by Multiple
Shrill sounds suddenly pierced Fanton’s hearing. He snarled on the edges of a manic roar, looking down at the blood washing his hands. His body shook as he wildly looked around. What had he done? How had he come to this? Again! So soon.
***
Beth heard a blood-curdling scream split the night air. It seemed to come from the woods behind the Valtimer mansion.
“Ariel!” she cried, lifting her skirts to begin running down the patio steps into the garden and beyond toward the woods. She’d lost her, and then she’d lost Adam too. He’d never returned to their rendezvous spot inside. She’d considered the gardens outside. It was the only place she hadn’t searched.
“Ariel, where are you?” Beth cried, darting her gaze back to the closed ballroom doors. No one would hear her cries with the music and the doors closed. She would be all alone. “But I cannot ignore her need!” Her gaze returned to the hag-shaped woods as she ran toward them. Did she really intend to go in there?
A wrenching scream split the cold night air in front of her from deep within the haunted woods, and her steps faltered. “Adam, oh God, Adam, I wish you were here.”
Beth clutched the small pearls on the necklace at her collarbone as she tried not to cry out in fear. On the scream’s heels came a more frightening sound. It was like no sound she’d ever heard, and it brought her rushing steps to a halt right at the edge of the eerie, blackened woods. She couldn’t tell the direction of the sound that was either terrible agony or heart-wrenching terror. Could it be an animal? She didn’t know of any animal that could possibly sound like it had.
Her gaze skittered about the menacing woods. What did she know of night predators? Then thoughts rushed her. Except for Fanton. He was an evil creature of the night. She couldn’t help herself; she called out, “Ariel! Ariel!”
Instantly, she wished she’d not cried out her presence. Her eyes leaped to the right, turning her body, then to the left. “I’m not going into those woods,” she hissed with a frightened whisper.
She tried to assure her quaking conscious that by daylight the woods before her would look harmless and innocent, perhaps even inviting.
“Not as if haunted by demons,” she whispered on a fierce note. Then, the sound of a woman’s wretched weeping crept from deeper in the woods. It was to the right of where she stood in her dew-soaked dancing slippers — or was it straight ahead?
“Ariel?” Beth hissed with a louder whisper as though some evil wouldn’t hear her lowered voice, as opposed to the high-pitched pressure seeking release as a scream. Her entire body trembled with more than the cold night air against her bared shoulders and arms in the sheerness of her now damp ball gown. She shuddered with the need to go into the woods, but the fear to do so pulled her back.
Suddenly, something rushed toward her through the woods, breaking branches to the right of where she stood. She screamed in terror, grabbing up her full skirt and fleeing into the woods toward the left. Instantly, her long hair lost the battle to stay on top of her head. It tumbled down, like a black shawl, over her shoulders as her full skirts hindered her attempts to run through the underbrush of the forest.
A malevolent sound barked out of the night air, making her gasp. An evil chuckle followed. The threatening sounds seemed to be right behind her as she shrieked and ran to the left. Her gaze jerked over her bare shoulder trying to see. She thought she saw a hulking, dark shape rushing toward her and she panted in fright, turning to the right, trying to evade it.
Something snatched at her gown, tearing the silk easily. The attack was like icy talons of evil intent, ripping silk. She screamed, stumbling to a halt with tearing material all around her. Her dark, heavy hair was as wild as a swirling shroud everywhere she turned in a frantic circle trying to evade the malevolence attacking her.
“No! No! No!” she screamed with each turn as she tried to clutch pieces of her gown back.
She felt the charged breath of death fill her nostrils with a blast of heat singeing her throat.
“Run,” an ungodly voice roared.
Beth screamed and cried as she ran forward, clutching her pale, naked breasts. She’d seen fangs and red eyes as the animal attacking her howled with inhuman potency. It was a harrowing nightmare she prayed to live through as she ran with terror, and the monster chased closely behind her.
***
Trinity guided his black stallion to a halt beside Church’s pure white stallion. “I wasn’t asking for help yet.” Trinity’s voice was low as his yellow-rimmed, blue eyes flashed toward Church. His voice was modulated so perhaps his brothers, Christian and Baptiste, wouldn’t hear as they settled their horses a bit behind them.
“I’d not keep those two on a leash long and let you have all the fun,” Church replied, his voice level as he nodded toward their two siblings. Yet Church’s voice, even devoid of inflection, held a multitude of command. Perhaps it was because he knew Church so well, Trinity thought, releasing his irritation as a lost cause. He simply didn’t care for his brothers miring themselves in foulness when they’d already lived through such malevolence at their Sire’s hands. He wanted it to be his mantel to now take on and leave them free. Trinity shifted in his saddle. In the end, it might be an idiotic desire he had for his brothers, who were vampires after all, yet he couldn’t rid himself of it.
“I’ve no problem sending them back.” His voice was gravelly as he sneered and held his stomping stallion steady.
“It’s brothers Blacknall, not brother Blacknall.” Church glared at him with a stubborn tilt to his masculine face; a face most humans would call menacing even through its compelling handsomeness.
Trinity sighed, looking out into the pitchy woods in front of them. He wondered why he trained so hard to take on most of these burdens, and then Church refused to allow him his head in these matters.
“There’s no blood-scent,” Baptiste advised them.
“I don’t detect a thing,” Christian added.
“Not even the smell of the hunt,” Church finished.
Then, Trinity saw all three of his brothers’ gazes turning toward him.
“I feel her,” he spoke softly, looking to the west.
“Her?” All three brothers spoke as one, in varying degrees of acerbic puzzlement.
Trinity’s eyes narrowed into slits and he nearly let out a foul snarl. Let them wonder, he thought. He wondered. But he’d felt her the moment her terror had ripened.
“West,” he snapped, turning his stallion into a sudden gallop. Let them wonder and keep up. He had no time for their questions. Questions he couldn’t answer.
A hard gallop later, Trinity knew they all now smelled the blood of a fresh kill as he halted his stallion and swung down from his saddle. The moment his boots touched the ground he began to sprint forward.
“Trinity, where are you going? Wait!”
Trinity looked over his shoulder at Baptiste, giving him a sharp growl, but not stopping his forward run. He knew the woods were a swatch of forest behind a long cobblestoned lane of noble-owned mansions on Kings Row. The tract of woods was wide and eventually yielded into a large park by the Rothberry Road.
His thick, dark-blond hair whipped about his head and upper shoulders as he ran. He could track straight for the fresh blood, or he could race toward the terrified woman, who was still alive.
Chapter Four
“You look troubled, sir.”
Adam turned toward the deep voice behind him to find a blond nobleman regarding him, while the man’s voice reverberated through him even after the sound was gone. Adam noticed the gentleman wasn’t dressed for a ball but wore outdoor attire showing a fit and muscular frame. The man regarding him with soulful, dark blue eyes over a goatee that molded around his wide mouth was no noble fop laying about on his title.
That the man could tell his unrest simply by looking at him spoke volumes about his distress, Adam thought, worrying a hand through spikes of his sandy hair. His eyes continued to dart across the voluminous ballroom
. “My sister,” he uttered, showing his desperation by blurting his distress to a complete stranger, “is missing.” His hand scrubbed his jaw on the strident note.
“And you fear for her safety?”
Adam’s gaze darted to the man. A very comely man with a voice like warm, red wine. He wasn’t so very old as his first glance assumed. It was the man’s trim goatee that hid his younger, but very handsome, face.
“Yes,” Adam hissed, and then without further comment or worry of rudeness he started forward. He would try the kitchen.
“I’ll help you,” the man’s soothing voice sounded as he strode beside him.
“I’ve looked everywhere.” Adam lifted his hand and slashed it through the air with frustration. “She is searching for her friend and now I have lost her.”
“We will find them.” The man’s quiet confidence seemed to fill Adam’s desperation and soothe his rising panic.
“I’m, Lord Adam Winslow.” Adam glanced at his companion and nodded.
“Mr. Christian Blacknall. Good to meet you. I wish the circumstances were better.” Christian Blacknall’s hand reached across his chest and Adam’s met him halfway for a short, firm handshake.
Adam could tell Christian was a nobleman, as he was, even though Christian was dressed in casual traveling attire in the middle of an ongoing ball. If he found it strange … Adam didn’t let himself consider it, because he had worries that were more pressing.
“There.” Christian pointed and Adam turned with him toward the kitchen.
What gnawed at Adam was the fact Fanton was nowhere to be seen.
“Have you seen a lady with black hair and a green ball gown?” Adam fairly attacked the first kitchen worker he saw with hissed voice and glare. The lad was tall and lanky, and he could not be more than sixteen. Adam’s hand clasped the lad’s shoulder. “Have you?” he demanded. The lad seemed to stutter with no words, but wide eyes that a gentleman was accosting him.
Then an older man’s voice said, “The boy knows nothing, my lord. No lady would be back here in the kitchens.”
Adam’s gaze jumped toward the voice of an elderly worker as he held onto the boy.
Christian interceded, “Oh, good worker, we know a lady would not normally visit here. But, sir, we fear this is not normal and we pray you could tell us or anyone here if they have seen her.”
Adam blinked and the awareness of his agitation softened as his hand relaxed on the lad. He was amazed at the quality of Christian Blacknall’s voice … and his compelling demeanor. He felt the man’s warmth soothing him.
“Ah, my lord, I’ll ask around for sure.” The elder kitchen worker turned away.
At that moment, the lad looked up at Adam, and he whispered. “I did see a lady with long black hair running in the gardens while I was taking a wee break.”
Adam’s gaze jerked toward Christian’s dark blue eyes. Christian nodded and Adam felt like clasping him into an embrace. Suddenly afraid something might show on his face, he tugged his gaze away, letting his fingers release the lad and he moved to stride toward the back kitchen door.
The lad offered a bit more in a much stronger voice as he moved away. “I didn’t think much of it, sir, as I saw a blond lady earlier doing the same thing. We thought it was a new noble’s daft, err … I didn’t mean that! But a game or some foolishness.”
Adam barely heard the end of what the lad said before he was out the back door of the kitchens, striding into the night. The fact that Beth was running, and her hair was down, scared him. Something was very wrong.
“Beth!” he shouted, and then he began running toward the large, dark expanse that was the gardens. “Beth!”
Adam felt the aura of Christian sprinting beside him and once again he was glad for the man’s presence. Lights from the back of the mansion lighted the extensive gardens into ghostly, glowing shadows as Adam realized Beth could be anywhere in the large area. Suddenly, a darker shadow than the rest loomed in front of them and Adam nearly went into a fighting stance, but for Christian’s hand on his arm.
Christian’s voice halted him. “Lord Adam Winslow, it’s my brother, Baptiste Blacknall, Earl of Sterling.”
Adam huffed a labored breath from his desperate running as he looked at the man. He couldn’t make out the man’s features very well in the gloom, but he did see the trait of blond hair that appeared to run in Christian Blacknall’s family.
“Christian, it’s this way,” Lord Baptiste uttered, pointing toward the woods before he started forward. “Did you find anything inside?”
“What is this way?” Adam demanded, grabbing the back of the twill fabric on Christian’s jacket as he rushed forward with the two men. Why were they here? The question began to chant loudly inside Adam’s skull. “And what were you looking for?” he demanded.
“His sister is out here, Baptiste,” Christian’s voice uttered as Adam wondered about both men’s sure movements through the murky woods. As it was, he had to hold onto Christian’s forearm to guide him through the dark tangles of branches and underbrush. He halted his retorts, listening to the two odd men.
“There are two out here then,” Lord Baptiste expelled as a statement more than a question. “Trinity seems to sense the one still alive, but you can smell the blood of the other.”
“Blood!” Adam exclaimed, feeling more fear stabbing him as one glowing shot of stark moonlight broke through the fog and tree branches overhead. He saw Lord Baptiste turn his gaze back to them.
Lord Baptiste expelled sharply, “You’d best prepare him, if you insist on involving him. ’Tis bloody.”
Adam could swear he heard an animalistic bass snarl come from Christian’s direction, but then Christian said, “He’d be out here with or without us. Better with us.”
Adam was startled at the yellow, animal-like glints he’d seen in Lord Baptiste’s eyes in that one moment when he’d looked back. He wondered why these men were out in the woods as if they knew some deadly deed was occurring and knew it before it had happened. However, most of all, the thought of something bloody up ahead terrorized him.
“Beth!” he began to shout. “Beth!”
“Here,” Lord Baptiste called, coming to a halt ahead of them. “But be prepared,” Lord Baptiste growled, halting next to Christian as he looked back at Adam.
They are yellow beast eyes, Adam thought in alarm, nearly backing away from the entity that was Baptiste, who had growled his words like an animal.
“Control yourself!” Christian shouted, and Adam watched Baptiste’s features contort as Baptiste stretched his neck toward the moon, then back down again.
“’Tis the blood,” Baptiste snarled.
“I know, brother,” Christian uttered, grabbing Baptiste’s shoulder. “Fresh blood is the hardest. But we will resist.”
Hardest what, Adam wondered? Resist what? He growled himself in scared frustration and plowed between both strange men, until he saw what was on the other side of Baptiste.
“Oh Lord, no! Oh Lord!” Adam cried, crumbling to his knees in horror before the bloody and torn apart remains on the forest ground before him that had once been a woman.
“Lady Ariel!” he cried at the blonde hair he saw, but more the tattered pieces of lavender silk.
Chapter Five
Beth didn’t know how she stayed upright, but the vicious and snarling voice kept howling at her to, “Run!”
It came from her left side, and then it stalked her from the right side. Suddenly it snapped right behind her and she could feel scalding hot breath wash over her bare buttocks. She knew the beast was playing with her. It meant to kill her. Its intentions loomed over her like its black shape. The more she screamed and panted, the more the monster howled and she was running out of breath and strength.
She could barely see through the wildness of her long hair to keep from running head long into trees. Branches jabbed her flesh. The fact her gown was torn from her body, along with her petticoats, leaving only a half corset covering her w
aist, mortified her as much as terror gripped her.
She was going to die.
Trinity caught the flashes of alabaster skin off to the left and in front of where he ran through the brambles. The woman’s screaming had stopped many minutes ago, and he had to guess the foul beast hunting her had nearly run her to ground.
He veered his headlong sprint towards the glimpses of pale flesh he kept catching sight of through thickly-grouped trees surrounded by scattered bushes. His timing to reach the young woman before the vile monster leapt to kill her was too close to think he’d make it. The threatening roar he released was of a maddened vampire reverberating through the night air. The abhorrence would recognize his thundering challenge.
He heard the woman cry out … in pain this time. Instantly he smelled blood, as he bellowed, “No!” Then his large body crashed through a small opening in the foliage.
He realized too late he was moving much too fast to halt his forward motion, when suddenly the woman was there … as if pushed forward toward his unchecked momentum. He only had seconds to react and he grasped her against his body. Her long black hair whipped around them as he turned to take the brunt of an inevitable fall. He landed on his back with the woman piled on top of him. Then he heard the triumphant howl of escape from the foul beast fading into the distance.
Trinity held tight to the voluptuous young woman as he arched his back and shouted his anger at losing his chance to kill the abhorrence. “I will find you!” he bellowed.