My fists were clenched. My Light thrummed in a menacing warning. Not for Alain. But for whatever torment my brother had experienced that led him inside the cages.
"He did not fare well," I guessed.
"Initially," Alain said, purposely not looking at my Light, giving me a modicum of privacy, even if only for show, "he proved quite adaptable. Even winning a few rounds. We believe he became cocky."
We. Alain was referring to his stable of spies. They'd been watching Luc. Which meant they watched me.
My nails cut into the flesh of my palms. Sweat beaded on my brow. I concentrated on breathing, because I knew what would come next.
"We have not been able to find much of use on Hakan Bahar," he concluded in that abrupt way he often used when delivering a report to my father. Detached facts only.
"Were you there?" Meaning was his team there? Alain only appeared in places I happened to be, otherwise he left it up to his minions.
The pause in his reply made me look at him. He'd flushed pink on the tips of his cheeks. A colour change only accomplished if the vampire was well fed... or had managed a decent gulp of Nosferatin blood in the past hour.
That's my blood fuelling your blush.
"Well?"
His eyes met mine, cyan and turquoise swirling in a beautiful display of 'fuck off!'
I flashed my teeth at him, a purely vampire move. Hunters tend to smirk, not offer toothy grins. But I'd been raised around the upper echelons of vampire society, some of their quirks were bound to rub off.
His fangs snapped back. My breath sucked in, which really infuriated me. Because I had never been afraid of Alain before. And, truthfully, I wasn't now. What I was afraid of was his speed, should he decide to reach for me and use those fangs for real.
His gaze flicked to the base of my neck, registering the increase in speed of my heart through the fluttering of the blood vessel there, a growl emitted from the back of his throat.
"Why are you scared?" he demanded. His voice had lowered, roughened. Sanguis Vitam accompanied the command.
He hadn't meant to use his influence, I knew. The look of regret in his eyes said as much. But I was prey, in that moment, and he was predator about to pounce. Intrinsic behaviour.
So was the movement of my fingers wrapping around a stake at my hip.
"Don't," he warned, then closed his eyes slowly. Allowing my breath to finally escape the trapped cage of my chest.
He'd compromised himself to calm me. Or to calm himself.
"Our relationship has changed, Bébé," he whispered. I shook my head to say no, but I knew he was right. "You push and I want to push back. I still taste your blood on my tongue and I crave more. Your fear excites, and yet I have never wanted you any other way than defiant and lethal. Your Light." He swallowed, it looked pained. "Éliane," he added, his voice a roughened whisper. "It does things to me it has never done before."
Silence filled the limousine. His eyelids flickered open and a depth of hunger, I had only ever witnessed on one vampire before now, appeared in his eyes. Where those eyes had been silver and ice-blue, these were purely cyan. But the hunger was the same.
Not for my blood.
Not just for my power.
But for me.
The vehicle rolled to a stop, neither of us moved as it became stationary. Our eyes locked on each other, our breaths held.
"I will contact you when I know more," Alain said, breaking the stand-off first.
"More?" I asked, unintelligently.
He smiled, it showed fangs which didn't help ease my state of mind.
"More about Hakan Bahar," he explained. "What are your plans?"
Oh, OK. “I have someone delving into the vampire as well, but for now I just need sleep." Travis would work tirelessly on finding information on Bahar. Hopefully by nightfall I'd have something to go on. And now I could add Alain's formidable resources to my list, making the time for confronting Luc's captor quickly approach. "I will find my brother," I added.
"Just don't lose yourself in the process," Alain returned, but there was more to the words than they should have meant.
He held my gaze and then the door clicked open, revealing the footpath outside my apartment doors. Alain had brought me home, not to the Plaza where he must have known security would be best.
"You've got men on me, haven't you?" I said over my shoulder.
"Not men."
"Vampires then."
"Not just any vampires."
I turned fully to face him, but the answer was in the set of his jaw, the lift of his chin, and the challenge in his eyes.
"Go home to Papa, Alain," I ground out between clenched teeth. "There is nothing for you here."
He leaned forward in that new preternatural show of lightning fast speed and wrapped a hand around my throat holding me captive. His eyes blazed mesmerising blues. His fangs lengthened, but I had the distinct feeling he was doing it on purpose.
"You are mine to protect, Bébé." He emphasised my nickname.
"Not until we join." And I had serious doubts about that.
"The sharing of blood is inevitable. The wearing of my mark a fait accompli." Who said anything about wearing his Sigillum? "You are mine."
I let a beleaguered sigh out. Vampires. They really were a twitchy, possessive lot.
I inherited much upon my birth. My emotional colour changing Sigillum. My strength and speed and heightened hearing. My Light.
And my mother's ability to Dream Walk, except I used my Light to make vampires Walk outside of their bodies, rather than Walk outside of my own, like she did. I couldn't hold it for long. But it did buy me some time. To get away. To win an argument. To end a lecture.
And the vampire had no defence against it. So I used it now.
My Light blasted Alain square in the chest before he had time to rebuke my childish behaviour. His grip at my neck released, he flew back against the far door of the limousine, and crumpled into a graceless heap.
No heart beat behind his ribs. No flicker of movement beneath his lids. No rise and fall of his chest. I turned my head slightly and stared into the angry eyes of Alain's incorporeal form, trapped in stasis until I released him.
I raised a challenging eyebrow at him, liking this new dynamic far better, I think. He growled, but I could still hear it. Even if he was outside of this realm.
I started laughing as I climbed out of the car, shutting the door firmly behind me. I may not be able to Dream Walk myself, but my tenuous link to that rare talent had its moments.
Despite it leaving me incredibly tired whenever I used it.
Another sigh, this one weary, as I climbed the stairs to my front door.
Luc can glaze vampires to do his bidding with the use of his Light and suffer very little ill effect.
I can make them take a short Walk, but need to sleep straight away afterwards most of the time.
Life's a bitch. And then you get staked by one.
I fingered my stake, rolling it in my palm, as I entered my apartment. Not bothering to carry out my usual checks; Alain had obviously been watching the place himself. Just because he was recovering from a Light induced outer body experience, did not mean he neglected to have someone's eyes on my home.
I crossed to the blinds on the lounge room windows, floor to ceiling glass that showed me the blue sun-streaked sky over Auckland City. The Sky Tower dominated to the left, rebuilt after the first rebellions quietened. The half destroyed and neglected wharves to the right, Travis in amongst the depravity and neglect found in between the broken buildings. I scanned the various areas of Vampire Central, knowing no vampires would be out at this time of day. Some streets were pristine, some a veritable mess of angered and frightened humanity.
Slowly the city was rebuilding, but every so often a revolt arose that the Iunctio had to put down. I just wondered if we were overdue for another flaring of that now age-old flame. If the moment of calm we'd been having was nearing its end. If Alain knew Luc was m
issing, had he told my father yet? I couldn't imagine the Champion remaining silent at such a challenge. Luc's time may well have been running out, but so was mine. And Auckland's. Before too much longer I would be called home. And my father would be on the hunt.
I reached up and grasped the curtains, pulling them closed with a satisfying tug. The room turned dark, shadows overlaying shadows, as a coolness invaded my body making me sleepier still and desperate for bed. I slipped my jacket off, removed my Svante sword and sheath, and settled them across the back of the couch, then started to strip on my way to my bedroom. My steps were heavy, my lids half closed.
The singlet was around my neck when the shadow moved.
I yelped. Adrenaline allowed for wakefulness. The material tore as I frantically freed myself. And a stake was in my hand by the time the vampire coalesced.
Silver and ice-blue stared back at me. And then he said the words I feared most.
"Hello, Nosferatin."
Sanguis Vitam flared in a powerful display, arcing across the room and straight through my chest. He wasn't attacking. He was testing.
Our compatibility. Our kindred connection. My Nosferatin to his Nosferatu.
The stake fell from my grasp in a sickening show of weakness, and my body was in flight before I could scream.
6
Let The Games Begin
There wasn't much space between us. Not nearly enough to allow for a Nosferatin spin. But my body acted outside of my control, fully directed by Hakan Bahar's Sanguis Vitam as he tested our kindred compatibility with that power-filled word. While the room swirled around me as my body spun and twisted in the air, I wondered just what this reaction to the test actually meant.
I'd dropped my stake. So my intrinsic desire to stab him through the heart and turn him to dust wasn't going to be an outcome of this entanglement. But I was spinning, a Nosferatin skill used during fights. If I didn't intend to stake him, then why was I spinning toward him as though I did?
My heart beat unmercifully inside the constrains of my chest. My breath stalled in my lungs. The world closed down to me and him. Time seemed to stretch, unnaturally so.
And then that new sensation, deep inside my core snapped awake. Ribbons of anticipation and excitement twisted within my stomach, entwining and dancing in a spiral of emotions I had no right, at this moment, to feel. Something stirred. Something altogether apart from me, but also deeply entrenched in my soul. Something alien and foreign, yet as I came to the end of my trajectory, face to face with the vampire who held Luc prisoner, I fought the sensation of that feeling deep down inside. I fought it from feeling so right.
It could not be right. Whatever this new Nosferatin talent was. It had no business filling my body with pure delight and welling up inside like a fountain of blissful champagne. Making me lean toward the still and silent vampire, who watched the display with a kind of hunger that should not exist in this world. Not desperate. Not essential to their survival. Not even an intrinsic reaction of a predator to his prey.
No, this hunger was soul deep. As much a part of the vampire before me, as this new talent, I had yet to decipher, was a part of me.
My breaths came in frantic huffs, stirring his short dark hair where it curled at his ears. His eyes flashed intense Arctic-blue laced with shining silver streaks, as bright as lightning, as electric as a storm. We stared at each other, his Sanguis Vitam slowly dissipating on the air. I hadn't touched him, he hadn't touched me, but I had never felt as connected to another person as I did right then.
I sucked in a much needed deep breath and shook my head, frowning, finally managing to move of my own accord by taking a step away. I’d managed to unsheathe my spare stake, which was in my left hand, turning within my palm in an effort to clam me, but also arm me - ready for battle.
But he didn't move. He didn't strike out. Why should he? When all he needed to do was say the name of my kind and lace it with his blood life power. And I would be his.
Oh, this was bad.
I didn't dare glance down at my exposed Sigillum, already well aware that it told a story all of its own. Greens, purples, blues and I was guessing sultry red as well. A volatile and unusual combination of worry, anger, shock, and passion. If Hakan had knowledge of what the colour changes meant, which I could only assume someone as enterprising as him could, then he knew exactly what effect he had over me.
I was at one hell of a disadvantage, so of course, I raised my stake with the speed gifted to me by my abnormal heritage, and centred it above his still non-beating heart. He was shirtless, something that had not escaped my notice but I was determinedly trying to ignore. However, once the silver tip of my stake entered his flesh and announced its intentions with the acrid smell of burning flesh, I could hardly miss the perfection he displayed.
My eyes flicked reluctantly over the broad, smooth expanse of bronzed skin, goosebumps followed wherever my gaze landed, giving me at least some measure of understanding as to where he stood in the whole react-to-the-compatible-kindred-standing-before-you game. I let a slow breath of air out and lifted my eyes back to his.
He still hadn't moved, hadn't breathed, hadn't even blinked. He was watching me though; assessing, contemplating, judging. But what his verdict was I couldn't tell by looking at his face.
But, oh Goddess, he was gorgeous up close. Steal your breath, make your panties wet, fill your mind with wicked and debauched images kind of hot. This vampire was part incubus, I was sure. Not that incubi exist, but that was my excuse for salivating and I was sticking with it.
"So," I said, wanting to be the one who returned to their senses first. "Fast or slow?" Unfortunately my senses weren't completely back to normal yet. The question sounded like a come-on, not the threat I'd intended.
He took a breath. It was his first in several minutes.
"You are even more beautiful in person," he managed, clearly not quite back to his senses either.
And now I had an accent to go with the sinful images playing on repeat in my head.
I pushed the stake a little harder against his chest. Wake up, vampire! I'm about to turn you to dust.
He leaned forward, making the stake slip in another millimetre or two.
"Do you really wish to bring me the final death, hayatim?"
"It had crossed my mind," I replied, coolly. More and more of myself returning at last.
"And then how would you find your brother?"
Was the man crazy? I held a stake to his chest, inside his chest - albeit just skin deep at this stage, but still. Did he want to incite my rage?
His eyes swept over my shoulder and down my arm, blatantly staring at my Sigillum. Reminding me I stood here in nothing but my leather trousers, empty stake holsters at my hips... and a bra.
"Eyes up top, vampire."
He smiled. I refused to let it have any effect over me, but I'd be lying if I said my heart didn't ridiculously flutter.
"Can you control the colour change, or is it intrinsic?" he asked, as though I'd fucking give him the answer.
"Why are you here?" The sooner I determined his intent, the better. Because he was right, that annoying sensation inside my gut, that new talent that so far had not proven its worth, was telling me staking this vampire was the last thing I wanted to do.
I was beginning to think the twists and twirls of ribbon-like sensations, that made me want to curl up in a ball and smile, did not mean bloodshed and dust was anywhere on the horizon. This reaction I was having deep down inside, it was either a reflection of how dangerous or not a situation was, or an insight into the future, a hint of what path I should take.
But what future did I have with this creature who had invaded my home, imprisoned my brother, and tested a kindred compatibility without invitation? So far the stake in the chest scenario should have been winning.
But it wasn't. Even now I wanted to lower my hand, return the silver to its holster and then spread my naked palms across the skin that moulded his chest so lovingly. The
re was a nipple in that imagery somewhere too. I was valiantly ignoring it as well.
"I was called here," he murmured, his eyes lazily perusing my bare flesh.
"Here to my apartment? Or here to Auckland?"
"Both."
His hand came up and a solitary finger traced my collarbone, from one side to the other. I swatted at it and took a step back, in the process removing the stake from his chest. Whether he'd done it for that exact reason, I couldn't say. But now he was too far away for me to get a decent strike in, without projecting my intention.
I'd seen him fight on screen. He was fast. As fast as me.
"What have you done with Luc?"
"Lucien is where he needs to be: Paying off a debt and also aiding me."
It was not the answer I'd been expecting. Hell, I'd been expecting him to avoid answering altogether. But to actually offer an explanation, and one that did not involve skinning my brother alive, threw me for a moment. I frowned at the vampire before me, trying to determine just what his game actually was.
"How is he aiding you?"
"You ask a lot of questions."
Ah, and here was the deflection.
"I have every right," I pointed out. "Answer me."
His eyes lifted from their current investigation of my breasts and speared me with intense annoyance.
"Do you think I like being called here?" he asked.
I shrugged my shoulders. Wasn't my problem. Luc, however, was.
"I want my brother back."
"And I want to understand why I have felt compelled to travel the world to visit an Iunctio owned city and lay eyes on a female."
I smiled. It was all Nosferatin sass.
"Wasted trip, bloodsucker." A term that was frowned upon in the crowd I grew up in. Hakan's furrowed brow deepened. "Now you've seen me, laid eyes on me, it's time to go. But not before you hand over my brother."
He stood up straighter, eyes glinting a steel-like blue.
kindred 08.6 - blood enchanted Page 6
