Awakening (Fire & Ice Book 1)

by Karen Payton

  He retrieved the glass vials from his breast pocket, flipped the lids open and quickly downed the contents. Connor calculated that taking his full quota of human blood would kick-start the chemical reaction and accelerate the refreshment of rap-sleep.

  This was not the chilled and mellow inmate of revival sleep to which he was relinquishing control of his mind. In rap-sleep the craving for physical pleasure and aggression went on the rampage, hence the name: rapacious.

  He could take his rap-sleep in any place or position, even standing.

  Connor, however, observed the social code which gave fair warning to others. He crossed to the examination couch and in an effortless glide, reclined until he was lying flat. It’s the drunkard rather than the psychopath, but still. The signal being given to others was ‘steer well clear’.

  Gazing at the ceiling, he tuned in to what was happening inside his body, taking an inventory of his tight muscles and sinews. Satisfied when hydration tingled through his blood network, he closed his eyes, linked his fingers over his stomach and visualized the opening of the cell door.

  The blood vessels in his optic nerve glowed like red threads on a pink background as electrical impulses exploded inside his head. His stomach lining absorbed the blood, and, as it hijacked his arterial network, his pulsing carotid arteries filled his ears with a rushing sound.

  Blood cascading into his temporal lobe welcomed Connor to a piece of Hell on earth.

  Fiber optic darts of pain hit all his nerve endings at once, his groin flooded, and he grinned at the irony of his last conscious thought. Would humans be surprised to learn that, rather than the sex-starved beasts of myth, if we find ‘the one’, we mate for life?

  Without that tie, many vampires took their pleasure whenever and wherever they pleased. Connor chose solitude, but rap-sleep gatherings were common as the barriers tumbled down and they were driven to slake their thirst for pleasure. The downside was that not every vampire survived it because some were a little too enthusiastic.

  Connor gave himself over to the searing inferno and his errant mind conjured a face with delicate elfin features, chocolate-colored eyes with long lashes and blonde feathered hair. The erotic images flooded his hardening groin with unbearable pressure and his fantasies took flight.

  He imagined touching the velvet texture of her skin. He stained her breasts with love bites, pulling her blood near the surface where he could almost taste it, smell it; Rebekah.

  Riding the wave of feral desire, he burrowed his hand into his pants, sliding down, and stroking over the tight globes hugging his body as he hissed in anticipation. Closing his fist around the satin-coated steel of his excitement, he pushed into his hand.

  The dream Rebekah, who existed only inside his head, stood naked before him. Turning her around, his hands covered her breasts, their heat scalding his palms. Her hair brushed his cheek as her head fell back and she groaned.

  His hard arousal pushed between her thighs, the satin length of him caressing, until her slick heat soaked him. She reached down, her fingers brushed his tip, and he growled, swallowing down the venom flooding his mouth as his need for release boiled over. He tugged hard on her nipples, and as her hips jerked back into his, he pressed her forward onto an examination table. Her hands gripped the edges of the table, laying the pink wet folds between her thighs open to him, and, in a surging stroke, he thrust up inside her.

  Embers of lust burned in his groin as, covering her back, he kneaded her breasts. On a guttural sigh, in deep brutal strokes, he drove into her body until shuddering release rampaged through him. He bit down hard on her shoulder. Every sinew in his body vibrated.

  His eyes snapped open. HELL.

  As he eased his grip away from his sated body, his fingers shook. What the Hell?

  Nervous tension skittered through his body. He quickly stood and adjusted his clothing. He had to go and find her, and he knew now, he had no choice.

  He had never dreamed of a specific person before, and he had no idea what it meant. All he could think of now was to get her out of London before Serge caught up with her. Or take her as a pet. If I feed from her, maybe I will stop obsessing.

  He shook his head as he opened the door. “Damn it,” he muttered softly.

  Chapter 5

  Dusk fell as the five human men walked in single file along the deserted railway tracks. They wore grime-blackened combat gear and dirty strips of linen wrapped around their boots deadened their footfalls. The dried mud on their faces accentuated the whites of their eyes as they scanned left and right.

  The shelter of the steep embankments on either side made them feel safe, but they had all been out on long-range missions into vampire territory too often to trust the feeling.

  Greg hung onto the consolation that the forty mile journey to the abandoned Royal Army Armament Depot at Chattenden had not been a wasted effort. If you don’t count the fact that we didn’t actually find any weapons, the hike has been worthwhile. They had filled their kitbags with army ration packs they found in the quarter master’s stores.

  Away missions meant humping food supplies, which presented problems in terms of smells and the stay-fresh factor. Only a few drops of water was needed to activate these self-heating food pouches. They would taste terrible in comparison to the food Oscar provided, but would be safer.

  As for the grenades and hand guns they hoped for, they had come up empty. When the vampire invasion began, the Royal Navy had evacuated with ruthless efficiency.

  But, it had been worth a try. Life for the group of humans had settled into a state of mind-numbing monotony. Greg’s Royal Marine training left him crying out for combat, and being unarmed and passive was a tough pill to swallow. But swallow it he had, after all, if you fire a gun at an undead, the chances were you’d piss him off and not a lot more.

  But land-mines, they might have been a different story. Greg sighed. Claymores and grenades were the stuff his dreams were made of.

  The wind picked up suddenly and plastered Greg’s combat jacket to his chest. The five men dropped to the ground like stones. Their black-gloved hands covered the backs of their heads as they pressed their cold faces into the gritty gravel-packed earth.

  Lying prone, no one moved until Greg scuffed the ground with his steel-toed boot three times. Climbing up from under the seventy pound heavy duffle bags took a lot more effort than the dive downwards had taken.

  Greg’s grin said, ‘phew, false alarm’. They were hypersensitive to sudden changes in the air pressure as an early warning of vampire activity, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

  The men huddled together, and mouthing the words quietly, Greg said, “The woods outside Vigo Village are a mile northwest of here.” He jabbed a black-clad thumb in the precise direction. “Base camp is ten miles on from there.” Greg tapped his watch and put up two fingers. “It’s 1800hrs. We can be there in two hours if we get a clear run through. Stan?”

  The stout man jerked his chin and whispered, “I’m not fucking past it yet, tha knows.”

  Greg grinned and launched a punch which Stan dodged with the ease of a well-practiced ritual. “C’mon, you old bastard, let’s get this done.”

  Stan hoisted his kitbag higher and pulled his woolen hat lower over his brow, covering the crop of snow white hair which framed a walnut wrinkled face. His hefty bulk boasted more muscle than men half his sixty years, and he beat two of the other three men to the top of the embankment as he trudged to the top without breaking stride.

  Crouching low, the five figures ran across the blackened meadow, grateful for the autumn night sky, thick with shadow. Dropping down onto his knee at the edge of the wood, Greg pulled out the only pair of night vision goggles they owned and set them high on his forehead.

  “Okay,” he hissed. “I’ll go first. Use the owl call signal if you lose sight of me.”

  He set off into the woods, pulling the goggles down into place when the light level dropped to pitch-black. Moving slowly, he listene
d for the signal, reassured by the faint rustle of canvas kitbags rubbing over combat gear close behind. Vampires usually stayed in the cities until midnight, at which time they appeared like cockroaches swarming the countryside.

  Closer to the eco-town, humans had the vampire movements figured out. They farmed the fields of crops which fed their humans, and the London docklands saw a lot of vampire traffic to and from, as they drove trucks, of all things. But this far northeast of the human settlement, Greg had no idea what to expect.

  We’ll dig in at basecamp for the night. The twenty-five miles home will take three days, if we’re lucky.

  A yelp in the darkness behind him chilled his blood. Shit.

  Spinning around, Greg saw three of the guys circling carefully. Fuck, where’s Stan?

  Retracing his steps, he found Stan sitting on the ground, doubled over his leg. His tight face gave away the swear words being held back by his clamped lips.

  Dropping down beside him, Greg lifted a brow. “What?”

  “Fucking badger.” Rolling onto his back, Seth revealed the blood-soaked stain below the knee of his pants leg. “The fucker bit me.”

  Greg jerked his chin to the others and they turned away, scanning the woods as far as their unaided human sight could allow.

  “Slowing down in your old age, ay mate?” muttered Greg as he cut away the blood-sodden fabric and disguised his grim expression with a smile.

  “Piss off,” Stan groaned.

  Greg grunted with the effort of tightening a linen tourniquet below his friend’s knee. Inspecting his handiwork, he said, “Take more than a badger to finish you off, but you aren’t going anywhere tonight, not with seventy pounds on your back.”

  Ignoring Stan rolling his eyes, Greg poured iodine over the tear in the older man’s leg, sprayed antiseptic over the exposed flesh around the wound and, even though it was not meant for deep lacerations, he sprayed plastic field Band-Aid over the area. Three applications created a membrane which held back the bleeding.

  “I can carry on.”

  “Not this time, Stan.” Greg wound several layers of Saran-wrap around the limb and a field bandage over that. Satisfied, he reached out and tugged the nylon strap dangling from backpack of the nearest man. “Simmons, Stan’s gonna dig in here while we get the supplies back. Dig a hole at the bottom of that oak tree.”

  Greg handed over the night vision goggles, rested back on his haunches and gripped his friend’s arm.

  Simmons moved off, pulling a metal trowel from his utility belt as he scuffed his boot into the mulched ground, looking for a soft spot.

  “I’ll come back for you tonight, Stan. It’s about two hours to basecamp, and I’ll hike back here in an hour. Think I can trust you to keep your gob shut for three hours?”

  Stan grinned. “Sure thing, Sarg.”

  “Here. Take these.”

  Stan swallowed down the beta-blockers Greg pressed upon him as Simmons re-emerged beside them.

  “C’mon, let’s get you tucked up for the night,” said Greg.

  Taking some of the old guy’s weight, he helped him over the rough ground. Once Stan was settled into the dug out between two tree roots, they covered him over, leaving one hand and his face exposed.

  “Back soon. Hang in there, okay?”

  Pulling on the night vision goggles once more, Greg took out a knife, and as the four men moved off, he cut a lump of bark out of every sixth tree they passed.

  Looking back, Greg saw Stan rest his head against a tree root and close his eyes. He’d been in Stan’s place, reduced to breathing quietly and listening to the sound of your men moving off through woods. Of course, that was before the bloodsuckers.

  Lifting a fist to halt the others, Greg jogged back to Stan and dropped to his knee. “I’ll be back in two and a half hours, got it?”

  Stan smiled.

  <><><>

  When Greg returned, the world inside the dense woodland, even viewed through night vision goggles, took on the appearance of air filled with charcoal dust. It almost felt like his eyes were still closed. The confusion of shadows reduced him to counting trees and feeling for the markers gouged into the bark.

  Relieved when he reached the trunk of the sturdy English oak where he had left Stan, his strained stare scoured the tumbled clumps of earth around its base, and anxiety closed a cold grip around his chest. He eased the medical kit from his shoulders and smothered the litany of swearwords rattling through his head. Shit, stubborn old buzzard. Stay here, how bloody hard is that?

  The shallow grave was empty.

  Fear for himself Greg took in his stride, but when it came to his men, the responsibility was crushing at times. How do you train men to hide and not fight? Being silent every waking moment shredded their nerves. We have to stay below the radar and battle the survival instincts of fight or flight. The truth is, we can’t do either and win.

  In the movies he watched as a youth, vampires were fierce white-faced creatures who dissolved if you threw holy water at them or rammed a stake through their hearts. The reality was very different, and so was the world he lived in as a man.

  In this world, where vampires had risen, humans were prisoners on the human farm.

  Shit, Stan. At least if they found him, he’ll still be alive. Humans were a valuable food source.

  Moving in slow motion, aware of every groan and creak of the mud-stained fabric of his combat gear, Greg scanned the woods slowly. Looking for a moving bulk large enough to be a man in the spectrum of gray, Greg crept forward. I have to be sure. His flesh crawled. They could be watching, and I wouldn’t know it. Greg grinned. Fuck, I’d fight. Death would be a blessing.

  Autumn was tough because dusk came in like a fog bank. Getting back to the eco-town before dark was always the aim, but on a long-range foraging mission, digging in for the night came with the territory.

  Why the hell didn’t you stay put, Stan?

  Greg dry swallowed two more beta-blockers and inhaled deeply through his nose. Keeping his body’s responses under control was the only weapon he had.

  Stan was no rookie, and he knew Greg would make it back. That thought scared Greg. The plastic membrane sprayed over the wound would only hold for so long, so binding it and staying still was all they were left with. Stan wouldn’t have left, not unless he was forced into it.

  Greg caught a flash of movement through the trees and froze. Could be a deer-

  The cramped feeling in his neck told him it wasn’t. A guttering groan drifted on the breeze and Greg screwed his face up tight. Shit.

  A shower of splintered wood rained down upon his head as a heavy wet thud shuddered through the tree branches above. The blurred comet trail of a man-sized mass smeared across his vision, the ground shook, and his throat filled with bile as he looked downward and into Stan’s slack face.

  Greg froze. Staring at his friend, he prayed the old man was dead already.

  Stan’s body twitched, and he frothed at the mouth. An oozing slug trail of blood crept down over his face. His head dropped to the side and his eyes looked straight into Greg’s soul.

  Sorry, buddy. Greg’s muscles burned as he locked his knees and fought the urge to fight. Playing dead while standing up was the hardest thing he had ever done.

  A shower of debris pelted Greg’s face as a fast-moving black shape emerged from the cowering shadows of the woodland.

  The white face floating above a crow-like silhouette stopped and a black grin cut the face open. Jet beads glittered in ebony sockets as the creature lowered his chin, and in a chillingly human gesture, nudged Stan’s slack body with his boot. A wet growl rumbled in its throat as he bent, grabbed the front of Stan’s jacket, and lifted him.

  Stan’s body swung gently. The grinding sound of broken bones stuttered through the night air as the ligaments of his arm tore and the swaying weight slipped slowly and fell from his sleeve.

  Greg glued his eyes front and center. The trick was to breathe slowly, and trust the pheromone supp
ressants, mud packed skin, and beta-blockers gave him a chance. He heard the arm hit the floor with a dull thud, and the tendons in his neck jerked as he tried not to look.

  The creature pulled Stan’s sagging body forward and stared into his face.

  Shit. He’s still alive.

  Panic rattled through Stan, his legs jerking in spasm. The grinning white face tilted in bird-like curiosity and as the thing smothered Stan’s body in an embrace, the slopping sound of wet flesh tearing filled Greg’s throat with bile.

  His stomach contents lodged in his throat, burning a hole in his chest.

  The creature’s embrace eased, and Stan’s feet stirred the undergrowth in a desperate shuffle of twitching muscles. The stiffened inhuman mask of white caught the moonlight hovered over the clump of bleeding flesh clutched in its hand, and then it bit down into Stan’s heart.

  Tossing the bloodied mass aside and pulling the dangling body abruptly forward, the creature shoved Stan’s head back, snapped his spine, and tore into his neck.

  A moment later, the body dropped to the ground, and the creature looked up.

  Greg’s flesh crawled as, even knowing he stood buried in dark shadow he felt as if its eyes raked over his skin. The flared nostrils dripped blood down over the stark white features and Greg prayed.

  He was terrified that even closing his eyes would make a sound. His thigh muscles burned and his brain screamed ‘run’. And end my frigging life? Crap. If this was a pissing contest, Greg knew he had already lost. A cloud covered the moon and the world through his night vision goggles became a cluster of coal lumps, again. But which one was the monster?

  His face hurt as the darkness seemed to burrow inside his eyeballs.

  Fuck. Was it a vampire? Zombie? Zombire? Hysteria bubbled in Greg’s throat. All he knew was, in the fifteen years since vampires had risen he had never seen a creature like this. What the Hell. Are they mutating now?

  He closed his eyes, held his position as long as his combat hardened frame would let him, and when his knees buckled and he collapsed, he prayed.