Touched by A Dragon: The Exalted Dragons (Book 2)

by K. T. Stryker

  “You don’t need any help?” Peter called from above.

  Ashe shook her head and with a look of determination let go of the windowsill. She tottered for a moment before grabbing hold of another branch to her left. She gave a thumbs-up to Peter and then a sign to keep quiet as he followed her. Peter had no trouble navigating the way down to the ground from Ashe’s second story window. He could have easily jumped the distance, but he didn't want to remind Ashe of Landon’s escape. Peter wanted so much to be human for her. If there was a cure for vampirism, he would have taken it in an instant. But there wasn’t and he had to make do and pretend for her sake that he was not so different from her after all.

  Ashe landed on the grass with a soft thud and started off toward her dad’s car, which was sitting in the driveway.

  “You don’t have the keys,” Peter whispered.

  Ashe smiled and reached in the open window. Her hand came back with a ring of keys held in it. “He doesn’t think anyone would steal this piece of junk,” she said. Peter had to admit David was right. It was an old maroon sedan that even a car thief would have been embarrassed to drive to the chop shop.

  Peter got in the passenger seat and Ashe put the car in neutral. It rolled at a snail’s pace backwards down the driveway toward the street.

  “Something tells me you’ve done this before,” Peter commented.

  Ashe only smiled that inscrutable smile of hers that Peter appreciated every time he saw it, even if he didn’t always understand the joke.

  As they neared Landon’s house, Ashe slowed the car. Her face was set into a scowl and she seemed to be building up her courage to make it all the way there. Peter didn’t blame her. He wasn’t so eager to go inside himself. As much as he had reassured everyone that Landon’s clan had fled the city, doubt was starting to creep into his own mind. If somehow they had stayed and were in the house waiting, lurking...

  Ashe parked the car a little ways down the street. There were no lights on in the windows and no sign of anyone, living or dead, inside. The street itself was dead quiet as well and Peter had an eerie sense that many of the houses now sat empty. Landon’s clan might have been far larger than he could have fathomed. Or maybe Landon had been the only one.

  Peter got out of the car and waited for Ashe to join him on the sidewalk. He twined his fingers with hers as they approached the house. Even from afar, they could see that the front door stood ajar. Peter quickened his pace and, when he reached the door, did not hesitate to go inside. Ashe hung back on the doorstep.

  Peter thought he heard her say his name. Her voice had sounded scared.

  “It’s okay,” he reassured, her squeezing her hand.

  Their footsteps were now oddly resonant in the house that had been loud with fighting only hours ago. The empty bags of blood were still strewn about the kitchen, as well as a small black puddle where Penelope had gorged herself. Despite her modest appearance, she could be a complete heathen, Peter thought. As much as he hated to admit it, Ashe was lucky to have gotten away with just a bite wound.

  The kitchen was empty, as was the living room. They made a cursory sweep of the second floor as well but found nothing. When they got to the room where Landon had held Ashe hostage, Peter told her to wait outside.

  “It’s okay,” she said. “I can handle it.”

  The air inside the room was freezing; the window was still open as it had been when Landon had fled. Furniture lay in splintered ruins and the curtains were hanging half-way off the curtain rod.

  “Did we really do all this?” Peter asked. He could barely remember the fight itself, only the desperate need to hurt Landon and protect Ashe at all costs. He also remembered the tang of Ashe’s blood in the air and felt sick to his stomach.

  Ashe appeared at his side. “Come on, let’s go. There’s nothing here,” she said, taking his arm to lead him out of the room. Peter paused to pick up a broken table leg.

  “Just in case,” he said to Ashe, who was eyeing him with concern.

  It was now pitch dark and Peter wanted more than anything to turn on some lights, but he knew that if the clan was still nearby the lights would be an instant signal of their presence in the house. Ashe stayed close by his side as they searched the rest of the upstairs rooms, never letting go of his arm. She shouldn’t be here, Peter thought. He should have insisted she stay home. But if he had, he would have been no better than her parents. He would have to be able to protect her and trust her at the same time.

  Back downstairs, Peter told Ashe, “We need to find a way down into the basement.”

  “Why?” Ashe asked.

  There was a small study off of the living room that had piqued Peter’s curiosity the first time through. He answered Ashe’s question as he approached it. “Vampires tend to sleep where the sun can’t get to them during the day. Basements are perfect for that. As we get older, we get more sensitive to sunlight. I’m still able to go out during the day fairly normally, but Vanessa, for example, wouldn’t survive a sunny day. Landon’s clan would have holed up somewhere underground until nightfall.”

  “It’s already dark,” Ashe pointed out.

  “Then we don’t have much time.”

  Peter started searching the desk in the center of the room while Ashe wandered over to the wall of bookshelves on the side. Peter marveled at how she was drawn to the books even at a time like this. He could hear Ashe muttering to herself as her finger traced the spines of the dusty old tomes.

  Peter pulled open drawer after drawer, looking for anything that could tell him where the clan’s hideaway was. If he could find that, there would be no need to go down into the basement. He could torch the house and then go to their lair in the country and take care of the remaining survivors. It would be easy to do and Ashe would never need to know.

  There was a massive creaking noise and Peter looked up. Ashe was standing in front of an open doorway where a section of the bookshelf had once been.

  She grinned when she saw his look of surprise. “It’s a bit cheesy, isn’t it?”

  Peter couldn’t help smiling to himself. “It’s not cheesy, it’s classic.” He should have known Landon’s clan would have designed something like this. Though he had only ever met Landon, he could extrapolate what he knew of the man to the rest of the clan. They enjoyed being vampires, they thought it was all a game, and that was the most dangerous kind with which to deal. They were convinced they were truly immortal.

  Beyond the doorway was a narrow staircase leading down to what Peter assumed to be the basement. Peter tightened his grip on the broken table leg and told Ashe to get behind him. “I know you’re not going to let me go down there alone,” Peter said in a low voice. “But it might be dangerous and you’re no match for a vampire let alone a whole clan of them. Stay upstairs until I tell you to, and if I tell you to run, then you run all the way back to the car and drive home without stopping. Even if I’m not there with you.”

  Ashe nodded in understanding, though she looked like she wanted to protest. Peter admired her courage, but courage wouldn’t be enough against a basement full of hungry vampires. He proceeded cautiously down the staircase, careful not to make a sound. When he reached the bottom, the darkness consumed him and it took a moment for his eyes to adjust.

  The basement was empty. There were camping cots lined up along both walls and in the back Peter could see what looked like a carpentry workbench, but without the power tools. Peter proceeded cautiously forward, though he could see there was no one there. The wooden bench was deeply scored and stained in places with something dark. There were chains lying across it, which were secured by metal eyelets screwed into the wood. On the shelves above the bench were boxes of medical equipment, everything from IV drips to surgical scalpels and tongs.

  Peter’s foot kicked a large glass jug on the floor and he winced in pain. Everything started to come together. It was a draining station, and from the looks of it they were in the practice of keeping their victims alive for days o
n end. Peter couldn’t imagine the torture.

  “Peter, can I come down now?” Ashe called down from the stairway.

  Peter hastily grabbed a blanket from a nearby cot and threw it over the workbench. “Yeah,” he called back. “I’m on my way up. There’s nothing down here.”

  He turned to leave but Ashe was already at the bottom of the staircase. She was holding a bunch of papers in her hand. “I found these while you were down here,” she said.

  Peter took the papers from her and flipped through them, they were the deeds to a house. Peter didn’t recognize the address, which was across the state line, nor any of the names listed under previous owners. He tried to remember Landon’s last name. It was something from the old world, something uncommon. Was it Alilovic? Peter traced the list, but there were no names even remotely similar, and the last entry was from 1957. Landon’s clan must have either taken up an abandoned house or disposed of its last owners before stealing the house for themselves. Either way, Peter now knew where the clan was and they were nowhere near the city. He hoped it would be enough to put David’s worry to rest.

  Peter and Ashe left the empty house and got back into the car. Ashe started the engine and as they waited for the car to warm up, she said, “We haven’t had any time just to ourselves. You wanna go get something to eat?”

  Peter gave her a look.

  “I mean, you can watch me eat and then we’ll do something we both can enjoy. I found a pair of bolt cutters in the trunk of Dad’s car and no one’s going to be in the music building tonight, since it’s the weekend. It’s a clear night and we’ll be able to see the stars for miles.”

  Ashe pulled onto the street and took a sharp U-turn towards the direction of the college. Peter felt like he couldn’t refuse, not that he wanted to anyways. Peter loved the new, more confident Ashe, just as much as he loved the quiet, cautious side that he had encountered when he first met her. He would have done anything for her, anything at all.

  CHAPTER 2

  Ashe lounged in an armchair with her laptop balanced on one armrest and a book on the other. Her feet were stretched out in front of her, resting on Peter’s knees in the chair opposite her. It was a slow kind of afternoon, but Ashe wasn’t about to give in to her laziness. It was the last spurt until winter break. All she had to do was finish her paper for English Literature, the topic of which had turned out to be, to Ashe’s dismay; Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights. As if Ashe needed something dark like that to finish off the semester. She couldn’t help picturing Landon whenever imagining the sadistic protagonist, Heathcliff.

  Peter stretched and Ashe lowered her feet. Though he had no more work to do before the semester’s end, he still kept her company every day in her corner of the student center as she banged away on her keyboard. For that she was infinitely thankful. But what she wanted most of all right now was some caffeine to get her through the afternoon.

  “I’ll go get you some coffee,” Peter said, putting his book down. Lately they had been so in sync with each other’s feelings that Ashe sometimes wondered if Peter couldn’t read her thoughts. The coffee was only one instance in a growing number of coincidences that made Ashe feel like Peter was truly looking after her.

  She watched him leave, still marveling at the fact that he was hers. Often when they walked together on campus Ashe noticed other girls looking at him. It was no secret that his mysterious green eyes and tall, lean body were on the radar of most of the girls on campus. If only they knew his real true nature!

  She picked her book back up and flipped to the next dog-eared page without really reading the words on the page. For the first time, graduation was finally within her grasp. Not only were her grades where she needed them to be for her major, but her father had finally started to accept that Landon’s clan was no longer a threat. Wherever they were, they were not coming back to the city; at least for now. Ashe only needed enough time to graduate. After that she didn’t mind where they went, as long as Peter was with her.

  Peter came back with a steaming cup of coffee, which he handed to Ashe with a smile. She carefully took a sip and was pleased to know that he had remembered her preference for three creams and no sugar.

  He sat back down in his chair. “You know, we haven’t talked about what happens after.”

  Ashe raised an eyebrow. “After what?”

  “Graduation.” He answered.

  It was true; Ashe had been so busy thinking about graduation itself that she hadn’t bothered to start planning for what she would do afterwards. She knew she would have to get a job but she didn't know what she was even remotely qualified for.

  “What are you going to do?” Ashe asked.

  Peter shrugged. “What I always do. If we don’t stay here, which seems likely, I’ll enroll at another school.”

  “Aren’t you tired of being a student?” Ashe couldn’t imagine repeating college over and over. Four years was more than enough.

  “I like going to school,” he said. “And besides, what would I do otherwise?”

  “What did you do before?” Ashe asked.

  Peter’s face took on a strange look, like he was both troubled and amused by her answer. “You’re avoiding my question. I asked what you’re going to do.”

  Ashe gave up. Peter could be impossible to talk to if he wanted to. Ashe knew there were years, maybe decades, of Peter’s life that he would rather not share with her but she wanted to know him fully, in order to love every part of him. Even the parts that hurt the most.

  “I haven’t figured it out yet,” Ashe admitted. “I thought I would have by now, but it hasn’t really been a priority lately.” She also didn’t like the idea of overtaking Peter, of moving into the working world while he was still a student. It reminded her too much of their incongruent timelines, of the mere decades she had with him while he had eons to move on and love other people. Just thinking about it overwhelmed her and tears welled in her eyes.

  “Hey, hey,” Peter said soothingly, crouching by Ashe’s chair and taking up her hands. “Is something wrong?”

  How could Ashe explain to him how much she already missed him?

  “I don’t want to leave you behind,” Ashe confessed. “My life will go by in a blink for you. We can’t share growing up, or growing old, or most of the things any other couples get to experience together.”

  Peter stroked her hair with a gentle hand. “Maybe we’re not a normal couple and there are some things we might miss, but I wouldn’t trade any of it to lose being with you.”

  Though Peter’s words did not completely put Ashe’s mind at ease, she promised not to get ahead of herself. They still had all the time in the world.

  Snow fell softly as Peter and Ashe walked through the city. Twinkling lights for the holiday season hung in the trees lining the sidewalk and storefronts advertising Christmas sales in bold red-and-green signs. Ashe had just turned in her last paper of the semester and was feeling light on her feet. She knew that she had a little over three weeks ahead of her with no classes, no homework, just Ashe and Peter together. There were quite a few people out on the street, some hurrying past with arms full of shopping bags and others who were, like Ashe Peter; just strolling along and window shopping.

  A family came out of a diner on the corner; the children’s faces were bright as they talked about Santa Claus to their half-listening parents. Ashe remembered her own childhood Christmases, just mom and her, the two of them forgoing presents in favor of a big turkey dinner and hot cocoa in front of the fireplace. By the time Dad had left them, Ashe was already too old for Santa, but not yet ready to give up the holiday altogether. Her mom had done the best with what little money they had.

  Peter interrupted her trip down memory lane with a tug on her coat sleeve. “Do you mind if we stop in here?”

  It was an antique shop whose windows were grimed over with years, maybe decades, of dust. Ashe didn’t know why Peter wanted to go in but she followed him inside anyway. At the very least it was a wel
come break from the frigid winter air outside.

  There was an elderly woman at the counter making notes in a ledger book. She looked up and smiled when she noticed them in her shop.

  “You’re early,” she said, closing the book.

  “Sorry, I couldn’t wait,” he replied.

  She nodded her head towards Ashe. “Is this the girl?”

  “Yeah,” Peter replied. Ashe was completely lost, but as she neared the counter with Peter she noticed something striking about the woman’s smile. Her canines were much longer than the average human’s and they ended in sharp points. Ashe couldn’t help but stare.

  “Your fangs are showing,” Peter said, apparently noticing Ashe’s surprise.

  The woman tapped the eraser end of the pencil she was holding against a tooth. “These darned things won’t stay put. I think it’s the old age. They’re not the only things I can’t keep under control these days.” She winked at Ashe who smiled weakly back.

  The woman turned from the counter and started riffling loudly through boxes stacked behind her. Ashe whispered to Peter, “She’s a vampire!”

  Peter laughed. “What tipped you off?”

  Ashe felt foolish for having stated something so obvious but she was still apprehensive. Just how many vampires were living amongst humans and going about their daily lives with the constant thirst for human blood?

  Peter explained, “There are certain vampires that we call sentinels. They like to keep tabs on the comings and goings of our kind and function as a sort of network hub for people like us. Winnie here is one of them. She’s older than you could imagine and has connections all over the place. I was lucky to find her here, because not all cities have a sentinel.”

  The old woman, Winnie, came back to the counter with a small black box cradled in her hands. “He thinks he found me all on his own,” she said. “But he underestimates the power I wield. I called him here with my magic.”