Raven's Blood

by Cassandra Lawson

Chapter Forty

  Despite the fact that her body regenerated blood quickly, Raven couldn’t keep up with Graham’s demands. Weak from blood loss and being kept from the healing power of the woods for several days, she had an easier time convincing Graham she was too weak and confused to help him. She was dying, which was likely a good thing because then she couldn’t help Graham destroy her loved ones.

  “Answer me!” Graham shouted.

  “What did you say?” she asked in a slurred voice. They’d tied her to the chair as further torture, but it was working out well for her. Without it, she’d have collapsed onto the floor long ago. That had happened when Graham had been questioning her a few days earlier, and she’d decided being hit was better than being kicked.

  Graham had decided not to torture Layla because Raven had convinced him she loved Connor too much to betray him. She’d told him she’d rather let a human die since they die all the time. Luckily, Graham had believed her. Now, she just had to keep her mouth shut and die.

  “I told you we took too much blood,” whined a chubby man at Graham’s side. “Her mind is too befuddled to provide any answers.”

  Despite the pain, Raven giggled, wondering who used the word befuddled.

  “See,” the man declared as he gestured toward Raven. “She’s delirious. Her body can only regenerate the blood so quickly. It’s using up most of its resources trying to heal from the beatings, and she’s also being weakened by her confinement. If you want to kill her, then this is the way to do it.”

  Graham scowled angrily at the chubby man in the lab coat. At least, Raven assumed he was scowling. Her vision was pretty blurry. She’d already heard this argument between Graham and Roger. Based on the tension between the two, Raven suspected it wouldn’t be long before one of them killed the other.

  “Fine, we don’t really need her answers, anyway,” Graham snapped. “I have another plan to get what I want, but I can’t have her dying. Have someone take her out to the copse of oak trees in the middle of the island. We’ll have them keep her bound the entire time and get her just enough energy to produce more blood.”

  Raven’s head fell to the side. Graham leaned forward to grip her chin roughly and pull her head up so they were nose to nose. “Don’t worry, Raven, I won’t let you die. You’re blood is far too important to me. Not only is it the key to controlling my vampire army, it’s the main ingredient in the serum keeping me young. Early on, we had scientists trying to find a way to gain the vampires’ immortality without actually becoming one. A single injection every month with a serum made from your blood gives me eternal youth.”

  The chubby man started speaking. “Due to your natural immunity, your blood neutralizes parts of the virus. We have to add certain-”

  “Will you shut the fuck up?” Graham practically snarled, and the chubby man nervously moved away from them. “If I didn’t need him, I’d kill him. That’s something you have in common. I need both of you too much to let you die.”

  Raven groaned, realizing he wasn’t going to let her die. Death seemed like her only escape. As much as she hated to sink to that level of hopelessness, torture didn’t bring out the optimist in her, and she was already beginning to wonder how much longer she could keep her mouth shut. She was almost to the point where she would do anything to make the pain stop.

  “I’m going to use you to convince your lover, or lovers, to give me what I want. I’m sure by now they’re missing your addictive nymph blood, not to mention your tantalizing body. I might be tempted by it myself if you hadn’t whored yourself to the blood brats,” Graham said with a sneer.

  “Well, then,” Raven slurred. “I have one thing to be thankful for.”

  Graham’s fist connected with her jaw, causing her head to snap back. For a moment, Raven thought she might lose consciousness, but she was one of the unlucky ones who didn’t black out from pain.

  “I’ll send someone in to take you out for some fresh air,” Graham told her before he and the man in the lab coat left the room.

  “You have a lot of attitude, nymph,” called out a man from one of the cells against the wall. It was too dark to make out any of his features.

  “Was that an insult or a compliment?” she asked weakly.

  “Yes,” he replied. “Which vampire settlement were you at?”

  “Why would I tell you?” she asked. “For all I know, you’re just trying to get information for Graham.”

  “He already knows where the settlement is,” the man reminded her before having a long coughing fit.

  “Are you okay?” Raven asked.

  “About the same as you,” he replied. “Probably better. I’m just being bled nearly dry now. It’s pretty rare for them to beat the hell out of me. If I was stronger, I’d kill them for what they’re doing to you.”

  “Thank you,” Raven said. “Are you human?”

  “Born vampire,” he replied. “I was taken captive a long time ago. They only left me in here with you because they don’t think I have enough of my wits left to talk to you.” He let out a humorless laugh. “Most days, I wish I didn’t. It’d be better if I didn’t know what was going on. I hate knowing they’re using my blood to help create these vampires killing so many people.”

  “There has to be something we can do to stop them,” Raven insisted.

  “Which settlement is he planning to use you to bargain with?” the man asked again. “What’s the leader’s name?”

  “Connor,” she told him, her heart aching just from saying his name.

  The man sucked in a sharp breath. “You’re Connor’s?”

  “Yes,” she answered without hesitation.

  “He’ll kill to get you back. Did you see Norah?” his voice shook with emotion. “Little woman with dark hair and the prettiest eyes when she’s mad?”

  “Rand?” Raven breathed out. It couldn’t be Rand.

  “Yes,” he confirmed. “So, I take it you know my wife.”

  The door opened, interrupting their conversation.

  Danny and Mark walked into the room. Both were members of her team she’d been willing to sacrifice herself for, yet both were willing to stand by and see her like this. She’d assumed they would be distrustful when she’d first come back, but she’d also assumed they would move past their distrust and remember she’d always been there for them. Their betrayal was probably the worst torture she’d had to endure.

  Swallowing hard, she fought her tears.

  Danny walked over and untied the rope securing her hands to the chair. They were still tied behind her back, so he tossed her over his shoulder and carried her out without a word.

  “We’d better take her around the long way so we don’t run into Layla,” Mark suggested from behind Danny. “She’ll freak if she sees Raven this way.”

  Danny sighed. “Yeah, and the last thing I need is for her to punch me in the nose again.”

  Raven let out a weak laugh and groaned at the pain it caused her.

  “I’m just lucky she pulled the punch or she would have broken it. She already warned me she was tempted to cut my balls off.”

  “She’ll do it,” Raven rasped out weakly.

  “Shut up, Raven,” Mark ordered, and if she wasn’t mistaken, he sounded close to tears.

  The long way meant it took more than thirty minutes to get to the large copse of oak trees. Without a wolf, Raven wouldn’t be able to fully regain her strength, but this would help. Of course, she wasn’t sure she wanted to regain her strength knowing Graham was just going to use her to destroy people she cared about.

  Mark took her from Danny near the end of the walk, so he was the one carrying her when they reached the trees. He set her on the ground with a gentleness she hadn’t expected.

  Danny quickly scanned the area before crouching down on the ground beside her. He held a canteen to her lips since her hands were still bound. She took some tentative sips and began to shake. She’d never been cold before, and it was a strange feeling.

 
“Fuck, Raven,” Danny cursed in a pained whisper. “I don’t know how much longer I can watch that bastard do this to you.”

  Mark wrapped his jacket around her shoulders and helped her lean back against the oak tree. “We don’t want to let him do this to you, but we need him to believe we’re on his side for now. We’re working on a plan.”

  “What plan?” Raven asked as she felt her strength quickly returning. A sigh escaped her lips. It was like coming home whenever she got close to an oak tree after a long time away.

  “We’re going to get you out of here,” Danny told her. “Mark is right. We don’t buy any of that asshole’s crap, but we have to make him think we want you and the vampires at that settlement to suffer or he won’t let us near you. He allows us around you to torture you. I heard him the day you came back, and I know he’s an evil bastard. After I heard what he said, I did some digging and found out a lot of the people who disappear are being detained for experiments. He’s taking humans from other settlements, too. The sick bastard is making his own vampire army.”

  “Yeah, I figured that out.” Raven was no longer able to hold back her tears. “The worst thing was thinking you’d all turned on me.”

  “Never,” Mark assured her. “Our team is behind you. We know we can’t simply change the minds of the other people here. A lot them never trusted you, anyway. For now, we just have to get away from here and then figure out a way to stop Graham and the rest of the leadership. Graham seems to be the one giving the orders, but even if he’s gone, someone else will step into his shoes.”

  Raven laughed.

  “What’s so funny?” Danny asked with a shaky smile.

  “I never thought I’d be talking to you about helping the vampires,” Raven admitted. “That’s exactly what you’ll be doing if you go against Graham.”

  Danny met her gaze. “I trust you. I was an idiot for doubting you in the first place. I’ve known you as long as I can remember, and you’ve never given me any reason to doubt you. I’ll follow you on this.”

  Raven closed her eyes and sighed, healing from the beatings and blood loss. Still, she was weak and not sure her legs would hold her weight yet. “Hard to follow me when I can barely walk.”

  “You’ll be ready to kick ass soon enough,” Danny insisted, but she heard the strain in his voice. He was trying hard to be strong, but he wasn’t sure how he was going to follow through on his promise to help her.

  “I wish Connor was here to help you,” she mused.

  “Is that your vampire?” Danny asked, and she smiled at the restraint in his voice.

  “I don’t expect you to be happy about this, Danny,” she told him.

  “We’re all trying,” Mark added. “I’m sure it took you some time to get used to the idea, too.”

  Raven let out a weak laugh. “That’s an understatement. It was really hard to get over my hatred, but it was easier once I realized Muriel was happy there.”

  “Muriel?” Danny asked in obvious shock. “They captured Muriel?”

  “No,” Raven replied sleepily, “Muriel left us willingly. Apparently, she met a vampire named Jack months before her disappearance. They just had a baby boy.” Raven smiled as she thought about Cole. “Vampire babies are messy eaters.”

  Danny let out a nervous laugh. “I’m not sure I want to know how one goes about feeding a vampire baby. Actually, I didn’t even know there were vampire babies.”

  “When I first got there, I accused Connor of keeping children for blood. Turns out many of them were vampire children—born that way. It took some time to get used to. They all live much better than we do. The humans are required to donate blood, but they can donate bags, and they don’t have to donate much,” she explained.

  “We’d better take you back before someone gets suspicious,” Danny said with obvious regret.

  Raven nodded and tried to stand which was hard with her hands tied behind her back.

  Danny gently helped her to her feet and then lifted her over his shoulder. “Don’t get used to us toting your lazy ass around. After we get you out of here, we’ll expect you to take care of us again.”

  “Deal,” Raven agreed, hoping they were able to find a way to free her. Most of all, she hoped Connor wouldn’t come after her. He would be walking into a trap, and it would be her fault. She’d told him they were good people here, but she’d been wrong. Not completely. Her friends weren’t letting her down, but they were just a handful of humans against Goddess knew how many turned vampires.

  Then a thought came to her. “Can you get extra blood for the vampire that’s in the cell in the room where I was being questioned?”

  “Maybe,” Danny replied hesitantly. “There are three in there. I assume you mean the one they captured a long time ago.”

  “Yes,” Raven agreed. “His name is Rand, and his wife is my friend. We may need his help, and he won’t be much good if he’s too weak.”

  “We’ll see what we can do,” Mark told her. “I can’t promise anything. We really don’t have much clearance over there. They only bring us in to torment you.”

  “Just do what you can,” Raven said, and then she finally felt herself losing consciousness, annoyed that her mind had waited to shut off until after the pain let up.