The Bloodline War (The Community)

by Tracy Tappan

  The giant threw his knife.

  Jaċken twisted out of the path of the blade, spinning a full 360. The knife screamed harmlessly past, but the attack had done its job. Jaċken was diverted long enough for the giant to sling her over his shoulder again and take off for the tunnels. Within seconds, he was passing through the still-smoking gate.

  The need to vomit broke over her flesh in a cold sweat. Instinctively, she now knew those passageways weren’t the way out, but the way into some—

  Whirr, then clunch-clunch. Two knife handles were sticking out of the giant’s back, protruding on either side of her waist. Her captor roared and flung her to the ground, adding bruised ribs to her rapidly growing list of injuries. He turned and rushed Jaċken.

  Half-blinded by sweat and tears, she watched from a fetal position on the ground as the two men went at each other with unmatched brutality, fists slamming into flesh in one bone-crushing punch after another, the relentless pounding of their blows echoing off the cave walls like thunder.

  She’d never seen such violence in her life. Soon both men’s chests were heaving with exertion, their faces awash with sweat and blood. Jaċken’s left eye was rapidly swelling shut, and the giant’s nose was smashed out of alignment. The battle seemed to go on forever, although it probably only lasted the twenty seconds it took for Thomal, Nỵko, and Arc to pound onto the scene. The three men arrived just as the giant seized Jaċken by the throat and hiked him off his feet. With veins bulging on his forehead, Jaċken still managed to kick the giant in the stomach. The creature flung Jaċken at Nỵko.

  The two men collided, hit the ground, and rolled across Thomal’s path. With a shout, Thomal leapt over the two warriors, barely clearing them. Jaċken was back on his feet in an instant, blasting toward the tunnel.

  But the giant had already disappeared.

  “Shit!” Boots planted wide, his lungs working furiously, Jaċken stood at the mouth of the tunnel and glared into it. “Fuck!” he shouted into the echoing chamber, frustration and anger apparent in every unyielding line of his body.

  Toni pushed onto her hands and knees, coughing weakly, her breath rushing painfully along her tender throat. Her jaw felt as if someone had taken a baseball bat to it. She tried to rise, but couldn’t. Her legs had no more substance than overcooked spaghetti.

  “Oh, Jesus, Toni.” Thomal hunkered down in front of her and took her by the shoulders, his expression clouding with concern. “You’re covered in blood.” He pressed his lips together as if hiding something in his mouth.

  “I-It’s not my blood,” she stammered. “D-Dev, it’s…. Is he…?”

  “Nỵko’s heading over to him now,” Thomal said softly. “He’ll be all right.”

  She nodded her head, the movement stabbing pain into the backs of her eyeballs. She couldn’t seem to stop crying. Maybe this was what hysteria felt like. She turned and looked for Jaċken.

  He was standing several feet away, his bloody face a rigid, unreadable mask, his dark eyes devoid of emotion. “Jaċken….” Her lips trembled and then her whole body began to shake. “Don’t—” She reached out a hand to him, feeling suddenly like he was the only one who could keep all of the monsters of the world under the bed where they belonged. Don’t leave me.

  He stood wooden and unmoving, making no effort to approach her.

  You know, for someone who’s probably real smart about most things in life, you seem to have your head particularly far up your ass about staying away from me.

  She let her hand fall.

  Arc placed a palm on Thomal’s shoulder. “Let’s get Toni to Dr. Jess.”

  A final tear slipped from her eye. She tilted sideways, and the last thing her conscious mind registered was that it was Thomal who caught her when she fainted dead away.

  Chapter Twenty

  Jaċken stood in front of Toni’s bedroom door and fidgeted with the cold thermos he was carrying. Shit, just how many sandwiches short of a picnic was he? Three hours ago at Garwald’s he’d all but planted his size thirteens on Toni’s ass to get her away from him, and now here he was standing outside her bedroom. Fucking genius.

  He should just go. He took a step backward, but then hesitated, staring at the Eiffel Tower on her door. Thing was, he might be a lot of damned things—a hard, difficult man, a real prick sometimes—but he was never undependable. Ask any of his warriors and they’d say he was the most reliable son of a bitch out there, a man anyone would want watching his six. And, no, maybe he didn’t know thing one about being there for a woman, but that didn’t mean it was sitting well with him that he’d let Toni down.

  She’d needed him after that gut-wrenching near-Gwyn reenactment at The Outer Edge tonight. Not Thomal, but him. He’d figured out that much in the hours he’d paced his bedroom while Toni was being tended in the mansion’s basement clinic. What she’d needed was still a bit of a mystery to a man with his limited understanding of females, but whatever it was, he’d been too catatonic with his own fear to give it to her. Yeah, him, a guy who faced the possibility of death in battle as easily as he picked out his breakfast cereal. A guy who’d been beaten, stabbed and tortured more times than he cared to count had been scared out of his ever-loving mind when he’d seen Toni on the ground in Stânga Town, banged up and covered in blood.

  He swallowed convulsively as he pictured her in Oţărât right now, serving as some Om Rău’s party favor. He gripped the thermos in a hard fist. All right, enough of this crap. If he kept on like this, he’d end up standing in front of her door doing jack diddly squat, just like in Stânga Town, maybe start in on some blubbering. That’d be real fucking manly.

  Drawing in a tight breath, he knocked softly on Toni’s door. She didn’t answer. Christ, knowing his luck, she’d off’ed herself because he was such an unmitigated bastard. Muttering under his breath, he pushed open the door and stepped into her room. No one was inside…no Toni hanging from a light fixture, either, at least.

  He paused to look around, some of his tension easing. The place felt like Toni now. Her delicious scent saturated everything, of course, but more than that, she’d made the room her own with a collection of paperbacks on a corner bookshelf, a different bedspread, kind of a puffy, pale purple comforter, and about half a dozen framed photographs. Most were of an older blonde woman—probably Toni’s mother to judge by the resemblance—and of a guy about Toni’s age, strawberry-blond like her, but wearing glasses. A brother? Jaċken shifted his boots restlessly, feeling oddly like an intruder, yet also suddenly wanting to know everything about her. Do you know that I once sat on my brother for fifteen minutes to get him to let me play with his red fire truck? That kind of shit was, you know, really cool to find out about.

  He swiveled his head abruptly at the sound of retching coming from the open door of the bathroom. Ah, hell.

  He crossed into the bathroom and stopped just inside the doorway, his gut twisting. Toni was slumped against the side of a gargantuan bathtub, her eyes watery and still haunted with the trauma she’d endured, her face colorless except for a vivid bruise on her jaw. His heart took a nosedive into his soft spot at full speed, the way it always seemed to do whenever he saw her looking so damned vulnerable. Fuck him for failing to protect her better.

  “Go away,” she told him, though not unkindly. “Don’t you know that girls don’t like anyone to see them barf.”

  “Here.” He stepped forward and offered her the thermos. “Drink this. It’ll make you feel better.”

  She didn’t take it. “How’s Dev?” she asked thickly, wiping a small towel across her mouth.

  “Recovering. More worried about you.” A sentiment he could totally relate to. He squatted down on his haunches and pressed the thermos into her hand.

  “What is it?”

  “A mixture of juices: my own recipe. I, uh, have a bit of personal experience with puking over the things Lørke can do to a person.”

  “Oh.” Her eyes ran over his battered face. “You look like reconstituted
hell, by the way.”

  He propped a forearm on his thigh. “I suppose it wouldn’t surprise you to hear I’ve been called worse?”

  She snorted at hearing the words she’d spoken to him at Garwald’s repeated back to her. Lowering her eyes, she added, “I owe you my thanks, Jaċken. I would’ve died out there tonight if you hadn’t saved me from that fiend. Of course”—her chin came back up—“I’d like to point out that it wouldn’t have been an issue if you hadn’t kidnapped me in the first place.”

  He pressed his lips together into something close to a smile. “Noted.”

  She fiddled with the thermos lid for a moment. “What…happened out there tonight, Jaċken? I’ve never seen a knife do what it did to Dev. It just exploded in his shoulder. And that giant man walked through what looked like a spray of electricity as if it was no more than a field of daisies.” She met his gaze. “What’s going on?”

  He sat back on his heels and sighed. “Are you sure you want to know? I mean, Christ, you’re still not entirely convinced you’re living among Vârcolac.”

  She eyed him intently through a long pause. “I think I need to know.”

  He massaged the back of his neck. “All right, then. Here it is. The man who attacked you is Lørke, one of the leaders of a neighboring town called Oţărât, home to another species of human. Like Vârcolac, their people are incredibly strong and fast, but their Peak 12, their aggression gene, is mutated, escalating their hostility and violent behavior off the charts. They lack impulse control and a sense of morality, they’re nearly impossible to kill, and they can create enchanted knives called Bătaie Blades, which you saw in action on Dev today. All of that makes them very dangerous beings. We call them Om Rău.” He paused. Here comes the fun part…. “Regular human lore and legend would probably refer to them as demons.”

  She blinked once, then dropped her face into her hand. “Oh, God. Of course. Yes. “Demons” and “vampires” all living in unhappy discord together half a mile below the earth’s surface. Why not?”

  He glanced aside. Yeah, he’d figured as much.

  “Okay….” She opened the thermos and gulped some juice. “Okay, so how do I come into this? Why did that Lørke monster want to kill me? It didn’t seem like he was just acting out of simple demonic impulsivity.”

  “Your death is the last thing Lørke would’ve wanted. He was trying to knock you senseless enough to kidnap you easily into Oţărât. He wants to breed you, same as we do. Lørke and his kind can have children with regular females, but those offspring turn out weaker, and with fewer Om Rău traits, so they want your Dragon bloodlines.”

  Her face reddened and her brows drew down. “And you’ve known about this all along,” she accused, struggling to a standing position.

  He stood, as well, his head down to hide a grimace.

  “Why the hell didn’t you warn me, Jaċken?”

  “Roth doesn’t like to scare the new acquisitions any more than they already are.” Another topic of contention between the two men.

  “That’s great.” She plunked the thermos on the edge of the tub. “Have you ever lost a woman? Holy crap,” she hissed when his face colored. “Jaċken, please.” She grabbed his forearm. “You have to get me out of this place before something worse happens. Please. I’m in mortal danger here, stuck in the middle of some…some bloodline war between your kind and these Om Rău.”

  He paused for a moment, struggling to overcome the feel of her hand on his arm so that he could stay in this conversation.

  She moved closer, her demeanor changing. Her eyes turned limpid blue. “You said that you know what it’s like to feel trapped, remember?”

  He became aware of her body heat, warm and feminine, and how it laced with her scent in a way that was entirely too intimate for his well-being and sanity. What she’d said was even more dangerous, forging a connection between them that had no right to be there. Had no place to go. Why had he said that to her at The Shank Took, damn him? The next time he had the brilliant impulse to comfort a woman, he should just stab himself.

  He gave his feet a stern command to retreat—run like hell would’ve been even better—but couldn’t get any body part to obey. “I’m sorry,” he managed to get out, “but sending you to the surface isn’t the answer. Not anymore. There’s a new faction of Om Rău, a Topside Om Rău, hunting you. They were at Scripps Hospital the same night we were, also trying to kidnap you.”

  “What?” She let go of him, her lips parting in shock. “What are you saying? That I can’t ever go back?”

  The expression on her face twisted his innards into knots. “Only under full guard.” Yeah. Lame. “If you went back to the surface to live, the Topside Om Rău would eventually find you and take you. Your bloodlines are just too valuable. And I can guarantee that, as much as you think you hate it here in Ţărână, life with the Om Rău would be a living nightmare. Trust my experience on this.”

  “Good God,” she breathed, her lips bloodless. “This isn’t happening.” Tears pooled in her eyes.

  A bolt of panic shot up his spine. “Toni…please, don’t cry. Okay, uh…. Vârcolac males can’t handle…we don’t do so well with that.” Despite his warning, a tear trembled along her lashes, then slid down her cheek. He watched it in outright horror, his knees turning to sand. “Just give Ţărână a chance,” he said quietly. “I know you can’t feel it, yet, but this is where you belong.” He shoved a hand through his hair. What in hell was he supposed to do with a crying woman? “I can keep you safe here,” he tried, “I promise. Nothing bad would’ve happened to you tonight if you hadn’t escaped your Protection Team.”

  “No,” she cried, burying her face in her hands. “No.” Her shoulders began to shake and little hiccupping noises came out of her.

  He stared down at the delicate crown of her head, his arms dangling loosely at his sides, his belly sagging into his boots. Blinking a couple of times, he finally lifted his hand, held it in a hover over her head for a second, then plunked it on top of her hair.

  She froze.

  He froze. Now, uh, what? Her crying quieted a bit. That was good. He began to pet her head. Whoa. Her hair felt even softer than it looked. A sinew quivered in his jaw as emotions he couldn’t name muscled his chest to the floor and pinned it there. The shape of her head felt so small and vulnerable beneath his large, callused palm.

  She stopped crying.

  Holy shit, he’d made her stop. Him! His lungs expanded. He was King of the World.

  Impulsively, he grabbed both sides of her head and gently pulled her forward. She didn’t resist, just stepped closer to him. Shutting his eyes, he pressed his nose to the top of her hair and breathed in deeply. Stupid, stupid, stupid….

  Her scent swirled through the lobes and crevices of his brain, locking inside there with a feeling of absolute rightness. He shuddered.

  Angling her head up, Toni caught his gaze. Intimacy warmed the air around them, wrapping their bodies in a private cocoon.

  He lost himself in the drowning blue depths of her eyes. Stupid, stupid, stupid….

  Toni lifted a hand to his bruised cheek, touching him lightly with her fingers.

  He inhaled a slow, uneven breath. Two fingers against his skin and he wanted to die.

  “Lørke has the same teeth tattoo as you do,” she said softly, “but here…” She moved her fingers up to his temple.

  His heart stopped, dread squeezing his chest.

  She dropped her hand, but never took her eyes off him. “The man who pounded ink-soaked tacks into you,” she said, the caring tone of her voice both wonderful and terrible, “the man who made you feel trapped…that was Lørke, wasn’t it?”

  The moment of intimacy between them evaporated. No, more like—ka-blooey!—it exploded, all the old cage doors slamming shut inside him, walls going up, guards put on full alert. He should thank her for it. Long experience had taught him that it was way fucking easier not to feel a thing rather than deal with all the pain and defe
at, all of the heart-wrenching disappointment that was surely heading his way from this woman.

  “Yeah, you figured it out,” he told her flatly. He paused a beat for emphasis, then shoved the three damning words past his lips. “Lørke’s my father.” He gestured at the thermos. “Drink that,” he instructed, then turned hard on his heel and walked out.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Raymond leaned impatiently on his walking stick, his double-breasted camel hair topcoat buttoned tight against the evening’s brassy weather, a pair of Aspinal leather gloves covering his hands like a second skin. Mürk and Rën were standing off to his right, Rën’s incessant gum-chewing near driving him around the bend, and Tëer was kneeling on the weedy earth in front of an opening into the rocky cliff. They were all clandestinely gathered behind The Cave Store on Coast Boulevard in La Jolla Cove, so close to the Pacific Ocean that Raymond could hear the boom of the surf and feel the occasional mist of sea spray.

  He glanced irritably at his Rolex, visible by virtue of the security lighting attached to the back of the store. It was after midnight. “Best you haven’t called us out here for naught, son.” Raymond had just been about to get a leg over with a lush sort from his polo club when he’d received Tëer’s message.

  Tëer gestured at the machine on the ground in front of him. “Subterranean vibrations are registerin’ on the meter, so the elevator should be movin’.”

  Hidden just inside the cliff face were elevator doors—supposedly one of the secret passageways of the Underground Om Rău. So, yes, fancy that, the creatures did exist. It’d been quite the kerfuffle getting that information out of the demonic mother of his children; Ұavell apparently feared being reacquired by some chap named Lørke, a demon she’d escaped from some years back.