The Last Keeper's Daughter

by Rebecca Trogner

  “Are you okay?” He was more uptight than usual. She wanted to run her hand over his chest, feel the peaks and valleys of his muscles, sooth the old scars with her lips.

  “I need to feed.”

  There were a multitude of questions she wanted answered. It was his honesty and obvious need that made her pause. Would it matter if she asked tonight or another night?

  “Cherie explained how everyone smells different. How humans don’t notice scent consciously the way Others do. Do I smell different than other humans?”

  “Yes.” He moved away from the fire to sit on the chaise placed at the foot of the bed.

  “Cherie, she said I probably wasn’t human.”

  Krieger leaned forward, resting his forearms on top of his thighs.

  “You are human, partly.” His expression was kind. “I’ve never encountered any Other like you. Possibly you’re one of a kind.”

  “Or?” she asked. “There is always an or.”

  The tense line of his shoulders eased down. “Or you are something that hasn’t been seen for many centuries.”

  “Like dinosaurs.”

  They both laughed.

  “Does it bother you? That you aren’t completely human.”

  “No,” she answered truthfully. “I’ve always known I was different. I just thought I was crazy.”

  “That’s a common reaction.”

  “Are you attracted to me only because of the blood bond?”

  “No.”

  That was a relief.

  “The moment I saw you I vowed to possess you,” he added.

  That was disturbing.

  “You can’t possess me. You realize that, right? I am a person, not a toy.”

  “You are mine.” Again, his mood changed. “My blood snatched you from Hades.” He stood. “My blood pumps through your veins.” He took two steps towards her. “You’ve bewitched me, Lily. You are blood and bone like other women, and yet there is something about you which I cannot forget. When I am far from you, I yearn for the sight of you. When I am near you, I ache to hear your voice, to feel the warmth of your skin, and taste the sweetness of your breath.”

  “I’m my own person.” She couldn’t deny the pull she felt towards him.

  “Do you want me, Lily?”

  “I don’t know what I want.” It was the honest truth.

  “I could force you.” He held up his hand. “I could bend your body to my will with one finger.”

  She wasn’t afraid that he’d hurt her. “That’s not what you want.”

  His arm fell to his side. “True.” He looked sad.

  She hoped he didn’t expect a response, because she was too stunned by the conversation to think of anything to say.

  “You’re pure, and clean, and light. I’ve killed men, and women, and children. I was a soldier long before I became a vampire. Is it possible for you to love a creature such as me?” Krieger didn’t wait for a response. “I’ve overwhelmed you, haven’t I?” His smile was kind. “You have nothing to fear from me. Come.” He held his hand out to her.

  Like the night they met, she slipped her hand into his.

  “I will wait.” He kissed the palm of her hand. When she looked up into his eyes, they were savage, and wild, and kind, and beautiful, like nature itself. “When you’re ready, you shall come to me, and I will bring that sweet body of yours to the very peaks of ecstasy.” He lifted and placed her atop the bed. The sheets smelled of vanilla and lavender. He kissed up her neck, stopping to whisper in her ear, “Until such time, I need to feed.”

  “I’m not done with my questions.” She tried to sound calm, but her whole body shook with being so near to him.

  He laughed. “You have too many questions.”

  She kept her eyes closed as he slipped in next to her. The mattress dipped down with his weight. His hand slid between the shirt and her bare skin. Something in her brain shut off, and something in her pelvic region turned on. Her breasts felt alive and full and achy. “Right,” she said huskily, not recognizing her own voice. “We have to do this blood thing. What if I said no? What if I fought you?”

  “Then you would lose,” he purred into her ear.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Hunter slept like the dead. In the haze between asleep and awake, he pondered that phrase, not sure anymore what dead meant. Was anything dead? When he opened his eyes, it took him a minute to sort out exactly where he was.

  Last night, he and Merlin, along with the Vantors providing protection, had gained access to the mausoleum. He’d expected some sort of supernatural mojo to open the locked gate, but it was done with ordinary bolt cutters. The ornate ironwork screeched in protest when they entered. The steel doors behind them took a little longer to open. Hunter had brought his pick lock gear. Even a mere human could have a trick or two up their sleeve.

  He’d never seen anything so bizarre. In the center was a raised stone slab with an Egyptian type sarcophagus on top of it. Inside, he assumed, was the remains of Faust, the dog. What type of person had their dog mummified like a pharaoh? The room inside was relatively small compared to the outside structure, the stone walls three to four feet thick.

  It was Merlin who found it. One of the marble blocks that lined the walls was of a slightly different color. Once you knew, it was obvious that this piece was quarried at a different time than the rest.

  They hadn’t brought the proper tools to pry off the block. Hunter had wanted to try and bash it in, but Merlin insisted that everything must look undisturbed after they left. At the time, this annoyed him, but in hindsight Merlin had been wise to insist.

  Hunter had spent most his adult life reading people. He’d honed his natural talent from years of dealing with individuals, usually in their darkest hour after a loved one had been killed or raped, or worst of all when a child had been harmed. No one, not even Meirta, could know what a person was capable of. Everyone liked to think they could tell a good person from a bad person, but the truth was the good could change. The world was not static, or the people in it. Change was the one constant of life.

  This knowledge had kept his mind and senses agile. He could process everyone except for Merlin. Here was someone Hunter’s senses didn’t even recognize. He was a challenge. He liked Merlin, felt at ease in his presence, and sought him out on occasion. He’d asked him if he was the Merlin of history. Merlin had said he was a Merlin, not the Merlin, whatever that meant. He had stressed that he was not a practitioner of the Dark Arts. Hunter wasn’t sure what that was, but decided not to ask at the time.

  Once they’d pried off the slab with their shovels, an iron strong box was revealed, nestled inside a cavity in the wall. They’d both looked at it. It was too heavy for either or both of them to pull out.

  Merlin closed his eyes and leaned his head back. For a moment Hunter wondered if he was having the precursor to a seizure, but within seconds one of the Vantors appeared in the doorway. The muscle has been summoned, Hunter thought, using humor to help his unease.

  When the box was pulled out of its hiding place, Merlin became wary. Hunter could see the line of tension furrowing his forehead. It made Hunter jumpy.

  The Vantor easily placed the box on his shoulder, and waited. They replaced the marble block exactly as it was before. No one would be the wiser that it had been removed. They stepped outside the room, between the ornate gates and the steel doors. Foot and hand prints were clearly visible in the dust-filled room.

  If he hadn’t seen it, he wouldn’t have believed what happened next. Merlin reached out his hand, and tiny particles of dust swirled around the room. It looked like a small tornado. Merlin clenched his hand into a fist and then opened it in a tossing motion.

  When the dust settled it was like they’d never entered. The steel doors were locked, the rusty chain replaced around the iron doors, and an appropriately aged lock clicked into place.

  They’d driven back to Stoke at speeds far exceeding the posted limit. He caught glimpses of the Van
tors, in wolf form, running in the woods bordering the road. Headlights periodically caught their eyes and reflected back to him.

  Meirta had explained that the Vantors had been werewolves at one time, before the Russian queen had captured them and subjected them to things he didn’t want to think about. Meirta said that they’d been force fed vampire blood. The ones who survived became stronger, able to control their changes, not tied to the moon any longer. Meirta didn’t know how, but the king had bargained them away from the queen, and brought them here.

  Meirta stretched beside him and brought his thoughts back to the present. Expertly she slid under the covers and used her talented mouth for things other than talking. She rose up and straddled him, looking every inch the warrior that she was. She rode him mercilessly, bringing him to the edge, and then retreating, over and over, until he was covered in sweat and their bodies slapped together. He begged her with his eyes to let him release. He was almost unable to breathe, his muscles felt ready to snap. She smiled, but her eyes did not, they were glowing green orbs. He must release, must, must, must, his mind screamed.

  The woman would fuck him to death, he was convinced of it. It took him twenty minutes to come back from the out-of-body experience that was sex with Meirta. After a shower, breakfast, and a gallon of coffee, he felt somewhat revived.

  Merlin called. It was time to open the strong box. Hunter rolled the Elder’s ring around his knuckle.

  “Have you heard from the Elder?” he asked Meirta.

  “No,” she said, walking out of the closet.

  His big head warned his little head, If you get hard again, I’ll die and take you with me.

  She’d pulled her red hair back, leaving the sharp lines of her face exposed. Her green eyes had taken on a catlike appearance. A neon green t-shirt, one size too small, covered her torso. The word Juicy was written in bright pink letters across her chest. A pleated school-girl type skirt hugged her hips, falling to the tops of her thighs. A large Bowie knife was strapped to her leg. The hilt disappeared underneath her skirt. She’d topped it off with black combat boots laced up to mid-calf. He wasn’t sure if she looked more like Lara Croft or Britney Spears, before the bad marriages and breakdown.

  What was wrong with this picture? He looked down at his sensible shoes, khaki pants, his slight paunch covered up by an untucked shirt. Was it only that he was human? Like when usually sensible headed women went bat crazy over a man with an accent?

  “You amuse me,” she said. “You’re funny, and that–” she pointed to his manhood– “Hits me in just the right place.”

  “Stop that.” He hated that she could pull out his thoughts so easily.

  Meirta nodded and took his hand. They walked back to the sky room with the displays, and the floor to ceiling windows cantilevered out over the valley below. The moon was perfectly framed in the center of the windows.

  Meirta was not allowed in the room. He didn’t care to be around the king and Lily alone, and would rather have had Meirta by his side, but there was nothing to be done about that now. Lily and Merlin were in front of the displays. Lily looked even more introverted than before. Her hair hung down, hiding her face while she nodded her responses to Merlin, who was using very sophisticated facial recognition software to recreate the face of the man she had seen in her vision.

  Liam and two other Vantors were looking very dangerous. Maybe they hadn’t eaten their allotted rare flesh for the day. Their eyes were in almost continuous motion, but always fell back upon Lily.

  It took Hunter a while to find the king. He was pacing on the upper level which looked down over the room. Even from this distance Hunter was unnerved by the shark-like stare he was giving Lily.

  Truth be told, he found her unappealing, and wouldn’t have given her a second glance if he’d seen her on the street. She was pretty enough, as he looked her up and down, just not his type.

  Goose bumps rose up on his arms. The king was staring at him and not in a good way. Obviously, he’d been watching him while he looked at Lily. Hunter walked over to the fire and contemplated taking up a hobby. Maybe carving wooden bullets or learning to melt silver.

  “Here is the man that the Miss is seeing.” Merlin’s accent was heavy tonight. “Do any of you recognize him?”

  The king jumped over the railing and dropped down a few feet from him. Hunter didn’t want to let on that it scared the ever loving crap out of him. He was good at keeping his face impassive. Hunter had been around criminals most of his adult life. He’d seen it all, but nothing had prepared him for vampires. Meirta had tried to fill him in on vampire nature, but it was one of those things you had to experience for yourself.

  The display showed the face of a young man, probably in his late twenties, with honey colored hair, curly but kempt. His eyes were an interesting shade of light brown. He looked kind and slightly soft, like he’d never had a care or worry in his life. There was nothing to distinguish him from the masses of young men around the world.

  “He’s clearly of European descent,” Merlin said.

  “He looks familiar.” Hunter walked up to the display. “Was there anything unique about him?”

  “Not that I remember,” Lily said.

  “Did he say anything? Did he have an accent? Was there anything around him to give you an indication of where he was? Did he have on any jewelry, his clothing?” Hunter was grasping.

  “No, it wasn’t completely clear and I only saw his face.”

  “I’ll run his image through all known facial databases. Maybe we’ll get a hit,” Merlin told no one in particular.

  “Don’t waste your time.” All eyes were now firmly placed on Hunter. “There are over one billion Caucasian males in the world. Probably half of them look like this man or whatever he is.” He knew it would be a waste of time to try and find a facial match, just like the fingerprints taken at the crime scene had provided no information.

  Hunter avoided the king’s eyes, but had to ask him, “Can you tell if he is a vampire? Or some type of Other?”

  “No.”

  Okay, something to be said for short and sweet. “Do we know how this is being done?” Everyone just stared at him except for Lily. “How is he appearing to her?”

  The king went to stand behind her. He placed his oversized hands on her delicate shoulders. “My Lily,” the king said, looking hard into his eyes, “has never met this man. She thinks he is trying to communicate something to her.” The king and Merlin exchanged a glance. No it was more than a glance; it was one of their unspoken conversations.

  Merlin picked up the thread. “The first time was at her family home, the second here at Stoke.”

  “That’s not good. It means he can find her anywhere.” Hunter looked at the computer-generated face. “Does this happen in the Other world? Seeing ghosts or visions?”

  Merlin smirked slightly. “Not in this way.”

  “Could he be dead? Maybe it’s a warning.” Hunter thought they would laugh at him for saying that, but Merlin and the king were thinking it over.

  “He is an unknown,” the king said, clearly not happy about something he could not control.

  “Lily,” Hunter addressed her directly. “Has this man appeared to you when anyone else is around?”

  She shook her head.

  “Can you ward her against this?” The king asked Merlin.

  “Ward?” Hunter asked. There really should be a supernatural dictionary.

  “A ward is used to guard against, combat, or toss back evil or magic,” Merlin explained.

  “Then you can create a mark for her? This ward thing you’re talking about. Then you could track or look in on whoever is doing this?” The room became very quiet. “Or call the Elder to do what he can. Maybe he knows who this guy is.”

  The king shoved his hands into his pant pockets and rocked back on his heels. “If we knew how this was being done, then yes, Merlin could do as you suggest.” Again, another unspoken conversation happened between Merlin and
the king.

  “Call Mathers,” the king said to Merlin.

  “What is he?” Hunter asked. “Mathers, I mean. What type of Other is he?”

  Liam laughed. It made him look demented. “The type of Other you never want to meet alone in the woods.”

  That pretty much covered them all, Hunter thought.

  “Mathers is unavailable,” Merlin said.

  The king looked more lethal than usual. “Keep trying until you reach him.”

  “Should we open the box here?” Hunter asked, a little worried about what was inside. “Or someplace else?”

  On cue, Liam hefted the heavy iron box to the center of the room. Strong boxes were used to safeguard valuables before the modern safe. As a child, Hunter had been fascinated with pirates, which is how he knew about boxes like this one. Pirates were famous for transporting their stolen loot in them. The box was an old piece, probably dating back to the seventeen hundreds. There were no markings on it, just straps wrapped around iron. A thought occurred to him.

  “There’s no way Walter could have moved that. I can’t lift it.”

  He could metaphorically hear their brains humming over that quandary.

  Lily spoke up. “My horse was buried recently. There were a lot of workmen in the cemetery. It could have been placed without anyone noticing.”

  Hunter nodded, that made sense.

  “Are we secure?” the king asked Merlin.

  “My wards are strong. Nothing can cross over.” Merlin walked towards the entrance doors. He accessed a panel on the wall and punched in a code. The whir of a small motor signaled something mechanical was about to happen. Heavy plates descended over every entrance and window. Soon they were completely encased inside the room.

  Merlin explained to Hunter what everyone else seemed to understand. “We share your concern about this clue. To be safe, the room will be secured, in case anything surprising should be inside.”

  Great, Hunter thought.

  Krieger walked around, studying the structure of the strong box. These old boxes were like puzzles; you had to find the latch. Usually, it was hidden under some ornate piece of metalwork. Unfortunately, this particular box had none of that.