And then my sword would sing, and I might just get some answers.
I could have called my father, of course. As Champion of the Iunctio; the vampire governing body, he would have the resources and contacts to call upon. But he’d given me this task. Stood aside and let me follow my brother.
I might have invoked the Iunctio name and notoriety this evening, but I was on my own.
In more ways than one. Could I even trust Papa?
Add in that Hakan had been missing for four days. Half a day shorter than my brother. And I was literally alone as well as figuratively. Luc. Dear Goddess, what was happening to him? He’d asked for help and then fled.
The Darkness was consuming him, that was the only answer I could come up with. And what better place to seek a hit of Light than with the Ljósálfar? Only the Light Fey were meant to be imprisoned in Álfheimr but somehow Luc’s and my maturity, our burgeoning power, had broken their chains.
The King of the Dökkálfa must be fuming. But it wasn’t Aliath I wanted to face. It was the sodding Light-filled fairies who hungered for my twin’s and my blood.
My hands fisted. A snarl worthy of a Taniwha left my throat. Auckland was a long way away. Nothing here felt like home. But I am a Durand. That meant something.
Mix in my enchanted blood, and it meant a whole lot of trouble.
Lacking contacts in this city or a way to travel home, the only thing left for me to do was call the solution to me.
One severed foot of a Ljósálfar later and here we were.
I came to rest in the middle of the Sultan Ahmed Mosque, the slick tiles beneath my feet covered in a thin layer of dirt. A spire lay crumbled across one corner. An archway had fallen down at some stage. Graffiti covered the grey-blue walls shouting to the world that “Fangers are here to stay; save the kids.” As if vampires ate children for dinner.
Well, some might, and that’s why my kind existed.
Shame I was too busy trying to save my brother and contain an outbreak of dangerous Fey.
I waited, hands relaxed at my sides, stakes on hips, Kilij heavy down my thigh. A soft breeze floated on the air, bringing the scent of fish and sea salt from the Aegean. I could hear the odd fishing vessel clank on its moorings. I inhaled deeply, letting the scent of survival wash over me.
And then got a hit of something else.
I spun on my heel, my hand going for the sword. The glint of silver shining brightly under a full moon. And watched as a shadow peeled off the far wall, gliding out nonchalantly toward me.
Alain Dupont strode out into the centre of the courtyard, hands thrust in his trouser pockets casually, shirt undone at the top button, blond hair artfully dishevelled, hiding the danger beneath the impeccably presented package.
I didn’t return my Kilij to its sheath. What the hell was he doing here?
Alain smiled. Then licked his lips, his eyes surveying all of me.
“Hello, Nosferatin,” he said.
And my Sigillum burned.
2
There Is No Iunctio In Istanbul
Iridescent colours would be twisting and turning on my left arm; sage, magenta, sky blue. Luckily my leather jacket hid their meaning. I didn’t need Papa’s spymaster knowing I was uneasy, angry and confused. He could tell I was feeling something, though. Vampires sense weakness in their prey. And right now the power that was humming through my parents’ mark on my arm was making my heart rate accelerate and sweat to glisten across my skin.
Alain didn’t miss a thing.
How the hell had he found me?
I’d searched the city after Hakan vanished, but as yet I’d not uncovered a Ley Line. Alain must have used conventional means to reach Istanbul. Papa’s private jet? That would explain the mechanics of his getting here, but not the reason why.
“How did you find me?” I asked, feigning a casualness that I didn’t feel.
“I wish I could claim that accomplishment as my own,” Alain said, his French accent only slightly apparent today. “But alas, I had assistance.”
A second vampire swept out of the shadows to my right, some twenty feet away from Alain as if to bracket me. My fingers itched to raise the Kilij, but I kept the curved blade pointed at the ground, ready and waiting. Instead, I let a little Light out, sending it into the ether.
It touched only two signatures, one Darker than the other.
I studied the vampire that approached; long golden tresses, tall, tanned leg slipping out of a red silk dress slit, perfectly moulded thigh exposed to the glow of the moon.
“Alessandra,” I murmured.
“Little Durand,” she replied in her Italian laced purr.
Alessandra was one of Uncle Gregor’s vampires. A bitch to the nth degree. But a huntress who rarely failed to catch her prey.
I did not like considering myself as Alessandra’s prey.
“OK,” I said, my eyes returning to Alain, forcing a calmness into my body I did not feel. “So you found me. Why?”
“Why do you think, bébé?” he murmured.
I didn’t need to see my Sigillum to know it was shining a vibrant magenta. Anger coursed through my veins, boiling my blood, heating my extremities. My fingers curled around the Kilij; Alain’s eyes tracking the movement with ease.
Less than five minutes in his presence and I was already relegated to a child.
First, he tests our kindred compatibility without invitation and then he calls me a baby. Nice.
“A long way to come to say hello,” I said evenly.
Alain smiled; it was seductive and alluring; full vampire mojo in effect.
My eyes flicked to Alessandra. She had her hip cocked, her stiletto shoe angled to the side and her long leg on display, in case Alain’s magnetism failed. I suppressed a snort.
Alessandra might be one of Uncle Gregor’s vampires, but she didn’t visit Auckland all that often. She and Mama did not get along.
So, although Alessandra thought she knew me, she didn’t have a fucking clue who I was.
Alain on the other hand?
Yeah, he knew me and right now he knew I was pissed. For so many damn reasons.
I twirled the Kilij in my hand and then sheathed it. Thankfully I didn’t have to wrestle the curved blade into submission this time. The move looked practised and casual. When I was feeling anything but.
Alain was meant to be family. Alessandra aligned with the Durands through the Master of Wellington City. I shouldn’t have felt threatened.
But I did.
My hands rested above my stakes. The sword was coated in silver, an oversight or a clear fuck you on Hakan’s behalf. But although the silver would do damage, the stakes could kill. Bring the final death. Having my hands free to grab a stake seemed logical.
Ribbons of unease unfurled inside my belly on that thought. I was thinking my new psychic abilities weren’t warning me off staking Alessandra per se but instead warning me off harming Alain. As I hadn’t yet had the chance to test the veracity of this new talent, I ignored it.
For now, I’d go with good old hunter gut.
No Pull as such, but a whole lot of threat.
“What do you want, Alain?” I asked.
“Are you not going to ask after your parents, Éliane?” he enquired mildly.
“You’re not here to chat about Mama and Papa.”
He inclined his head in agreement. “You have not joined,” he said quietly.
My heart skipped a beat.
“It’s only been four days since I left.”
“Yet your brother has managed to contain his power.”
I felt dread spread throughout my body. This time the reaction had nothing to do with my talent. The telltale signs of avocado, mint green and lime rolled over my wrist where my jacket didn’t quite cover my mark. Dread along with fear and worry.
I licked my lips.
“How can you tell?” I asked, my voice breathy; giving too much of my emotions away.
I was better than this; I knew how
to show no fear. I’d been raised on the mantra. Never show fear. Never give an inch. Always stay on guard.
But four days alone in a foreign country, the dark gaze of the shadows following my every move. The heat of a too bright sun beating down on my head. The chilling scent of ozone teasing my senses. And I was a jagged mess. Sharp-edged and unrefined.
Mix in the loss of my Svante sword in Álfheimr last week and no way to get home to Auckland now, and my usual hunter demeanour was fracturing.
I pulled on every reserve I had and lifted my chin. My fingers brushing across silver. My pulse slowing at my will.
“Who has he joined with, Éliane?” Alain pressed. Either he hadn’t picked up on my unusually shaky state - which for any vampire, let alone a level one Sanguis Vitam vampire, was saying something - or Alain was trying to help.
Help from Alain was not welcome.
I didn’t know if I could trust him.
“I’m sure if Luc wanted Papa to know he would have contacted him,” I said evenly. As far as I knew, Luc hadn’t joined with anyone, unless Hakan had caught up with him and forced him to join as a last resort to containing his Darkness.
And didn’t that just make me feel things a sibling should not feel of their twin?
No, this had to do with him being in Álfheimr I was sure. The Fey world is parallel to ours but cut off from it. To get there, you need a portal. And portals don’t allow magic to leak. What Luc and I are is magic. Our blood enchanted; the power as mystical as a vampire’s Sanguis Vitam.
“So, he is remaining silent on this, then?” Alain asked, but he was talking again before I could answer. “And you, Éliane?” At least he'd stopped calling me bébé. “You are still refusing to join?”
“I’ll join, Alain. When I’m good and ready.”
“Enough of this,” Alessandra hissed. “The hour grows late, and I wish to return to civilisation.”
“Istanbul not up to your usual standards, Alessandra?” I drawled.
She bared her fangs at me. I smiled back just as toothily if not as sharply.
A hiss followed her fang flash. A hiss that seemed to echo off the walls of the Mosque.
Alain felt the change in the air as well. His eyes flashing cyan and turquoise, his fangs lengthening as he stared into the shadows.
“The shadows have eyes,” I murmured, the Kilij back in my hand. Alain took a step toward me. Alessandra made the same protective move on my other side.
Funny how your supposed enemies become your allies when faced with a bigger threat.
I inhaled deeply, but the sometimes present scent of ozone or burnt peaches alluded my nostrils. There were no Fey hiding here. The severed foot felt redundant hanging from my belt.
“Show yourselves,” Alain demanded. “In the name of the Iunctio, show yourselves now!”
Bad move, I thought. There is no Iunctio in Istanbul.
And then the shadows surged. A roar rose up on the night, tapering off to a hiss. Followed by another and another and another. Alessandra and Alain moved to place their backs to me, all of us facing off in a different direction towards the threats.
The scratch of claws on tile. The rasp of a weapon being drawn. The clack of serrated teeth snapping.
The twang of a crossbow being fired.
3
Light Swelled
The first bolt hit Alessandra in the chest. The second was snapped in half by Alain before it reached its target. The third and fourth I sliced in half, having to spin out from my position to protect the fallen vampire. Alessandra let out a rage-filled screech, her eyes bleeding to crimson. I shifted my gaze back to the shadows, Kilij raised, senses on high alert.
But I didn't fail to see her vampire-within from the corner of my eye. Cobra. Ready to strike.
I smiled grimly to myself. The cobra was covered in jewel-like scales, as beautiful as the woman herself. But a snake is a snake in any form. And Alessandra was ready to strike.
“Easy,” I murmured under my breath. She hissed at me. “Get yourself under control, vampire,” I urged, my eyes scanning the shadows. Nothing else moved. Nothing except the vampire-within at my side.
I turned my head and stared into malevolent elongated pupils then bared my teeth in a back-the-fuck-down snarl.
“I’m not the enemy,” I growled.
“Alessandra!” Alain clipped. “Control yourself.”
She was hurt, the crossbow bolt still embedded in her upper chest, blood seeping onto the silk of her dress. She hadn’t pulled it out; that kind of undertaking required strength and guts, both of which Alessandra had in spades. But she couldn’t risk even a second of lost focus.
We were surrounded.
I took in a deep breath and catalogued the scents on the air. The metallic taint of blood. The cloying perfume Alessandra wore. Alain’s cologne and signature scent. The musk of fur, the pungent odour of damp earth.
“Shifters!” I called. “Is this how you fight in Turkey?” I was tempted to make a gobble-gobble sound, or perhaps something more akin to a chicken clucking. But I was thinking the shifters we faced weren’t birds of a feather, but something far more lethal.
With razor sharp claws, fur covered thick arms and serrated teeth in a muzzle-like maw. As my old friend Travis would have said, something between a tiger and giant mutant lizard.
“Erbörü!” I shouted into the silence of the night. Alain arched an eyebrow but kept his focus on the now unmoving shadows. “Show yourselves!”
Ediz walked forward, the sole movement in the courtyard right then. I wasn’t fooled into believing he was the only shifter in the Mosque tonight. The only Erbörü. And as he was in human form, fully dressed, I was guessing his backup had been the claws we’d heard. Ediz was quite capable of roaring when not shifted. But claws? Not so much.
The forest green of his eyes surveyed all of me as if checking for an injury. It made me realise none of the crossbow bolts had been aimed at my head. I’d had to spin to reach them. His gaze landed on the Kilij, a soft smile edging what had been until then hard lips. He stopped several feet away, no crossbow in sight. He appeared unarmed.
But what shifter is ever unarmed?
“How dare you fire upon a member of the Morel line?” Alessandra snapped. At least she hadn’t called on the Iunctio like Alain had.
Ediz spat on the ground at Alessandra’s stiletto clad foot.
“You are not welcome here,” he said in heavily accented English.
She hissed and took a menacing step forward. The fact that it was slow enough to track indicated just how affected she was by the still embedded crossbow bolt. I held my hand up, receiving a sneer for my efforts from Alessandra, and took a step toward Hakan’s right-hand man.
“You didn’t go with him,” I said, strangely pleased Hakan had left Ediz behind as well and then promptly worried he’d not taken back-up.
“My instructions were to remain here,” Ediz offered, his muscles bulging as he crossed his arms over his chest in a challenge.
I checked the shadows for movement and sound, but there was no sign of his shifter brethren. I didn’t for a second think he was alone, but I’d also never seen Ediz with other Erbörü.
“To guard me,” I guessed. Ediz confirmed the assumption with a curt nod of his head. I had the distinct impression he wasn’t pleased with his orders. “You’ve been the eyes in the shadows,” I said. Another short, sharp nod of the head. “Why didn’t you show yourself?”
“You did not require assistance until today.”
I crossed my arms over my chest and arched my brow at the man. “I didn’t need assistance today, either,” I snapped.
Ediz smiled, showing a row of very white, very blunt teeth. The contrast to his alter ego was striking. I think he smiled like that because he knew it reminded the recipient of the different halves of his persona. You could never trust what you saw with a shifter.
I let a slow breath of air out. I’d spent the past four days trying to get the fairies’
attention, and all I’d managed to do was drag Ediz all over Istanbul and call Alain and Alessandra to me. Magenta swirled at my wrist. I wasn't sure if I was mad at Hakan, mad at Papa for sending his minions, or mad at Ediz for not helping me track down a way to rescue my brother.
“What now, Éliane?” Alain murmured from beside me.
I gritted my teeth. My pride told me to send Alain home; I didn’t need him. My anger told me to tell Ediz to fuck off; four days he’d been following me! My gut, that new feeling deep down inside, twisted and turned, ribbon-like sensations knotting up and then instantly unwinding. It felt like a ball of string being battered around by a crazy kitty in the pit of my stomach.
But what it meant, I didn't know.
I looked down at my Sigillum, or what I could see poking out from the bottom of my sleeve. It was a wasted effort. My mark wasn’t a portent of things to come, but a direct conduit to my current emotions. The presence of more green and blue than purple and yellow didn’t help. I was worried and confused, not angry or even hopeful.
I had to come up with a plan. A better plan than trying to piss off the Light Fey enough to call them to me.
I looked at Alain. He waited patiently as if he knew I’d ask for his help eventually. I ignored an impatient and now bolt free Alessandra, my eyes skipping over to Ediz. If Alain wasn’t here, I could ask Ediz what he knew of Hakan’s whereabouts. But asking Alain to leave would be an invitation for him to follow.
“Why are you here, Alain?” I asked, at last, frustration marring my tone.
“I told you, bébé,” he said in a vampire purr, “you have not joined. Your brother has. Your father wishes to know why the Mhachkay has failed to keep you contained.”
Oh, hell no, he did not just use those words on me.
My stake was pressed against his chest in the next heartbeat, the spin so unexpected and fast no one reacted until smoke whorled up in the air. Ediz growled. Alessandra hissed. Alain lifted a hand and wrapped it around my throat. Cyan stared back at me. But it wasn't the cyan I wanted to see. The one laced with silver.
Blood Entwined (Blood Enchanted, Book 2): A Vampire Hunter Paranormal Romance Series Page 2