by Kiki Howell
Below him, the burial chamber for their dead rested and for just a moment he felt a disturbance, putting from his mind as a large chunk of stone fell from above, almost colliding with his head.
When he got to the lower levels, he met the smooth metal door with little resistance, pulling it from its hinges.
Flames licked at the walls and vampires darted around him, wide eyed as they attempted to thwart the blaze. The salty stench of smoke filled the air, as did the cries of women and younger vampires huddled to the side of the chamber, fear dancing in their eyes as the blaze grew.
No. He’d built this place stone by stone and he would not let it fall. Nonplussed, he stalked to one of the emergency precautions he had built into the walls during his reign, releasing a mass of earth to smother the flames. Was it day or night? He simply could not tell any longer, his body unused to movement and at its limit from centuries underground.
A roar to the right of him caught his attention and he caught sight of his friend, Abel fighting off what appeared to be a wolf with glowing green eyes.
Fuck.
He did not stop to think but pushed forward, shoving both vampire and wolf aside, punching the wolf in the side of the skull and sending it sprawling several feet away.
“My lord.” Abel blanched, staggering forward to grasp his shoulder. “You’ve risen.”
“What is happening?”
The other man shook his head and raised his sword to fend off yet another attacker, the assailant’s body sliding to the floor in a pool of blood and viscera. “I don’t know. There was an explosion and we were set upon by wolves. It is as if...”
He could see where Abel’s thoughts were leading. It was indeed as it had been before, the demon’s energy leeching through the walls like poison. “It is. I can sense the foul taste of the magic in the air.”
“The spelled case. It was found empty just last night. The guard found dead.”
Rand nodded. It made sense with what he had seen in his visions. The witch. Her shop and the young woman who’d brought in the piece only to be ensnared by its power.
There was something else. Something he was missing.
“Where is Virgil?”
Abel’s lips twisted into a sneer. “Hopefully dead in the explosion.”
Startled at his second’s response, he angled his head toward the bed chambers. “Have they checked his quarters?”
More soldiers poured through the Great Hall, pushing the dirt over the open flames and spraying a white mist from red canisters.
Curious. He would have to inquire as their nature.
“I sent two guards when the fighting began. Nothing. He may have already made it out. Likely, in fact.” The other man’s lip curled in distain.
He needed to see for himself. Any Regent would be here, fighting for his coven and the fact that Virgil was sight unseen gave him grave concern.
“Take me there.” Rand stumbled, the lack of blood making him weak. He growled, his fangs cutting into the paper thin flesh of his lip but he barely registered the pain. His people were in danger and it seemed their Regent had all but abandoned them. Disappointment at the young man he’d known in the past rankled. His thoughts muddy, he wove on his feet, sagging against his second.
The other man caught him without missing a beat.
Abel shook his head. “My lord. You need blood.”
“I can manage.”
“No.” Abel shook his head, his lips pressing into a thin line. The grit and grime of battle gave him a harder edge than he’d remembered, even in the years before. “You’ve been asleep for centuries. There’s a reason we have procedures. Protocols. You rose without benefit of blood at your bedside.”
Head spinning, all he could do was a halfhearted growl, his second propelling him forward. Abel was right. There were processes set in place for a reason. They were to prevent needless deaths and injuries to the humans in their care. He would take care of his people. But to do so, he needed to feed.
Abel led him down a corridor into the heart of the fortress. The room he’d designed to be a safe place should something happen to threaten life and limb to his people still stood, it’s massive door open, women still dressed for their evening out rushing around, the wounded being attended to.
“I’m pleased it is still here.”
“Sit.”
Rand wove on his feet, the burst of adrenaline fading. A woman in a nurses white apron approached and frowned at his wizened appearance, pressing a goblet of what he assumed to be blood into his hand.
“Drink. I won’t have anyone looking like a walking corpse.” She turned away, but not before giving him a curious look.
The moment the blood hit his lips, Rand felt the life giving elements sing through his veins. He chugged the thick liquid, letting it wash down his throat. The goblet drained, he lifted his eyes to search for the woman but she stood in front of him, refilling his cup with shaking hands.
“My lord. You have returned.” She met his gaze with an assessing one of her own.
“Sonia.” He hadn’t recognized her. Not until the blood had cleared some of the cobwebs from his mind.
He guzzled the second cup and yet a third, finally settling into his skin once more. Now he understood why there was a procedure for the Awakening. If so much as one human had been in the vicinity, he would have drained them dry with nary a thought.
“Have you enough, lord?”
“I have. Thank you.” He got to his feet, Abel at his heels as he stalked back out into the fray. The din had quieted, the wolves pushed back into what he hoped was night. The sense of danger to his mate was nearly overwhelming and he dared not tarry a moment longer. He had to find her and the blade that called to him from beyond the centuries.
Then he would deal with Virgil, the traitorous whelp.
“My lord...” Abel gestured toward the hallway. “I can show you where his quarters are.”
“When I return.”
“Where are you going?” Another loud explosion rocked the building and the sounds of battle commenced.
Fuck. He had no choice but to leave and return with the woman that held the answers to the mysteries of his past.
“Find Virgil. Secure the perimeter in preparation for dawn. There is something I must do.” Taking a breath, he pushed past the gawking onlookers and found himself in a world that took his breath away.
Chapter Six
ARISTIDE PACED THE streets searching for Gabby but there was no sign of her. No scent trail to follow. Not the school, nor her usual hang outs near the mall. Zilch. So he vied back to his original plan and ended up in front of Diana's antiques shop.
Dusk had fallen, humid and hazy, a storm brewing in the distance, thunder rolling, and bursts of lighting streaking across the sky.
He pushed open the door to find a tearful Celine and Diana. At the jingle of the door chimes, they both regarded him with startled expressions.
“I got your text. Have you heard anything?”
“Not a thing,” Diana responded.
“I thought maybe the two of you had some idea.” He let the door fall shut behind him as the first rains began to fall. The normally the shop with its antique cases and scent of old leather soothed him. As did being in Diana’s proximity, but even that held no comfort for him this night.
“No,” Celine started. “That's why I came to your house. We were supposed to talk about stuff at school and she never called me.”
“And I needed to talk to her about the missing piece from the other day. If you know anything Celine, now would be the time.” Diana frowned.
Aristide glanced between the two females. There was something going on that he didn’t know and that bothered him. “Her purse. Her phone. They're up in her room.”
“That's not like her.” Diana couldn't speak and she turned away.
The feeling of hopelessness tore at him and he forced it down. That would not help Gabby. He had to be strong and if anyone was it was the woman acro
ss from him.
“Tell me what you know.”
“All I can tell you is there something missing from my case.” Diana pointed to the glass enclosure next to them. “One of the girls took it in so I was at a meeting and it was supposed to be here, untouched, until I came home but when I checked it was gone.”
Aristide narrowed his eyes on Celine.
The girl held her hands up. “I didn't touch it. I swear. Only that picture and Gabby is holding it, not me.”
“I know.” Diana reassured her.
“Let me see the picture.”
She held up the phone and soon as he saw the green stone staring back at him he felt like someone had punched him square in the gut.
That fucking thing?
It had been burned into his memory as a pup.
“Watch for this trinket, boy.” His grandfather had warned. “It’s dangerous. If ever you see it run. Don’t touch it. Don’t look at it and for fucks sake never, ever deal with the one who wields it.”
A young Aristide wanted to ask him why, but after the pictures in the book his grandfather Mathias showed him, there was nothing left to say. The amulet was evil and now it had taken his Gabby.
“Where did you get that?” Aristide bit out, his voice harsher than he’d intended.
“Someone found it and turned it in. They were waiting on a quote.” The girl’s eyes were wide and she backed up against a bookshelf, a whoosh of something invisible brushing past him with an aggravated hiss.
Was that a cat?
“Who? Who brought it?” Aristide demanded, made his way deeper into the room.
“I don't know,” Celine wailed, flustered.
“What's wrong?” Diana narrowed her eyes at him.
“That necklace has been the cause of war between vampires and wolves for as long as I can remember. My grandfather spoke of it.”
Diana paled. “Then what's it doing in my shop?”
“I thought you deal with cursed things.”
“Yeah. Except I hadn't had the opportunity to check this one in.”
Nothing added up. The necklace. Gabby missing. The skirmishes in the outlying parts of the town. And the fact that being here with this woman felt like the most right thing that had happened today.
Mate.
His wolf whispered loud, scraping the underside of his skin with a persistent nattering of teeth and claw. She would make their family complete. If only she didn’t have the faintest scent of vampire around her.
But even that didn’t dispel his beast’s interest. The wolf had wanted her from the first day he’d stepped foot in the shop, but he’d kept away for Gabby’s sake.
“Something's wrong.”
“Tell me what you remember about and holding the necklace.” Diana walked over and pulled a bowl from the bookshelf behind her, setting it on a small wooden table.
Encouraged, Celine continued, moving away from the bookcase and back toward the center of the room, still keeping her distance from him, he noted.
“Well she couldn't stop staring at it.”
“What else?” A candle joined the bowl on the small table, as well as a bottle of water, which she poured into the bowl. A pinch of salt and she set the grinder down, the dark water rippling as the granules sank beneath the surface.
“It was really pretty but it kind of gave me the creeps.”
“In what way?”
“Well. It was weird. She couldn't stop staring at it. I didn't want to.”
Diana paused, waving her hand over the top of the candle and lighting it without stopping. “What did she say?
“She said it was like looking at the thing you want most.”
Diana reached for a smudge stick of sage and a box of matches. “Okay. Thank you Celine.” She arched an eyebrow at him and continued fussing with the items on the table. “I need an item of Gabby’s.”
Shit. Why hadn’t he thought to bring one?
He reached for his phone as a barrage of dings went off, indicating he had a slew of texts waiting for him. “Send me a copy of that picture.”
“Why?”
“So I can forward it out to the pack. There are things happening all over town. And they need to know what’s out there. And to stay away.”
“Okay. Here.” Diana pressed a couple of buttons and his phone pinged again.
“Thank you.” He busied himself forwarding the text to the pack with a message to avoid and to alert him if they came across either the amulet and to make them aware Gabby was missing.
The pack would come through. If there was anything out there, they would do their best to stop it. But they would need his help. And he felt foolish standing by some sort of candle ritual. He just hadn’t tracked the right places yet was all.
The teen rummaged through her pack, giving up with a slump. But then she touched her ears and grinned.
“I have something.” She reached for the earrings in her ears, pulling them out, replacing the backs onto the studs and placing them in Diana’s palm. “She let me borrow them a couple days ago.” Her cheeks flushed and she looked away.
“Okay,” Diana said. “That should do it.”
“Now what?”
Diana met his gaze. “Now I scry and try to find your daughter.”
“SIT.” SHE POINTED AT the chairs around the small table and tried to ignore the flickering glances of unease between her teenage apprentice and the Alpha wolf.
Diana’s libido ran hot being in his presence and she tried to shake off the inconvenient attraction, but no matter how much her head protested, there was something inside of her that didn’t want to listen.
She held out her hand to Celine and the girl took it. The other she offered to Aristide. His warm fingers slid around hers and she shivered, imagining those hands and what they could do to her body. Heat crept up the back of her neck and as if he could read her gaze, he gave her a sad but stunning smile.
Goddess, but she just really wanted to kiss him. To run her fingers along the tribal tattoo that was uniquely his along the muscles of his upper arm. Every member of his pack had one, including Gabby, although hers was much, much smaller.
That was why they were here. Gabby. Not for her to undress Aristide with her eyes.
“Okay. I want you all to focus on Gabby.”
Diana held the earrings in her hand and thought about the enigmatic young girl as she stared into the swirling darkness of the scrying bowl.
The pictures came to her slowly. Fascination with the amulet in her hand. A flash of something powerful but wrong sizzled just beneath her awareness and then a numbness threatened to topple her out of her chair.
Walking. There was a sense of movement for a long distance and the earthy scent of the woods. As more images coalesced, Diana paused, her mouth falling open in surprise.
She knew this place. The woods and the isolated house in the middle of nowhere. It belonged to her childhood best friend Joanna. But then the images flickered and a familiar vampire’s face came into view. She scrambled back in her chair as the visage of another man filled her mind’s eye. Only this man wasn’t part of the scrying session. She let go of Celine’s hand and reached for the blade at her belt and felt her nipples tighten in response. Her other hand gripped Aristide’s until he grunted, the heat between them combusting into something she wasn’t ready to name as the last of the vision waivered and stilled, the scrying session falling flat.
At this point it didn’t matter. Gabby was out there and they had to hurry. As she resurfaced, she found her hand still in Aristide’s, the glow of the moon shining behind his eyes.
His nostrils flared and at that moment, she knew he scented her arousal. Heat surged inside of her, the blood racing beneath her skin.
“When this is over, you and I have some talking to do.” Aristide pressed his lips to her hand, the sharp points of his fangs scraping across her tender flesh.
Diana gasped, pulling her hand away. “You marked me.” Her body warmed, but the dream lover
inside of her howled his anger and it left her shaken. The backs of the earrings brought her back to the present. They had a job to do, but that didn’t stop her from the feeling the surge of desire that was nearly her undoing.
“I did.”
“Why?” She blinked, trying to shake the unsettling sensation of the other man in her mind.
I’m coming.
She heard the whisper in her head as clear as day, and her hand gripped the blade at her side. Need to feel the unknown man’s presence and the heat sizzling through her from Aristide’s declaration of intent left her breathless. She lifted her eyes to Aristide’s and sucked in a breath at the glow in the pack Alpha’s eyes.
He wanted her.
“Aristide.” She raised her palm and placed it on his chest. The heat in his blood sizzled through the shirt and she itched to feel what his skin felt like beneath it.
That was it. She was going to spontaneously combust and her panties were going to melt. Right here. Right now.
“Oh boy.” Celine scooted out of her chair and grabbed her book bag. “You’ve got company.”
Anger bristled along her spine as the ramifications of what just happened sunk in. Two men were vying for her attention. One in her head and the other very much right in front of her. Diana’s gaze snapped to the street and a groan burst from her lips.
Virgil.
That was all she needed.
And then the blade at her hip started to hum.
Chapter Seven
THIS NEW WORLD was a perplexing place, Rand decided. Holding fast to his connection with the witch, he stalked down the smooth stone pathways, each step bringing him closer to the one who’d nudged him from his slumber. She was near. He could sense it.
A horseless carriage whirred by him and Rand watched with wonder as it barreled down the smooth road, the red lights of its back end fading in the distance. Humans in strange modern garb strolled down paths in front of buildings taller than he had ever seen. Had he more time, he would have stood still and marveled at all the people of his city had accomplished while he had been at rest. Wolves walked among them, their eyes traveling over him with a hint of fear.
