The Vampire Touch 3: A New Dawn

by Sarah J. Stone

“I wonder,” I reply with a stern honesty. “I’ll talk to you again soon. Let me go see what’s going on with Hamish.”

  “Of course,” she replies, pressing the button to end the call.

  “Hamish, what is it?” I shout out the door. He mumbles something from behind the door. “Come in, man. I can’t hear a thing you’re saying.” He steps inside and comes to sit opposite me at the desk.

  “I do think you should come see.” We both stand up, and he begins leading me to the entry hall door. Pushing them open, a massive force of lieutenants, fighters, and fledglings stand at my door, on attention. They take up near the entirety of the open plane where the Veil sits.

  “How many are there?” I near shout with elation.

  “I don’t know,” Hamish replies. He was supposed to be handling these smaller details, getting as many as we can from the various leaders.

  “Who sent them?” Someone begins walking to us from the front of the line. By a wrap on his arm, I can tell that he’s a lieutenant.

  “King Daffyd,” he interrupts, Hamish only replying to my question with a shrug, “we are the forces sent by Lady Olivia Lockhart.” He informs, “Twelve thousand men and women ready to do what needs to be done to end this war. She asked me to personally speak with you on this.”

  The lieutenant turns to Hamish. “Don’t worry about him. He can stay,” I reply. He knows enough about Olivia and I already. Hamish, the poor simpleton, will never break the bonds we constructed.

  “Among us are of her best troops. The Black Berets, the Emerald Guard, and the Golden Knights. She has given us instruction to do as you command us to do. Specializing in personal, long range, and tactical combat. We are the forces that have guarded our lady and her order for generations.” Atop his head is a black beret. I notice that their uniforms each, somehow, indicate what they are. Some wear the greens, some dressed fully in black, and others’ outfits have a golden hue. Their uniformity is something I’ve not seen in the vampires for a good long time. Olivia has a good grasp on this command. Something I should speak to her about.

  “And you said twelve thousand?” This shoots our projections for battle through the roof.

  “Yes, King Daffyd,” he replies. His stance never breaking from a military pose, his eyes looking at me…through me. A good soldier in any war.

  “And what about the rest?”

  “Between the twenty-two others, we’ve gotten over twenty thousand troops. With our own forces and the twelve that Olivia sent, we stand over fifty thousand against the wolves’ projected ten.”

  I can’t believe it. One strike will bring them to their knees now. We have five vampires to their one wolf. Sure, we’re fighting off on their territory, but that means nothing. We have become accustomed, in our times, to fight here, there, and everywhere.

  “How many did they lose in the tunnels?” I ask Hamish.

  “They lost a troop of two thousand.”

  “Then if they were so low on troops, why didn’t we do this years ago?”

  “Because of the Forsaken and shifter elements. Now they have the witches,” he reminds me.

  “Are we still sourcing more vampires?”

  “Yes. More should be in tomorrow and the next day. That should be the last. Fledglings mostly. Not many have sent a good deal of lieutenants. They want to win the war but not lose their most valued.”

  “You may return to your line,” I tell the man, and he begins moving back. I walk further onto the patio to see better. A massive army of its own. We could have fought the rest of the war with mine and her army alone. “They will find that this cuts from their own returns on the war, but that is fine. Victory will fall into our laps with this. Now, give the word that they rest and prepare. Find housing for them. We strike on Romulus tomorrow. A fight that will not end until every wolf and every witch is cleared from that swamp or they bow down and praise my name.”

  “Yes, sir.” Hamish runs off into the mansion.

  This war will be won on pure infatuation.

  Chapter Thirty-One: The Jade Emperor

  I find myself increasingly perplexed by the rumblings of the Bifrost. I have meditated on the bridge before and know its calls. A low hum. Soft, soothing. So, when I hear this new sound, the sound that breaks the calm nature the bridge brings, I can’t help but wonder about the peculiarities of its cause.

  I’ve been out here for days now. Or what I believe to be days, considering that the Bifrost falls under the realm of Odin, granting times of day and night as he chooses. In my domain, I have kept it simple. Day and night run concurrently with the Earth realm. Our dates may vary, but our times do not. Twenty-four hours come and go. This is the way it is meant to be. Squandering power on banishing the night, or continuing a feast seems pointless.

  So, I sit. Many have come to me in wonder, asking what I am doing, and my reply is always the same.

  “I’m waiting for her to speak.” They chortle as they move on. Their drunken stupors continuing on and on.

  This is exactly what I’m doing. I’m waiting for her to give me a sign. A message. She deserves more than to be forgotten to a party or a feast. Odin should be out here, tending to his Bifrost. There is nothing in the Forsaken realm that does not whisper its secrets if you give it the time. Odin created the bridge that took us from Earth to sin and back again. The bridge was meant to be our path to eternity and beyond. This it did.

  Now we take her for granted. Neglecting her cries of sorrow and pain.

  Maybe they do, but I will not. I will find the root of her pain and suffering. It has been days. Months. Years. Who knows how long we have passed together. Myself at her side. I sit in a meditation pose, my left hand in gian mudra, the other hovering just above the Bifrost. I bring my breathing and hum to meet with her soft hum. We are connected through the internal suffering her energy faces.

  A few out of place hums in between each precise coo. This continues and has for however long I’ve been out here meditating on the bridge, allowing myself to enter without force. A long process. A peaceful calm nature above all, it seems, shows the same force as rage and aggression. Balance.

  The Art of War.

  Suddenly, the noises in the bridge become sporadic as if the energy within is being shuffled and toyed with. I can feel her crying out. The pain she must be suffering, the energy that’s being torn and scraped and ripped and forced around something. The thorn in her side. The grain of dust in an oyster’s mouth. A thunderous crack comes from somewhere down the bridge. I do not see it. I only hear it.

  Without the correct guidance on how to tap into the Bifrost, the bridge extends on for eons before you happen upon what I’ve been told is the Darkness. The point where nothing and everything connects.

  After the thunderous crack, the low humming returns to normal. I wait here, longer still, taking in the movement of energy. No longer does she cry out in irritated rumblings. No. She is back to normal, and something has been unleashed from her.

  I can only imagine it can’t be good.

  Chapter Thirty-Three: Madison

  When I was given this task, I knew that it wouldn’t be easy. It was not necessarily meant for me, but it was a means to distract me from the ongoing search for Victor. One that I had no part in, I understand. But still, I felt very strong about it. The answers to the puzzle brought me one step closer to bringing answers to a family that is terrified. They are looking for their girl. I was part of a similar situation. So, Jack and I came to a silent agreement. This case would keep me off of Victor. He knows just as well as I do that there is nothing I won’t do to bring answers to the family. Mine never got the chance, and I can’t be a part of this Agency if they do this on a constant basis. Leaving families hopeless and terrified – this is not why I signed up. I signed up to bring hope, peace, and understanding, something that I haven’t quite felt in the Agency since my entering.

  “So, what do you want to do about this?” Vicky asks me. I shrug.

  “I don’t know. We di
dn’t really get much but an address from Serendipity.” Serendipity Industries being one of the leading technology companies in the world. Focusing on the war efforts mainly, they built their kingdom on countless deaths and destruction. Heading to Serendipity was planned as a means of to gather as much intel as we could. This proved rather troubling since the company was either very secretive on the matter, denied that there were leaks from this section, and claimed it must be another or ‘couldn’t give out personal information.’

  This was never for us. We’re hunting down a witch that killed officers. They want to keep this under the table, and we’re not in the business of underhanded dealings. So, Vicky and I pushed until we found a connection to the witch. Once we knew that there was a definite cause to continue, we forced information out of them with fake lawsuits and so on. We just had to find one weak person. They gave us an address. A few numbers and letters on a piece of paper that, if it was a fake, would mean nothing. The entire operation returned to ground zero.

  “Your call, boss.” Vicky is just trying to be supportive. I know she wants to hunt down the address for the next information, but I feel like it’s going to be a waste of time. She would be too smart and cover her tracks. There would be no evidence. I can just tell.

  “Let’s go then,” I finally say. Vicky begins driving, and we head in the direction the GPS takes us toward the house.

  ***

  The drive was quiet. Intentionally so. I don’t have great hopes for this case, and I’m not even sure if we’re going to be able to pull anything up, but when it was handed to me, I had the childlike wonder that said everything will be okay. You will succeed and be well respected. The same as when I used to pretend that someday I’d be the next big British pop star and the current ones would come and ask me for tips and tricks on how to improve themselves. Or the first average Joe to become part of the Royal Family through adoption by the queen. I loved my family, but I would have loved to be a princess.

  How sad.

  “We’re here.” When we get to the building, it wasn’t at all what I expected. I was thinking it would be an open plot of land or a crummy apartment building that was just used as a front. This, on the other hand, is a luxurious, upper-market block.

  “Maybe I was wrong,” I have to admit.

  “Don’t stress, kiddo. It’s your first case. I would have thought the same if I haven’t been around the block a few times.”

  We get out. Instantly, I feel the witch’s power. She was here. Might be here, still. Vicky gave me a few pointers on how to pick up the energy on the fly. I tried what she suggested, and it worked.

  “So, she’s here?” I ask. It’s a fifty-fifty gamble. She’s either here, or she isn’t. If I’m right, then I seem like I know what I’m doing. If I’m wrong, I’m just the new girl that’s still learning the ropes. I don’t come off badly either way.

  “She is,” Vicky agrees, her hand sliding onto her belt, feeling for a pistol. We walk to the trunk of the car, and she opens it. Inside are a lot of weapons and armors and all kinds of goodies for the line of business we’re in.

  “Stun guns,” she says, pulling a similar looking pistol from the back and handing it to me. “I don’t kill if I don’t have to. I’ve been lucky enough to not have to, to this point. That doesn’t mean we can have anyone running amok. We stun them. Put them to sleep. Even if her magic is strong enough to keep her awake, she won’t have much juice to zap us with. You can go either route. We’ve got both kinds in the Agency. Jack seems to fall in the middle. Caution until there is no more. I don’t walk around with a gun. If I need defense, I use my magic. Jack doesn’t have the option, so I can see it from his point, too,” Vicky explains. I don’t know how I’d do with killing someone so, for now, I think I’m more inclined to join her ‘no bullets’ policy.

  “Now we’re going in there to do one thing, and that is find a witch and neutralize her. This is where the training wheels come off. We’re in this for the long run now,” she finishes. I nod and then strap the gun to my belt. We lock up and head inside.

  We follow the trail of her magic to a room on the top floor. The criminal lifestyle pays well, it seems.

  “Rebecca Sanchez,” Vicky shouts out into the hall, “you are placed under arrest by the Agency of Supernatural Law Enforcement. Do not attempt to resist,” is all Vicky says. The door swings wide open with the last word.

  “Come in then.” We step inside. Rebecca Sanchez stands before us in a bathrobe, hair in a towel. She just stepped out of the shower. “If I knew I was having guests, I would have put something on,” she taunts cheekily.

  “Don’t touch anything,” Vicky whispers to me.

  “Get dressed and let’s go,” she adds to Rebecca. She’s beautiful. Slim, with long, black hair that doesn’t seem to have an imperfection. Of Asian descent, her face also seems young. Well kept. Her nails long, pointing out dangerously. I wasn’t expecting this.

  Rebecca goes into her room for a moment. I fiddle restlessly with the gun on my hip.

  “Things are going too smoothly,” she adds. “She’s going to try and run. She’s killed before. So, don’t put it past her to try it with us,” I nod.

  Rebecca steps out in a beautiful red dress, heels matching and other accessories.

  “Ladies, I am going out on the town tonight.” We haven’t moved further than the entry hall. It’s too dangerous to do so with wards she may have placed around her home. “I would like for you to join me,” she adds. I grip the handle of the gun.

  “What don’t you understand about the whole arrest thing?” I ask. She chuckles.

  “I thought that would be the case.” She extends her wrists as if saying ‘cuff me.’ Vicky does one better, and before she can do anything to protect herself, a needle finds itself implanted in her neck.

  “That was not going to end well. Many various combat magic styles start with open palms. She just needed one of us to get close enough to start the attack. Rebecca goes limp and collapses to the floor. Vicky restrains her, and together we drag her to the car, throwing her in the back.

  “That was still too easy,” I finally say after much deliberation.

  “Yes, it was,” Vicky replies. “Perhaps this is not the final act.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three: Jack

  I’ve put off this awkward conversation between Romulus and I off for long enough. It’s one that I’ve been intentionally avoided, leaving them to do as they please in this battle. He lost his family to Daffyd. Daffyd deserved what’s coming to him, and even if I did get into the mix, what would it really change? This war would continue with Agency intervention or not.

  So, coming up on the grounds, standing opposite the small piece of land out in the distance, I wonder just how the conversation will go. Is he going to concede? Does he know he did wrong?

  I get out of my luxury German automobile – which, I might add, did not have a good time driving down the muddy dirt roads – walking to the small pier and getting onto a rowboat. I light a smoke and begin rowing. Slowly at first. Testing the waters but realizing there wouldn’t actually be a current. This is more a pond than a lake, and nowhere near a river. So, I push on until I meet the shoreline. I walk past a wood cabin. Outside, an old man sits by the fire. He’s detached from the wolfpack, half-drunk already, no end in sight with how he’s hitting the bottle.

  “Howdy,” I say, in a passing good gesture.

  “Hi,” he replies. “What are you…come to ge…looking for…?” he slurs, the mixed mumbles of various chopped sentences thrown together. I wave him off with a dapper smile. I’ve never been one to handle drunk men very well.

  The small heap of land that Romulus claimed when taking the peace grounds is no bigger than two hundred meters across and three hundred wide. It’s why I struggle to understand how I don’t see any of them. No signs of the wolves at all, apart from a few campsites that were very recently taken down. Maybe they’ve moved off the land. Maybe this is him trying to show some good fa
ith after a disaster.

  Well, we can hope, right?

  “You know this is not the end, right?” the familiar voice, though forlorn, speaks out from behind me.

  “What do you mean?” I stand up from my hunched position at one of the camp fires to turn and face him. He’s bruised and battered. His body covered in bandages. He’s not ashamed about the wounds. Why would one be? Displaying them openly as the alpha. Those who challenge, beware. I fought off my enemies and won.

  “Why not?” I ask in true wonder.

  “Because things don’t go the way you plan in war.” He leans against a tree, “When I claimed the peace grounds as my own, it was purely to send a message. One that worked for a while, but Daffyd has wizened up. Somehow, he’s just got the upper hand these days. We’re trapped in here. We can’t leave the forest. By day, there are the White Elephants, by night the vampires. My wolves are tired. We all understand, though, that you don’t give up because you’re tired.”

  I didn’t realize why he was saying all this, but I feel it’s being put into place now. I take my father’s ring from my pocket and begin mindlessly fidgeting with it. A nervous habit I’ve taken up over the years.

  “And that’s why you’re here, isn’t it? To tell me to give up…” I can hear that he’s not himself. He hasn’t been since the death of his family, but things change. You adapt to the change, and so do they. He’s become the war hungry general now. So, when he breaks character into the more sympathetic wolf I once knew, I can tell something is off.

  “Yes, that is why I’m here. Your actions in having the witches enter the battle have caused severe casualties in the city and around it. The implications do not only fall on you. When I became director, I was tasked to stop this war by any means. I knew that I would not be able to do so with words, so I let you go. Do as you pleased because I know that Daffyd was your redemption. I left it to be so. We had an understanding. A silent agreement between the three parties – you will not fight in the town or anywhere that could get a human killed unless it was their own foolish ambition to see it themselves, right?” He nods in agreement. “Well, now I’m coming to you and telling you that this is where it has to come to an end. The war has gone on too long. You’re on the way to facing a major defeat. You’ve killed normal, innocent people that have had nothing to do with this war from the start, and I can’t believe you didn’t traumatize the witch that had to do this bidding. Can you not see that this is hurting rather than helping?” I keep it calm, but I know he can tell there’s more underlying rage than I’m letting on.