“Yes, live. There are ways to control the beast within. I can show you, if you’ll just answer my questions.”
Sneering, the vampire replied, “My sire sent me and you have been found out as a weakling. He will simply make more of us and overwhelm your little clan. He will find soldiers for an army and wipe you from the earth!”
Fanatic, Marek sighed at the word. This was something he couldn’t overcome. The rogue was a fanatic and such people cared nothing for themselves in the face of a cause. They were the assassin attached to a car bomb. Such creatures went into a situation ready to die with nothing to live for but that cause.
He asked several more questions with little results. Audrey stepped in trying a more feminine approach. She tried to be the voice that could break through, but the pretty woman found even her wiles were no match for a mind set to kill and never tell. He debated on trying to tie up the man to bring to the Lair and attempt to break through his defenses there. Maybe with time or maybe Nicholas with his skill with people could find the answers?
The question resolved itself as the vampire attempted to break free of Marek’s grip. They struggled and Audrey tried to add her strength to hold the rogue down. The fight ended quickly and the questions became moot as the vampire seemed to leap onto the silver dagger. It plunged into his chest and fire flared from the blade driving the other two back as a blaze of heat erupted from the silver causing a chain reaction that incinerated the vampire in seconds.
After a quick curse, Marek led the woman in a leap across the roofs to their comrades. The aftermath of a tough fight could be seen. The second enemy vampire was a charred husk from a stake through the heart. Little more than ash, the body would disappear with a simple kick or a strong wind.
Marcus looked nearly as bad. He had been ripped up on his arms and chest. A slash across his face nearly took his eye. Edgar must have caught the enemy by surprise as he looked little worse for wear.
“Marcus?” Audrey called out seeing the vampire slumped against the low wall along the rooftop. He looked up at her with blood on his face but he managed to smile wearily.
“Still here,” he affirmed. “He was a tough bastard. If Edgar hadn’t gotten here in time, I think he would’ve had me.”
The words bothered Marek. The threat had been made and, if these two would have a similarly trained following, his clan might be in serious trouble. He would have to tell Nicholas. The voran would want to know and, despite their differences, Marek knew his ally would be there to help if only to protect the city from the new threat.
Picking up Marcus from the ground, the vampires limped back home for the night. The patrols would have to be maintained as long as they could, Marek decided, if only to maintain their territory.
Chapter 10- Door to Door
Sleep and dreams. They were two things that Nick seldom was able to enjoy with his condition. It felt good to refresh one’s batteries and, though he often went five days or more without being able to sleep, when he did, it was almost a relief. It was a tie to humanity and let him know that he wasn’t a shell of a man.
A man needed dreams, whether found while asleep or from just the need to have an objective in life. The voran found he needed to find goals as well. It would be easy to just sit back doing little or nothing. He had money and could make it last or earn more. With over one hundred thirty years behind him, it would be easy to just sit back and watch the world continue its momentum. He was a mere flea beside the world.
The other side of the coin led to domination. A vampire was likely to join that side of the world view, since they were virtually immortal and control of the world led to being fed. It was the start up of that goal that led to most of their deaths. You had to step on a lot of toes and still manage to hide yourself while you built power.
Nick’s goals often were to prevent the darkness’ latest attempt to gain power over the light, but he was still just one man. Greater powers than human or not, he was just one person amongst billions. Tethered to Marek’s vampires lent him a larger power base, but there was still a separation of that world from that of the day.
The night attempted to break into the day and Nick awoke to find his cell phone had been called by Marek. A new vampire incursion and it seemed to be a true threat to the peace the two of them had tried to keep for more than two decades. They had not always lived in Chicago. Immortals had to move from time to time or the mortals would notice.
The morning light streaming into his apartment felt brighter than normal. For once there were no gray clouds. It seemed like it had been weeks since he had seen the sun, though he knew better.
It was Geni’s day off, so he knew that there would be no interruptions this morning. He turned the TV on, as well as flicking the laptop off of standby mode. It continued to monitor the two cell phones carried by the werewolves.
As he prepared his breakfast, Nick wished he had taken more time to check the phones’ contact lists. If the two phones were disposed of or lost, he would no longer have valid information on their movements. At least he had the two phones, and it appeared that he already had found out where they were hiding out. Over the last three days, the two phones had continually found their way back to one of two addresses. His goal of the day was to find out what their dens were like. They were werewolves, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t be living very normal lives. He just kind of doubted it.
By midmorning, Nick was in the neighborhood where the signals had spent most of their time. He parked a couple blocks away in a parking lot and trudged his way over. Carrying a simple plastic bag of candy boxes, Nick had already thought of his cover should he need to get himself in or out of the area. He was simply sporting a jeans and leather jacket look, neither fancy nor too scruffy.
It was still cold as March always seemed to be in the north, but it was sunny and that helped. He still wondered where the so called global warming was supposed to be because it didn’t seem to be in Chicago.
The houses, as well as most buildings in the area, were made of brick. Much of Chicago and the nearby suburbs had been built more than a century ago when brick was the common material in the area. Trees around the street were mostly old and large, though still leafless from winter’s touch.
Nick settled across from the first house appraising the two story with a basement. It was fairly large and must have cost a fair penny even in the current market. Being a werewolf must have been profitable for at least one of them apparently. The red brick façade was partially obstructed from his view by two large oaks in the front.
Checking out the house as he walked, Nick began pretending to try and sell the candy from his bag. He would walk up to a door and fake a ring of the bell. Looking casually across the street, the voran watched for activity from the house. Would they pick up his scent or notice his attention as he walked?
He was almost exactly across the street when Nick began feeling the presence of the werewolves. The voran had not realized that he would have to be so close to feel them. With vampires, his sixth sense worked more than twice the distance.
Six werewolves were on his radar at the home. He thought a seventh presence could be felt from the basement, but he wasn’t sure. Whatever the feeling, Nick was going to have to get closer to figure it out. Was it the girl from his vision?
Unwilling to rush his patrol of the street, Nick continued the charade of selling candy. It was daytime so many people wouldn’t be home anyway. The ruse of him going from door to door with no one opening up for him wasn’t exactly unexpected. In fact, his senses told him that most of the homes he had gone up to actually didn’t have anyone home.
Nick pulled out his phone. He had downloaded the mapping application into his phone as well. Checking the map, he noted that neither phone was actually in the building, which was more than fine for the investigator. He didn’t want to walk up to their door and have one of the three werewolves be the one looking him in the face. The information didn’t necessarily insure that one of the t
hree wouldn’t still be there, but he hoped.
Stepping onto the porch, Nick could feel them as tension began to build in his body as he waited for what would greet him. He could feel all seven presences. Three were in the basement including the one that was hard to identify. One was upstairs. He listened intently and thought the sound of a shower could be heard by his extraordinary ears. The smell of nature and animals lingered on the porch. A pungent odor of the werewolves leaked through the door tickling the voran’s nose. A TV was on in the first room.
The bell rang. Light footsteps came quickly to the door. The door was pulled open to reveal a woman. Brunette and nearly as tall as Nick, she was long and lean, but her dark eyes were attention getting in a pretty face. With a grey tank top and sweats, she was unusual for a girl since the cold didn’t seem to bother her. A deep breath confirmed that she was a werewolf, though she had put on some flowery perfume. Her hair was also more brushed with a light make up job. She was like a show dog compared to the trio from nearly a week ago.
“Can I help you?” the young woman asked raising an eyebrow.
Putting the nerves behind him, Nick smiled his most charming smile throughout his lying, “I’m sorry, but I’m selling candy for my daughter’s school. She got the flu yesterday and is a little behind so I thought I’d help her out after getting out of work early.”
He noticed the girl’s face change from being stubborn to totally charmed by the story. “Aaww, well aren’t you a good dad? How old is the poor little thing?”
“Just seven. She’s in second grade this year,” he said without missing a beat.
A second set of footsteps had brought a shorter redhead into view. “Oh, they’re so cute at that age!” the second werewolf said with a warm hearted smile.
A strategic chuckle from Nick as he nodded, “Yes, she is, and luckily she takes after her mother for her looks. Don’t tell her, but that little girl’s had me wrapped around her little finger since she was born.”
A combined sigh from the girls meant they were continuing to fall for it. Nick smiled even as he let his senses feel out the house. The women invited him in while they found their wallets and called to the other two wolves to bring money.
“I’m Charlotte,” the tall brunette introduced herself, “and that’s Vanessa.
“Miguel, John, bring some money for this guy’s daughter. It’s for charity.
“It is for charity?” she finished double checking her information.
“Books for the school library,” he replied with a smile taking in the living room to the left and their kitchen to the right. It was your average everyday sort of home. Couches and chairs pointed towards a LCD TV, coffee table, lamps and the kitchen with its table and chairs were all looking for the world like normalcy.
Nick continued to smile and wait, even as he watched the body language and faces. Eyes never questioned what was before them. There was no raise of attention to worry over and the wolves wound up buying several boxes for his “daughter”.
By the time he was walking down the porch stairs, Nick wondered at how easy it had been to fool them. He hit the sidewalk and glanced back to see if anyone was watching him through the windows. No one was and, at the next house, the investigator slipped into the neighbor’s yard, but instead of heading up the porch, Nick moved to the side yard. A six foot shadowbox fence separated the two houses and offered excellent cover for the man to check out the other building.
The basement windows could be seen easily from over the fence. That also made it a problem for sneaking into the yard also. Examining the problem, Nick decided to give up the idea for now. Daylight worked against him for stealth, so he took his leave and went on to the next house that the werewolves had been visiting.
Using the same technique as before, Nick worked his way towards the house, but he never bothered to head to their door. Noticing an alleyway with no fence hiding the rear of the house, he simply moved to the rear at the end of the block. Their neighbor had a fence and the werewolves had a nice tree behind them as well. Again he relied on his sixth sense, but here he only found three more werewolves. There was no strange scent or a human one.
Unless the werewolves were planning on moving the girl around, Nick was pretty sure that he would find her in the first home. The mission accomplished. He would have to try again at night, which led Nick to begin analyzing possible plans. Night gave him some more options than by day.
First, he would need to go to the Lair and talk with Marek.
Sitting at a large oval table in Marek’s kitchen, Nick was in audience with all ten of Marek’s clan. Their leader sat at the head of the table with Nick being to his immediate right. Nicola managed to sit right next to him and often found a way to touch Nick whether with her hand touching his arm or her leg brushing his. The girl knew how to be distracting and she was subtly persistent.
The rest arrayed themselves at the table or on the stools by the bar. It was essentially a council of war so they all wanted to be included in the discussion.
“I think we have a new player trying to take over. The two that we dealt with last night actually had the nerve to tell us that someone was testing us. If he’s just making vampires to send at us, he could send an army of enemies until we are simply worn down,” Marek gave his impression of what had happened.
Nick noted the scratches on Marcus’ arms and face. To still have even those marks visible meant that the vampire had taken a lot of damage. Vampires could heal remarkably fast, especially when they had access to blood.
“So we have a new vampire pushing his clan into your territory with no more reason than he wants it apparently, and a pack of werewolves on the southwest side of the city. At least, I can tell you where the latter are,” Nick informed them.
“Are the wolves our fight?” Cheryl, Marcus’ girlfriend asked where she sat beside her marked man. “Other than the fight you two had with a few of them at the mall, which could be a simple matter of territory, we’ve never run into them.”
Feeling Nicola stiffen beside him, Nick answered before angry words could be said, “Perhaps not at the moment, but potentially, yes. I was able to find out there are at least as many of them as there are in your clan and that may not be the extent of them numerically. They’ve also moved into the city at least once in the last week and that was before we ran into them in the mall.
“The problem of ignoring them is twofold right now. One, they can multiply like this new vampire threat, which brings them either into conflict with you or more likely to be exposed and put into public view. Second, they have a girl they’ve captured. If she’s left to them, we can assume they’ll either kill her or turn her.”
Nick didn’t go into what he believed the girl actually was. If there was a second voran, that meant they could potentially expand the clan with a second blood source of voran blood. At least, that would be true if she were amenable to the idea anyway. He could hardly decide the girl’s future for her, but he would interfere with her possible death if he could. The fact that vorans seemed impossible to turn into vampires didn’t factor out that werewolves were a different creature and may have the power to turn a voran.
“That said,” Marek took back the conversation, “we need to figure out how to deal with two immediate threats. Right now, the question becomes: do we find this mystery vampire or work with Nick on his werewolf problem.”
Biting his lip, Nick noted Marek trying to shove the werewolves into just his lap. He wondered if that might be better in some ways, but the man also thought having back up would be wiser when he knew that there were at least ten to one odds involved. The creatures were also stronger than he, so the voran could hardly rely on surprise and skill to offset the numbers involved. Finally, there was the worry of whether voran blood could resist a werewolf’s curse like it could a vampire.
“It’s hardly just my werewolf problem. They didn’t come after me at the mall or attack me this afternoon when I was in their home.”
The second bit of information elicited gasps of surprise. No one realized he had been to their den and left unscathed. In fact, they even had paid for the cost of the candy, to which he had been amused. The werewolves either had a sweet spot for his story or some major sweet tooths.
Nicola sniffed at his shirt, which had been changed well before he arrived at the Lair. “Thought I smelled some dog on you,” she said quietly as the others all talked over each other in confusion, “and some girl’s perfume too.”
“I told them I had a daughter that was sick, so I was out selling candy for her school. That implied I had a wife, didn’t it?”
“Oh my lord, you didn’t?” she laughed bringing many eyes to her and a silence came over the rest. Noting their eyes, Nicola released the arm she had leaned into and rested back in her chair.
“Anyway,” he returned to the subject, “my kind seems to be under their radar but, if they come into contact with vampires, it seems like there will be trouble. The three wanted to kill Nicola pretty badly.”
“You can’t be sure they wanted to ‘kill’ her,” Audrey put in with a frown. “They could merely have wanted her out of a place they considered their own like Cheryl said. It also hardly warrants a quick retaliation.”
Nicola frowned at her long time friend. The two girls had known each other for nearly eighty years. “They didn’t let me leave the mall. If it weren’t for Nick, I would’ve had to fight all three of them. They were quick and strong. I don’t know that they would have simply let me off with a warning the way they attacked. In fact, since they chased me, I would guess that Nick is right.
“Will they be intentionally looking for me or you? That I don’t know, but as it gets warmer we might be seeing more action from them also.”
Vorans and Vampires (Book 1): Voran the Night Guardian Page 8
