by Martha Woods
“I’ve seen it before, and I still don’t quite believe it,” Tariq said, “But I’m glad that it’s happening. I don’t know where any of us would be if it wasn’t for this alliance.”
“Most likely dead,” Alexis said, stretching herself out and taking a sip from a glass that I hadn’t even seen her pick up, “We would have kept fighting a stupid war against each other for a reason that I can’t even remember anymore, and all of us eventually would have killed the other. It’s the way it’s been for decades, about time someone snapped out of it.”
Taking a step back and nodding to myself, I came to a decision that in hindsight should have been made hours ago. “I’m going to go talk to the brothers, see if they can offer us anything that could help us defend ourselves. After all they’ve been fighting these people for way longer than we have, maybe they’ve seen some weakness that we can take advantage of.”
“Be careful around the younger one,” Christine said, rolling her eyes, “He’s a terrible flirt, no matter how many times you threaten to knock his teeth out.”
“Oh don’t worry,” I chuckled, waving my hand as I walked out of the room, “I’ve still got a pretty good left hook.”
“Wow,” Caleb said, pushing himself up in his bed, “I’m really dying, what other reason could there be for an angel to come visit me?”
Nathan rolled his eyes. “Caleb shut up, this is more important than… just about anything that you could ever possibly be thinking.”
“At least I do think, what do you do?”
“Oh please,” I sighed, pinching my bridge between my fingers, “Can we not do this now? Can we talk about what I came to talk about before you start bickering?”
“Ah,” Nathan said, “Yes, we can do that. How are you feeling?”
The bruising around my nose hadn’t really gone away at all, so just at a glance it was pretty easy to see that something had happened. No doubt the word had spread to all of the shifters that we were caring for by now, if the looks of sympathy that were passed my way as I walked through the halls were any indication, made sense that I would have to endure people talking to me about it too.
“I’m feeling fine,” I said, maybe a little more tersely than I intended, “I want to hurry up and sort this whole problem out before it gets even more out of hand, because I actually want to be able to sleep properly one of these nights without having to worry about missing anything.”
“You’re torn between two places of wanting to defend yourselves and wanting to defend us, I understand that’s frustrating.” Nathan nodded, the expression on his face obviously apologetic. “The two of us haven’t been anything except a burden to you, it’s been purely down to you to do all the hard work of organizing to keep us safe so we aren’t murdered in our sleep. And none of us have died since we stepped into your city, so clearly you’ve done a fantastic job.”
“You lost people before we could get there to help.”
“And that’s a natural outcome of what we were doing, running for our lives from a group that would chase us to the ends of the earth if they wanted to. You couldn’t save all of us, that’s just how things go.”
“Yeah,” Caleb said, “I mean… we’ve been fighting a long time, but this is the first time that we’ve had anyone else backing us up. It’s a real cool thing that you’ve done for us, I don’t want to sound like I’m ungrateful or anything.”
“You don’t, and I’m… sorry I snapped.” I pulled a chair along until it was between their beds, taking a seat and placing my elbows on my knees. “I’m just so tired, I need whatever advice that you can give me, because I’m running out of ideas on how to get us through this without blood.”
“It sounds like something’s happening,” Caleb said, brow pinched, “Something bad.”
“Yeah, you could say that. We’ve got someone in their group telling us about their plans, so we have the advantage of warning there, but it seems like the matriarch of the group is coming to make a personal appearance.”
“What?” Nathan said, eyebrows rising up his forehead, “She’s coming here?”
“Yep, lucky us.” I leaned back in the seat, exhaling a long, tired breath, “You’ve run into her before it sounds like, maybe you can tell me a few things about her.”
“Yeah sure but… what sort of things?”
“What she’s like, how she fights, if she’s really dangerous enough to mean this fight is meaningless.” I shrugged. “You know, small stuff like that.”
“Oh just small stuff, well why didn’t you say so?” Caleb snorted, pushing himself up in bed with a grimace, “She’s a good fighter, but she doesn’t do it if she doesn’t have to. Kind of like you actually, now that I think about it, she’s always more in the planning position rather than tearing it up on the front lines. But she’s… colder than you, like she’s always in pain, and since she saw her dad die right in front of her… I guess that’s justified, isn’t it? A parent dying right in front of you isn’t something that you just get over, not like that.”
Nathan nodded. “She’s a woman in grief, it’s the thing that keeps her going, her grief and her hatred for us. Her husband, he just hates us, but he doesn’t really have a reason to, so it’s easier for us to think about killing him, but her? Anthony told us what he did, how he killed her father right in front of her eyes, and when I think about that… if someone you loved more than anything was killed right in front of you while you couldn’t do anything, and they just ran away without facing any consequences, wouldn’t you want revenge?”
If someone took Damon or Vincent away from me… I like to think that I would be able to accept it, that I would be able to move on with my life. But in reality… I know that if they were taken away from me I’d probably go out and do something that would make that massacre at the hotel look like a total picnic. Maybe that’s what was bothering me so much about the possibility of this woman making an appearance, that on some level I could understand her. Maybe I just don’t want the reminder that if things go a certain way then I could very well end up like that myself, so filled with rage and grief that I let myself fall into something evil, that I’ll spend the rest of my days lashing out at whoever I can because all I’ve got left to get me out of bed in the morning is hatred.
“I suppose it bears thinking about,” I said, “Even if I really don’t want to think about it.”
“After Anthony explained everything to us…” Caleb sighed, “It’s not like I think that our people deserved to be wiped out, I’ll fight and I’ll die if I have to just to make sure that we live, but some of the older ones, Anthony… her wanting revenge against them is kind of justified.”
“The younger members had no part in what happened, and her father was insane, but I’m not going to sit here and pretend like she’s just some… insane murderer out for a kill thrill out of nowhere.”
I ran my hand through my hair, brushing my thumb across the still bruised skin on my nose. “When I spoke to the hunter… it was pretty easy to see that he was absolutely insane, even if he does a good job of trying to trick you by being friendly. He’s so driven by an incredible hatred of people like us, I could easily see that hate having infected her when she was still grieving. If someone came to you in a moment of grief and longing and told you there was a way to make it all stop hurting, you’d take it wouldn’t you? God knows I would…”
“Regardless of who is to blame, and regardless of when exactly it all started, what matters is what she’s doing now. We’ve lost people to her, just like she’s lost people to us, so we need to be prepared to do whatever it takes, and we need to accept that there is just about anything that she would be willing to do if she hates us enough.” Nathan pulled his bed sheet off, slipping out of bed and holding his arm around his side with a grimace. “I’m not going to sit around in a comfortable bed all day and let you be the one who has to make all the tough decisions on what needs to be done, I’m going to do my part to help you however I can. Both of us will.”
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“Thanks for volunteering me,” Caleb scoffed, though he pulled his own sheet away as he said it, “If I end up losing anything then I’m going to kick your ass.”
“Depending on what you lose you might not be able to do anything about it,” Nathan said, corner of his mouth turning up in a smirk, “I think it’d be funny to see you trying to hop around and catch me.”
“You don’t shut up I’ll skip ahead and kick your ass right now.”
“Please, the both of you, shut up.” I tried to sound as stern as I could, but I couldn’t quite help the smile that was stretching across my face at the sight of them bickering like only siblings can. The fact that these two borderline idiots were so eager to jump into the fight and do what it took to protect all of us… well, I couldn’t really help myself in the face of that enthusiasm, it’s always something that warms my heart to see. “If you’re going to help out, I’d say that you should be prepared to listen to whatever it is that Christine wants you to do, she’s the one who’s been taking care of you all this time. But if she doesn’t need any protection here, and let’s face it, they’re werewolves, then the witches could always use a little more help.”
“Are you sure? Because from what I’ve heard, they haven’t exactly needed much help before. I read about that hotel, some of those floors were basically going to collapse any minute, gunfire doesn’t do that much.”
“And imagine what we could do if we didn’t have to worry about watching our own backs?” I grinned, and I must be a little more intimidating than I thought because he actually took a step back. “Trust me, with you and the witches working together, anyone that tries to go through you is going to have a very rude awakening to what we can do. If they want to take that step to start a war, then you better know that we will be able to finish it.”
I didn’t really want to bring up to them just yet the possibility of retreat, but then again I hadn’t fully expected them to jump so fully into their role as defender, it was another source of backup that we could count on if worse came to worst. And as much as I didn’t want to fight, I wasn’t lying when I said that we had the ability to end a war as soon as it started, you just had to look at what had become of Tristian to see what much.
“Thank you, for actually taking the initiative here,” I said, “I wasn’t sure about you being leaders, maybe I was wrong.”
“You probably weren’t,” Caleb laughed, scratching the back of his neck, “This whole thing has… well, I feel like I’ve grown up a little bit.”
“Not by much,” Nathan drawled, shaking his head, “But we know what it is that needs to be done now. No one else should have to die while we just sit around trying to feel better about ourselves, I’m going to go and do what I can to keep the people who’ve defended me safe.”
“I’ll give a call to Christine and Alexis then, let them know before you go marching in that you want to help out however you can. Whatever it is that they decide to do to you… I’m not involved, that’s between the three of you.”
“Yeah I, what? What do you mean by that?”
“Nothing, nothing at all,” I laughed, backing out of the room, “I’ll see you two soon.”
Well, maybe not the most ideal of circumstances to be getting more friends, but I have to admit, with every ally we gain I feel so much more confident about our chances. We just need to not fuck it up and we’ll be fine.
Kind of a tall order, given everything else that’s been happening lately.
Chapter 2
“So this is the edge of the city,” I said, more to myself than anyone else. I’d been here before of course, if you work murder in a city chances are you’ll see one dumped at the outskirts sometime. But in all the murders that I’d seen, and there had been many, I’d never really taken the time to actually look at the places themselves, never really grasped them for what they are when they’re not covered in blood.
Turns out they look like shit, but hey, at least now I know for sure.
“Do you remember when we went out partying back in college?” Cara asked, toying with a thread on her sleeve as we leaned on the railing. “We both got so drunk that we almost passed out, somehow we ended up riding a train all night around the city and then jumping off without paying a cent?”
“Yeah, I remember that,” I chuckled, “You managed to break a trash can somehow, I don’t know how you managed to do that by throwing a bottle at it.”
“I’ve got a good arm, you know that,” She laughed, “Then you had to go and become a cop, then suddenly we couldn’t have fun like that anymore.”
“Well, you still could, and I could turn a blind eye to that, but it’d be kind of shitty for me to be one of those cops that busts other people for doing the same shit that I do.”
“And yet, you were still going around getting into fights all over the city without any sort of warrant or investigation.”
“Ok, fucking vampires are a whole different deal, the usual rules don’t apply.”
“Ok yeah, I guess that’s a fair point,” Cara said, shrugging her shoulders with a smile, “But you’re not a cop anymore, now you’re just… actually, what the hell even are you now?”
“On paper I’m some kind of executive, probably of some job that doesn’t matter anyway. You’re my secretary or something.” I reached over and pinched her cheek, smirking at the lack of resistance that she put up. “And what a good secretary you are.”
“You know I might just have to spill your coffee on you next time I bring you one, just for that.”
“You can try.” I brushed my hand through her hair, thanking whatever was out there once again for the fact that she was still here and healthy, a far cry from those dark days so long ago. “So what did you want to talk about Cara? Not that I don’t like hanging out with you, but there’s kind of a war going on, I’ve got to organize a lot of things with a lot of people.”
“I know, I know you’re busy,” She said, wringing her hands together, “And I know that there’s a lot of people that I could talk to about this but… I don’t trust any of them as much as I trust you, even after all this time, you’re still the only one that I can tell anything.”
“This is starting to sound serious,” I said, turning to face her and reaching out for her hand, “Are you alright? You and Tariq aren’t in danger are you?”
“No, no we’re not but… you might be, you and everyone else.”
“We’ve got our defenses building, soon enough everyone’ll be ready for a fight, we’ll be able to face them down.”
“But you won’t face them down, because they’ll hit you from where you can’t see them, they’ll come up from under the ground and from the trees, you won’t be able to see them in time.”
Never mind serious, this was starting to sound specific. I was finding myself with more questions than answers as this conversation went on. “Cara, how do you know that? Why are you so sure that we’ll fail?”
“Because…” She sighed, looking around to make sure no one was listening, a feat which would have been impressive given we were the only ones around for a full two miles. “Because I’ve seen it.”
And there my blood went, stopping cold so suddenly I was surprised I didn’t get an icicle through my heart. “What… do you mean you’ve seen it?”
“For the last couple of nights whenever I go to sleep… it’s like I wake up again, except everything feels really off and floaty. I’m dreaming, but it all feels so real, I can walk around, I can touch things, and when I wake up I swear that I can still smell the dream in the air.” Toying with her fingernail, it was obvious that she’d started chewing them again. “It’s always the same, you’re there, Damon, Vincent, everyone that we’re friends with is there. Then the shifters come out of nowhere and just rip you apart, you don’t even know that they’re there until you’re already down, you’re the first one to go. And then I wake up in a sweat, because I just watched you die, and I know that I’m going to have to see it the next time that I c
lose my eyes.”
” You… what?” Screwing my brow up and reaching for her, I squeezed my hands around her biceps just so she knew that I was still here. “You saw me die? And it’s always the same, there’s nothing… weird about it?”
“It’s the same dream every night, right down to the smallest detail, you’re always standing giving orders when one springs right out from around the corner and bites your throat out, then when they’re all screaming for you the shifters just… flow through everyone like they’re nothing.” She wrapped her arms around herself, shivering for a reason completely unrelated to the cold. “I don’t know what this means Amy, but… I’m scared by it, I don’t want to be seeing this, I don’t want to see you dying every night!”
“Hey…” I said softly, pulling her head to my chest and running my hand through her hair, “Hey, I’m right here ok? I’m not going anywhere, it was just a dream…”
“But it wasn’t just a dream,” She said, fisting her hand in my coat, “It’s going to happen, I know the street where it happens, I know what time it is, I know what day it is Amy, this wasn’t just a dream this was… this was something else.”
“Ok Cara, ok” I said, pulling her head back to look into my eyes, “I believe you, alright? You’re my best friend, and I believe every single word that you’re telling me, do you trust me?”
“Of course I do,” She said, without a second’s pause, “Whatever you want me to do, I’ll trust you on it.”
“Ok, then we need to go and see Alexis and Faye, they’ll know what we should do with this, and there’s not a more powerful witch that I know.”
“What about you?”
“Power doesn’t really mean anything if you can’t control it, I can blow up a building sure, but they’ve been using their powers for years now, I can’t compare to that kind of control.” I squeezed her hand, giving her my most comforting smile that I could, given the circumstances. “And if anyone will know what to do in a case like this, it’s absolutely them. So don’t worry Cara, we’ll get answers for you before you know it, ok?”