by L. A. Banks
“Even second levels hold aspirations. We would have to take harsh measures while you were not yourself, while you were under the influence. Too risky,” the counselor said, shaking his head. “We have fortunately retrieved you, and would never dream of imperiling one of our rising stars again. You stay down here with us until your territory is realigned and cleaned out of any potential rebel forces.”
This was not a part of his plan, and Carlos watched in dread as the attorney slid the eternal contract across the table toward him.
“Sign,” the attorney hissed. “The last time you left our chambers without a signature. This is a policy breach. But, as men of our word, we all kept our bargains. Good faith had been demonstrated on both sides, therefore let us seal this in the appropriate manner.”
Desperate for a diversion, Carlos clung to the only information he had that would make them hesitate. No vampire in his right mind would refuse a throne of all power and knowledge. To do so would blow his cover and end his game—and start a very long period of torture. Carlos glanced around. He was so far down in the pit that no sources of light would be able to evacuate him. The Vampire Council knew it; he knew it. There was only one option. Go for the jugular.
“I’m not signing shit under these circumstances. This is a bullshit deal, and you know it! First of all, Damali Richards was my hit,” he said in a defensive tone, his eyes roving over the group with an expression of frustration. “I was the one who was supposed to bring her in, and I want my name going down in the history as the one who brought in the millennium slayer. Let’s start my complaint there, Mr. Counselor.”
The chairman smiled. “Raw, unadulterated ambition. Passion. This is why he is such wonderful new blood for our council table. He reminds me so much of myself in my younger days.” The chairman sat back and watched the brewing debate, his fanged smile widening.
The attorney paused and begrudgingly nodded toward the others. “That minor amendment can be made in the documents—however, he still needs to sign the eternal contracts.”
“Why?” Carlos shot back. “I thought that practice was passé, and did any other council member have to sign? Oh, so because I’m a young blood, right, and a brother . . .”
They didn’t answer, but the attorney’s eyes narrowed.
“By the way . . . where’s my soul? On what level is it? One of the transport messengers said y’all were looking for it. I wanna be sure it doesn’t wind up lost on level four with the Amanthras.” Carlos folded his arms over his chest as the full council responded with silent, stricken expressions. “Now, I have been gone a full calendar month, putting my limbs back together and slowly restoring my power off of coyote blood, then nonadrenaline-spiked innocents and damned highway roadkill—before I sign anything, fair exchange is no robbery. Where’s my damned soul? It needs to be in the right hands, or the contract is void anyway.” Checkmate.
“We can assure you that our vigilant search continues, and that our alliance with the old Amanthra Supreme Council—”
“You know what,” Carlos said evenly, taking the risk to show fangs for theatrical measure, “this is bullshit!” He walked to the table and slammed his fist down, causing the blood within its marble veins to spill over the edges.
“I infiltrate the Minion, alone, risk going after a rogue master with Neteru in my nose, and his, literally castrate the bastard—then I off several of his top-ranking, second-level rebel generals; singlehandedly get inside the Neteru compound to keep a lock on her, then carry her while she’s wearing silver, no less, through demon-infested tunnels—and you guys send my backup late! Your boys were late. I almost died on this mission. Now, you promise me the throne, but I have to sign some shit to show my good faith? And let’s not forget about the matter of my lost soul. Down in your own territories? Fuck you. I finish this mission the way we agreed—I bring in the Neteru, then I sign the papers and the throne is mine. In fact, I shouldn’t even have to sign that shit for the power in it to be ceded to me, since I was the one who hit Nuit! You need to give me a seat just on general principle.”
The chairman nodded, the blood within his transparent veins not even quickening. “Hmmm . . . hatred, pure rage . . . intelligence, strategy. Absolute ruthless ambition—and balls enough to challenge a seated councilman? No fear—down here?” He suddenly laughed. “You’re going to bring much to this council. So be it. We’ll discuss the possibility in the near future.” Without looking up, the Chairman waved his hand. “Gentlemen, on to the next item on the agenda.”
Carlos stood there for a moment dumbfounded. He’d expected more of a fight. In truth, the other council members seemed shocked, especially the attorney.
“Uh . . . Mr. Chairman,” the counselor said in a slow, cautious tone. “We do need that signature.”
“Mr. Rivera has shown more loyalty than some of our current council members,” the chairman snarled. “In fact, Mr. Counselor, he has also demonstrated greater effectiveness than our member responsible for corridor containment.” The blood sped up in the chairman’s veins under his skin as he looked down the table at a nervous council member at the far end. “Please do not provoke me to explore this discussion any further tonight. Mr. Rivera has slayer scent in his system, and asks the small favor of this council to allow him to bring her in before she ripens. It is done. This is the way we used to do business in the old days—when a man’s word was his bond, his actions were his oath. I am satisfied.”
“I have a question, though,” Carlos pressed after a moment, testing his luck. “There have been mountain climbers killed on topside . . . and when I passed level five—”
“That is out of your jurisdiction,” the counselor cut in.
“I only asked because I want to know everything that’s going on that could endanger the Neteru while she’s topside. If I’m protecting the package, hey.” Carlos shrugged and began to walk away.
Again the chairman nodded and waved his hand. Another council member from a far point of the star-shaped table spoke in a hushed tone, making Carlos turn around slowly.
“There’s been a breach on level five. We do not know the extent—as it is, again, in the most insidious of the demon provinces. Our fight was with the Amanthras on level four, and we can ill afford to scatter our energies to contest a breach on the formidable level five weredemon realms. If not for our civil war, we would have dealt with it swiftly.”
“Well how did some whack shit like that happen?” Carlos was appalled. These old boys weren’t handlin’ their business.
The counselor narrowed his gaze and hissed. “Apparently, Nuit’s international Raise the Dead concert opened several portals to demon energies on our five continents, but not all the portals have been resealed. We quickly sent forces to North America, Europe, Asia, Australia, and Africa, which includes our guarded Middle East provinces that are being held fallow for the Armageddon—places where commerce interruption would be highly visible and problematic for our financial arrangements. A few nagging elements escaped topside, but nothing to trouble oneself about. It shall be rectified.”
“Why didn’t you send anybody to check out South America? That’s a major piece of real estate in my territory that should have been on lockdown while I was rehabbing. See, here again, y’all haven’t had my back proper and—”
“South America was illegally ceded to you by Nuit. He was only to cover the US and Canada, North America, and he assassinated the South American ambassador to annex that area, and to pick up the Caribbean. It caused major alignment issues, because we must keep the Biblical city for level seven—with three of the most powerful world religions battling over it. We must have a continent to feed from, as council. We had to elevate a second-level vampire in Australia to keep the balance, so that we had five continents covered, with two to match the realms that never venture topside. Do not quibble with this council over your land distribution issues.”
“Quibble? What?” Carlos was leaning forward across the table glaring at Counselor Vla
k. “Motherfucker,” he yelled, pointing at Vlak, “your ass may be council, but I tore North America and South America out of Nuit’s ass. Matter fact, he’d ceded the Islands and South America before we even came to blows—just from a hit of Neteru.” Carlos pushed away from the table; this time the rage was no act. “You keep sending me through changes about shit that is by right mine . . . sign this, leave the package and let some other bastard unwrap it. Now you’re taking my land? Oh Hell no!”
“I will kill this young bastard with my bare hands!” The counselor said, standing quickly, about to reach for Carlos’s chest, but his arm was immediately slapped away by a mere glance from the chairman.
The chairman smiled. “Vlak, sit, and do not be hasty.” The chairman looked at Carlos. “Young man, have a seat in the throne and calm yourself, get a power surge from it. Your nerves are frayed to the limit. You haven’t established a lair yet, nor responded to the insistent female calls in your region, given your rehabilitation . . . and that has made you volatile. I understand . . . the counselor understands, don’t you, Counselor? Let’s see what we can siphon from his seat. If he does well, I might be so moved to give it to him.”
The chairman’s smile went to a chuckle as he glanced at Counselor Vlak. “Indulge me this once, gentlemen. He delights me. He hasn’t fed well for a month, hasn’t sated himself with a harem . . . but he came to us, first, to handle his land issues.” The chairman made a tent before his lips with his gnarled fingers. “This is a real businessman. You want him to sign trivial documents, when his ambition is a palpable lust?” He looked at Carlos and he dropped his voice to a seductive murmur. “Young man, sit in the chair. Please.”
With trepidation, Carlos sat slowly, hoping like hell that whatever was there wasn’t strong enough to break the black box Father Patrick had around his thoughts. He watched the old vampires close their eyes and touch the table gently, caressing it with the tips of their clawed fingers. A current ran through his producing a rush like he’d never felt before, along with it a power hit that made him shut his eyes and arch his back away from the chair. Damn . . . He gripped the throne’s arms with trembling hands. He almost couldn’t take it all in. The first time they let him sit there, he’d absorbed centuries of knowledge, this time absolute carnal pleasure ran through him, along with the knowledge of how to deliver it with a bite.
“Oh, shit,” Carlos murmured, tears brimming beneath his lids. “It’s almost as good as pure Neteru.”
“You feel that?” the chairman whispered to the other seated vampires. “You feel how much he wants her . . . but he came here about business, first. You feel that pent-up desire . . . sheer aggression, but with willpower enough to resist the call of five strong females in the most seductive regions of his territories, but he came here, first.” The chairman closed his eyes. “This man hasn’t even been on a proper blood hunt. He was made at twenty-three years old, and the stamina in that body . . . the virility . . . but to have the presence of mind to be strategic—I’m awed.”
The chairman sat back, his hand trembling slightly as he released the table, causing the others to break the trance. “Give this young man his fucking South American territory and a throne, Vlak. He won it, earned it, winner takes all. Trim back another master’s continent, if necessary—but I haven’t felt a power erection like that in years.” The chairman dabbed at his brow and let his breath out in a slow, controlled stream. “Damn. He was practically one of us before he’d turned. All predator.”
The old men chuckled, and the councilman in charge of alignments smiled. “Makes you want a cigarette afterward, doesn’t it, Mr. Chairman?” He shot his gaze at Counselor Vlak. “Give the young blood his territory, cede him a throne, and stop this bullshit. You’ve been on his ass since he got down here. We’ve got other business to address tonight . . . and after that, I might go topside myself.” He shook his head and laughed, gaining nods from the others around the table.
“His South American provinces are not safe—if he is so valuable,” the counselor shot back, fury making his eyes glow red. “Our amusement with what he brings to these chambers notwithstanding.”
“What are you talking about?” Carlos mumbled fast, now sitting forward and trying to get ten inches of battle-length fangs to go back up into his gums with much effort. The hard-on had left a wet spot in his pants. It was ridiculous what they’d done—embarrassing. He could hardly speak around his fangs. Shit. He hadn’t even gone there while fighting Nuit, that battle only produced six to eight inches. He watched them laugh harder as he used both thumbs to send his incisors up and into his jaw. “What’s not safe in my turf?”
The chairman released a weary sigh. “We closed everything we could, but one portal remains partially opened, and we can only fathom that there were human forces leveraging the event. Nuit’s cursed concert. For all we know, humans at one of the concert points might have performed a ritual. But we don’t know what it was, or what it was designed to release. They could have then gone behind the concert and reopened one of the places we had shut down. Simple logic dictates that the site we cannot totally close has to be the primary ritual site, because the other portals were easier for us to reseal. Our vampire forces of topside sniffers have been erstwhile diverted to tracking down any remaining Nuit Minions. That’s our issue. The civil war has been a tremendous resource drain on the empire, and we do not have enough information, at this juncture, to immediately ferret out and cope with this minor breach.”
The counselor glanced at the council members and then settled his line of vision on Carlos. “It’s not the Amanthras. As we said, they are embroiled in their own subterranean civil war, at present.”
“Where was the first breach?” Carlos asked carefully. “I need to keep the Neteru from that region—it’s in her nature to go after it, though. She’s already talking about doing concerts again.”
The chairman nodded. “Brazil.”
“I’ll try my best to persuade her not to go there,” Carlos said quietly, their combined voices mentally entering his head. “But, you’re right. She is stubborn.”
The chairman and the council simply nodded in unison.
“Do what you have to do to protect the package,” the chairman said, dismissing him.
While it felt good to be topside again, and he’d narrowly missed getting off-ed at the Vampire Council’s meeting by Vlak, worry consumed him as he loped through the woods back to the cabin. Eyes were everywhere, watching, waiting, and he’d have to figure out a way to communicate to Father Pat . . . maybe just before dawn, when the dark eyes of his world couldn’t see. Once he got inside the monk’s safe house, he was cool. Their protective barriers sealed out the dark forces’ sight.
But he couldn’t be detected entering or exiting a fortress of monks—at least not without a good story, which even he couldn’t come up with to address that unlikely match. That meant he’d have to hang out in the woods all night, and couldn’t get near his blood supply after using so much energy. If he did, it wouldn’t be enough anyway. Sitting in that throne had literally been a bitch.
The monks would be at risk, then his soul would be in Vlak’s claw. And after experiencing those old bastards again, he definitely knew he had to protect Damali.
If he went to her like this, he’d open up their package for sure—and the council would smoke him. If he went to any of the known lairs in his regions, five strong females would instantly gravitate there, and he’d definitely do ’em . . . there’d be no choice about it. But they’d also be a threat to Damali. They’d smell her as soon as he fantasized about her—shit, he could smell her right now, his brain was working overtime on just the thought of it. The old clerics were crazy. He had willpower; sure he loved her, but shit . . . Block the shot without taking a human body? Madness. If that young blood in her compound, Jose, got in her face, or one of the human helpers was already on her trail and couldn’t pull up off it, his soul was history.
This was definitely being between a rock
and a damned hard place.
Fatigue and hunger clawed at his gut, yet he was also filled with a new level of strength. He was breathing hard just from walking. Slow awareness entered him. Yes. Each time he went down he got stronger, more knowledgeable, darker. A doe lifted her head and froze. The scent of fear filled his nose, lowering his fangs. Run, sweet thing, his mind whispered. Run.
The night air felt awesome against her damp body as she reveled in the freedom of standing in the open air—alone. Her crew needed to chill. After the big argument, going out for a bite to eat with Jose had been good, but she’d brought him home to try to get everyone else to understand. They all needed to go out and do what they loved. She’d tried to convince Shabazz to go check out some jazz. Tried to get Rider to go get his Jack Daniels on with a good card game—him and JL and Jose were some gambling fools. She’d even tried to coax Big Mike to find a barbecue joint and to turn Dan on to some real soul food. Marlene’s crazy ass wouldn’t even budge to go check out a flick, her favorite pastime. Their loss. She’d tried. And she was out again!
Perspiration damped her skin, her T-shirt clung to her, and her leather pants were now vacuum-sealed to her thighs and butt. Clubbing was da bomb. Dancing put the music back into her veins, her heart was thumping. Yeah, it was all good.
Damali looked down the street. North Hollywood was alive at night. Neon lights flashed, horns blared, people dressed as outrageously as they could, waiting and hoping to be granted access into whatever happening spot. Pullease. All the freaks were out tonight and people were looking for get-high or a drag race. Yeah, the night was alive. So was she.