by Marie Hall
She couldn’t make heads of his rambling. Did he not want the female vampire to claim her? She didn’t know, and frankly, she didn’t care. “You don’t understand. It’s not what you—”
His nostrils flared and he clamped her lips shut forcefully, his long nail nicking her flesh, making air hiss between her teeth at the sharp burst of pain.
“You’re done talking. We monsters have played your human games long enough. Now it’s time for you to play ours. Vanity”—he looked at the feminine shadow standing beside them—“hold her legs.”
Gran, I’m sorry. She squeezed her eyes shut. She’d screwed up bad at the pub. If it’d been anyone but a child, she never would have done it. She would have walked out the door. She would have turned her face to the side and pretended that the future she’d seen wasn’t meant to be.
But it was too late for regrets.
There was only one way to take her powers, she only prayed to God they didn’t know it. Opening her eyes, she plastered on a sneer and then, gathering every last dredge of courage remaining, she opened her mouth and spit on him.
The only way to save humanity now was to make sure they killed her.
Chapter 2
Frenzy heard the screams first before he smelled the stench of blood. Fire ripped down his left side, burned the flesh off his hand, turning it to nothing but bone. The bumping sound of a heartbeat in distress slammed into his consciousness.
Sucking in a sharp breath, sweat coating his frame, he gasped as he turned to look at the dilapidated buildings towering around him.
Thanks to Cian’s betrayal of The Morrigan, the queen of the fae sithen, Frenzy had been forced back into reaping souls—a task he did not want. He hated humanity and all it represented.
The greedy corruption of their souls had nearly infected him once centuries ago. No, not nearly—it had poisoned him. A betrayal by one had turned him into a monster. Frenzy had become someone of dark legend, an avenging demon of death. It’d been a black time in his long life and many had died. For the sake of the world, The Morrigan had yanked him away from the humans, made him serve her whims only, and he’d slowly begun to heal.
Now she’d thrust him back into this world, and there were no words to describe the absolute agony of being permanently returned to a place he wanted to see burn to the ground. They all deserved to die and to be forced back into their lands; to have to carry out the duties of a grim reaper all over again made a fury burn through his soul.
The bones of his hand throbbed, made bile roil through his gut. The only way to ease the ache was to drag the soul to its resting place.
A black alley cat screeched, arching its back as it peered up at him with angry yellow eyes.
“Come here, kitty cat,” Frenzy drawled, wiggling his finger at it, then laughing when it jumped behind a Dumpster and scampered off with its thick tail tucked between its legs.
Gods, he hated this world.
Following the stench of blood, he slowly made his way toward an abandoned building, in no hurry to get there. The maggot could wait a while longer; not like he/she/it was going anywhere any time soon.
Frenzy rolled his eyes as he continued to snap and crack the bones of his left wrist. As the screams raged down the mostly deserted alleyway, he gazed at the abandoned houses with wooden boards hammered against the windows and bullet holes riddling the walls. Humans. They destroyed all they touched.
Kicking a glass bottle hard enough to shatter it against a set of crumbling cement steps to alert whoever was snacking on whatever that someone was at present, he waited and listened.
“Did you hear that?” something snarled. The voice came from the house directly in front of him.
The house had at one point been painted robin’s-egg blue, but now it was mostly just patches of paint interspersed with long slivers of ragged wood poking out. The door was gone, and yellow crime scene tape marked the entryway.
A man’s voice growled. “Go check it out. We’ve come too far.”
Frenzy rolled his eyes. What the hell had he walked into this time? Another rape, murder, mugging? Only more of the same crap as always.
He could just sit out here, drape himself in essence, and become invisible until they finished whatever the hell it was they were doing, but he was bored and all he wanted now was to get back home. This would be his final harvest of the night, then he’d tell Morrigan he was done. Period.
She could flay him, skin him, rip him limb from limb—frankly, he didn’t care. But he was done being death’s bitch.
With a loud sigh, he opted to get it over with quickly. “I’m outside, dumbasses,” he growled.
Suddenly the voices grew hysterical.
“Get the hell away from here. She’s ours,” a deep masculine voice rumbled before a pair of bright blue eyes locked onto his from the doorway. Instantly the ripple of other pulsed against Frenzy’s body. It took barely a second for him to peg the monster. Werewolf killings were much gorier; the creature standing before him was clean, which meant he was a vampire. His jacket and jeans were spotless, but Frenzy’s nose was as good as any bloodhound’s. There was blood soaking into the floorboards of the old house.
The vampire cracked his knuckles, taking an advancing step out the door. “I said go. She belongs to us.”
Snorting, Frenzy nodded, making sure to keep his hands hidden inside his black leather jacket. “Yeah, sure, dip weed. Finish her up, whatever. I’m patient.”
Leaning against the ramshackle house, he bent his knee and yawned.
The vampire full-on growled, making a sound like an angry pit bull in the back of his throat. “Vanity, get the hell out here,” he called over his shoulder, never stopping his slow, menacing glide toward Frenzy.
“Seriously, man, go finish.” Frenzy waved him on, still trying to appear at ease while the muscles in his legs began to reflexively tighten up. “I’ll wait.”
Another vampire joined the first one—this one a female, with short black hair and intense amethyst eyes. The two began a slow convergence on him and Frenzy might have laughed, if he weren’t suddenly annoyed.
“I don’t think you heard me the first time,” the male spoke up again, opening his mouth wide to expose the long canine fangs.
“I’d listen to Gabrielle if I were you.” Vanity’s full red lips curved up at the corners as she eyed him slowly up and down. Her fingers began toying with the collar of her pristinely white shirt.
The sexual heat in her eyes was obvious; so was the bloodlust. Her irises were a deep, bloody red. She’d recently fed on the human still inside the house.
The wind kicked up then, dragging the scent of blood, but mixed in with it was the unmistakable odor of vampire hormone. It was metallic and spicy and tickled the inside of his nose.
Frenzy chuckled, pushing off the wall as Gabrielle came within five feet of him. Unlike Vanity, the electric-blue-mohawked male was definitely posturing, ready for a fight.
“You should have left when you had the chance.”
If the chuckle was intended to terrify Frenzy, it missed the mark. “Really?” He shook his head. “You’re really doing this? I told you to finish, I’m not gonna stop you.”
Gabrielle narrowed his eyes, his jaw clicked, and then a second later his nostrils flared. “You’re a faerie.” He spat the name like it offended him. His grin was nothing but teeth. “Fairies aren’t welcome ’round these parts.”
Vanity straightened up and where there’d been heat in her eyes only seconds ago, now there was the flickering flame of pure hate. Suddenly there were knives in her hands and she was standing by Gabrielle and they both knew they were going to kill him.
At least that was the attitude they were giving off. Goddess, he hated how stupid others were sometimes. Did they really just assume because he was a “faerie” he was an easy mark?
Being a faerie wasn’t very popular these days. Not after the Great Wars, not after the way his kind had nearly caused the rest of the supernatural worl
d to go extinct. But he didn’t care about any of that; whatever hatred they still held on to, that was their own drama. He was only here to pick up the pieces of their meal.
If they wanted to fight, well, then…He smiled, more than happy to oblige them.
“Look, c’mon.” He held up his hands. “Can’t we all just get along?”
“Don’t worry, sexy,” Vanity purred, “I promise you won’t feel a thing.” She licked her fangs.
He snorted. “Yeah, sure. One more chance, guys. I’d really rather not kill you tonight.”
Not that he cared one way or another whether he killed them, but he’d like to not get dirty. He hated the stench of vampire blood. It was a noxious odor, much more metallic than the norm and usually always black. Why, he had no idea. But getting the stench out, not to mention the stains, it was hell.
Gabrielle pounced, hands outstretched and fangs ready to sink into his neck. Vanity was suddenly at his back, and he rolled his eyes.
Vampires moved fast, but death moved faster. In less than a blink, he had Gabrielle pinned up against the rotted wood, which was groaning as the board bent inward, threatening to snap in two at any moment.
Vanity stopped moving, looking between him and Gabrielle’s face with eyes as wide as saucers. Gabrielle was clawing at Frenzy’s wrist; thing of it was, his wrist was nothing but bone. He didn’t feel a damn thing and just chuckled as the vampire’s eyes began to slowly pop from their sockets with his efforts to take a breath.
“What the hell are you?” Vanity hissed, still holding her knives in both hands, but they were now hanging past her waist, and there was a definite trickle of fear sliding from her pores. It was a thick, greasy substance that made Frenzy gag.
Spitting to the side of Gabrielle’s booted foot, trying to get the nauseating taste from his mouth, he grinned. “Impressed yet?”
Her black Chinese bob bounced around her face when she yelled, “Lucian!”
This was really getting old. Frenzy debated whether to spare Gabrielle’s life or not, then decided it really didn’t matter one way or another to him. He’d given the goth bastard a chance to finish his prey. He’d wanted the fight. So…
With a smile full of teeth, he inhaled deeply and then, blowing out, pushed a jet of death down Gabrielle’s throat. A rim of frost first coated the vampire’s lips, turning them a deep shade of arctic blue, moving slowly but relentlessly down his tongue, his throat, the icy grip of death traveling through every nerve, vein, and muscle.
Within seconds the hands grasping his own began to slacken, and a moment later the vampire dropped like a sack of stone, shattering into a thousand pieces when his body hit the pavement.
There was no soul to gather from within the pieces of vampire; the fanged freak had died long ago.
But before Frenzy had a chance to gather his thoughts, claws raked fire down his back, and now he was pissed. He’d been ready to let the vampires have their prey, ready to wait them out.
Roaring, he twirled on his heel. There was another vampire in front of him, but this one looked wrong. His face reminded Frenzy of melting wax, the way it slid down one side. But the eyes were a glowing shade of blue.
Something about the vampire seemed familiar. A nagging thread tried to worm its way through his consciousness. Something about the intense neon blue of those eyes…about the iris that looked more like a teardrop than a circle. He’d seen those eyes before. But then the vampire was shoving his fangs out like a serpent ready for the strike and Frenzy stopped thinking.
The incisors literally seemed to leak a fluid and there was a sickly sweet smell, almost like raw almonds.
Lucian kicked Frenzy straight in the gut, shoving him against the wall. Seeing her buddy kick his ass must have spurred Vanity into action, because she was back in the fray. Slashing and moving her knives in a dance that was as beautiful as it was deadly. He’d blink and a new cut would appear, almost like magic, she moved so fast. But they were shallow slices, not even enough to leave scars. Blood slicked down his arms and sides. He needed to end this tiresome charade now.
“I gave you”—Frenzy slammed his bony hand against Lucian’s cheek, every vein in his face standing out in bright green relief against the lily-white starkness of his flesh—“a chance to escape.”
The press of death’s hand to the vampire’s cold flesh instantly immobilized him, but the trance wouldn’t last long: maybe thirty minutes or so. And there was also the brilliant little side effect that while he lay in a catatonic stupor, the vampire’s entire body would feel as if it was boiling in liquid ice. That knowledge shouldn’t make Frenzy smile. But it did.
Two down, one more bloodsucker to take care of. Pivoting just as her curved blade descended for yet another stab, Frenzy thrust his fist through Vanity’s chest.
Her entire body jerked, spasmed on his arm that had gouged a large hole through her abdominal cavity. The blades clattered uselessly to the ground and he tsked.
Vanity’s mouth opened and closed in an ugly pantomime of a suffocating fish. He shook his head.
“So tell me, vampire.” He cocked his head, peering up at her unusually pretty violet eyes. “What was so damn important back there that you were willing to tangle with death to get it?”
Her nostrils flared and a slight tugging pulled at his lips as the knowledge that she now realized exactly who he was expressed itself in her pain-filled gaze.
“Ah yes, my little prickly petunia, I am a grim reaper. Perhaps you should have thought of that before attacking me, eh?”
Again she said nothing. Grabbing her jaw, he moved her face up and down. “The correct answer is yes, Frenzy, I should have thought of that. Well, no worries.”
Yanking his fist out of her, he let her slip to the ground. Her fingers shook as she grabbed at the gaping hole, which had very little blood coming out of it. Obviously she hadn’t fed enough back there. Vampires could not produce their own blood; much like a mosquito, they had to suck their sustenance out of others in order to pass as mostly human.
Which begged the question, if she wasn’t feeding on the human who was still obviously inside the house, what had she been doing? Vampires weren’t known to run in packs unless they were on the hunt.
Breath rattled from her lungs. “The woman is ours,” she managed to finally wheeze out.
He shrugged. “I do not care at all what you do with the carcass. The soul, however, belongs to me. You know how this goes, mosquito. Just business.”
“You can’t leave me this way,” she gasped.
“I can do whatever I want.” His smile was pure poison. “But since you’re asking so nicely…” Leaning in, he pressed his palm to the side of the house.
Every reaper had a talent for killing, but not all reapers killed the same. Some could transform their bodies into killing vapors, literally shooting themselves like an arrow into their prey and ripping them apart from the inside out. Frenzy’s preferred style was much more romantic.
Using his free hand, he feathered his fingers across her cold marble skin. Hissing, she twisted her face to the side.
“Shall I kiss it better?” he whispered as the power of death filled him, stretched him until he vibrated with it. The cadence of his voice lulled her gaze back, ensnaring her. Entrancing her.
Frenzy had always been more of a lover than a fighter. Tipping her face up to his, her breathing ragged from the pain and a sexual wave of intense longing for his touch, she melted into his lips.
But touching him while ridden by death was like kissing a volt of lightning. His mouth tingled as his power transferred to her. Death’s kiss sank its tentacles deep inside her, rushing through her veins, her pores.
She gasped, pulling away as her body began to freeze from the inside out. Already pale ivory skin turned an alarming shade of arctic blue, and then cracks slid in large grooves down her face, her neck, her arms.
“Good-bye, vampire. It’s been swell.” He gently flicked the tip of her nose, and she shattered like a pi
le of broken marble at his feet.
Sighing, he stood, refusing to acknowledge that the knife wounds in his sides and back actually hurt like a mother. He licked his teeth, kicked the still-catatonic Lucian in the gut, just because he felt like it, and followed the sounds of wet gurgling inside the house.
The smells were the first things to hit him. A blast of spring, the scent of newly turned soil and seedling sprouts. Humans smelled of this. The good ones anyway. The ones who went to the light.
Not that he considered any of them good; as far as he was concerned they all deserved to be thrown into the fiery pit that reeked of sulfur. But whatever, not his decision.
The squeaking chirp of mice and rats rang like a melody all around him, almost in sync with the wet rattle coming from a few feet in front of him.
“Bloody freaking vampires,” he growled, fully expecting to find a partially dismembered human with barely a torso attached and full of fang marks. Vamps could be a lot like sharks when in a frenzy, ripping off and sucking clean. The myth that they killed with a love nibble was rarely the case.
He now knew why their eyes glowed. Vampires could only pass as human when they fed properly. Only by being the parasites that they were could they attain the rich shade of healthy, pinkened skin and the natural eye color of what they once knew when alive and mortal.
But when a vampire didn’t feed, they began to resemble the monster of legend. The pale-faced, glowing-eyed freaks whose looks gave them away as something other than human.
The vampires he’d fought tonight had been half-starved. Maybe they didn’t care to appear human because San Francisco was the one city in the world that allowed any monster, be it vampire or zombie, to roam free and unmolested. A vampire did not need to hide his truths if he did not wish to. There were even clubs where humans and vamps went to hook up for those few but rare mortals who enjoyed being a vampire’s snack for the night.
