Hunting Shadows

by Rain Oxford

  “If you continue, I’ll kill your vampire.”

  “Do you actually think I care?”

  Morbid or not, Logan was sincere; the demon part of him didn’t care, and that was the part in control.

  I tried to think of ways to defend myself, but I still couldn’t even breathe. Either my body wasn’t healing like it should because I needed blood, or it was his magic that hindered my healing.

  The demon looked at me. “There is still a chance for you to join me. I defend and protect my pets.”

  He hadn’t defended or protected the creature we captured earlier that night. The pain receded slightly and I was able to breathe. “I’ll take my chances with the half-demon,” I said with great difficulty.

  Marluk raised his hand once again and lightning shot towards me… only to strike an invisible shield around me. “It turns out I do care,” Logan said.

  “You’re too late. You can’t stop me.” The demon clenched his fist and I felt like I was being squeezed by a massive hand. Logan could stop the lightning, but not all of Marluk’s magic, apparently.

  My bones protested. As strong as vampires were, being crushed to death was the last way I expected to die. While Logan continued to speak his Latin, Marluk squeezed me tighter and tighter. My mind was screaming at me to fight, to use my strength, to kill and bleed the enemy, because as a vampire, I had never faced anything that couldn’t be defeated with brute strength.

  Then, as my vision was starting to dim, Marluk yelled something in another language and the pressure vanished. I hit the floor hard and stayed down as I sucked in oxygen. The candles all went out as Marluk disintegrated into darkness, just like the creature had.

  I closed my eyes, suddenly feeling very tired, until I felt Deimos standing over me. I ignored him when he licked my ear. Then Phobos started licking my face and I was forced to sit up. “I’m okay, boys,” I said, trying to push them away.

  At that moment, the farmer started to get up and reach for the shotgun. Without looking at him, Logan pulled out his gun and shot the man right in the head. Then he put his gun away and held out his hand for mine. I let him help me up, but when he leaned in to kiss me, I stepped back automatically.

  “You need to be healed,” Logan said, his voice cold.

  “I need blood to heal.”

  He shrugged. “Whatever. You have six children and an old man to choose from. Just do it quickly, because I don’t fancy being here all night.”

  I held up his chain, which I had somehow managed to hold onto. “Here.”

  “No.”

  “No what?”

  “No, I’m not putting that back on.”

  “What happened to the price for magic?”

  He moved nearly as fast as a vampire and clenched his fist in my hair. “I don’t like to be controlled, Ms. Ares. I haven’t been free of that cursed chain for years and I’m not going to be bound again.”

  “Okay.” I dropped the chain to show him I was dropping the subject, but the metal didn’t hit the floor. Instead, it shot upward like a snake, under his unbuttoned shirt, and wrapped around his torso.

  Before he could tear it away, it began melding into his skin. It was clearly as painful as it was obscene, for he was on his knees and shouting after just a few seconds. I hated to see him in pain after he stopped the demon from killing me with the lightning, but I had no clue how to help him.

  A minute later, his exclamations of pain faded into heavy panting. “Are you okay?” I asked.

  He stood up, wobbling only a little, and I saw that he was sweating. “Yes. Thank you for returning it.”

  “I didn’t exactly return it.”

  “The wizard who made it for me knew the demon part of me wouldn’t willingly give up my magic, so he enchanted the chain to seek me out.”

  “You lied to me about your personality.”

  “I did, but it wasn’t intentional. I had merely forgotten how much my demonic side was subdued.”

  “Explain as we take the kids home… again.”

  * * *

  Fortunately, none of the children were permanently injured. They were just all exhausted, which made them easier to return to their homes. The farmer was dead, but I wasn’t going to lose any sleep over it.

  Logan finally told me how he got his chain and sparkling personality.

  “I told you I ran away at the age of sixteen. It was about that age that I started getting very tense. I was restless, angry, hateful, resentful, and arrogant much of the time.”

  “Like every sixteen-year-old.”

  “A sixteen-year-old with no morals. I was a textbook sociopath, except with extremely powerful magic. It got worse with age. When I was eighteen, I attracted the wrath of the wizard council. They sent one of their members, a man named Vincent Knight to kill me. Instead, he decided I was redeemable and tried to teach me not to hurt people. The thing is, he wasn’t much better than me. I could sense that he had killed people and his morals were questionable at best. Maybe he was a closet-sociopath. Anyway, I knew if I could kill him, I could take his power, so I tried to. He escaped. I really wanted another chance to kill him, but when he returned a few weeks later, he had the chain. The bastard had somehow gotten my blood and used it to enchant the chain.”

  “Are you sure he wasn’t…”

  “After my magic? That’s what I thought, but he never tried to hurt me after he bound me. It also calmed me quite a bit. He taught me that there was a price for magic. I didn’t really believe him until I finally got loose one day. Removing the chain is excruciatingly painful and draining, so it took me a long time to manage it. I locked it in a box and went on a rampage. A few months later, I woke up in a pool of blood and surrounded by four members of the wizard council. Once again, Vincent saved me and bound me, having found and released the chain.”

  “Who did you kill?”

  “I don’t know. For the next five years, everything went wrong for me. It was like I was cursed; I couldn’t settle down anywhere, I would get attacked, and every decision I made was wrong. I was homeless and jobless for much of it. Then, I guess my karmic debt was repaid, because things turned around very quickly. I started collecting magical objects to protect them from those who would abuse them like I abused magic. However, the more I got, the more I liked the power they gave me. I quickly figured out that they gave me just as much power as magic without the consequences. Probably because of my demonic side, I could naturally know a good deal and bartering was second nature. People started coming to me for the artifacts and books they couldn’t get themselves. People feared crossing me.”

  “There wasn’t a price for that?”

  “Not to me. I’m a very inimical man, which works out well for me, because I prefer to be alone and friendless. I have acquaintances and contacts. Maintaining a friendship means being social, and that is… painful for me. Painful in a bad way.”

  “Is there a good way?”

  “Of course. There is nothing wrong with being in pain and misery. It means you’re alive. I just don’t want to be forced to be nice.”

  I laughed. “You’re very different than I expected. I like that.”

  We finished dropping off the kids and returned to the motel with Lilly and the boys. I didn’t even take off my shoes before passing out on the bed. My body was running on vapors and adrenaline. There was nothing left.

  * * *

  I woke to the taste of blood in my mouth and sucked harder. It was cold, so it was gross, but my body was too starved to slow down. I sucked until there was nothing left but plastic. Logan was sitting on the bed next to me, holding an empty blood bag to my mouth. “I was only able to get one packet,” he said, setting it aside. “The hospital is not well-stocked. Do you need more?”

  I nodded. My body was aching, terribly. The next thing I knew, Logan was leaning over me so that his neck was easily accessible. I could have fed off his wrist just fine, but I wasn’t going to argue. This was much more intimate.

  “Just do
n’t turn me,” he said.

  “Don’t bite me back and you’ll be fine.”

  I bit him. To my surprise, his blood wasn’t spicy or sulfuric. It was actually really good, as I was pretty sure I could taste the magic in his blood. Although it wasn’t a taste I could identify, it was strangely more pleasant and satisfying than human blood.

  Logan groaned, though it wasn’t with pain. My vampire instincts alerted me when I had enough, as well as when the person I was feeding off of was at risk. With Logan, I had enough before he did. I let him go and licked his wound closed, but he didn’t sit up.

  “You can take more.” His husky voice against my ear made me shiver.

  “I don’t need it.”

  “Maybe not, but you want it.”

  I did. I wanted more of all of him. I turned my head so that my lips just barely brushed his. “No magic.”

  “I can’t promise that,” he said before kissing me.

  Yes, there was definitely magic, but it wasn’t demonic. It was even more passionate than when he was healing me. When I tried to unbutton his shirt, he grabbed both my hands and held them above my head with his left hand, then nibbled on my collarbone.

  I laughed. “What the hell are you doing? That tickles.”

  Without a word, he moved his lips closer to the front of my throat and the feeling changed. I didn’t even realize he’d unbuttoned my shirt until he pulled it out from under me and tied my hands with it. “I bet you would look great in shackles.”

  I laughed again. “You are a kinky bastard.”

  “I haven’t even started yet.” He kissed me and ran his tongue over my fangs.

  The door opened. “Seriously, can’t you put a sock on the door or something?” Lilly asked, huffing.

  “Get out,” Logan said, darkly.

  “That’s fine with me. Mom says if you don’t have me home in ten minutes, I will be living with you.”

  Logan jumped up, grabbed her hand, and pulled her outside, not even taking the time to shut the door. I sighed. A moment later, Phobos hopped on the bed and licked my face. I rolled over, but Deimos came up on the other side and licked me in the face instead.

  “Yuck!” I pulled my wrists free of my shirt and pushed Deimos away. Phobos flopped down on top of me. “Get off me.” Phobos grumbled and settled his head on mine. “You’re getting a bath.”

  He jumped off and darted out the door. I got up, packed what was left of my stuff, and went to the office to give the key back, although I wasn’t sure where the door to my room was. When I returned to my car and opened the door for Phobos to get in the back, he whined.

  “Logan’s not coming, buddy.”

  “You could have waited for me,” Logan said, suddenly behind me.

  “Jesus, Logan! How the hell do you keep doing that?!” His shirt buttons were off and it looked like he had hurried in order to catch me before I left.

  “Magic. You are very interesting to me, and I usually find people so boring.” There was an obvious, unspoken invitation. Unfortunately, I didn’t know what the invitation was for, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.

  He was intriguing, undeniably attractive, and I had no doubt he would keep life interesting, but I couldn’t see it working out. A relationship with him would be like an explosion— fun in theory, possibly beautiful, and likely deadly. We were both dominant. Demon or not, I wouldn’t take shit from him, and I wasn’t exactly a joy to deal with. Moreover, anything short-term would just be inconvenient; we lived over two thousand miles away from each other.

  “Well, I guess it’s time for me to get back to my bar.”

  “And I need to return to my store. I owe you, though, so if you need me, you have my number.”

  I nodded, although I didn’t plan on it. “You can call me if you need anything, too.” It was not easy to get Phobos into the car. Deimos just rolled his eyes and got in the passenger seat. I was oddly disappointed the entire way home.

  * * *

  Three days later, I pulled into my spot behind my bar. As soon as I stepped inside, I had to hold back a laugh; little, dainty Brandy was on top of Melvin and had him in a choke hold. Several of my regulars welcomed me back, which got Brandy’s attention. She looked up at me and smiled. “Hey! How’d it go?”

  “It wasn’t as bad as I’d expected it to be. It’s over, now; I’m home.”

  I got to work and it was as if I’d never left. At the end of the night, I told Brandy everything. When I was done, she looked somewhat sad. “You sound like you liked it.”

  I thought about it for a few minutes. “Some of it, I think I did.”

  “If another case comes up before Astrid is found, do you think you’ll do it?”

  “I think that depends on the case.”

  “Will you take me next time?”

  “We’ll see. One of us has to watch the bar. You can go on an adventure if you want. You’re not imprisoned here.” Even though I offered, I really expected her to immediately turn me down; she never wanted to leave my side.

  “Maybe I will,” she said, thoughtfully.

  “If that’s the case, I think you need a little training.” Vampires weren’t the top predators anymore, and I highly doubted Marluk was the last demon I would have to worry about. Although I didn’t want Brandy to get hurt by being unprepared, I didn’t want her to become like me, just like I didn’t want to become like Astrid.

  As Friedrich Nietzsche once wrote, “Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster… for when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.”

  About the Author

  Rain Oxford is a teacher who has been writing for more than half of her life. She does most of her writing in a secluded cabin in the woods with a four-pound Maltese as a companion. When she’s not teaching or creating worlds, she usually enjoys cooking, playing the piano, or photographing exotic wildlife.

  Facebook Page: www.facebook.com/rainoxfordauthor

  Website: rainoxford.wordpress.com

  Amazon Page: amazon.com/author/rainoxford

  This book was made with 100% recycled electrons. If you enjoyed this book, please leave a review. Thanks for reading!

  Books by Rain Oxford

  Abyss of Shadows Book 1: Hunting Shadows

  Elemental Book 1: Dark Waters

  Elemental Book 2: Hungry Earth

  Elemental Book 3: Furious Flames

  Elemental Book 4: Insidious Winds

  Elemental Book 5: Soul Guard

  The Sorcerer’s Saga Book 1: The Sorcerer’s Quest

  The Sorcerer’s Saga Book 2: The Wizard’s Secret

  The Sorcerer’s Saga Book 3: The Raven’s Curse

  The Guardian Book 1: The Guardian’s Grimoire

  The Guardian Book 2: The Dragon’s Eyes

  The Guardian Book 3: God of the Abyss

  The Guardian Book 4: The Demon’s Game

  The Guardian Book 5: The Wizard’s War