And now all those innocent souls still weighed heavily on her heart. She would never forgive herself and would never allow anyone else to either. Especially Cerci.
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Chapter 33
6:05 a.m. in D.C., November 25
When Doctor Samantha Andwell agreed to serve as the consultant forensic anthropologist for the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. she couldn’t have been more enthusiastic about it. It was a coveted post, one she had always hoped for.
She was warned she would have stiff competition for the position and plenty of people would try to talk her out of it. Andwell was overheating in her dark scrubs but didn’t consider doing anything about it. As she leaned over her desk she could hear Ruth, her assistant, taking a call on the other side of the wall in the adjacent office.
“Where on earth have you been?” Ruth asked. “I told you, Jack, I’m far too old for you! And your poor wife, what would she think? …Yeah, I bet…”
She continued to play her usual game with Agent Jack Mitchell. Jack Mitchell went on with Ruth, who was close to seventy, for several minutes as Andwell read through an email she had just gotten from the Forensic Society asking her to give a lecture. Agent Mitchell was not so much of a friend to her as he led himself to believe but she played along for the good of her posting. Having the FBI on good terms was a positive thing.
WASHINGTON FORENSIC SOCIETY
Dear Dr. Andwell,
We at the WFS would very much appreciate it if you could find time in your busy schedule to give a lecture about the analysis of bone trauma. Please contact us when you have time.
Terence Mycroft
“Hold on now, Jack. I’ll get her for you,” Ruth said to him as she transferred his call to Samantha’s desk.
“Agent Mitchell,” she answered the phone. “What can I do for you?”
“Good morning, Sam. I was hoping you could help me out with a consulting job later today.”
She hated it when he called her Sam. After all, she was a doctor of forensic science and she was polite enough to call him Agent Mitchell, a title he had worked hard and long for. Didn’t she deserve the same respect from him?
Dr. Andwell knew Agent Mitchell was just trying to be friendly and maybe she was just a little too guarded in her views of him. But his sexual appetite was common knowledge and calling her by her first name was just the beginning of trying to force her to lower her guard. After that, he would be coming onto her even more aggressively than he already did.
Her eyes wandered around her office—over the top of her piles of paperwork and files yet to be handled—as she pondered whether or not she should help him.
“I’d appreciate it if we could work it so I could do it from my office. I have a lot of work to do,” she said to him, almost rudely.
“That’s not a problem, Sam. I will have Dr. Marty Colleens, the M.E. in Seattle, email you what she has. She’s having a lot of problems with recent skeletal remains that have surfaced in the last couple of weeks.”
“Alright, fine. I have to go now, Agent Mitchell. I’m sorry.”
“Thank you again, Sam. Goodbye.”
There he went again, calling her by her first name. She swallowed her anger and told herself he was just being friendly with her. But it still bothered her. She had worked hard for her title and, within moments, Agent Jack Mitchell had reduced her to nothing more than just a woman in the work place. She really hated him.
She walked by the side of a long, white table illuminated by a powerful light underneath. Bones sat on top, scattered in disorganized fashion and strewn across the glowing workspace. Her arms reached over the skeleton of an ancient Greek soldier and lifted up his fragile skull.
Her office was small, cluttered with papers and books, and located in the middle of a long laboratory. At one end was an array of different scanners and high-powered microscopes and at the other end, another long light table glowed white as the skeletal remains that sat on top of it waited to be put to rest.
Dr. Andwell was the only one who had an office in the lab. She got up and hurriedly made her way out of her area and onto the lab floor. She had to work fast if she was to make time for the job for Agent Mitchell.
God, I really hate that man, she thought once more.
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Chapter 34
2:55 a.m., November 25
It was five minutes to three and claws of mist were groping in from the water in Ballard. Fabiana walked along a deserted street in front of Tim’s house. The night breeze ruffled her hair as she leaned against a streetlamp. A human would have been shivering in the November chill, but she loved the freshness of the air. Fabiana lingered for some time in that spot. There was a sadness that had been hovering over her and was descending now that she was close to him.
She could feel Tim inside his home. He was asleep but his thoughts were of her. Entering his home took very little effort. Fabiana was silent on his wooden floor and even the creaky board she knew was there did not give her away as she traveled down his darkened hallway to his bedroom. She padded over a Persian rug of spiral designs that rested in front of an oak sleigh bed.
As she passed the bed, her eagerness to touch him sharpened. At the foot of the bed was an oak chest. She stopped, knelt down to it, and took a seat without a single sound. With her mind, Fabiana opened the shuttered windows and the moonlight flooded down on him. As Fabiana approached Tim, she gave a soft gasp when she delicately touched his cheek, his tender lips, and his soft eyelids.
His face was perfect to her and his flannel bed sheet had fallen deep into the creases between his legs so that she could see the shape of his sex beneath it.
Fabiana moved in even closer to him now and Tim almost let out a moan silently, as if he knew she was there with him. She made no sound, but as she looked upon his manly form she wished, only for a moment, to kiss him. And then she did just that.
Fabiana lifted his chin, kissed his throat and, for the first time in eons, didn’t want blood. No, Fabiana wanted the salt of his lips. She looked down at him and held him in that timeless moment with her thoughts. She didn’t want him to wake. No, she wanted this moment. She wanted to savor every second of it.
Fabiana looked down at him steadily. His cheeks were suffused with color and their lips met. Taking his warm hands in hers, she could feel the strength in them, the masculine power. And she wondered, Could they be gentle hands as well?
Could they be loving?
“Innocent man,” she whispered.
His dreams were soaring with passion now. He gave out a moan as his sex began to arch the bed linen. Not once had Fabiana ever even toyed with the idea of being with anyone but Cerci, even after so long a time of not being with him. It was always his touch that she wanted. But now this human had intrigued her. She wanted to touch him, to feel him, but her power was too great. In a moment, she would crush him beneath her and she could not do it, but some part of her wanted to.
She pushed the idea away as fast as it came and with that she left his tiny little room in that two-story house in Ballard. Fabiana left him to his pleasurable dreams.
“Enjoy me, human,” she murmured quietly as she stole out of the house on silent feet.
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Chapter 35
3:15 a.m., November 25
Her phone at the Regional Computer Forensics Lab rang a few times before Agent Jones answered it.
“Agent Jones, this is Agent Mitchell. What do you have?”
“Okay. I checked the email headers and tracked down the IP address that the message originated from. I also opened the thermo desktop for User319. I’m sending the images to your phone now. This is a live feed.”
“What am I looking at?”
“We now have full control over the computer belonging to whoever sent these emails.”
“What did you just do?” Jack was staring at a live feed of someone’s office, and just at that moment someone sat down in front of the computer. He was an older m
an, white, in his mid-fifties. He was wearing a nice grey suit and tie. Then something really caught Jack’s attention—he was wearing a name badge. Jack pulled the screen of his cell phone closer to his face but he could not see what it read.
“Agent, can you make out what that badge reads?”
“Give me a second here and let me pull it up,” she said.
“Oh.”
“What? What is it?” Jack asked.
“CIA… I’m trying to see the name but… oh, shit.”
“What’s wrong?” Jack asked as his screen went blank.
“An alert just went up. I’ve been kicked off. They’re onto me. I’m sorry, Agent, but that’s all I can do now.”
“Thank you, Jones. You helped a lot. Good bye.”
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Chapter 36
6:59 a.m., November 25
Fabiana stood alone at the railing of the Ballard Bridge and the wind played in her hair. She was beyond the Locks and all around her the city lights were fading with the coming dawn. Soon the rising sun would glitter off buildings of steel, mortar, and glossy high-rise towers and cast a diffused, golden streak across the water.
She could feel the coming warmth of the sun. If it had not been for her keen vampire senses she would be completely caught by its sunrise. Not that the rising sun would kill Fabiana at this point in her existence. No. Not one as old and powerful as Fabiana.
Vampires grow more powerful with every year they survive but it’s the blood that is the real trick. The blood of the old ones was magic to a fledgling vampire. Fabiana was by no means a fledgling vampire, but in her youth—when she had killed her first elder vampire—she had been quite young. That blood was like an enchantment to her. Her strength doubled in one moment, in one swallow even, and it was like a drug to her mind. But now, after so much immortal blood, not much would kill her, not even the sun. But it would not be a pleasant walk in the morning’s daylight.
Fabiana sighed to herself as she gazed out across the cityscape. So much had happened in the last few days that even her ultra-sharp vampire mind was reeling from the memories. All through the night she’d been making her way as best she could over the skies of Seattle. She could feel them. The Family had come.
Cognatus had made his move and her insurrection had officially begun. Fabiana, after all, had called them to her. Summoned them to this city. Her deeds called out to Cognatus and now they had come to finish their game.
But that human was a complication. They will certainly kill him, Fabiana thought. She could not let that happen. She could not leave behind the only man she had even cared for in close to one hundred years. She couldn’t just leave him to fend for himself in the wilderness of the city. Tim would be more alone and more terrified than he could possibly have ever imagined.
Fabiana had to make a stark, brutal choice and she knew it. If she moved to save his life, her final move would have to immediately follow. Fabiana was still unsure if her abilities could hold up to the massive powers of The Origin. But if she turned her back on the human, on Tim, she would have the time she needed and her victory would be certain.
Fabiana knew Tim would come looking for her after seeing her in his dream. He wanted her. At least some part of his mind did. The indelible connection between vampire and victim would lead him to her. When that day came, she would have to take responsibility for her actions.
He would most likely not accept her tales of immortality on word alone. He would have to be shown. In two thousand years, Fabiana had never revealed her true self to a human without destroying him immediately afterwards.
The company that Tim kept also gave her pause for concern. Jack was not what he pretended to be.
That one has hunter blood in him, she thought.
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Chapter 37
7:10 a.m., November 25
In the early hours of morning, The Origin of Blood were gathering in a hidden house under the hills of Golden Gardens. The sun was weak in the pale blue of the sky and the light was thin and chilled in the woods. As Cerci walked, he wandered out into the wet breeze and made his way through the woods. He walked through the shade of tall, thin trees and was careful to stay out of the seeking eyes of the light. His long, dark coat flapped in the breeze around his feet. He walked quickly and with purpose towards the hidden door of the house as he recalled the fateful evening he lost his love forever and had to face The Origin of Blood alone. It was so long ago in Italy, but he remembered the pain and fear as if it were yesterday. Cerci envisioned every aspect of that forest in Italy and it reminded him so much of these woods in Seattle that he couldn’t help but think of how things had happened.
* * *
In the old times, the forest in which the dead vampire lay had been severely cut down, but on the day Fabiana killed Jizi, no empty spaces had been present. The woods had grown back full and sweet in some gullies and over old paths. And even as wild as it was then, Cerci had found the path home.
The walls of the old home of The Origin of Blood were thirty feet high, immensely thick, and older than some castles and keeps of Italy. Old even beyond any romantic fable of that time in history. Inside the compound there existed a group of angry vampires busy with the intention of revenge and destruction. Cerci could feel their growing rage as if it were his own.
But from the hollow mouth of darkness, beyond the opening of a staircase gloomy with shadows, there came only a low, soft laughter. It was a mocking sound which came from behind the heavy oak door with the iron knocker. And it seemed echoed by others as Cerci heard a powerful thundering of urging in his mind. The Origin of Blood was calling him home, demanding his return.
The air was cold and damp, but it felt good on his face and Cerci slowly descended the stone staircase. The clatter of rage went on; the cries of angry vampires did not die out as he reached for the door handle. Then, so suddenly it was as wondrous and frightful as the noise itself, there was total silence.
As the door swung open and light filled their eternal night, Cerci saw the vampires, rigid with anger, gazing up. Then the murderous cries continued. Their words assaulted him with viciousness and brutality.
“Traitor!” they yelled. “Killer! We know what you and your whore did!”
In an instant, fingers came at him, desperately looking for flesh. Then it hit him. Pain. His clothes were tearing and his skin was opening as immortal hands clawed at him. Their angry words filled the darkened room of the home.
“No! I would never go against our laws! You know that!”
“Enough. The decision has been made.”
“What decision? I am the High Priest and it is left to the High Priest to make such decisions!” Cerci roared at them.
Cerci didn’t recall weakening; he didn’t recall any turning point when anyone’s strength overcame his own. But just the same, he was losing this struggle. He remembered simply being outnumbered. Hopelessly, by sheer persistence, Cerci was stilled, surrounded, and forced into the blackness. The clang clang of restraints echoed as Cerci was consumed by shackles and chains. In a press of action, he was being forced along a passageway as he struggled against fetters of iron. But it did little good.
“Stop! You cannot do this to me. I am the High Priest to The Origin of Blood. I am one of the first hundred!”
“You are nothing. We shall chose a new High Priest and The Family will go on without you,” a vampire named Alastar said to him.
They entered a small chamber where a fire burned in a deep fireplace cut into the stone wall. A garden lay at the other end of the chamber, fitted past the rock and enclosed with two brass gates. At first Cerci saw these things clearly and scanned the long walk they were to take, but his mind did not see the dangers for he had seen them a hundred times before. His nightmares became a reality when their trek brought them beyond the gates where a freshly dug grave gaped. The fire was intensely hot against his legs as they walked but it was good at the same time. It was something for his mind to focus on besides the ope
n stone coffin at the base of the deep, empty grave before him.
“What are you going to do to me?” he insisted. Cerci’s mind was reeling at the coming horror before him. How could he escape? The passageway was so narrow and there were so many vampires, all bent on his punishment.
“You will spend every waking moment, for the rest of time, imprisoned in the earth. Maybe after enough time has gone by and the metal of your restraints has corroded enough you may find the will to dig free. But I seriously doubt it.”
It was Alastar who spoke those words to him, words of anger. Cerci had always known that there was no love between the two of them, but this… This was going too far.
“You know, only a small group of vampires have the will to be able to survive the long journey of immortality. Most end up taking their own lives. I had always thought you would last longer than anyone. Too bad that you won’t,” Alastar said, and his words stuck in Cerci’s mind. But Cerci would not look at him.
Cerci drew back, his eyes only half open, and tried to see again what was about to become of him. He desired to escape the room entirely, to find the streets of Rome and wander free of The Family. He had never felt as utterly terrified as he did at that moment. But as he tried to grope along the stone passage, the determined hands of furious vampires pushed and urged him forward.
“You will not even listen to what happened? Even after all my time with The Family you are going to just cast me out like the so many nameless victims of this city?” Cerci pleaded.
“There is no need. We saw it all and you have been watched for some time. Your loyalty to your whore is common knowledge, and if you can abandon your Family so easily, we have no need of you. Goodbye, Cerci of Keos.”
The Blood Born Tales (Book 1): Blood Collector Page 15