Ally’s plan had been ingenious, a vampire would hear a car coming and know that someone was approaching, if they heard a horse or two wander by, they would think nothing of it. He was so proud of her; she was showing a real aptitude for the task at hand so far.
They rode in silence for the first two hours wanting to get as far and as fast as possible. Choosing to take the horses over James’ car had put them at a speed disadvantage but it would give them the added benefit of a silent arrival, once they reached their destination.
Ally slowed and rode next to James while Chase rode in front. “It’s time to tell Chase,” she said.
James nodded and called him back, saying the horses needed water and they also needed a break. “Chase!” James yelled to catch his attention, “Stop, we need to talk to you and refresh the horses.”
Chase stopped and dismounted next to a slow running creek that was just in front of them. Ally and James rode up beside him and dismounted. James led all three horses over to the creek whilst Ally organised a snack them and something to drink.
Chase went and sat down under the tree that wasn’t far from Ally. He felt sure that they wanted to talk to him about Mackenzie; and it wasn’t a conversation he needed to have. Chase still wasn’t sure what was going on himself.
Ally brought water and sandwiches over to Chase and sat down to wait for James before she began to explain what she knew. Chase appeared nervous and uncharacteristically quiet. Her heart went out to him. She knew he was beside himself with worry.
James having refreshed the horses let them wander nearby and walked over to Chase and Ally.
He sat down next to Ally and with a shared look she began to tell Chase what they had been keeping from him. “I have been having dreams and we think they are of a prophetic nature. Last night I dreamed that Kathryn was being held by Natalia and a few other vampires, which we knew but there was a man in the cell with her,” she paused.
Chase felt sick to his soul, what man was she sharing a cell with? Was she in danger from this man? Most importantly he wanted to know that Kathryn was safe. He looked at Ally urging her to continue.
“I believe that the man she is sharing the cell with is Damian.”
His eyes widened and they flicked to James, who nodded affirmatively and then back to Ally who was looking at him with a mixture of joy and sadness. He thought of what this would mean if she was right.
“Have you told Addie?” he asked them.
“No,” Ally answered. “I didn’t want to tell her till we had him home safe.”
“I think that is a wise decision.” He looked off to the side for a moment thinking, then said, “I saw her when she lost Damian the first time. I don’t think she could survive it a second time.”
James nodded. “It was hard on all of us, but Adele took it the worst. I was glad when she moved on but I think she did it as a reason to keep going.”
“She was pregnant with my mum that would also have been a factor,” Ally said, reflecting on what Adele must have gone through. She looked to James noting how peaceful and happy he looked despite the situation and felt a pang of guilt that it would be taken away from him so soon.
“I think any soulmate would want their loved one left behind to move on,” she said purposefully, looking at James.
He looked at her quizzically for a moment then said, “I would want my soulmate to move on but I don’t think I ever could.” Emotion flashed over his face and was gone before she could register what it had been.
“What of Kat?” Chase asked bringing their focus back. “Is she alright?”
Ally shrugged her shoulders, “I don’t know. She was when the dream ended but…” she trailed off.
“What?” Chase demanded.
“The vampire that left her said Natalia would be back for her later.”
He slammed his fist into the ground beneath him in frustration. “Damn you Natalia.” He stood up to walk off and lose some steam. “I should have killed her when I had the chance. I will regret it for as long as I live,” he said with a conviction that was unmistakable.
They watched him walk away and knew he would come back but he needed to calm down first. He would be no use to anyone with his emotions making him react erratically. Everyone needed to go in with a clear head.
Ally stared in the direction that Chase had walked for a while thinking about how things were coming to an end, before James brought her back to reality. “Ally, is there something you aren’t telling me?”
He was far too perceptive for his own good she thought. Lying was something that Ally was terrible at but she gave it everything that she had so that he wouldn’t know what would happen. Ally knew that she had to give her life for Kathryn and Damian but she didn’t want anyone to know that.
“No, I’m just worried about everyone.”
He smiled and pulled her in for a warm embrace that she memorized for it might be the last.
Reluctantly she pulled back and looked into his eyes for possibly the last time. “Let’s get going, we can take Chase’s horse and catch up to him, he can’t have gotten far.”
They got back on their horses and grabbed Chase’s by the reins. James decided that he would lead the other horse. Ally had no arguments.
They had been riding for ten minutes when they caught up to Chase who was brooding under a tree. “I figured you would find me quicker than I could walk back,” he said sarcastically.
“Come on Chase, we have to get going. The house is only an hour’s ride from here.”
He nodded and then pushed himself up with a cat like grace and jumped onto his horse. The three shared a look and then nudged the horses as fast as they could go. Time was of the essence.
James, Ally and Chase rode hard until an old abandoned double story house came into view. The roof tiles had begun falling off and it appeared to be overrun with weeds around the outside. The house itself looked like an old hunting lodge of sorts, made from logs and the veranda had begun to lean. They dismounted from the horses a few hundred yards from the house. Ally trembled from the anticipation. She was about to rescue her best friend, Kathryn and her grandmother’s soulmate, Damian.
Although she knew that she would die doing it, Ally couldn’t regret her decision. Not knowing why she had been shown her untimely end last night in a dream, but the reason would be revealed, she knew that much.
Ally had kept it from James. She knew that he would never have let her come. Her heart contracted and exploded at the thought of what James would feel when she was lost to him, but she had no choice.
Everyone had been telling her from the start that she couldn’t fight her destiny and it would seem her destiny was to die during this rescue. What that meant for the prophecy she didn’t know but it wasn’t for her to decide. Someone had decided her fate and they would pick up the pieces when she was gone.
Ally began to wonder if somehow she had adjusted her fate by the things that had happened along her journey. It was the butterfly effect; everything we did affected something else.
Upon further reflection she hadn’t been able to decipher what she had done to change her fate. After a resigned sigh she decided to continue with the task at hand.
Alessandra had made a decision riding here today that no matter what she wasn’t dying until Damian and Kathryn were safe from the vampires. Then death could come and whisk her away and not a second before. Ally would look death in the eye and tell it to go to hell till she had achieved that.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“LOOKS LIKE IT SHOULD BE CONDEMNED,” Ally said as they sat on their horses, looking at the house from a safe distance.
“I think that’s the idea Ally,” Chase said stating the obvious.
She turned and glared at him.
“We all have our parts to play and we stick to the plan,” Ally said looking pointedly at Chase. “No renegade missions.”
“If I have the chance to kill Natalia, I’m taking it,” Chase said coldly.
James nodded in ag
reement while Ally looked at them both like they had two heads. “She is your sister Chase.”
“She was,” he said with no emotion. “Now she is Vincent’s vindictive puppet that has wrought destruction and chaos long enough. My sister is literally dead,” he said. As he turned to face her, his eyes softened and she saw the unshed tears he tried to hide.
She nodded, there wasn’t anything she could do to stop him from achieving his goal and when the dust had settled Chase was the one who had to live with whatever decision he made, not her.
They got off the horses and tethered them to a nearby tree. The plan was to leave the horses here out of sight and walk to the house. So that no one would see them approaching they took to the cover of the surrounding forest.
Ally had lost her heart to this land and this man. She wouldn’t have changed coming here or meeting him even if meant she would have lived. As far as she was concerned life without this man or this country was no life at all.
They hurried through the bush with James leading the way, Ally following behind and Chase covering the rear, in case of a surprise ambush from the vampires. They had both decided Ally would be kept safe by staying in between them.
As luck would have it they met no one and saw nothing to alert them to any signs of danger. The closer they got to the house the less the forest seemed alive. Everything around them had begun to die and rot; the birds no longer sang in the trees. She couldn’t even hear a cricket or frog.
She whispered to James, “Do you hear that?”
“Hear what?” he asked on full alert.
“That’s just it, I hear nothing no birds, crickets, nothing. The vegetation around here is dying and rotting.”
“That means that a vampire is in residence nearby. Nothing can stand being near the pure evil that resonates out of them.”
“Right,” she said taking it all in. This was a visual on how evil vampires were and the creatures that caused this had Kat and Damian.
Something had been bothering her about Kat’s abduction. A few things didn’t seem to add up. As she began analysing all the information that she had been given about the situation, Alessandra found that she was left with more questions and no answers to ones she initially had. Why had Chase been left alive and not taken with them? How did they know that they would be there? And was Kat simply a pawn in the game of cat and mouse between Vincent and herself or was there something more to it that she hadn’t figured out yet?
They were getting closer to the house, closer to her doom unless she did something and thought very fast. Ally felt like the answer was right there in front of her but she couldn’t see it. She stopped in her tracks and turned on Chase. “Why did they take her?”
He was startled for a moment then said, “I hadn’t thought about it but I suppose it would be to lure you out so they could kill you before the prophecy was fulfilled.”
She nodded and then asked another question, “Why weren’t you killed or taken with them?”
Chase thought about it for a moment. “To send the message back to ensure that you would come and find them.”
James had stopped walking and was listening to the information unfolding with interest. He had only thought of getting them back safely, he hadn’t considered the finer points of the situation. Ally was right, something was off.
Alessandra suddenly understood why she would die.
It wasn’t because she destined too, that fate had changed or she had altered things somehow. It was because she was unprepared that she was going to die. Ally felt a strange relief knowing that she hadn’t done anything wrong to change the fates, the fates had simply conspired against them and put Ally in the line of danger before she was ready.
Vincent wanted her dead.
He had planned this from the start. Kathryn was bait to lure her out before she was ready so that he could finish her off. It was simply a chance coincidence that Damian was there as well she thought.
James spoke up and interrupted her thoughts. “It’s a trap.”
Ally nodded solemnly. “My thoughts exactly. So what do we do?”
“We go home,” he said without hesitating. “I am not putting you at risk.”
She was getting so frustrated with his attitude. “James, look around would you. I am at risk no matter what. My role in life is to be at risk. My god damn destiny is to be at risk! Fight it all you want but danger is going to find me whether I hide or not and death seems imminent unless we start getting smarter than these god damn vampires!”
He was taken aback by what she had said but she was right. He didn’t want to admit that to her, but she was. The prophecy girl had a simple purpose, kill or be killed if you narrowed it down to the point.
“Alright, so what do you suggest we do then Ally?” he said with frustration and agitation.
Chase cleared his throat. “I have an idea if you two love birds have finished bickering.”
He earned himself a glare from them both which he returned with a wicked smile and a gleam in his eye that inevitably meant trouble.
“Obviously I have the least to lose here, so I will go in as bait and you two find a way down to the basement and get them out.”
James looked thoughtful but said, “You know that it is a suicide mission.”
He rolled his eyes. “I’m not that young boy anymore that you still see. I know what I’m doing. Ally is the one that was chosen to fulfil the prophecy and she must be kept safe at all costs.”
“We agree on something,” James said dryly.
Ally glared at James, this wasn’t the time for petty arguments.
“What would you do James if Ally was in there?”
James answered begrudgingly, “I would go in as bait.”
“Thank you,” he said looking rather proud of myself. “I think I have made my point.”
Ally stared at him. “So let’s say for a moment that we go with this crazy idea, you have to have more of a plan than going in as bait.”
“I’ll wing it,” he said. “We can stand here arguing about it or we can all agree on it. I’m going in there as bait regardless, so make your choices, work with me or against me.”
Ally put all her effort into giving him the best death glare she could muster then turned to James with a look begging for back up.
“I don’t like it either little one but he is right, we need a new plan. He is the one with the least to lose and if we work together we might just save his sorry behind,” James said with a glare towards Chase.
“This is insane,” Ally exclaimed.
They both looked at her, waiting for her to agree so they could get started.
She threw her hands up in the air as a sign of defeat. She turned to Chase. “If you get yourself killed in there out of pure stupidity I will find you in the next life and kick your sorry behind!”
James looked on proudly as his human soulmate threatened an immortal without a second thought.
Chase looked over Ally’s head to James. “I see why you sometimes call her your little spitfire.”
Ally looked at him indignantly and slammed her foot down onto his without a second thought.
Chase made a noise that was a combination of pain and surprise whilst James was leaning against a tree so as not to fall over from laughing. Ally turned on her heel and walked back to James who earned a glare for laughing hysterically.
“Sorry lass,” he said trying to pull himself together.
“Chase,” she said turning back to where he stood behind her. “Go act bait like and we will find a way in to rescue Damian and Kathryn.”
He smiled at them both then said, “Despite being slapped in the face and having my foot stomped on, it was an honour to have met you Ally. I deserved both those things and if I don’t survive tell Kathryn I love her and…” he trailed off for a moment. “Tell Mackenzie I’m sorry that I didn’t make it back.”
Ally looked at him bemused but smiled. “I will but make sure you don’t die and you can tell them yourse
lf.”
“Don’t wait for me, just get them and go I will find a way back.” With that he took off towards the house so fast that he was just a blur.
“Are you ready?” James said to Ally.
“As I will ever be,” she said trying to appear as confident as possible. Maybe she wouldn’t die but had she just sent Chase to his death in her place?
James took her hand and led her half crouching half running towards the house. They made it there without any incident and leaned with their backs flat against the wall.
“There has to be a way in,” James muttered.
Ally looked around and noticed a trap door in the ground beneath her feet. “James,” she whispered and pointed to door below. He smiled and nodded. It looked undisturbed so it hadn’t been used in a while. The vampires may not have even noticed it was there.
They crouched on either side of it and lifted the door slowly and quietly. Beneath them they heard laboured breathing and hoped it was Damian.
James lowered himself into the hole first, if there was danger he could fight it.
He looked around and adjusted to the darkness. Sunlight filtered in from the hole above him and a weak light from the candle in the wall sconce but that was it.
It was a dirt cell just as Ally had seen in her dream. He sensed there were vampires present, so he looked back up to Ally and motioned her to come down. Ally let James help in her in and was nearly blown away. “This is exactly what I saw,” she exclaimed.
The laboured breathing was still rhythmic and they looked around the dark cell and became aware of a figure crouched in the corner.
“James,” it cried in disbelief.
“Damian, we are getting you out of here,” he said as he walked over to the figure.
Ally watched the middle aged man in the corner; this is my grandpa she thought to herself.
James picked him up and carried him back towards Ally.
“Where is Kat?” Ally asked. “I don’t see her anywhere she was supposed to be here with Damian.”
Damian’s weak scratchy voice was barely audible as he answered, “Natalia took her.”
Immortal Prophecy (The Immortal Prophecy Saga) Page 25
