Cat's Choice: The Chosen's War

by Jana Leigh

  The party at the compound went off as planned. Lagon moved all the children to his house for a sleepover. He wanted the m close. Ten minutes before the sun set, he put all the children to sleep and moved them to his cave. Hope had tried to fight off the sleeping spell, but she wasn’t as strong a Lagon yet. She gave him a look instead that meant ‘just you wait’, and Lagon knew she meant it. Trinity agreed to go into the cave too, and Blaze went along to stay with her. Only Lagon could bring them in and out; the opening was too small, and he had to use his Dragon Magic. After getting them all settled inside, he positioned himself outside the cave in his dragon form; invisible to all except the Chosen and their mates.

  Half an hour after the sun went down; the band began to play, and the food was being served. The stores were all closed, in preparations for the late-night sale, and there was an atmosphere of festivity in the air.

  “This is a really great party, even if I do say so myself,” said Cami.

  “It was a lot of fun putting it together. I can tell that the Pack is having a lot of fun. Some are nervous with anticipation, for the most part, everyone’s very happy. It feels great!” answ ered Jo, giving Cami a high five and leaned into her mate’s side. Tey turned his head and gave her a kiss.

  Sofia came bustling up and sat down next to Cami. “Caterina , she smiles at my Orfeo. I think soon she is ready to mate with him.”

  “I hope you’re right, Sofia; she deserves to be happy. Both Tripp and Orfeo are wearing their hearts on their sleeves,” s aid Cami. “That’s not a bad thing!” she said to her mates.

  “Did I say it wasn’t?” asked Quin.

  “Not unless you want to sleep on the couch! I know you men, wanting to be all strong and silent. We have to pry those three little words out of you,” said Cami.

  “True, mon Coeur, we men are horrible beasts,” said Jaden. “Of course, once we’ve said them, we find it’s easy to say them over and over, Je’taime, Cami.”

  Cami had been practicing; Jaden always used French endearments with her. It was so sexy, and she wanted to say ‘I love you too’ in French. Now she was ready to try, “Moi aussi, Je t’aime.”

  He pulled her into his arms to give her a kiss. “Your accent is improving,” he said, knowing she didn’t like to get too mushy in front of others. She laughed as she gave him a playful punch in the arm.

  Sofia just smiled indulgently on them as if they were her children.

  Attilio came and sat down with a plate of food. “I like this barbeque, the sauce is nice and spicy. I’m also thinking of having some beer imported from Germany.”

  Sofia looked at him as if he’d grown two heads. “No wine with your meals?!”

  “It would depend on the meal. Beer would be nice for lunch,” he responded.

  Conversation progressed; people ate, and some got up to dance. Soon it was getting close to ten, and the human residents with children started going to their homes. A few of the younger ones helped the band pack up when they promised to take the party over to the church hall. Everyone was having a great time and most of the human population of Milliken that had stayed went over to the hall to keep the party going. A couple of the food and beer vendors went along. The permit for closing the street would end at eleven.

  By eleven, the street was once again open for vehicle traffic and the few remaining tables and chairs had been moved up onto the wide sidewalk. Lev came by Quin’s table as the last saw horse was loaded up and hauled away. “Great party , Quin, I just wish I could have spent more time with my mates,” he said loudly, clamping Quin on the shoulder. In a softer voice, he said, “Everything is proceeding to plan. I have teams with Orfeo’s special lances on every door at the church hall. It was genius thinking of the church hall. Sure, Vampire s can go into churches, but being a church made it easier for Lacy’s mom and dad to place wards on the entrances. Ryan and Arielle and her warriors are backing them up so our people, there are safe.”

  “Yes, and having those survey takers go through the neighborhoods, leaving protection spells in all the houses, was smart too. Way to go , Cami,” said Jo.

  Cami just blew on her nails and rubbed them on her shirt as she gave her mates a smug grin. Many of the stores were opening up for the sales now, so Tey said to Quin, “You’re in the final match, aren’t you? Maybe we s hould head over to Kira’s place.”

  “Yeah, I want to watch you kick Vampire ass , honey.” Cami said, then turned to Sofia and Attilio . “Sorry, gotta root for the home team.”

  “I do not mind; it will give you comfort when you lose,” said Attilio as he leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest.

  Sofia could see that this would quickly turn into an argument. Attilio and Cami loved to debate about everything under the sun. Normally, she didn’t mind as they both enjoyed it so much. They’d fought about sports, books, and a host of other topics, and she wasn’t having it now. “Basta! Enough! Attilio , sit and drink your beer. Quin, Jaden, go play the little boy games with my son. Cami, you go cheer them on. I am going shopping in Bama’s store; she said she was going to introduce me to her mother-in-law, Willow.” With that, she stood up, and crossing the sidewalk went into the store.

  At eleven forty-five, a truck drove into the main substation at the edge of town. Milliken went dark. The Vampire s attacked.

  ***

  The alarms went off at the front gate to the compound. All along the walls, emergency lights fed by the central generator came on. The same thing happened throughout the compound, emergency floodlights and motion sensitive lights came on.

  The Vampires and one of Roarke’s teams smashed into the front gate with a large truck that had a battering ram attached on the front . They were surprised when the gates held. Since the last attack, the gates had been reinforced and thrice blessed; once by witches, once by Sidhe , and once by druids. So t hey shot silver bullets that had been cursed with a killing potion through the bars as the Vampire s used their skills to go over. The wolves and other Pack Enforcers wore Kevlar vests, which mostly protected them. They held the gate. As five Vampire s came over the top, one of the Ambrosetti teams came out of the shadows and attacked. The fighting was fierce as each side held swords and lances. After twenty minutes of hand-to—hand combat at the gate, Diavolo’s forces there were defeated.

  They treated the wounded quickly. Unfortunately, there were no survivors to take prisoner for information. They then went running towards the back of the compound. The surveillance team had spotted a group of ten Vampire s sneaking over the back wall as mist, heading for the children.

  ***

  Lagon had been curled up in his dragon form for a few hours. He might have looked as if he were napping, when, in fact, all of his senses were on alert. Soon after the lights went out and the emergency lighting came on, he heard sounds coming from the back wall of the compound. Knowing the cave was protected, he stood up, raising his head over the top of the trees to see what was happening.

  He was surprised to see a group of ten Vampires headed for his house. Many in the compound knew he, and his mates would be babysitting the children tonight. He was surprised that outsiders knew precisely where his house was located within the compound. He knew Trinity wouldn’t like it if he made a mess in the house, so he flew over the top to land in the front yard.

  He was hoping the Enforcers, and warriors would come; however, these Vampire s were so quiet coming over the wall as mist that maybe the surveillance team hadn’t picked them up. They shaped changed and began running towards the house. So he decided to slow them down.

  He took in a deep breath and let out a stream of fire over them. They started to scream as they ran around like candle flames across the lawn. One fell and rolled to put out the flames, it didn’t work. Hmm, magical flames can kill Vampire s! Who knew? he thought, looking down at the ten piles of ash on his lawn. Just then the Enforcers arrived, so he flew back over the house and shifting went in the back door. The Enforcers were coming in the front, and he
met them in the middle.

  “Is everything okay here?” asked Luc, one of Tripp’s head Enforcers. “We saw them come over the wall and got here as fast as we could.”

  “Turns out my magical skills are a natural defense against Vampires. We’re all fine. Blaze is with them now, but I should get back and tell them the Vampire s are dead,” he answered with a smile. “I appreciate you getting here as quick as you did. You may want to try to find out how they knew where my house is.”

  “I’ll do that,” answered Luc as he left, taking his Enforcers to support another trouble spot he could hear through his earpiece.

  ***

  The lights in the street went out. Attilio turned to the others sitting at his table, “It seems the next act in our little play is about to begin. Shall we take our places?”

  Romy, Larkin, and Tey got up and went into Bama’s store , calling out for their mates. Attilio got up to follow and then turned in the entrance way to face the street and the group of Vampire s and werewolves approaching. “You are all newly turned.” He said, “You cannot know all the laws of our kind. You are being led to your deaths. You cannot stand against me with your weak skills. I am an elder of ancient years and much more powerful than you. Stop this nonsense and I will speak to the Sire on your behalf.”

  Not realizing he was stalling for time for the innocent to be made safe and the Enforcers to arrive, one of the Vampire s spoke, “Old man, one gulp of your blood, and I’ll have all your power, and you’ll be dead. A new age is coming, and your kind is going to be put down. We don’t want your laws; we’ll make our own laws and take what we want. He’s the one our master wants dead. Kill him!” And they all rushed forward.

  Foolish boys, thought Attilio, as he quickly shifted from the form of a squirrel and dodged beneath their feet to get behind them. They didn’t have time to go after him as their forward rush brought them into the store where they were confronted with Romy, Larkin, and Tey, all holding lances. Two of the Vampire s were killed immediately. That left t hree Vampire s and two wolves. Attilio shifted back and struck down a third Vampire . The fifth, the leader, had broken away from the main fight and raced towards Sofia with his sword held high.

  Isabella jumped in front of her with a stake in her hand. As she plunged the stake through his ribs pushing towards his heart, he swung his sword down into her back. She screamed at the pain but didn’t stop pushing the stake, holding on to him with her other arm. He locked her within his embrace and grabbed the end of his sword in his other hand and slowly began pulling it through her body to cut her in half. She could feel that she had pierced one chamber and his aorta and was trying to find the strength to push through the last inch and kill him. Her strength was failing. He bent his head and piled more pain upon her by taking her blood, even as it poured from her body. She could feel the sword severing her spine. Once he got through the bone, he would have no further resistance.

  Suddenly, Sofia was there at her side. Using her strength, she grasped Isabella’s elbow and shoved the stake the rest of the way in. The Vampire was dead, though his jaw was locked on Isabella’s neck and his arms around her. The sword had penetrated an inch and was now being held by her own body.

  The fighting had spilled onto the street, and ten additional Vampire s had joined in the attack. The Vampire Enforcer team had arrived to fight while Romy, Larkin, Tey, and Attilio kept the entrance secure.

  Sofia called out and Bama and the others came out of the office where Trace, Shane, and the other men had quickly shoved them when the lights went out. Sofia and Isabella had been in the dressing room, and were still in the store when the attack hit. Attilio, hearing his wife’s distress, came also. He made short work of disentangling Isabella from the dead Vampire . Then he removed the sword, and the ladies swooped in to help the now unconscious Isabella . Trace and Shane stood ready in case any others came in as Bama grabbed clothes from the racks to apply pressure to the wounds. She wasn’t dead; her heartbeat and breathing had slowed to lessen the amount of blood flow.

  “Attilio, she stepped right in front of me. It happened so fast!” she cried.

  “It will be all right, her heart wasn’t damaged; she will heal. For now, we need to keep everyone’s safe until these Rogue s are defeated. Let me remove this trash.” And he picked up the arm of the dead Vampire to drag him outside. As he approached the entrance and called out for the others to make way, they spun around. Romy, Larkin, and Tey, when they saw Attilio , rushed into the store. In the midst of the fight, they hadn’t seen the Vampire breakaway. They wanted to check on their mates, and were appalled at the sight that met their eyes. Blood was everywhere; they couldn’t understand how Isabella could still be alive.

  Meanwhile, Attilio stepped onto the sidewalk still pulling the dead Vampire . A Rogue wolf, spotting him, broke off from the fighting and ran full out to attack him. At the last minute, he flung the Vampire ‘s dead body, knocking over the wolf. Then leaned over and broke its neck.

  Within a few moments, the fighting stopped, the attack defeated. Cleanup of the scene began immediately. The Vampire /Enforcer team went back into the store to escort the Chosen, and the wounded back to the compound. Just then, Cloe came running down the street. “Abaven yelled out that Isabella was injured. I got here as fast as I could. They’re still fighting over at the House of Gaming; it was winding down when I left.”

  Some of the Pack members present took off to the warehouse to protect their Alphas.

  ***

  Kira closed the lobby and computer gaming rooms. Her employees wanted to watch the final match of the laser tag tournament between the shifters and the Vampire s. Dotted around the warehouse on the second floor were observation platforms for live viewing and a part of the second floor had a lounge that had multiple viewing screens fed streaming data from cameras throughout the laser-tag arena.

  In the lounge were off-duty Enforcers and several female Pack members. Jean-Paul and Charlie drove in from Denver to watch the match and cheer on their Alpha. They left their mates in Denver. Sarah and Judy thought laser-tag was silly and had stayed in Denver to visit their parents, Jean-Paul said earlier in the day, for the ears of any watchers. They increased the number of Enforcers in Milliken, using the match as an excuse. There were a lot more Enforcers than the attackers would most likely expect.

  The additional Enforcers were split between the lounge and the various observation platforms. The largest of these held Cami, Cloe, Caterina, and Lacy, all of whom had mates in the match going on below, as well as Kira and her business partner, a weasel she called “Q”. In order to be quiet, the men were going barefoot. The laser vests were velcroed over bare chests, and they all wore tear—away sweat pants. They wanted to shift easily when the attack occurred.

  When the power went off, it took a few moments before the emergency lighting kicked on. That’s when Diavolo, and his men attacked. They came through the two emergency exits at the back of the laser-tag arena and immediately began hunting the players.

  Diavolo immediately scanned, and seeing Caterina, started working his way over to her. Enforcers in the lounge began feeding information to the players’ earpieces as they watched the vamps move around. Enforcers began pouring into the arena from the entranceways, and he could see that his followers wouldn’t be able to hold them off for long. Caterina had been pushed back into a corner with the other women standing in front of her as they held off any enemies trying to climb up to them.

  Diavolo shifted into a spider and scrambled up the wall as fast as he could, staying to the deeper shadows. Soon he was hovering over the observation deck. The fighting was at its peak, when suddenly, a huge Ambrosetti warrior let out a roar and started lashing out like a berserker, slashing everything in his path. He knew then that soon the Enforcers would turn the tide.

  Leaping down into the midst of the women, he grabbed Caterina and pushed two of the women over the balcony of the platform. At the women’s screams, the door behind burst open and several
Enforcers came out in a rush. He jumped over the railing, down to the floor of the arena, and started to run towards the exit, calling his followers to cover his escape with the prize.