“I see you petting my cat,” I said.
“Wow that was fast.” Then we tried with several other vampires in close proximity. Holly was thinking about how many children she was going to have and if she would go back to practicing medicine on humans. I guess that explains why she was called in when I got injured by the revenant, she was a doctor. The cook was thinking what a slow day it was and how she’d like to close the kitchen early. Nobody living here ate everyday anyway, so it seemed like a waste for her to be inside when she could be outdoors chasing the coyotes.
“Let’s take a break for a few minutes and then we’ll start working on Samuel.” We sat back on the floor more informally to take our breather. “Wow, I’ve never heard or seen things like that before. The gifts you have are truly amazing.”
“I didn’t know Holly was a doctor,” I said casually wanting to switch the conversation. I didn’t feel my gifts were amazing, in fact I could think of a few other vampires who only found them to be a nuisance and a reason to murder me.
“Holly is lots of things,” he smiled. “She’s my closest sibling and the one who is kind of like a second mother to us all, seeing as how she and Mom are only about twenty years apart in age.”
“I guess that’s pretty close for two vampires.”
“Yeah, they come from a different time. Every period out of sanctuary is a new experience of starting over. She’s hoping she can be out of sanctuary for at least twenty years before Mom and Dad go back.”
“I guess that’s understandable. She was telling me she has sixty one kids.”
“She does, of course most have passed on now. Only a few have opted to turn.”
“That’s a lot of kids,” I said with a great degree of respect.
“Yes sixty one is a lot, if you have them all at one time,” he laughed, “fortunately that’s not usually how it works out. Do you want children?” he asked tentatively.
“I always thought so, but then Holly told me about having to watch them live and die, I’m not sure I’m strong enough for that.”
“You’re stronger than you realize. Look at the things you’ve done already. A year from now you’re going to be a different vampire. You’ll be much stronger, more powerful, and less emotional. That’s why they didn’t execute you. They want to see what you can do, and after this is all over there will not be a vampire in this clan who’ll want to be on your bad side.”
I waived my hand dismissively. “Well that would certainly be a switch.”
“You’ll see,” was all he said. “Ok, back to work.” We knelt again and touched heads. This time we put the picture of Samuel between us and held on to each other’s arms. “Just do what you were doing before. You grab the images and pass them to me.”
We had to work for a long time to get even a single image. I could see a lush forest at night and hear the sound of footsteps. The view was through the eyes of someone walking. The perspective looked down at his feet, and then up toward a highway that was beyond the forest. The sign on the roadway came into focus. ‘CANADIAN BORDER 35 MILES’ it said. “Do you see it?” I said whispering as if Samuel would hear us talking.
“I see it,” Gavin whispered back. The image went on, the view from Samuel’s eyes then looked behind him. A large group of silhouettes were following, sloshing through the wet earth, dragging themselves along. They came more into focus and we could see the yellowing skin, the rotting flesh and tortured eyes of the revenant army.
“How many do you think?” I whispered to Gavin.
“At least a hundred right there.” They groaned and howled as if in pain. We saw the body we were looking through make a slight motion with his hand and the revenants went silent. The looks of suffering on their faces seemed to intensify as they were quieted, as if being silent deepened their miserable state.
“My god,” I whispered, “that is truly a hideous thing to do to them.” Just as I spoke we heard Samuel’s thoughts in verbal form. I jumped because for a second I was sure he was going to address me again. His thoughts were that he hoped his helper at the sanctuary would have everything in place by the time he arrived in three days. Samuel stopped in mid thought and froze. I broke away from Gavin immediately.
“He was about to realize we were there,” I said shaking. Samuel wasn’t even in the room with us but being inside his mind was a frightening experience just the same.
“I felt that too. We got some good information we can take to the council now though.” And then the one piece of information we hadn’t wanted to admit came down on us. “We have a traitor.” Gavin stood up and sat on the bed with his head in his hands. “I didn’t want to believe it, but I thought that might be what we were dealing with.”
“Who do you think it might be?”
“I can’t imagine anyone here betraying us and the whole of the island for the likes of Samuel. What on earth would be the reward in that?” I could think of one person, but I didn’t want to tell Gavin that I thought his brother James was a traitor. He didn’t know his own brother was responsible for my blood loss days earlier and I never intended to tell him. James was mine to kill, and I wanted to see him die a slow death.
I must have been very deep in thought because just then Gavin interrupted me, “You have an idea, don’t you?” I was silent for a moment. “Tell me,” he pressed.
“It’s just a thought.” I said. “I’m sure I’m wrong, but I want to try to take a trip inside that vampire’s head alone first before I say anything.”
“Even to me?” he sounded a little hurt.
“I’m sorry, I wouldn’t do it alone unless I absolutely had to.” He put two and two together before I knew it, I should not have said it the way I did but I was caught off guard.
“You think its James don’t you?”
“I never said that.”
“You didn’t have to; I got a flash of your thoughts just now.” Here were the side effects we were warned about.
Gavin had been inside my head and I hadn’t even known he was there. I had to use every bit of my self control to not think about the attack. I didn’t want him to see that. If he was ever to know I wanted to tell him myself instead of finding out from a random thought.
“I know he’s been hostile to you, and I can understand why you’d feel that way given your experience with him, but he’s on the council for a reason. He’d never side with Samuel.” He shook his head at me, “Didn’t you hear him say he was afraid you were going to get us all killed? That means he’s afraid like we all are, afraid of Samuel.”
“You’re right,” I said stopping him, “It was just a random flash through my mind. I’m sorry.” I wasn’t sorry, I just wanted him to stop defending his brother and I didn’t want him to think that I had it out for James, even though I did. Now I just had an extra reason.
“Let’s get dressed and go find Angus.” I said.
Chapter Twenty Two
It was déjà vu all over again as the council assembled. This gathering, however, was much more informal. Gavin and I were seated at the table instead of standing in front of them. I never enjoyed being in this room with these vampires, especially James, but sitting at the table was better than standing in front. It would have felt too much like we were being judged again as opposed to delivering valuable information. Slowly they were beginning to see me more as a peer than an outsider, except for James of course.
“You have information for us?” Mariah said.
“Yes,” Gavin began, “we did find the Cape Breton Book of The Dead in the study, but either it was put away and forgotten about, or someone went to some lengths to hide it.” No one spoke but they all seemed to eye one another with varying degrees of suspicion. “We read the story but there was no indication of how to duplicate what had been done, so we had to go to the source.”
“The source?” James was agitated, but that was nothing new here.
“Yes!” Gavin snapped back at him, James lost the superior look he had been giving us. “We fou
nd Duncan and…”
“You went straight to Duncan?” Angus said. “And you are still alive to tell about it?”
“Of course,” Gavin and I shared a confused look. “Angus, why do you say that?”
“Because the last time any vampires went to seek him out they were never heard from again. Duncan doesn’t wish to be disturbed, I wish you’d come to me before leaving.”
“He seemed pretty agreeable to me.” James was not impressed I had offered my take on the meeting and snorted something under his breath.
Gavin continued, “Honestly, Angus if he has a reputation for being violent toward other vampires we didn’t see any indication of it. He does seem to harbor a certain distaste for humans though.”
“Yes, he certainly does.” Mariah cast a bleak look in our direction. “And our newest is still in her transformative state, I’m very surprised he showed such restraint with you.”
“I was able to communicate telepathically with him, maybe that’s why.”
“Can we get to the point of your little excursion?” James whined.
“Well the point is that he told us a lot of details had been left out of the book, and gave us another book with instructions on how to do what he did with Annie and Adelia. We were able to access Samuel’s thoughts for about two or three minutes before he had any indication we were there.”
At this point they all seemed to lean forward in their chairs toward Gavin. “There is a traitor among us.”
The words hung in the air for a few moments. The council members tried to think of something to say in response but they were genuinely stunned.
“How do you know that?” Mariah asked after a long silence.
“Because he was hoping his helper would have everything ready when he arrived in three days.”
“Three days?” James’ sarcasm was giving way to panic.
“Yes,” I said.
“Is there anything else we should know?” he seemed to be taking us more seriously now.
“We got a look at the revenants,” Gavin said. “When he glanced at them we got a quick count of about a hundred, that was just what we could see, and in my experience they seem to be starving. Starving revenants are much more dangerous, and I don’t have any idea how he’s controlling them if that’s what he’s doing, but they were moaning and howling, and when he waived his hand they just...stopped.”
Angus took on a very businesslike tone, “Alright then, we should start to get our house in order. We must decide who will fight, who will stay inside the sanctuary and who will meet them outside to try and prevent them from getting in.”
“I’ll find Aries tonight then,” Gavin said. “Should I ask him to bring his men tomorrow night for a dress rehearsal of sorts?”
“Yes,” Angus was glowering toward us now as he spoke. “We have one other order of business that needs to be discussed.” Something about the way he said that made my stomach knot up. “I heard from the leader of the St.Peters clan.”
Gavin’s eyes widened, “Malcom? What did he want?”
“He wanted to let me know that the St.Peters clan, the Johnstown clan and the Chapel Island clan want to stand with us against Samuel.”
“How did he even know about Samuel?” James said, snarling as his fangs ran out.
“He wouldn’t say how he knew, but I accepted his offer. It looks like we have traitors on both sides of the argument, but for preservations sake I’m not going to pursue how he got that information at this point.”
“Angus!” James protested, “That is an unforgivable offense.”
“Yes it is,” Angus agreed, “But we need to put it in perspective for now. We can deal with those vampires after we have faced off against my brother. Put your fangs away council member.” James obliged.
“Will they be joining us tomorrow night as well?” Mariah seemed more amused than Angus and James at the thought of different clans banning together to fight a common enemy. I was still working to understand why what Holly and I had done was such a distasteful act.
“Yes,” Angus said.
Mariah smiled, almost whispering to herself. “Interesting,” she said.
“Enough talk,” Angus was getting frustrated now. “Gavin and Rachel you go inform Aries and the rest of us will organize the other clans and ourselves. We will all meet in the courtyard after dark tomorrow night. Until then.” He stood up as did the rest of us. I left the room immediately. I really couldn’t stand another second in the same space with James. I felt the anger rising in me and I wasn’t sure I could keep myself from attacking him again, even though I wouldn’t stand much of a chance of killing him that way. I had to be more calculated if I was going to be successful because like it or not, he was more powerful than I was.
I was out in the corridor before Gavin was who had stayed behind to talk to James, or so I assumed because Mariah was out at nearly the same time I was.
“Can I ask you a question of a personal nature?” she said without much emotion. I wanted to say no, but didn’t think I had the luxury of refusal.
“Of course,” I said forcing a smile.
“Your Guardian, is he being improper with you?”
“Not at all, why do you ask?”
“As your Guardian he is your advisor, your protector. I’d hate to think he was taking advantage of that role. Not only are you a very young vampire but you are not fully transformed yet. Something that seems ok to you now might seem very wrong once you fully become what you are going to be.”
“I appreciate your concern,” I said in a tone that indicated she should back off.
“Just tread carefully my dear. You can’t un ring a bell.” With that she gave me a polite nod and flitted away.
Gavin emerged just as Mariah disappeared around the corner. “Want to go for a walk in the woods?” he smiled. “It won’t be dark for another couple of hours but we can explore together.”
“I like the sound of that.” We made our way out into the early evening air. The sky was not yet dark but clouds were hanging over threatening to burst with snow by nightfall. We left the grounds of the sanctuary and trotted into the underbrush.
“How are we going to find him?” I asked.
“Don’t worry,” he said, “They come out mostly at full dark, sometimes a little before. He was here a few days ago and they tend to stick to one area, plus he knows I want to talk to him. And also we can...um...”
“What?” I had a feeling I didn’t want to hear the end of that thought.
“Well, if we become physically aroused he can smell it. That might be the best way to attract him.”
“Oh my god, you want us to have sex out here so that he can smell it and find us? Gavin!”
“We don’t have to have sex but just, you know, make out a little bit.” He took my hand and drew me against him with a devilish smile. “Come on, it’ll be fun. Better than wandering in the woods for hours looking at random.”
“Oh I suppose,” I said playfully, “If it’s for a good cause.” Gavin grabbed my hair and pulled my head back exposing my neck. I immediately gripped him by the waist and pulled him close, it was evident he had been aroused before even the first touch. He bit into me and sucked my neck, I moaned.
I was certainly enjoying our activity but in the back of my mind the words Mariah had said came back to haunt me. Did I really have anything to worry about with Gavin? Was he taking advantage of his guardianship, or were his feelings genuine? What did she mean about seeing this relationship differently at some point?
As much as I hated to admit it, she had planted the seed of doubt, no matter how small, into the back of my mind.
There was a rustle in the bushes behind us just then and Gavin peered over my exposed neck, fangs showing, to look for our expected company. I heard the familiar trot of goat hooves, not something you hear often in the woods of Cape Breton, and I knew our satyr had arrived.
“Don’t stop on my account.” He looked just as handsome as he had the first time
I saw him, although I felt guilty just thinking that.
His soft chestnut hair hung just below his shoulders as it had before, and once again I found myself wanting to touch it. Not with the intensity I had last time, but enough that it disturbed me. His beautiful eyes stared right through me. If he wouldn’t have been saddled with a pair of horse hooves from his mid-thigh down he could have been mistaken for a movie star.
“Aries,” Gavin greeted him. “I’ve come to talk to you about your offer.” His fluid black eyes lit up and the fine layer of black hair all over his lower torso seemed to stand on end.
“You’ve reconsidered sharing your lover? How very generous of you vampire.”
“No!” Gavin said surprised. He must not have remembered that portion of our encounter until the satyr reminded him. “Your offer to come fight with us against Samuel.”
“Oh, that.” Aries didn’t seem to remember that portion of our encounter until Gavin reminded him. “Of course, what is our plan of attack?”
“Samuel arrives in three days; he is coming with an army of at least a hundred revenants, maybe more. Angus asks that your men come to the sanctuary tomorrow night at full dark. We are going to meet also with vampire clans from St.Peters, Johnstown and Chapel Island.”
“My goodness,” Aries said, “either this is going to be quite a large event indeed or Angus is not as powerful as he used to be. Your clan certainly seems to be in need of a lot of help with this exercise.”
Gavin was offended. “Angus is just as powerful as ever. We just want to make sure that this situation gets taken care of for the good of us all. You want an island full of revenants running loose?”
“Certainly not,” Aries said. ”There would be no food for you and no women for us because they’d eat them all.
We can’t have the few women who wander in the woods alone getting their innards torn out.”
“Of course not.” Gavin seemed amused with the way Aries had put that. Aries then turned his attention toward me, taking a step forward. Gavin stiffened and held my hand.
The Vampires of Soldiers Cove Page 15