Witchling Wars

by Shawn Knightley

Tobias took a knee. He brought my arm up to his mouth and snickered at Nathaniel, who was starting to struggle against the vampires holding him down.

  Tobias laughed. A deep unsettling laugh. One that told everyone he got the exact reaction he wanted from Nathaniel. Then he plunged his teeth deep inside my wrist. Two small knives dug into my skin and latched onto me with more force than Nathaniel had dared. And suddenly I realized what Tobias meant. Nathaniel was being careful. Maybe even gentle compared to how other vampires would feed. Tobias didn’t show me such mercy.

  “No! Stop!” I heard Nathaniel holler just before he thrust his hands up to the heads of both the vampires holding him down and tore away their throats. He swiftly turned around and decapitated the one directly behind him with his bare hands and launched his head across the room. Then he did the unthinkable. He threw himself directly at Tobias. I never saw the two of them collide. The only strength I had left inside me had fled. My eyes shut. There was only darkness and the struggling beat of my heart before I completely slipped away.

  Chapter 6

  A bright light flooded my eyes the second I started to stir.

  To anyone else, this would have been the moment when they assumed their soul had left their body and they were ascending toward heaven. Or hell, granted on how they behaved in life. I may have been a sourpuss and sarcastic ass sometimes, but I tried to be a relatively good person. I tried to do the right thing…most days. I tried to help people. These were the thoughts that ran through my mind when that light struck my eyes and forced me to raise a hand up to shield them against the bright sunlight.

  “Sun? That can’t really be the sun! That would mean I’m… I’m…”

  “Calm down, darling. You’re very much alive.”

  I sat up as fast as I could, recognizing the voice that greeted me almost instantly. It was a voice I didn’t want to hear again. One I never even expected to hear again.

  “Tobias,” I muttered.

  When my eyes finally adjusted to the light, I was able to take in the entire room. It was exquisite.

  I was laying in a large four poster bed in a huge master bedroom. There were two ornate glass doors leading out to a terrace and a beautiful view of the monuments of Washington D.C. The walls were decorated with fine paintings that I had only ever seen a likeness of in museums. One in particular that held a striking resemblance to Tobias, only he was wearing Renaissance style clothing. It wasn’t a great leap to assume that it was a portrait he had commissioned of himself centuries ago.

  “I’m not generally the sort to sit around admiring myself,” he said, catching me when my eyes settled on the painting. “But it’s the only portrait of me. I never trusted or like photography much. It could lead to being recognized for not aging by the wrong sort of people.”

  I didn’t know whether to summon what little magic I could stir from my hands to blast him away or to just stay silent. The man tried to kill me only hours ago. Or at least it felt like hours ago. Days could have gone by and I never would have known.

  “Wh-” I stammered. “Where am I?”

  He chuckled with his arms crossed over his muscular chest, leaning into the tall doorway leading to his balcony.

  The sunlight was shining directly on him. Meaning he could walk in the daylight. Also meaning that he had killed a kruxa in order to get that ability. A subtle way of letting me know that he would kill me if I made a wrong step or said the wrong thing.

  “You’re in my home. My bedroom to be more specific.”

  ‘Um, excuse me?’

  “I may be a lot of things, Harper. I have been very cruel to a great many people. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned over the centuries, senseless death only leads one to a life of misery. And there’s no sensible reason to kill you.”

  “Then why the show? Why did you display me before the entire coven like that?”

  “To let them think you’re dead so no one will pursue you again. I only drained you enough to make you pass out. Then I had a trusted friend with his own medical practice give you some blood.”

  I didn’t even notice until that moment that an IV was hooked into my left arm. I peered down to see a large needle sticking into my vein connected to a bottle of fluids next to the bed.

  “What the hell?” I stuttered.

  “It was necessary,” he said, moving from the doorway and stepping closer to me. “The caverns you saw were the underground meeting place for the coven since vampires first settled this land back in the 18th century. We rarely use them anymore except for ceremonial events. A trial of one of my leading men suits such an occasion.”

  Oh no. Nathaniel! I hadn’t even thought of Nathaniel yet.

  “What happened to him?” I asked. “What did you do? He didn’t do anything wrong.”

  Tobias smiled down at me and sat at the edge of the bed. It felt almost forward of him to do so. I inched away toward the pillows behind me, not liking that he was welcoming himself on the bed. I mean, it was his bed. But I was in it.

  “Nothing happened,” he said. “I was fully aware that he hadn’t been scarred by you, Harper. I simply wanted to showcase to the entire coven that those who break our laws will be held accountable. Even if they’re trusted by me. I also wanted to see if Nathaniel was willing to do what he was told if I asked him to do something he didn’t want to do. And that meant seeing if he would kill the woman who holds such a striking resemblance to the lover he lost over two centuries ago.”

  His lover. I suspected that might have been the case when Tobias started grilling Nathaniel the night before, but to hear it confirmed still made me uneasy. But it did make one thing abundantly clear. Nathaniel was putting on a show from the start. Even when he held a knife to my throat. He would never hurt me. He knew I was Georgeanna’s descendant before he ever even showed up. He knew who I was. What I was. Where I was. Maybe even from the day I was born.

  Tobias was right. It took dedication for a man to keep tabs on a woman’s family for over two centuries after she was gone.

  “Did you get your answer?” I asked.

  “Indeed, I did,” he said with a smirk.

  “And?”

  “He didn’t kill you. He barely even tried to drink from you. Although, I’m willing to bet it felt rather unpleasant.”

  “So he failed. He failed to do as he was told. Are you going to kill him for that?”

  He laughed at me. Again. How was I managing to sound so silly to him when I was clearly being left in the dark? His eyes looked at me in the strangest way. As if even though we were alone I would have his full attention if we were surrounded by other people. They were commanding and directly focused on me. In a way that would make a girl feel like she was the only girl in the entire world that could gain his attention. Or even his affection if they tried hard enough.

  Was he luring me? My magic was too weak to tell me yes or no. Did he use this same technique on all the women he met or found useful?

  No wonder Samantha was drooling over him. There was a definite allure to him that was undeniable. Even Emily fell victim to it.

  I kept my guard up. I refused to let him even have a hint that I was taking a mere second to admire him. He was still a vampire. The most powerful vampire in all of the western world. He could decide to kill me at any moment.

  And yet, even when that thought crossed my mind, I wasn’t certain if it was true.

  “No, Harper, I’m not going to kill him,” he said softly. “It was a test of sorts. You were the bait. Sorry about that. But Isaac unknowingly gave me the perfect opportunity to see if Nathaniel was worthy of greater things. Knowing if he could question authority and go his own way rather than doing everything he’s told like a common foot soldier in combat was critical.”

  “Greater things?” I asked.

  He gave a small sigh and changed the subject. “Isaac however, Isaac was nothing more than a common foot soldier. He was strong and one of my most lethal killers, but not much more than that. He didn’t do wha
t he was told and thought he knew better. He directly interfered with the task I gave to Nathaniel. His death was for the best. These are trying times and such times require certain men who can complete the task I assign to them and others who can make good decisions without constant direction.”

  Was he talking about Nathaniel? What did he mean by that? What was going on? He admitted that I was nothing more than bait, that he knew Nathaniel wasn’t scarred by me, and that he was testing Nathaniel the whole time. Why go through all that trouble?

  “What are you doing with the vixra blood?” I asked. I had already outed him to his coven. And after all, Eli told me to find out what was going on and why the vixra tunnels were being misused. No better time than the present given I had the leader of the Catach-Brayin sitting across from me in a large four-poster bed.

  “That was a mere oversight. It won’t happen again,” he stated very matter of factly.

  “An oversight?”

  His eyes drilled into me. I couldn’t quite tell if he was telling me to stop prying or if he was trying to look straight through me and see what was inside. What made me tick. It wasn’t that complicated. All that was making me tick at the moment was my will to survive. A will I didn’t know I even had. For so long after Caleb died I wanted to die right along with him. It took having my life threatened as well as the lives of my family for me to realize how much I wanted to live. To see my nieces grow up. To see them graduate high school. Maybe even see them get married. To find fulfillment in any way that I could.

  “There are very serious things happening, Harper,” he said. “Things that you can’t know at the moment but over time you may prove worthy of learning. If such a day comes, I will trust you with the truth. But until that time, you can only know this. Yes, I’m using vixra blood. I have someone providing it to me. Someone I have known for a very long time that trusts me. Who thinks along the same lines that I do. Someone who wants a future where witchlings survive. And we both agree that my possessing vixra blood and giving it to a select few is a way to ensure our survival.”

  “Does that include murdering young women who displease the Catach-Brayin?” I asked. Now that I had been through hell and back I didn’t care if I pissed him off. The man used me as bait and made me believe he was going to kill me. He could answer my questions, regardless of how blunt they were.

  He sat back and took a long hard look at me. One that was even more prying than the previous. What did he think he was going to find?

  “The recent murders are as much of an interest to me as they are to you,” he said “I want to know who is committing them.”

  “Why?”

  “Because whoever is doing it is directly interfering in me getting what I want. And I want those I trust with vixra blood to do as I say without interference. Vixra blood is very powerful in the right hands. And lethal in the wrong ones. Like I said, I don’t want to see senseless death any more than I already have. Killing the mortals I trusted to carry the vixra blood for me one way or another would be senseless.”

  “Why did you get those girls to help you? Why them?”

  “Some volunteered. Samantha was one who actually thought that by doing what I asked and being branded with the Catach-Brayin symbol that I’d see her as worthy and accept her advances.” He stifled a laugh. “Stupid girl. Only reason I let her do my bidding was because she lived with Congressman Larsen. He’s been a somewhat worthy ally.”

  “And Emily?” I asked with a not so subtle hint of judgment. “Was she a stupid girl?”

  “No. She was quiet. I like girls who are quiet. They tend to know their place.”

  I tried raising my body upward only to get a sense that I was free falling. If I didn’t feel so weak, that comment would have sent me through the roof. But I wasn’t exactly in a position to fight back with anything except my mouth.

  “Emily didn’t deserve any of this. And now she’s missing. She ran off in the middle of the night in a storm after her sister was found dead.” I threw off the comforter and put my feet on the white marble floor. I was barefoot. Someone had taken off my shoes. And put me in satin pajamas! I stared down at my body and felt the satin material of the nightdress I had definitely not changed into.

  “I had nothing to do with that. One of my maids-”

  I reached across the bed and slapped him as hard as I could. He didn’t try to stop me. He didn’t even flinch. Of course he wouldn’t. Strong vampire and all. Maybe I should have tried summoning some magic to make it feel like a forceful punch.

  “Like hell you didn’t,” I shouted and stood up from the bed, only to get an instant dizzy spell followed by the sensation of falling right down into the floor.

  Tobias was holding me before I even realized I was about to hit the ground. He caught me and set me back on the bed without a word. Not even a laugh. That light laugh that was already incredibly annoying. He set me down as I tried to refocus my energy into stopping the room from spinning.

  “The Congressman offered to work with me,” he said, not moving away once he set me down. “As a service in exchange for certain favors. Being alive for as long as I have has given me connections. Connections that men who desire power would often kill to possess. It was never my intention to see either of them harmed. I spoke harshly of Samantha and Emily before my coven because they expect my cruelty. To appear soft would be to appear weak. And I can’t have that. The Congressman and I think alike. And for that he’s proven very useful.”

  His arms were on either side of me. And he didn’t move. I could see his lips moving, but the rest of the room was still spinning. Even so, I knew he wasn’t backing away from me. Perhaps he didn’t intend to.

  “I didn’t commit those murders, Harper,” he went on. “I do however have an interest in discovering who did, which was why I told Nathaniel to find out what Officer Andrew Parker knew. Nathaniel sought to protect you. But often times the best way to protect someone is to keep them in the dark.”

  “Not necessarily,” I said. “I tried keeping Officer Parker in the dark and now he’s dead.”

  He grimaced. “Yes, I know. I heard last night soon after I had my maid clean you up.”

  ‘Yeah, right. I don’t buy it.’

  His eyes examined me. Or admired me. The light blue satin nightdress certainly didn’t leave much to the imagination. It was something a woman would wear on a romantic getaway. Not something you are changed into after someone nearly murders you. He let his eyes roam down my body. I wasn’t going to deny that he was striking. Much like Nathaniel, his eyes exuded power. Strength and masculinity. But he looked so different from Nathaniel. There was something inside Tobias that I could sense the second his cold hands caught me and placed my limp body on the bed again.

  Exhaustion. He was tired. Not in the ‘I need sleep’ kind of way. But in a way that told me he had seen a great many years. Years that broke him down and made him yearn for something more. A quality he might never find. Inner peace.

  “Can I help you?” I snapped.

  His attention left the low cut top of the nightdress and came back up to my face. “I sure hope so.” He was still leaning over me.

  Goosebumps erupted all over my body. It didn’t matter if Tobias was by any other woman’s standards, sexy as hell. I still felt married. I still felt taken. Even though I wasn’t. There was no one to speak for me. No one to protect me. No one to tell him to fuck off. He stayed right where he was. Unwilling to move even if it made me uncomfortable.

  “Harper,” he said in a soft voice, “I want you to accept Nathaniel’s help. No one else in my coven will harm you. They believe you’re dead after my little display in the caverns and will have no reason to search for you. If you succeed in helping me discover who murdered the young women aiding me, I will remove the Catach-Brayin brand from your side.”

  Now it was my turn to laugh. “How about you just remove it and I’ll help you out anyway? I don’t want anyone else suffering like those girls suffered. I want whoever
did it found and held accountable.”

  His hand moved over my face and pulled back a strand of hair, much like what he did to Samantha in my vision. It was a romantic sort of gesture. Unfortunately for him, I’d seen him do it to Samantha already. He wasn’t interested in me. Hardly. He wanted to use me. I made a face that must have looked rather unpleasant because he finally sat back where he wasn’t leaning over me anymore.

  “Once you’ve found the murderer and not a second sooner,” he said. “I have faith you’ll find him. It’s been my experience that humans stay a little more motivated when they’re branded. It prevents them from making stupid mistakes.”

  ‘I officially don’t like you. And I’m only part human by the way.’

  “Why won’t you tell me the reason you’re distributing vixra blood?” I asked.

  His eyes went from playful to downright serious. “I have my reasons.”

  “Reasons I’m not privy to?”

  “Do as I say and I will consider telling you all my secrets, Harper. You seem like someone who knows how to keep a secret and never tell it to another living soul.”

  Was that a jab at me being a kruxa? Probably. Hiding the secret that you’re even alive is something of a challenge when there’s a rather large group of hungry vampires walking around out there who would love to see you dead.

  “How do I even go about doing that?” I asked. “Officer Parker is gone. I can’t get to any of the evidence.”

  “Nathaniel will help you with that.”

  “What if I can’t find the murderer?”

  He stood from the bed and I did my best to try propping myself up onto some pillows. He reached behind me and helped me get to a position where I was laying at more of an angle. Then he leaned over me again. Smooth. Very smooth.

  “I don’t have any reason to kill you, Harper. Something as rare as you is meant to be cherished. Not harmed. Nathaniel knows that as well as I do. I’ve trained him to be rigid. But he’s fearsome when it comes to protecting what he values. You are on that list of things he values. All of Georgeanna’s descendants are.”