Rival Love (The Blue Falls Series Book 1)

by Wilson, Amelia

  “M… mercy, Avice, please.”

  The last thing Yarra saw in her vision was Avice rushing towards the man in breakneck speed. And then all was gone after that.

  Yarra kept her eyes closed as the vision evaporated away in her mind. She did not flinch when a cold, clammy hand gripped at her wrist. When she opened her eyes, Avice was sitting next to her with a subdued look on his face.

  “H… how did you get in?” Yarra whispered sharply, looking at the other passengers. None of them had noticed nor even cared that Avice had somehow rematerialized within a moving bus.

  “You do know that we can fly and move through partially permeable objects, don’t you?” He smiled, pointing at a small crack in the window just two seats away.

  Yarra gave out a small laugh. Vampires were gifted with different abilities, each unique to the individual; very rare was it for one to have all possible. For Avice, he was blessed with the power of flight, combat, healing factors, and relative invisibility. He could also render his skin fully permeable to lightwaves, making him invisible in the process.

  “You killed them,” Yarra said in a matter of fact tone. She glanced at his clothes. Other than the slight dampness of his shirt from sweat, there was nothing else to show that he had been embroiled in a fight for his life. There was a small nick to his wrist which was healing at a super-human rate. She watched interestedly as the skin stitched itself back up as though with an invisible needle and thread.

  “I had to,” Avice said, massaging his temples. “If I didn’t, they would have informed mother of our destination.”

  Though the tone of his voice did not betray the sadness in his heart, Yarra knew that Avice regretted killing his former clan members. It was not ingrained within him to use violence, but desperate times called for desperate measures.

  “I’m sorry you had to do that,” Yarra offered. Though a part of her was ecstatic at the length that Avice would go to protect her, there was a faint, pervading guilt within her too. It was because of her, that Avice was deemed a traitor to his clan.

  Avice did not reply, choosing instead to rest his head on her shoulder as the bus moved towards the airport.

  Chapter-2

  Escape

  Unfortunately for them, the airport was also littered with members of the Keepers of the Blade. Having to rely heavily on their disguises, Avice pulled down his beanie hat as far as it would go to cover his now long locks of rusted hair as they carried the simple luggage with them given by Nainoru. Yarra pulled the scarf closer around her neck.

  “No Scent Sensors around here,” Avice mouthed to her discreetly. He was referring to the vampires who had the ability to smell a particular person’s scent from over a mile away. Having killed one of them, Avice was struck by an idea. He had pilfered the ambushers’ personal belongings which were now on him and Yarra.

  Yarra reluctantly wore Mark’s wristwatch, and Avice had on Domlen’s beanie. The amalgamation of one’s scent with another could help throw their pursuers off for a little bit.

  The couple walked within a large group of people, which helped to keep their scent diluted. Even if there were Scent Sensors around the airport, they would have had a hard time trying to triangulate the couple’s exact position.

  “Look,” Avice pointed out discreetly through his overcoat.

  Just fifty feet away was the unmistakable sight of Alicia Selleck, walking through the crowd with her husband, Jared. The jaw on Avice’s face tightened at the sight of his parents. She was unsure of how he would react, but she needn’t have worried for he just continued walking in the opposite direction.

  Alicia and Jared were moving around the airport floor with a nonchalant pretense, looking around the place as visitors to a new town might. Occasionally, a man or woman would approach Alicia to say a few words to her before walking away. Yarra knew that these were her subordinates, reporting to her at very specific intervals.

  “I’m quite surprised that mom is here. Domlen and Mark would have probably warned her of our arrival before they ambushed us earlier.”

  Yarra could only nod, too nervous to speak. So far, none of the Keepers of the Blade had seen through their simple disguises. With a little bit of makeup from Nainoru, Yarra had to admit that she looked different. The shadows accentuating her cheekbones made her look slightly older than she really was.

  Avice was a completely different person with the beanie on his head, that was failing to cover his long, rusty hair.

  Holding on to his hand, she let him lead her to the lower floor of the airport, away from the departure lane. An odd sensation rose within her. How were they to travel to England without plane tickets and passports? As they moved with a smaller crowd, Yarra could see a couple of eyes looking in their direction.

  “Shit, they have Scent Sensors in this part of the airport,” he said, still keeping themselves adhered to a group of twenty or so people who were part of a tour. None of them seemed to neither mind or care that two strangers were following their group. By the sound of their accents, they seemed to be from Eastern Europe, though he could not say for sure.

  Yarra looked up. Leaning against the metal railing one floor above them, was a vampire who she knew was third-in-command to Alicia, a young woman by the name of Tess. She too, had pale skin, though for her, it made her look more haunting than it did deathly. Her cheeks were lightly rouged, and her lips were delicately painted with a subtle tinge of red. She looked unassuming. Which was the point.

  Twice, she felt Tess’ eyes wash upon her, paired with a raising of one fine eyebrow. She prayed that her scent would be masked within the group.

  “Avice,” Yarra mouthed as they continued walking. “I think the lady above suspects something.”

  Her love gave the slightest of nods and went straight into action. Reaching into the luggage bag, he pulled out one of Yarra’s old college shirts, along with a pair of his briefs – he had prepared for such an event. They retained a scent of its owner, having been worn countless times. Without anyone noticing but his mate, he wedged the articles of clothing in a stranger’s luggage.

  The man was too busy pointing out something to his friends to notice what Avice had done. With a quick maneuver, he grabbed hold of her hand and pulled her apart from the group, walking into another group of people who were gabbing away excitedly in Chinese as they passed at the right time. The ruse worked. Tess continued to pay the group of Eastern Europeans more attention, and had not noticed that Avice and Yarra had somehow slipped away.

  “That was close,” Yarra sighed with relief.

  “It will not last long. Our scent on the clothes will wear out within minutes.”

  As they continued walking in the airport, Avice secretly placed more of their clothing on other passengers’ trolleys to allow their scents to be diluted in various parts of the airport. It achieved the desired effect, for she looked back to where Alicia was standing. She could see Avice’s mother having a frustrated look on her face as Tess spoke up, perhaps admitting that she had tracked the clothes but with no success to show for it.

  “How are we going to get tickets?” Yarra asked. She did not remember him packing any money. If he used his credit card, there was a chance it would rouse Alicia’s suspicion even further, as well as leaving an obvious paper trail. For all of those sent after them earlier having carried swords, the vampires were not above using technology when it was convenient.

  “Tickets?” Avice raised his eyebrows and smiled in spite of the situation that they were in. “You are going to learn how we vampires travel in style without paying.”

  To her amazement, Avice led them down into the place where the bags were being pushed by the conveyor belt into an adjoining space out of the building. A security guard was quick to stop them with a curious, but also annoyed look on his face.

  “Get out of here,” he said in a gruff voice, patting the gun on his holster.

  Avice did not budge, but instead snapped his finger at the six-foot-four man. She
watched as the security personnel’s eyes slide out of focus as though he had a lazy eye, before orienting itself back to normal. To her surprise, the man’s scowl vanished, and was replaced instead with a warm smile nestled within his thick beard.

  “Right this way,” he said in a tone of voice that was far too sweet for his built and demeanor to be entirely natural. Without pausing, he pressed his access card against the panel, and the door slid open.

  “What…?” Yarra wanted to ask.

  “Charm,” Avice explained. “Kind of like hypnosis. It renders them susceptible to be commanded to do our bidding.”

  “Did you do that to make me fall in love with you?” Yarra asked jokingly as the security guard escorted them through a noisy lane underneath all of the conveyor belts.

  “Baby, no amount of hypnosis can make you fall in love with me. I had to work hard for that,” he grinned.

  None of the other airport personnel seemed to care that a man was ushering two strange looking people around, probably assuming that a small tour of the place was being conducted for one reason or another. Either way, his badge and presence seemed enough to stave off any questions. The guard led them out of the airport building into the tarmac area where the planes were waiting, parked in a line. Noisy and windy as it was, Yarra found herself focused on the task at hand.

  “Which plane?”

  Her mind burst into a flurry of ideas and visions. She saw them in all her visions, stepping into each plane, flying to all parts of the world. Some flew to Turkey, others to Hong Kong, one to Japan, another to Washington D.C., another to California, and one blue plane with yellow wingtips heading straight for England. The visions folded in and out of one another, and Yarra knew then which plane to choose.

  When she returned to the tarmac – in mind, as well as in body-, she pointed out to the plane the second furthest away from where they stood.

  “That one,” she said. He nodded. The security guard who had chaperoned them now stood with a dazed look on his face, clearly not paying attention to what the couple was saying. With another snap of his finger, Avice whispered something in a language that Yarra did not quite understand or hear clearly.

  The man nodded and proceeded to bring them to said aircraft, where a few workers were hauling luggage up into the belly of the plane. With another snap of his finger, Avice ordered the guard away, to which he proceeded to walk off with a slight waddle. The plane was scheduled to fly in the next half an hour, according to the notice on the nearby screen. Flight attendants greeted the passengers as they entered.

  Knowing full well that they had skipped the line for passport checks and such, Yarra and Avice were not worried, for the flight attendants would not check their tickets any longer. All they had to do was go into the plane and sit at any unoccupied seats.

  “Excuse me sir,” a flight attendant came up to them with a paper in her hand. From the corner of Yarra’s eyes, she could see the lady holding a piece of flight document, showing which seats would be occupied. “Is this your seat?” she asked politely.

  “Yes,” Avice replied confidently.

  “But, according to our charts, these seats are to be vacant,” she protested mildly. “May I see your tickets?”

  Avice reached into his pocket and pulled out a blank piece of paper. As he did so, he snapped his fingers again and whispered. Just like how the security guard’s eyes had vibrated in a spot and slid out of focus for a second, so did hers too. She looked at the blank piece of paper, smiled and bowed slightly.

  “I am so sorry, Mr. Avice Selleck, and Miss Yarra Davis,” she apologized profusely. “Clearly we were not updated about the last minute changes.”

  “No problem,” Avice beamed. “These things happen.”

  The flight attendant smiled graciously at Avice’s easy manner. She walked away, but not before promising to come back with two glasses of wine as a means for saying sorry.

  “Nifty trick,” Yarra said as the flight attendant walked off. “Do you always hypnotize everyone?”

  Avice shook his head. “It is something that mum always said separated us from humans. Though she believed in not killing them, she always had no qualms in manipulating them. It was one of the first abilities she passed on to me.”

  “How come you never told me?” Yarra asked, genuinely curious. Such ability would make Avice powerful in the eyes of many humans. He would be able to manipulate anyone, even the President if he had such a whim.

  “It isn’t a power I’m proud of, baby. I don’t believe that humans should be put into a hypnotic stupor just for our own pleasure,” he admitted. “Even doing so with the security guard and the flight attendant makes me feel guilty. But it was necessary.”

  Yarra nodded. The conversation came to a stop as the plane began easing off its parking spot, and heading into the tarmac for takeoff. For now, they had escaped Alicia and her clan, if only barely. When the clan mother realized this, they would be high up in the air, heading for England.

  She smiled and eased her head to rest against Avice’s shoulder. At least they would not be attacked for the next ten hours or so.

  *

  The slight turbulence of the plane woke her up. She found Avice staring out of the window. He had left his tray of food untouched, a sign that he was too deep in thought. Avice was usually a voracious eater, able to eat even the most disgusting of foods. The bland chicken meal laid out in front of him remained in pristine condition, with its foil still wrapped.

  Yarra stretched in her seat. In front of them were a couple travelling with their kids, who could not keep their voices down. Disgruntled, she turned to him.

  “You couldn’t have asked the attendants to give us first class seats?”

  Avice sighed heavily. “It isn’t a power to suit our convenience,” he reminded her. “We only use it when the situation calls for it.”

  Yarra leaned back against her seat and tried to tune out the voices of the children. She found it difficult to concentrate whenever there were erroneous sounds contributing to the din around her. The kids’ constant yelps and shouts coupled with the background roar of the plane’s engines made it almost impossible to focus on her visions.

  “Any interesting dreams?” Avice leaned in to kiss her on the cheek.

  It was somewhat cute way of his trying to ask whether she had had a vision of some sort while sleeping. Shaking her head, she playfully nudged him on the arms.

  “Dreams only come true when we are in first class, Avice,” she said, making him snicker. But her hands rested on her flat belly every time he asked that question now. Her dreams showed nothing but the two of them in a small home in the countryside somewhere, with kids running around. A sort of eternal happiness. Yarra wondered to herself if what had just transpired was a vision – a flash of clairvoyance, or if it was a dream – a random projection of her subconscious.

  Putting herself too much into precognitive state made her confused. It blurred the line between fantasy and reality. What if the images she saw in her mind, of them being together forever, was just a mere fantastical extrapolation of her deepest wishes? Would it come true just because she saw it happening in her mind?

  Her inner monologue was put to rest when the head of the kid in front of them came peeking from over the seat. Avice and Yarra could hear his tired mother chastising the boy for the umpteenth time. Instead, the boy ignored her and proceeded to wave at them both.

  Though Yarra was annoyed by the child, she could not help but wave back. The child giggled as though he was playing a game of hide-and-seek with them and vanished by going beyond their line of vision. His mother gave out another groan as the seat shook.

  “Quite a handful,” Avice said silently. “Imagine us having a little monster like that one day.”

  It was a question that was prodding in Yarra’s head since they had made love the night before. She knew, from her vision, that they had definitely conceived a child from that union.

  “If we did have a child, would it
take after you? In more ways than one?” she smiled, referring to his vampire traits.

  Avice considered the question with a bite of his lower lip. “The gene is extremely dominant, so yeah, it definitely will,” he answered, gazing lovingly into her eyes. Suddenly, he placed his hand atop of hers which was rested on her belly and rubbed at it. “I can’t wait for us to have a kid one day.”

  Yarra smiled inwardly. “I can’t wait too.” She loved Avice, but knew that this needed to be kept a secret. For now, at least. If she revealed that she could possibly be pregnant – even if she herself was certain-, then he might put a stop to their entire trip to the Oracle’s hometown.

  But the urge to tell him about her vision of their child was so great, and Yarra could not trust her own will. Instead, she decided to change the topic to save blurting it out.