A Curse Of Glass And Iron (Dark Heralds Book 2)

by Lynn S.

  If Marissa couldn’t give him a child, then at least she’d serve him as sustenance. Francis had not tasted that intoxicating blood since the day Carla and Isabel offered precious droplets mixed with milk and honey in an effort to trade in place of Esteban.

  ***

  Garan felt his lips moisten. His connection to Francis Alexander was so perfect, so in synch, that he tasted blood as the Sidhe fed. This was not the ravenous feeding of a vampire, but something that implied a degree of ritual.

  Thick drops of blood ran sluggishly to be caught on the tip of his tongue. No doubt it came from a wound expertly and carefully made in order to not disturb his victim. The vampire counted three small incisions in the back of the neck, following, through Alexander’s eyes, the elegant and delicate curves that betrayed female anatomy.

  Garan’s hands no longer felt kept in place by Killian’s. His hands roamed freely, along with Francis, caressing the soft skin of a woman half asleep.

  In a given moment he felt her soft breath escape between his fingers and traced the shape of her lips as the Sidhe did so to keep her spell bound. The smell of her hair was glorious; it reminded him of a long lost time in which he’d seen the sun rise over lavender fields, right at that moment where the heat of the day stirred the sweetest fragrance. Marissa Salgado tasted like dew drops of youth and wine of old age and he wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anything.

  The vampire had a moment of weakness and uncertainty. Taken by surprise with a surge in feelings, Garan was not sure if the attraction he experienced was something coming from him or Francis Alexander. It was inconceivable for him that seeing through someone else’s eyes could trigger something so intimate.

  On one hand, he wanted to tear through the source of that blood with frenzy, biting and tearing until that tempting red on the tip of his tongue ran like a river, bathing him in warmth. On the other hand, he wanted to guide the Sidhe to stop his torture of the woman and turn about her face. Garan wanted to see her, not through the mist and memory of Adriana, but up close.

  Perceiving someone else, Marissa woke on her own, as Francis had finished feeding. She hardly felt the sting of the feed, the pain subdued as her gray eyes opened, bewildered and questioning. She turned, resting her hands on the side of Francis’s face, looking for the comfort of the familiar. But her eyes saw beyond. She couldn’t help it and asked, “Who are you?”

  She could guess at him, that curious creature touched by Light and Shadows, seeing him as clearly as he saw her.

  Garan followed her cues, knitting his brow and curling his lips with curiosity. A very human mistake the dweller allowed, for which both would pay dearly.

  “Just give me a second, love. I’ll fix you a nice cup of tea. It looks like you were having one of those waking nightmares once again.” Francis gave Marissa a quick peck on the cheek and left her to wake completely. He knew the smile that took form on his lips seconds before was not his at all. Someone was watching. Francis whispered to himself as he made his way to the kitchen. His voice was soft as a prayer, his intentions not at all pious.

  “Is that you, my prince? I wonder what are you doing snooping into somebody else’s business when there are so many things to entertain yourself with.” This time, Alexander smiled, and the sinister smirk was all his own.

  Garan felt the fairy’s attack as a physical blow. It forced his eyes open. The vision was not meant for him, but for Killian. Now it was just the vampire’s turn to be the conduit. The vampire simply witnessed, impotent, but the prince felt it all, bitterly, the pain of his past made alive once more, and then some.

  It was Zaira, his mortal wife. Standing at the edge of a cliff, her dark hair waving in the afternoon breeze. There was a swollen cut on top of her eyelid that made her bleed profusely and forced it shut. Violence had been done to such a fair face, blood upon the perfect skin he once showered in devoted kisses. Her clothes were stained with grass, soil, and blood. Annand hovered one meter above the wounded woman, drawing a sword meant to carry the designs of an unspeakable fate…

  The prince broke the connection, pushing against Garan. The vampire was still serving as channel and didn’t fully wake until body and chair crashed against the floor. Even understanding what just happened, it took the vampire a great deal of will not to unleash an attack. Their little experiment had disturbed Garan’s own transition and it took Brigitte to settle the dweller back in.

  Through all this chaos, the prince made his way out of the house in a hurry. As he pushed the heavy ebony doors, Killian met Bansit, who had just arrived, and it was more than he could bear.

  In her mortal guise, Bansit was nothing more than a young woman. When Killian shook her by the shoulders, he almost sent her tumbling down as well. The only reason she didn’t fall was because his hands, steady upon her, were willing to keep that grip until they left marks.

  “Listen to me, you damn crow. I thought you the most decent of the three, but no. You are just the better actress! You lied to me! You had the gall to sit by my side as Mikka’s mark took hold. Right before darkness took over, you swore that Zaira didn’t suffer before she died. Now I am asking you directly, Bansit, and take care that your answer will bind you…what happened to my wife?”

  The Phantom Queen looked him in the eye, measuring her words.

  “She threw herself into the sea below before Annand could deliver her blow. There was no life in her body as she touched the water. I rescued her from the raging waves. You cannot blame us, Killian, for being the executioners of the determination of the Universe.”

  Brigitte and Garan rushed to the main door. The vampire separated Fae and Morrigan, standing protectively between them. Brigitte broke the heavy silence with a string of imprecations.

  “I’m sick and tired of Fran-fucking-cis Alexander and his precious cargo! He is not even here and managed to make a shitfest out of this night. Whatever millennial grudge you have stops tonight. Next time you pull one like this on me, your ass is grass and I’ll be the lawnmower! None of y’all came to my city to behave like children and have endangered us all.” Even the vampire received a flash of angry, tawny eyes.

  If anyone strolled that night down St. Charles Avenue to admire that colossal beauty of a house, they probably also saw a group of young people arguing, their exacerbated voices impossible to make out. Not much to worry about. It was not all joy and camaraderie. Any given night in New Orleans, someone let off steam and then blamed it on the moon.

  Chapter XIII

  Broken

  It had been a week since the Francis Alexander fiasco, that attempt at contact that resulted in a divisive squabble between all factions. Garan regretted his unexpected sensibilities. That undeniable, instant feeling of attraction toward a stranger, an inclination shared by both Nolton and the dweller within, humiliated him into being perceived as weak and, therefore, easy a target.

  On top of it all, the Sidhe and the woman had disappeared, eluding everyone’s radar.

  The vampire did what he perceived to be the honorable thing. In order to make amends, Garan took all responsibility for what happened. It didn’t do much to restore Brigitte to her usual good graces. The oracle was livid. She well knew that Killian of Fae was as guilty. After all, the prince broke the contact and stormed off to Bansit, giving no reason for such unruly behavior. The silence of the Morrigan and the adamant behavior of the prince spoke of secrets. Brigitte hated all those impregnable riddles when the welfare of all should have been the concern.

  “Well, one must make do with what the Universe puts on their plate. I’ll have to deal with this broken doll collection.” Brigitte was getting annoyed. It was starting to show.

  That was when the Lady decided to restructure their makeshift coven, calling for a truce. Nothing big, just time and space between them, a chance to collect themselves and meet their tasks with a different approach.

  After quite an uncomfortable week of seeing each other’s faces without saying much, Brigitte disbanded their no
t so merry troop for forty-eight hours. Two days of leisure, to do what they must, in order to start again.

  During this interval, Garan decided to reconcile with his instinct. That terrible feeling of longing, the need to run, derived from something more than his little dance with humiliation. Something was, much as Brigitte said, broken. The dweller within him had not fully integrated as expected. As a vampire, Garan had not gone into a total, peaceful transition.

  The one advantage of being possessed by a dweller was complete immersion. By all accounts, Garan should’ve reacted as a vampire with at least half a millennium of existence, not been bothered by the trivialities of a human existence. Then…why? Marissa’s face, her troubled gray eyes, had managed to leave him sleepless.

  There was only one thing meant to trouble a vampire, and that was the need for blood. In the last week, Garan had merged one need with another and now he wanted to drown completely.

  He’d go on the hunt. Brigitte should’ve thought her truce rules through better. He had forty-eight hours and no one to answer to. Damn them all, the Lady, the pious Morrigan, the Sidhe in the dark, even the blonde woman.

  Garan joined a group of new arrivals to the city. It was worth paying for a night tour; it gave him an unexpected source of entertainment.

  His little group had a guide, of course. The man counted himself an expert on all things supernatural going about in the city. They were told to meet at the foot of St. Louis Cathedral and were given brightly colored beads of green, yellow, and purple to wear and separate themselves from other tourists.

  They walked around for an hour and a half. Garan’s hands were tucked in his pockets. He had gone without sustenance for longer than he should have and his silence had more to do with following the pace of hearts around him than need for knowledge.

  The tour guide kept quoting old stories, recycled tales that may or may not have been true. Flashes abounded, people trying to capture an apparition in their phone screens, pointing their cameras at once to where they were told to. Garan chuckled at a couple of “legends” that came out of TV shows and novels. The youngest of the bunch high-fived triumphantly after recognizing one or another reference. In short, their little excursion avoided all the places where true ghosts inhabited.

  Their walking tour ended paces from where it began, in an absinthe house that had been pouring emerald drinks since before it was legal.

  While in there, Garan started a conversation with a couple he deemed the most pretentious of the night. Dark-haired and pale, they looked like they had put too much effort into attaining an intriguing look. They had him pinned since the tour started, and Nolton, being bored and enjoying the attention, decided to oblige. After all, Garan had noticed that while the rest of the tour chased after ghosts, this couple was fascinated by vampires.

  The vampire received his complementary absinthe shot as the tour guide announced the green liquid as a “spirit of green hue, the decadent taste of all the city embodies.” As he turned, never missing the couple’s body language, Garan took the silent invitation and pulled up a chair.

  “It’s just a story. This whole absinthe business.” As the vampire raised the glass to the level of his eye, the woman at the table smiled confidently, the man simply straightened up, measuring his frame against Garan’s.

  “How so?” the woman responded.

  “There’s no such thing as a fairy who shares their magic with the liquor.” The vampire’s eyes, though blue, were as intense as the emerald poured. Old ice, inviting the light in. “For what I know of fairies, they are irking and severe. If they were to brew an elixir meant for human consumption, it would turn out to be scorching acid.”

  “That’s…” Whatever the man sitting at the table was about to say, the woman interrupted.

  “My name is Natasha.”

  Garan interpreted the interruption as a way for the woman to indicate who had the lead. At first glance she looked like a delicate female: short, with pasty skin and dark rimmed glasses worn as a fashion statement rather than out of need. But the way she spoke…there was a tinge of cruelty in her voice and her manners. The suddenly silenced partner had boy toy written all over him.

  She was eager, almost anxious to make her mark with the handsome stranger. Garan listened to her heartbeat, and it was almost as effective as reading her mind. It fluttered with a rush of adrenaline. She believed things he had not yet spoken, and wanted in.

  Garan took her hand. His soft, cold lips granted a gentlemanly kiss; his fingers lingering to trace the blue veins on the top of her hand.

  “And who might you be?” Garan inquired, suggestive. The man had been watching him as intently as she had during their excursion.

  “You can call me Ladislav.”

  The man’s accent was out of place, and there was something about him that was unsettling. His hair was long, combed back in a low hanging ponytail. It was dyed black with tinges of blue, a shade the man tried desperately to sell as natural. An enthusiastic fan boy, one of Brigitte’s poseurs, no doubt. It was too rich to ignore.

  “Allow me to guess…” Garan had been undernourished and the dweller was rising, even if Nolton hardly noticed. “You’re from Eastern Europe. Either Bulgaria or some other country close enough to Turkey. I have visited those countries often. It is such a rare opportunity to find people with whom one has things in common. I’m sure we can catch up on whatever is going on your side of the globe.”

  The man who called himself Ladislav smirked with closed lips and didn’t bother to answer. Garan got what he wanted: for the man to keep his atrocious fake accent and internet generated notions to himself. Natasha blushed furiously. She had caught on as well. A break-neck glare made her boy toy slide back into the chair while she continued. Her attention was fixed on Garan.

  “Did you have any fun tonight? I was telling Lads the night has been such a disappointment. The tour guide was dreadful, don’t you think? And they had the audacity to ask for tips. Ugh!”

  There was a part of Garan that had worked for tips before, and the vampire couldn’t do anything but sympathize with the poor tour guide who had to put up with these two. While he entertained the notion, Natasha continued.

  “But it was this or nothing. So disappointed there’s no Vampire Experience Tour.” Garan wondered if Brigitte had anything to do with the sudden sanguine silence of the Tourism Board. “There are, though, a bunch of bars we wanted to visit, but I’m feeling like we need an escort…” Natasha worked her way to an allusive look, securing her glasses on the bridge of her nose and batting her eyelashes in the process.

  There were lots of things crossing Garan’s mind in order to justify what was about to happen. He considered the couple petty, cowardly, and undeserving. Too perfect an opportunity.

  “Bars? Really? Let me guess the lineup on your list. The Mallet has to be on top. It’s not only a vampire bar, but a murder scene. Lafayette’s, The Bourbon Room, those have been growing their reputation since the vampire craze in the late seventies. Vampires and bars go hand in hand; it’s too good a metaphor to let it slip. But I wonder…is there a respectable creature of the night who would rather spend hours cleaning water stains off tumblers?” Garan meant to sound cynical, but nostalgia caught up with him. Azure and the sound of strings appeared, uninvited. The vampire coughed to catch up with his tone once again. “I used to work at a bar, my job was lots more interesting, you could say. Still, I had to leave. There are better ways to kill a night.”

  This time, when the vampire smiled, he let them see perfect teeth that showed a slight elongation in the canines. Not enough to trigger panic, but a peek to make them curious. Natasha pinched Ladislav’s forearm. There were predictable enough for Garan to experience secondhand shame. The man took the sign as his turn to speak.

  “Are you offering to take us some place interesting?” The Lugosi sketch was gone, but his eyes stayed the same, taking all that he could of Garan’s profile. Ladislav made a sign for the waitress to bring a r
ound of drinks.

  “Why not? Welcome to New Orleans. My name is Garan Nolton.” The vampire soon dismissed the waitress, who was alleviated. Ladislav and Natasha had been all shades of rude to her that evening. The dark-haired man, however, had been nursing his drink without asking for much and now, even as he cancelled, the man slipped a hefty tip in her apron’s pocket.

  “Thank you!” she said as the other two brushed past her.

  “Is the least I could do, darlin’. It’s been a rough night for your feet, my ears, and our patience.”

  The waitress giggled, instantly forgetting the face of the man who just tipped her enough for a night.

  The streets were crowded. The trio crossed diagonally from Toulouse to Basin, to reach St. Louis #1 Cemetery.

  “Lafayette takes all the glory. But this…this is the heart of the city of the dead.”

  Garan kept walking, passing the gates to the graveyard and cutting through the side of the cemetery that connected with the projects. The couple stopped, doubting their guide.

  “Oh, come on! Did you leave your game at the bar?” The vampire traced his steps back to meet them, another crooked curve of the lips and a hint of lust animated his face. His eyes burned sapphire under the street light. Tugging at both playfully, Garan mocked, “Too afraid? Would you rather consider a booking for trespassing? There’s too much light here, let alone cops on this side of the street.”

  The vampire guessed they wanted his company as much as they desired that window to adventure. They would have gone through hell if he asked them directly. But there was no need. They followed to where a light post was lost against the dark. Flickering and about to exhaust, the flashes stretched their shadow over the walls.