The Nightwalkers Saga: Books 1 - 7

by Candace Wondrak

“No,” I replied quickly. “I mean, I don’t think so. It was…hard to tell.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  I turned to look at him, noting the seriousness in his voice. He was concerned about me, about what I saw. But if I told him, would he just go and tell everyone else? That was something I did not want to happen. And besides, I liked keeping these things to myself because I wasn’t good at discussing them.

  I didn’t have a problem fighting my problems. It was talking about them that I had difficulty with.

  “No,” I said lightly, “no…let’s just—” I stopped. His gaze was so deep that I totally lost my train of thought. Neither one of us spoke. We were locked in a staring contest that neither of us would win.

  Someone else’s voice entered the conversation. “Kass, you’re still here. Fantastic.” Rapidly I conceded the staring contest and glanced to Koath, who was on his way to us. The sun made his graying goatee appear even grayer.

  “Koath,” Raphael stood, gripping the wooden staff. “It’s good to see you again.”

  “Likewise. Am I interrupting your lesson?” Koath noticed the weapon lying in his hands.

  Raphael said, “No. We were just about done.”

  A small laugh emanated from Koath. “I could see that. Well, I am glad to see that you are training them to be versatile. Never know when a skill like that might come in handy.”

  Sneaking a ha-I-told-you-so glance at me, Raphael smiled. “Exactly.”

  Creasing my eyebrows at him, I turned to Koath. “Why are you here?”

  “I was hoping to steal you away for a bit. We haven’t had much time together since I’ve arrived, and much of the time we did have was filled with a young Shifter trying to kill me,” Koath said, beaming down at me.

  I chuckled softly. He was talking about Vincent. The Shifter that thought Koath had killed his parents when in actuality it was Crixis. Crixis was the root of all our problems, it seemed. “Sure,” I said as I handed Raphael my staff, “let’s go.”

  “If that is all right with you, that is,” Koath directed at Raphael.

  Raphael looked from him to me. He was slow to answer. “Of course. Have fun.”

  Koath thanked him and started walking away. I was right behind him after I snuck another look at Raphael, who stood there silent, leaning on the wooden staff, watching us leave.

  Watching me.

  “Vanilla is still your favorite?”

  “Yep,” I responded to his question quickly. Vanilla had and will always be my favorite. I watched Koath order two ice cream cones, one with a scoop of vanilla and one with chocolate. After paying the man, Koath handed the vanilla one to me. “Thanks.” I cocked my head at his cone. “Since when do you like chocolate? I thought you were always a Neapolitan fan.”

  He grimaced at the thought of chocolate, strawberry and vanilla all in one. That’s what I’d been saying. One flavor for me was sometimes more than enough, so I didn’t see how people could eat three.

  The lake in the center of the city was large and beautiful. There were ducks and geese floating in the center, like they belonged there naturally even though this lake was man-made. We began to walk the path that surrounded it as we hurried to eat our ice cream. Here’s a tip for the future: ice cream plus ninety-degree weather equaled milk in a cone in about one minute.

  “Lately I’ve been sticking to just chocolate,” Koath finally answered me after taking a huge lick and getting some of it on his goatee.

  I stifled a laugh and said, “That’s not like you.”

  He shrugged, and I wondered how he could walk around in the Carolinian heat wearing a dressy shirt and pants. “For some reason I’ve begun to hate the strawberry flavor terribly.”

  “Why? That used to be your favorite.” I reminded him, because a few years ago, before he left, that would be the first flavor to go when he bought a carton of Neapolitan ice cream.

  “Too much of a good thing can be a bad thing, at least that’s how the saying goes,” Koath paused as he licked a drip on his hand. “Though that’s not entirely true about everything, mind you.”

  “I know what you mean.” I bit into the cone.

  We rounded the corner, making and I remembered the time I came here running and ran into a tall, handsome man named Vincent, who just happened to be the Shifter who was after Koath. Coincidence? An almost unbelievable one. I was too busy looking at these two, adorable little chipmunks to notice where I was going. Silly me.

  “So,” Koath began as he finished his ice cream cone. “How is living with Gabriel and Michael? They don’t give you trouble, do they?”

  I squinted my eyes. “Is this a trick question?” Koath told me no, so I continued, “Not that much trouble. No trouble at all, really. It was all good before we moved here. The only thing that sucks about this place is that I have to share a bathroom with Gabriel.”

  “What?” Koath was incredulous, and I didn’t blame him. “You have to share a bathroom with Gabriel?” He repeated me, as if he wasn’t sure that he heard me correctly. But he did.

  Nodding, I told him, “Yeah. It sucks because he’s a bathroom hog.”

  Koath rubbed his chin, thinking. “You know, I would have guessed that it was the other way around. You are the girl, after all.”

  “Gabriel takes the longest showers, he spends forever doing his hair,” I commenced to whine about Gabriel, “and sometimes he just stands there and does nothing because he knows I’m right outside waiting for him to get out.”

  “That does sound like him,” Koath nodded in approval. “Does he dye his hair now? Last time I saw him, I recall it being a darker blonde, not—”

  “Platinum?” I cut in, smiling. “He doesn’t do anything to it…” Truthfully, he just woke up one morning with lighter hair than he went to sleep with. How or why that happened, we still didn’t know. And trying to explain that to Koath seemed like too much work.

  “Then why is it so light?” Koath just couldn’t get over it.

  “The sun?” I said the most reasonable explanation.

  Koath laughed. “Right. And…how are you? I know we talked a bit in the office the other day, but we didn’t get into much detail. I heard about John…I imagine it was very hard for you, doing what you did.”

  My eyes fell to the concrete pathway, taking in the few pebbles that were scattered everywhere. “It was hard. But I had to do it. I wouldn’t have felt so bad if I would have known…”

  Koath’s voice was quiet, “That he was a Vampire?” My head bobbed. “Kass, you did what you had to do. If you wouldn’t have done it, things probably would have been much worse.”

  That was most likely the truth. If I hadn’t pushed my rose blade through his heart after Osiris’s evil light entered him, he might have gone crazy and killed more people.

  “Yeah, I know. That’s what everyone told me.” I gazed out onto the lake’s surface. The setting sun was creating a shimmering pink and orange reflection.

  “As soon as I heard what happened,” Koath carried on, “and that the Council was sending someone to take the principal’s place to oversee things, I went to them and begged for the position.”

  That was news to me. “And,” I asked, “they let you?”

  “Well, I may have put an ultimatum in there. Needless to say,” Koath said, smiling at me, “they didn’t want to lose me.”

  “I’m glad you’re back,” I told him cheerfully.

  “So am I, Kass.” He turned to glance at the sunset one more time before we began heading home. “So am I.”

  “Pizza? Pizza?” Gabriel was taken aback. “Pizza? You are aware that I can eat almost a whole box myself?” He had a good point. The boy could eat a lot. “When I’m full,” he righted himself, “I can eat almost a whole box when I’m full.”

  “What are you yelling at me for?” Michael fixed his glasses. “I brought home four boxes. I’m sure that will be more than enough, plus leftovers.”

  “We’ll see about that, won’t we?�
� Gabriel spitefully grabbed the top box and headed into the living room.

  We both stared at him, unbelieving that he was complaining about the number of large pizzas. “That boy drives me insane,” Michael whispered to me as he got a plate down. “Do you want one?”

  I shook my head. “I eat out of the box, too.”

  “Right. I should have known,” Michael said, mostly to himself as he retrieved two pepperoni slices. “I do not understand how we can both live with him and that he’s not strangled on a daily basis.”

  Gabriel appeared in the doorway, looking normal. “You know you both love me. You—” He pointed to Michael. “—as a family member and you—” He moved his finger in my direction. “—as a future husband.”

  “My God,” Michael whispered, mostly to himself once again.

  “So, I’ve finally decided that I’m going to buy you a promise ring. Which would you prefer,” Gabriel paused, blue eyes staring straight into mine, “a candy ring or one of those twenty-five cent ones you get from—”

  I tilted my head at him. “We are not getting married.”

  “Yes, we are.”

  I leaned back, “You can’t force me to marry you, Gabriel.”

  “Hey, who said anything about force? Soon enough you’ll realize you’re crazy about me.” Gabriel laughed at me, which made me a little mad.

  “That settles it,” I shot a quick glance to Michael, confirming his previous statement. “You are clinically insane.”

  I grabbed a pizza box and went into the living room. Gabriel was on my heel, pizza slice in hand. “That’s why you love me,” he chimed, moving his head at an angle and smiling like an idiot.

  For a moment I was quiet as I stared at him. He was slowly inching closer, like he thought I was too unaware to see it, which I wasn’t. I was a Purifier, after all. My senses were as sharp as they could possibly be.

  Taking a deep breath, I said, “Stop it or I will shove this pizza slice—”

  Gabriel cut in, “In your mouth?”

  “No.”

  “In your closet?”

  “No.”

  “In a whale’s blowhole?”

  “No.”

  “…In your mouth?”

  Teeth clenching, I gripped the slice I was holding tighter, getting some sauce on me in the process. “Up your—” I was about to chuck my half-eaten pizza at him when Michael came into the room and gestured to the front door. We followed his hand to see Koath and Max standing there, looking slightly awkward, as if they were intruding on someone’s dinner.

  Which they were.

  Gabriel spoke first. “What are they doing here?”

  “They are here to take you both around the town,” Michael crossed his arms. “You will go romping about like worthless teenagers and have too much fun.”

  Gabriel threw down his pizza, saying, “Does this mean what I think it means?”

  “He lied. Michael lied.” Gabriel kicked the grass. “I knew there would be no laser tagging involved in this. No frozen yogurt, no getting more tattoos…please tell me that we are at least going to get some Starbucks?”

  Koath laughed and shook his head.

  Gabriel glared at Max. “This is all your fault.”

  “What?” Max was bewildered.

  “Oh,” he mocked, “don’t act so innocent over there, Max. I can see through this act. You purposefully asked Koath if us four could go roaming the cemetery in search for some Demons to purify. It’s your fault the rest of my dinner will have to wait.”

  “Gabriel,” Koath slowed his pace and glanced at the whining boy, “you already ate an entire large pizza. And besides, this was my idea. I wanted to see how well you three work together as a team.”

  “And what if we don’t find anything, huh? What then?” Gabriel stomped his foot.

  “Then I’m sorry that you had to miss out on your second box of pizza.”

  “You. Are. A. Jerk,” Gabriel pouted, crossing his arms and glaring down at me. Great. Now his sights were set on me. “And you,” his voice was low, “I ran upstairs and got it before we left. Here. Think of it as a pre-promise ring bracelet.” He rolled the green band off his wrist and placed it in my palm.

  One of those rubber band bracelets. Of course. And not just a normal one, either. It was engraved with an iconic line from Toy Story.

  Max busted out laughing. “You two,” he said as he got himself under control, “are cards.”

  “Cards?” Gabriel and I spoke in unison, which happened more than you think.

  “Yeah, isn’t that—” He fixed his huge glasses. “—the right expression?”

  “Not any expression I ever heard of,” I said, putting the rubber band on my wrist, figuring that Gabriel would kill me if I didn’t. Our eyes met, which was my indication that I wasn’t wrong.

  Max looked to the darkened sky and started twirling in circles. Gabriel’s signature look (one eyebrow up, one down) appeared instantly as he glanced from Max to me, wondering the same thing I was: what was he doing?

  In a few seconds, Max’s head came down and he said, “Two forty-seven.”

  As Koath glimpsed all around us, Gabriel placed a hand on the small boy’s shoulder and said, “You’re not too good at telling star-time, are you?”

  “Gabriel,” Koath said as he planted his feet firmly on the grassy ground between two gravestones, “that is not what Max meant. Look.” His finger lifted.

  “Oh,” Gabriel whispered as he saw the group of five Nightwalkers that were slowly approaching us, “in that case you should have said six o’clock, buddy.”

  “But your six is my three and her—” Max started rambling off how he came up with the number two forty-seven. But Gabriel quickly shut him up.

  “Get ready, guys,” Koath spoke as he took a few steps backward.

  “Wait. You’re going to watch?” Gabriel was disbelieving.

  Koath responded, “Yes, and I’m taking mental notes that I’ll relay to Raphael, so I suggest you make use of each other’s strengths and protect each other’s weaknesses.”

  “That’s the last time I ever buy you a smoothie,” Gabriel mumbled, causing Koath’s face to become twisted in confusion.

  “You never bought me a smoothie,” he said as the Nightwalkers neared.

  “Then remind me, if I ever offer, to not buy you one.”

  “Gabriel,” I dragged out the word so he would snap out of his talk with Koath. “Focus.”

  “Right.” Gabriel scratched the grass with his foot and tackled the nearest Nightwalker to the ground, being careful to stay away from its mouth. One bite was all it took. One scratch from their extra sharp teeth and we’d become just like them.

  No blood exchange needed. Simple as that. For Nightwalkers, anyway. Daywalkers were a different story. Turning into one of them involved a lot of different elements that all had to align, otherwise you’d merely die and come back a mindless Nightwalker.

  I roundhouse kicked two Nightwalkers in a row, feeling quite accomplished with myself. It was the moment that I reached into my nonexistent coat pocket to take out my nonexistent stake when I realized the only weapon I had to purify these things with was not there.

  “Koath,” I yelled as I landed hard kicks on their stomachs. “We have no weapons.”

  He rose his hand, motioning to the adjacent woods. “There’s plenty in there.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I mumbled, remembering the lesson I had with Raphael earlier today. I must have cursed myself when I wondered when I was ever going to use a wooden staff.

  “No, I’m not.” Koath stood motionless as I made a dash for the forest.

  You would think that, since it’s a forest and all, it would have some big sticks just lying around. But it didn’t. At least, not any I could see. It didn’t help that it was nighttime, so my eyes were next to useless. The tall trees blocked out most of the moonlight, which would have helped my situation quite a bit.

  Feeling rushed, I glanced back at Max
and Gabriel. They held their own against the five as Koath circled the area, taking mental notes on how they were doing. If I didn’t get back there soon, he might yell at me. And I didn’t want him to yell at me for leaving the guys hanging, so I did the only logical thing: I ran deeper into the forest.

  I wasn’t stupid, even though sometimes it did seem like it. I didn’t go too far. Tried not to, at least. An uncanny feeling rose in my gut, and I felt something peculiar all around me, but quickly dismissed it as my imagination. Sometimes it did get the better of me.

  After everything I saw, I should have known better by now, because it wasn’t my imagination. I spotted a large tree branch and ran for it, but was stopped abruptly by an appalling Demon wearing a long, flowing black cape. Its ears were huge and its head bald and scarred. Its fingernails were long and sharp, along with its teeth.

  All I could think was: what was this thing?

  Its eyes flashed yellow and I suddenly became aware of the staff it held. The wood was a burned white color, rising vertical to the ground and snaking around a yellow crystal. With a jerk of its arm, the bottom of the staff lifted and thumped the ground, making everything around me blindingly white.

  Chapter Three – The King

  The moon that constantly hung over the city came in through the windows, shedding light on our bedroom. Macabre paintings, smearing with the blood of our enemies hung on the walls, interspersed with my lover’s favorite things: masks. Venetian masks, expensive and hand-crafted, collected in our years together. The building we made our gore-filled home lied in the center of town, in what used to be city hall.

  Now everything belonged to us.

  I was caught in a dream, a memory of my past, thousands of years ago. Those I lost. Those I killed. Those particular moments in history when I wanted nothing more to die. Of course, I always got over it.

  There was nothing better than wreaking havoc during life. And my life was eternal.

  As was my Queen’s, now that she was a part of me.

  King and Queen. The nicknames were not chosen by me, but they did suit us. The Witch and her little rebellion feared us, as did the rest of those who managed to survive this long.