The Guard

by Harri Aburrow-Newman

  “Make sure you’re at the drinks tonight, and make sure you get yourself straight before then. The whole point of this evening is to make some friendships between the units. We have to work well and trust each other. Socialising is important.” Beth sighed quietly, looking down and slipping her hands into the pockets of her combats, when she looked up her annoyance seemed to have cooled a little,

  “I know, sorry. I’ll sort things out with Yzzy, don’t worry.” She smiled at me, just a slight tilt of one corner of her mouth, and turned away, heading off down the corridor again.

  I blew out a long breath, wondering what could have happened with them. Beth’s use of a nickname for Ysabel suggested that they must have been friends at one point, and until the news that Ysabel would be coming to England, Beth had never seemed to have any problem with her. I decided, consciously, not to stress about it, and grabbed my jacket from the back of my chair, following in Beth’s footsteps towards the car park.

  Chapter 18

  Beth

  The conversation with Michael had rattled me slightly, reminding me of how obvious my emotions were at the moment and how oblivious I was to everyone else’s. I jumped in my car and sped out of the car park. Heading towards the countryside outside of London, I edged the sporty car faster as the roads grew steadily quieter and narrower.

  After about half an hour’s drive, I turned off the road onto a small track and round a sharp bend, parking my car in a small layby tucked into the trees, out of sight of the main road. Climbing out, I closed my eyes and slowly released my grip on my senses, letting the barriers around me melt away. I reached out delicately, searching, and as I did, I felt Ysabel doing the same… reaching for me. She was above me. Looking up sharply, I scanned the sky, hunting for the tell-tale glint of her pearlescent wings. There. I shifted instantly and without any kind of conscious thought, my wings unfolding so fast they wrenched my shoulder blades and tore the skin of my back in a burst of crimson, not sliding cleanly out of their sheaths as they would normally. I felt Ysabel’s attention hone in on me more sharply as the scent of my blood reached her, even over this distance. Snapping my wings out to their full extension, I jumped, pushing off from the ground like a rocket and flapping hard, focused only on the flickering spark of light high above me that was the sun reflecting off of Ysabel’s wings as they moved. As I shot upwards to meet her, some small of my part of my brain wrestled back a modicum of control, reminding me that daylight was not the most inconspicuous time to be flying on night black wings. I slowed with difficultly, fighting Ysabel’s pull, even stronger now that our minds weren’t so protected, and scanned the ground below me for any humans that might have noticed.

  Yzzy hit me hard, having dived towards me when I halted my ascent. She slammed into me, wrapping her wings around mine and bearing us both back to the ground. We slid to a stop amongst the trees of a small wood near where I had left my car, and before I could as much as blink, she had sunk her fangs deep into my throat. I cried out, suddenly barraged by a flood of emotions as my barriers completely crumbled under her assault. She slid her hands up my arms as she drank, linking her hands with mine and jerking her head slightly, widening the holes in my neck to slow their healing. I groaned, helpless under her, my wings flattened to the ground on either side of me, not even twitching as I completely, deliciously, finally surrendered myself to her. I felt her withdraw her fangs and gently run her tongue over the wounds, carefully cleaning off any drops that might have escaped her. Sitting up, she stared at me with those wide green eyes and reached out, smiling as she ran her fingers over my face like a blind woman, drinking me in in a different way… feeling lighter than I had in weeks, I laughed out loud and grabbed her, pulling her down towards me and rolling over, so that now she had her wings pressed to the ground. I knotted one hand in her glorious, silky hair and kissed her. Revelling in her mouth; perfect, soft lips and delicate tongue… and her mind… oh that mind that I had missed so much! The barriers between us were all but gone, and our bodies were no longer rebelling now that we had granted their wish and returned them to where they should be. As we kissed, our hands sought flesh and our minds sought refuge, melding together until we were one person again, whole again. Our wings and hair curled around each other, light and dark, perfect balance restored.

  The afternoon passed quickly. When we had finally sated ourselves in the woods, we walked to my car and drove back to the city, going to the rooms that Ysabel had been assigned. In typical military style it was small and utilitarian, with everything she needed and nothing more. We only stayed there long enough for her to grab the bag that she had brought with her from America and then we went back to our own, far nicer flat. Once there we showered, carefully brushing the leaves from each other’s hair, then spent a couple more happy hours of forgetting ourselves. Eventually though, we admitted that we really ought to get ready for the social. I lounged back on the bed, watching Ysabel zip about the walk-in wardrobe and do her usual flapping about what to wear, pulling out outfit after outfit, discarding each with barely a glance.

  “How do you know Archer’s here, anyway?” I drawled lazily.

  Yzzy paused briefly in her search,

  “they didn’t tell you?” she frowned.

  “Oh, I was in the meeting, but after “the American advisor is coming here”, nothing else seemed important enough to listen to.”

  She tutted at me and resumed flitting around the wardrobe, talking as she moved.

  “We found a laptop, or rather, one of the fire teams did. A hacker managed to get into it and found emails to Archer, sent to a UK IP address.”

  It was my turn to frown.

  “So why didn’t you let the IGS know so that Lexi could get the information to me? I wasn’t particularly happy about finding out at the same time as everyone else.”

  Yzzy stuck her head out of the wardrobe and gave me a wry smile,

  “Well after “you’re coming with us to England”, nothing else seemed important.”

  I rolled my eyes at her, even as my chest warmed with pleasure that she had been just as affected by the news of our impending reunion as I had. She shook her head slightly and her smile turned soft as the feeling shimmered down our bond,

  “you’d think that after all these years you would be used to the idea that I feel just the same for you as you do for me...”

  “Ptsh. I’ve simply maintained a charming sense of wonder.”

  She laughed at me, the sound bubbling up delightedly,

  “Idiot.”

  Finally, she emerged wearing an emerald green shift dress made of soft jersey, with black tights and knee high, black suede boots. She put small braids into her hair on either side of her face and then pulled them back loosely, clipping them together at the back of her head. She looked beautiful. Sliding off of the bed, I padded silently up to where she was stood in front of the mirror, putting on her eye makeup. I wrapped my arms around her waist from behind, nuzzling into her neck and inhaling the sweet-and-spicy scent of her hair. She chuckled softly,

  “Aren’t you supposed to be getting dressed?”

  “Mm… I guess. I’d much rather stay like this though…” I continued to run my lips slowly up the side of her neck and she raised an eyebrow at me in the mirror, glancing at what she could see of my naked body,

  “Well, as much as I’m sure that would go down excellently with the soldier boys, I’m not sure I could contain my jealousy when they all threw themselves at you.”

  “Ha. Alriight, alright.” I released her with a swift kiss on her cheek and darted into the wardrobe. Thirty seconds later and I was dressed in baggy, black jeans and a fitted red shirt, with dark kohl rimming my eyes. I ran a brush through my hair then left it to fall in loose waves to my waist. Immediately, I returned to my previous position behind her,

  “Ready.” The pulse of the blood in her jugular vein taunted me and my fangs lengthened slowly, breaking the skin of her throat as they did, she gasped and stepped away from me,


  “No no… you’ll make us even later” she giggled. Adorable. I grinned and normalised, taking her hand as we left.

  Chapter 19

  Michael

  The social had been going for nearly two hours by the time Beth and Ysabel turned up. The troops had been mixing well, chatting and enjoying the beer that had been laid on. Occasionally even the military powers that be recognised the need for a morale boost in the form of alcohol. A brief hush fell over the room as the women entered, broken by a wolf whistle, which brought on a wave of laughter that led conveniently back to talking. I had to admit that even I couldn’t help but stare a little, they looked… radiant… and I was glad to see them laughing together, obviously having reconciled. It seemed that even as exceptional as they were, they weren’t immune to the bizarre, confusing politics that seem to rule all young women. I watched as they wove through the crowd towards the long trestle table that served as a bar, disappearing quickly as the larger forms of the people around them shifted, swallowing them up. Nathan immediately pulled me back into conversation,

  “What’s it like having that girl on the front line then?”

  “That girl?” I frowned, “Beth has been a pretty invaluable source of information, and has actually proved very competent in skirmishes. I haven’t really had to worry about her anymore than I do about any of my soldiers. How have you found it to be working with Ysabel?”

  He shrugged non commitally,

  “Oh fine,” he drawled, “the information she brought to us was good, but she hasn’t been doing any fighting. I don’t like having women on the front line, especially not young, pretty civilians.”

  “How did she take that?” I wondered, “Beth’s pretty forceful. She always insisted that if she couldn’t fight, she’d walk, and take her information with her.”

  Nathan cocked an eyebrow at that,

  “Ysabel’s done as asked. She argued a little I guess, but didn’t press the issue.”

  “Hm... fair enough.”

  Nathan chattered on a little more, telling me about some of the battles they’d encountered and tactics that the vampires had used, but I found myself switching off slightly. It seemed like the vampires in America were using the same quick raids, based on force of numbers, as the ones in England were. They were just happening more often. I nodded and made the appropriate noises, using the time to look around and observe how the men were interacting. It seemed like the two units were gelling fairly well already - I suppose military men are all essentially similar in their mentality. It takes a certain sort of person to be a soldier. They were mostly just standing around drinking and sharing stories of their exploits. I saw a small knot of them gathered around Beth, and Ysabel standing a short distance away talking to Glen. There was a softness in Beth’s face as she watched the blonde girl, and I wondered if there might be something more to their relationship than she had let on. Nathan dragged my attention back to our conversation,

  “How do you want to split command while I’m here?”

  “Uhh..” I hedged, thinking, “Well I think it would be better to integrate your men into our unit, spread them out a little, rather than keeping them as a separate unit. And we can each take point on missions as we see fit, I guess. But I’m open to other ideas..?”

  “No, no. That sounds good to me. No point keeping my boys separate if we’re going to be here for a while. And I’m happy to yield main command to you, home turf advantage and all that.”

  “Well that’s great, then. We can sit down tomorrow and go through our personnel lists, and slot your men in where you think they would fit best. I’ll also give you a proper tour of the base and we’ll go through the progress that we’ve made so far in detail. I’d like your input on it, given that you’ve had more direct contact with the vampires.”

  “Sounds just fine to me.” Nathan stood and clapped a hand on my shoulder, “right now, though, I’m going to have a wander and a chat with some of your fine soldiers.”

  He meandered away through the gathered men and women, and was quickly waved over to a group by one of the other Americans. The man grinned and slung an arm over his captain’s shoulders. Nathan was clearly well loved by his men, but his conservative attitude made me a little nervous. There were several women in my own unit, not including the many female administrative staff, and they were all integral and valued parts of our machine. I was going to have to keep a close eye on how he dealt with them, because there’s no way they would be as forgiving as Ysabel had been.

  Chapter 20

  Beth

  I listened with amusement as Glen chattered away at Ysabel, who was smiling and nodding politely, feigning ignorance of his flirting. I could go and rescue her I supposed, but where would be the fun in that? I was sitting on the edge of a table not far from them with a small group of soldiers, American and British, talking and laughing around me. I was only half listening to the conversation; just enough that I could answer if someone directed a question at me. I let my senses wander, people watching, catching snippets of conversation throughout the room. Occasionally I heard something interesting and eavesdropped for a while, or followed someone around the room with my eyes for a couple of minutes. The general atmosphere in the room was good, I found the discussions about our differing tactics interesting, and also that the Americans had seen a lot more direct action than we had in the UK. I wondered if that was intentional on Archer’s part… trying to mislead us into thinking he was in America somewhere.

  Sighing, I tried to concentrate on a lighter matter… which at this moment was an amused conversation about Glen and Yzzy between the people in the group around me. It seemed that several of the Americans had already tried it on with Yzzy, and found her to be a ‘hard nut to crack’ so they were all now debating whether Glen’s rough charm would manage it. The debating quickly turned into a friendly wager and I smiled to myself, glancing over towards them.

  “Having fun, sweet?”

  I asked her… unable to keep the laughter out of my thoughts, provoking a brief glare as she looked past Glen towards me.

  “You’re not going to rescue me then? He’s very nice and all, but I’m not sure how much longer I can be polite.”

  “Well the guys over here have started something of a wager… if it makes you feel better, general consensus is that you’re an ice queen…”

  I felt her gasp and an incoherent stream of irritated thoughts, mock and otherwise, flowed over me. I felt Glen’s attention shift as she suggested that they join us, and the two headed in our direction.

  The conversation was hurriedly changed to a blow-by-blow account of a battle the Americans had recently engaged in as Glen and Yzzy approached us, a few of the men struggling to hide smirks as they clocked Glen guiding her with a hand on the small of her back. She headed straight towards me and I grinned, guessing her intentions. Slipping away from Glen’s hand as they joined the circle, she moved to stand between my legs and lean her back against me. I wrapped my arms around her waist and went to lay a kiss against her cheek, which she turned into, smiling, so it hit her lips instead… there was a brief pause in the conversation, before a burst of laughter from all the British men except Glen, who shook his head ruefully as the man next to him clapped him on the shoulder, still roaring with laughter. I joined in, chuckling at him over Yzzy’s shoulder,

  “Sorry Glen… should I have said something earlier?”

  “You suck, Beth.”

  He huffed good naturedly, shaking his head again as the few men who hadn’t caught on were clued in by the people around them. A few of them groaned, rolling their eyes, whilst another few cheered and made motions at their mates to get them to hand over whatever they had lost in the bet.

  The social rolled on for another couple of hours, growing steadily more raucous as the beer stocks dwindled. Someone even dragged out a karaoke machine from somewhere. Yzzy and I wandered away before someone thought it would be funny to try and pull us up to sing. I snagged us a couple mor
e beers as we walked past the trestle table and then we headed for the back of the room, plonking ourselves down on fold-out chairs. I took a long swig of beer, eyeing her.

  “From what I’ve heard,” I started, “you haven’t been allowed to fight.”

  She grimaced and shook her head,

  “No. Nathanial is a little backwards in his attitudes towards women.”

  I raised an eyebrow at her,

  “You didn’t argue?”

  She tutted at me,

  “Well of course I did, but I wasn’t going to refuse to help them because he said no.”

  I chuckled, looking out around the room again,

  “I threatened exactly that. It worked too.” I smirked at her and she rolled her eyes,

  “For some reason, I am not at all surprised.”

  “Michael’s pretty good with it. He will insist on telling me every other day that I need to start using a gun though.”

  “Oh?” Yzzy raised her eyebrows, “how did you get around that?”

  I shrugged, “just told him it was pointless. I haven’t used guns before so would be more use hanging back and then just using my swords. He still doesn’t seem entirely convinced,” I grimaced slightly, “but I’ve gotten by. The ferals always end up getting inside the range of the guns, so it’s not like my refusal is rendering me useless.”

  “Hm. How did you find slowing yourself down?”

  “Hard, at first. But it got easier the worse…” I trailed off with a scowl, the words catching in my throat.

  “The worse the pain got.” Ysabel finished for me, quietly. She sighed and reached over to me, linking her hand with mine. I looked down at our entwined fingers, and ran my thumb down hers,

  “It’s so good to have you back. I don’t even know how to put into words how good it is.”

  She smiled at me, slightly sadly, a soft, lazy tilt of her mouth,

  “I know what you mean. Honestly, I thought I was going to go mad. There were a couple of times when I genuinely wondered if something had happened to break our bond, and that I was actually dying.”