by Aja James
The bird came round again and stopped beside him to peck insistently but gently at his hand, as if it knew how fragile he was, how easily broken.
But that was only his physical shell. His will had never been stronger. As long as there was hope of his daughter, of her, the demon bitch would have to kill him outright if she wanted him to stop breathing, stop fighting.
She had hurt him badly the last time. He moved one skeletally thin hand over his groin, careful not to touch the area, merely to provide cover, ineffectual though it was. He didn’t know what she did to him, but a deep, burning pain remained in the root of him. He knew that she had not unmanned him as he had feared that day, but she had raped him of his seed, perhaps permanently damaged him there. It was one more way she’d stolen from him. One more way she tried to break his spirit.
He hated himself for letting one lone tear leak from his eye that day. It was a tear of frustration, or fury, but in letting it escape him, she was able to feed off of his tortured emotions. He could smell the stench of her arousal at his pain and helplessness polluting the air around them. It was the first time he hadn’t been able to control his reaction in hundreds of years.
He despised his own weakness for giving her that much.
In the hours and days that followed, the kite had comforted him, nuzzling its soft cheek against his, chirping quietly in his ear, bringing him morsels of food from his tray. It helped to keep the darkness at bay, helped to keep his soul intact, for there were times in the millennia that he’d lived in this hellish misery that he’d been tempted to give in. And this had been one of those times.
The bird was now softly pecking at his hair, pulling at the strands with enough force to make him focus his attention on it.
“What is it, little one?” he rasped, his throat parched from more than a day without water. He’d left as much of his food and fluids as he could for his cellmate.
Abruptly, he felt it—the gust of wind that pushed into his prison from the slit high in the wall above. It was strong enough that he could hear it throwing its weight against the outer walls, echoing through the tower which magnified its force like a giant wind tunnel.
The kite squeaked plaintively as if trying to tell him something urgent and important. It kept pulling his hair, until several strands were yanked out by the root.
The prisoner stilled to consider what it could mean. The wind was picking up speed and ramming against the walls of the tower. The kite started to flap its wings and cry louder.
Perhaps… yes, it might just work.
The force of the gale might be strong enough to blow through the opening above and provide the lift the kite needed to fly out of here.
But they were too low on the ground. The opening was too high. The kite would need a boost if it were to capture the wind at just the right moment beneath its wings.
The prisoner understood what it wanted.
He shifted his legs and painstakingly got to his knees. Every cell within him protested at the movement, every muscle clenched in agony. Taking a few deep breaths that burned his lungs with icy cold air, he tried to push himself to his feet, using the wall as leverage.
Finally, after a couple of faltering attempts, he stood on his feet, one hand braced on the wall, the other extended outwards for balance.
“Come,” he said to the kite, squeezing the outstretched hand into a fist and locking his forearm.
The bird leapt up with a flap of its wings and landed on his arm, its talons digging into his flesh, almost to the bone.
“I have strength enough for one try, so make the most of it, little one,” he told the kite, and it chirped as if it understood.
Together man and bird waited for the next blast of wind. They could hear it coming before it hurled against the tower walls, and at the precise moment when it would blast into the opening, the prisoner sprang up and extended his whole body in a powerful surge as the kite simultaneously pushed off of his arm and into flight.
The prisoner could hear a flapping of wings and cries over the pounding of his own heart, working furiously to compensate for his exertion. And then there was a triumphant screech as the kite shot through the opening and into the freedom of the open skies at last.
The prisoner heard its continued screeches from outside the tower walls, growing more and more distant until he could hear it no longer.
Exhausted and bleeding, the prisoner crumpled to the ground against the wall, his limbs once again lifeless, his arm throbbing with pain.
He closed his eyes to rest.
Be safe, little one, he thought in his head. Thank you for giving me strength when I needed it the most.
*** *** *** ***
Turned out the red-alert was a false alarm.
Or at least, the intruders that had tripped the safe house’s perimeter security measures were actually friends of Ryu, not one or many of those shadowy assassins Ava had seen him fight off the night of the explosion.
“Did I enter the wrong code?” the female called Inanna asked after Ryu brought her and her companion into the secure chamber and introduced them to Ava.
“No, I changed it a couple nights ago because we needed the extra security,” Ryu explained. He quickly tapped on some keys and surveyed the monitors, presumably re-enabling the security measures.
“Have we come at a bad time?” the male called Gabriel inquired, looking from Ryu to Ava and back to Ryu.
Ava had pulled on her clothes before the three of them came inside, but she was extremely aware of the state of undress they were still in.
She couldn’t find her bra and underwear to save her life, and Ryu wore only his pair of loose black pants. She hadn’t taken a look at herself in the mirror, but she could just imagine what their visitors saw. There was evidence throughout the room of how they spent the last Lord knew how many hours. Ryu was still half hard after their most recent love making and he didn’t bother hiding his body.
Not that, she supposed, he could. It would be like trying to hide the nose on your face.
“She’s under my protection,” Ryu said as if that answered Gabriel’s question and explained everything.
Strangely, the other male seemed to understand what he meant, and inclined his head to acknowledge it. Ava wished she knew what he meant.
“So, are you…” Ava looked from Inanna to Gabriel and gestured between them. “Are you both like Ryu?”
“In what way, Ms. Monroe?” Gabriel asked, a dry smile spreading on his handsome face.
“It’s Ava,” she said, then answered, “you know… are you…special?”
Inanna and Ryu shared a silent, meaningful look. She looked back at Ava and replied, “Yes, we’re like Ryu. For the most part.”
“And I was once human, like you,” Gabriel offered helpfully. “Until just a few months ago.”
Ava turned wide eyes on him.
That’s right. Ryu said he was human once too. Did that mean… Ava could also become a vampire like Ryu?
What would it take? What would it cost? She knew that at the very least it probably cost her ability to reproduce, if what Ryu said was true.
“And you?” Ava asked Inanna.
“Over four thousand years old, but who’s counting.”
Ava did well to hide all reactions except the blink of her eyes.
“You’re remarkably well preserved,” she managed in a thin voice.
Inanna grinned.
“Let’s talk business,” Ryu interrupted the get-to-know-yous before they could go much further. In particular, he did not want to reminisce about his own age and history.
“The fight clubs are still active, and expanding globally but at a controlled pace,” Gabriel informed them. “Did you locate Sergei Antonov?”
Ryu shook his head once. “I believe he’s already left for another destination. In fact, my guess is that he departed just before I arrived. But he’s managed to trigger a string of fight clubs here in Tokyo. I suspect there are more cropping up in Kyoto
, Nagoya and other major cities all over Japan.”
“Any idea where he might head to next?” this from Inanna.
“Other major cities in Asia,” Ryu surmised. “He’s been impossible to pin down. Whoever he’s working with knows how to cover his tracks. Even Devlin couldn’t triangulate his location long enough for one of us to get to him. My bet is he’s in Seoul, and next stop is the Mainland.”
“We can’t keep chasing him ourselves,” Inanna said, frowning. “Our resources are spread too thin as it is.”
“I have a network I’ve tapped into to keep an eye on him if not take action,” Ryu said.
“The shinobi?”
Ryu blinked once in confirmation.
“What’s that?” Ava interjected.
“Modern popular culture has dubbed them ninjas,” Inanna explained, while Ryu remained silent and avoided Ava’s eyes. “They are known for being the fiercest and deadliest of warriors in feudal Japan.”
“Mercenaries, spies and assassins, you mean,” Ryu corrected her with a sardonic tip of his lips, making Ava frown.
He was degrading himself again.
Inanna calmly regarded him and said, “You know as well as I do that that is not all they are. Ninjas were instrumental to ultimately ending the civil war in Japan. Just as you are instrumental to the security of our Kind, Ryu.”
Ryu ignored her comment and took a seat in front of the monitors, clicking rapidly on the floating keyboard to bring up a video call with the Cove.
“Devlin,” he greeted when his comrade’s face appeared on screen. “We’re all here. What have you got?”
“Well, hello, strangers,” a gorgeous blond man flashed brilliantly white teeth at the four of them through two monitors, the third showing live footage of various areas around the safe house’s perimeter.
“And how do you do, Dr. Monroe,” he added with a knee-melting smile directed at Ava, as if he were looking straight at her.
Ava smiled shyly and wiggled a few fingers back.
And then Ryu’s back moved into her line of sight and blocked the blond man from view.
“Anything new on GTI?” Ryu prompted.
Devlin leaned back in his seat, angling away from the camera on his side so that they could see him dressed for hunting in form-fitting black leather.
Were all vampires built the way the four of them were built? Ava wondered. Every one of them looked like they could have been movie stars, except even more outrageously attractive, because they had an aura of real danger about them that all but throbbed with animal magnetism and power.
If there was a prerequisite for looking a certain way in order to become one of them, Ava feared she wasn’t going to meet the bar.
Not that she was seriously pondering becoming a vampire. Not that she even knew if she could. But if that’s what it took to be with Ryu, she’d have to really think about it in case the opportunity presented itself.
But of course, she could always love him as long as she lived, but how long would it be practical for them to be together? Already, she was thirty-years-old going on thirty-one. She looked and felt a lot younger, given her small stature and good genes, but she was well aware that he would stay forever young.
She didn’t even know how old he was.
“Ah yes, my ongoing waltz with Medusa,” Devlin mused, as if contemplating a particularly elusive femme-fatale.
“And she is?” Gabriel prompted.
“The head of Genomics Technology Incorporated,” the Hunter answered. “For all intents and purposes anyway. She’s like a ghost, or a figment of my imagination.”
“I’ve seen her,” Ava broke in, and everyone turned to stare at her.
“At least, I think I saw who you’re talking about,” she said, now somewhat uncertain given the looks she was getting.
“The other day when the new sample arrived from GTI, the one I call Genesis, it was a woman who brought it. I remember because she delivered it directly into Sōsuke’s hands, and she said something to him. No one outside of the project team ever comes to the labs except occasionally a cleaning person. I looked at her security badge and it said A. Medusa. No one else was paying attention. But before she left, she looked directly at me.”
Ryu had moved closer to her while she spoke, close enough that she felt protected by his body heat, enveloped in his intoxicating scent. It calmed her, even though she hadn’t realized she was getting increasingly agitated.
“She was very beautiful,” Ava said as if in a trance. “Straight, dark brown hair, almost black, that shone like obsidian. With the most amazing eyes I’ve ever seen, glowing golden, with facets like a gem. They were very hard to look away from.”
“You got that, Dev?” Inanna said, holding Ava’s gaze, concerned.
“Already injected the description into my programs,” the Hunter responded, his fingers moving so fast on his end of the video, they were a blur.
Ava shook her head to clear it. What had just happened?
“She must be extremely powerful and old if her hypnosis in that moment can still affect you now,” Inanna said. “She must be a Pure or Dark One. And if the latter, then a True Blood or Pure turned Dark.”
“What?” Ava rasped, her mind still hazy. “Hypnosis?”
“She doesn’t know about Gifts,” Ryu broke in, cutting off whatever explanation Inanna was about to provide. He turned back to the screens.
“What else do you have, Devlin?”
“This might just be a coincidence, but I don’t happen to believe in coincidences,” the Hunter began, and Ryu knew that he was winding them up for a big reveal.
“While I couldn’t trace Medusa the person, I did manage to trace her movements and interactions through GTI. It’s quite convoluted if you looked at all the transactional intersections, but two things become clear.”
Devlin paused here for effect.
The three vampires with her seemed used to his dramatizations, but Ava was hanging by a thread in suspense.
“What? What became clear?” she couldn’t resist asking.
Devlin smiled, like a teacher pleased with a student who provided the right answer during a pop quiz.
“One, she’s connected to the fight clubs somehow. Haven’t figured out exactly how, but I’ve seen too many zeros attached to large numbers transfer between her hidden accounts and those of the mafias not to flag it. At a minimum she’s one of the financial backers of the networks, probably funding their expansion overseas.”
“And two?” Ava prompted when the others remained silent.
“Two…” Devlin looked toward Inanna. “I think she’s the one holding your father prisoner, Light-Bringer. Or at least knows his location if he is still alive. The archeological expedition of 1853 that uncovered the treasures from feudal Japan was funded by one of the organizations linked to her.”
Ryu frowned. “Then that means she wanted us or someone else to discover the vase with Inanna’s father’s writing and to follow the trail to its destination.”
“Or someone in her network accidentally or purposely screwed up,” Devlin added.
“1853?” Ava’s mind boggled. “She waited hundreds of years for someone to follow a trail?”
“Time becomes irrelevant when you live for millennia,” Inanna told her gently.
To Ryu, she asked, “Any luck finding the vase’s origin? Where do we go from here?”
For several seconds, Ryu did not respond. Finally, his lips tipped in a grim half-smile.
“I can take you there,” he said, “to the place where I was made.”
*** *** *** ***
“What’s so special about that cherry tree?”
Sōsuke realized it was probably not the most prudent thing to goad a vampire assassin who could slit his throat with one fingernail, but he’d been waiting for more than half a day up at the shrine, and he was bored.
And hungry. And thirsty. But he wasn’t about to ask for victuals and in the process remind the vampire that to him,
Sōsuke was the victuals.
His host spared him a lingering glance, the sort one gave a cockroach that was skittering across the floor when contemplating the lesser of two evils—squashing said roach and making a mess, or letting the nasty creature wander back into its hiding place.
The ninja decided to let Sōsuke live a while longer, it seemed, when he turned back to regarding the gnarled tree, as he had been doing in silence for the past hour or so.
Just when Sōsuke thought his question would remain unanswered, the ninja spoke in his melodious, dark voice.
“The typical sakura tree can live for a few decades, perhaps a hundred years with proper care. Yet this tree has lived as long as I have been here. It was only a young sapling when I arrived on Japanese soil.”
“Maybe it’s a vampire cherry tree,” Sōsuke said sardonically.
The ninja looked at him consideringly, his black eyes glinting.
“Not an impossibility,” he murmured, and Sōsuke involuntarily shivered at the words.
“It has seen many battles, mock though they were. The blood that my shinobi shed on the ground and splattered on its trunk seem to have been directly absorbed into the tree.”
The ninja—Sōsuke still didn’t know his name—smiled a ghostly smile.
“Perhaps that is why its blossoms turn crimson in the moonlight, red like droplets of blood.”
“Fascinating,” Sōsuke said. “I thought you said you can find Ryu Takamura for me?”
It was perhaps bad form to remind the vampire of the purpose of his visit, but it wasn’t like Sōsuke had all the time in the world to dawdle, unlike his youthful-looking host.
“Humans and their impatience,” the ninja murmured, as if deploring of a particularly wayward child.
“Well, we only have so long to live,” Sōsuke said, his tone betraying his irritation.
“Your life is particularly brief, is it not, Doctor?”
