Vampire Captives (From Blood to Ashes Book 1)

by Kestra Pingree

  “It will be done,” Gala said.

  “You’ve also earned a white cloak,” Queen Maud said. “You have proved yourself to be more than an ally.”

  I was glad to hear Gala would be leaving us for a time but displeased to hear of her new cloak. I disliked the outsider sleeping at White House and tagging along with White Team when she didn’t know the first thing about being a slayer. She could fight, but she didn’t know us and we didn’t know her well enough to patch up the clumsiness she added to our fine-tuned machine. And yet, now she’d be a permanent teammate?

  Ednis tapped the glass touchscreen of her pactputer rapidly with slate-gray fingers. Then she went to the queen, to the side clear of the fallen thrall. She leaned toward the queen to whisper something in her ear. I hadn’t been sure of it at the time, but the queen’s fire-orange eyes seemed to lock onto me in this moment. It wasn’t anything overt. It could have been that she was staring straight ahead and I happened to be in her line of sight. What would happen to me not too long after strongly suggested her gaze was purposeful, though. Meant for me. Cold, calculating, with a hint of a challenge…

  When Ednis straightened her toothpick frame and patted down her already wrinkle-free white lab coat, Queen Maud spoke again. “Report to your houses to wash up and rest. White Team, your presence is required in the coliseum first thing tomorrow. You are all dismissed.”

  After our rows of timed deep bows, we turned to leave. White Team’s movements were stiff. My stiff movements were unavoidable. The others were nervous. Once in the hall, the guards closed the throne room’s doors with that same grating echo of concrete sliding against concrete. We, the three slayer teams and the Crimson Caves vampire, held our silence and nodded goodbyes as we returned to our gliders.

  I gathered Tuel’s hardening body in my lap and waited for the others to close their doors. Scarlet and Olive were my seatmates in the back again. Scarlet’s face was about to explode with a color fitting her name. Olive’s mouth hung open in a soft O as she blankly stared at the glider’s silver ceiling. Claire reclined the front passenger seat and automatically started snoring. When Fyefa took the driver’s seat, Scarlet barely waited until she closed the door to hiss, “What the hell does that mean?”

  “What the hell does what mean?” Fyefa replied with a level tone. The electronic roll-up door opened to reveal sunrays and the concrete road that would lead us to White House. Fyefa hastily backed out of the garage, causing the tires to squeal.

  “Why would our presence be required in the coliseum first thing tomorrow?” Scarlet clarified. “This screams punishment, not celebration.”

  Olive nodded and tugged at her plaited hair, loosening the dark brown knots along her scalp.

  Fyefa locked eyes with me in the rearview mirror. I met her gaze. She blinked first, forced to return her gaze to the concrete road.

  “It’s because Lisette brought Tuel back,” Scarlet said. Then she jabbed my side with her elbow. “Someone told the queen.”

  “If you have a problem, Scarlet, I’ll be happy to settle it,” I replied. “I’m not your first for nothing.”

  But Scarlet’s yellow eyes weren’t trained on me. She turned her head to stare lasers at the glider behind us. “It was the Crimson Caves brat. We could have handled this quietly. You may be White First, Lisette, and you may be physically superior to most of us, but you are young and inexperienced.”

  “Enough.” Fyefa raised her voice. “Shut up. We’re slayers. Age has nothing to do with this. Lisette hasn’t technically broken any rules. This has nothing to do with her, either. We don’t know why we’re going to the coliseum tomorrow, but we’ll take whatever comes and rise, because that’s what we do.”

  Olive turned toward me, her wispy voice breezing out of her lips. “What possessed you to take Tuel with us? She’s dead. Why not let the sun do its thing? She could have turned to dust on the battlefield she fought so fiercely on.”

  “I’m taking her home,” I replied and said nothing more.

  CHAPTER 5

  LISETTE

  HUMANS had a bizarre custom I’d seen once among our slaves, involving their dead. While vampires let the sun take the brittle husks of our dead, humans and werewolves treated theirs as if they still contained something important.

  Vampires held no ceremony, because once a vampire died, Yessma had already extended her hand to lead her to heaven. Werewolves made the effort to burn their beloved dead on a night when moonlight shone, as if their God couldn’t be bothered to reclaim them otherwise. He likely couldn’t. Lureine was far below Yessma, Cor as well. The humans’ God must have created them from dirt, because the way they buried their dead was the strangest.

  And yet, burying was exactly what I had in mind for Tuel. Her spirit had been ferried away long before now. I simply wanted what remained to stay close. In time, she would decay and the earth would take her, but part of her would always be here.

  Home.

  Behind White House, in our small garden, I dug and dug through dry, rocky soil, careful to throw dirt on our little patch of poking grass and not on the pale-pink flowers making up the border. I had started digging in the afternoon. Now the sun was hidden below the jagged horizon. Normally, digging a hole large enough to fit Tuel wouldn’t have taken me long, but my muscles refused to cooperate. I knew they needed rest. I knew I was making the cooldown worse, inviting aftereffects, by ignoring that fact, but I needed to bury Tuel, and no one would lift a finger to help me—not that I had thought they would or expected them to.

  Sweat poured down my face as my fingers locked around the shovel’s shaft and handle. I had to pry them loose so I could experimentally lift my hood. Nothing unpleasant followed. The sun was far enough below our teeth-like mountains that the sunrays could not touch and therefore hurt me here. It wasn’t always clear when shade was adequate coverage from the sun, so a vampire could never be too careful.

  I shed my cloak after getting tangled up in it and draped it across Tuel’s legs; she lay on a white-concrete bench next to the matching west wall of the house. I thought about uncovering her face for the last time. Gently, I pulled her hood back. She more resembled mottled stone than flesh and blood. Her veins were shriveled and the stench of spoiled blood made the surrounding air stagnant, much like the blood-soaked battlefield in Low Grassland.

  I took a deep breath to steel myself and to convince my limp arms to move. Perhaps I had officially torn my muscles beyond repair, because they would not move, no matter how much I willed them to. Then my legs buckled, and I hit the ground. The next time my eyes closed, it took everything I had to open them again.

  “You’ve overdone it, First.”

  I craned my neck to look up at Fyefa. Her starlight-yellow eyes shone brightly in the growing darkness. Her white-blond hair was sopping wet, taming the curls some. She, unlike myself, was dressed in her casual clothes: a loose V-neck shirt and billowy cotton trousers. “Leader,” I croaked.

  “You’re putting her in that hole?”

  I couldn’t offer more than a weak nod. “Take her badge.”

  Fyefa took my cloak from off Tuel’s legs and dropped it on my lap. Then she unpinned Tuel’s badge and threw it at me. It hit my chest before also landing on my lap.

  After wrapping Tuel up in her cloak, Fyefa lifted her with ease, in arms strong and unhindered. I twisted to watch as Fyefa lowered Tuel into the ground; she wasn’t gentle, but she didn’t drop her. Fyefa wielded the shovel and piled on dirt, mound by mound, until the land in our garden was somewhat even again. If not for the conspicuous section of upturned earth among mature poking grass, no one would have known what was done here—unless they recognized the putrid scent of a ripened carcass.

  “Are you satisfied?” Fyefa threw down the shovel; it clanged against the rocks.

  I cleared my throat to ensure a sound would escape it. “Rummadies, her favorite flowers.” They were also the only plants anyone had bothered to grow in our garden. It wasn’t a garden until Tue
l made it one. Coaxing anything to grow in Silver Hollow, outside of the hardy native poking grass, was a feat. Tuel had to bring rich soil from Shade Forest to make it possible. This garden and these flowers were Tuel’s. To some, myself included, they didn’t look like anything impressive. They were small with five paper-thin petals per head, and their scent was potent, fruity and cloying, but Tuel adored them and this patch of land.

  “Lisette.” Fyefa sighed, but she did as I asked. She took the knife she kept hidden inside her boot when she was otherwise unarmed and gathered an armful of rummadies. Then she dropped them on top of Tuel’s grave. They scattered, petals and leaves like falling rain.

  Fyefa sat on the bench and leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “What are you going to do with the badge?”

  Since Fyefa had allowed me a brief respite, my muscles worked well enough for me to pinch the silver badge between my fingers. I rubbed the pad of my thumb across the single coil. I couldn’t feel its intricate grooves through my leather gloves.

  “I’m going to keep it,” I replied.

  “Will you do this every time one of us dies?” Fyefa asked as she pulled at her damp wild hair to weave three pieces together into a loose braid.

  “That depends on what White Leader has to say.” I rested my cheek on her knee and let my heavy eyelids close. Fyefa was warm. I had forgotten how warm.

  “You’re too soft, Lisette.”

  “I’m the opposite of soft.”

  “Only someone who’s soft would do this. Is it because you’d miss her otherwise? I’m trying to understand.”

  “That’s not why I did it.”

  Fyefa’s hand found my hair, and she dug her nails into my scalp. “We’re the youngest vampires to rank as slayers.”

  “And you’re the youngest vampire to become a slayer leader.”

  “Natural talent and hard work got us to where we are—watching each other’s back too. We’ve had our fair share of disobedience as scamps. That troublemaking aspect of you will never go away, but you went too far this time. With my new position, I’m under more scrutiny than ever. Don’t do this again. I can’t fathom why you did it in the first place.”

  “I took her home,” I said. “I would have wanted someone to take my body home. Would you have done that for me, Fyefa?”

  “I would have left you on the battlefield.”

  My chest contracted and refused to expand. It was worse than what I had felt when I had found Tuel dead. It was as if Fyefa had whacked my chest with the pommel of her short sword. Even my eyes stung.

  “Would you have uncovered me at least, to make sure the sunrays would hit me?” I asked.

  Fyefa’s nails ran across my scalp, barely light enough to stop them from drawing blood. “I will make an example of you. You got what you wanted this time, but it comes at a price. If you sleep now and recover from the cooldown, you’ll live and retain your position as my first.”

  She brushed the black lock of hair that came loose from my braid away from my ear, and her humid breath kissed my skin. “If you do anything like this again, where everyone can see you acting… strange, I’ll kill you. I know you, so I know you care for this team, but this showed weakness, a weakness that makes all of us wonder if we can trust you. Cage your wild heart or it’ll end all of this.”

  “Why did you let me take her, then?” I asked.

  Fyefa’s fingers tightened, yanking another chunk of my hair out of its braid. “I made a mistake.”

  “You said I’m too soft, Fyefa, but I could say the same about you.”

  “Not anymore. This was the last time.”

  Fyefa was being pressured by other leaders, perhaps by Ednis the Wise or the queen herself. I had seen the signs, the discomfort in everyone around me, while carrying Tuel. I knew better than to test the limits as an adult, as a slayer. We weren’t scamps anymore, who’d be disciplined by a few lashings—though I was always the cause of the lashings. Fyefa was only trouble because I was trouble. I knew that and what my most recent actions could do to Fyefa’s position as White Leader, but I couldn’t let Tuel go. I told myself it wasn’t against the rules.

  Technically, it wasn’t. It had never needed to be explicitly stated, made part of the slayer code, because no one had thought to do it before me.

  “You’re slipping away from me, Lisette,” Fyefa whispered. “I can’t protect you like this.”

  “It won’t happen again.”

  “See that it doesn’t.”

  Fyefa moved my tired head when she stood, but she caught me before I could melt onto the concrete like a puddle.

  “Up,” she said. “I’ll help you shower, and then I’m tossing you in your bed. We go to the coliseum well before daybreak. You’ve already lost hours of sleep.”

  Fyefa had to half carry me to the back door, just around the corner from where we were. Gala was on the other side, in a little paved nook. She sat on a white-concrete chair with her leg pressed against one of its sharp corners as if it were padded. She was treating her new white cloak with blackout paste, running the thick dark substance over the silver wreath emblazoned on its back. Her black eyes narrowed when she nodded at me and Fyefa.

  The crimson rat had listened to our every word.

  CHAPTER 6

  LISETTE

  CHEERS and jeers filled the coliseum. Half of White Team was betting on me, and the other half was betting on Hann—at least that was what I had gathered. I couldn’t spare those on the sidelines much attention.

  My bones creaked as I leapt back, avoiding Hann’s long kick. Height was one thing I was rather average in, and Hann was rightly using that to her advantage along with my shot reflexes, strength, and stamina. None of my handicaps had stopped me from beating Olive and Claire in previous fights, though.

  My bare feet slid on the loose dirt of the arena floor. My ankles strained, but they held me.

  “C’mon, Hann!” Scarlet shouted. “It’s too sad if you can’t take her down. Just look at her.”

  I held my hands close to my chest and crouched low. Hann stalked toward me in the same stance. She struck first, with a punch that would inevitably reach farther than my own. I leaned away, putting no more distance between us than necessary. Then I sprang back. I dropped and swept a leg at Hann’s knees. My shin connected, but her knees weren’t locked, so they didn’t break. She did, however, lose her balance.

  I didn’t give her time to think. I flipped around and kicked her head with my once-grounded leg, ensuring she face-planted. Something cracked when she bit the dirt, and it wasn’t just the ground.

  She groaned. Her arms shook as she tried to push herself upright. I brought my heel down for a final kick, aiming for the back of her head, but Ednis the Wise called the fight. “Enough. Lisette wins.”

  I stopped my blow an inch from where it would have connected. A tremble took my leg then, but I hid it by withdrawing. I bounced on the balls of my feet to shake out the jitters that hadn’t stopped racking my muscles since the fights began.

  “Gods damn it all,” Scarlet grumbled.

  I shook out my arms and stared up at the high ceiling. It was square, with those same hard edges and sharp corners found throughout all of Silver Hollow. It had the same bright lights too, as much as I tended to dislike them.

  My neck creaked, announcing its soreness. It felt like whiplash. I dropped my chin and pressed my fingers to the back of my neck to massage away the awful twinge. Besting Hann hadn’t been easy.

  “You good?” I asked and held out my hand to my fallen teammate. Hann wiped the savory blood from her broken and already-healing nose then clasped my forearm. After gripping her forearm firmly enough to chase away the color, I pulled her to her feet. Hann’s skin was darker than mine, but the reddish-brown undertone beneath our grays was quite similar.

  “As the eldest member of this team, I feel I should congratulate you,” she said. “Even though you’re recovering from a significant boost, you defeated me.” She bowed in half.
“I’m honored to have you as my first.”

  I bowed in return. “The honor is mine.”

  It seemed not all of my teammates were furious with me over what I had done with Tuel. Hann didn’t agree with it, I was sure, but since Tuel was out of sight, she chose to push her and what I’d done out of mind too. The same couldn’t be said for Demsneh. She refused to acknowledge my existence unless she had to. Since we hadn’t been paired against each other, she’d been spared so far.

  I told myself they’d all forget about it soon enough. Today was a painful reminder to anyone who fought me that I had earned my rank as White First.

  “Next pair,” Ednis said. She was seated on a steel stool she had brought with her when she met White Team in the coliseum earlier. She didn’t tell us why we were competing, but she was gathering some kind of data from it. She tapped furiously on the keyboard attached to her pactputer during each fight, while tracking us with inefficient eyes. The way the artificial light glinted off her glasses made me shiver. I didn’t like when I couldn’t see someone’s eyes.

  Ednis was here with us instead of with the queen. This, whatever it was, was so important that Queen Maud sent her best. If I were the nervous type, that would have made my skin crawl.

  Perhaps it should have anyway.

  Ednis paused her typing to say, “Lisette and Fyefa.”

  I was almost disappointed Gala wasn’t here. I would have beaten her ass and no one would have faulted me. She had no knowledge of or skill in barakor, because barakor came from the vampires in the north. It was, at its roots, a strict-yet-fluid style of unarmed combat. If a warrior was incapable of mastering it, she couldn’t be a slayer. Gala would have known, without a doubt, how outclassed she was.

  Next time, I thought, since apparently Gala would be coming back if Crimson Caves came to our aid as she believed they would.

  Puffs of sand followed my bare feet as I met Fyefa in our designated circle of the arena. Other slayers and warriors were here training too, so we had to share. It was a typical sight when the coliseum wasn’t being used for tournaments. Today felt like nothing more than training—if Ednis hadn’t been directing.