White Lies: (The Uruwashi Series #4)

by Christina Moore

  A small smile quirked Wren’s lips. “I owe you?”

  “Yeah,” Tristan said, busying himself with the last of his meal, feeling their agreement was the finale of this conversation. “But anything involving any bodily fluid doesn’t count as payment, got it?”

  Wren thought for a moment and then bowed his head. “Ii daro,” he answered, assenting to Tristan’s conditions with a silly smile he didn’t try to hide. He straightened and smoothed the front of his shirt with his free hand.

  “Great, shall we then? Don’t have all night, you know.” Not that the vampire hadn’t had months to murder freely. He should have taken this more seriously when Desmond had shown up in Greece.

  “Very well,” Wren answered dryly and stood, not bothering to ask Tristan to clean up his mess. The vampire disappeared into the other room for a moment and came back with Tristan’s sword as well as his own.

  “I’m trusting you as an honest man, Tristan, not to betray me. So just know, I take broken contracts very seriously. Am I understood?”

  Tristan glared at the man through half-lidded cynical eyes for a moment. “Unmistakably… Same goes for me.”

  “Wakarmashita. I believe we have an accord.” The vampire suddenly smiled all teeth. “We might be friends yet.”

  Tristan harrumphed at him and stood to take his stuff from the vampire. As he slipped the holster on he said casually, “So, tell me about this vampire who’s framing you. Xue…?”

  “Xuejiao. She’s a kodaijin.”

  Tristan flinched. “A true ancient… shit.” While Yuki was old, she wasn’t considered an ancient. That distinction was reserved for those on the other side of the current era. Tristan met his first kodaijin in Greece, Ash’s ancestor. And while Innokentiy, or Netty as he liked to be called, seemed to be a fairly likeable guy, it was clear the vampire was strong and knew how to do some frightening things, like mask his presence entirely. In fact, Tristan had yet to confirm exactly all that Ash had been taught by her Great, Great Grand-Master, even while he was rooting around in her mind. And when the time came, he fully expected Ash to teach him those same things. Too bad it didn’t help him right this moment.

  He frowned suddenly, wondering if that time would even get the chance to come. Would he die before Ash gave him the fatal kiss to end his life and become a true Uruwashi? If the mother of all shinwa—of sin was after him, what sort of future, outside of dead, was there?

  Thinking he understood Tristan’s despondency, Wren nodded. “That’s not the most troublesome of it… She’s, how do I say this…?” Wren stopped, gaze turned upward as he thought. He muttered in Japanese under his breath and then, one good eye fixing on Tristan, he held up two fingers and said, “Ni seikonō.”

  Tristan stopped fussing with his weapons and stared at Wren. “What do you mean two seikonō?”

  Wren shuffled lightly on his feet, looking uncomfortable for the first time since the two met and tried more overtly to hide his face behind his silky hair. “Exactly that. She has two seikonō abilities.”

  “That—that’s impossible.”

  Wren nodded, frowning. “I’d thought so too. Until I met her.” Wren sighed and turned to retake his seat at the low table. Realizing it was going to be a long conversation, Tristan joined him, a little more conscious of where his hands in relation to his weapons were now that the threat was apparent.

  “I first met her after my death—I never knew her as a mortal. I was—I had trouble with my existence… I have always been damaged but dying was too much for me. I lashed out and said some things I shouldn’t have. Master… After having put up with my… well, my impertinence for so long, he finally broke too. He did this to me as punishment.” Wren reached up to touch the hidden side of his face and stopped short, fingers caressing air.

  “Xuejiao appeared in my life shortly thereafter and picked up my ruined self. I needed her just as much as she needed me. However, it wasn’t until I’d spent nearly a year with her that I realized she had deceived me.”

  “So Desmond wasn’t the bad vampire you thought him to be?”

  “Oh no. He is a disgusting monster. But I… I still loved—love him, despite the pain of—” Wren shook his head, not wanting to finish his sentence. “But Xuejiao, she is terribly practical in everything she does. She wasn’t the vampire I thought her to be and I found myself physically ill just being in her presence, seeing the things she was capable of. It was when I tried to leave that I discovered that not only was she Mizu no Ie, but she could also wield wind. A Master to both. She stopped me with an ice and air display that still shakes me to the core every time I remember it.”

  “That’s not possible.” Not once did Mamoru say that the vampire could wield two seikonō. It was fact that they couldn’t… right?

  “There’s many things your kind doesn’t know. That’s by design.”

  That humbled Tristan, his mind going back to his ride in Ash’s consciousness. By design, the children of Izanami and Izanagi were never meant to understand their origin. Would Ash even remember by the time they rejoined?

  “No one else knows of Xuejiao. Not Master, not the all-knowing Yukihime… I am the only one. Even if the others did believe me, I don’t know that even two Yukihime’s could defeat Xuejiao.”

  Tristan bristled, jumping to his feet. But it was his hands going for the comfort of the gun that made the vampire flinch. “Then how the fuck do you expect me to kill her?”

  At ease again, Wren looked perplexed, head turned to hide the ruined side of his face from view, always very conscious of how others saw him. “You’re Uruwashi,” he said with a calm frankness.

  “I’m not!” Tristan snapped. “I’m just a mutt and a virgin, barely getting by, blundering through life, just barely missing death—” He unconsciously touched the newest scar over his heart where he should have died. “I lived instead of Mamoru, it wasn’t supposed to be one or the other. I can’t protect the one’s I love, instead I’m forced to bare their loss, their pain! I can’t do anything worth a damn that’s good anymore!”

  The world was narrowing and the panic rose. Everything he said, it was all true. He was an ant under the thumb of the universe, that’s how insignificant he was. And as soon as Mother arose, because fuck all if he was about to kill innocent pregnant women, then he’d die. Surely he would because he’d never join with the Mother of Sin.

  Tristan stumbled back a few steps, unable to hide his emotions. He felt naked in front of a man he wasn’t sure he should trust yet. He’d said too much.

  “You do know about the seven shinwa and heikō?”

  Tristan blinked at the other man, slowly lifting from the cloud of panic. “Uh… yeah.” Why was he bringing this up?

  “Have you heard of Apos?”

  “That a thing or a who?”

  Wren licked his lips and shifted on his seat, a nervous gesture if any. “Everything has to come from something, a single pair of beings with which the future of an entire race is born from.”

  Tristan’s stomach dropped and he struggled—and failed, he was sure—to hide his reaction. Was this man, this vanilla vampire seemingly unimportant in the greater order of things in the know? Is that the reason for their meeting?

  Not noticing Tristan’s inner turmoil, Wren continued. “For the vampire in particular, I’m told that a single person gave birth to our kind. Apos, the First Vampire.” Wren’s expression went dark. “It’s said that he wields all four seikonō.”

  Tristan’s initial reaction of yelling “bullshit” was lost to his utter shock. In fact, he couldn’t even speak as logic rolled in the realized that, yeah, it was possible. Wouldn’t at least the Mother of all shinwa, the Mother of vampire, wouldn’t she have all four elements?

  All of the hair on Tristan’s body rose. Yeah, now the complete amount of fucked he was in was starting to make itself clear.

  “Xuejiao claims Apos is her Master.”

  After another moment of being taken off guard, Tristan swallowed hard
and shook his head. “No.” Of all the things he’d seen and heard… “No, I don’t buy it.” He couldn’t believe because then it’d be true and then maybe his problems with Mother would mean nothing, because, surely, if he went after someone like Xuejiao, he would die.

  Wren shrugged. “Honestly, I don’t know what to believe either. She is wrong in many things, a skewed sense of morals, but I’ve never found her to be a liar.”

  “But you never saw this Apos person?”

  “No.”

  “And Xuejiao, I’m guessing, is the one who told you all this shit about the First Vampire and such, right?”

  “Hai.”

  “Then it’s bullshit,” Tristan said standing. “It’s impossible for a vampire to be more than one element.” He had to believe. Believe, believe, believe…

  Fuck!

  Wren, still on the floor, looked up to him. “Not everything in this world is black or white, Tristan. Off or on, good or evil. There’s so much grey… Vampire are made of grey.” The vampire stood fluidly and moved around to stand before Tristan. “You are made of grey.”

  Tristan scowled. “I know what I am.” Yeah, a murderer and soon to be murdered himself. Damn.

  The vampire put his hands up in defense, as if to say sorry, but he didn’t look like he really meant it as a tiny smirk quirked the corner of his mouth. “I’m just saying that you must be open to all possibilities, however impossible.”

  Tristan never thought of himself as close-minded about anything, but fear made him react in strong ways. Worst of all, he was afraid of himself more than the idea of trying to kill someone like Xuejiao.

  “Does she really Master two seikonō?”

  Understanding the look of disappointment and fear on Tristan’s face, Wren nodded somberly. Neither of them wanted it to be true and that it was frightened them both.

  “What makes you think I can even touch her?”

  He looked Tristan over before standing. “I’ve seen up close what your kind can do.”

  “Yeah, but Mamoru was—”

  “Bitten?” Wren moved closer to Tristan. “I find it hard to believe Ash hasn’t bitten you.” The vampire stopped very close to Tristan, setting off all his instincts to move away, but held his ground. “Her scent is all over you but not in you. Your blood is clean… Must be because of Nastasia, why she won’t bite you.”

  Tristan’s brow furrowed. He’d heard the name before but couldn’t remember where. Before he could ask, Wren moved in a way that made him flinch back. Then the man was reaching for him.

  “What are you doing?”

  “May I touch you?”

  Tristan took a step back. “No,” he snapped.

  A smile curled Wren’s lips. “I promise, nothing scandalous, I just… I find you curious and I—I’m vanilla, but I still have strong mental facilities. I can’t command water to do my bidding as my Master can but I can still put the fear of death into humans with a single word. I can also, and pardon my metaphor, taste your mind. There’s something—I’d like to have a closer look at.”

  Tristan took a few more steps back until he felt a wall at his back. Bad move. “No. I don’t need anyone else in my head, you got it?”

  Wren didn’t look surprised at all. “So someone has been in your mind. Was it Master?”

  “No, it was Yukihime.”

  Wren looked like he’d just been punched in the nuts by his best friend. “What did she do to you?”

  “I don’t know,” Tristan answered frowning.

  “If you’d allow me, I could—When a vampire manipulates memories, they don’t actually erase them. Did you know?”

  Tristan shook his head.

  Wren nodded decisively. “Most vampire can only lock them up tight in the owner’s mind. Barricade them. However, ancients and older, mostly of the water line, can learn how to remove them but even then they must reside in a mind, the offending Master’s mind to be exact. And those memories will seek out their original host should they come in blood contact again.”

  He let out a shaky breath. He had no idea. He knew, from what Mamoru had said, that pythia spells could not only flat out erase the mind of memories—targeted or otherwise—but also reform them and create falsities. He’d always thought that’s how the vampire’s gift worked too. He hadn’t thought to ask before and wished he had. This truth changed so many things.

  “You think…” He licked his lips. “You think they’re still with me?”

  “If you are unbitten, then yes, as the Master must bite to transfer the memories from the host… through blood.”

  He was breathing hard. Of course, it made sense. If Yuki was the one to fuck in his head and it was obvious he hadn’t been bitten, then he still had those memories. They were just locked up tight. Or… maybe not so tight. His dreams, were they actual memories trying to break free? And if they were, did he really want them again. The things he, felt the fear and despair, they were overwhelming at night, in his head, in his dreams. Did he really want to know what caused such strong emotions?

  “I, uh—” Tristan let out a surprised squeak that embarrassed him, jumping forward to push past Wren. Standing on the other side of the table was a young child, a Chinese girl of about seven. Soft, round face with perfectly straight black hair and bangs cut just above sparkling eyes. “Hey! Where’d you come from?”

  Wren gasped and spun, grabbing Tristan’s arm and yanking him back, hissing the American’s name into his ear so that the word aggravated Tristan’s brain like a cheese grater.

  He cringed at the emotion Wren pushed onto him. “Gah, what’s the big deal, Wren? Fuck, that hurt.”

  The vampire’s hands where they held onto Tristan’s arms tightened. Tristan was about to push the man away when Wren said in a shaky voice, “A very good evening to you, Master Xuejiao.”

  14: Wet Secrets

  THE girl let out a pitched squeal and charged Wren, arms wide to take him in a hug. The vampire’s nails cut into Tristan’s good arm as Wren froze in fear. Tristan managed to tear his arm free and stumbled away from the others when the girl tumbled into Wren, wrapping her little arms around him.

  “Uh… Wren?” Tristan muttered, rubbing where Wren’d held on.

  The vampire looked up into Tristan’s face in a way that let his hair fall away, giving Tristan an unfettered view of the mask and the fear in his eyes. Wren shook his head, ever so slightly and whispered, “Don’t.”

  “Dude. She’s just a child, I can’t kil—”

  “Don’t!” Wren screamed but it was too late.

  The little girl let go of Wren, spinning to face Tristan. Hands clasped timidly before her, the child looked up to him. She had a strong Asian shape to her eyes, but they were large and shined with her smile. Those big fangs were pretty damn shiny too. “Hi.”

  “Uh, hey…?”

  She took a little step towards him and tilted her head to the side, gazing up at him. Christ, she was adorable. “I’m Xuejiao.”

  Tristan glanced back at Wren. The vampire looked positively horrified. Tristan clicked off the safety off the gun under his left arm but left it nestled in the holster. “Yeah…”

  “What are you?” she said with the simple innocence of a child. Her English was perfect and without a trace of Asian, or otherwise, accent.

  “Um…” Tristan glanced at Wren. The vampire was stone still, his eyes wide in horror.

  “You feel human, but not.” The girl put a hand to her chin in thought and then burst with sudden excitement. “I know what you feel like! Oh, Wrenny-poo!”

  Tristan took a step back. Wrenny-poo?

  Xuejiao spun to Wren, taking his hands and swinging his arms back and forth. “You shouldn’t have!”

  “Shouldn’t have, what?” Tristan asked as his instincts silently screamed at him to run. Xuejiao seemed like a sweet little girl, but then, Tristan knew better when it came to the vampires. They all lied, starting with their appearance.

  The little girl let go of Wren and moved
closer to Tristan. “Well, he lured you here for me, of course.”

  “Wh—what?” Wren chirped and shot forward only to be slammed back by the tiny fist of the vampire before him. His feet were taken out from under him and he flew back a good eight feet into a wall. He grunted with the impact and quickly picked himself up. But Xuejiao was already standing directly in front of Tristan.

  When it registered that she’d moved and was in his personal space, Tristan gasped, taking a step back. It was too late and he blinked down in surprise at the tiny little hands holding his wrist, keeping him from backing away.

  “You see, Wrenny-poo knows just how much I enjoyed the blood of your kind, so he had you delivered especially for me.”

  “That’s not—” Before Wren could finish protesting, Xuejiao threw her hand out and a gag of ice silenced him. He slumped down against the wall, pulling desperately at the ice choking him. The vampire was just vanilla enough that he might have needed to breathe, but Tristan didn’t know for sure. As he let the little thought distract him, a bolt of lightning shot out of Xuejiao’s hand and hit Wren square in the chest, knocking him out cold.

  Tristan only could gape. Who needed a fucking taser when you were a goddamned Sith Lord…. or a vampire, apparently.

  Darth Xue.

  Fuck.

  She smiled a smile that suddenly looked all adult and glared up at Tristan with contemptuous eyes. Her voice was deeper and evinced more of an adult candor, darker and made his skin cold. “Or was there some other nefarious plan in mind?”

  Cold started to seep out of her hand and overtake his arm. Tristan gasped but refused to struggle against it even though the ice felt as if it’d permeated to his very bone, burning him from the inside.

  “Was my darling Wrenny-poo filling your head with his wild ideas of killing me?”

  The temperature in the room dropped a sudden twenty degrees and a breeze strong enough to lift everyone’s hair circled the room. Tristan gave his arm a little testing sort of tug but the child vampire held fast with her immense strength. Sure, she had to use both tiny hands just to get a proper hold of Tristan’s larger wrist, but they were like a vice. Good for him, he had two arms.