Bloodlines 1 Alliances

by Toni L. Meilleur

  * * * *

  It was the sound of steps in the grass that awoke him. Whatever or whoever it was, was only about five hundred feet away. He jerked up and could feel the sun had set at least a half hour ago. Normally, he would have never slept past the first minute of sunset, but the bullet wound had required much of his energy to heal and romping with Allantra hadn’t help matters. Still he wouldn’t trade it. They had time to get away. He nudged her awake, shoving the clothes he recovered from the forest into her sleepy hands. Dressing quickly, he scanned the area with his mind. There were six outside; they had maybe two minutes before they attacked.

  Wulf had found this house no doubt with the help of the Elders. Allantra, now fully dressed and looking sexy in a sleepy tousled state, looked to him for answers. The Elders could find out about the house but not what was inside. He had carved the tunnels himself, in case he was ever in a situation when he couldn’t escape because of the sun.

  He took Allantra’s hand and went to a wall in the bathroom; he pushed a series of panels before the wall slid to the side and revealed a small cubicle like an elevator. To Allantra’s surprise that’s exactly what it was. The panel slid back into place and they descended at an almost sickening speed. It stopped abruptly and the door opened, revealing a tunnel. He turned to her and said, “Follow these tunnels in the direction they go. When you reach the end, push the darkest rock you see, it’ll let you out into the forest, go some place safe. I have to deal with this on my own. I can’t risk anything happening to you.”

  “I fight my own battles, Khaelen.”

  “Well your battle turned into mine. Now go, we’ll talk later, I promise.”

  Suddenly Allantra realized she knew very little about Khaelen and she dreaded the idea of never getting to know him. Sure, they were great together during sex, but there was something about him that she could not explain. Something that made her feel like she knew him. Knew his soul. She nodded and prayed that the Gods would keep him safe, for her. A selfish thought, but it was true nonetheless.

  It isn’t a selfish thought; it’s exactly why I’m sending you away from me.

  I told you to stay out of my head! she half-heartedly chastised him.

  Like you meant it, he laughed at her.

  With one last squeeze of her hand he closed the panel, leaving her in sudden darkness. Shifting her eyes into those of a cat, she could immediately see clearly. She had taken no more that two steps when she heard the sound of bullets. Were they regular bullets? Silver? Or the ones dipped in holy water? Allantra was torn between doing as he asked and wanting to help him. She tried to reach him mentally, but either the connection was fading or he was dying. Her heart stopped in her chest for a second with that thought. She came to a decision. Shifting into a large rat, she went inside the crude elevator shaft and began to make her way up.

  * * * *

  For the first time in his life, Khaelen was afraid. Afraid of dying and not getting to know the one woman who had gotten under his skin. Afraid of dying and not being able to protect her from the malignant laws that would surely follow and hunt her down.

  Even as the small elevator rose to the main floor of the cabin he knew he would fight to the death for her. Why? He couldn’t even answer that for himself. He just knew she was important relating to the Mass Execution, and important to him as well.

  As soon as the panel slid open, he crouched down on the floor, covering his eyes from the remnants of wood that splattered as the bullets sprayed into the small cubicle. Instinct told him these were the bullets that would hurt him. He closed his mind to Allantra, in the event he got hurt he didn’t want his pain to slow her down. That was the only consolation to the situation. At least she would be getting away.

  * * * *

  He moved quicker than even the vamps could track. There were two men in the cabin and four outside. The first one he passed too quickly for the vamp in uniform to protect himself. He snapped his neck; the sound of broken bone the only indication the event even took place. The second guard, now on alert when he saw the body of his comrade fall, did a slow circle, aiming the gun ready to shoot at the smallest movement.

  Khaelen blended in with the shadows of the cabin and watched him. Slowly he entered his mind, urging him to end his own existence instead of dying at the hands of the Executioner who would show him no mercy. The guard shook his head to ward off the powerful suggestion, but Khaelen’s power of persuasion was much stronger, and in a second the guard pointed the gun to his own head and fired. He fell in a macabre display, the body not quite catching up to the mind telling it, it was dead. In a flash of light, he turned to ashes, the blessed bullets making short work of the vamp.

  Khaelen knelt by the first vamp and decapitated him easily by hand. He couldn’t risk the vamp rising again and having him attack him from behind.

  “Very impressive, friend,” came Wulf’s voice.

  “I aim to please,” Khaelen shot back, his hazel eyes glowing from the bloodlust.

  “I take it we can’t talk this out?” Wulf sounded genuinely disappointed. “I don’t want to hurt you, Khaelen, we’ve been friends too long.”

  “Correction, friend,” Khaelen returned sarcastically, “I’ve been a friend, you’ve been an enemy in disguise.”

  “Pardon?” Wulf tried to sound hurt and puzzled, but Khaelen wasn’t buying it.

  “It was you all along. You killed Demetri. You set me and Allantra up. My question is of course, why?”

  “Why do you think?” Wulf spat out, no longer even trying to keep up the pretense of innocence. “I’ve watched you all these years. Watched your potential for greatness just wash away by your bleeding heart. At first, I thought it was because of Demetri that you didn’t aspire for more. But the more I watched the more I realized you had no intention of taking Full Caste away from Demetri. You never wanted to be leader of your bloodline, you settled!”

  He said the last part with such disgust Khaelen wondered why he hadn’t seen his disloyalty sooner. “I find no comfort in pompous behavior. My job is to keep the peace and see that justice is dispensed.”

  Khaelen noticed the other three guards silently entered the room. He laughed to himself; surely they didn’t think they were unnoticed? So all of this just to become Full Caste, it seemed petty even to Khaelen. Wulf wasn’t even of their bloodline what could he possibly gain…?

  “Oh, I see our star pupil has worked out the math puzzle.” Wulf laughed seeing the understanding on Khaelen’s face. “Don’t you see? You were in a position to keep our people dominant, but you screwed it up. You with your fair trials and letting people go.”

  “What are you talking about?” Khaelen now was truly puzzled.

  “You became part of the problem, old friend. Under your reign more low-enders have survived than ever. They have lived to breed. Their numbers have greatly multiplied, becoming almost as great as ours, again.”

  “And if they realize that, we have a civil war on our hands, one that does not guarantee we would come out the victors.” Khaelen finished for him. He couldn’t stomach such pure hatred of other species. It was absolutely sickening to see the mad light in Wulf’s eyes. What did he mean by ‘again’?

  “Yeah, you and your bitch girlfriend could make things difficult. But it’s not too late. We could use her as an example. Kill her. We could start another Mass Execution and decimate their numbers before they even realize they had a fighting chance.” Wulf began to advance. The sickness in him seeping through him pores, Khaelen tried not to inhale the stench.

  “Stop!” Khaelen warned. He didn’t want to kill Wulf. But he would if it came to that.

  “Look, even now you want to give me a fair chance, don’t you?” he chided Khaelen.

  “No, Wulf, I just don’t want to stain my hands with your filthy blood. You will not leave this cabin alive. You’re sick.”

  “I’m right. I have the support of the Elders.” Wulf proclaimed, pride abundant in his stance.

  “Do t
he Elders know you are the one who set this whole thing up?”

  “They know what I want them to know. You know sometimes a person or a group,” he laughed to himself and continued, “can think they’re so smart. They want us to believe that they are omniprescient, but I suspected long ago they were not. They’re just cursed.” He began to laugh, hysteria taking hold.

  “Cursed? That sounds far-fetched even for you, Wulf.” Khaelen tried to distract Wulf as he caught wind of a familiar scent, and cursed inside his head. Wulf, however, lifted his nose ever so slightly to scent the air as well. He smiled then. Khaelen’s heart began to beat right out of his chest. Damn her! Why couldn’t she listen to a simple order!

  “What’s that I smell, Khaelen?” Wulf said in a singsong voice. “I think I smell a bargaining chip.” He turned to his men. “Look carefully for a small animal, don’t kill it just train your gun on it. I think we might have a way to subdue our very powerful friend here.” Wulf smiled showing his fangs. Saliva dripped from one as he too began to search the cabin.

  Dammit, Allantra, I told you to leave! He hissed at her in his mind.

  I couldn’t leave. I thought you were wounded.

  Khaelen took a deep breath. He had to get her out of this. Leave now.

  I’m by one of the guards, if I move he’ll see me. She whispered back in his mind.

  Khaelen tried for a diversion. Quickly he grabbed the gun from one of the guards that he had killed, dropped to the floor and shot two of the men. Light flashed from their bodies, ashes rained on the cabin floor.

  “Now that wasn’t very sporting of you, Khaelen,” Wulf bit out, clearly pissed off. “You’re going to die for killing uniforms under the Reign of the Elders.” He tried to make it sound like a legal and official warning.

  To hell with that, there was nothing legal about this situation. “I’m willing to take that chance.” With that comment, Khaelen shot the remaining guard. “Leave, Wulf,” he advised in a grave tone. Truth was, Wulf couldn’t possibly hurt him, but he could hurt Allantra before Khaelen could save her. He could deal with Wulf after he was sure Allantra was far away.

  “I can’t. I promised the Elders I would bring you in, and that’s what I shall do!” Wulf quickly threw a disk at Khaelen, and though he sidestepped it, it did not do any good. The ring seemed to reach for him and wrap itself around him, squeezing, rendering him immobile.

  Wulf smiled at him cruelly. “Now, where’s that bitch you’re trying to protect, she’s still here I can smell her. Maybe I’ll have some fun with her before I kill her. I hear shifters can give one mean blowjob. They can unhinge their jaws like a snake and take down some serious cock!” Wulf rubbed his now aroused cock as he said it.

  Khaelen’s whole body burned, it felt like he had been caught in full view of the sun. Smoke began to rise in spirals around him. He wanted to scream but he would not, there had to be a way to get out of this thing. However he was as useless as a babe on a battlefield.

  “I can smell her cunt, Khaelen, boy it smells like one of the good ones. I smell you on her too. Fucked her have you?” Wulf stood in front of him now, taunting him. “Is she a good fuck? Must be the way your eyes are bugging out. If you’re good I’ll let you watch as I fuck her.”

  Suddenly Khaelen saw Allantra scurry into a different hiding place. It was a bad move; Wulf noticed the movement right away. He whipped out another disk and caught the rat as it tried to scurry under the bed. It squeaked in pain. Immediately, Allantra began to shift back into her normal state. Her long hair singed by the ring.

  “Well, well, well. Look what we have here. A treat for Wulf.” He turned his back on Khaelen, confident the powerful vamp could not possibly touch him or save Allantra. “You know,” he said conversationally to Khaelen as he approached the struggling Allantra. “The Elders specifically designed these new weapons for vamps and shifters, I must say it’s some of their best work.”

  “Don’t touch her.” Khaelen’s voice dropped very low. It sounded very lethal; any one with sense would have heeded it. Wulf, however, did not.

  “Or you’ll do what?” Wulf laughed, pulling a syringe of out his pocket. He looked Allantra full in the eyes. “I thought what a hot fuck you would be when I first saw you at the P and B. Don’t worry my dear, this is what you should have had the night Demetri was killed. I developed the other stuff, took me two years, and it was beautiful seeing it work on Demetri. I never could stand that bastard, hated him more than Khaelen. This will relax you and give us a chance to get to know each other.” He stepped closer to Allantra.

  Blind rage filled Khaelen before realization hit him. He knew how to get out of the ring! With a mere flexing of mind muscle…

  Just as Wulf was about to deactivate the ring to inject Allantra, he heard the sound of steel hitting the wood floor. Curious, he turned in time to see Khaelen rush him and knock him into the wall behind Allantra. The wall gave beneath Wulf’s back letting him sink into it.

  “We’ve done this before, haven’t we?” Khaelen quipped, baring dripping fangs. His eyes glowed brighter than Wulf had ever seen them.

  “How did you…?” Wulf began.

  “Get out?” Khaelen laughed finishing his question. “You said the rings were designed for vamps and shifters.”

  “You’re a vamp there’s no way you could…NO…you can’t…you can change into human form?” Wulf gulped.

  “Just long enough to fool a device or say, an idiot like you!” Khaelen ripped Wulf’s throat out in a matter of seconds. Feeding on his very life source. He could feel Wulf began to slump and still he suckled. He did the one thing he promised himself he would never do. He sucked every last bit of fluid from him, Wulf became just a husk of a being. His eyes sank in as if he had been mummified. Only when he felt the dry, flaky skin did Khaelen stop and dropped the husk to the floor. It immediately became a pile of ashes.

  Khaelen wiped the blood from his mouth and turned to Allantra, who was moaning in pain. He walked quickly to her and turning human for just a few seconds, grabbed the ring, which immediately stopped glowing.

  “Step out of it,” he ordered, when she did he threw it on the other side of the cabin. She ran into his arms, hugging him tightly, her hot tears seeping through his shirt. He cradled her to him like she was the most precious object in the world. To him, she was. When she got her crying down to a few sniffles, he gently put her away from him to see her face. Her eyes were slightly pink and puffy.

  “Why are you crying?” he asked her gently. “Did the ring hurt you that much?”

  “No, you idiot,” she sniffled. “I thought, I thought…”

  “What did you think, Allantra?”

  He sounded so calm and reasonable she hated that she was falling apart like this. “I thought he would win. I thought I’d lost you,” she gulped out. Not caring that at the moment she sounded like a raving lunatic. Not caring that she hadn’t known him long enough to be carrying on. Not even caring that he didn’t share her feelings. She was just glad he was alive.

  “It’s not over yet, we still have some stuff to sort out,” he said gruffly. Much more gruffly than he wanted. He wasn’t used to anyone caring and he didn’t know how to handle it. It was easier to just put it aside for now. He knew he hurt her, but he would make it up to her as soon as he got his own feelings in check.

  “What do we do now?” she asked. Letting him ignore the real question she was asking only because she knew he didn’t want to explore it yet. It was just as well; she had known from the beginning they would never make a couple.

  “We go see the Elders.”

  “Are you crazy? They’ll kill us on sight.”

  “I don’t think so. I believe I just stumbled upon something. Trust me, will you?”

  He grabbed her hand, lifted it up to his mouth and kissed it. She nodded, too breathless to say anything. It couldn’t last, this thing between them.

  “We need to get moving, when Wulf doesn’t check in they’ll send another unit. I, for
one, am not in the mood. We need to bring the fight to the Elders on our terms.”

  “We have terms?” she asked, surprised at the update.

  “Yes, Allantra, we have terms. I’ll give you what details I can on the way. We’ll take one of their vehicles, they won’t be needing them.” Allantra followed Khaelen out of the small cabin; this was the most trouble she had ever gotten into in her life. Her grandmother would not be surprised.

  * * * *

  The ride through the woods in the jeep was bumpy at best, but Allantra wasn’t complaining. The events that unfolded left her emotionally confused and pathetically aroused. For some reason she could not explain, and yet she knew a psychiatrist would have a field day with, the thought of someone trying in vain to kill her left her with the need to fuck. If that wasn’t a cry for help she didn’t know what was. Needless to say, the jeep was frustrating and helpful at the same time.

  She tried not to give such long sideway glances to Khaelen, but she couldn’t help it. He had saved her life and had been willing to give his in the process. That is where the confusion took place. Why? Except for a few romps in the sack they really had no ties, and yet they felt tied together in some way.

  She couldn’t even guess what his favorite color was; let alone what he liked to do in his spare time. She didn’t know what he did to relax or even what he was capable of when he was angry. She just didn’t know enough about him to feel the way she did. Yet here she was, more than willing to show her gratitude for being saved. Allantra shuddered to think of the reason why she had sex with him those other times, other than it had felt right.

  She barely took in the woods as he drove as fast as he could through the foliage. They were going to the Elders. It was the equivalent of lying down in a lion’s mouth. What did he hope to gain by doing that? The Elders were said to be the most powerful beings on the planet, having lived hundreds of years. What could Khaelen and she possibly do to gain the upper hand?