Hunting Trip (Hidden Blood Book 3)

by Al K. Line

  As the swelling eased a little, I made out a blurry outline of a naked young woman trembling before Oskari. He grabbed her hair, bent her head, and sank his teeth into her neck. In seconds she was little but a dried up husk; he let the body fall to the floor.

  His head tilted back and he gasped loudly.

  "Now, let's give you your punishment, shall we?" he said, moaning in ecstasy, voice full of passion. Oskari's eyes turned red as the blood magic coursed through his veins and his strength increased a thousand-fold.

  "Maybe make me go without my dinner? Send me to my room?" I gasped.

  Oskari sneered then launched himself at me.

  No Chance

  To someone observing this scene, I was like a helpless child. Beaten, defeated, cowering on the floor before the almost Godlike presence of her overbearing, abusive father.

  Been there, done that, not going back thank you very much. Whatever he did, I would not go out like that. I would not shy away from confrontation, I would not be made to feel bad or inferior, made to believe I was somehow in the wrong as my elders always knew better. I've experienced enough to know that just because someone is older, it doesn't make them smarter or always right. All it does is make them older, and often more closed-minded and insular than someone younger.

  Well, Oskari was ancient, certainly set in his ways, and believed utterly in his own sense of rightness. A megalomaniac, like most vampires, especially all vampire Heads if the stories are true.

  But above all that, above my refusal to allow him to dominate and belittle me, to treat me like a naughty girl, was my refusal to leave behind my family, my life, my existence.

  I took the first punch right to the face without trying to move. As his bloodied fist came straight at me again, and this time he and I both knew it would split my head wide open and that would be the end of me, I let the raw, but now rejuvenated muscle in my neck spring back like an elastic band.

  Faster than his fist—and trust me it was fast—my head whipped to the side and he punched the wall, obliterating plaster and the brick behind, raining down dust on my shoulder.

  "Haha, getting slow in your old age," I taunted, blood dripping from my fat, split lip, my bruised face healing so I could finally see again.

  It's hard to explain how rapidly this all happened. Thoughts were formed as fast as I could run, all movements a blur to the Regular eye. Full on vamp fight in other words.

  "Bitch," he spat, and punched faster and harder.

  Each blow was dodged as my head weaved, and all the while I was getting to my feet until I had my back against the wall, dodging his assault easily as Hidden magic, something he could never have, consumed me.

  I shot out an arm with speed that surprised Oskari but not me. He didn't know me, he didn't know what I was capable of under extreme duress, and this was about as extreme as it got. The life and future of everyone I cared about was on the line, and I would not let him win.

  He was shunted back ten feet as my fist made contact with his chest, the ribs cracking, the breastbone splitting. His eyes widened and then he grinned, like he was pleased I was more of a match than he'd expected.

  "Good, very good."

  "You were going to use my baby. I'll destroy you, take everything from you," I screamed, a bit over-excited and maybe somewhat dramatic because of it, but I think it's understandable.

  "You're a baby yourself, a child. You cannot defeat me, ever." Oskari was at me before the last word hit my ears, his hands at my throat. The momentum carried us both to the opposite wall. He squeezed, fingers locked tight around my throat, the death grip of the vampire.

  "Wanna bet." Magic swarmed through the ink that fattened and sent pure, violent energy up from the intricate patterns just below my collar line. It engorged my neck, and his hands flew apart as fiery red sparks erupted.

  He gasped as he held out his hands, the skin blistering and the magic wrapping around him like a million strands of silk as it grew tighter, binding his hands together. The heat grew more intense as my focus increased and dismay and anger spilled over, until they were on fire. The flesh melted away like butter in a pan.

  He snarled, the tendons in his neck standing out as he used his immense strength to pull his hands apart.

  The magic flew off in all directions, dissipating as it went. His skeletal hands, blackened muscle and bone exposed, healed even as I launched forward and feinted low then stabbed out right into his goddamn pale eyes, bloodshot from magic. One eyeball popped warm liquid over my fingers and I ripped his nose with the other, yanking away flesh and cartilage.

  He stumbled back and I fell with him, never letting go, pushing my finger deeper into the eye socket, searching for his brain so I could squish it to mush.

  Something hammered over my back, like getting hit by a troll, and I turned to see an entire section of the table arcing toward me, the aide who'd ushered me in swinging with grim determination.

  It cracked over my head and I was thrown off Oskari as everything went black.

  I was in big trouble.

  New Enemies

  Vampires aren't nice people, although ask a vampire and they'd say they weren't a nice vampire—being called a person seen as an insult worthy of them doing something nasty like biting your face off and stuffing it down any handy holes they made. What I naively hadn't realized until now was quite how not nice some vampires can be. Sure, I knew their nature was frosty verging on glacial, and that the suffering of others didn't affect them, that taking a life was seen as a right, nothing to worry over, about as stressful and guilt-inducing as eating an egg, but it still hadn't quite sunk in what the normal attitude of my brethren was.

  I found out, boy did I find out.

  While I was semi-conscious, Oskari ordered the aide to bind me with a strange thin wire around my hands and feet, a material I'd heard talk of but never seen before. This was becoming a worrying habit. Not satisfied, it was wrapped around my neck and then my upper arms and thighs too. I felt this was overkill but was in no position to argue. It appeared delicate, like gossamer, but was razor sharp, and any movement made it cut deep into my flesh. There was no getting out of it if you wanted to keep your hands and feet, and personally I quite like them. It aids with mobility.

  Once trussed up like a fly in a spider's web, I had my clothes cut from me, leaving me naked and standing in the middle of Oskari's dining room dripping blood over the polished floor. That'd teach him.

  The two men spoke for several minutes out of earshot then a hatch slid aside in the dark paneled wall and a very modern bank of electronic equipment activated. Buttons were pressed and then the ceiling made a strange whirring sound, although it was hard to see as my eyesight was still bad and craning my neck hurt too much. Plus, the wire, and the last thing I wanted was to chop my head off. That would not end well.

  Not to worry, as soon enough I got to see the surprise. A cross, simple yet beautiful in design, made of blond ash and polished until it gleamed, descended from the ceiling, hanging from thick steel cable. They wouldn't, would they?

  What were they going to do, crucify me? I chuckled, thinking it ridiculous, that this was just an elaborate way of making miscreants tow the line, but then I thought about how steeped in tradition the vampire culture is, how old Oskari was, and that no matter how anti-religion the current vampires were, the old ones had religious traditions and iconography etched into their very being. They'd lived through periods of history when belief was at the heart of everything everyone did. When archaic, barbarous acts were performed on the disbelievers, when vampires were burned at the stake, tortured to make them confess they were in cahoots with the Devil.

  Oskari was old skool all the way. He was ruthless, efficient, ran the UK vampires with an iron fist the likes of which no previous Head had ever managed, and took unkindly to anyone challenging his authority.

  I'd ruined his plans, turned Kane vampire before he had chance to indoctrinate my son, had kept Kane apart from him, left him with Gra
ndma, all of which was far from what Oskari had in mind for this epic subterfuge. But worse than all that, more deserving of punishment, was that I'd defied him to his face. I'd fought back, cursed him out, even laid my hands on him. Heck, I'd taken his damn eye, which looking at him from where I stood, seemed futile and a rather rash thing to do. His eye was back, his skin was flawless, he was right now brushing his lustrous hair, and had already cleaned himself up and dressed in fresh clothes. He looked like nothing had happened.

  And here I was. Naked, broken bones still repairing, covered in blood—mine and his—hurting on so many levels the physical seemed almost inconsequential, and staring at a bloody cross in a spooky dining room.

  "Gather the others," Oskari ordered the aide. He scowled in my direction before leaving me alone.

  I sagged once I knew the room was empty. I wouldn't give him the satisfaction of seeing me anything but defiant, but I was very scared.

  My world had been well and truly turned on its head. Deep down, I knew what Oskari was, but I'd been drawn to him, felt a bond, a deep connection. It's my own fault. I was looking for something I should have known I'd never have. A father who loved and cared for me. All I got was more of the same. A man who thought of me as nothing but a way for him to get what he wanted.

  Oskari had used me for years, I knew and understood that, it was part of the way all Heads operated. Every action was considered, the big picture always in mind. Even Dancer thought and acted on information I wasn't privy too, but stupid as it sounds, I trusted Oskari. I believed I knew him, even understood him a little, that he had a moral code even though he was Head.

  I was wrong, so very wrong. Utterly naive. He'd set up this elaborate plan so he could get Dancer, Faz, Persimmon, even Mithnite cloned, basically leaving him in control of the country, and able to influence and order the main players in the human Hidden world. And he'd done it in such a way that would lead to Kane and I being taken then escaping, coming to him for help maybe, leaving me and my boy at the mercy of him and the doppels.

  They would have played us, slowly turned me into something despicable, influenced my child's upbringing then used Kane to cement his hold over the human Hidden of not just the country but probably the world. Wield Kane like a weapon, the most powerful human there had been in maybe centuries, maybe ever. No other human as far as I knew had ever been able to shape-shift, do what the doppels did, wield magic, and be a vampire. It was unheard of, but Oskari had known he would possess such abilities, or had hoped at the least, and now his dreams were if not shattered then certainly cracked.

  He'd do whatever it took to get things back on track, and that meant getting Kane and eliminating me. He'd also be after the doppels, would eradicate them for their treachery. Which, I suddenly realized, meant there would be no clones of the others put into place, and he could never let them go free.

  At the first opportunity, Oskari would annihilate the doppels, murder the Head, kill Persimmon, Mithnite, and Faz, and then, once he had Kane, he'd destroy me and do his best to control my son and make him do his bidding.

  If it was the last thing I did before I died, I'd drag Oskari right down to hell with me.

  "Bring it on, you bitch," I said, just not too loud in case he heard.

  Beyond Expectations

  I'd tried to be good, I really had. I'd kept out of trouble, stayed away from Hidden politics, refrained from taking any enforcer jobs, just looked after Kane and kept my head down. It hadn't worked. What was meant to be a nice vacation had turned into a nightmare on an epic scale, way beyond anything I'd ever dealt with in my role as enforcer.

  This was the life I'd chosen, and once you're in you can't get out. My family was too deeply entrenched in all things Hidden for me to ever escape this and live a life that was even semi ordinary.

  As I stood naked and bleeding, I understood with every fiber of my being that this was a turning point for me and mine. After this night, if I survived, there would be no going back. Our lives would be transformed and nothing would ever be the same again.

  There would be no happy families, no peaceful weekends at home, digging the veg plots, having a superficially Regular life, switching off from the outside world for days or weeks at a time. This was it, the crux, the point of no return. Kane was too special, and we had too much focus on us as individuals and as a family, for us to play at being normal.

  I think that scared me more than anything else, even more than the terrible trouble we were presently in. That even if we squirmed out of this utter mess it wouldn't bring peace and isolation, give us freedom and more choices. We'd be more boxed in than ever, more caught up in the world of the Hidden, trapped in madness with no chance of ever extracting ourselves from the murderous power plays and machinations of the higher echelons. We'd be those people, up to our eyeballs and responsible not just for our own safety but for countless beings who looked to us for guidance.

  For this could only end one way, and that was for me to eliminate our enemies.

  All of this imbued me with a deep, soul-crushing sense of sadness. We'd be thrust into the Hidden limelight whether we wanted to or not. Kane would be at the center of it all, forever marked as a man apart. Yet, there was something else, something I didn't want to admit but knew now was the time to do so.

  I wouldn't change a thing.

  To hold this kind of power, to be something unique and special, is intoxicating and utterly addictive. To play with the elemental forces of the universe is a rare and wondrous gift, and the things I'd felt, the things I'd done, they were a true blessing. If I were religious then I would call it a gift from God, although I knew many thought of it as the Devil's curse. But, as usual, this was all mankind's doing.

  And above all this, above thoughts of the future and the uncertainty it would bring no matter the outcome of this current problem, this pressing, very immediate danger that threatened our happiness and very existence, was the concern of a mother.

  If for no other reason than to ensure my son survived, I would do all I could to get out of this. To protect him, nurture him, teach him the right way to be responsible and become a man deserving of respect. I just had to get away, and as I looked up and the door opened, that was looking less and less likely.

  Vampires young and old filed into the large dining room, each and every one of them serious, faces somber. But I caught the sneers, the twinkling eyes of expectation, the bloodlust rising in anticipation. I saw the hatred. There were even a few sorrowful and scared faces of friends, or as close to friends as they could ever be in this world.

  I was grabbed from behind, the bindings tearing into flesh that couldn't repair properly because the cuts went so deep, and then I found myself positioned on the cross, arms out to the sides, limbs tied tight.

  This was an archaic ritual, older than Christianity itself, and I knew all about it. All vampires did. This was the ultimate punishment for those who betrayed everything being a vampire stood for.

  Crucifixion by committee.

  Blood dripped from my hands and feet as wire chewed deep until it was grinding against bone. I stared at the single long steel nail every vampire held in front of them like an offering to the gods.

  Oskari entered wearing full white ceremonial robes, his pale hair brushed until it shone, his eyes hidden behind his dark, gold-rimmed sunglasses, making him look like a rapper bishop.

  I laughed at the image it conjured, but when he drew his arms forward to reveal the hammer, my laugh turned to a choke.

  Broken Ties

  "…betrayed her family."

  I began humming to myself the moment I saw the hammer, so missed most of the crap Oskari spouted. I didn't want to listen, knew it would rile me up and make me stress more when I had to do something different. I had to take myself off to another place, get away from my body and the damage about to be inflicted. So I hummed a lullaby and zoned out, but came back for Oskari's dramatic finale.

  He turned to face me, the room now packed with eager v
ampires. He lifted the hammer and showed me a gleaming seven inch nail sharper than his teeth. Trust me, his teeth were plenty sharp.

  Oskari removed his sunglasses and gave them to the damn aide. The Head approached, then placed the nail against my open right palm. The crowd's eyes snapped to black. They hissed as hundreds of incisors snicked down. The most terrifying sound I have heard in my life apart from the screams of Kane as he died in the dirt.

  Oskari whirled three-sixty, the utter knob, and with a single blow from the hammer he crucified me.

  The aide went next. Then, one by one, while I hummed, giving them no satisfaction, the rest took their turn. I stared at Oskari the whole time—even though I was far away and focusing on singing to Kane as a baby in his cot while he smiled and squirmed and made cooing noises—as the vampires each hammered a nail into my body so it pierced flesh and bone and pinned me to the wooden cross.

  I lost consciousness many times throughout the hours-long ordeal, but every time I came back from the beautiful oblivion I locked eyes with Oskari and I hummed the lullaby. He remained stationed in front of me the whole time, stoically watching, passing the hammer back and forth, each vampire handing it to him after they'd finished.

  The hammer grew bloodier and bloodier until it was so slick that Oskari called for a cloth. Once wiped, he handed it with grim detachment to the next vampire, one who I'd had several run-ins with because he was a dick and I was brilliant.

  This guy, Randal, took the hammer and smirked at me. He approached, whispered, "Bitch," then placed the nail on my kneecap and whacked the head. Pain exploded through my body the likes of which I hadn't thought possible, then I was back in the nursery singing to Kane and merely experiencing the torment from a distance.

  Then Randal hit the nail again and this time his curse of, "Mother of monsters," echoed around the room.

  The room went deathly silent as Randal stepped back, his face twitching and sweat beading instantly on his head as he understood what he'd done. This torment may have been barbaric, and in their eyes deserved, but you didn't go around calling vampires names, especially ones whose child Oskari held in the utmost regard and saw as part of the destiny of our entire kind. Randal had insulted Oskari. He could have called me names, although he would have been severely reprimanded, but this was a step too far.