by Lily Luchesi
“Our creator might be gone, but she left us with a taste for vampiric flesh,” one wolf said, its voice a growl.
“And now, especially, we want to watch you bleed,” the second added. “The fucking Empress. You will not enslave us into your bidding ever again!”
“That is not my wish,” Angelica said honestly. “I even gave up the PID. I only care about what my subjects do. You can go fuck off and, frankly, I don’t care if you all dropped dead.”
They laughed, and the sound grated like tectonic plates grinding together. To her sensitive ears, it was like listening to the San Andreas Fault tear itself up.
“Like we could ever trust a vampire,” the first spat. “Your kind always treated us like lepers, like you were any better than us. You vampires are worse than we are. At least we don’t torment our prey.”
Angelica thought about Quentin, her first love and her first kill. She thought about his great-great-grandnephew, Bart Michaels, who had been her head of security for decades, who had died because of a hex bag four months ago as a warning to her. She recalled the entire Werewolf Corps, an organization formed by her ancestors in ancient Rome, which had grown to protect humanity in war. She might not like many werewolves personally, but she had great respect for their kind.
“I never thought of your species that way,” she said. “If I did, I’d have killed you where you stand. As of right now, I’m even willing to let you go.”
The second smirked, revealing its saliva-dripping fangs. “Too bad, because the only way we’re letting you leave here alive is if you kill us first.”
Angelica shrugged, elegant for such a blasé gesture, and said, “Fine. Have it your way.” She leapt forward and knocked the first shifter back into a large pine, rattling it and making brown, dead needles crash down on their heads like confetti. In the space of a second, she had her sword straight through its heart, relishing its wheezing death rattle beneath her.
She pulled her sword back only to feel it grabbed from her hand and thrown somewhere in the distance. Turning, she kicked at the remaining shifter, breaking its jaw and knocking a few fangs loose.
In its momentary distraction, she reached into her jacket’s inner pockets and pulled out her two daggers. “Like I only carry one weapon. Give me a break.”
This shifter put up a better fight than its packmate. Angelica worked up a much better sweat fighting it as she watched it get worn down as time went on. Each of them were scarred in turn, but hers kept healing thanks to her newfound royal blood, while its wounds just kept bleeding.
Angelica felt sorry for it and went in for the kill, her blade stopping an inch from its heart. She’d have to shove in deeper, burning her hand on its blood. Vampires are allergic to werewolf blood because it has double the red blood cell count compared to humans. However, werewolves were strengthened by vampire blood.
The shifter, weakened and in no position to move, chuckled lightly. “You think you’re a big shot, Cross. But the other species won’t stand for your rule. Nor will your own. You’ll see.”
“Fuck off and die,” she hissed, moving her hand and using her palm to shove the blade in past the hilt, piercing the heart and killing it without harming herself further.
She wiped the blood-sweat from her forehead and sighed. That was more of a workout than she had planned for. Cleaning her weapons on the torn clothes the shifters had been wearing, she stored them and went home. She needed to notify the PID to pick up the corpses and shower.
Getting back into the house, she found Danny watching her old Lord Slug VHS. He looked up when she came in and then did a double take.
“What the Hell?”
“Most of it is deer blood. I…also fought two of Fiona’s wayward shifters,” she said. “I need to call Harriet and get a cleanup crew out there.”
“I should really be used to you coming home covered in blood by now, shouldn’t I?” Danny asked with a smile.
Angelica returned it. “Probably.”
As Angelica took her phone out, it began to ring. It looked like Harriet was calling her.
“Hey. I was just gonna call you. Got two shifter corpses behind the house if you can get someone to dispose of them before they start to stink up the neighborhood,” she said. When werewolves decayed, it was like rotting, wet dog fur permeated an area.
Harriet sighed. “Yes, sure, but we’ve got another problem. There were three more bodies found. I think it’s the same vamp who killed your neighbor.”
“How would you know?” Angelica asked. There was no way to tell vamp bites apart unless the vamp had a dental abnormality.
“Because you knew these guys, too.”
Chapter Three
Angelica had befriended the band Lycancore back in nineteen-ninety-nine. Three of the band members were psychic vampires, and their vocalist was a male siren. Male sirens were rare, with one being born every century or so, whereas five females were born every century. Angelica had helped him figure out a way to feed and not kill, which is difficult for sirens, and they had been very close ever since. At times they didn’t speak for years, but when they did see each other again it was like no time had passed.
Angelica had also fed from him backstage after the band’s first show, a mixture of his powers and her vampiric thrall ensnaring them both, culminating in one extremely hot night. He had written a song about it, released on their debut album a year later.
With Brighton, Mark, and Bart dead, siren Sean Wireman was the only real friend she had outside of the people in the PID. The three people who had been vampire victims were his bandmates, which is why Harriet assumed it was the same vamp who was after Angelica.
Danny insisted on coming with Angie to the crime scene, which was an empty, one-story building the band had renovated near Belmont and Clark so they could rehearse. The PID were already there, finishing up bagging the bodies for either cremation or burial, and the only person not working somehow was Sean, who was pacing, rubbing the back of his head in a nervous gesture that was very familiar to Angelica.
He looked up when the door opened again and his countenance brightened considerably when he saw her. “Hey!”
The room was a bloodbath. It was impossible to step anywhere without getting your shoes in it. She momentarily mourned the loss of her Converse—why didn’t they give us booties, the idiots—before going over to Sean and wrapping him in a hug. The whole place stank of rotten meat and iron, overpowering every other scent, and her stomach twisted with hunger.
He held her tightly, knowing he couldn’t hurt her, and she felt him shaking. “I’m so sorry,” she said to him. “This is all my fault somehow.”
He pulled away from her and said, “Bullshit. Angie, you’ve always been a target. Just because you’re the Empress does not make you responsible for every vampire in existence. No one blames the President for when some psycho offs his entire family, right?”
“This is the second vampiric murder connected to me,” she said. “Someone wants to send me a message and I got it loud and clear. I just can’t believe this happened.” Her eyes scanned the room, noticing the spots where the corpses had been laying. Just the thought, the image in her mind, and she was no longer hungry.
“Why weren’t you here?” Danny spoke up, taking Angelica’s concentration off of Sean. “Your whole band was rehearsing, yet you showed up after they were murdered.”
Uh-oh, Angelica thought. She should have seen this coming. Danny was a jealous man, and she knew he could read a siren’s mind almost as easily as a human’s. If Sean was thinking about Angelica in any way other than platonic, Danny knew. Regardless, she knew he could feel their connection, especially Sean’s. On top of that, Sean had called her ‘Angie’. She could only imagine how pissed Danny was.
“And who the Hell are you?” Sean asked, crossing strong arms over his chest.
“Detective Mancini, and now you can answer me,” Danny said.
“I was late. I’m always late. Ask anyone. Are you done? Because I’m a siren,
genius. I couldn’t do that, and no vampire would ever do my bidding, in case you were thinking I orchestrated all of this.” He gestured to the bloody floor, dark eyes glinting in the harsh lighting.
Angelica stepped between the men. “All right, boys, put ’em away: the measuring contest is over. Really, you’re acting like fucking teenagers. Sean, Danny is my husband. Danny, Sean is a very good friend. All cleared up? Good. Now we can focus on the real issue here.”
She shook her head. Men! No matter the century, no matter the species, some things always remained the same, it seemed.
“Sean, you have to have security cameras here,” she said.
“Of course. Have at ’em,” he said. “Nothing in here, but there’s one facing the hallway and one each at the front and back doors.”
Sighing, she said, “I guess that’s all we need, then. I see Harriet was questioning people in the area when we walked in. What a press nightmare you’re going to have.”
“No kidding,” Sean replied, his eyes distant. “…I can’t ever unsee what I walked in here and saw. Their bodies twisted. Their faces still in fear. And they were not exactly fighters, either. If I had just been on time for once—”
“You would have died, too,” Angelica cut in. “Don’t blame yourself. You’re strong, but you couldn’t have defeated a pureblood vampire with no weaponry.”
“What’s left to do here?” Danny asked. “Besides clean up.” He grimaced at all the blood.
Angelica surveyed the room again. Vampires never leave evidence like mortals do, and once the camera footage was analyzed there was nothing to do, and she told him so. “I need to find this vamp before he hurts anyone else.”
“Including you,” Danny said, his hand on her waist. Just his touch, and she was comforted.
“Sean, you’ve gotta get out of here,” she said.
The siren looked at her quizzically. “And what exactly do you mean by that?”
“I mean you need to get as far away from me and this vamp as you can. I doubt they will travel to another country to find you.”
His eyes were downcast and she saw he now realized where she meant for him to go. “You want me to go home, to the place I was excommunicated from?”
Sean had been born in a small religious village a few centuries ago, to mortal parents. Once he was nearly grown and they realized what he could do, they tried to kill him, but they did not do it properly. When he did not die, he was cast out of his home, and eventually he made his way to Europe and then America. To talk to him now, you’d never know he had lived anywhere but Chicago his entire life, but he’d had a hard go of it at the beginning, as many sirens born to mortals do, especially in the old days.
“Yes, for three reasons: one, everyone who knew you there is long dead. Two, it’s far away from this vamp and me. Three, there is a PID there where you can get work, and so can your wife. I’m not sending you to some village in Buttfuck Nowhere: it’s the capital.” His wife was also a siren, but it was a marriage of convenience, not love. She turned to Danny. “Can you help Harriet get an emergency flight out of O’Hare? I’ll go and make sure he gets on the plane safely.”
She saw that Danny was not exactly pleased with her plan, but he agreed, kissing her before they parted.
After getting to Sean’s home in Oak Park, she helped him with everything he needed together. Once they were at O’Hare, Angelica wanted to stay with Sean until he was actually on the plane.
“The media is going to think I killed them if I run off like this,” he commented.
“Nonsense. I’ll have someone from the mortal FBI release a statement that you went into the witness protection program. I refuse to have all your fans thinking you’re a murderer,” Angelica said. “And you’ll be back soon. You know me, Sean—I’ll turn this bastard to dust in no time.”
He smiled at her, and she was glad to see it. He took her hand in his, his fingertip running over her engagement and wedding rings. “I’m glad you’re happy, Angie. Congratulations. Even though your husband doesn’t seem to like me very much.”
Angelica laughed. “He’s a little jealous because he’s a psychic. He can tell how you feel about me just by glancing in your direction. I have a complicated past, and he has slowly learned to deal with that past as pieces come to light. You’re just another piece of the puzzle that is me.”
“As long as he deserves you and makes you happy,” Sean said. He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. “I am always going to love you, darlin’. That thrall you put on me never left.” He pulled her into a tight hug and she hugged him back, not as warmed by his declaration as she should have been. Anyone who loved her usually ended up dead.
When he let her go he said, “You’re a brilliant ruler, Angelica. Go show them who the fucking boss is.”
“You know I will.”
Angelica watched as Sean went through his gate to board the plane that would hopefully take him halfway across the world and far away from danger. She prayed she’d find out who this vampire was, because she could not take it if more people died, all because of her.
***
While Angelica was preparing Sean for travel, Danny was with Harriet, who could tell that something was very wrong.
“You want to tell me why you look like someone urinated in your cereal this morning?” Harriet asked him, sitting down on the dirty curb next to him.
Danny shook his head, ashamed at being jealous. Angelica was…well, she was Angelica. If she wanted someone aside from him, she’d have that person. He was sure she had not been celibate between the time Jonathan Price died and she met him in his current incarnation. But he was only human at heart, and his heart was pained at the strong wave of love that came off of Sean Wireman for Angie.
“Come on, Mancini, don’t brood. It had to be Sean, right? I never met him till tonight, but I knew about him. Not only because he’s a pretty famous musician, but because Angelica personally took it upon herself to find him a mate, so that he didn’t need to kill anyone. Your wife is a good person, with a bigger heart than anyone gives her credit for. And her heart is filled with you and you alone.
“It’s only natural for you to be jealous. When you truly love someone, your head and your heart gets a fierce, protective vibe. Like a lion.” She smiled at him.
“You sound like you’re talking from experience,” Danny said. “Is there a Mr. Galbraith somewhere?”
Harriet shook her head, removing her glasses and pinching the bridge of her nose. All of a sudden, Danny got a serious wave of grief coming from her like someone had flipped a switch. Usually, he couldn’t get anything from her because she guarded her mind. Tears leaked from her green eyes. “He died in eighteen-ninety-two. You’d think it wouldn’t still hurt so badly.”
Thinking of Brighton Sands, and how he mourned his lover in two lifetimes before they finally met again, Danny said, “I think it’s never going to stop hurting if you really loved him.”
“Angelica was there,” Harriet said. “She was helping with this crazy war we had going on. She was the shoulder I cried on, and she helped me get emotionally stable again so I could lead Britain’s Coven. I did it for him, because he would have wanted me to.”
“Do you wanna talk about it? I mean, you don’t even have to talk. Just…kinda purge your memories,” Danny offered. “It might make you feel better, and it will sure as Hell take my mind off of Angie and that muscle-headed bastard.”
Harriet chuckled, her eyes still red-rimmed. “Yes, I’d like that.”
Danny smiled and held his hand out. She took it, and he was transported into her memories of a long-ago love.
***
Inverness, Scotland
1852-1892
Harriet Galbraith was born to mortals in eighteen-fifty-two. Many paranormal people are born to unsuspecting humans, particularly witches, Psis, and sirens. Her early life is similar to Fiona Guilfoyle’s story, but instead of wanting all creatures to be submissive to magical folk, Harriet grew to l
ove humanity much as Angelica had.
A natural born witch, she was practicing magic before she could walk or talk. Her family did what they could to assist her in her abilities. Quickly, she became a hero to her small town, helping vegetables grow, heal sick animals, and even mend broken bones in humans. When she turned eighteen, the Grand Coven came to validate her.
The wizard who then led Britain’s branch of the Coven was the one who came to her home. Tall, severe, with fair skin and black hair, Aulus Occio immediately took a dislike toward the bubbly little witch who so easily revealed the secrets of the paranormal world to humans. The magical community survived via secrecy, he told her, and what she was doing could get her executed.
“But if we have these abilities, why can we not help others?” Harriet had asked.
She was met with a cold, dark stare. “Because, while you have met with grateful mortals who care for you only because you are useful, some of us with more…worldly experience have had slightly more disconcerted humans try and burn us to death.” He moved his high collar aside to show her a ghastly scar. “Or worse.”
Harriet had no words to express her horror that a human could do such a thing. Young as she was, she still had an optimistic outlook on life.
“I’m sorry you were ever hurt, sir,” she said.
“I do not require your pity, Miss Galbraith,” Aulus said. “What I require is your cooperation. You are talented, but there is much to learn. And regardless, you must leave here. We cannot afford you to reveal our entire community to the mortals, lest we become hunted again.”
Harriet was upset by his crass nature. She had only been endeavoring to be kind to him. “Where do I have to go?”
“Not far. There’s a community of us, the Grand Coven, living here in Inverness, just a few miles over. You can even visit your family if you are so inclined. Gather your belongings. I will wait, but we must make it to the castle before sunrise,” Aulus said.
“Why before sunrise?” she asked.
“Because that is when the protective charm cast on our journey will end. Now make haste, little girl.” He waved a hand dismissively and Harriet decided then and there that she did not like him whatsoever.