Once Upon A Midnight

by Stephanie Rowe

  That sounded harsh, but besides feeling a bit sorry for the ghouls’ state of being, as any creature’s suffering was bad, I couldn’t blame him for wanting to be rid of them. I’d been in the room with those creatures for less than five minutes, and I was uncomfortable as hell. I chalked it up to the fact that my intuition was nudging at me strongly, warning me that underestimating the ghouls and feeling compassion for them in any capacity would be a dangerous, if not fatal idea.

  Even knowing that, I had to ask, “What’s wrong with them? Why are they in such awful shape?”

  The next thing he said shocked me. “You’d look a little beat up, too, if you hadn’t eaten in a few decades.”

  My mouth fell open. “That’s insane. Terrible!”

  “It’s a good sign, is what it is. Besides my hellhounds, they’re our only protection from the vampires, ghosts, and necromancers from your world. The hounds keep vampires in check, and the ghouls handle any ghosts that dare venture here.”

  “Who ‘handles’ the necromancers?” I asked for self-preservation.

  “Protecting ourselves from your species has been quite an ordeal. Harkers and beholders are easy enough to deal with. Even humans could kill one of them if they knew how and tried hard enough. But Creators, as you know, are a different story, especially the women born into your ancestral line.”

  “I still don’t understand what’s so special about my family.” I said, trying to get as much information from him as I could without seeming too eager. He was my own evil nemesis, and as such, probably didn’t want to divulge any secrets that could aid me in harming him.

  “For starters, you and all the Creators in your line are the only practitioners of life magic to ever mark your vampires. Every vampire awakened by a Chase bears that individual necromancer’s mark. Your grandmother’s mark was the serpent, and yours seems to be winged predators. That’s how I found out that you inherited your grandmother’s gifts, and the same reason I forced you to raise your first vampire. I needed to be sure that you possessed your grandmother’s powerful magic.”

  “You knew my grandmother?” I asked breathless. That was a soft spot for me. Besides my mother and Torra, I’d never met anyone else in my family.

  “Indeed, I did. Your enhanced power predominantly skips one or sometimes two generations. So I kept tabs on your mother, once your grandmother deceived me, in hopes she would bare a female child. Then I waited for you to come into your powers, for the day you’d raise your first corpse, but instead of following your calling, you became a killer of vampires.” He peered deep into my eyes; I shivered from the coldness in their depths. The guy hated me for whatever my grandmother did to him before I was even born. “You are so much like her in that regard, a murderous chit.” He shook from his thoughts and finished, “So I had no other choice but to get creative. And now, here we are, and you’re about to fulfill your destiny, and right the wrongs committed by your grandmother, so to speak.”

  I was confused by his words, completely thrown. I had never met my grandmother and had no idea what kind of person she was or what she even looked like. My mother never spoke of her and kept no mementos or pictures of the woman who’d given her life, and then shortly after, disappeared off the face of the earth.

  Wolf stopped talking and led us over to a golden door. Jewels—emeralds, rubies, and sapphires of all shapes and sizes—sparkled, gilding the entryway with an unimaginable beauty and luster, screaming that someone important occupied the space behind it.

  Wolf reached for the knob. It was clear and round, a diamond of about one hundred carats, give or take a dozen. If I was a diva, my mouth would be watering, hypnotized by such a bedazzling chunk of ice. But instead of a promise of riches, the opulent door signified the last barrier between me and an unknown future—a destiny that I had been moving towards, manipulated like a chess piece over a dark and chilling game board.

  The room we entered was an oasis of carved rock, crystal and marble statues and benches. The scent of sulfur and smoke hung heavy in the air. As I took my first few steps over the threshold, my eyes widened as they took in the view of an enchanting waterfall. It was on the far side of the room, surrounded by statues of all kinds of mystical creatures. A blanket of blue and white churning froth cascaded into a bubbling man- or demon-made pool. A crystal dragon with its wings spread wide sat center stage in the front of it. Steam rose from the pool. The popping of tiny bubbles, along with a light after-spray of water, struck a soothing chord of calm serenity.

  I pulled my eyes from the falls and focused on a large, canopied bed. The bed was placed in the middle of the room, high on top of a massive pedestal. There were at least ten wide, black marble steps leading to the curtained-off bed. Wolf trudged up the large steps. When he reached the top, he pulled back long and flowing, black laced drapery. The action revealed a small, slender form, subtly hidden beneath a blanket of silken lavender. With my hands clenched in front of me, I tentatively made my way up the stairs.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  I knelt down on one knee at the foot of a grave. The earth in front of the deteriorating stone was hard and compact, evidence of the years passing by while its occupant lay six feet underneath it, rotting away in a pine box. The soul that belonged to that grave, however, never left that plain. She was restless, in need of our help, and wouldn’t rest until she knew her family was safe. Deidra, skimming the air, floated up beside me with a small frown twitching her lips.

  “Even after all these years, it bothers me to see my name carved into that blasted stone. Anyway, vampire…it’s time to put that strength of yours to good use.”

  Rafe arched a brow. “Pardon me?”

  Deidra floated towards him, pointing at the ground in front of her tombstone. “We need my dagger to get to where Kris is. And down there, my boy, is where it is.”

  Rafe wrinkled his nose and stepped back a few paces. Holding up his arms, he said, “Are you serious? You need me to dig up your body? That’s gross.”

  Torra sneered. She was looking a lot better than she had been a few minutes before. The color had returned to her face and she was moving on sturdier feet. “It’s not like we have a shovel to dig with, vamp boy. Besides, if you’d stop whining like a little bitch, we could get this over with.”

  “You’re a vulgar woman.” Rafe said, casting Torra a leering grin. “It’s kind of cute.”

  “Umm…no. Not even going there, especially not with a blood-sucker like you. Now, get to work,” Torra said.

  “Sure thing, hellcat.” Rafe winked.

  I may not have the strength of twenty men like Rafe, but being a necromancer did make me stronger than the average Joe Shmoe, so I ignored all the background chatter, which was only stalling me from my mission—to save my woman. I needed to get to Kristina.

  I leaned forward and dug my fingers into the hard dirt. The others must have seen what I was doing, because they stopped arguing, and in a blink, two sets of hands joined me in my single-minded pursuit. Dirt flew up with an explosion of clots as soon as Rafe put his might behind the task. After only a few minutes, the hole became too deep, so Torra and I had no other choice but to stand back and let the vampire finish the job.

  At the bottom of the hole, Rafe yanked open the coffin. Deidra’s spectral form shivered before she shot behind her own tombstone in a flurry of mist, refusing to gaze into the dark, gaping chasm of the open grave. I didn’t blame her one damn bit; everything about the situation was disturbingly screwed up, especially for her.

  “Do you mind telling me exactly where I can find the dagger? The less poking about I have to do in here, the better. You feel me?” Rafe asked from below.

  “Someone from the Chase family should have placed it by my side. Chases always bury their kin with their tools. You never know if you’ll need them on the other side.”

  Rafe nodded once, then using only his eyes, searched the decomposed corpse. His brows lifted like he’d spotted something. Reaching over the body, he clutched
Deidra’s right forearm. The pop and crack of bone breaking, as he accidently dislodged it from the rest of the body, made everyone cringe.

  “Ouch! I can feel that!” Deidra shrieked from behind her tombstone, making my jaw drop to the ground.

  “What the fu—?” Rafe yelled back.

  “Kidding.” She chuckled. “I was just trying to lighten the mood.”

  I fell deep into motherly love with Kristina’s grandmother after that stunt.

  Rafe, not appreciating Deidra’s humor as much as I had, mumbled a curse and tossed the arm bone back into the coffin. Soon after, the bag he filched from wherever he’d been searching flew out of the hole. It landed with a thud at my feet. I heard the door to the casket slam shut, and then two seconds later, Rafe jumped from the grave.

  “Kris owes me big time for this,” Rafe grumbled as he beat the grave dust from his clothes. The look on his face was priceless. “And you, Grandma Chase, are not funny.”

  I looked down at my own clothes. My hoodie was ripped and blood soaked with a hole in it the size of a quarter over my chest. My jeans were just as bedraggled, sans the blood and bullet hole. But for some reason, I didn’t give a shit about any of it; all I could think about was Kristina. Was she okay? Where was she? What was she doing? Would I ever get to kiss her sweet lips again?

  In front of me, on hands and knees, Torra pushed big piles of dirt back into the hole. Her shoulders shook from laughter as she winked at the ghost of her dead great-grandmother.

  “You’re not finished yet, vamp boy,” Torra said, ignoring Rafe’s complaints and obviously getting a kick out of Deidra’s needling him. “Get over here and help me fill in this hole. A wonderful woman like my grandmother deserves nothing less than for her remains to be respected. I won’t allow her grave to be desecrated.”

  Rafe rushed to Torra’s side without another word, or rather, whine. Deidra smiled and floated over to where her great-granddaughter was covering her casket. With a motherly smile and soft tilt of the head, she reached over and smoothed her hand over Torra’s cheek.

  “You make me proud, granddaughter of mine.”

  For the first time since we saved her life, Torra actually smiled. Not a smart-ass laugh, but a loving expression. I almost fell back on my ass from the glare. I couldn’t believe it. The look on her face was so innocent and child-like, not resembling the hard-as-stone hellcat that Rafe likened her to.

  While Torra and Rafe finished filling in the hole and packing down the dirt, I slipped my hand into the bag Rafe had tossed at me. My fist squeezed around the hilt of a dagger, and I pulled it free. The steel blade was long, with a fine, sharp point that glinted in the moonlight.

  I turned it sideways, inspecting it, and my eyes landed on an insignia. I saw two entwined figure eights etched onto the blade, matching the ones on Kristina’s dagger—the symbol representative of their family line. The difference was that Deidra’s figure eight was carved into the hilt, rather than the blade.

  Deidra floated past me, heading farther into a darkness that wrapped around the original cemetery like a well-used blanket. I put the dagger back in its sack. As I followed her, night crept in, leaving me nearly blind.

  It was surprising, how eager we all seemed to venture deeper down the broken path of cobblestone decay. The path was lined with old, fog-shrouded trees and weeping branches, helping to paint a nightmarish picture, giving squirming fingers of dread free rein to prod at and tweak my already antagonized nerves.

  The path stopped, and I blinked several times, an absurd attempt to clear my vision. The fog was too thick to see anything clearly, but I was able to make out a dirt field. The closer I crept through the rolling fog, the clearer things became. My hand brushed against frigid stone. It was a headstone, among the many gothic crosses and angels that stood tall with crumbling wings.

  On the other side of the private burial place was a building. It loomed hauntingly in the distance. Deidra bee-lined towards it, leaves bursting underneath her, scattering like frightened insects in her wake.

  “It won’t be long now.” Her voice trailed.

  ~~~

  “You want me to do what?” Rafe asked while staring at the dagger I pulled from the dirt-caked bag. I pushed it towards him, chest level.

  “Must you complain about everything?” Torra asked. She snatched the knife from my outstretched hand, and after a quick flick of the wrist, sliced the blade across the fleshy meat of her palm. Blood welled from the shallow gash. With an impatient grunt, she jabbed the dagger in Rafe’s direction. “See, nothing to it.”

  “Okay, okay…I’ll do it. I’m not scared of cutting myself, hellcat. If I haven’t proven it already, I’d do anything for my sweet Kris. Even grave rob.” He arched a brow, daring Torra to argue the fact.

  A rumbling growl tumbled from my chest. She was MY Kristina, not that joker’s. And who the hell did he think he was calling her sweet?

  Rafe gave me a hard side glance in response to my possessive claim. My eyes shot heated spears of warning at him. My lips twitched, almost exposing my clenched teeth. He needed to tread lightly. There wasn’t anything I wouldn’t do to keep or protect what I considered mine, and that included sending that punk back to the grave for another fifty years.

  I shook away from those crazy thoughts. I didn’t know what was happening to me. I’d never reacted so strongly over a woman before. I felt like a coiled snake ready to strike. Kristina wasn’t just another woman or conquest to me. She was the one. The woman I’d spent countless hours fantasizing about, the goddess that haunted my dreams and filled my heart with passion. The sex-kitten that I planned on spending the rest of my life with, playfully chasing after and catching, a million times over.

  Rafe’s loud chuckle dragged me from my thoughts. He’d already dismissed me and was talking to Torra.

  “I don’t understand exactly what needs doing, but thanks for the moral support. And by the way, you smell like Heaven, flowers after a spring rain.” Rafe sniffed the air around her.

  Her face contorted in disgust. “Get away from me!”

  He threw back his head and laughed. He took the knife, eyes flashing to Deidra. You’re sure I shouldn’t go last? My wound will close up faster than you can sniff a flower after a spring rain.” He chuckled and shot Torra a devilish grin.

  “It doesn’t matter who goes first, as long as point A,” Deidra said, pointing to the blood welling up to seep over the side of Torra’s hand, “gets to point B.” Her finger swung to the rectangular stone we were all kneeling in front of.

  The stone she was referring to was a trap door which had odd glyphs and old-timey images carved all over it. The door was situated in the ground inside the mausoleum that we had all followed Deidra into. She’d just explained that in order to open the door to the Shadowscape, we would need the blood from a necromancer and a vampire, as well as the ectoplasm from a ghost. She had also filled us in on the reason we needed her sacred dagger. It was because the only thing on earth or any plain, for that matter, that could cut the ethereal skin of a ghost was an awakening dagger, or the razor-sharp fangs of a ghoul.

  “Aye, aye, captain.” Rafe saluted the ghost. With little sound, he sliced deep into his hand. After he was finished, he handed me the dagger. I wrapped my fingers around it and watched as he squeezed a line of crimson from his cut. It splashed over the trap door, filling the carved-out grooves with blood. The after-effect was a red, snaking stream, and when Torra followed suit, her blood added fuel to the building river.

  Deidra and I traded nods as she held her arm out to me. Her hand hovered over mine, childlike in its size, wispy in its true form. I knew how to give corporeal substance to a ghost, but it took a lot of energy and usually required a certain bond—a familiarity that came from years of sharing the same energy and space. But years weren’t a luxury for us; all I could do was cross my fingers and hope that I had enough juice in me to pull it off.

  Kristina could do it, my longing conscience reminded. I sucke
d in a hard breath in an attempt to slow my frantic heart. It was half-way broken from the thought of losing Kristina. It would shatter into a million pieces if the worst was to happen.

  It started as a tingle in my skull, a power tightly coiled under the space between my eyes and the bridge of my nose. It built in intensity until it unfurled, spreading out to reach the back of my head. It wanted to leave my body and move into something lifeless. The power’s only motive was to create life. Even though I wasn’t a religious man, I whispered a small prayer. “God, please let this work.”

  My hands began to glow white as my power started a slow crawl over Deidra’s ghostly hand. At first, nothing happened. Then after several minutes of concentration, my power transferred over. I felt a click like a puzzle piece moving into place the moment it took hold. I laughed my relief. Deidra let out a small giggle.

  “Good job. Now, hurry up and cut me. We have no idea how long this will last,” she said, excited.

  It was the first time in over a century that she had a corporeal form, even if it was only her hand and part of her arm. Her joy was apparent in the exuberant expression on her face.

  Her hand was a freezing cold weight in mine. Even though it was flesh and bone, it still belonged to someone who was dead. “This might sting a bit,” I warned.

  Still smiling, she said, “I hope it does. I haven’t felt a thing in a very long time.”

  My heart ached for her. I rubbed my thumb over the spot on her wrist where her pulse should be, but there was no thump of life under the cold flesh. The dagger sliced through her skin like butter, the ease of which it left its path, unnatural.

  “What in the world?” I stuttered when bright green goo slipped from the wound, instead of the expected stream of red blood.

  The green substance was thick, but still flowed from her hand freely. It splashed onto the stone, swirling among the blood already there, reminding me of a macabre Christmas, with the bold red and stark green colors of the blood and ectoplasm intermingling together.