Bonded In Blood (A Dark Legacy Book 1)

by L Ann

  “Wait! STOP!” A voice thundered through the darkness, making everyone freeze. The entire pack turned as one as the lights came on.

  Temporarily blinded from the sudden change from dark to bright, Taz and Morgan blinked and shielded their eyes, watching as Rego hopped down from the table he’d been standing on.

  “There’s no sportsmanship in this,” he declared as he approached. “I’m not seeing the rumoured expertise of our two guests.” He fluttered his arms at his followers. “Move back. Move back. Give them some room.”

  The pack shuffled outward, fanning out into a circle around Morgan and Taz.

  “Are you okay?” Taz asked, taking in Morgan’s pale blood-streaked face.

  Morgan nodded her head, but didn’t answer. Instead, she looked around the now visible basement. To one side, a pile of wine crates had been stacked; at the far end was the metal table Rego had used as a platform. Other than that, there was no furniture. The floor was stained with dried blood and there were at least a dozen bodies scattered around where their victims had been cast aside and left to rot.

  “Let’s give the Nikaran Prince and his lovely companion a fighting chance,” Rego continued. “If they survive, they can leave.” He smiled, nothing more than a baring of teeth. “Two against two until only two remain standing.”

  “You’re insane,” Morgan told him. “There is no way that you’ll be allowed to live after this, even if we don’t survive.”

  “And yet here I am,” Rego replied. “Children!” he raised his voice and clapped his hands once sharply. “Begin!”

  “Whoa WHOA, Count Dracula,” Taz jumped in, as two of the child soldiers stepped forward, fangs bared and claws at the ready. “Aren’t we stepping on our tongues here?” He scanned the circle of toothy countenances before bringing his gaze back to Rego. “You say sportsmanship in one breath… and in the next – less than a minute later – it’s ‘Children clap clap begin… Go Kill!’ Gimme a break! What about giving the combatants,” he threw a quick glance to Morgan, “namely us, a little time to get ready? A little breather before the big event.”

  Rego stood in motionless silence for a long moment, eyes never wavering from Taz’s. And then came the smile, one that would have left little doubt in anyone’s mind as to the level of the vampire’s mental cohesion.

  “Let it not be said that Rego was not gracious in victory and fair to those he has conquered.” He stopped to snap his fingers and the pair of waiting child killers stepped back. “You have two minutes. Make them count.”

  The sound of material ripping brought Taz’s head around to look at Morgan. He found her tearing a strip from the bottom of her shirt and binding it around her wrist. Tying it into a knot using her other hand and her teeth, she glanced up to find Taz’s eyes on her and slowed to a stop.

  “What?” She waited, then when he didn’t speak, finished tying her makeshift bandage and then checked the clips in her pistols.

  “We should make a plan.”

  Morgan shrugged. “They attack, we kill them as fast as we can, take as many as we can down and, if we get an opportunity, take that bastard out. Other than that, we try to stay alive – as unlikely as that is.”

  Taz angled a surreptitious glance at their Cabal antagoniser who, at that moment, was surrounded by a group of his adoring cadre; basking in their adulation like a rock star backstage in the aftermath of a particularly rousing concert. He seemed to take little or no notice of his captives.

  “Look at the son of a bitch,” Taz kept his voice low, hoping that Rego was so involved that their conversation would go unnoticed. “I’m betting he’s so arrogant, so close to complete mental meltdown he really believes we’re toast and he’s already won.”

  “And he may not be far from wrong,” Morgan said, eyes flicking upward at the ceiling. “I haven’t heard any gunfire or noise from upstairs. Kane and Fallon might be dead. It could be just you and me against –“ she gave a tired wave toward Rego and his pack, “all that’s left.”

  “You might be right. But we’re still standing and as long as we are, there’s hope.” Taz moved closer, taking her by the shoulders. “Follow my lead, okay?”

  Before she could acknowledge, he pulled her against him, lowering his mouth to her neck and peppering it with slow, passionate kisses.

  “I’m going to take for granted there’s more to this than indulging your libido,” Morgan whispered.

  “I would love nothing more than to have the time to indulge,” Taz answered between little sucking bites. “But, no. Just a little hunch, maybe it won’t work. But if I’m right, the bond might give us a burst of renewed energy. Brace yourself…”

  He swooped, singing his fangs deep into her throat, groaning with the first rush of fiery, sweet Necuno blood against his palate. Three healthy gulps, hopefully just enough.

  “Okay… your turn,” he said, after forcing himself to pull away from her. He lifted his wrist and bit deep before pressing the welling wound to Morgan’s lips. “Take out your opponent as fast as possible and move as close as you can to Rego,” he told her when she stepped away.

  “And there was I thinking I’d like to spend some time getting to know them first,” Morgan replied.

  “Yeah, well… they’re a little too light on the conversation for my tastes,” Taz quipped back, reaching across to give her arm a sympathetic squeeze. “If we… no, when we get back to Shadowfall, you and me…” he left the sentence unfinished.

  “Young love, so sweet,” Rego’s voice reached them. “It won’t last, you know. Nothing lasts.” A brief look of sadness passed over his face before his habitual sneer returned. “Everything the young Prince touches dies. You are not the one for him, another comes and she will show you the truth.” He pointed at two of the young vampires standing before him. “Kill them.”

  “Show time,” Taz whispered, and barely had time to get it spoken when what appeared to be the eldest of the two, a boy of maybe thirteen or fourteen, propelled himself at Taz like a flesh and blood SCUD missile – head first, claws extended.

  Taz stood his ground, waiting until the last second to pivot leftward, away from the attack. He caught the young vamp by the throat and the scruff of the neck and dug in, allowing the boy to continue his momentum. A sudden and mighty jerk upward snapped the boy’s neck and Taz gripped him by the back of his pants and tossed him back in the direction from where he attacked. Morgan took the easier option and as soon as the second boy moved toward her, she brought her gun up and shot him in the head.

  A flick of Rego’s wrist brought another two barrelling out of the pack and the fight began in earnest.

  Taz’s was another teenager-proper, a big boned African-American in gang-garb – ‘do rag, hoodie, slouched jeans with boxers showing, and teardrop tattoos down the corners of both eyes. His advance was careful, calculated, guard up like he’d been trained.

  Taz decided to drag this one out, to dance a little. He allowed the boy to get in a couple of good solid left and right hooks, then guided him so he was backing toward the rim of the circle. When they were less than three feet away, Taz feinted letting the boy’s roundhouse daze him. When the over-confident young vampire moved in for the kill, Taz dropped and delivered a battering ram punch to his groin. The boy went down like a felled tree and Taz tore out his throat.

  With each pack member they defeated, Taz and Morgan moved a little closer to Rego. He didn’t appear to notice, too focused on issuing orders, until Morgan found herself within touching distance. Hoping Taz could see where she was, she launched herself toward Rego, emptying her clip into his chest as she moved. She knew the bullets wouldn’t kill him, but hoped that they would weaken and anger him to the point where he would make a mistake. Reaching the now screaming ex-Cabal vampire, she used her body weight to knock him to the ground and rolled out of reach.

  Taz moved then, grabbing the closest child soldier and flinging her at Rego as the Cabal apprentice struggled to recover from Morgan’s surprise attack
. The young girl’s body slammed into her bleeding master, knocking him into the wall behind him, and Taz hit him with a flying shoulder smash.

  Rego recovered almost immediately. He clutched two fistfuls of Taz’s shirtfront and reversed their positions.

  “You are mine now, Nikaran,” he roared, digging into Taz’s chest with his steel-tipped fingers. I will rip out your heart and feast on it! The way you ripped out mine many years ago.”

  With Rego’s attention on Taz, his control on the minds of the child pack faltered, sending them into confusion. They milled around, clutching their heads and screaming while Morgan rose to her feet. Knowing she only had seconds before Rego killed Taz, she looked around for a weapon she could use. Spying one pack member clutching a baseball bat, she set off at a run, snatching it from his hands and heading toward Rego and Taz.

  Swinging it, she landed a blow on Rego’s head hard enough to have killed any human. Unfortunately, Rego wasn’t human and, while it knocked the Cabal apprentice away from Taz, it did not drop him. He shook off her blow like a bull elephant would shrug off a bee sting and roared at the top of his lungs, swinging to lash out in blind fury. His wild punch caught Morgan in the chest, dead centre, and knocked her the length of the room where she smashed into the stacked crates and bounced off the wall with a sickening thud.

  “NO!” Taz stared at Morgan’s unmoving form, and a haze of anger enveloped him. The attack he launched on Rego was frenzied, uncaring of his own safety and Rego turned to meet him with a howl.

  Morgan lay amongst the debris of the crates, pain radiating from her right shoulder. Inch by slow painful inch, she rolled herself onto her left side, struggling to focus on the fight going on not far away. Swallowing against the waves of sickness flowing over her with every breath, she curled her left hand around one of the splintered pieces of wood and carefully, slowly, struggled to her feet. Neither man noticed, too intent on killing each other, as she moved closer and closer to them. Every step was pure agony, and she knew what she planned would either get her killed or knock her out cold.

  A sudden feint from Taz brought Rego’s back to her and Morgan made her move. Pushing through the pain, she shot forward and drove the wood into Rego’s back, twisting it up at an angle. The force of it sent him forward into Taz.

  And it happened in an instant, a glimmer of combined reflex and blazing, red rage. As Rego tottered forward, on an irreversible collision course with the murderously enraged Taz, he threw up both hands to regain his balance. Taz’s eyes focused on the Cabal Apprentice’s spiky finger weapons and, as Rego drew near, the Nikaran grabbed his elbow, clutched his wrist and bent his hand back, pointed at his own face. A firm and well-aimed shove sent the apprentice’s steel-tipped forefinger deep into his eye socket and into his brain.

  Rego loosed a high-pitched shriek, stiffened and convulsed for a moment, then collapsed.

  In less than a minute, it was over.

  Chapter 14

  The remaining pack members hadn’t noticed the death of their leader and, for a moment, Taz and Morgan stood frozen over Rego’s rapidly decomposing body.

  “Can you walk?” Taz asked, casting an eye across her bruised and battered form.

  “I will crawl if I have to,” Morgan replied, hoarsely. She raised her head to look at him. “His sudden breaking of the link has destroyed their minds. Move slowly, stay away from the them and they won’t attack.”

  “Speaking from experience?”

  Her clipped “yes” ended the conversation. Stepping over the body, she drew level with Taz. “Let’s get out of here.”

  They headed toward the stairs leading up to the main house, careful to avoid contact of any sort with the screaming vampire children. A walk that should have taken only a couple of minutes took almost twenty. Going up the stairs, with the pack behind them, was hard on Taz’s nerves. Every sound made him flinch, expecting at any moment to have to spin and defend them both from attack. He released a breath he didn’t realise he’d been holding when they exited through the door and pushed it closed.

  Morgan dragged a chair from the room opposite and wedged it under the handle.

  “That should hold them for a few minutes, at least.”

  Taz nodded, his mind on the silence of the main house and he wondered how Fallon and Kane had fared. “We should –“

  “Get outside,” Morgan interrupted. She pushed him back into movement.

  The question which had nagged them both was answered when they exited the house. Bodies were strewn in a trail from the inner foyer to the front gate. A trail that ended where the group had parked their vehicles. A trail of decomposing corpses that, sadly, included Queen Qetsiyah – Kizzy – and her nephew.

  “The little bastard got to her before we could stop him,” Fallon told them.

  “And I put him down,” added Kane, with a look somewhere between revulsion and regret. “He just stood there, waiting for it, with a grin on his face.”

  “Who’s next in line for the Rroma crown?” Morgan asked, passing by all three men and heading to the trunk of the car she and Taz had arrived in.

  “Hard to say,” Kane replied. “The House Lords will all be called to council. It’ll probably take a while.” He watched as Morgan hefted out a large container. “Is there something wrong with your arm?”

  “I think Rego dislocated my shoulder.” She dropped the first container and reached in for a second.

  “It needs popping back into place.”

  “I know, but we need to finish the job first.” She waved at the three containers still in the car. “Make yourselves useful and pour this around the house. Block all exits except the back door. Once we set it alight, the remaining pack will try to escape. We should be able to pick them off if we contain their escape route.”

  Fallon and Kane picked up a container each and headed off. Before Taz could do the same, Morgan caught his arm.

  “I need you to put my shoulder back.”

  Taz nodded and gently laid his hand on her shoulder. “Ready?”

  “Yes… no! Wait!” Morgan sucked in a deep breath, then gave him a jerky nod. “Okay. Now. Ready.”

  He gave her barely enough time to get the words out before grabbing hold of her wrist, bearing down on her shoulder and giving the arm a quick and violent jerk. The resulting pop was drowned out by Morgan’s choked growl and her legs gave way beneath her.

  “I got you, baby,” Taz moved in to loop an arm around her waist. “I got you –“ always, he left the last word unspoken. But the, there was no need to give it voice. Somehow, he sensed that she knew.

  As if to affirm his inner knowing, Morgan nodded, buried her face against his shoulder and snatched in a snuffling breath before righting herself again. “We… need to give Kane and Fallon a hand.”

  “Kane and Fallon are fine,” he told her. “You need to give yourself a minute. I think we could both use a breather, to be honest.”

  “We can’t afford to, not until we know we’ve got them all.” She gave a wave toward the car. “There should be a field medic kit in the car somewhere. Help me strap my arm up and then we’ll drag whatever remains are left and throw them into the house before we light it up.”

  He could have argued, but if there was one thing he’d learned about this woman in the time they’d been together, it was how determined she could be once her mind was made up. Stubborn? Mules weren’t stubborn. Morgan was the proverbial immovable object.

  It took a short time to rig a sling for her arm, then they both carted what was left of Kizzy and her nephew into the rear of the house, dropping their decomposing carcasses at the back door and moving a safe distance away as Fallon and Kane finished blocking the front and side exits in preparation for the final step.

  “We’d better hurry. I can hear them stumbling around near the kitchen,” Morgan told the group. “They’ll be coming out that door in droves the minute they feel the heat.” She looked around. “Fallon, Kane, if you two start the fire, Taz and I will
get into position.”

  The two vampires disappeared into the shadows along the sides of the house, jogging back a minute or two later. Moments afterwards, all bore witness to the brightening inner glow that signified the spread of fire within the structure. And almost immediately a cluster of small bodies appeared in the rear doorway.

  Morgan opened fire, dropping the first group, so they formed a barricade against the deluge of their fellow survivors. A full five minutes of constant gunfire from the four defenders and the doorway was dammed shut. In the minutes that followed, the blaze had done its work.

  “Jesus…” Taz whispered, stiffening against the waves of iciness that rolled down his spine, listening to the piteous shrieks of the dying pack. Not that he believed a God, a Devil, a Heaven but if there was a Hell, he hoped Rego’s soul would fry there like those innocents he’d condemned to the inferno within.

  Stony-faced Morgan approached the house and walked around the perimeter to ensure there had been no escapees. Taz met her halfway round.

  “Doesn’t it bother you?” he demanded. “They were children, innocent children!”

  Morgan sighed and stopped walking. “I can’t let it bother me. If I did that, I wouldn’t be able to do my job. I didn’t make this situation. I didn’t turn them. But I can stop them hurting others and that’s what I focus on.” She cupped his cheek with her palm. “Think about what they’ve done. You wouldn’t second-guess your responsibility had it been done by a grown man. They may have had the bodies of children, but they stopped being children the minute Rego took them.”

  “Yeah… yeah,” Taz nodded, swallowing against the bile that rose in his throat and he tried to ignore the last of the screams from within the now roaring inferno. “There’s a part of me that knows that. Or, at least, keeps telling myself that. Maybe a few hours, a few days from now, I might even believe it.”