Fire and Fantasy: a Limited Edition Collection of Epic and Urban Fantasy

by CK Dawn

  The rampant wildlife should’ve given the place an abandoned look, but oddly, it fitted with the scene.

  There was only one cottage in Hunter Academy. This had to be my great uncle’s. To say I was excited was an understatement. I’d known about the cottage but had never seen it. Jayson Duncan was not only my great uncle, he was also one of the best hunters in history. I’d always felt I understood him despite our age difference and the barrier between life and death.

  “This was his home,” Izella whispered.

  Her eyes were dilated, her breathing short. Somehow, she seemed more thrilled than I was.

  “This was the cottage you were talking about.” She headed for the entrance. Her eyes never left her target.

  Fifteen

  Izella

  The ensorced stake was inside Jayson’s cottage. It made sense. I should’ve thought this might be the case. Jayson had created Hunter Academy. He might have brought the stake into Hunter Academy.

  The cottage in the clearing was modest at best. Without knowing beforehand, I wouldn’t have believed the greatest vampire hunter of all times would make his home in such a puny house in the middle of nowhere.

  A breeze played with my hair. Sunlight seemed to pour down on this particular patch of the forest, casting a yellow glow over everything, and I couldn’t deny the tranquil beauty of this place. It wasn’t as grand as what my mansion used to be, but it certainly wasn’t without its merits.

  My heart decided to make up for all the lost beats in the last two centuries. The closer I got to the cottage, the faster it pumped.

  I was within three meters of the cottage when I hit an invisible barrier. Red light radiated from where I touched the barrier and zapped across the air like lightning. I twitched in pain.

  Both Rune and I backed away several steps, yet the light still raged. It charged across the sky, creating a web of red magic until a full dome covered the cottage. Then an alarm went off all over Hunter Academy.

  Just my luck!

  “What is this?” I demanded.

  Rune glanced in the direction of Hunter Academy. “The protection spell Jayson Duncan set up. Everyone must’ve heard that. The headmaster and instructors will be here shortly.”

  “How do you break the spell?”

  I yanked at the web. It wasn’t real light because I could grasp it. Before I got a chance to figure out what it was made up, a sharp pain brought tears to my eyes.

  I released the web. Red burn marks sizzled on my palm, several times more intense than what the academy gate did. The marks were so painful that my hand spasmed.

  “Rune. Tear this apart.” I gestured at the web with my uninjured hand. Perhaps this magic was smart enough to recognize me as a vampire even after reversification. If it was because of that, it shouldn’t harm Rune.

  He turned to me. The moment I looked into his eyes, a sinking feeling settled in the pit of my stomach.

  “This is my great uncle’s house. I can’t allow a vampire to enter,” he said.

  The word vampire tasted bitter on my tongue. Since the day I’d turned, hunters had slapped that label on my forehead. I was a vampire, so I needed to be eliminated. I was a vampire, so I didn’t have feelings.

  “You promised to obey me,” I said.

  “I never promised to help you break into Jayson Duncan’s house.”

  Technically, he was right. That didn’t mean I had to be happy about it. The alarm grated on my nerves. I only had half a day to seize the stake and escape Hunter Academy. Now I only had minutes until the hunters came into the forest and arrived at the scene. Normally, that was no big deal, but I was not in a normal condition. I was practically human.

  “Fine! Leave before I change my mind.” I pointed my forefinger in the direction we’d come from. I should’ve known better than to depend on anyone, especially a hunter.

  “The offer still stands. I could take you out of the enchanted forest.”

  “No need.” My tone was cold, but a tinge of warmth spread throughout my body. This didn’t mean anything. He probably wanted to ambush me once the deal was over. That would be easy to do if reinforcements from the academy arrived. But his voice sounded so sincere and his gaze seemed honest, as if he were only trying to hold up his end of the bargain.

  Then the flash from the web jolted me awake. What was I thinking? I actually believed in the words of a vampire hunter. Perhaps reversification’s effect on vampires wasn’t limited to physical.

  The shadows of his lashes covered his eyes. Then he gazed at me once more, his expression resolute. “In that case, our deal has ended.”

  “Yes.”

  The alarm pulsed like a siren, reminding me how precious time was. As much of a looker he was, I really didn’t have time for useless conversation.

  He raised his stake and pointed it directly at me, and all words got stuck in my throat.

  “Izella Pristin, as a vampire hunter, I can’t allow you free rein in Hunter Academy. As a descendant of Jayson Duncan, I can’t let you damage his home or take anything from it.” A vortex of light swirled around his stake, casting his face in flickers of light and shadow. His hold on his stake was firm and confident.

  Way to shoot myself in the foot. I had taught him a spell to lead me to the cottage, and now he was my first obstacle.

  I faced him directly and narrowed my eyes. “Rune Duncan, I give you one last chance to leave here.”

  He replied by slashing his stake. Blue light rippled across the air. I leaped out of its reach but not before its tail whipped my arm. It hurt like hell. I rolled on the ground to break my fall. In a single, smooth motion, I swiped him off his feet and pinned his chest down with my foot.

  The glow of his stake danced across his face. Looking down at him from this angle, the similarity between him and Jayson was more pronounced. For a moment, stars realigned and time traveled backward, and it was Jayson staring at me.

  Rune hurled me to the ground and locked my arms down with his hands. A particularly hollow feeling settled in my heart. He was like Jayson in more than just looks. Both had hunted me down to eliminate me. Neither would think twice of plunging their stakes into my chest. They were saviors to the human race, but they were vampires’ bane.

  I lifted my head and bit his neck so hard that I drew blood despite my lack of fangs. All the years of love and hatred, hope and heartbreak sank into this single bite. I’d been a fool for two centuries, pining for a man I could never have. Even when his body lay in the grave and time eroded the world I knew, I still couldn’t let him go. He was like poison, disintegrating my body and eating away my will. He was like drugs, utterly irresistible but detrimental to my health.

  No more! Two centuries of my life was enough to pay for a foolish mistake. Jayson and Rune would show me no mercy. They were vampire hunters, and I was only their prey.

  I thrust Rune back and threw him against the web. The most delicious blood rolled down my chin. I wiped it off and licked my finger.

  Rune hit the web and bounced off it, landing on one knee with a hand on the ground. In the next heartbeat, he attacked me, his movements so fast that I could barely keep up.

  My body reacted with instinct, blocking his attacks and returning the favor. A thought tugged at the edge of my mind. Every time I started to remember it, he distracted me. I kicked him back and increased the distance between us.

  There! I remembered. He hit the web and didn’t even grimace. He wasn’t affected at all by the red light that had practically fried me.

  The alarm died down, but a sense of foreboding made me antsy. I thought I heard noises, voices. They were coming. The students, the academy staff, Tessa, and probably everyone else.

  I licked the blood on my lips, and some strength seeped back into me.

  Rune slashed his stake across my waist. I threw him against the web. The web caved in but didn’t break. I seized his neck and slammed him in further. The threads stretched until they became taut strings, so thin that they were prac
tically invisible, but still, they didn’t break.

  Some parts of my body touched the web, and the pain brought tears to my eyes. My body screamed for me to release. Only my will kept me from letting go. I’d done so much to get here. I couldn’t turn back. If I did, all the suffering would be for naught. I would fail, and if Blake or Celtric succeeded afterward, it would be that much worse.

  Izella Pristin didn’t do failure. I couldn’t let my sire down. He had chosen me out of millions of humans to be his descendant, and I had to prove to him he made the right choice.

  Rune grabbed my wrist. His fingers dug into my skin. I used all my strength to keep him where he was, but he tore my hand off his neck. He kicked me off him. I stumbled back a couple step before planting my foot on his abdomen, pushing him back into the web.

  He drew back his stake, and my stomach sunk. I couldn’t release my foot because I was so close. The threads of the web were now splitting. In some areas, the red light had thinned so much that it almost broke. But my arms were too far out of reach. He could bore holes into my leg before I could stop him. His magic could travel throughout my body and do some critical damages.

  Somehow, he didn’t.

  The strings broke. As if the power had just gone out, the red light flickered and disappeared. That was what I had wanted, yet when it happened, I was standing there like a person who’d lost her head.

  The crackling of leaves in the distance woke me. My enemies were close. I couldn’t afford to stare at Rune like an idiot.

  I dove into the hole Rune had made and threw the intact portions of the web at him. The next moment, I was running as fast as I could underneath the fallen web.

  The porch groaned as I breezed across it. The door was made of thin panels of wood. Although it was locked, I had no problem breaking in.

  There weren’t that many things in the tiny cottage. There wasn’t even another door to separate the space into rooms. Everything was laid out before me: the worn cot in the corner, the ring of stones underneath a cauldron in the center, and the one-person table against the wall.

  I dragged the table to the entrance and anchored it to the door. Someone pounded against the door. He could’ve barged in. The weight of the table and door wasn’t nearly enough to hold a hunter back, but he didn’t. I guess Jayson’s cottage had some sort of historical value to the hunters.

  I, on the other hand, wanted to burn the cottage into ashes. Jayson was dead. He no longer existed, and I didn’t need another place to remind me of him.

  A lump formed in the back of my throat. I pushed it down and began my search.

  I rummaged through the trunks and the stuff heaped in the corner. Clothes. Containers. Stakes! A lot of stakes.

  They looked no different than sharpened wood posts darkened by age and use. A few of them had holes bored by insects. I shifted through them, but none seemed special. Rune’s stake looked more like the ensorced stake than any of these.

  Nevertheless, I yanked out a piece of cloth and piled all the stakes into it. A shadow flashed in one of the windows, and I quickly tied up the cloth and swung it over my shoulder.

  I saw him now. It was Rune. He stuck his upper body inside and pulled himself in. I grabbed the iron cauldron and threw it at him to buy time.

  I was halfway to the door when something creaked near my foot. Every part of the flooring groaned, but this was different. I stomped at the floor and heard a hollow sound.

  Rune’s foot perched on the windowsill. At any minute, he would be in. But I couldn’t resist bending down and knocking on the panel of wood.

  It did sound hollow.

  I slammed my fist into the floor, and the wood splintered into pieces. Inside the crevice lay a book. I didn’t have time to examine the book. But it must be important if it was so well hidden, so I threw it into my makeshift sack and dashed for the door.

  “Izella, you can’t take anything from here.” Rune jumped into the cottage and grabbed my shoulder.

  I swung the table against him and yanked open the door. When I stepped onto the porch, I stopped dead in my tracks.

  Sixteen

  Izella

  The web was removed from the clearing, replaced by hunters, a lot of them. They surrounded the cottage on all sides, their weapons drawn and their gazes locked on me with the same intensity as predators looked at their preys.

  I took a couple steps toward them to see them better.

  “Julia.” Tessa pushed herself to the head of the group. “Explain why you are here.”

  “She’s Izella Pristin.” The instructor with the old-fashioned glasses and hooked nose grabbed Tessa’s shoulder to hold her back.

  “She is my apprentice. I’ve known her for—”

  “Tessa, she’s Izella Pristin, the descendant known for her talent in command,” the instructor said with a firm voice. “I saw her before. I know her. She must have hypnotized you.”

  Tessa’s eyes grew wide. A confusion of emotions played on her face. Rage at being tricked, doubt at Hooked Nose’s words, and guilt because she brought me in. “Izella Pristin was a vampire. She couldn’t walk past the academy gate.”

  The head of the group was an elderly man with a salt and pepper beard and haywire gray hair. “Izella Pristin, do you mind enlightening us as to how you did it?”

  Out of everyone here, he seemed the most relaxed, as if he knew I couldn’t escape and I was as good as dead.

  I walked down the couple steps until I was standing just a few meters from him. The younger hunters around him stumbled back at my approach, like I was a monster who could bite off their heads without notice.

  My heart settled down and the tension in my body unknotted. It was not because I was safe—far from it—but because there was no use worrying.

  I might die here today, but it didn’t mean I would go down without a fight.

  “You are the headmaster of Hunter Academy, am I right?” I asked the elderly man.

  “Correct,” he said.

  “Good.” One second, I was smiling at him. The next, I snatched a hunter’s dagger, pivoted, and slashed at the headmaster.

  Four hunters jumped at me, dragging me away from him. I lashed out with my weapon, slashing through their flesh and jabbing holes in their bodies. If I had time, I would have loved to suck them dry and replenish my quickly depleted energy.

  Then two more hunters surrounded me. Twelve hands, six weapons, hungry for my blood. I only had two hands, so when I engaged two of the hunters, the other four drove stakes into my body.

  I knocked one hunter unconscious and kicked another away. Splatters of blood flew everywhere. I wasn’t sure how much was mine and how much was theirs. Sweat dripped into my eyes, temporarily blinding me, but I didn’t stop, not when I was so tired I could drop down right then and there, not when my limbs felt weak and numb from overexertion. My body was on autopilot, reacting to attacks and destroying everything in my way.

  Another stake stabbed into my body. This time, it pierced through my shoulder and came out clean on the other side. Pain. So much pain. In the corner of my now blurry vision, I thought I heard Rune. He was saying something and trying to reach me, but Brydon seized his shoulders.

  Damn them!

  I snatched a hunter’s wrist and twisted it until I heard a satisfying snap. Someone hooked an arm around my neck and squeezed. I tried to claw free, but my hands lacked strength.

  The bulging biceps felt like iron strangling my throat. Black dots blotted out parts of my vision, and I thought I saw Rune dashing toward me.

  The arm squeezed harder. A stake appeared near my chest. The hand holding onto the stake yanked back, then it thrust.

  The pain never came. The arm around my neck loosened, and the hunter behind me dropped to the ground in a thud. I fell with him. When I opened my eyes, I saw someone standing over me, his hand covered in blood.

  The sun had set and I couldn’t see his face clearly. I thought he was Rune—Rune was the last person I saw running toward me�
�but when my vision refocused, I realized it wasn’t.

  I’d never seen him before. At this angle, he towered over me like a god with his short amber hair and a model’s face. Everything about him was perfect. His body was lean but not bulging, his stance confident but not arrogant, and he commanded attention without saying a single word.

  The only thing marring his perfection was the hand coated in a layer of blood. I glanced behind me and noticed a gaping hole in the chest of the hunter who strangled me.

  “Izella Pristin.” He held out his clean hand.

  I looked at the perfectly sculptured hand that should belong on a musical instrument. Normally, I wouldn’t accept anyone’s help, but I couldn’t deny I needed help right now, so I took his hand and allowed him to pull me up. At the point when our bodies almost touched, he whispered in my ear, “I’ll distract everyone. You run for the gate. Reinforcement is outside.”

  The moment I stood without his help, he was gone from my side. He took my place as the center of all the hunters’ attention and the subject of their attacks. I wanted to join him, but I knew I was only a liability now.

  Soon. I looked up at the sky. Time was ticking away. The third day was almost over. Soon, I would be myself.

  Everyone’s attention was on the stranger who engaged all the hunters in the clearing. I looked at him one last time before I spun around and dashed out of the forest. No one saw me leave except for Rune. For some reason, he didn’t stop me.

  I tore past the trees and the bushes, straight for the gate. The sun had set. I didn’t know how much time I had left in this almost human form. The scratches on my legs and arms had started to heal. Strength seeped back into my limbs. I could almost feel the prickle of my fangs on my tongue. Then I saw the gate, a plain thing of iron and rust standing guard in front of Hunter Academy. It was already open. I hesitated for a moment before I burst through.

  Time stopped the moment I crossed the threshold. My breath got stuck in my throat. The gate hummed louder than the time I entered it. The section of the gate closest to me lit up, burning red as if it had been heated in fire. Just before the entire gate scorched me alive, I leaped through and landed on one knee on the other side.