by Morgan Rice
Jade broke into action. In one quick motion, he reached into his belt, extracted his sling, inserted a stone and, as he’d done a million times before, he pulled back his arm, aimed right for the man’s eye, and hurled it with all he had.
To Jade’s shock and amazement, it worked. The stone went flying at lightning speed, and struck the man, only feet away, in one of his eyes, knocking it out of his skull.
The man grabbed his empty socket and screamed and screamed, horrific screams, as blood poured from his head. Jade had saved Rose’s life.
But now the man turned on Jade, and looked at him with a snarl from hell. Jade reached down for another stone, but this time he was not quick enough. The man pounced on him with lightning speed, faster than anything Jade had ever seen.
The last thing that Jade saw was his grotesque face, filled with rage and fury, and heading right for him.
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CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
Caleb fought with his coven in the streets of Venice, in the midst of heated battle. With Samuel at one side and Sera at the other, he swung wildly with his ivory staff, killing the convicts left and right. The three of them, outnumbered, were charged by a dozen convicts, but these were only humans, and the three of them prevailed.
But Caleb was caught off guard as a dozen vampires suddenly charged their way. He recognized them immediately—they were of the Lagoon Coven, hardened criminals that he thought were rotting beneath the prisons. Their presence immediately alerted him to the fact the someone had released them, had been behind all this mayhem. That this was all a deliberate plot.
But he hadn’t much time to contemplate it, because soon, they were in the thick of battle.
Caleb and his men got separated. One vampire leapt for Caleb’s face, but Caleb stabbed him in the throat. Another grabbed his shoulder, but Caleb wheeled and head butted him. Still another charged from behind, but Caleb took his staff, and thrust it backwards, its pointed end going right through his throat.
Two more charged at his front, but Caleb pulled the staff back and swung it down, cracking them both hard across the head, and knocking them to the ground.
Caleb caught his breath, and looked over and saw his brother doing well; but Samantha, with her short sword, was jumped from behind. He stepped in and tore the vampire off of her, wrestling it to the ground.
The vampire reached up with his long claws and tried to gouge out Caleb’s eyes. But Caleb grabbed them and twisted them around, breaking the vampire’s wrist. Caleb then rolled over, grabbed his spear, and punctured the vampire’s heart. It died with a horrible shriek.
After minutes of heated battle, finally, they were the victors. The few convicts who survived took off into the streets, while the rest of them were dead in the square. The vampires, too, all lay dead.
Caleb surveyed his coven members, and saw that, while several of them were bruised and beaten, none had died.
Caleb felt a hand on his shoulder, and turned.
Samuel pointed at the sky.
“The smoke,” Samuel said. “It’s coming from our island.”
Caleb and Samantha exchange a worried look at the same moment. With a running start, they leapt into the air, their coven members close behind.
Caleb felt his heart pounding in his chest, more disturbed now than he had ever been during battle. His island was on fire. And his son was all alone.
*
Caleb landed back on his island with all his coven members, and quickly searched for Jade.
“Jade!” screamed Caleb.
He ran to and fro, as Samantha ran to the church, and Samuel ran to the cloisters. They covered all their bases, looking in every direction as they fanned out.
Fires raged everywhere, lighting up the night, and Caleb knew that someone had attacked. He realized now that what had happened on Venice was just an elaborate decoy; that the real target was his island. That they had been tricked.
Caleb scoured the docks, looking everywhere—and finally, he stopped.
And his heart stopped within him.
There, lying before him, was Rose.
Dead.
There was no way, he knew, that Rose would have ever left Jade’s side. Unless something had happened to Jade.
Caleb searched again, and there, in the darkness, he saw the outline of a body. The body of a small boy, lying on the stone.
He felt his entire world collapse around him. He felt himself die inside.
He was unable to move, unable to breathe, to think. He felt himself in utter denial, screaming to himself that it could not be Jade.
But even as he began to approach, he knew it could be no one else.
He knelt by the body, and slowly turned it over.
Caleb leaned back and let out a horrible wail, one of an animal that would never recover. It was a wail that filled the night, that stopped the entire coven, and that rose up to the very heavens themselves.
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CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
Caitlin flew, the sky streaked with a million colors in the sunset.
After her heartbreaking goodbye with Caleb, she had lifted into the sky and had not stopped flying since. She had cried for hours, but now, finally, the tears subsided, hardened on her face. She was slowly coming to a new, steely resolve. As she had always been in life, she was on her own. She had never been able to rely on the comfort and safety of a father, or brother, or boyfriend.
She had wanted to say goodbye to Polly, and to Aiden and the others. But she couldn’t bring herself to. She felt that she had to get as far away from Venice as possible. She couldn’t stand the thought of being anywhere near Caleb when he couldn’t even remember her. It hurt too much.
She knew she had to get to Florence—she had known that since she’d arrived—and while she hadn’t set out for any particular place, she found herself heading in that direction. South. Hundreds of miles away from Venice.
After hours passed, after she had stopped crying, she’d slowly started to ask herself where exactly she was going—and that was when she realized that it was, indeed, Florence. It felt right to her. She had followed her heart, and it had led to heartbreak. Now she needed to fulfill her mission.
She regretted that she had not done it sooner. She had been selfish. Clearly, she was an important person, and she could be of some great service. And the more she thought about it, the more the idea of finding her father stirred in her a new type of resolve. Finding him was something that she had always wanted, and if going to Florence held the answer, she felt no need to hesitate.
The only person in Venice she truly regretted leaving behind without saying goodbye, was Blake.
Now that Caleb was clearly taken, she
thought more and more of her night with Blake. Their dance.
Their gondola ride. There had been something real between them. And she had just thrown it away.
He would probably never forgive her, and she’d only wish she’d had a chance to explain it all, to say goodbye properly. But in her current emotional state, she couldn’t trust herself to talk to him.
Boys were too hard for her, too confusing. They overwhelmed her emotions, made it hard for her to think clearly. They always seemed to distract her. She had a mission to fulfill, and she’d have to focus. Being on her own would make it much simpler.
Caitlin also felt sad at leaving Rose behind, but before she left, she felt how strong Rose’s connection was with Jade. She was in good hands with him. The two of them were clearly meant for each other, and at least it would keep Caitlin connected to Caleb in some small way.
Caitlin cleared a mountain range, and as she lowered, she saw before her, in the distance, a startling site: the massive, sprawling city of Florence.
She dove further, and found herself circling it. It was magnificent, unlike any city she had ever seen. Nestled in a valley, surrounded in the distance by a small mountain range, Florence was flanked by rivers, over which spanned small, beautiful arched bridges. The last light of sunset lingered in the air, and it was just enough to afford Caitlin a magnificent, bird’s eye view.
Everywhere were red, shingled rooftops, sloping gently downward, making it look like the city was aglow in red and orange. The buildings were low, most of them not more than a few stories high, and the skyline was punctuated with a plethora of church steeples. Some churches had domes, others, square towers. The grandest church of all towered over everything else, its massive orange, tiled dome seeming to rise up from the center of the city itself.
As she flew close to the city center, she saw huge mansions and palaces, the massive buildings towering over the smaller ones around them. Amidst the buildings, every several blocks, were open squares. She could already see that the city was not nearly as crowded as Venice. Thankfully, there seemed to be plenty of breathing room down below.
Caitlin circled the city a third time, taking it all in. The architecture was beautiful, so clean, so ancient. There were statues in all the squares, and people strolled leisurely, at ease, while others rode on horses. The rivers surrounding the city were aglow in red from the sky, and people casually crossed the many footbridges.
Caitlin had no idea where to begin her search. She had never been to Florence, and the city was so spread out. As she flew, she hoped for some hidden sense to kick in, some intuition, a message, perhaps, from her father. But nothing came.
She decided to approach the city from the outside, to get the experience of entering it for the first time. She also thought it wiser not to land right inside the city, in case she was detected.
She crossed over the river, just as it was getting dark, and landed in the woods on the other side.
Caitlin walked down a dusty dirt road, heading towards the river bank. Her immediate concern was finding shelter, and food. She was hungry. Not for food, but for blood. Being in the forest, and in the thick woods, stirred up her hunger. She could smell deer close by.
Caitlin heard a rustling in the branches, and she turned and saw a family of deer standing there, not more than 30 feet away, staring.
She jumped into action, choosing one, and chasing it down.
As it bounded left, then right, she stayed close on its trail. She remembered her time with Caleb, in Salem, his teaching her how to hunt.
He taught her well: moments later she found herself leaping onto a small deer and sinking her fangs into its neck. It was a direct hit. The deer went down, Caitlin on top of it. It kicked for a few seconds, but then it stopped, as Caitlin sucked the blood from its body.
As she drank, Caitlin slowly felt her life’s force returning.
And then she suddenly heard a click behind her—a loud, distinctive click.
She immediately recognized it as the click of a rifle.
She froze, and slowly turned.
There, standing over her, was a hunter, elegantly dressed, holding a rifle, aimed right at her.
“Don’t you move,” he said to her, threateningly.
Caitlin heard more rustling, and saw that he was accompanied by a group of about 30 humans, all pointing crossbows at her. She was completely surrounded.
She didn’t know what to do. She could kill the humans easily enough, but she really didn’t want to harm them. She didn’t want to have to spend her time here on the run, rushed out of the city before she could find what she needed.
She slowly turned, raising her hands.
“Get up,” he said. “On your feet.”
She slowly stood, hands held high, debating a course of action. The hunters behind him all seemed itching to fire. The arrows and bullets might not kill her, but they would surely hurt.
“I mean you no harm,” she said.
“We know what you are,” he grunted. “A vampire. Your kind bring nothing but evil. I killed one of yours just yesterday. Apparently, I didn’t kill enough.”
The man clicked back the action on his rifle, and raised it higher, right for Caitlin’s head.
She realized that he was about to fire.
Suddenly, there was a rustling in the woods, and the entire group spun and looked. A vampire had dropped him from the sky, had landed behind all of them.
Caitlin was shocked to see that it was Blake.
It was the distraction Caitlin needed. Before they could turn back her way, she sprang into action, grabbing the hunter’s rifle and tearing it from his hands just as he fired. She had managed to raise it just high enough, so that the bullet missed her head by an inch.
She yanked the gun from him, spun it around, and cracked him across the jaw with the butt of the rifle, sending him down.
Blake had sprung into action, too, knocking three of them down with a single blow.
The other archers turned back to Caitlin and fired, but she was faster than them, and had already leapt into the air. She came down fast and hard, kicking them all in the face. She swung the butt of the rifle wildly, knocking several others over. It would have been easier to kill them, but it was not what she wanted.
Blake was also in a frenzy, punching, kicking, elbowing, knocking them all out.
Of the entire group, only one managed to get off a shot. The arrow pierced Blake’s arm, as he let out a scream.
Caitlin spun, identified the hunter, and kicked him so hard, with both her feet on his chest, that he went flying back at super speed, into a tree. To his bad fortune, he went flying right into a sharp, protruding branch, and it punctured his throat. He was pinned to the tree, dead.
All the other humans were knocked out cold, unconscious.
Caitlin turned to Blake, running over to him, feeling responsible for his wound. He stood there, clutching it, the arrow still stuck in his arm.
“Break it off,” he said through gritted teeth.
Caitlin hesitated, then snapped the arrow. He screamed as she did.
“Now pull,” he said.
She looked at him, unsure, but he nodded, locking his jaw.
In one strong motion, she yanked the arrow as hard as she could. Blake screeched, as it went entirely through his arm. Blood poured everywhere, and Caitlin stopped it with her hands.
Blake reached down, tore a strip of fabric off of his shirt with his teeth, and handed it to Caitlin.
She took it, and wrapped it tightly around the wound.
Finally, the bleeding stopped.
Blake bent down, grabbed the tip of the arrow, and held it up to the moonlight.
“As I thought,” he said. “Silver-tipped. These were not hunters. They were vampire hunters.
Looking specifically for types like us.”
Caitlin looked at the arrow tip, and saw that he was right. She looked at his wound in concern.
“Will you be okay?” she asked.
“Let’s get out of here,” he said.
*
Caitlin stood beside Blake on the stone terrace, leaning against the ornate marble railing. High up on a hill, she looked out over the forest, over the river, at the city of Florence. Her mind was still reeling, still trying to process how she got here, how it all happened.
She had never expected to be surrounded so quickly by a group of humans, especially armed with weapons capable of hurting vampires. She hadn’t known of vampire hunters, and it was stupid of her to let down her guard so much. She had been too focused on Florence, too excited to be here—and too hungry, too focused on feeding. It had been a stupid mistake.
Thank goodness for Blake. Seeing him there had been such a shock. She had thought that he’d forgotten about her, and that if he thought of her at all, it would only be with anger. After all, she had left him so abruptly, when he had been so kind to her.
After their encounter, he’d led her through the forest, up this hill, to this incredible mansion. It was, he explained, a palazzo. Sitting proudly high up on a hill, it had a wide, marble staircase, with thick, ornate railings winding their way up to this huge stone terrace. It all led to a magnificent, marble house, with huge oak doors, and glorious arched windows in every direction. Blake had led her inside, and had explained that this was one of his many houses. It was magnificent, fit for a king.
It sure beat spending the night in the forest.
After collecting herself and helping tend his wound, Caitlin had wandered out onto the terrace, to get some fresh air, to take it all in. He had wandered out after her, and now stood at her side.
She and Blake hadn’t said much, both still reeling from the shock of battle. He looked like he was in pain from the arrow, and Caitlin felt terribly about it. She was deeply touched that he had come for her, that he had saved her. Who knows what would have happened if he hadn’t arrived.
