Marked by Courage

by W. J. May

  “That does sound pretty unlucky.” Kallie had tried to make a joke, but she heard her voice echoing lamely in the dark. “Liam?”

  “Yes?”

  “Is it all going to be okay? This secret?” She could see that he wanted to reassure her, and that only made it all worse. “It’s not, is it?” she whispered.

  “I wish I could say yes,” he said simply.

  “And you swear you thought it was the right thing to do?”

  “I swear,” he said seriously. There was no hesitation.

  “Then let’s hope we all make it through this,” Kallie said. She rubbed her face. “I don’t suppose that after that monologue about doing the right thing, you’d be willing to tell me what my mother said the other day?”

  “I…can’t.” When she looked up, Liam had turned away.

  “Oh, crap! Is that the secret? Did she tell you something? Are you keeping her confidence?”

  “Kallie, I can’t tell you.”

  “I’m going home to talk to her.” Kallie shoved the chair away from the desk but Liam blocked her path, desperately.

  “It’s light out,” he told her, shaking his head. “It’s light out, Kallie. You can’t go out there.”

  Kallie squeezed her eyes shut and dropped back into the chair. Her tenuous acceptance of Liam’s words had disappeared entirely into a rising wave of anger. How dare he keep secrets from her? Secrets that were about her? He’d admitted as much.

  “She’s figured out who Petra is. Who I am.” Kallie heard her own voice echoing flatly in the small room.

  “Kallie…”

  “She’s pretending to be sick because she doesn’t want to see me. Because she knows I’m not really her daughter.” Hurt was rising along with the anger.

  “No!” Liam was at Kallie’s side in an instant. “Kallie, even I don’t know what she knows and what she doesn’t. But believe me when I say that Helen is your mother. In her heart, you are her child. Maybe it started as a lie, okay? And maybe she knows and maybe she doesn’t—I really don’t know. But I do know that she thinks of you as her daughter, and I would bet anything, Kallie, anything that, if she ever does learn the truth, she’ll never stop holding you in her heart, as her daughter.”

  The tears came in a rush, and Kallie doubled over with her face in her hands. She was trying desperately to keep from making a noise. It didn’t matter that Liam would know she was crying; she couldn’t keep herself from trying to stay silent. She felt like a little child, trying to hide her hurt and her sadness, because this was a world that preyed on anyone weak.

  When she sat up at last, wiping her face, Liam’s arms fell away from around her and he stepped back. She had been so locked in her own misery that she didn’t even notice him, but he had been there, holding her. Something in her heart warmed slightly as she looked at his face, and she tried to smile. “Do my eyes still puff up when I cry?”

  He laughed at that. “A little,” he admitted. “But you still look lovely.”

  “Thanks, but you don’t need to say that.” Kallie leaned back in the chair and sighed, letting her eyes drift closed. When she heard the buzz of her phone, she grimaced.

  “What is it?” She could feel his curiosity radiating through the air.

  “I’m willing to bet it’s Jeanna and Lisa.” Kallie opened her eyes and looked at him. “Why do you look all funny?”

  “I just can’t get over how pretty your eyes are like that.” He smiled and sat back on the couch. “Sorry. Jeanna and Lisa, your friends?”

  “They want me to go hang out with them.”

  “When this is all over, Kallie, I promise you’ll be able to.”

  “I’m not even sure I want to!” Kallie burst out. “I don’t know what I’d say to them. Liam, it hurt like hell to see my mother for the first time and want to kill her. How am I going to cope with wanting to kill them, too? How am I going to hide that I can’t see them during the day, that we can never hang out…?” She shook her head. “I mean, they always say that you might grow up and leave your high school friends behind, and I was terrified of that while my dad was so sick. Hiding things, worrying…I was so envious that they could just live their lives without worrying about any of the stuff I had to worry about. And now, this is just too much. I’m hoping we grow apart, that way I’ll never have to cut things off. I won’t have to come up with reasons for why I’m always, always going to look like this. I’m already going to watch my mom get old and die. I don’t want to do the same with anybody else.”

  “Wow.” He looked over at her, one corner of his mouth rising. “I’m sorry; I shouldn’t have said what I said. I just thought, maybe you wanted something normal in your life.”

  “I do want something normal,” Kallie whispered. “I just don’t think I have a hope in hell of getting that.”

  “It’s going to work out,” he told her seriously. “I promise you that. Right now it feels like a giant mess, and dealing with your friends is one thing too many, right? But when the rogue Reds are dealt with and things calm down,” he broke off, looking inexplicably guilty, “well, at some point, anyway you’re going to be living a life that seems a little bit normal. And then it’ll just be the same old thing, coming up with a new excuse every time as to why you can only see them after dark.” There was a rueful smile on his face now.

  Kallie managed a laugh. “I guess you’re right. It’ll get better.”

  “It will.” He shifted over on the couch. “Come here for a second?”

  “Why?” Kallie was grinning as she went to sit with him.

  “For this.” He pulled her down, her head nestled on his shoulder, his arm around her. “Comfy?”

  “Yeah.” She smiled and wriggled closer.

  “There. Okay, listen up. I told you I wasn’t as brave as you. That I didn’t know how you’d made this decision. But the truth is that you and I both chose this path for the same reason: the people we love. Kallie, your friends aren’t just a complication. They’re part of what makes you into you. Hold on to that. I’ve seen too many vampires drift away from the world, and they only get more feral as they go.”

  Kallie nodded, but the tension was already leaving her body. She felt like she was drifting, pillowed on Liam’s chest and hearing his voice vibrating beneath her splayed fingers. Her eyes drifted closed, and she only shook her head when her phone buzzed again.

  “Let it go. It’s just them again.”

  “Mm-hmm.” Liam sounded just as lazy as she did.

  This was perfect, Kallie realized. This moment, right here, was perfect. She had been shrinking away from her feelings for both Liam and Caleb. She was heady with desire, and no matter how sweet and seductive those feelings were, that wasn’t her. She wanted love; she wanted something deeper.

  And here, she had it. She could feel the trust flowing between her and Liam and she smiled slightly as she nestled against him. When her phone starting ringing, she hauled herself up with a groan and he laughed.

  “If you don’t answer them they’ll only keep texting.”

  “I know.” But her smile died when she saw that it was Caleb. She accepted the call and frowned at the window as the call connected. The shadows were lengthening; it would be almost entirely dark out now. “Hello?”

  “Thank goodness.” Caleb’s voice was rough. “Kallie, I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

  “What? What is it?”

  “It’s Jeanna and Lisa.” His voice was tight. “I’m so sorry, Kallie. They must have come to see you, only it was getting dark when they got here, and…”

  “What?” Kallie felt the bottom drop out of her stomach.

  “The rogue Reds got them,” Caleb said quietly. “They dragged them off. There were too many of them for me to fight on my own. I tried, I swear I tried, but they’re gone.”

  Chapter 16

  “Where were they taken?” Kallie burst through the door of her house. “Did you see? Did they tell you? If it was to get back at me—”

 
; “They said they’d be in contact.” Caleb’s face was screwed up in misery. She could see the bruises still standing out on his fair skin and his eyes were shadowed. “Kallie, I’m so sorry. I—”

  He broke off as Liam came into the house. The men stared at one another, growls beginning in their throats, and Kallie picked up the nearest object—a plate, she observed belatedly—and hurled it against the wall. At the shattering sound, their attention jerked back to her.

  “Good,” she said flatly. “Listen up. Caleb, you were right. We need allies. That means that at the very least, you need Liam. So—look at me.”

  “Kallie, I can’t just—” He dragged his gaze back to her and tried to calm himself. “I can’t just turn this off.”

  “You need to,” Kallie told him. She knew she was being brutally unfair, but she didn’t care. She couldn’t afford to care right now. “In a few minutes, we are going to rescue my friends. If we don’t, they’re going to die. Even if we save them, these rogue Reds are going to keep coming after me until I figure out who’s controlling them and turn this thing around. I cannot do it without you both. Do you understand me? I can’t throw either of you to the wayside. Not you, and not my father. So you both do whatever the hell you have to do to keep yourselves sane and not attacking each other. You, too,” she added, as her father came up the stairs. “I know you heard that.”

  “Kallie.” Liam’s voice was strangled. “I know that, once, we used not to be bound by this hatred. I know it. But you don’t understand what it’s like. My vision isn’t clear anymore. You know me; you know I don’t kill without reason, but…”

  “Then don’t kill either of them,” Kallie snapped. “Do what you have to do. Breathe. Count to ten.”

  “He’s right, Kallie; this is beyond that.” Her father shook his head. “He needs to leave, or none of the three of us can be held responsible for our behavior.”

  “No!” Kallie knew she was yelling but she didn’t care. “No. I refuse to accept that from you. You spent two years living in a house with two humans and you never bit a single living soul. You dragged yourself through a very literal hell because you refused to give in to your nature and your instincts. Every one of you here has done that. You have made it part of your life’s work not to let innocents get harmed for what you are. You have instincts, and you have minds. Use them.”

  There was a silence. Caleb was white-knuckling the counter. Liam’s fists were clenched so tightly that Kallie worried he would explode. Her father had his hands braced against the frame of the basement door, and she could see the tension as he fought the urge to launch himself across the room at Liam.

  “Nobody move,” Kallie said softly. She turned her back on Caleb and her father and looked into Liam’s eyes. “Liam, listen to me. Sometime, probably during the war, some magic was done that made Reds and Blues mortal enemies. I need you not to give into that. That magic, that war, allowed vampires to become divided. You’ve seen how my father raised me. You’ve seen that Caleb has helped me. You know that they’re both good people. Please, hold yourself back.”

  He swallowed hard and managed a nod, and Kallie squeezed his arm before moving on to Caleb.

  “Caleb, you were the one who convinced me that this was necessary. Do you see? You asked me if I could get us the Blues as our allies. Soon they will be. But I need you to understand that no matter the magic that’s been cast on you, Liam is your ally. I need you to push away the instinct telling you to hurt him. That will only weaken us when it comes time to fight.”

  He nodded jerkily, his eyes still locked on Liam.

  “He’s saved your life,” he whispered harshly. “I’ll do what I can for that, if nothing else.”

  Kallie nodded. It was enough. She went to her father last, her lips pressed together guiltily. She knew what she was asking of him.

  “You didn’t want me to get mixed up in this,” she said finally.

  “No,” he told her, shaking his head. “And yet every time I turn around, you’re deeper into this mess.”

  “The more I think of it,” Kallie admitted quietly, “I’m beginning to think that this is fated somehow.”

  “Kallie…”

  “I know it’s crazy.” Hearing the words out loud, they did sound crazy. There was also a sense of rightness. “But everything’s fallen into place. The Reds and the Blues once had an empire, and it fell into ruin. Now no one rules the vampires. They prey on innocents. And now here I am: a Hybrid; proof that the Blues and the Reds aren’t as different as they claim. I’m Petra’s daughter, for good or ill. Fixing this seems like what I’m supposed to do.”

  He said nothing, swallowing and looking away from her.

  “So can you accept my allies? Can you accept that the Blue blood in my veins is there because of Liam, and that he’s saved my life more than once?”

  Her father trembled. She could see the tumult of possessive, territorial feelings running through his body. This was his nest, his house. His mate slept upstairs, defenseless and ill. And there was a Blue in his house, something his magic-warped instincts told him must be an attack. But at last he breathed out slowly and looked up to meet Liam’s eyes. He nodded.

  “Until this is over,” he told Liam, “I won’t hurt you or yours.”

  “I swear the same,” Liam said simply. He managed a smile. “It’s easier for me, I think.”

  “How?” Kallie asked him. She looked over with a frown.

  “Petra,” he said simply.

  Kallie swallowed. She had considered that, but only in a glancing way. Now she realized that she would set her father up against his true wife, and her maker against the woman who had created him anew as a day- walker. She looked at them both, but they nodded resolutely.

  “If Petra is behind the rogue Reds now,” Caleb said quietly, “then she is no longer a friend to us. Embracing magic that dark is a sign that we can’t trust her anymore. If you can bear to go against her, we’ll stand with you.”

  “Good.” Kallie’s lips were numb, but she forced the word out anyway. She took a deep breath and considered. “Okay, we need to figure this out. I haven’t…”

  But her phone buzzed even as she spoke. She swallowed, looking around at her allies as she pulled the phone out of her pocket. When she saw the picture, she nearly gagged. The phone went clattering across the floor and Liam and Caleb moved for it at the same moment. She only vaguely saw them move cautiously closer to one another, shaking with fighting instinct as they looked at the picture. Both of them closed their eyes.

  Jeanna and Lisa hadn’t been turned, and they hadn’t been killed, but the vampires had clearly had had their fun. Cuts and bruises bloomed on their skin, and both of them were bound and unconscious.

  “Damn it,” Kallie whispered. “No one’s going to believe them, and they’ll live their whole lives with people thinking—”

  “Not important.” Her father’s voice was firm. “Where are they? First, we get them back. Then we worry about the rest of it.”

  He was right. Kallie nodded and looked at her phone again as Caleb handed it over.

  “They’re at Red Dragon.”

  “Then that’s where we’ll go.” Her father looked up at the ceiling. “Your mother’s still sleeping, I think. She hasn’t let me in.” A smile touched his mouth. “She said that with my sense of smell, she didn’t want me smelling her stomach flu.”

  “Oh, gross.” Kallie shook her head, laughing. “But I should go—”

  “She knows not to open the door to anyone,” Liam broke in. “Right?”

  “Yeah.” Kallie looked at him curiously.

  “Then let’s give her privacy,” he said tightly.

  Kallie stared at him, wary, but something in his eyes told her that he wasn’t ready to give up the secret yet. She wondered if he really thought she was so ill-mannered as to burst in on an ill woman and ask her about her secrets, and then sighed at herself. She hadn’t exactly proved to be a model of discretion and patience.

&
nbsp; “Let’s go,” she said quietly.

  “Wait just a second.” Her father held out his hands. “First, it’s going to be okay when we’re all going after the rogue Reds, but I don’t think we’re going to have much luck all being in the same car together.” Liam and Caleb nodded seriously. “And how do we figure out who’s an enemy and who’s not?”

  “We may have to fight all of them,” Caleb said with a grimace. “I’ve been thinking about it. There’s clearly a division in the ranks somewhere, but we don’t know where, and especially if we show up with a Blue—which we can’t exactly afford not to do—even the ones there who would be on our side are going to side with the rogue Reds. I’d say our best bet is to get to Petra as quickly as possible and figure out if she’s on our side. If not, she’s the first one we need to take out.” His voice was quiet with grief, but sure.

  “He’s right,” Liam agreed. “It’s a good plan. And I’ll stay as close to the entrance as possible, taking out sentries. If I catch their attention, you all will have a clear shot.”

  “Right.” Kallie felt her heart pounding. “Let’s go, before I think better of all of this.”

  Chapter 17

  The bouncers at Red Dragon were as imposing as always, tall and well-muscled. One of them, however, was clearly new to his job. Though he had the body to be imposing, his nervous eyes and faintly hunched shoulders belied his confidence. He stood nervously, as if he expected an attack to come tonight.

  He was right to worry. Kallie felt her lips curl in a predatory smile that only widened when she saw the second bouncer. His eyes scanned the street with the ease of long practice, and she knew that he could fight, but he was one of the ones she had attacked in the forest the other day. Others might find his bruises only another reason to fear him, but to Kallie they were a sign of her victory: she had won, and she would do so again.

  “I’ll take the one on the left,” Caleb offered.

  “I’ll take them out.” Kallie shook her head when they all began to protest, and closed her eyes, taking a deep breath as she tried to connect with the source of her Hybrid power. When she was not exhausted, it was more difficult to find, but James’s lesson had left her a way to find it. She followed the path as if she were finding her way in the darkness with her fingers stretched out in front of her, and she felt the warmth of it grow. It was easier to find it each time, she realized.