by Unknown
This, then, was the eldest surviving daughter of the Delacore bloodline, Irenae. She had appeared to be relatively cheerful before I entered. As she saw me, however, I could see her expression congeal, her smile becoming more forced by the second.
“Irenae, my dear sister, allow me to introduce Deimos, my-”
“An interesting name, Deimos,” Irenae interrupted, her tone haughty and imperious. I just knew we weren’t going to get on. “Named after something, I suppose?”
I had a feeling I already knew where she was going to go with this. I could feel Corvi’s tension, both as a physical thing and across the link. It was uncomfortable, but there was something about it I recognised - Irenae made her feel the way my brother used to make me feel; small and insignificant.
“Yes, Lady Delacore, that’s correct,” I said with a curt bow, maintaining a casual smile. Propriety surely couldn’t hurt, I figured. “Named after a son of the Greek god of war.”
“Ah.”
“Please, Irri, try and get along, he is-”
“And your father, was he named after a mythical figure too?”
“Yes milady, he was named after Tyr, the Norse god of war.”
“I see.”
“Irri, why-”
“I ask, Deimos, because some time ago, my own family had a run-in with one or two members of a hunter family. A family which used a naming convention much like that.”
That was certainly news to me, if she meant my ancestors had been involved in the attack on the Delacore household.
“Tell me,” she said, rising and walking very slowly towards me, setting her drink to one side. Even the way she walked spoke of a sense of self-superiority, like she was claiming every bit of space she moved into. As she approached me I noticed her fingers tapping against her thumb in a random sequence...as if she was trying to keep herself from punching me.
“Tell me,” she repeated, quieter and more threateningly, “do the names Hades, Anubis and Megarea Black sound familiar to you?”
Vaguely, they did. Their exploits were in the family chronicle, but I had never for a second thought they were involved in the murder of my lover’s family.
“Yes, they were my-”
I never got chance to finish, as Irenae’s backhanded fist smashed across my face, knocking me to the floor. I just about heard Corvi shouting in alarm as she ran to my side, but most of all I heard Irenae’s contemptuous snarl.
“Ishya vath’nir khiyadh! You are a fool, Corvina, to have a Black in your home and not realise it!”
“Of course I bloody realised it, you imbecile!” Corvi snapped back, and I suddenly felt like my presence had spoiled a warm family reunion. “I know he’s a Black, but why should that matter? He cannot be held accountable for the actions of his ancestors!”
“He can and he should!” Irenae shot back, her hatred towards my family being directed entirely at me. “Rissa. Serina. Mother. Father. All dead because of his family!”
“But not him! He wasn’t around a thousand years ago, he had nothing to do with the deaths of our family!”
“Of course you wouldn’t understand,” the taller woman told Corvi, her tone dripping with disgust. “You weren’t even there, were you? No, you were off, traipsing across Europe with your patron and idol, following him everywhere like a lost puppy, while your family were being put to the sword!”
The agony at her sister’s words was plain on Corvi’s face. Worse, I could feel her emotions, and it was as if Irenae had plunged a dagger into her heart and twisted. My lover was stunned speechless by what she had heard.
I, however, was infuriated.
I got back to my feet, wiping the blood from my split lip, and drew Black Terror in anger for the very first time.
“Lady Irenae Delacore,” I announced, using every ounce of steel in my tone I could muster, “you have attacked me without provocation, but in light of the grief you and your sister have suffered at my family’s hands I will let that slide.”
“Well, aren’t you the gracious-”
“Faethy’ed!” I commanded. Essentially, ‘silence!’ “However, you have seen fit to insult the honour of your own sister, my lover, Corvina Delacore, and that is a slight I cannot allow to stand. You will either apologise right now, or else I will demand satisfaction in a duel.”
“Deimos, don’t,” Corvi whispered to me in a broken voice. She’s a master fencer, she would cut you to ribbons, she added through the link.
I could see Irenae weighing up her options. She was clearly the sort of person to whom apologies were an alien concept.
She still surprised me, though.
“Corvina, forgive me. My words were...cruel. I was angered by the presence of this...butcher in your abode, and as yet I see no reason to take them back.”
She glared at me then, a venomous stare that could have punched a hole in a battleship.
Before I could answer further, Corvi once again leaped to my defence.
“Your apology is accepted, sister. But Deimos is not the same as his family. He was allowed to spend time in my base, and after seeing the truth of our world, he made his own choice to stay here and join us.
“Beyond that, I can personally vouch for his character. He is my lover for a reason - because no other would be good enough. Give him time, and I’m sure you will see in him the same things I do.”
Irenae looked between the two of us for a moment, as if weighing up a decision.
Eventually she simply snorted in derision, and moved to the door.
“You always were a bleeding heart, Corvina,” she said sadly. “No wonder the Countess sent me here. Perhaps with me here to keep you focussed we might actually solve the problem of your traitor.”
With that she yanked the door open, storming down the corridor to whichever guest accommodation she had been given.
I allowed myself to relax at last, sheathing my blade and turning to Corvi.
I could almost feel my heart tearing, as I saw my strong-willed warrior reduced to tears. I pulled her close, comforting her in my arms and with soothing thoughts through the link.
“She’s become more vicious than I remember,” she said between sobs. “Service to our Countess has changed her for the worst.”
“It’s okay my love, I’m here for you,” I reminded her, keeping her held close.
“What was that she said to you, anyway?”
I was hoping she hadn’t asked that. I didn’t want to tell her what that meant.
“She didn’t, she said it to you...and I would really rather not translate that for you.”
“Please, Deimos. I need to know what she was saying. She’s stronger than I am, I can’t read the meaning behind the words with her.”
I sighed heavily, glad that her face was turned away from me so I couldn’t see the fresh pain this would cause.
“She called you...she called you a traitor to the family blood.”
“Oh,” was all Corvi managed, before giving vent to fresh tears.
I stayed with her for the rest of the night, this time because she seemed truly shaken by what had happened with her sister. It hurt me more than I can say, seeing Corvi so distraught. The whole ordeal really did seem to have taken the steel out of her for the time being, and I decided that one way or another Irenae and I would have a reckoning.
At that moment though, Corvi was my concern. Not only was she distressed by her sister’s treatment of her, but also the knowledge that she had been sent by The Countess - so far the only name I had for The Order’s head - to basically put pressure on Corvi, and see if there was some overriding reason why this hadn’t been dealt with before.
I could
have told them the problem. The problem was that our leader, a seer, wasn’t ‘seeing’ in the right place.
Everything that was going on seemed very suspicious to me, and a thought hit me.
“Hon, are you going to be alright for a few minutes? I need to head to Ops,” I asked her, shifting under her weight slightly. We’d curled up on the bed just so that she could get some rest and be near me, but now I needed to check on something.
She sniffed slightly, her eyes still red from where she’d been crying, and lifted her head away from my chest.
“Ok, my love, but...please don’t be long?”
My heart tore anew as I heard the plea in her tone, and I nodded.
“I won’t, love. I’ll come right back once I’m done. If you need me, just shout.” I smiled at her with that, and she gave me a weak one in return. It was an improvement at least.
“Back in ten, beautiful.”
I strode through the corridors as fast as I could go. Something had been bugging me since the last couple of attacks that Corvi had told me about.
I swept into the Ops room like Death himself was chasing me, and grabbed hold of the Omega Company soldier standing by our tactical map.
“I need you to show me on the map where all of the base attacks have been, now, preferably.”
The soldier looked at me blankly. I understand I didn’t look like much in jeans and a T-shirt, but I was technically superior to him now, but aside from that any response would have been better than the bland stare I got.
When nothing else happened, I grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and pulled him close to me.
“Listen, I am not in the mood to fuck around,” I snarled into his face. “I have come from Lady Delacore herself. I now rank among the number of Sentinels on this base and I am in the mood to kill something. Do as I have asked or you will be my number one candidate.”
I let him go with a slight shove, letting him brush the creases out of his uniform as he replied.
“O-of course, sir, v-very sorry,” he stammered, and I grinned inwardly. It was nice to know my position actually carried the weight I had been led to believe it did.
I watched as the young man dug out some blue pins, and started pinning them into all the places where one of our bases had been attacked.
Milton Keynes and Buckingham, like Corvi had told me a few days ago. Swindon. Cheltenham. A couple more down in Berkshire, near Reading and Newbury.
I looked at the pattern, and swore in vampiric again.
We were virtually encircled.
The only places that were clear so far were north of us, and I pointed to a likely target: Banbury.
“Have we got a base there?”
“Y-yes sir, we do, wh-”
“Who’s the senior Omega Company officer in here?” I shouted to the room in general, and a sturdy, grizzled Major sporting a thoroughly Fifties moustache straightened up at the end of the room.
“That would be me, sah,” he announced. He sounded like a true Major, alright.
“I need troops sent to the base at Banbury,” I told him, and he shrugged.
“Already on their way, sah!” he said with a laugh, like I was a fool for suggesting it to him. “A third of our force.”
“What? On who’s orders?”
“Lady Delacore’s sister, sah. Said she was taking h’over, and ordered them sent there, sah.”
I looked back at the map again, and thought it over.
“Vek’shai,” I said under my breath. “Bring them back.”
“You what, sah?” the Major blustered, and I repeated the order, but louder. “And tell Banbury to stay on High Alert!” I added.
Before he could protest further I stormed back out of the Ops room, praying my hunch was right.
If I was right, Irenae wasn’t here to to help us uncover a damn thing. She was here to damn us.
And that, in turn, would mean that the Countess was a traitor as well.
Since I had promised Corvi not to be long, I headed back towards her quarters, adamant that I was not going to tell her my findings just yet. I didn’t think she could take it.
My walk was interrupted when I rounded a corner and found the barrel of a USP pointed at my face, behind which was the all-too familiar scowl of Irenae Delacore.
“Give me one good reason why I should not put a bullet through your head right now, Sa’thahd,” she hissed through clenched teeth, using the Ancient Vampiric term for ‘worthless one.’
“Really? Is this supposed to be intimidating?” I asked defiantly. “I fought a feral a couple of weeks back. You really don’t frighten me.”
“I asked you a question!” She snapped.
“Well, if you want to be pedantic, you-”
She whipped the butt of the pistol across my face, an errant edge of the weapon opening my cheek.
“Answer me, filth,” she sneered, as I straightened up again, looking her straight in the eyes. The hate she felt towards me seemed as boundless as Corvi’s love for me, which was...disconcerting.
“Fine,” I told her, “but I can do better than that. I’ll give you three. First of all, I think Corvina would almost certainly tear your head off for murdering her lover in cold blood. Secondly, you’ve left the safety on, and guns don’t work too well in that state. And thirdly-”
There was the ratcheting click of another handgun being cocked from behind the taller woman, and I grinned.
“-her gun is bigger than yours.”
“You alright, D?” Lev asked, as Irenae moved her weapon away from my head, allowing my friend to take it.
“I’ll live. You’re timing is impeccable, by the way.”
“I try my best. Now milady, what say I escort you back to your quarters, and you stay there?”
“We are not finished,” she snarled at me, as Lev began to lead her away, but Lev wasn’t in the mood.
“You are for tonight sweetheart, so let’s move.”
Naturally, Corvi was horrified when she saw the gash across my cheek, the bruise and swelling that were already beginning to show.
“Shit, deimos, what happened?!” she cried, rushing over to see to my injuries.
“Your dearest sister again,” I told her, and I felt her sudden rush of anger at the news. “She put a gun to my head in the corridor, and demanded a reason not to kill me.”
She led me over to the chaise-longe again and sat me down, retrieving her small medical kit and tending to my wound.
Not before she’d run her thumb over the cut and tasted the blood from it, though.
“Seriously?” I asked with a small chuckle.
“What can I say? You taste good,” she answered, sounding much more like her usual self again. She tilted my head to get a better view of the wound, and started cleaning it gently.
“So, at what point did this happen?”
“Apparently, she really doesn’t like pedantry,” was all I offered as explanation, and she snorted derisively.
“She doesn’t like anything that defies her - pedantry, snide comments, general cockiness - you know, everything you’re good at.”
“Love you too, sweetheart,” I told her, loving the banter coming from her. “I’d like to think I’m good at other things, too.”
She gave me one of the dirty looks she seemed to have been perfecting lately, and a smile that matched.
“I certainly can’t argue with that.”
I blushed at the comment, wincing slightly as she administered something stinging to my wound.
“You’re quite good at fixing me up, you know.”
“I’ve had plenty of practice.”
“Hey, I don’t get wounded that often,” I replied, not sure if I believed myself or not.
“Perhaps. But I meant in medical terms. I was a nurse during both World Wars.”
“Wow, that’s..pretty impressive,” I said, genuinely amazed. “What else have you been?”
She shrugged. “Not a lot, to be honest. Don’t forget, it’s only really been the last hundred years or so where women could really do anything. Plus, being a Lady meant not being allowed to work, usually because most of your family don’t let you.”
I was quiet for a little while, as she finished her various ministrations.
“Right, I think that’s you done. Can’t do much for the bruising right now though, but I’ll send for an ice bucket.”
“How come you didn’t tell me my family was involved?”
She sighed heavily, cleaning her hands and turning away from me.
“It wasn’t necessary, Deimos. It would only have made you fret over our relationship, and I didn’t want that. Despite what my sister said, my point still stands - you cannot be held accountable for the events of a thousand years ago.”
A silence reigned between us once again, until Corvi decided to change the topic.
“I don’t want you going back to your quarters tonight,” she told me in a serious tone. “I can’t guarantee your safety if you do, and while you might think you can handle her, trust me, you can’t.”
I shrugged. I wasn’t about to argue that point.
“Well, she’s your sister. You’d know.”
“Damn straight I would,” she told me with a smirk. “Get some rest, Sythan’en. We’ll deal with any other issues in the morning.”
She rested her hand on my other cheek, and kissed me softly.