Nightwalker

by Jocelynn Drake

  “You can’t remember because we didn’t want you to remember,” Jabari stated.

  “We?”

  “The Coven. We needed to know who could control you. You can be quite an effective weapon.”

  I gritted my teeth and tried again to move my head away from his touch, and again I couldn’t, which made his smile widen.

  “Sadira can control you,” Jabari continued. “Tabor could, and so can I. Surprisingly, a couple of Tabor’s children could as well, so we naturally assumed that it was a matter of finding the proper bloodlines.”

  “There were others?” A new horror dug its claws into my flesh. There were no memories to drag up, but I could easily imagine the scene: me playing the puppet for the amusement of the Coven and its lackeys.

  “A few. We ran some experiments. Unfortunately, most of those we found who could control you had to be destroyed. We couldn’t let our little secret out. We also had to make sure you didn’t know. There would always be the chance of someone reading your mind and discovering your unique ability.”

  “So I’ve been allowed to live this long so the Coven could pull my leash at any moment,” I said. Something flashed in Jabari’s eyes for half a second, a random thought I wasn’t supposed to know. “What?” I snapped. “Something about the Coven?” I watched him as his expression hardened, and I smiled back at him. “Not everyone can do it,” I slowly said. “Not everyone on the Coven can control me.” My smile widened and his expression went purposefully blank. I was right. “That must be an ugly sticking point for someone.” My mind quickly rifled through the other members of the Coven; Macaire and Elizabeth. Tabor, my other leash holder, was gone. Could I have been the reason for his final demise?

  “You’re very lucky to have survived so long,” Jabari said. “Wisely, you chose to fulfill the requests of the Coven, giving you a purpose and the illusion that you would obey our wishes.”

  “All the Coven asked of me was to keep the peace and protect our secret. Not an entirely unreasonable request,” I replied, with a slight shrug that made me instantly wish I hadn’t moved my hurt shoulder.

  “And now we have this problem,” Jabari growled, his eyes sliding over to Danaus, who was closely watching the exchange. The hunter pushed to his feet, wincing at the movement, but at least he was standing. I still wasn’t sure I could.

  “We naturally assumed that you could only be controlled by your own kind,” Jabari continued. “That’s not good, my desert flower; particularly since there are questions about your loyalty.”

  “There are few who have done anything to earn my loyalty,” I replied, causing him to frown. I liked it better than his smile at the moment. “But it doesn’t matter. You will only let me live until you find a way to create another like me.”

  “If you live that long,” Jabari said, moving his finger from beneath my chin. If I still breathed, I think I would have sighed with relief. The Ancient stood before me, staring down as if weighing something. “The naturi know you are the key to stopping them. Enough of them survived Machu Picchu to know that you were the one who sealed the door. You were right. They were trying to kill you in Aswan, not me. I believe they were also trying to kill you in London, but they killed Tabor’s child instead. You have always been their target.”

  “If I’m so damned important, why send me to protect Sadira? Why not send someone else?”

  “We needed bait.”

  “Bait?”

  “To draw out Rowe. We knew he would come after you again. The chance to kill you is too much of a temptation.”

  I closed my eyes, trying to ignore the knot of tears that had grown in the back of my throat. It seemed I was becoming everyone’s favorite target. “And killing Rowe would end this? It would stop the naturi?” My voice trembled as I fought for control of my emotions.

  “Rowe is the last known leader of the naturi,” Danaus volunteered.

  My head snapped up to look at him, meeting his glittering blue eyes as he watched me. “You used me too,” I whispered.

  To his credit, he didn’t look away, but continued to hold my horrified gaze. “Yes. When he tried to take you in Aswan, I realized that you must have some other importance that you either were not telling me or didn’t remember. I thought he would make another grab for you.”

  “Well, you both missed your chance to end this. Rowe had me in London, threatening to kidnap me,” I said bitterly. “It would have meant destroying me, but I can only guess that you both have other plans for me still.”

  “Mira…” Sadira began in a placating voice.

  “I’ve heard enough!” I shouted.

  “So have I!” mocked a horrible voice from behind me. I didn’t need to look around to see who had spoken. I knew by the sound, the tone, the look of complete shock on the faces of the others who had spoken. With a burst of sheer terror, I tried to lurch forward, but he grabbed me by the hair, wrapping it around his fist. Jerking me backward, he pulled me into the darkness and out of the Compound in less than a heartbeat. Rowe had finally caught me.

  Twenty-Nine

  The darkness gave way suddenly to a moonlit plain hugged by a desolate ribbon of road. I slowly pushed up into a sitting position so I could look around. Rowe took a few stumbling steps away from me before finally collapsing to his knees in the grass. Bent over, his fingers clutching the grass, he struggled for air. His whole body was trembling, his shirt sticking to his narrow frame as if he were sweating profusely. All this flitting from place to place was taking its toll on him.

  Digging my nails into the dirt, I started to pull my legs beneath me so I could rise. My whole body screamed in pain and the world swayed slightly. I was too low on blood to pick a fight and expect to win, but at least Rowe was in ragged shape as well.

  “Watch her,” Rowe bit out without looking over at me.

  Until he spoke, my gaze had not drifted beyond him. Now, I lifted my eyes to see six naturi of various size and clans approaching us warily. And beyond them rose the pale monoliths of Stonehenge. They were attempting the sacrifice tonight, and for some bizarre reason, Rowe had decided he needed me on hand to witness their triumph.

  “Shit,” I hissed, lowering my head. I was in no shape to take on seven naturi alone.

  A wheezing laugh escaped Rowe. He was kneeling on the ground with his forearms in the grass in front of him. His head was turned toward me, his black hair partially obscuring his face, but I could still see the smirk twisting his lips.

  “Oh, like you’re in any better shape than me,” I snarled.

  “At least I have someone to protect me,” he said, pushing into a sitting position with pain-filled slowness.

  I looked back at the naturi standing before us. A female with pale blond hair that fell to her waist stepped forward. She extended one hand and flames danced over her fingers. Naturally, one of my keepers was a member of the light clan.

  “It doesn’t have to be like this, Mira,” Rowe said.

  “Go to hell, Rowe,” I snapped, my gaze never wavering from the six naturi standing before me.

  A harsh clutter of words jumped from Rowe that I couldn’t understand. Several of the naturi briefly expressed surprise and confusion, but after a moment they backed away, returning to the inner circle of stones.

  Silence crept back over the plain. The air was still, waiting. It was only after the naturi retreated back into the shadows of the stones that I noticed the soft sounds of a woman crying. The naturi had their sacrifice waiting in the darkness, surrounded by great bluestones. Where the hell was Jabari? He could move from place to place in an instant. He should have been able to locate me wherever I was. Why hadn’t he appeared yet? If he were there, I knew we could stop this now. I’d even have settled for Sadira or Danaus, but I knew it would take several more minutes for either of them to reach me.

  I dragged my fingers through the earth, digging narrows furrows in the soft dirt. The grass was moist, as if it had rained recently. Beneath me, I could feel the strange hum of
power beginning to build. Had they begun the sacrifice already? I couldn’t see most of the naturi, as they remained hidden behind the giant stones, but I could hear the faint sound of movement; breathing, the soft swish of clothing.

  “You can feel it, can’t you?” Rowe said. The weight of his stare was a physical pressure on my shoulders, but I refused to look over at him. “You could feel it while you were at Machu Picchu. In those last days, Nerian didn’t need to touch you, the power in the mountain was enough to have you writhing in pain.”

  I shook my head. I wasn’t going to let him play mind games with me. “Just stop. You weren’t there,” I replied.

  “I was there,” he murmured. My gaze jerked over to him at the sound of movement. He crawled a couple feet closer but remained out of arm’s reach. “Every day and every night of your captivity, I was there. You just don’t remember because I looked a little different back then.”

  “Years not been kind?” I mocked.

  His face twisted into a look of anger and hatred for a split second before he could wipe it away. “I’m sure the years have scarred us both in interesting ways.”

  “Why bring me here? I could still stop your sacrifice, destroy all your plans.” I smiled at him as I sat up. I rubbed my hands together, knocking off the dirt.

  Rowe sat up as well, seeming to move with a little more ease and less obvious pain. We were both slowly regaining our strength. “Because the reward is worth the risk.”

  A laugh escaped me before I could stop it. “Killing me is worth that much to you?”

  Rowe shoved his left hand through his hair, threading some of it behind his left ear so it no longer fell in front of his one eye. A white scar ran along his jaw and seemed to glow against his tanned skin in the moonlight. “My goal is not to kill you.”

  I snorted in response, and Rowe said something under his breath in his own language, frustration filling his voice. He looked over at the arrangement of stones for a moment before turning back to me again.

  “It doesn’t have to be like this between us.”

  “What? The naturi have graciously decided to stop killing nightwalkers?”

  This time he was the one to snort. “No, nightwalkers are vermin. They need to be exterminated. I meant between you and the naturi.”

  “I am a nightwalker, asshole.”

  “But you were never meant to be,” he said, leaning toward me as his voice dropped to an urgent whisper. “You never should have been made into one of their kind. Your powers reach beyond their limitations. You could have been more. You still could be.”

  I leaned back, trying to keep some distance between us. With him sitting this close, it was hard to resist the urge to take a swipe at him, but I didn’t stand a chance with his compatriots just a few yards away. “Let me guess, you can help me become more,” I sneered.

  “You can feel the power here, and no other vampire can. When they swarmed Machu Picchu centuries ago, not one of them reacted the way you do. You can still feel the earth despite being a nightwalker,” he explained. “It’s still a part of you because it’s more powerful than anything you’ve gained through becoming a nightwalker. You belong with us, not them.”

  A slow chuckle built until my head finally fell backward, my laughter filling the plain, silencing the soft plaintive cries from the woman doomed to die tonight. “Save your breath. I’ve heard this speech before, though it was more interesting the first time. At Machu Picchu, you guys were just trying to convince me to kill my own kind. Now you want me to believe that I belong among you.”

  “Can you honestly tell me you feel you belong among your own kind? Hmmm, Fire Starter?”

  The laugh died inside of me. “It doesn’t matter.”

  “You can end the war tonight,” Rowe softly said.

  “By killing you?”

  “By completing the sacrifice.”

  My brow furrowed as I stared at him for a long time, letting the silence grow between us. “What are you talking about?” I asked, my voice dropping to match his softness.

  “If you complete the sacrifice, the seal will be broken permanently. You made it. If you break it, the nightwalkers will never be able to recreate it again. We end this battle forever.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  “I kill you now.”

  “And if I do?”

  “You walk away. The naturi shall never bother you again.”

  “But I will be branded a traitor and will be hunted by my own kind until the end of my nights,” I said with a shake of my head.

  “Then break the seal and remain with us,” he offered, stunning me. “I am consort to the queen, and you will be under my protection. The naturi will never harass you and the nightwalkers will never touch you.”

  I turned my head to look back at Stonehenge for a second before letting my eyes fall shut. In the hands of the naturi, I was a weapon against the nightwalkers. And while among the nightwalkers, I was a weapon against the naturi. Without ever knowing it, I had managed to dig a heel into both worlds.

  Planting both of my hands into the dirt, I pushed off and rose to my feet. Beside me there was a soft rustle of clothing as Rowe stood. He stuck close to me as I slowly walked past the first circle of stones and into the inner circle. The other six naturi circled the woman lying on the ground. Her wrists had been bound together and then tied to a stake in the ground above her head. Her ankles were also bound together and staked so that she was stretched out, her body running east to west. She had short, dark brown hair and her round face was streaked with tears. The smell of her blood filled the air, as her wrists were rubbed raw from her struggles.

  “What do you need me to do?” I asked, staring down at her.

  Rowe stepped in front of me and gently grabbed my chin, tilting my head up so I was forced to look him in the eye. “You will do this?”

  “It’s time to end this war.”

  A half smile lifted one corner of his mouth briefly and he nodded. “You must cut out her heart and place it on the ground. Her blood must saturate the earth before we burn her heart.”

  I had to be sure. I couldn’t make any mistakes now. As Rowe stepped back to my side, I took a step closer to the woman. She stared up with wide eyes, pleading silently with me to free her. But I couldn’t. She was the only human in the area. As long as she lived, she could serve as a sacrifice for the naturi whatever I did. The best I could do for her was make it quick.

  Staring down at her, I focused on her heart. The slender woman gasped suddenly, shattering the silence in the night air. Her body arched off the ground and all the naturi took a step backward. The woman jerked again, this time screaming.

  “What’s happening?” someone demanded.

  “It’s the nightwalker! She’s killing the woman,” another voice snarled, but I didn’t look up. I remained focused on the woman’s chest until her pale blue shirt with pearl buttons finally started to blacken and catch on fire.

  “Stop her!”

  Rowe grabbed me and threw me backward into one of the enormous stones, breaking my concentration. I fell back to the ground, my eyes clenched shut as I waited to see if I’d hit the stone with enough force to knock loose the other stone balanced on top of it. When I wasn’t immediately crushed, I opened my eyes, trying to ignore the pain throbbing to life along my spine and in the back of my skull.

  “Can we still use the woman?” Rowe demanded, looking briefly over his shoulder at the woman, who was no longer moving.

  “The heart has been destroyed,” someone else confirmed.

  The naturi with the eye patch turned back to me, a knife clutched in his right hand. “Then we will try it with her heart,” Rowe proclaimed.

  I dug my heels into the earth and tried to scoot backward, but I was halted by giant stone sticking up from the earth. I had used the last of my powers to kill that poor woman, and now I had nothing left to save myself.

  My only warning was a slight building of pressure, a shift in the powers that fille
d the circle, and then Jabari was standing beside me.

  Rowe and the other naturi jumped back, gathering on the other side of the circle, the woman’s corpse between us. The knife in his hand trembled as he stared at the Ancient, his breath hissing between clenched teeth.

  “You cannot have her,” Jabari proclaimed.

  Rowe hunched forward, then a low growl escaped him as giant wings exploded from his back. As black as a moonless night, the fully extended wings were more than nine feet long from tip to tip and resembled those of a bat. “You cannot keep her forever,” he snarled, pointing his knife at Jabari.

  I looked up at my onetime mentor and protector to see a wide grin split his handsome face. He extended his arm so his hand was nearly over my head. Power immediately surged through my body, ripping a whimper from my throat. It was as if strings had been attached to various parts of my body and I was pulled back to my feet. There was no voice in my head commanding me, but I could feel a presence, a subtle push of power. There was nothing to fight. Nothing to push or struggle against. I was merely a spectator in my own body. Reduced to a mere marionette.

  A second wave of power pushed through my body, nearly blinding me with pain. My left arm lifted and three of the naturi exploded into balls of fire. I could feel the member of the light clan trying to extinguish the fires, but she was no match. She was engulfed in flames next.

  With a single flap of the enormous wings, Rowe launched himself into the air. “See you with the dead,” he bit out, and then he was gone, leaving behind the last two naturi to be burned alive.