by Kari Gregg
“Stay on mission, Luc. Disable security then free any survivors.”
When Garrick had come through with the information they’d needed, Malachi had thoroughly drilled Lucien on their objectives before agreeing to the raid. David’s stable had grown fat with humans infected with the vampyr virus, but the dark master had become too unstable to allow his slaves to suffer more than a century before he killed them. His defenses had predictably weakened. When Garrick had revealed a vulnerability in the western fences, Malachi had assigned Lucien his usual task of recovering survivors while the vampyr elder destroyed David.
It had been a good plan.
A solid plan.
A sorely needed victory in the war.
But none of them had anticipated Krystiyan joining David at the heavily fortified estate—Malachi now faced two dark master vampyr rather than one.
Feral warning shivered up Lucien’s spine.
Still, he must obey the commands of his new elder.
Turning his back on his screaming dread, Lucien scrambled over the debris that littered the stable’s hub and picked his way to the control panel. Malachi was senior headhunter. They worked together well. He and Mal had forged a formidable team, one that had begun to earn as much notoriety as his former partnership with Garrick.
But unlike Garrick, as Lucien’s elder, Mal expected his orders obeyed. Without question. Without hesitation. God help him if he failed to meet the elder’s expectations, because Malachi wouldn’t. His absolute, unbending control grated, particularly since Lucien had fought their enemy longer and under far less supervision with Garrick.
He lifted his sword when he reached the control panel, though. Snarling bitter anger, he slashed down. His arm vibrated as the blade sliced through fragile electronic components to lodge home in the thick wooden struts beneath.
The security system short-circuited with a bright electrical snap.
He mentally retuned his mind to Mal’s. “Done.”
“Search for survivors.”
Lucien’s lips thinned, frustration birthing foul and malignant inside him. At his new partner. At the inevitable failure of their mission. “David turned the slaves who were vulnerable. He killed the rest.” He yanked his sword from the wall, none too eager to check the cells for bodies. Scenting the air, he mentally amended that: pieces of bodies. “We’re too late.”
“One of them is still alive. Find him.”
Swearing under his breath, Lucien stalked from the hub to the narrow corridor branching from it. Doors lined both sides. He ripped the first off its hinges. His nose wrinkled in disgust at the hard-packed dirt floor, rough plank walls, the harsh glow of a bare bulb swinging high from the ceiling. The neat cot and trunk told him this had been the living quarters of one of the now dead servant vampyr.
Slaves hardly received such deluxe accommodations.
He moved on to the next prison cell and jerked the door wide, unsurprised at the emaciated body crumpled on the ground within, nor the head lying several feet from it. Blood dripped from the stump of the slave’s neck to a stingy, dime-sized puddle, mute witness to how thoroughly his master had drained him.
“You can’t defeat David and Krystiyan both.” He doubted even Garrick would last long against two masters freshly glutted with blood. “Not alone, Mal. I’m—”
“Krystiyan ran.” Lucien felt Malachi’s satisfaction in the triumphant hum of his partner’s pulse. “There’s only David now, and he’s wounded. Keep looking.”
In the next cell, the scattered gobs of flesh that had once been a brother vampyr made Lucien’s stomach pitch. David had dismembered him, squashed his head like a ripe melon, torn great chunks from his torso… The slave must have fought like hell to send his master into such a murderous rage.
Which meant he would’ve made an excellent headhunter.
Lucien tipped his sword in grim salute to the fallen comrade. “They’re all dead.”
“Find that survivor or I’ll take your head myself.”
“Damn it, Mal—”
Lucien staggered. Pain spiked just shy of his suddenly pounding heart, but the pain wasn’t his. He breathed through it, rubbed at his unwounded chest. “How bad are you hit?”
Agony washed his partner’s mind in tumultuous waves. “Doesn’t matter.”
Lucien pivoted, sword at the ready. “I’m coming.”
“David’s dead—I’m not. Find that slave. He’s important. Don’t you feel it?”
He hadn’t sensed much since he’d fought beside Garrick, didn’t expect to without his old partner’s aid. Lucien had lived only three hundred years, and his vampyr hadn’t matured enough to draw that kind of power. Not yet.
Still, in the past decades, he sometimes caught vague flashes if he concentrated, a fluttery sensation at the base of his spine. Never consistently and his feelings had never been distinct enough to act upon. He’d try, though. If nothing else, to shut Mal up. After seeing the carnage David had left in the stables, Lucien knew that any slave who had survived would beg for the mercy of death.
His new partner, in the meantime, sprayed blood like a fountain from the hole in his chest and would die within the hour without immediate attention. Mal wouldn’t ask for the swift end that a newly freed slave would plead for.
And the rebellion needed Malachi.
Badly.
Lucien closed his eyes, fought to tune his senses.
His brow furrowed to a deep V.
Garrick.
With his mind wide open and searching, his old partner’s presence—close, drawing nearer still—flooded his mind.
Luc frowned.
Garrick had surrendered the field of battle almost a century ago, when the blood and sweat of war had proven too rich a temptation to him. Yes, his old elder maintained a loose connection with him and helped Lucien whenever he could. Garrick fed him information that had many times saved lives. Including his.
But he’d done so from afar.
Even Luc wasn’t sure where.
Certainly no closer than Mexico. Perhaps Colombia. Or Brazil.
Luc’s heart thudded.
What, in the name of holy Christ, was Garrick doing in Illinois?
“Focus, Luc. Don’t think. Feel.”
He bit back a moan, part relief at Garrick’s whisper in his mind, so close Luc felt he could reach out and touch him. Part bone-jarring terror.
Because if Garrick was in Illinois…?
Something was wrong.
Brutally wrong.
Hell was about to descend on them.
With Malachi gutted, hell already had.
“Concentrate!”
His gut knotted. “Malachi—”
“Will survive. I’ll not reward him for partnering you by watching him die, but you must heed me, Luc. Time is short.”
Lucien shoved a shaky hand through his hair. “All right.”
“Close your eyes. Narrow your senses.”
Though anxiety thrummed in his veins, Luc trusted Garrick so his eyes squeezed shut at Garrick’s familiar litany, but nothing came to him. No shiver of awareness, no shrieking shadow of dread.
“Use our link to tap into my power. As you did when we fought together.”
“I remember.” He relaxed the bunched muscles of his shoulders. Sucking in a cleansing breath, he released his tension and worry when he slowly blew it out.
The shiver running up his spine provided only a moment’s warning.
He abruptly paled. “Dear God.”
He tried to swallow but his mouth had gone bone-dry.
“I couldn’t tell you. You would’ve stepped aside for Malachi.”
His stomach rolled and pitched. “You’ve killed me. The masters will never stand for it. They’ll hunt us. You. Me. Mal. They’ll pick the flesh from our bones for daring to—”
“I’ll pick the flesh from your bones if you don’t follow that scent. Now!”
Anger exploded inside him, and thank God for it, because rage at his old
partner’s deceit lent Lucien the burst of strength he needed to sever the connection with Garrick.
That bastard.
That sneaky, conniving bastard.
Malachi would have never agreed to the assault on David’s estate if they had known.
Garrick couldn’t have missed it. Not this. No, the elder vampyr would never have mistaken it and had cleverly maneuvered him and Mal into place…
With or without Garrick’s prodding, the scent was driving him crazy.
Lucien shook his head to clear it. So he could think. With Garrick evicted from his head, Malachi’s more ephemeral presence returned, and with it, his new elder’s agony, his weakness.
Garrick had promised not to abandon Mal, but his old vampyr elder was yet far—too far—away.
And their position too vulnerable.
“Get out of here, Mal. Move!” Luc raced to the hub, stumbled across the room. Reaching the other side, he ripped away a desk he’d tossed against the far wall while fighting the two servant vampyr.
A narrow door a yard high and forged of thick, leather-banded steel winked from the shadows. He’d never get through that door, his sword and strength useless against metal half a foot thick. He swept the area with narrowed, searching eyes. There had to be another way.
His lips stretched to a smile.
Lucien retreated a step, raised a booted foot, and roaring violent desperation, kicked once, twice.
The wood under the hinges that held the door in place splintered. He pried at them with his fingers, tips bloodying on edges serrated by rust, but the hinges bent. Moments later, they popped away.
“Find him?”
Lucien ignored Malachi’s pained, gasping question. Instead, groaning at the weight, he heaved the wretched door to the side, and retrieving his sword, he bent to a crouch. The door had barred a rough earthen tunnel arrowing down steeply. Lacey tatters of cobwebs hung by dusty threads in one corner. Otherwise, he couldn’t see beyond the first few feet of inky black.
The tunnel, long abandoned, had been recently reopened. The musty odor of neglect wafted to him on a miserly breeze from below, but underlying that scent, something more, something that made his blood shriek. He wouldn’t be too late this time. Couldn’t.
“Hurry, Luc.” Lucien’s stomach twisted at Malachi’s awkward lurching gait as his vampyr elder forced his damaged body to their rendezvous point: the stables. “He’s dying.”
“Get out of here. While you still can.” Lucien entered the tunnel at a low stoop. Loose dirt crumbled beneath his feet, plinking down to the darkness below. “Krystiyan didn’t run. He’ll return soon, with reinforcements.” He scrambled as fast as his awkwardly bent legs would allow, slid, tried to focus whatever fine senses he could muster.
“A woman?”
Lucien winced, unsurprised at the sensitivity of Malachi’s vampyr, but hardly pleased by it.
“Master David found a woman.”
And Garrick, that sly son of a bitch, had sent them—had sent him—into the viper’s nest to retrieve her.
Holy Christ, they were doomed, but Luc couldn’t resist the female’s call. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t old enough to be a proper father to her. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t powerful enough to become the protector she’d need. All that mattered were her weakening cries in his heart and in his head. If he didn’t take her as his ward and get her away, she’d die. They’d all die.
So he scrambled down the tunnel.
It widened ahead, spilling into a narrow, circular room with crude stone walls that might’ve once outlined a well. Lucien dug in his heels to slow his descent and dropped from the tunnel several feet. Skidding on rotten leaves, he avoided slamming into the lump huddled in the stale muck by twisting to a sharp roll. He grunted when the back of his head cracked into unyielding stone. His body jolted to a stop.
Heart thundering against his rib cage, he stared at what was left of her.
She was naked, her slim body shivering between weak, twitching convulsions brought on by the transition. Slashes tore pale skin muddied by dirt and grime. On her back, her legs, the arms she hugged around herself. Bruises flowered sadistic blues and purples under the grit. And the parts of her that hadn’t been beaten or shredded had been bitten.
No.
Mauled.
“Can she be saved?”
He shoved Malachi’s presence from his mind. If Mal hadn’t gutted himself on David’s sword, Lucien might’ve answered. To give her the more powerful elder’s blood. Garrick had been right about that. But his new partner was wounded, unable to provide for her.
More importantly, unable to follow.
As Garrick had planned.
Cursing, Luc pushed his sword into its sheath and scooped the female from the dirt and the rot. She shrieked—in terror or agony, he didn’t know—but the hoarse scratch of her damaged vocal cords spiked fresh fury through him. How long had she screamed before her voice had deteriorated to that rusty, croaking rasp? “Sh, bébé. It’s over, all over,” he lied.
He stroked dark curls from her face and off her shoulders, ignoring slimy bits of leaf and twigs snarled in it. He exposed her mouth first, lips blue from lack of blood. They opened and shut in spasmodic gasps, wounded-animal whimpers emerging from her bruised and bloodied throat. Then her pert nose. Twin threads of scarlet streamed from her nostrils, but it hadn’t been broken, so he assumed the virus responsible. Swearing, he pushed her hair past the shell of her ears until her dark eyes stared, unseeing, back at him.
Her emerging vampyr sparked red glints inside them.
Even starved, her transition criminally protracted, she couldn’t have been exposed to the virus long. No more than two days. David would’ve shored up the stronghold’s defenses if he’d had more time. Krystiyan wouldn’t have been able to breach the increased security, nor would he and Mal have been capable of forcing a way inside.
If the dark master had had her longer, the virus would be changing her instead of killing her.
He punctured his neck with the jagged tip of his fingernail, a small, neat crescent just above his carotid. When fresh, hot blood surged, he pulled her mouth to it. “Drink. To ease the pain.”
Her eyelids flickered.
He crooned to her, hoping the gentle tone of his voice reached her. If not, then the acrid scent of his blood. Or the taste of him gurgling against her cracked lips. Anything to coax her to drink, but he needn’t have worried.
She fell on his neck like a rabid animal, biting, clawing, scratching for more.
“That’s it, chère. Feed.” With his blood now linking them, he concentrated, struggled through the agony of her thoughts to pluck her name from her shattered mind. “I need to get you away from here, Kate. Don’t let go.” Gritting his teeth against the pain, Lucien lifted her.
She’d feed as they fled. They couldn’t wait.
Krystiyan wouldn’t.
When they emerged from the tunnel, Malachi weaved shakily in the stable’s sole exit. Sticky black blood sheeted his shirt and seeped into the waistline of his jeans. “She lives, then.” He leaned against the doorjamb, his face pasty white. “Good.”
Snarling, Lucien swiveled to place the bulk of his body between Mal and the woman. He anchored her to him with one arm, freeing the other to retrieve his sword. The sharp, metallic slide of his weapon as it slipped from its sheath electrified him. “Don’t make me kill you.”
“David may have beat you to it, kid.” Malachi laughed, turning to stagger from the stable. “I’ll leave a blood trail for Krystiyan, lead him from you as long as I can.” Beads of scarlet spattered on the cool grass as he walked, his gait awkward and uneven.
Lucien followed cautious yards behind. Relief that his partner wasn’t fighting him for Kate made him dizzy, but he was young, not stupid. He wasn’t foolish enough to put his weapon away yet. Malachi would hunt him for the woman cradled in his arms soon.
His throat tightened.
Garrick hunted him alrea
dy.
“This is where we part company,” the elder said when they reached the hole they’d cut in the perimeter fence. “I’ll go through first, heading west-northwest.” He raised a red-smeared hand when Lucien opened his mouth. “I don’t want to know which direction you’re going, so you don’t need to lie.”
He watched his partner’s clumsy crawl through the opening. “Thanks, Mal.”
When he reached the other side, Malachi struggled, but he finally pulled himself upright. “I’m in no shape to fight you for her, anyway.” Shoulders squaring, he lurched forward one step, then another. “It was good hunting with you, Luc.”
Lucien frowned at the wet rattle in his partner’s chest. “Forget drawing the others from me. I can outrun them. You can’t. Garrick is coming to help you, Mal. Go to ground.”
“Death is nothing to be afraid of.” The vampyr smiled, blood foaming pink and frothy at the corner of his mouth. “Even the death Krystiyan would give me would be…a blessing.”
Lucien’s first responsibility lay with Kate now. He wouldn’t risk her, not even for his partner, but the survival of their kind demanded more than the woman in his arms, the females who were so horrifically rare. They needed women. Desperately. But to win the war, they needed soldiers too. “We can’t afford to lose you, Malachi.”
“Get the woman to safety. I won’t die.” Mal shrugged an apathetic shoulder. “My luck’s never been that good.”
Chapter Two
Lucien sprawled against the scratchy nap of the sofa. His chest heaved when Kate’s mouth released the opening he’d made above his left nipple. The cut wept blood, but her boneless weight told him she already slept, too weak to notice or care.
He closed his eyes.
His head fell back against the couch’s spine.
Five nights.
He’d wasted precious weeks circling Krystiyan’s search parties and Garrick’s ruthless hunt to reach his closest shelter, a derelict basement in Chicago’s K-Town. Then he’d shut out the world to nurture and tend to her for five hellacious nights.
He’d cared for the injuries David had inflicted. He’d comforted her through the agony of the transition, murmuring into her hair, stroking and soothing her. He’d coaxed precious drops past dry, cracked lips as hour passed to hour and night melted into night. In the beginning, he’d marveled at how eagerly she’d feasted. Those brief periods of hunger had galvanized him while they’d been on the run, but hope had since become a vague memory.