She wasn’t one hundred percent certain they had the orphanage bugged as well, but common sense said duh, why not there if they had the nerve to do so here?
Just as she was getting ready to say fuck it and start screaming like a blithering idiot, the triplets flashed in and literally fell on top of the damn boy, mumbling a quick, “What the fuck?” in unison when a slight electric charge smacked them on the butt. The three were now just as tall and beautiful as their mother, and sometimes just as fucking stupid. One of them glanced in her direction, and Hildegard hissed at her, then went back to her routine of rocking back and forth.
“Let’s get him up top to Aunt T,” one of them said right before they all flashed off.
Hildegard thought about giving up her ruse and helping the buffoons out. Then she thought, naw, she’d done her part, the rest was up to them. She needed a few more years or maybe a few more decades of solitude before having to deal with others again.
12
United We Stand
Flashing into the large study room where Grimm was being verbally accosted by the other families with missing children, Tia was torn between wanting to rescue him and wanting to simply spell everyone in the damn room to shut the fuck up. Both Chandler and Bran squeezing either hand made her think twice about doing either. Especially since her demon’s palm was soaked in sweat, which did not bode well for anyone. All the tension in here was palpable; rage, anger, and fear even a normal human could feel bouncing off the walls was making it difficult for him to keep not only his own emotions in check, but this form as well.
She knew damn well they shouldn’t have let him come down here with them, but he was bound and determined not to be left behind. Time was of the essence, and she didn’t want to waste any more of it by arguing she was right and he was wrong. Though now that she could feel him losing it, she was more than sure she had made the wrong decision. Some arguments really were well worth having.
And the scene in front of them was truly a disaster zone. Tia’s biggest relief was there wasn’t much furniture around to be destroyed if things did end up getting out of hand. Which they were well on their way to becoming. This room used to be the triplets’ playroom, otherwise known as their safe room, where they could entertain themselves without anyone worrying they might accidentally kill one another. Young vampires tended to play rather rough, and with the added strength and agility, no one wanted to take any chances. So this was one room that had no windows, no sharp or deadly objects; just plain, cream-colored walls, some with a few paintings done by the girls, three black leather couches nailed to the floor, and a few chairs that were also nailed down. All the toys were long gone, now replaced by art supplies, jewelry, and crafting trinkets, and a computer desk over in the corner.
Right then it seemed more like a human hospital waiting room with all the beings in it. Some paced back and forth; a few huddled together on the couches, but the ones that had Tia worried were the ones standing around shouting accusations towards Grimm that weren’t doing anything to help.
“This is a waste of time.”
“What do you plan on doing?”
“Where the bloody fucking Hel is my kid?”
“Should have known something like this would happen with you idiots in control.”
“That’s because the queen is nothing but a raging, hormonal bitch.”
“Ah fuck.” This was said by Tialanna, Chandler, and Grimm as one as soon as those last words were said, knowing exactly what they would trigger. Bran was barely holding it together as it was, so for someone to just all out and disrespect Tia like that with no regard… The only thing they could do at that point was to step back and allow Bran’s true nature to take its course.
The pure, awkward, and kind Bran persona was gone in an instant as the true demon violently broke free before everyone’s view, views that varied from shocked, to awed, to scared shitless. Though one, an incubus, looked relieved as he stepped out of the shadows he had cloaked himself in. Apparently he decided there was no sense in hiding anymore since he was no longer the only demon around. Not that anyone was paying much attention to him anyway. No, they were staring openmouthed at the much larger demon who stood before them, roaring out his rage, spraying spittle on anyone with the bad luck of being close enough to him, his mouth open wide enough to swallow a head whole. He was also stark-ass naked.
Tia sat there, trying to gauge whether there were more stares focused on how large and tall he stood, or on the rather large phalange that lay in wait down past the middle of his thighs, that, along with the tail in the back, looked as though he could whip everyone’s ass with it. One of the males who had been bickering had a lights-out moment and plain passed out.
Chandler rushed over to where the idiot who’d let the damn near fatal infraction pop out of his mouth stood staring in abject horror and fear, placing himself between the two. “All right now, let’s not literally bite the poor sod’s head off. I’m sure he didn’t mean to let that idiotic choice of words spew from his lips. I’m also quite more than sure his foul mouth already regrets what leaked out of it.”
Right as the fool was getting ready to form the words thank you with his traitorous lips, Chandler pulled back and socked the shit out of him with first a right hook, followed by a jaw-breaking left jab with fingers that no longer held any flesh, just skeletal digits stronger than steel. Being a decomposing vampire did indeed have its advantages.
The offending vampire fell to a heap at Chandler’s feet and Chandler shook his hand while his skin reformed as he looked over at the rest of the unruly mob. “Now, is there anyone else who would like to offend our lovely wife and end up like this dumb bloke at my feet? Or are you ready to settle down as though we are all civilized beings and try and figure out what exactly has happened, and why, so all our children may be found? Fancy you blokes didn’t realize we too have a stake in what’s going on. So how about you all sit down and shut the fuck up so we can discuss everything? Including the big oaf of a demon standing in the middle of the room who just blew his guise, thanks to you lot.”
Demon Bran harrumphed at that last statement, which sounded odd coming from his demonic throat. He hadn’t planned on discussing a damned thing about himself. All he intended to do was threaten them into keeping their mouths shut. He looked over at Tia shaking her head at him in warning not to kill the villagers, so to speak.
As hard as he had tried to maintain his façade he had to admit, if only to himself, it did feel good to be within his own skin. With all that was going on right now, if this was the only relief he could get, he’d take it. Although, seeing Chandler defend their ladylove’s honor was about to have his member standing at full attention.
So he flashed into a pair of sweat pants so the females, and some of the males, could avert their gazes and focus on details other than his anatomy; details that could actually help. He also flashed himself a plush, black, velvet nine-foot throne with silver chrome surrounding it that could accommodate his full demonic form.
He also flashed thrones for the woman and man he loved by his side, all three in the forefront of the room. He flashed in a doggy bed beside them for Grimm, which earned him a begrudged growl in thanks. Yes, he still held hatred for the male. Any male who couldn’t man up and take whatever was thrown at him, whatever torture, pain, and/or responsibility, was no more than a bitch in his book.
But, when they all went to sit and Tia and Chandler gave him that look, he went ahead and flashed Grimm in a folding chair. What? It was better than the rug of spikes he’d originally wanted to flash in for him. Too damn bad for Grimm only demons and powerful witches could flash in objects. Too bad for Demon Bran’s ego and sick, dark, and twisted sense of humor that Tia was one of those powerful witches, since she tossed the folding chair aside while looking dead at him and flashing in another throne. Fine with him. They really did need to show a united front in front of these imbeciles anyhow.
“It seems we have more than one situation,
” Demon Bran began in his demonic, guttural tone as they took their seats and the others settled down, for the most part. “Whatever happens or is said in this room stays right the fuck here. If anything is leaked out I will not kill you, but I promise I will make you wish for death. That includes the other demon in the room who was hiding in the shadows with none of you the wiser.”
He settled back some more in his throne as the incubus came fully out, grumbling something under his breath, and took a seat with the other families. “Most of the realm is by now privy to the fact of the Queen’s true biology, but none other than those residing within the walls of this castle knew of mine. Sorry, there were others, but they are dead, very, very dead.” He put a ton of emphasis on that last to get the picture implanted in their heads, in case they got any ideas after all was said and done. “Chandler is a rare full-blood decomposing vampire, which the nimrod still sprawled out on the floor could testify to. Grimm, he’s just a damn wolf. And there is one more among your missing children: our daughter.”
Bran watched each and every one of them as they listened with rapt attention while he explained Jelissa’s origins, and could see that Tia was doing the same, gauging which of them they could possibly trust in an attempt at rescue, and who they might need to figure out a way to keep on the sidelines, or detain until all was said and done.
It was a task he knew wouldn’t be easy because keeping a parent from their child was something he didn’t even want to begin figuring out how to do. But, as he watched each of them, all he saw was shock and confusion morph into understanding and then comprehension. Bran felt the exact moment Tia became sick to her stomach as realization of the factions each of these families belonged to hit her like a bulldozer on steroids.
As their bond forced her to feel any extreme emotion that her sister did, Anya must have felt the second it truly hit Tia too, because suddenly she was right there by Tia’s side, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder. Of course, Kierra wasn’t too far behind, flashing in right after Anya.
Kierra had never been one for standing in the spotlight, so until that point she stayed right by the doorway off to the side, but in a position where she could be ready without hesitation if anything popped off. Well, anything else. Bran looked at her as she caught sight of the incubus among the rest of the rabble, then him in his true form, and saw her eyes bug out of her head for a moment. She quickly gathered her wits and shot him a look that said, Do you, bruh, but one word about me, and I’ll gut you like a fish. He gave her a dramatic eye roll in response.
And as though the room wasn’t already crowded enough, in flashed the triplets with their special package, which they dropped promptly at their aunt’s feet. “We think you may need to see this.”
13
Divided They Fall
“Gigi, Jenna, Laina, who the Hel is this, and where the fuck did he come from? Laina, why is your eye twitching like that, and what in Sekhmet’s name do you have on?” Tia asked her nieces in an exasperated tone, as Laina’s left eye twitched and she kept rubbing at her bare arms. “I see him, but who, or what, exactly am I looking at?”
See, the triple threat didn’t quite come to their aunt straight away like they knew damned well they should have. Nope, not those three. As mostly usual with them, they made the wrong decision instead of the right one slapping them in the face so hard their heads should have been spinning like that human Linda Blair woman.
Instead, they stopped by their living quarters, which was more like the party wing of the castle. Even though the girls were now twenty-six, their mentalities were still those of teenagers. Since they were pure-blood vampires they aged much slower into adulthood. The same wouldn’t apply to Jelissa, just as it hadn’t with Tia and Anya. So, they now had a wing all to themselves and a few of the guards’ children to do with as they damn well pleased, to a certain extent. They could blast their music, binge on humans (as long as it was only the pond scum and none of the loyalists). They even had their very own gaming room, complete with arcade games, pool table, billiard boards, the whole nine yards. They did whatever they wanted so long as they didn’t slaughter either one another or any of their guests. There were also no worries about them becoming pregnant either. Pure-blooded vampires didn’t become fertile until the age of eighty-five, unless they found their mate before then, which very rarely happened.
Gigi and Jenna had decided it would be a good idea to play around with their captive before presenting him to their aunt as they should have, Laina had another more constructive reason. While they did intermingle with all the other species now that all were united thanks to their family, none of the other species took very kindly to being fed upon. Especially not by the younger ones, who were still working on their control. Puberty amongst female vampires could be a very dangerous and deadly thing.
They knew better than to kill him, since it was more than likely he had some type of information that could lead to finding the cousin they had almost completely forgotten about, seeing as they had been only five years old when she was born and taken away. Laina, who was usually the responsible and observant one, was the one to point out to her counterparts that the tech-mage was not just a scrumptious snack someone had bundled up and left for them to find. No, he was much more than that. She had long suspected dear old Aunt Hildegard wasn’t as insane as she led everyone to believe. And if the mage was left down there in the open for someone to find alive, then he must know something. Logically speaking, why else would he even be down there? If the other two hadn’t been so busy salivating over the smell of his blood, they might have been able to put those facts together for themselves. Sort of like how the two hadn’t realized one of their teachers in high school, Ms. Nita P. Usar, was actually a Rasputin until it was practically too late.
Laina was thought of as the geek of the three. She didn’t mind, not really. It was a long-standing joke among the three of them she sucked up most of the brain stems while they were still in their mother’s womb.
But Laina was gifted with more than just that of her overly large brain. She could also see the darkest secrets of whomever she fed upon. Which was why she would usually only feed from the willing donors living in the castle instead of the prisoners they kept as feed bags. She needn’t visuals of the nightmarish deeds the scumbag human prisoners had done to end up trapped in her brain then revisiting her in her own nightmares. But that was the reason she had wanted to bring the captive to their quarters, to see what he knew, only things didn’t quite go the way she had planned.
Laina didn’t bother telling her sisters what it was she was about to do. They were too busy getting their jollies out of poking at the poor bastard, each getting a small electric shock as they did so. That should have been her warning sign right there. But she paid no heed. There was only the thought of getting some type of answers as she knelt, grabbed his slightly muscular brown arm, and bit into his wrist.
At first, she began seeing random images that made no sense to her, because two of the people she saw should have been dead and the building they were in was unrecognizable and looked like nothing she had ever seen in Underlayes, all broken and dilapidated. Once she saw him and others of his ilk on the roof of this castle, the images started coming into her head way too fast for her to handle, then came the shockwaves. Laina got a sensation as though someone was zapping electricity directly into her brain. Then her body began to seize up.
Gigi and Jenna noticed something was wrong at the same time and pulled his wrist out of Laina’s mouth right as her body began shaking uncontrollably. Neither of them knew what the fuck to do. They instinctively held her as still as they could on the floor so at the very least, she couldn’t hurt herself. After about two minutes, the shaking finally stopped on its own. That was when the real fun started.
For one full second, Laina’s body went ramrod straight, and her eyes opened as wide as they possibly could with her pupils nothing more than tiny pinpricks. Her alabaster skin went stark white, her fangs fu
lly elongated, and her raven hair became a hot mess all over her head. She looked like a demented Snow White on crack. All of a sudden, she started zooming all over the place, so fast at first Gigi and Jenna thought she was flashing until a breeze ruffled their hair each time she sped past them. Laina was zipping around from one corner of the vast room to the next, even up and down the stairs; she was quite literally bouncing off the walls.
Then she did begin flashing, something they were usually only strong enough to do together, back and forth to the donors’ quarters, taking a sip or two from each one of them so fast they thought it was nothing more than a mosquito bite. When they went to slap at their necks, she was gone before their hand could even connect with their skin, let alone her.
Laina then did something she never would have done had she been in her right mind, but right then she was, as they say, high as a damn kite. She flashed herself down to the human dregs who had not volunteered to be donors. The ones who had spent their worthless lives preying on other humans; using, abusing, and some even murdering their own kind for nothing more than sport. Now they were the prey. Usually she never strayed down there because seeing any of their memories was the last thing she wanted, but she did hear talk of what each of them had done to end up in their predicaments.
The Succubus, the Demon and the Witch Page 8