by E. M. Knight
“Maybe so,” I murmur, stepping around a sharp rock jutting out from the mountainside, “but Sylvia belonged to both the Order and the Crusaders. The marks on her skull—those alone might prove invaluable.”
“So snap a picture, then cut off her head!” Liana scowls.
The intensity of the suggestion surprises even me.
I stop and look my youngest fledgling in the eye.
“Sylvia is our prisoner,” I say firmly. “She is not to be harmed.”
For good measure, I add a lick of vampiric influence and direct it at her.
Liana wilts visibly under the pressure. “Fine,” she grumbles. “But it doesn’t mean I like it.”
“Nobody said you have to like it,” I remind her.
She scowls and goes to join April. Seeing as Liana hasn’t shown any particular affinity for the other girl, I take that as a measure of how angry she is with me.
I can’t help but sigh. Who knew that ruling a coven would amount to no more than glorified baby-sitting at the start?
Victoria goes still up ahead. One of her arms shoots out, motioning for us to stop.
We all do. Smithson, still reeling from the operation, nearly loses his balance and topples over.
I grumble under my breath about the vampiric serum taking too long to heal him.
Then I pick my way over to Victoria. “What is it?” I ask.
“The forces are being disrupted again,” she says. “I can feel them shifting in the air. It’s like they’re rebelling against whatever she’s doing—” Victoria nods down into the distant forest, “—down there.”
I chance a look back at Sylvia, who’s feigning disinterest but obviously trying very hard to listen.
I grunt and use the Mind Gift to nick her in the back of the head. She gasps in surprise and touches the spot. I exert my vampiric influence, pulling her toward me, while at the same time growling, “Come here.”
Grudgingly, she makes her way over. The stare she directs at me is full of hatred and vitriol. I only smile in the face of it.
“Sylvia,” I tell her sweetly. “We will hold no secrets from each other. You want to know what Victoria has to say? I give you unfettered access.”
I gesture grandly at the petite blonde.
“But you have to know that we expect equal honesty in return.”
Sylvia crosses her arms. “I’m not saying anything,” she mutters.
I perk an eyebrow up. “A very poor choice, dearest,” I tell her. “I thought both you and Victoria could collaborate. You seem to hold Cierra in such high regard.”
Victoria hisses at me. “James! What are you doing?”
I turn and face her. “You’re telling me about the Elemental Forces. I care nothing for them. But Sylvia seems to be exactly the right person to bring those issues up to.”
“You can’t trust her,” Victoria stresses. “She isn’t bound to you in any way!”
“Except in the way that a weaker vampire must respond to a stronger one,” I say. “We’ve taken the silver cuffs off her wrists and let her walk loose. Perhaps it’s time to reinstate them?”
Sylvia gives a visible shudder but keeps her opinion to herself.
I look at her. “You’re not a fan of the idea?”
Unconsciously she rubs her wrists. I feel a spark of triumph rise up inside me.
“Tell us what you know of the Black Sorceress,” I say. “Is she as much a threat as Victoria seems to think?”
When Sylvia doesn’t respond right away, I fire a bit more of that vampiric influence at her to ease her tongue.
She sputters out a series of curses, most directed at me, but then gets to the point.
“Cierra is the strongest witch alive, and she uses dark magic. Whatever threat Victoria conceives of her pales in comparison to the truth.” Sylvia shoots a spiteful look at the other vampire. “How can she know anything about her? She wasn’t the one to keep her under constant surveillance for ten years. She wasn’t the one to lose her sister to the Sorceress!”
“Ten years?” Victoria mutters, seemingly in awe.
“Or longer,” Sylvia says with a snarl. “All for naught, now that Smithson’s allowed her to escape.”
I detect an even angrier undercurrent in her voice when she speaks of our other captive vampire.
I step closer. My two girls, Liana and April, watch us all from afar. “Smithson was your leader,” I say. “How can you speak of him that way?”
“A leader?” Sylvia snorts. “You saw what happened to the Order.” She looks down at her slender, pale, arms. “You know what he did to me. He made me into this… into this… this monster!” she exclaims. “Why? Why couldn’t he just let me die? Better that than to wallow in misery for eternity! Better that than to be a damned creature of the night!”
“You see!” Liana butts in. “You see, she does not value the Gift! We can’t trust her. We should kill her!”
“Quiet,” I snap. “We’re not going to make any rash decisions.”
“Death would be a mercy,” Sylvia murmurs. The ugly, despicable desperation behind those words makes me want to vomit.
“Enough of this,” I say. “Victoria, you can feel the Forces. Tell me: does Sylvia have The Spark?”
Victoria looks taken aback that I could even ask such a question. “No,” she says. “No. Of course not.”
“Then what about the markings on her skull? You told me they belonged to the daughters of the highest ranking Crusaders.”
“Don’t you dare speak of my family,” Sylvia warns.
I can’t help but laugh at that. “Oh? Or what? You’ll throw a fit?”
Before she can reply, I direct a powerful torrent of my influence at her. Her knees buckle under the sudden onslaught. She falls awkwardly and holds her head in pain.
“James,” Victoria’s voice is low and urgent. “Stop it! She isn’t some beast you can beat into submission!”
I look at the fiery blonde… and sigh.
“You’re right,” I mutter. I stop the flow, and even go so far as to walk over and help Sylvia up.
She recoils away from me the moment she’s upright. “Don’t touch me,” she spits.
I hold my arms up in mock surrender. “If that’s what you want…”
I’m just toying with them, all of them, because these women all know that I am the one true leader here.
I turn back the way Victoria was looking. “If you’re concerned about the Forces,” I say, “we’ll just go around. We need to make it back to the plane before sunrise. From there, we’ll fly to…” I hesitate for a moment, racking my brain for a destination.
In truth, I never planned this far ahead. I thought we’d come here, kill Smithson, and then sort of wander wherever the wind takes us.
But that was before I made Liana… before we found out about the Black Sorceress… before we saw the destruction brought unto the Order… before Sylvia… and most of all, before I decided to let Smithson live.
“Go where?” Victoria demands. “We can’t just let Cierra run wild!”
“Why not?” I snap at her. “She had nothing to do with me. We’ve already picked up enough tag-alongs as is. We fly…” I spin around, come to a stop, and point out at random. “There. In that direction. We fly north.”
The further away we get from Mother and The Haven, the better, I think.
Victoria balks. “North? You want to go north? There’s nothing up there but ice and snow.”
“Exactly,” I say. “All the better to regroup and figure out where we go from there. The Nocturna Animalia need a home base. There aren’t any covens in British Columbia or the Yukon. We go there.”
“You can’t just cross the border into another country on a little plane!” Victoria exclaims. “James, are you even listening to yourself? Liana will have been reported missing, there’ll be a search for her. What, are you just going to show up at customs with two prisoners and—”
“No,” I cut her off. “Give me credit, Vic
toria. I’m not that thick. We fly up to Washington. We land and cross the border on foot. Easy enough to do for creatures with our gifts. And then we lay claim to a new piece of land, and we make it ours, and that is where the Nocturna Animalia will rise!”
“…and we just leave Cierra here, forgotten,” Victoria grumbles. “Smart, James. Real smart.”
“Cierra,” I hiss, growing increasingly impatient, “has nothing to do with any of us!” I fling a finger out at Sylvia. “And don’t you dare protest that.”
“We unearthed Cierra in an underground lair in British Columbia,” the woman says softly.
I spin on her. “What?”
She nods. “That’s where she was found. If you take us north… I have a feeling she will follow.”
I curse under my breath.
Then something Eleira said comes back to me. “What a minute,” I breathe. “Cierra—she’s a dark witch. Could she be the same one… who took possession of Eleira?”
Victoria gives a start at that. “I felt something when I had my link to the girl,” she says. “But I had no idea…”
“Are there any other dark witches alive?” I am directing the question at both Sylvia and Victoria. “Any others that you know of?”
“There are lots of witches out there.” Sylvia gives an unconditional hitch of her shoulders. “They’re scattered, though. Clans no longer exist. The odds of one of them stumbling upon the information required to learn black magic…” she shakes her head. “Is miniscule. There are no others. Cierra is the only one.”
“Of this you’re sure?” I press. “Victoria, what do you think?”
“As far as I know, she’s telling the truth,” Victoria says slowly. “But only one person would know for certain.”
“Smithson,” I say, pre-empting the grand reveal. “Of course. If he was in charge of the Order, as he kept tabs on all the supernatural…”
I trail off, then look all the women around me in the eye, one-by-one.
“Coincidences don’t exist in our world,” I announce. “Especially not when concerning one touched by prophecy, as Eleira is. She said she found a witch’s lair in British Columbia. That is where Cierra came from.”
On the spot, I make up my mind.
“That’s where we go, then,” I say. “Sylvia and Smithson will lead us. I want to see this lair for myself.”
“You can’t be serious!” Victoria exclaims. “James, no. That’s madness! What do you hope to achieve? It’s one thing to turn a blind eye to the Sorceress—but entirely another to invite her to us!”
“Who says I’m inviting anyone?” I ask.
April steps up to me. “I’m with James,” she says. I don’t know if the girl actually believes it, or if she just wants to go against Victoria. “Let’s go see the origin point of this witch. Maybe we can learn something, who knows?”
“You’re both mad,” Victoria mutters.
Sylvia, having refrained from speaking this whole time, jumps in, too.
“I hate what I’ve become,” she tells us. “I hate what Smithson turned me into. I never thought, ever, in my life, that I would collaborate with vampires.”
“You did it with him as your commander,” I remind her.
She shoots me a nasty look, then keeps going. “But if there’s one saving grace in all this, it’s that I can help get Cierra under control. For no matter how much I loathe vampires… what Cierra did to my family in the Order makes things personal for me. I’ve watched over her for too long to simply let her go, now.”
“Why did you have her?” I ask. “What was the Order’s purpose with her?”
Sylvia looks at Smithson. “Only he can answer that for you,” she says. “Our commander has his secrets. I was never before in a position to question him… but after the catastrophe he led us to? I am now.”
Beside her, Smithson gives a pitiful moan.
She looks at me. “I will help you find the lair,” she promises. “But I ask for one thing in return.”
“You’re not exactly in a position to make requests,” I say. “But I’ll humor it. What do you want?”
“That, when the time comes…” her eyes take on a steely look. “You will let me destroy her. You will let me end the Black Sorceress’s life.”
“I think,” Victoria continues, before I can speak, “that we will all agree to that.”
Chapter Fourteen
Raul
The few precious moments I got to spend with my girl were so much better than anything I could have hoped for. It was a scant half hour, no more, but I will treasure that time indefinitely and forever.
It’s too bad that I had made arrangements with Geordam to interrupt us on business of seemingly utmost importance in advance. Being called away like that was an integral part of the alibi I’ve now adopted… but I wish he hadn’t come right on the dot.
I give myself a shake and refocus my thoughts. I’m being stupid. I only made those arrangements for Eleira’s benefit. I can’t regret them now due to a growing desire for self-indulgence…
I look both ways, out from the line of trees, and—neither sensing nor seeing anyone—make a dash for the abandoned elevator entrance of the massive redwoods.
Geordam came and called me away on urgent business, but that was just to give me an opportunity to sneak out of the stronghold undetected. Phillip’s order still stands, of course. Just because Carter’s vampires were against it does not mean the ones who stayed do not respect the Captain Commander’s word.
And anyway. As soon as our vampires got wind that the Queen was back, they were all-too-eager to jump over themselves to show her that they never questioned her authority.
Mother’s showing of bringing that one vampire back from the dead quickly spread through the ranks and gave her a great, mythical status.
But the interesting thing, to me, is that magic is not supposed to heal. Only vampire blood has that property. From my understanding, magic is a force bound by certain rules, much the same as gravity or electromagnetism or nuclear power.
That is: it’s an extra force of our dimension. Undeterminable to most, immune to study by regular scientific instruments, but not altogether unlike the other ones that hold our world together.
So it is not ”magic” in the romantic sense, I don’t think. Hell, something as simple as the telephone would have been viewed as the most powerful witchcraft in the era I was born!
No, the one thing I’ve learned, if nothing else, in my many years of life is that this world is bound by certain rules, and those rules are immutable.
Which means that Mother either discovered an altogether new force… or that the show she put on was simply an elaborate illusion.
It is my greatest hope that it turns out to be the latter.
I hit the elevator button, then grunt in irritation when it doesn’t light up. Figures. But I was so used to having electricity providing constant energy to the vampire apartments in The Haven…
No matter. It’s not like I can’t just use my vampiric gifts.
I look up, pick a spot on the tree, and leap toward it. My claws hook onto the bark. Quickly, I scale the distance to the residences.
Of course, the doors are locked, but with nobody watching it doesn’t take much to pry one open.
And then I’m in.
I take a deep breath and relax as I take the first peaceful steps into my home. I didn’t realize how much I would miss this place, were it barred to me. Which, unfortunately, it has been… but not for much longer.
I go to the nearest window and look up at the sky. The sun had dipped past the horizon just minutes before I made the run here from the stronghold. It’s not quite night yet, but waiting that long allowed me to make the short journey without suffering any sort of discomfort.
Not that I wouldn’t willingly put myself through anything, really, if it meant that Eleira stayed safe. But there’s a difference between purposefully putting yourself in harm’s way and doing so out of necessity. I coul
d have gotten here sooner, but if the sun were up, then no way I could do what I intend to do next.
I enter the hallway, pick the right direction, and set off at a brisk pace.
First to my rooms. None of the Incolam dared enter when they brought their books into the stronghold. So there are a few volumes still here, to do with the constellations, that might yet prove useful.
I grab a bag from the closet and quickly stuff the books inside. Along with them go the charts, parchments, and diagrams that I have studied. The ones that show the final alignment of the stars as it should be when Eleira inherits rule.
With that done, I exit my room… then change my mind, and go back in again.
Just to be safe, I conduct another search of the premises with my mind, expanding the vampiric influence to test if I can sense any other’s presence.
I am, thankfully, still all alone.
I make my way over to the secret safe hidden behind a wardrobe, spin the dial in the proper combination, and pull open the door.
Inside, completely insulated and in perfect condition, are three vials of the most valuable human blood I’ve ever possessed.
Three vials of Liana’s blood.
They’ve been maintained pristinely for all these years. I attribute that mostly to the small stone torrial locked away with them. Mother gave it to me centuries ago, telling me what it could do. Obsidian in the safe prevents the magic from leaking out and being sapped. The fact that the safe is in my room ensures that none would dare attempt to break in.
I pick up one of the vials and shut the safe door. It is a completely hermetic container—I can smell nothing of the sweet, powerful blood inside.
That bodes well for me. Having even a scent of it might bring a whole storm of memories back—memories that I want nothing to do with now that Eleira is in my life.
But, moreover, I don’t want to be tempted into drinking the blood. It’s been a very long time since I’ve properly fed. I can hold off the thirst without much effort… so long as the temptation isn’t staring me in the face.
The one vampire who cannot, however… is my brother Phillip.
The vial is for him. I suspect—although that suspicion is so strong as to be cemented nearly as complete fact—that Phillip has been secretly feeding. Nothing else can explain his astronomical rise in strength. Neither can anything explain the bouts of irrational behavior he’s displayed recently… other than a pervading, all-encompassing hunger.