by C. L. Quinn
Alvin saw the ax in Bas’s hand just moments before he raised it.
Suddenly, Alvin couldn’t bear it. He saw a red neon light glowing in the distance and pulled out every last drop of energy in his body to vampire-speed there in the hope there may be some option, some chance to survive. It was a slim chance, but the blade hadn’t landed yet.
With a deep sigh of frustration, Bas followed him. The building Alvin had entered was the bar they’d met Eillia in earlier that night. Oh, fuck…
As he shattered through the already broken front door, he saw no sign of Alvin. That meant only one thing. He’d found Daniel. Eillia would be pissed, maybe heartbroken, he still wasn’t sure what was going on with her and this human. But he couldn’t let Alvin kill him. It seemed all manner of crazy that he was going to save the man who headed the team of killers who destroyed his home. But then this past year had brought changes to his life he could never have believed. So he headed to the storeroom to confront Alvin.
Eillia dropped her head into her hands. So, after they got Tamesine in the car, she’d go to the Bully to do a final compel for Daniel, and erase herself from his life forever. Then go home. The relief that this was finished was overshadowed by the loss she knew she would feel for Daniel. Bizarre, how she’d spent the first part of last year mourning Hamid, and she’d spend the first part of this one mourning the man who had been involved in his death. Karma and fate had a lot to answer for when it came to her life. It seemed ungrateful to question them when they brought love back to her. But she did. Their methods were suspect. And yet, Eillia knew, sometimes the universe has plans for us we cannot see. That didn’t make it wrong.
Park caressed Eillia’s hair with the softest touch. She could feel her friend’s pain. They had all been through so much this past year, both awful and beautiful.
“Eillia, are you ready to go? Do you need anything?”
Eillia thought of her little cabin. It had been home and haven for so long. Was there anything there she wanted? She thought of Daniel’s jacket that she’d held onto so dearly since she’d climbed out of the grave. It couldn’t be part of her life anymore.
“No. I’m ready to go.”
“We can pick up Bas on the way. For some reason he’s at that bar. Maybe he’s just waiting for us there. He probably realizes you need to adjust the human man before we go. I know Bas. He’ll have two bottles of whiskey in him before we get there.”
With their arms around each other, Eillia and Park joined Koen and David in the car. Tamesine was lying down in the third row of seats. Park checked her to make sure she was still out.
“She’s fine. But the sooner we get her back to the council and permanently contained, the happier I’ll be. I haven’t forgotten my last visit with her.” She turned to Eillia. “Tamesine got the best of me by using her blood-bonded human to stab me in the heart. It hurt like hell and then I died. My first death. I hated it. That’s how she got away last time. Would really like to not repeat that, like, ever!”
“Then let’s get out of here. There’s nothing to keep me here anymore.”
“Alvin, what the fuck!? You cannot possibly think I’m going to let you get away this time.”
“I’ll slit this man’s throat. Your pretty little Asian isn’t going to like that. He’s her lover.”
“Really? And you think I’m going to trade your freedom for the life of the man who killed close friends and burned down my home?”
“If not, I’d be dead already. You wouldn’t hesitate. So, I’m taking him. Follow me, and I’ll carve my name in his throat before you behead me.”
Bas shook his head. This he didn’t need. Alvin wasn’t going to live through this. Of all the things he knew at this moment, that was one of them. He was pretty confident he could get to him before he killed Eillia’s boy. He wasn’t certain.
Bas didn’t take his eyes off Alvin. If the mewling nerd of a vampire moved even a fraction of an inch, he was going to speed forward and break his neck. Then use the ax to finish this. How pissed would Eillia be if Alvin killed this human man? No. How hurt would she be? She’d been through enough. He couldn’t let Alvin kill him. There had to be another way.
“Alright. I’ll lay the ax down. Just know that if you touch a hair on his head, you will have three first bloods after you. And you won’t get the pleasure of a swift death. They’ll take you back. Koen’s good, and I’ve found out that every once in a while, he likes a good torture. Ask your boy Shanks.”
Shanks. So, he’d lived. Well, big surprise. Alvin kept the knife tight against Daniel’s carotid. If he could do it, before he died, he’d really like to kill that asshole who betrayed him. Now, he just needed to survive. One more day at a time.
“I’m leaving now. Don’t follow me. I promise, I’ll slaughter this one.”
Alvin and Daniel disappeared. Bas threw the ax across the room and buried it in a heavy wood beam.
“Fuck!” he looked around the room and scaled the counter. Four different brands of whiskey. A mixture sounded good, so he opened all four and merged the amber liquids in one tall beer king. Then sat down to wait for the others to arrive.
The year had been incredible. He’d lost so much and gained so much. He wanted Alvin gone but the lust for revenge, or even justice, was less important than protecting what mattered. And that was family. Park, and his little miracle, Cairine. Friends who were more family because they’d been together so long. Eillia, who he had mourned more than anyone else he’d lost in the three hundred years since he’d been turned. And yet another miracle in getting her back. He hoped this coming year would be calmer. Bas put his feet up and watched the door.
David and Koen stayed in the car to watch Tamesine. Park and Eillia entered the bar, looking around confused as they noticed the doorway in splinters and the long vampire stretched out on a barstool with his feet up, finishing off a tall glass of whiskey. They knew immediately something was wrong.
“What?” Park said as she walked up to him.
Bas shook his head and looked past his wife to Eillia. “He’s gone. Alvin took your human. I’m sorry, but if I’d stopped him, he might have killed him before I could reach him.”
She didn’t move. Eillia felt as frozen as when Tamesine had done it to her. Daniel might be dead right now.
Park moved quickly to her side and placed her hands in Eillia’s. “Let me help you. We can search for him and find him. You’ve fed on him. Has he fed on you?”
Eillia nodded. “He was nearly dead from an accident in the snow. I fed him to heal him.”
“Well then you know we can find him.”
The two women merged again and let their spirit amulets increase their auras, sending their spirits out onto the air. They searched for one who had Eillia’s blood in him, and they found him. Eillia nearly dropped as she realized he was still alive. But they were moving very quickly. Vampires could move fast. First bloods could move faster.
Park dropped her hands as Eillia disappeared.
“Any more of that left? Or have you been a pig?”
“Whoa, lady. I would never leave you in need.”
He reached behind the bar and pulled up all four bottles, still half full.
“Let me make you a Bas specialty.”
“Specialty?”
“Yeah. Everything at once. Only way to go.”
Park laughed and walked to the doorway. She called out to Koen.
“Bring her in. I’ll tell you details when you get in here.”
Koen easily carried Tamesine’s still body in and dropped it carelessly on the floor, then walked over to join Bas.
Park looked hard at her father. “Really?”
“It isn’t going to hurt her, you know that.”
David stopped for a moment staring at her, and felt Park’s eyes on him.
“Don’t do it. You won’t get any satisfaction from anything you can do to her unconscious body.”
“I know. I just…”
He squatted dow
n beside her. “I can’t imagine what fucked her up so much. How can she be this insane? She’s first blood.”
Koen downed the entire glass Bas gave him. “She’s first blood. That means anything she does, she does extremely well. Including being the most dangerous psychotic on the planet. She’d already gone completely mental centuries ago. Looks like she had lots of time to hone it to perfection.”
Park squatted beside David and touched Tamesine’s forehead. “I really don’t know if we can help her. I want to try. I’m going to ask the council to keep her in my facility.”
Koen looked up sharply. “Hell, no, daughter. That facility I built for you is for your genetic research. Not for the criminally insane.”
“And I say there’s room for both projects. This falls into the category of my study anyway. Before, when I was a human geneticist, we worked on many projects at the lab. This is within my purview.”
“Park, darling, I wish you wouldn’t. I’d like her far away from my family.”
“And if it turns out I can’t help her, she will be. Trust me.”
Koen turned to Bas. Bas shrugged his shoulders. “She is every inch your daughter.”
“Thank god. Alright, Park, but you’re getting a first blood sentry on her twenty four seven.”
“I’ll accept that.” She paused. “Should I follow Eillia?”
“I will. Although she should easily overtake that nasty squeamish little vampire. He’s a disgrace to our race in every possible way. We should all be back soon.”
He was gone. Park joined David and Bas at the bar.
“Got any girlie drinks?”
Bas moaned.
On a frozen tundra not far from the airport, Eillia found Daniel sprawled freezing in only shirt, jeans, and snow boots against the hard packed ice-covered snow. He was unhurt, other than freezing to death with nothing to protect his fragile human body from hypothermia. She picked him up off the frigid land and looked around for Alvin. He was gone. He knew Eillia would stop for Daniel and that she would need to help him right away if he were to survive. Well played.
Quickly she wrapped her jacket around him and pulled him into her arms, tore her wrist to feed him, and positioned him to drink. As soon as her blood pooled in his mouth and tracked down his throat, he came somewhat alert and gingerly reached out to encircle her wrist with his own hand. He held it there and drew the warm blood into him. It tasted sharp and strange, and unusually compelling. She thought he had a memory of what he’d done before, since she’d removed all previous compels and it seemed he knew what she was doing. And that they were once again connected by blood. Sex followed a blood feed so naturally for a vampire, but she was surprised that, even in this condition, he wanted her. She held him close to let her own body heat warm him, and felt his penis stir and fill.
“Apparently the blood-sex connection goes both ways. Down, boy. And I mean that. Down. No time for that now.” As he drew from her, she caressed his wet hair with her other hand. He was so beautiful. She loved touching him. And feeling his touch. If she thought the past year had felt lonely, she knew the coming months might be worse. In spite of everything, she still wanted him.
Eillia felt his presence as he arrived and knelt beside her.
“Is he going to be okay?” Koen asked.
“Yes. The little vampire asshole knew I would stop to take care of him. It was a brilliant plan.”
“Well, we’ll get him. Tamesine can track him, and we have her. I’ll force her to find him.” Koen paused. “You look so sad, chèrie.”
“I am. I wish you could take my memories like I will take his. There’s peace to be found in that kind of ignorance. I don’t want to hurt anymore.”
“Yes, there is peace. But you will lose what makes life worth it all. I feel your connection to him. It’s deep. I won’t understand how it happened, but I think your spirits have connected. I think your heart belongs to him.”
Eillia looked up at her oldest friend, her eyes glistening. “But it can’t. I don’t know where we can go from here. It may take me decades to move past all of this and he will be old and have long moved on. I think that is best for him. I think it is best for me.”
“I trust your judgment. I honor your choice. I don’t agree with you, but you will know that soon enough. Let’s get him home.”
She nodded and picked up Daniel after she closed her wound. He was nearly fully conscious, so she told him to sleep and he did.
When they arrived back at the bar, she put him back into the storeroom, wakened him, and emptied his memories of anything to do with her or this night.
Eillia held his eyes with hers. He was a good man. He deserved peace. “Daniel, I want you to forget everything that has to do with the mission in Vancouver. You won’t remember Alvin, or any detail of the mission. It’s gone. Tell me, what were you going to do with your life when you retired?”
“I was going to move to Bali. Find some pretty girls, great booze, and a beach to lie on. No more death.”
She smiled. “Okay. That’s what you’re going to do. After I leave, you will go to your home, get a good night’s sleep, and then implement your plan. Go to Bali. Enjoy the beautiful girls and give them a great memory. Be happy, Daniel.”
Eillia joined her friends who were family by choice. “Take me home.”
The car did a couple of wild fishtails before it finally left the parking lot of the Wooly Bully for good.
Alvin watched the odd skyline behind him as the sun rose a little higher. He was pressed back against the cargo hold, because they would fly through daylight. He knew where he was heading. France. This was it. Past time. He would kill Bas’s woman and vampire child in front of him. Then Bas. And that hideous nutcase he’d thought was his karmic gift. God, he’d like to drink his fill of her and slaughter her beneath his feet. Big plans. But he realized that if he went into it with the idea that it was a suicide run…well aware he wouldn’t survive, that made him almost invincible.
“Lucy,” he whispered from his cold spot on the fuselage floor. “I’m coming to you soon.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The flight was smooth and uneventful. Eillia slept the entire way, her head on Park’s lap. Through the close physical contact with her, Park could feel her pain. She imagined how she would feel if she could never be with Bas again, and her own heart skipped a beat. She looked up at Bas, who was resting in another seat across from them. His eyes had been closed, but he stirred and then opened them suddenly to see his wife’s deep green gaze on him. He mouthed the words I love you, and waited for her to respond the same. His eyes closed again, but a small smile curved his lips.
Park brushed Eillia’s hair from her forehead. She was so loved. An endless number of people would help her to rediscover the joy in her life, both at Koen’s villa and her own. As passionate as Eillia was, Park knew it wouldn’t be long before she found another lover. It would take her mind off Daniel. She had to agree with Eillia that their history may be insurmountable. His part in Hamid’s death was too fresh, too raw, too real. Her own emotions were a little ragged, too. Another dear friend of hers was lost in that attack, and very nearly everyone she loved. Park wasn’t sure she could stand having Daniel around as a reminder of that loss either. Harsh choices had to be made. They would all be there for Eillia. She’d be okay.
Everyone welcomed Eillia with tears and open arms. A dozen of her closest friends had flown in to Koen’s villa to see her. Members of her household were there to welcome home their mistress. Bas had notified them of her survival, but let them know that she would spend some time in his home before she returned to hers. They understood.
The greatest moment for Eillia was meeting Bas and Park’s child, one of the rarest people on earth…a first blood baby. While “made” vampires were ordinarily barren, it was possible for them to breed with a first blood. But it was extraordinarily rare. Even some humans could produce a child with a first blood. So to hold Cairine, a perfect first blood child just short
of a year old, made her tear. And she knew it would all be alright. This child was such a beautiful miracle. Eillia held her often the first days she stayed with Koen. Bas and Park had moved to France to be with her father just after the tragedy last year, staying with him in his huge villa on the Mediterranean until their own home was finished in a few more months.
For the next week, it was a nonstop celebration filled with food, drink, dancing, and raucous laughter.
Eillia was grateful for her friends and their warm welcomes. It showed how much she was loved. Koen had spared no expense to celebrate her rebirth.
But she was desperate to be alone. Just for a little while. To clear her mind. It was all so much. One thing she did know, though. She wanted to stay here for a while. Her staff understood, and they eventually went home to care for her property and the various animals and pets who had waited all year to see their master’s faces again. Well, the one who would be coming home eventually. Hamid’s dog would have to settle for her.
After the week ended and everyone said a reluctant goodbye, Eillia was able to find the solace she sought. Park, her close friend Burne, and Eillia would just sit on the balconies and talk quietly, or walk on the beach together in gentle chats with large mugs of hot chocolate. It was much nicer than the celebrations from her first week home. Eillia needed this. No responsibilities. No choices to make. No pressure at all for any reason. Just an easy night with desperately needed good sleep.
On one such lovely night, three weeks after Eillia’s homecoming, Park suggested they head into the city to shop.
“You are more than welcome to wear anything I have, my sister, but let’s go in and have a girls extravaganza. Pick out some beautiful jewel tones to compliment your exotic coloring. Get some pastries at Ladurée. How about it?”
