inward, not seeing the room anymore. I could see the ripples in the air as she manipulated it to reveal the threads of magic that wove through the world, unnoticed to most. It was creepy, and I didn’t like the flicker of shadowy blackness hovering around my body like a bad smell.

  I snapped my fingers in front of her face. The shadow disappeared but its chill remained.

  “Well you don’t have to understand. You need to get rid of this.” I swept my hands around the bodies.

  She quirked a brow at me. “I’m guessing you’re not volunteering for cleanup?”

  I looked at her in shock. “I don’t clean up messes, just make them. Plus, I’ve got a vampire, a witch and a human-turned-vampire thing to kill. And a war to end.” I glanced back around. “Can’t you just, like, snap your fingers and magic them away to limbo?”

  She laughed, a musical, pleasing sound. Such a sound should have been coming from an English lady in the 1900s who blushed around men and was as pure as the day was long, not a slutty witch with tattoos who was currently wearing a ripped Def Leppard tee as a dress.

  “It doesn’t really work that way.”

  I waved my hand as she opened her mouth to no doubt talk about physics and Mother Nature and the pulsating force underlying everything in the universe. “Save the magic lesson. I’ve got pressing matters. I’ll call you if I haven’t been killed or turned insane.”

  She stepped forward as I began to leave, grapping my arm.

  The touch of her magic made me flinch slightly, and she frowned at the movement before moving her eyes to mine. “I’m coming.”

  “Oh no, you’re not,” I said firmly. “You just got knocked out and I’m thinking you’re not at full witch. I’m not going to be responsible for your death. I’ve got enough blood on my hands.” I glanced down. “And my jacket. Plus, where would I find my next drinking buddy who’s fun and not afraid to use her magic for bad? You’re staying here.” My mind tickled with a cool sense of unease. “I have a very bad feeling that this is all far from over, so we’ll keep you on the bench for now. Let’s play the long game.”

  She scowled at me, crossing her arms. “You’re not going alone. You’re no match for that witch. I am. There’s only one bloodsucker who I can also count as one of my only friends who will rip someone’s throat out if I ask them. You won’t be able to do that after you’re drooling from a spell that sucked your brain out of your ears.”

  I paled. Or I expect I would have had I already not been that way. “They can do that?”

  She gave me a look.

  I shelved that one for later, to use on one or both of my brothers.

  I straightened my spine. “I’ve been around the block. I know how to handle myself. And I know when someone is dead on their feet, pardon the expression.” I gave her gray face a pointed look. “You’re in no state. Stay here, call my—” I caught myself before I said the word ‘friend.’ “Call Scott and get him to take care of this.” I gestured around. “He’s got this villain worship thing for me, so he’
ll do it no questions asked. Fair warning, he gets irritating after five seconds of being in his presence, so try not to hex him,” I instructed. “And then have a Gatorade or get laid, recharge, and we’ll make a new plan to stop crazy vampires who seem intent on turning humans into vampire warrior slaves.”

  I winked at her and walked out the door.

  Her scowl burned into my back but she didn’t follow me.

  Because she knew I was right.

  I always was.

  And I was feeling that the night was going to get much darker before we saw a red dawn.

  “THAT WAS AMAZING,” A THROATY voice purred as soon as I released him.

  I rolled my eyes, wiping my mouth demurely before standing from one of the plush sofas they had in the back of Succor. The lighting was low and décor was ‘bloodsucker chic’—in other words, a lot of red and velvet and eighteenth-century tapestries.

  Yuck.

  “Wait, don’t go. You can keep going,” the voice continued, the edge of desperation mildly sickening.

  I glanced over my shoulder at the man sprawled on the sofa. His muscled arms were extended toward me, a junkie looking for a fix. Blood trickled in a thin line down his sculpted torso. Our fangs had an anticlotting agent in them should we consider to use it, but he’d requested not to.

  Despite his outward appearance, his classically good-looking face, sandy blond hair and aesthetically pleasing physique, he was an addict. Twin incision marks scattered around his neck in various stages of healing, some snaking up his sinewy forearm, glowing in the low light.

  I scowled at him. “Keep going?” I repeated. “I’ve had my fill and you’re seriously anemic already. Get yourself a steak dinner and maybe a life? One that doesn’t include getting accidently drained to death as a job hazard.”

  His glassy eyes communicated that he’d barely heard me, his arms still outstretched.

  I rolled my eyes and turned on my heel. I was sated, but still peckish, if I were honest. I’d stopped purposefully, even though every instinct in my body had urged me on, to keep filling myself with the warmth of his lifeblood to chase away the cold touch of death that still gripped me from the witch’s spell.

  Not cool.

  You weren’t supposed to kill the ‘hosts’ there. It was pretty much frowned upon by Fabian, and I was already on thin ice with my fellow vampires, waiting for the whole ‘me and slayer’ thing to come out. It was best not to break the rules. Which sucked because the only fun to be had with rules was breaking them.

  I also had that rule about not killing innocent humans. While this was a pathetic one, he wasn’t a murderer or rapist, so he didn’t get to die by my hands.

  I glanced back one more time at the slumped form on the sofa.

  He’d die by somebody’s, though.

  When the structured rules of Succor became too strict for his addiction and he went to the streets looking for a longer, deeper high. When he went to the clubs that had no rules against murder.

  I sighed as I closed the door.

  “Not your problem, Isla,” I murmured to myself as the thumping bass of the main club filtered through the low-lit hallway.

  Succor was one of the most popular and mainstream clubs in the city. It straddled the border with the wolves so the clientele was always interesting. A lot came here to juice up before doing something stupid like strolling onto Third, looking to cause some trouble with the wolves.

  Okay, that was me. I did that once. Okay, twice, but I was bored. The third time I had a good reason. I can’t think of it now but I’m sure it was valid.

  But this visit was all about business. Which I had told Fabian when I’d walked in and surrounding conversations had muted just slightly. Not enough that a human would notice; in fact, the barely clad ones wandering around with drink trays and scarred necks didn’t even stutter in their steps. But I heard the murmurs.

  “Isla Rominskitoff. I heard she mates with humans,” a voice hissed.

  “There’s no bounty that would be worth taking her head.”

  “Someone said she can turn into a bat.”

  That one made me snort. Vampires couldn’t turn into anything but ash if someone had a flamethrower and enough gasoline. Shapeshifting was something the furry part of the supernatural community had dibs on.

  I whirled around my newly found stage as the undead eyes flamed on me with their fear, disgust, unease and hatred. “And I married a werewolf the other day,” I exclaimed to no one in particular, then rubbed my belly. “Now I’m carrying his child. I’m taking bets on what a fanged werewolf cub will do—”

  Fabian snatched my hand before I could completely run with it, shamefully.

  “Isla, I don’t want any trouble,” he hissed, yanking me into a dark corner, eyes darting around.

  I rolled my eyes. “Now, that’s a total lie. You love trouble.”

  He glared at me. “No. I don’t.” He paused, licking his lips. “Not when I have important clients in here tonight. You need to leave.”

  I pouted. “I promise I’ll behave,” I lied. “I just came in for a little drink, and then I’ll be out of your hair.” I looked to his smooth bald scalp and back down at his eyes. “Or out of your… eyebrows,” I corrected, focusing on the furry caterpillars framing his small pinched face.

  His glare deepened and he stared at me for a long time. I smiled back. He sighed and lifted his arm to jerk a chubby finger.

  An attractive, sandy-haired human appeared, his lazy eyes intent on me.

  “Tristan, will you take care of Isla in one of our private rooms,” he asked tightly.

  Tristan sidled up to me. “It would be my honor,” he purred.

  Jesus.

  And he’d led me off into a private room that reeked of blood and lost dreams.

  Now that I was sated on Tristan and felt like I needed a shower, I was ready to break my promise to Fabian about the trouble thing and scout around the bar for info on Earnshaw. One of these vampires would know where he tucked himself away. Or maybe that was wishful thinking. I’d most likely have to go to Six, and I was avoiding that place. It didn’t have a no-violence rule and was more than likely full of vampires who wanted to kill me. I’d had enough of death matches for the day. Plus, I needed a nap something wicked. Blood could only recharged me so far.

  It was getting hard to fight the pull of laevisomnus since I’d gone too long being consecutively conscious, but I had fear of missing out, okay? You couldn’t blame me considering all the excitement I’d been treated to lately. If the world was going to end so brilliantly and violently, as Sophie had predicted, I wanted to have a front row seat and a cocktail while watching, not miss out because I had to take a disco nap.

  But it was better to miss the ‘end of the world’ than be permanently in the ground because my lack of sleep translated to slower healing and reflexes. Not good with so many darn humans, vampires and witches trying to kill me.

  I thought fondly of the werewolves for a second; none of the furry brethren had tried to kill me in at least a decade.

  Maybe I could use one to scratch the ever-present itch that had been simmering since I’d met Thorne.

  Ick. On second thought, I’d never be able to stand the wet dog smell.

  Because I was retreating in my head, the pair of beady and disapproving eyes that seemed to appear from the folds of the shadows caught me off guard.

  I steeled myself from jumping back. Just. “Jeeves,” I said smoothly. No way was I giving him the satisfaction of knowing he’d surprised me. “Not somewhere I’d imagine you would be eating dinner.” I jerked my head back to the door. “But I do have an inkling that you like them young, muscled and male.” I winked at him. “He’s ready and waiting. I’ve cooled him down for you.”

  I tried to step around him but he matched my movement. I frowned up at the wiry vampire in his three-piece suit that looked like he’d snatched it from the set of Downton Abbey. They didn’t make them like that anymore. Then again, he was the real
-life—or real-dead—version of the butler.

  “My usually paper-thin patience is now nonexistent, as I’ve had a trying day filled with too many people trying to kill me and not enough people I’ve killed. I wouldn’t push it, Jeeves.”

  He bored down on me with a blank face. “The king wishes to see you.”

  I raised a brow. “The king is here? Why would he want to slum it with the vampires who frequent such places? Surely he could just order in.” I paused, pondering. “So he’s the important clientele Fabian was speaking of. Well, if I were him I wouldn’t have let me in the door. Letting me in while he’s got the king under his roof? I admire that insanity.”

  Jeeves stood stoically, impatience radiating off him.

  I looked him up and down. “That’s a neat trick. You communicating your unreserved distaste and disapproval of me without uttering so much as a curse. Admirable.”

  He pinched his lip slightly. “Will you follow me to the king, or must I persuade you?” he asked tightly.

  I grinned. “Oh I’d love to see you try and persuade me, but I’d hate to ruin your suit.” I gestured ahead. “After you.”

  He gave me one more stare before gliding forward, his feet barely touching the blood-red carpet.

  We ventured to the end of the corridor, past doors on each side shielding subtle moans and the wet sounds of blood. Two ornate double doors sat at the end of the hallway.

  I tilted my head. “I always wondered what was behind these. I thought that’s just where Fabian stashed the bodies.”

  His only slightly blood-spattered track record had always been suspect to me. Humans were just so fragile; I didn’t believe only a handful had died in the years he’d owned and operated this place.

  Jeeves ignored me and opened the door.

  The sweet scent of blood mingled with the woodsy scent of our fair ruler assaulted me as soon as I stepped inside.

  The room had not been decorated by Dracula’s interior designer, rather a refreshing modern take. The lights were brighter than the dim ones in the hallways and the furniture was white and plush. It made me think of my forgotten sofas fondly. Maybe I could buy them from Fabian. Or at least arrange to have them stolen for me.