by S. K. Yule
The situation was overwhelming, too much for one person to take in at once. Hundreds of years of lies and deception. The rage took control and he swung on Ragnor. However, everyone in the room, including him, gasped when Ragnor’s hand flew up in a blurred speed and easily caught his fist in mid-air, holding it without effort as if chastising a small child.
Aldin’s eyes grew large. Never had he come across a vampire or other being who possessed that amount of strength. He’d swung on Ragnor with everything, and yet Ragnor stared at him in resignation and held him with ease.
Aldin gasped and stumbled back. Ashe and Aiston came to stand beside him.
“This will take some time for us to come to terms with,” Ashe said.
“Deal with it quickly because your brother will be here tomorrow. After that, you will have little time to devise a plan that will protect the family until Uriah finds his viata amant”—Ragnor glanced at Marilena and frowned—”and I can perform the ritual that will awaken your true blood powers.”
“Aldin hasn’t found his life mate yet either. That gives us more time,” Aiston argued.
“I think we all know better than that,” Ragnor responded.
“Why must we all find our life mates before we can come into our powers? Why can’t you do the ritual now?” Ashe asked.
“The powers of a true blood are not limited as your powers are now. You will be able to do things you’ve never been able to do before. Command things unthinkable. With that kind of power comes a certain darkness, a darkness that is consuming. Your life mates are the light, the reason that will always lead you out of the darkness that will call to you.”
“I still don’t understand why you can’t simply take Trinidad out and end this,” Aiston said.
“The prophecy was specific. I don’t know why, but it is essential that you all play a part in defeating Trinidad. You cannot do so without your true blood powers. You cannot obtain those powers without me. I cannot risk myself. Doing so risks all of your lives, and I am not willing to do that. If it were only my life hanging in the balance, I would not hesitate to go after Trinidad, but I think it has become all too clear what happens when we try to alter Fate’s plans. While the details surrounding the prophecy may be possible to change, the base structure that sets things in motion cannot. Try to alter Fate’s base plan, and She will do whatever She must to get that plan back on course.”
“Are we finished here, Mother?” Aldin gritted his teeth.
“For now,” Marilena answered.
Aldin stood, glared at both his mother and…no, he couldn’t say it. Ragnor could not be his father. He headed for the door.
“Where are you going?” Ashe asked.
“Hunting,” Aldin ground back.
“You cannot go on your own.”
“Watch me.”
“No. Aiston and I will come with you. I think we could all use an outlet at the moment.”
Aldin nodded. “Don’t fuck around. I’m not waiting long.” He wrenched the door open and started for his room.
Chapter Eleven
The house shook with a sudden rumble of thunder. Wilhemina jumped and Avril and Ebony looked at one another, worry etching their features.
“I didn’t know it was supposed to storm tonight,” Wilhemina said.
“Me either.” Ebony bit her lip. “Excuse me for just a moment please.”
Only seconds after Ebony left the room, chaos broke out. Wilhemina followed Avril out into the entryway to see what all of the commotion was about to find Ebony talking to a not-so-happy-looking Ashe.
Out of the corner of her eye, Wilhemina caught a glimpse of a broad back before it disappeared around the corner on the second floor. She was certain it had been Aldin. She looked back at Ashe and Ebony who seemed to be in a deep and heated discussion. Avril went to Aiston, and they too were soon in what looked to be an intense discussion.
A moment later, Marilena and a man Wilhemina had not seen before appeared from the study. The man shook his head at Marilena when she tried to go to Ashe, and tugged her along by the arm around the two couples and up the stairs until they too disappeared. Although Wilhemina was curious over what was going on, she suddenly felt like the third wheel—or fifth wheel in this case.
She edged to the stairs and made her exit as well. The tension that boiled in the air practically singed her skin. Me thinks something happened that pissed some people off. Yes. Something that isn’t my concern. When she got to her room, she dug around for something to sleep in and went to the bathroom to have a long shower. Maybe after the steamy water had relaxed her, she’d see if she could get some writing in before going to bed.
* * * *
Grady stood across the dark street under cover of the deeper shadows of a big tree and stared at the mansion. After risking his neck last year by going to the hunters to tell them how to find Trinidad, he swore he’d never come near the Aleksandrovs again when they’d miraculously let him go with his head intact. He had to be the biggest dumb ass in the entire world for being here.
No hunter had ever let a drifter walk. Usually, any interaction between a drifter and a hunter ended in the drifter’s death. Especially when that hunter was an Aleksandrov. But he had to help them. Not only for their benefit, but his as well. If Trinidad found out he was alive, there would be no dark corner on earth he could hide in. He would be hunted until the day he died…or was killed, which was the more likely scenario. He’d seen the demented evilness Trinidad was capable of, and he had no desire to find himself on the receiving end of it.
The only hope he had at a somewhat normal life again was if Trinidad was dead, and he wasn’t powerful enough to kill him on his own. But he was a good tracker, hell, he was the best tracker. He had lived a long time as a vampire before turning drifter. Unfortunately, something hadn’t gone right when he’d made his little deal with Satan. He hadn’t lost his ability to care or to love. Those emotions had been dulled, but they hadn’t disappeared like they were supposed to.
And he’d gotten another nasty present in his soul exchange with Satan. He’d never been one prone to destructive tendencies before, but now there were times when rage, the gut-wrenching need for violence, tore at him with razorlike talons. Times like those were difficult at best, but he’d vowed to stay in control. He shrugged his shoulders and started for the house. He was tired of running, of hiding. All he’d done since his botched deal with the King Ass of Hell was look over his shoulder.
He was pretty sure he was to blame for his predicament. Satan didn’t like to have his balls yanked. Since he’d backed out of the deal to trade his soul with Old Horned and Ugly numerous times before finally going through with it, Red had obviously done a little yanking back. Now he was technically neither vampire nor drifter. That didn’t stop every hunter he came across from viewing him as the latter and thus, an enemy.
He was unique, but not in an oh-how-cool-are-you kind of way. He was unique in more of a holy-shit-I’m-fucked kind of way. Maybe if he could convince the Aleksandrovs, some of the most well-known hunters among vampires, that he was different, that he was perfectly capable of living his life without being hell bent on evil. Just maybe he’d be able to live in peace. He frowned.
If he could convince the Aleksandrovs that he was willing to help them, and managed to survive the uprising, he’d have a chance at some kind of normalcy. If he couldn’t…
“If I can’t, they can kill me. I’m dead anyway one way or the other. This is my only chance.”
He’d barely gotten halfway across the street before he was surrounded by three angry-looking Aleksandrov brothers. He put his hands up in surrender, making certain not to make any abrupt movement. “Easy guys.”
“I’m certain I told you if you ever came around here again you’d die,” Ashe said through the hissing sound the long sword made as he pulled it from his back.
“I only want to talk. I have a proposition for you.” Grady could smell the malevolence in the air.
&nb
sp; “You picked a shitty time to try to proposition us.” Aiston glared at him.
He looked from one hunter to another until he came to Aldin who stood silently with his hands clenched at his sides. All of the men were intimidating as hell, but tonight, Aldin had an extra edge of scary aura floating around him like a dark cloud of foreboding.
“Give me one good reason why my brothers and I shouldn’t end your miserable life now,” Ashe said as he took a menacing step forward.
“I can help you find Trinidad. Other than the fact that I was forced to work with the fucker for awhile, I’m good at tracking. I know him better than any of you.”
He didn’t know the evil son-of-a-bitch at all. God help anyone who could understand anything that went on inside that crazy bastard’s head. But since he’d spent time with Trinidad—however forced and unpleasant it had been—that made him more knowledgeable about Trinidad than the Aleksandrovs. It was the only Ace he had up his sleeve, the only chance he had at keeping his head attached to his neck.
“Even if that’s true, do you seriously expect us to trust a drifter?” Aiston snarled.
He glanced at Aldin who had still not said a word. He’d only watched him with those damnable turquoise eyes that every one of them had. Thunder rolled in the distance, sounding much like growling hell hounds coming to drag him to Satan.
“I’m not a drifter. Well, not really,” Grady said.
“You sure as hell could have fooled me with those black eyes,” Ashe spewed.
Damn. The boys were in a touchy mood tonight. You had to pick the one night they all had their panties in a bunch to confront them, didn’t you? Nice timing, as usual.
“I still possess all of my feelings. I’ll admit, the ones that were supposed to be removed by my little deal with Satan are dulled, but still intact, nevertheless.”
“Why should your deal have gone any differently than any other drifter’s?” Aiston asked.
Grady shrugged. “I think Satan held a grudge against me for all the times I went to make the exchange with him and backed out. I guess he decided to have some fun, get some revenge on my ass. Hmm. Doesn’t sound like Satan at all now, does it?” He laughed bitterly.
Ashe looked from one brother to the other then back to Grady before sighing and lowering his sword.
“Come back in two days. We have some family business to take care of first. You tell us what you know then and how you think you can help. I assume you are hoping that if you assist us in taking Trinidad down, your worries will be over?” Ashe smirked.
“Something like that,” Grady murmured.
“Don’t let the fucker go. He can’t help us. He’s lying,” Aldin finally spoke.
“He helped before. Besides, what if there is a chance he’s telling the truth? We don’t kill innocents.”
“He’s as far from innocent as the one who took his soul,” Aiston said.
Thunder rumbled in the distance, and Ashe raised one brow at Aldin as if he’d somehow been responsible for the growling thunder. Hell, maybe he had.
“Don’t screw this up, Grady. Be back here in two days,” Ashe said through tight lips.
Ashe nodded to Aiston and Aldin and they followed him, but not before another rumble of thunder shook the ground under Grady’s feet.
At least he still had his head.
* * * *
Three hours later, Aldin reached under his leather duster and pulled the sword from its hiding place on his back.
“We are so fucked,” he said to his brothers telepathically.
“We’ve been in tighter situations. I’ve already alerted Conrad and Dominic. They’ll be here shortly,” Ashe said.
“Yep. This is going to hurt so good,” Aiston said. The words dripped with his usual brand of sarcasm.
Aldin was the tallest of his brothers, but neither Aiston nor Ashe were slouches. He only had Ashe by a couple inches, but those inches in no way took from the lethalness of his siblings. Aiston and Ashe both held their swords up and to the right in a fight stance, as he did his own. They were surrounded by at least twenty drifters—ten in front, ten behind—and all of them had weapons.
“I prefer the old days when you worthless pieces of shits cowered, ran, and hid,” Aldin sneered.
In the past, the only time a drifter fought back was when cornered, and none had ever carried a weapon before Trinidad became their leader. Actually, that wasn’t the whole truth. Drifters were armed with their own built-in weapons. Talons that were capable of ripping through flesh, tendons, and muscle straight to the bone. Talons that had poisonous tips. While the poison wouldn’t kill a vampire, it had the potential to slow a hunter down enough to give an advantage to the drifter.
That poison was lethal enough to kill humans. Fellow hunter Malachi Mannering’s life mate, Geri, had nearly died from a wound inflicted by a drifter’s talons. The drifter standing in the middle of the ten in front of them sneered.
“There will be no cowering now, hunter. We are being trained by someone more lethal than you’ll ever be. He is giving us the skills to kill every last one of you. You hunt us for no reason. We have the right to live as much as you, you self-serving, righteous bastards.”
Aldin laughed, and the drifter snarled again.
“You prey upon innocent humans. You get off on torturing, raping, maiming, and killing. There is no place on earth for spawn such as you. The world has a certain balance. While evil has always existed—will always exist—good has an obligation to maintain said balance and keep scum like you from hurting the helpless.”
“And you believe yourself to be good?” The drifter spat on the ground in front of him. His gnarled fingers tightened around the sword’s hilt in his hand.
At least they hadn’t gone to using guns yet. The hunters never used anything that would draw unwanted attention. Guns had a way of making everyone within earshot take immediate notice.
“In comparison?” Aldin gave the drifter a scathing once-over from toe to head. “Yeah. There is nothing decent about anything that will make a deal with Satan.”
Suddenly, Dominic and Conrad appeared behind the group of drifters in front of them and nodded at Aldin and his brothers.
“Let’s get this show on the road.” Dominic’s voice slid through Aldin’s mind.
Within seconds, pure chaos broke out. Aldin was not happy that the drifters seemed more skilled than the ones at the last ambush. Even so, none of them could achieve the same level of skill as a hunter. Those types of skills came with years upon years of practice and experience, not from a year or two of training. However, the sheer number of them proved to be a challenge.
Even though it was only a matter of minutes before half of the drifters had been dealt with swiftly and permanently, the remaining ten were putting up one hell of a fight. His brothers, Dominic, and Conrad, all had been wounded. He had a few injuries himself, but nothing life threatening.
Aldin faced off with the drifter he’d exchanged words with before the fight had begun.
“I’m going to cut your heart out, hunter,” the thing snarled.
“Doubtful, but give it your best shot.” The first rule of battle was to never allow your emotions to get the better of you. Emotions were distracting. Emotions got one killed faster than anything else.
Aldin had been up against countless opponents who had tried to rattle him with insults and scathing words, but he never allowed them to get to him. In fact, at this point, he barely heard them at all. On the other hand, insults tended to work well on drifters.
The drifter swung its sword, and Aldin easily blocked the blow before shoving the drifter with enough force to knock him back a couple of feet.
“Did your mommy teach you how to fight like that?” He tsked.
He watched the rage come over the drifter’s face and smiled. Such a dumb ass. Obviously, whoever was training the idiots didn’t understand that there was much more to fighting than being able to swing a sword well. Or maybe whoever was training them didn
’t care.
The drifter came at him balls out, full force with his sword once again. Aldin had to admit, he did have some skill, but not enough. Swords clashed and clanged all around him, as his brothers, Dominic, and Conrad, slowly took out the rest of the drifters.
Once a drifter’s head was off, the remains turned into a bubbling, black goo that wreaked of rotting corpses. The odor of the goo seeping from the decapitated bodies was nauseating. It was a stench that he’d become accustomed to. Unfortunately, it was a necessary evil that came with killing the drifters. It was the only sure fire way to make certain a drifter was dead and to remove all evidence of its body.
He raised his sword and stopped the drifter again from striking a blow, but an instant later, he made a tactical mistake—a rookie mistake.
Ashe grunted, which signaled Aldin that he had sustained another injury. He glanced in his brother’s direction, something he knew better than to do in the heat of a fight. The drifter took advantage of that distraction, as Aldin would have had the roles been reversed, and slid its sword between his ribs.
He was sure the blade pierced cleanly between two ribs as he hadn’t heard or felt any bones shatter, but the pain was sharp and stole the breath from his lungs. Unfortunately, the warm blood spilling down his side and soaking through his clothes told him the wound was a bleeder. He needed to wrap this up before the blood loss started taking his strength.
The drifter laughed, and when he did, Aldin in turn took advantage of the distraction. He spun and landed a kick to the drifter’s jaw. This time, the sound of bone crunching was unmistakable. When the drifter reached up to cup his face, Aldin spun again with his sword sideways and cleanly took off its head right along with both hands.
“Everyone going to live?” He turned to his brothers and the other two hunters.
Ashe nodded, but gripped his stomach. Blood oozed between his fingers.
