Alistair
When all of the debris settled, Leslie and Drac had vanished into thin air, leaving the room appearing like a bomb had exploded. The blast area left behind charred area rugs and hardwood flooring; flames danced on the coffee table that held the antipasto platter. Despite the magic produced in the apartment, where both Rose’s force field and Alistair’s wings hadn’t been, the damage wasn’t something that could so easily be wiped away. The windows had blown out, and the curtains were singed. Approaching sirens blared. It took a moment for the paralyzing shock to morph into pandemonium.
Zola approached him. “My lord, I apologize as I was unaware that a tokoloshe was in the area. Maybe that would explain more of the missing in the city,” she said aloud. “But he is not a good omen for you or these people here. Someone summoned and sent him to your betrothed.”
“She’s not my betrothed.” The fact that this was the first thing out of his mouth gave him pause. Why did he want the world to know he and Leslie weren’t together? Because how could he then explain her being bitten by another in front of them. A bite exchanged had meaning, and although he hoped it saved Leslie’s second life, it also hurt to know he couldn’t stop this snowball that was growing ever larger.
Zola quirked an eyebrow. “Then this is even more unfathomable. Usually, a tokoloshe is not one that would seek out to scare a new vampire. They are mischievous, but this tonight almost speaks to one under the maleficent magic of an even more powerful hand. Didn’t you see how my staff broke in three? The Great staff was gifted to me…” She trailed off, staring at the three pieces that rested on the floor.
Hopefully, the excuse of a gas line explosion would resonate with all involved. It was his only possible explanation.
Alistair turned to Beau. “You deal with the police. Killian, take care of Zola. I’ll handle Claudine.” He turned his attention to the screaming woman; her hands over her ears, tears racing down her face. This wasn’t going to be as easy to deal with as he’d thought. “Rose, you will handle the reframing and see Claudine to Beau’s sedan. Things are too dangerous here to remain.”
Everyone nodded after his instructions, and he moved over to Claudine. “You know, she is having a hard time with all of this magic stuff,” Gran said, and took a seat on the edge of the sofa. “Even I’m having a problem. Look at this place. We can’t stay here. But I also can’t leave.”
“We shall make it so that you can stay with us.” Leslie would not willingly leave this place without her Gran, and he knew that even without speaking to her.
“Well, if that’s the case, you’ll need to grab a couple of things to make that possible.”
Alistair tried to reach out to Leslie but received nothing back. Worry scratched him, but the room of people had to be mind looped.
“And what would that include?” he asked.
“Leslie has a go-bag in her closet, but I also need you to grab the kitchen sink. I’m tied to this place without it.”
“Uh?”
“It’s the strangest thing, but you know the saying, everything and the kitchen sink? Well, it was created for entities like me. It’s true, you know. The heart of a home is the kitchen.”
“You want me to rip out the kitchen sink?”
Gran simply nodded and floated back toward Leslie’s bedroom, and he trailed behind her.
Leslie’s room wasn’t quite what he expected. He’d expected her to be more modern in her taste, but instead, heavy European-styled antique furniture dominated the navy wallpapered room which was accented only with a wall of herringboned shiplap. A yellowish-white light filtered in through her closed blinds from the street.
In the corner, he noticed her desk. It definitely captured her creative mind—he smiled. Thereon was scattered papers, books which were cracked open, and others with colorful bookmarks tucked in to mark a page. Curious, he saw that she was reading up on Norse mythology. It was good that she was taking this so seriously. Tucked on the corner of her desk, he saw a golden statuette cheerleading trophy, and behind it, a certificate of completion for a Citizen’s Police Academy, alongside a collage of pictures that seemed to show things she’d done that had to do with her books if the captured “Dream big, Leslie” sign had anything to say about it. The collage included images of her at book signings, holding swords, throwing hatchets; and newspaper clippings from her most recently making a popular bestselling lists in the book charts.
“Find anything interesting?” Gran asked him over his shoulder. “Leslie does it all to make her books as accurate as she can. I’ll never forget how she returned home after hatchet throwing, talking about how her wrists hurt from the activity. She said if she’d never done it, she’d never have known that such could cause a problem; she also learned the need to duck because those things could bounce if they didn’t stick the landing.”
“Did she go back afterward?”
“Yes, she wanted to make sure she could make them stick.”
Gran’s words were filled with a pride he understood about Leslie. She didn’t half-ass anything, not even research for what might just be one line in the whole book.
“Just a little curious.”
“Yes, my granddaughter has worked hard to get where she is, and I hope you realize what that means. Don’t ask her to give it all up for a future she never wanted.”
Alistair remained silent, taking in all these new pieces of information. How did all of this align with the Leslie he knew?
It meant that she had much innate talent; some training even in things that could help her adjust to this new life. That was a good starting point.
He noticed the colorful bouquet on her desk and frowned. “Who sent her flowers?”
“Mmhm, you noticed them, too? That’s the thing about a good woman. If a man waits too long to claim her, she might just find someone else.”
“What?”
“No, it’s all shiz and giggles. Her father set up an account years ago, almost like a grant to the local flower store, and part of his estate’s responsibility is to send her flowers on her birthday. You should have seen her face when they arrived. It was like he’d never died, almost.” She pointed to the closet. “So, you see that huge duffel there, you need to get that, and then those five other suitcases there, the laptop off of her desk, along with the picture of her family off of the wall, her pillow and—”
“Whoa, I’m sure she doesn’t need all of this to stay out of her house for a couple of days.”
“Then you really need to get to know her. She’s a modern woman, and you can’t expect her to live without her laptop or phone off the charger. I don’t think she needs sanitary napkins anymore. Vampires don’t have menstrual cycles, do they?”
Alistair felt his face flush, turned on his heel, and headed straight to the kitchen. The main thing to get was the kitchen sink.
He dug into his pocket for the blasted cell phone. “Killian, once you have the car, come up here and give me a hand. Looks like for Leslie and her Gran to leave, we’ll have to take half of the apartment with us.”
“You know, I’ve heard that there are even special things about having your own towels with you, too,” Gran called out. “If you’re in a hotel, who knows if they clean those towels or their sheets. Yep, Alistair, you need to grab those, too.”
He piled things up in his arms while pulling a line of suitcases toward the front of the apartment.
“I do hope Leslie is okay,” Gran said.
“She will be fine. She is with a friend who can help.”
“Oh, that dashing duke of a man. I must say. Hopefully, you made sure to stake your claim because you might just be getting replaced, and no harm or foul, but no woman wants to feel like a freaking option. I’ve seen the way you’re torn between Rose and Leslie. You’re pitting them against each other.” She crossed her arms and stared at him, unblinking. “It will serve you right if you wind up all alone. I’d rather my granddaughter find happiness. Yes, you might have saved her, but you are
ruining your chance of having her save you.”
She then turned her back to him, silently ordering him and the kitchen sink he carried to follow her.
Chapter 10
Leslie
“Where are we?” I stood with Drac, and he held me up, my knees still wobbly. The scent of fire was still in my nose, and I couldn’t quite shake the overwhelming question of: Why didn’t we both burn?
Drac lifted my chin, and I noticed we now stood on top of a skyscraper with the howling wolf logo for Charming Industries in big letters. The city of New York rested at my feet, and I didn’t understand. “You have many questions.” He pulled away, crossed his arms behind his back as would an older mentor, and stared out at the twinkling city below us.
If he told me that tonight we were to drink of the city, I wouldn’t have been any more surprised than if he was able to tell me what the hell was going on.
“I have a few.”
“Good. A good mind is what you need to stay alive. This is your city, and you must find a way to protect it, and you need the tools to do that. These attacks that follow you like a bloodhound will soon catch you and end you if you don’t know how to fight back. The power in you that you unknowingly wield, someone will come and take it from you. Ones like you shouldn’t exist.”
“Why do I feel like you didn’t bring me here to show me the view?”
“And you would be correct. Since Alistair wouldn’t enroll you for your own good, well, I will, as ordered by the goddess herself. Scotland is a little too far and a little too late to get you properly started. Charming Industries has the perfect set up, including an internship for supernaturals like you.”
“Uh, I already have a career.”
“Sure, but does it teach you how to work with your gifts—the intricate knowledge needed to continue to wield on command, hand-to-hand combat, and of course, survival skills? I’ve tasted your blood. I know what it means to be sick, and what is in you will slowly kill you if we don’t find a cure. That cure is here.”
“Why are you telling me about this and not Alistair?”
“Alistair would rather you to return to Scotland, but you are slow to comply and look where it got you. Here you will receive the necessary medical treatment and a stipend.”
I turned away. How was it that it was simply expected that I’d give up my life, my independence, to enter this new world that I didn’t understand?
“And that is the point,” Drac said, reading my thoughts. He paused. “Because my venom is in your veins, just as Alistair’s, there is a connection between us.”
My mouth fell open. I couldn’t shake the shock on my face. “Does that mean we are—”
“Fated? No. It simply means that for the time being, we are connected. That of fate is for the Norns to decide, and not the likes of me. Now, back to the issue at hand, you and your family will be relocated to Charming’s compound, where even now, Alistair and his team await your arrival. Once there, your new life can truly begin.”
Everything whirled. There was so much more to deal with. Would that mean my career as a writer, the one I’d bled on the pages for, was, in effect, over?
“You’ll learn the things that all supernaturals of the Order need to survive: hand-to-hand combat, firearms, swordplay.”
In doing research for Highland romance novels, I’d had to visit the firing range, got to throw hatchets, and even took the workshops on writing fight scenes. But I’d be lying if I said there was any muscle memory there, or that when I did those things, it was anything more than just for the novels I was writing.
“How to be noncommittal?” I shrugged.
“That is something your sire surely can teach you. I’m sure Alistair will test you on everything to see what you qualify for and what your specialty might indeed become, and then I’ll take the lead to train you.”
“But why you? Why are you the one to train me instead of Alistair?” I wasn’t going to fall to my knees and wonder about what the boys club decided might be best for me. I also wasn’t going to concern myself with how I was going to get down. “Even more, why did we not burn?” I turned my hands over, searching for some evidence of the flame. How could everything be engulfed and not even a hair on me appeared singed?
“Do you know who I am?”
I turned to him and saw his eyes glowing with a subdued flame. After waiting for a heartbeat, he released a slow whistle and took a seat on the building’s edge.
“You call me Drac, but I am Vlad; many have cursed my name as that of Vlad the Impaler or Vlad, the son of the Dracul, Dracula. You are aware of the myth, no?”
Every book in the last one hundred years that had something to do with vampires came back to the mightiest myth of all. Of course, I knew the popularity of him as a trope. Heck, I’d considered writing vampires under the sea until Maurice damned the idea: “No one wants blood-drinking Mermen, Leslie.” To me, it made sense. If someone could write vampires in space, I could get away with them there. But of course, he as my agent won out. Maybe that was an idea I could put on my to-be-written shelf for when the highland boom was over.
“Please continue,” I said, noticing his hesitation.
“My life before my change was, how do you say, difficult. My father offered my brother and me into the servitude of the brutal Ottoman Empire. Although they still allowed us to learn certain things, it was never forgotten or forgiven that I was of another place. That was not my home. We all make our way, and my brother felt different. I wished only to return to my homeland and take what was mine.
“But that, too, came with a cost. After a while, the cost was something I was willing to pay, and I did.”
What he didn’t say, of course, was that he completely lost his shit and started impaling people, making forests of impaled people. He’d earned that name honestly, as he was nuttier than any squirrel’s harvest.
“And the fire?”
“It was a gift.”
“A gift, like your ending poverty by burning all of the homeless and poor.”
“It was a way to solve the problem.” He shrugged. “This is not about me, but you. The fire came as a result of the Nasnas, the humanoid demon creature who granted an unspoken wish like he knew what I needed before I could ask. Just as I thought that I could endure no more, he scorched me, but I did not burn; he fed me the blood of the long-dead dragon, and my wounds then healed.”
“And the madness?”
“That was part of the process of healing. All I saw was rage for recompense. Without proper guidance, as you start to walk in the darkness, you will feel it, too.”
“Whoa, I can still walk in the daylight?”
He shook his head. “Sorry, child, even my bite has a cost, and with it was your ability to be a daywalker.”
Just like doctors liked their patients to perform a Stress Test, well, the supernatural doctors seemed to like the same.
In a sleek room with glass walls, I ran on a treadmill in Charming’s building, with cords hooked up to me, while Drac sat at a desk on the other side, occasionally looking up.
“Doctor Sethos, the patient’s session will complete in 3…2…1,” alerted the automated voice.
“Thank you, Karnak.” The computer then posted results on the large glass wall, spitting out spikey blue lines, while numbers flashed on the wall, as well as hieroglyphics.
Spying the information, I noticed that the doctor monitored every bit of me—my pulse, which was still there? I thought I was dead. How did a vampire have a pulse? My breathing—the inhalation and exhale count, as well as how my lungs functioned, but also how my wound was healing since Alistair’s blood and Drac’s bite. Even that of digestion, and blood’s color.
The treadmill slowed, and the door swooshed open. In walked the doctor in his white lab coat. A stethoscope hung around his neck. “Charming doesn’t like colors much, huh?” I wheezed, finally coming to a stop.
“You wheeze out of habit, but you are fitter than a horse, my dear,” Sethos
said. He maneuvered his index finger over a touch-screen tablet and glanced back up at me.
I sure didn’t feel fit, but maybe fitness had nothing to do with my emotional level of dealing.
“You walk in an old pattern, not understanding exactly who and what you are,” he continued. “For honesty’s sake, I must admit that, at first, I was quite against the mixture—his lordship’s blood and then Drac’s venom, but I was more than wrong. You see, the dragon’s bite is what sparked your change, creating a hybrid.”
“A dhampir?”
“No, that would be if a human and a vampire had a child, which is rare and possible, but the dragon is almost the pinnacle of the supernatural hierarchy, as it, too, can create, while vampires can only infect. Most vampires are indeed only infected by death, but you, child, have been recreated by it.”
He moved over to the stand before the screen lit up with my driver’s license headshot, and certain details were listed, including my date of birth, weight, height, medical conditions, allergies, and I frowned noting it specified Alistair as my emergency contact.
“You are a daywalker,” he carried on, “but the weapon used against you caused a reversion. If it were not for your humanity, you would have died.”
“It stripped me from being a vampire?”
“No, it changed you into something else. Your blood has always had magic in it, even before Alistair, and that is why you have the sight. However, when the dragon’s blood restored you, it unlocked a door, allowing your beings and essences to fuse. Now, the weapon used had a poison on it, fatal to your kind, and Drac’s venom neutralized it, but it also opened a new door to you.”
“No more walking in the daylight?”
“Only for the time being, until the poison is completely removed from your system. But Drac’s venom has given you something, too: his talent of fire.”
“Whoa.” I bent over and leaned my hands on my upper thighs to catch my breath. All of this information was becoming a lot to accept.”
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