“She’s one of the few shifters I’ve known,” Riley said. “Some can’t do people, they can only do animals. Others, like Maze, are completely convincing.”
The door that led to the main hall opened. A bald vampire who kind of looked like Dr. Phil stuck his head in and asked if they were ready.
With a quick nod of approval, Garrick turned back to his audience. He raised his right arm and the room suddenly grew quiet. No one spoke, understanding his demand for a moment of silence – that something was about to change. Even the current in the room altered as the bodies grew still.
As the door opened again, Liz’s heart did jumping jacks in her chest.
Braden slunk into the room like he was too tall for the ceiling. His head hung low over his stooped shoulders and a spot of dark blood stained the muscle shirt he had bought earlier at the store. Even in the dim lighting, Liz could see he was searching for her. When he saw Maze standing in the white gown as Liz’s double, his posture suddenly straightened. Whipping his head around the room in search of Riley, his eyes stared with a burning intensity even the darkness could not hide.
“It’s okay,” Riley whispered. “He thinks I’ve betrayed him because he doesn’t know that’s Maze. Strix will signal to let him know before he feeds.”
“What are we going to do? Just wait for him to make a run for it?” She asked, still wanting details.
“Just be patient. You’re as ornery as he is.”
In the center of the room, with candles burning on the floor in a semicircle altar, stood Garrick and Maze, watching as Braden was forced to his knees.
Liz strained on her tippy toes, trying to see him. The floor swarmed and swelled with dozens of lounging draugar. Those out hunting the night before must have been called back for Garrick’s festivities. Liz tried not to look too closely at what they were doing. Their pallid skin glowed by candle light; mating and eating, the only needs they had left.
Finally, Braden was pulled back up on his feet.
“You have two choices,” Garrick announced. “Join me or not.”
“Let Liz go,” Braden said, refusing to mask his rage.
“Like this?” Garrick swung around, yanking Maze into his arms. In a flash, his fist was buried up to his elbow inside Maze’s chest. With a quick downward thrust, he yanked out his hand. Clutched in his grasp was her heart.
Oh God…
Liz could feel her whole body sway. She heard noises, the sound of her own voice screaming, but no words passed her lips. Maze’s knees buckled, and her expression glazed over in rigid, permanent horror. The front of the gown was blackened with her blood.
As Garrick stared at the organ seized in his fist, his mouth pulled into a hard line. Looking down at the female, his eyes finally registered what the others were seeing. Like earlier in the bedroom, Maze’s features shimmied and bent until her likeness of Liz no longer remained. Back to her true form, white hair spilled over vacant grey eyes.
“Stay,” Riley declared bursting through the door.
Liz struggled to make sense of what happened next, it was too fast. Braden barreled forward, knocking Garrick to the ground, catching the leader by surprise. Riley grabbed hold of the Dr. Phil’s twin and was tearing his head off, while Strix hissed and kicked at any of the vampires trying to get in on the raucous.
While most draugar stayed down, unconcerned about the power struggle on the floor, others clambered over to Maze and began tearing at her flesh. Huddling around her, females and males alike began eating what was left of her remains.
It was supposed to be me. Garrick was killing me.
Liz bent over and threw up. Maze wasn’t her friend, but the vampire offered her help, a way out. She couldn’t have known it was going to go down like that.
My God, this can’t be happening.
Braden’s scream shattered back into her consciousness. Clambering back to her feet, Liz tried to locate him between the blurry lines of the vampires moving faster than her eyes could process.
Garrick was on top of Braden, but the damphyr refused to give up. While the draugr tried using his teeth to tear out his throat, Braden freed his hands and delivered a head-butt to Garrick’s face.
Riley, finished beheading the bald vamp, jumped onto Garrick, giving Braden a chance to back out from beneath the crushing weight. Pulling a concealed knife from inside his waistband, Braden’s arm swung up and slashed at Garrick’s throat.
Although he made contact, Garrick’s wound wasn’t lethal. Reaching around, he swiped the knife from Braden’s grip, and tried plunging it into the teen’s chest. Riley’s hand shot out, stopping Garrick’s. After the three moved apart, it was Riley who bested the leader. Straddling the older vampire, he slammed the knife deep into Garrick’s chest, piercing his chest while Braden lay next to him, gasping for air.
Liz couldn’t stand another moment of doing nothing. With her fingers pressed against the cool metal, she was about to push the door open, when she paused. The draugar on the floor were now pulling apart what was left of Garrick and Dr. Phil, seemingly uncaring about the fate of their master. Moving among them across the floor, Strix, reached Riley and helped him to stand.
Holding Riley’s hand in the air, Strix said something in his crumbly voice Liz couldn’t quite hear.
Suddenly a bunch of heads popped up and high pitched shrieking filled the room. Riley looked around cautiously, before reaching down to Braden. Once he got his brother on his feet, he tossed him the keys to the Porsche and pointed to where Liz was waiting and motionedfor his brother to get moving.
As soon as Braden’s blue eyes connected with Liz’s, she could no longer stop herself from moving. Pushing her way through the swinging door, she dove into his arms, crying.
“It’s okay,” he soothed.
Braden’s body felt as hard as marble. Stepping back, she touched his face, chest and arms, needing to ensure he was safe.
“I’m so sorry. We should have left before,” she said.
Braden looked around them. On the floor, the demons hissed as they fought back and forth over what was left of the dead draugar.
“We need to go,” he said urgently. “Now.”
“What just happened? What did Strix say?”
“Riley just killed Garrick. That makes him in charge of the nest. With that feeding frenzy in there, he may get challenged. He wants us to go before that happens.”
“Why?”
“In case he loses.”
27
BRADEN
As they raced down Robson Street in the direction of the Thunderbird Motel, Braden breathed in the pine scented air. Although Vancouver was a relative urban forest with all of the different types of trees growing everywhere, it was the black spruce that reminded him of home.
Liz’s small hand still gripped his own. Even as they put distance behind them, her heartbeat pounded with adrenaline.
“What do we do now?”
“We get you somewhere safe.”
“Me? What about you?”
“I have to go back,” he said simply.
“What?” Liz said, confused. “You barely got out of there with your life. A fact that I hold myself one hundred percent accountable for. Going back is just crazy.”
“When I was locked up, Riley told me something about my father. Something about his death didn’t occur to me at the time. If I don’t ask him now, I may never get the chance to again.”
Liz sat motionless in her seat. She could see why he needed to know. The mystery hurt his entire coven. The pain would live with him forever, but answers could make it bearable.
“Okay, but I’m coming with you.”
Braden gave her a side long look. “That didn’t work out so well last time.”
“I know, but, I swear Braden, if I had to stay somewhere knowing you were back there, I would die. At least let me wait out by the car. Besides, Riley told me things too.”
“Like?”
“Lots of things. Like what the cure is
.”
Braden hadn’t forgotten about Ruby, but he did think the promise of a cure was a ruse to get him there. What else did he say? Did he tell her they would have been together if he hadn’t changed? His brother’s scent was all over her. Pushing the thought from his mind, he considered his options.
“I don’t know,” he said finally. “If that had been you instead of Maze, you would be dead now. I don’t know what I would have done.”
“That’s how I feel about you going back there alone,” Liz said, squeezing his hand. “The sun is coming up. They’ll probably be sleeping in the basement again. You can sneak in, check the place out. If it’s all clear, you can wake Riley, find out what you need from him and then we’ll leave.”
“And if it isn’t all clear?”
“Riley’s the leader and he told us to go. They aren’t going to expect us back. If they give you a hassle, I’ll throw a rock through the window and let the sunshine in.”
Braden smiled. She was a tenacious creature and perfectly impossible to tell no. Whipping the car around in an illegal u turn – he headed back in the direction of hell.
Please let this not be a mistake.
After parking under the trees, Barden knew something had changed. A quiet stillness had settled beneath the bloated sky. The sounds, the smells – everything about the old nursing home felt different. As he approached the entrance, the charcoaled remains of a dead draugr caught his attention.
“Why would he have come out after dawn?” Liz asked, close on his heels.
“Maybe the sun didn’t kill him,” Braden replied. “Maybe another draugr did after we left.”
Heading into the building, he motioned for Liz to wait by the door. Two more corpses were crumpled in the foyer, a third lay dismembered in the hall. Their blood was everywhere, sprayed across the walls, flooring and furnishings. A quick glance into the dining room confirmed what his senses already knew. Calling out to Liz, he didn’t think it was necessary to leave her alone out in the lot.
When she came in, Liz’s confusion echoed his. The room was littered with crumpled bodies. Gasping for breath beside him, Liz just shook her head, baffled with what she saw. “They’re dead. But how?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who?” she said, looking around. “There’s so much blood. I can’t tell where one body starts and another one ends.”
“I know.” Working his way through the room, he stepped carefully as he went. Some of the draugar were slumped over in tangled heaps, while others had been left flung oddly against the wall. A few he couldn’t identify at all – only muscle and sinew clinging to bones remained.
“I don’t understand,” Liz said from the doorway. “I saw them when they started eating Maze, and Garrick too, did they just start eating and not stop? Wait…” her eyes flashed with panic. What about Riley?”
Braden looked at the lifeless creatures. Other than the four bodies completely unidentifiable, the rest were either staked or had their hearts torn out the way Maze did.
Someone cleaned house. But why?
“Did they kill him?” Liz’s voice cracked.
“I don’t see him, but it’s pretty gruesome.” Braden glanced up and met Liz’s pained expression. “One of these half eaten bodies could be his.”
The moment he said it, he knew how stupid he sounded.
Another jerky guy saying stupid crap at the wrong moment – good job.
Tears rolled down Liz’s cheeks. Suddenly she stared up at him, her mouth gaped open.
“I didn’t mean to say it like that.”
“No, you don’t have to apologize. I just thought of something.” Turning her back, she ran straight for the stairs.
With his speed it wasn’t difficult to reach her, he just wished she’d let him know what she was thinking. Although the vampires all seemed dead, he didn’t trust the nest to be empty.
Once on the third floor, Liz headed straight for the room she had spent time in.
“It’s here. He left it,” she said excitedly, holding up a small red vile.
“It’s blood.” Braden finally understood. “His blood.”
“Riley said if I became a vampire, I could save anyone I wanted. Don’t you get it? Vampire blood is a cure. When he asked me if I wanted to run away with him, I told him I didn’t want to, that I needed to be with you.” Liz suddenly slowed down, and looked at him nervously. “It was my choice to stay. So he left this for me. He must have known I would come back for it. All we have to do is give it to her.”
Stepping closer, Braden ran his hand down the side of her face. “Thank you.”
“For what?” she said, holding still.
“For staying, for coming with me, for everything.” He answered. The gold flecks in her eyes caught him then, pulling him in until he could do nothing but kiss her.
Pulling her into his arms, Braden trailed a line of kisses over her eyelids, cheeks and the bridge of her nose until his lips met hers. Breathing her in, tasting her lips – he wanted nothing more than to freeze the moment in time. After a while, a slight sigh escaped her. Pressing her face into his chest, he enjoyed just holding her to him, knowing she was safe.
“I’m guessing we better get going,” she said softly.
“Back to reality,” he agreed. “I just wish I had found Riley. I didn’t think it would end like this. ”
“I know,” she replied, withdrawing from his arms. “Me too.”
As Liz turned her back on him to head down the hall, Braden followed close behind. Descending quietly into the stairwell, he couldn’t help but wonder what ending Liz had wanted with his brother.
28
DEATH
It was so easy to slay them while they feasted on each other. They paid no heed to screams while swimming in the deliria of cannibalistic drunkenness. The young one got away, a few others possibly too, but it didn’t matter. None witnessed his final glory as he annihilated the nest with his hands.
They never knew what he was. Like nests before this one, they came and went, refusing to bow to the strongest of leaders. Vampires were all the same. In the end they always tried killing him…and failed.
The damphyr believed he was dead. From within the darkened walls, he listened as Braden and Liz discovered the remains of his celebration. Even the charcoaled body at the door confounded them – one of the last who preferred facing the sun than the pain of his talons.
Believing he was gone, as dead as the heap slaughtered on the floor, they had no clue he watched in his altered form. A shape only he shifted into that could withstand the sun.
Death shivered with pleasure. Finally, it was time. The damphyr would lead him to the others – to the ones he had been waiting to find.
The half-breeds were so delectable, so delicious in their silken purity. His desire for them was like nothing else he ever experienced.
Two hundred and seven years ago, he systematically went from village to village, slaughtering them all. Death hadn’t always given in to the darkness. Even he once hunted wild boar and jackal with his brethren in the hills of Greece.
The first time he tore into the two beating hearts, he was forever hooked. The fact that they belonged to his brother didn’t matter, knowing it damned him to darkness didn’t either. One simple accident while hunting left Aigle bleeding – before it could heal, his hunger gave way to lust.
Temptation was so easily corruptible.
29
LIZ
After waiting ours in the packed terminal for their new flight, Liz was grateful to finally board the 747 bound for the states. Once seated on the plane and heading back to Maine, Liz had hoped to talk to Braden. But after they were in the air, the heavy need for a nap crashed into her like the weight of a bus. Curled up in the next to Braden, she vaguely remembered him murmuring something as a blanket was tucked around her. His presence, his intoxicating scent, having him close to her and leaving the vampires behind – it was too much. Drifting into a heavy sleep, she barely even
dreamed.
By the time they were in Maine, Braden awoke her and got her moving through baggage claim and out into the cool air. The brisk autumn air smelled like changing leaves and pinecones, aromas that were so familiar to New England.
It seemed strange climbing into Braden’s truck and back into the world that knew nothing of nesting vampires. Stranger still was that Braden, may or may not, have a living draugr brother who did everything possible to get them out of Sunnydale Rest Home alive. Although Erris had its resident damphyrs and psychotic werewolves, at least the filth she experienced in British Columbia was on the other side of North America.
As they followed the winding roads back to Erris, Braden seemed lost in thought. Although she attempted breaking him from his reverie a few times, he slid back into his quietness, pondering things she could only guess at. She wanted to know what he was thinking. Now that he could begin picturing a life for himself, would he make changes? Would he try telling the elders the truth about Lachlan’s death and Riley’s final plea?
What about me? Do I have a role here?
Just when she felt brave enough to approach the subject, the small sign on the outskirts of town read, “Welcome to Erris.” Like a preplanned pause, she bit her tongue and decided to wait and see what would happen once they were back with the others.
Maybe Lexie can help me figure out what to do.
Pulling into the driveway, Braden put the truck into park and sat still for a moment. Giving her a sideways glance, a tired smile spread across his face.
“I guess the first thing you want to do is go check on Ruby,” he said.
Liz looked at her hands clasped tightly in her lap. “That’s probably a good idea.”
“I would imagine Lexie and Ella are beside themselves with worry.”
“Yeah, I’m sure your family is worried too.”
“Well, okay then,” he said, without moving.
Liz reached for the door handle. As beat as she was, she didn’t want to leave it this way between them. What was Braden not saying? Biting the inside of her cheek, she tried seizing a semblance of courage to say how she felt. “I’m glad I went with you.”
Blood Twist (The Erris Coven Series) Page 12
