Satar continued within his shame. “What has been done is done. All that matters now is that I have come to make sure he does not succeed in what he is planning to do.” He looked back to Jameson, but suddenly a new thought raced through his mind. A familiar voice came in with it. Kenar was there. He was coming and he was not alone. “We have company.” He turned to the road and saw four horses coming towards them.
All of them turned and saw them too. Unlike the monster, they stood ready for the attack they knew was coming, and yet again, surprisingly, was not.
The Wanderers all stopped.
Only Kenar tipped his head to them. “We have not come to fight you, but to stand with you.” He said from behind Rochie.
He even turned the horse for him to see them too.
“But we must be quick about it. The Elders are preparing for their attack even as we speak.”
Satar nodded with this.
Jameson felt more confused and frightened than ever. “Why are they coming after us?” He stepped to Rochie’s horse. “Why?” He turned around and looked at Satar. What he just said raced through him like a vice squeezed his head tightly to its core. With it, he answered his own question. “They are coming for you.”
Satar looked into his eyes. “What has been done is done.”
Jameson just couldn’t agree. “This is all of your doing, all of this is.” He looked back to the Wanderers and then back to the monster again. “You started all of this.” He wanted to race him again, but this time the Wanderer behind him stopped him before he could.
“He is right.” Kenar had to stop him. There was no time for any of this, even if he did respect the boy for doing it. In many ways, he felt the same way as he did. Satar put all of them in danger, but he also knew there was more to it than this. He saw inside Devish’s mind too. “He did do this, but he is not alone in the cause of it.”
Jameson turned.
All of them did.
Satar only looked up. “My son.” He of course knew a lot more than even Kenar did. He was much more adept at seeing minds. Kenar’s gifts were secondary, as to where his was his only true power. “He is behind all of this. He has planned it from the very beginning.” He looked at all of them, but kept his gaze on Kenar as he did.
Kenar nodded. “Devish wants to start a war with all of you so he can go back to the hunt. He wishes to return to the ways before the Great Dying.”
All of the Wanderers gasped.
The humans only looked confused.
Kenar knew why. They knew nothing about the world’s past but for what they were told by the Walkers, and as far as he knew about it, they told them nothing. Knowledge was power, and that power was kept in the hands of those who truly wielded it.
“Before you humans emerged from the great continent in the south, another group of peoples populated this land. The Walkers hunted them to extinction. When that happened almost all of the Walkers died without them, without their blood. They called that time the Great Dying. It was a horrific epoch.” He looked at Satar’s thoughts. “Devish wishes to return to it.
Donte felt astonished by this and had to come in. “Walkers died.” He felt a gasp deep within his heart. It was hard to comprehend, but then suddenly, seeing the wolves die by their very own swords, he relaxed again. Of course they died. He killed two of them himself.
Kenar only smiled at him.
Patrice listened to everything and had to come in too. “Why does he want to go back to a time when they all nearly died? That does not make any sense to me.”
Kenar only shook his head. In many ways, he didn’t understand this himself.
Thankfully, one of them there did—the only one of them that ever truly could. “He was not born before the time of the Great Dying. He was born during it, towards its end, back before humans came.” Satar spoke softly. After all, this was a terrifying memory for him. It was also the time of his own dying, for a large part of him died then too. Permona made her choice.
Kenar now did understand. Of course, he would wish for that time again, especially if he did not even live in it. He only sees his own thirst, and nothing of the pain it caused to all of them.
Jameson tried hard to comprehend all of this, but he had questions, and now it seemed like the best time to ask them so he did. “Then why are they coming after us, or him?” He pointed at the monster with his good left arm. Now without the rage flying through him, he felt the pain again, stronger as the time passed.
Kenar knew some of this, so he tried to answer him with what he knew. “Without Gorhan being here, the Elders are blind. They have only Devish’s words to guide them.” He looked at Satar and saw his face turn down. It was an obvious look. “What is it?” he had to ask.
Satar looked up. “Gorhan is dead. Devish killed him for seeing too much.”
Again, all of the Wanderers gasped. They truly had no idea how far all of this had gone.
“How is that possible?” One of them, Garreth, had trouble reconciling it with everything he knew about them. It was just too hard to grasp all of it with a firm enough grip to get it right.
Everyone turned to Satar at the same time.
He felt their eyes like a thousand needles piercing his flesh. “My son wanted the ear of the Elders.” He looked only at Kenar as he continued. “Gorhan’s gift of reading thoughts went beyond a simple mind. He could pierce through you to your very being. As long as he was living, he knew that he could never keep what he needed to do silent. So that is why he did what he did.”
Jameson was more confused than ever. “If you knew he did that, why did you not tell the rest of the Elders the truth?”
All of them had their eyes flare wide.
The needles dug deeper, plunging through his skin and went into his muscles and bones. “He is my son.” It was all he had. There was no other reason for his actions. Any father would say the same thing, if given the chance.
Kenar bowed his head.
Rochie leaned into this. “What is he planning to do my lord Satar? What are his intentions?”
“His intentions are simple. He wishes to kill all of you.” Satar looked straight up at him. His eyes gleaned.
Rochie already knew this, but there had to be more to it than that. “And the Elders, why are they behind him?”
“They follow, but rarely lead. They now fear this, all of this.” He looked at the humans behind and around him. He then turned back to the horses and those riding them. “You are all standing together as one. You are standing against them. They will do whatever they must do to make things right again in their eyes. They will set the balance back.”
Patrice chimed in. “Is there any way to convince Lords Odan and Adollo of changing their intentions? They must listen to reason.”
Satar shook his head. “They will not because I too am a threat to them now. I am a threat to the balance.”
Jameson watched him. “Why are you a threat?” He already knew the answer to this, but at the same time, he still wanted to hear him say it.
Satar tilted his head towards him. “You already know this, but if you need comfort in my words than you will have them.” He looked back to Rochie and Kenar. “I have dared to love a woman—a human. I have dared to elevate her to my side.”
Jameson shrugged hard. That was his answer.
Rochie now understood everything, or so he thought, but there was still more about the details on all of this. He needed to know what they could and should do now.
“What are their plans for coming at us my lord? What do they intend to do?”
Satar shook his head again. “I only know what I see in his thoughts, and that is what is always simple to my kind. He just intends to hunt us down. He has nothing more elaborate than that.”
Rochie also already knew this. He knew them all too well. Walkers feared nothing for the most part. When they hunted, they just let the wind carry them to the ends. They cared, nor thought, of anything else but that.
“Then if they ar
e going to attack us at their will without planning anything, I say we do not do the same. I say we make those plans.” He looked back at Garreth, then to Patrice, and finished on Shandra.
All of them watched him with wide eyes.
Their eyes told him that they had no idea where to start.
Kenar did but not in the same way as Rochie. “We do have to do something, but we must keep it simple. Devish has the gift. He can still see what we do and will do. We must think but not show him too much of those thoughts.”
Jameson looked at him surprised. “And how do we do that?”
Kenar laughed before he began. “We do everything in the opposite direction as we plan it. Keep the opposite to what we say. Do not think it, but do it.” He looked at Satar. “He will see what he wants to see.”
Satar agreed, and admired Kenar now more than ever. He knew how to blunt his gifts. He was a more gifted reader than he ever thought he was.
Kenar looked back at everyone’s thoughts.
“Let us get to this then.”
They all agreed.
The Wanderers climbed down from their horses and joined the humans by the river’s edge.
Satar stayed in the trees. He stayed in the shadows. He stayed where he seemed to belong.
43
The night came quickly. The sun set with such a gentleness that it should have felt magical but wasn’t. This time it felt cold. The breeze was strong. The smell of death was on the air.
Odan, Adollo, and Devish gathered vampires. They gathered Shades. They gathered wolves.
When they were ready, they watched all of them form together in the courtyard, and only Odan spoke. “We have gathered for the defense of our way of life. We have come here to strike at those who have caused us the gravest threat.” He stood at the top of the steps. Adollo stood on one side of him, and Devish stood on the other. “Satar has dismissed our kind. He has set out to destroy us, so we must destroy him. All of you have sworn an oath to your clans. You have all paid homage to your families, but he is no longer one of them. He is no longer one of us. As the world turns, we will strike at him before he strikes at us.”
The courtyard remained quiet and firm. None of them thought. No one questioned. They never did.
Odan gave them all one final smile before he looked back to his fellow Blood Walkers.
“We will do what we must.” He looked at Devish as he spoke this, and then turned back to his families. Thirty of them were there. Thirty of them were ready. “Now go and find the humans. Find the Wanderers who now stand by them, and do what must be done.”
The courtyard collectively growled.
The wolves changed. A third of the crowd snarled as they turned into a deep dark brown wave.
The other third turned gray and swarmed into bats.
The final third stood there and allowed their eyes to flare with a bright ruby red.
Seeing all of them, Odan removed his coat.
Adollo did the same.
Devish did it last.
Odan called on the eyes of the bat at the back of his mind. Quickly his face unfurled into an angled bat’s nose. His ears grew pointed and narrow as his hands flushed out into wings.
Adollo called on his wolf’s eyes, and brought them forward. His pale skin turned to an ashen gray. Fur flew out all over his skin. A large and long snout formed from his nose and lips.
Devish brought his own eyes forward. He brought the blood inside him to a boil. His skin turned pale gray, as his half wolf, half bat face and body formed.
Now that they were fully changed, the three of them headed down the steps.
Odan took flight one-step down. He flew up and over the courtyard.
Every Shade joined him in the sky.
The wolves joined Adollo, as they grouped together and followed him through the front gate.
Devish led the vampires.
All of them headed across the plain. They headed to the trees. They headed for the fight that was now at hand.
44
He had to see her. He had to speak to her. He had to do it alone.
Jameson did not intend to allow his sister to be with him. He would die first. He would kill him if he had to. Feeling this, he kept with her. He stayed by her side. They stayed by the huge fire they built by the road.
With the sun down again, Satar could move out from the trees. He did so cautiously, almost acting like a stray cat that was too close to the front door of a home that it didn’t know. He crept to the flames. He moved slowly to her.
Jameson knew he was there. “You will not come closer than that.” He looked up. He knew where he was. He kept his eyes on him even when the sun was still up.
Satar did stop. He did stay calm. He changed the subject. “Why build the fire? Will it not help them find you easier?” He never did understand humans or their whims. Doing this, out in the middle of nowhere would only make them find them faster. It would also help him in the distraction to try to understand him. He needed no such help with her.
Jameson didn’t know the answer to this himself. “The blind Wanderer told us to do it.” He looked disgusted, and even forced the look. “Go and ask him.”
Satar understood the snipe. He understood the anger. “It will not matter. When they come, and they will, it will not mean anything to them. They will strike with or without light.” He crossed his arms over his chest.
Jameson dropped the disgust with a sudden flash of thoughts finding their way through his head. In fact, it even surprised himself with how clear they were.
“Why do you hate us? Why do you feed on humans?” After asking this, he paused. He wasn’t even sure if it was he, himself, who even said it. It didn’t even sound like his own voice.
Satar hugged himself with his own arms. He would have preferred hers, but that wasn’t going to happen any time soon, so he would have to make do with his own. “We do not hate humans.” He figured that he would do his best to answer his questions, with nothing else better to do until he could hold her again.
Jameson stared right at him. “You do. You kill us. You feed on us. If this is not hate then I do not know what hate is.”
Satar laughed some with this. He didn’t mean to sound amused. It was just a very hard question to answer. It was also hard to say it right, so he decided to ask a question himself instead. “Do you hate chickens?”
Jameson felt somewhat bemused with this. He answered it with the only thing he had, modest humor. “Of course not, although there was this one fowl that gave me no other choice.” He even laughed some after he said it.
Satar didn’t know what to say to that, so he kept with what he meant to say. “You do not hate fowls, just like we do not hate you.” He uncrossed his arms and let them fall back to his sides. “We no more hate you than you would hate cattle or the swine, or the birds in the sky.”
Jameson understood what he was trying to say. “So we are nothing more than food for you.” He shook his head.
Satar nodded with his. “We are the top of the world. My kind came first. We came with the taste of blood.”
Hearing this, Jameson had another question come up, so he asked it next, “Why not take blood from the countless other animals on this world? Why us? Why humans or those that came before us?”
Satar shrugged with this. Again, it was just all the matter of understanding one’s place in the world. “We survive off nothing else.” Sometimes you were cattle. Sometimes you are the hawk. One’s place was theirs and no one else’s.
Jameson blinked heavily with this. “So you cannot feed off cattle.” He nodded again. “You need us to survive.”
“Yes. We can only live off human blood, off human flesh.” Satar smiled. He was beginning to like this boy. He had a wit about him that was difficult to contain. He was more than he thought he would be.
Jameson thought about this, and again, the other voice rolled around inside him and was dying to come out.
“I have seen wolves feed off cattle. I hav
e seen Shades attack large cats. So what is the difference with them?”
“Those are Walkers but not of my kind. My kind, those who were born what we are, can only survive on human blood and flesh. All others, those that were once human, can survive on anything. They only crave the sweetness that is within you.” Satar shrugged again with his like for the boy. He truly couldn’t help himself.
Jameson nodded hard. He thought he understood, so he looked back down.
Satar saw a chance so he took it. “May I see her?” She was right there, sitting on the other side of the fire near the water. Two other humans were sitting on each side of her. All he had to do was walk the three yards to her, but he held himself firm. He stayed where he was. He respected his place.
Jameson shook his head. “Never.” He looked back up and added something else without truly thinking about it, “It is up to her to see you if she wishes, and even then, I will not like it.” He turned back to the fire. He turned back to her.
Satar watched him leave. He felt the weight of his answer. It was heavy enough to make him want to crash.
Kenar stepped to his right side. “She has been wronged Lord Satar. She will not speak to you.”
Satar bowed his head, and eyes, away from her. “She will come to see me Wanderer. I have no doubts in her.” He turned.
Kenar stopped him by taking one-step just in front of him as he did.
“My lord? I need to know something.” He stared at his bright red aura and looked directly into his eyes. He needed to see the answer while he heard it. If he would let him ask it that is.
Satar admired his strength. He admired the challenge. To step in front of an Elder meant that you wished to challenge him to be one. In any other circumstance, the fight would now begin. This was not one of those times, and being what it was; it may never be so again.
A Werewolf's Saga, The Beginning (A Werewolf's Saga Boxed Sets Book 3) Page 23
