Cheating Death (Wraith's Rebellion Book 2)

by Aya DeAniege

  My being so new allowed me to be like Quintillus, new to the life. But the weaning was real. In all my millennia, I had never attempted such a thing. I am ever grateful to Lucrecia for what she did for me.

  I now need vampire blood only rarely.

  Your once yearly blessing.

  Yes.

  That part of our relationship was genuine. Lucrecia and I both knew what we were getting into, or so we thought. I thought he and I would end up in bed together. He was handsome and the so called chosen one. Who wouldn’t want to bed him?

  Yes, him and his supposed skill.

  My dear, if you’re talking like that, it’s because Quintillus did not bed you because he wanted to. I wasn’t joking when I said that man wore me out.

  Anyhow, I somehow fell into the category of sister. My crush was unrequited, and I couldn’t exactly fight it. It was what he needed. Too soon, I was the only one who hadn’t tried to force him into bed. I realized that he viewed sex as a necessity. He had to participate, that was simply the way things went.

  I convinced Lucrecia to let him go to the Devils. Run mainly by men, I knew he’d learn one way or another about how different men had sex.

  It may seem inappropriate, but I was so thankful when he wrote me to tell me how much he enjoyed rape. Finally, he was into sex in some way.

  And vampires go through a phase?

  All vampires do go through the violent phase. I went through it, so will you. You may not rape, Margaret never has, nor did Lucrecia, but plenty of women do. There will come a day when you think it funny to wear a man’s skin, and yet another day when you regret the very act of eating.

  So, why haven’t you killed Lu?

  I placed myself on the Council to nudge them in that direction. As I told you, I am not here to solve the problems of the world. They needed to do it for themselves. I baited them. I even locked Quin in a box to draw him out.

  And the idiots stood there and agreed to his demands. They wanted me to tell them where I had buried my baby brother. So, I said I’d take them. Two returned to their stock, believing it to be done. The Middle and Elder Council remained.

  Then I ate them as Death attempted to murder me. He was still obedient to the Council, you see. They were trying to do what he wanted them to. They were still in the right of things in his twisted little mind.

  When he realized they were dead for good, he tried to use the tool on me. When he realized what I was, he vanished for a moment. I believe I startled Lu. All he believed me to be until that point was exactly what Lucrecia told him that I was.

  Sasha, a Progeny with boring powers and some small skill at relieving men of their coin. The Council only really kept me close because through me they could control Quin. Without me they found that he listened to no one, not even Lucrecia. He had, by that point, begun acting much like a cat instead of a hound.

  Sometimes he’d do it, if he felt like it. But he’d give you a look the entire time he did it, and sometimes he’d do the equivalent of pushing a vase off a shelf just to get your attention, then pretend he hadn’t done it. Which was how he ended up in the box in the first place.

  Learning that I was something besides what I said I was, what even the Council thought I was, surprised Lu so much that he lost control of his power for a moment, but only a moment.

  He returned, and we fought, with Wraith suddenly appearing.

  That was probably when I realized that no matter what I did, Wraith would continue to exist. I thought those my last moments, that he would kill me. It was the whole point of turning and training Wraith, to kill myself and Bau and Lu.

  Except the beast was leashed. I don’t know if he is tethered to Quin, or to myself, but he chased Death off then claimed his prize.

  I’ve never had a man save me before.

  When did Quintillus try to kill Lu?

  That would be after we went to South America, which was after the boxing. Lu was weakened and shaken by the attack on the Council. He was even terrified when word began to spread that Death had done the deed.

  His dropping off his robe wasn’t a message to the Council. It was meant to draw a line in the sand. He is, after all, technically my hound.

  Four hundred years ago, Death walked away from the cull. I thought perhaps that was the war that the Oracle saw so long ago.

  Tonight, I was proven wrong.

  Were you aware of Quin’s power before?

  He was capable of killing vampires, that much we knew. Or knew of Wraith, at least. The power attributed to Quin by the Council is telekinesis. I’ve never seen Quin as Quin use that lethal power. I think only the Wraith portion of his personality can use it.

  The point has always been about bringing the two halves of his soul back together. By doing so, he would gain full access to both sides of his power, but would also begin to heal.

  Transference is quickened when two vampires feed off one another.

  In a cycle, yes. If you mean to ask after our trip across the ocean, I asked Quin for that because I knew I wouldn’t make it otherwise. Not without showing him who and what I was.

  The trip was wearing on me. Those flashes of the two which I first witnessed when he was turned, were worse. Darker even. Quintillus reached for the sun still, but in a desperate way. Like a man dying of thirst reaches for water.

  Wraith’s edges had become more brittle. The events of that plague which swept through the old world had done a terrible number on him. Neither personality was quite able to take control of the body, and in the wake of it all, Quin began emerging.

  You refer to them as three. I’m guessing Quin is the whole.

  Quin is the man that Lu attempted to destroy. He’s sometimes a goofball, but can be a solid strength when necessary. He’s just so caught up in what the Council wants and their laws. He can’t think for himself.

  So… show him that anyone can take for themselves.

  How?

  I don’t know. I’m supposed to be the sage at this part? You come up with the solution! I’m only twenty-six, for crying out loud!

  The Council has always served a purpose. And your little book would out me. Though, I suppose, I must have outed myself.

  It is time, however. If we spend too long in the same skin, we become stagnant. Living through the same routines and seeing the same people day in and out. Like a hometown boy who never leaves that town but to visit. We’re still here, we still exist, but we suffer from a …

  Stunting? Like a plant in a small pot.

  Yes, like that. So, lend me your wrist. We will do this exchange of blood that you offered. He will be back soon. You will allow me my time.

  Here, like this.

  Licking the blood off my wrist, I wondered if I tasted sparkles, or just thought I did because some of Sasha’s blood remained on my skin. Mind over matter, I knew what I had before me, and so my head changed the flavour that my tongue tasted.

  I did note that there was none of that other that Quin’s blood had. Even that, Quin thinking that he had been given Maker’s Blood, may have been mind over matter.

  “Can I ask you something?” I asked.

  “What is it?” She asked.

  “When I was turned, what did you see? You see something for everyone, right?”

  “I saw a blackness. Not threatening at all, but you keep a great deal close to heart. We have been speaking to you for almost two nights now, and we only know your first name. And I think Quin mentioned cats?”

  “Wow, really?” I asked. “He and I talked about my past boyfriends, and I thought that was over sharing. I mean, this whole thing isn’t about me.”

  “But it is, isn’t it?” Sasha asked. “Lu never would have caused all this fuss if you hadn’t been interviewing Quin. Mind you, any mortal interviewing Quin would have caused this.”

  “I’m a stuffed animal, thanks.”

  “Oh, dear, no,” she said as I swore her voice seemed to deepen. “If you were just a catalyst, a placeholder, the Council would have
turned you to destroy the virus, then killed you the moment you woke. You being a vampire is purely you. Nothing more.”

  My phone went off. As it did, I made a sound at the back of my throat and picked it up. Unknown caller, as in not programmed into the phone, or a private number?

  I answered the call.

  “Helen?” Quin asked. “Helen, I need you to come to the park, I’ll send you the address.”

  “Why?” I asked. “I thought you wanted me to stay put.”

  “I did, but then I thought about it. The Council isn’t going to offer me another night to cause such destruction. It’s best if you see it now, instead of later. So, join me. Now.”

  “Yes, sir,” I muttered.

  “Don’t be lippy with your Maker.”

  He ended the call, and I sighed and shook my head as the text message with the address popped up on the screen. I blacked out the screen and set the phone on the table.

  “He’s changed his mind,” I muttered.

  “That’s not like him,” Sasha said.

  Okay, now I know that was deeper.

  I looked at Sasha and wondered how long the effects of exchanging blood took. I didn’t want to ask, however.

  “Will he recognize you, even?”

  “Tonight, he will, perhaps not tomorrow, however. Do bring him back in enough pieces that I can speak with him before the change fully takes hold.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “And don’t call me ma’am.”

  “Any woman older than me is ma’am whether they look like it or not.”

  “Take one last drink. If you’re spotted drinking outside, Lu may be watching. You want him to think you are mortal, not try to finish the job.”

  “Right,” I said, grabbing the almost empty bottle of blood and downing the rest.

  It didn’t seem to slosh around in my stomach, just curled in the pit of my stomach as a fear came over me. That fear almost turned to anxiety as I placed the bottle back on the table.

  “I’ll get you money for a cab,” she said. “Unless you have a card hidden somewhere on you.”

  I looked down at my outfit.

  Dresses do not make for good adventuring clothing.

  The Council had also taken my purse from me. Frankly, I’m surprised I still had my phone.

  Frowning, I looked down at the phone, then back up at Sasha.

  “That’s Quin’s phone,” she said. “It’s the only number he would have memorized. Your phone would have gone the way of your clothing. Burned in the incinerator to prevent contamination.”

  Which was why the files were gone and there were no contacts on the phone. Quin’s stock probably all used the same number since there were phone numbers, so he didn’t need contacts because he simply knew how to get a hold of those people. It also kept prying mortals from getting the contact information of others in his life, because there was no trace of it.

  “It was brand new!”

  “It wouldn’t have survived the decontamination process, which requires it be brought to the boiling point for at least a minute. Phones are replaceable. You need to learn that many things are disposable. They will not last but a drop of time in the scheme of your life.”

  “Missed all the fun stuff,” I muttered as Sasha reached for the table.

  Her hand hesitated at the drawer. Then she opened it and pulled out a pile of cash in a little clip. When I say a pile of cash, I don’t mean four or five bills. They were twenties and it was at least an inch thick, probably thicker.

  Just sitting in her end table drawer.

  There was enough cash there to pay several months of rent. There may have been almost a year’s salary on minimum wage, sitting in an end table in the safe house of a vampire.

  She slipped a few bills out and considered me.

  “Where are you going?” she asked.

  “The park where they hold the festivals,” I said.

  She slipped a couple more bills out and held them out to me. That was more than enough to get to the park and back, but if we had to go anywhere else, extra cab fare would be great. I took the bills and tried to slip them into my pocket.

  When you don’t often wear dresses, it’s easy to forget that you don’t have pockets.

  “I don’t expect change back,” she said. “This is a house Quin and I built years ago. Everything in here was purchased or brought in by both of us. Even the money is his.

  “Oh, but a word of advice? Pocket whatever you can, whenever it’s not stealing. It adds up over time, and you need a lot to start a base in this age. It’s not like when Quin was young and he could rob a man and buy a store with that money and then everything else just fell into place. You’d need a lot to do anything in this day and age.”

  I nodded and looked down again. Sighing in frustration, I looked back up at Sasha.

  “Do you happen to have a purse I could borrow? Something that doesn’t scream ‘maul me to death like an animal’?”

  “Oh, yes, I’ve got this one that I picked up a few weeks ago at a festival.”

  She stood and left the room as I picked up Quin’s phone.

  The number he had called from had been private, so I couldn’t even dial it back. At least, I didn’t think I could call it back. I had the text message though. I could text him back, maybe. All right, to be honest, I had no idea how private numbers worked.

  I wanted to text him and ask if this was one of those things that I absolutely had to do. I strongly suspected that the answer was yes. I had to do this thing.

  Which was why I waited awkwardly for Sasha to return, then accepted the purse from her. I put Quin’s phone into the purse so that I at least had a way to get a hold of someone if something did go wrong.

  “Good luck,” Sasha said.

  “I don’t need luck,” I grumbled. “I need vampires to deal with their shit instead of dumping it on the new girl.”

  “Think mortal thoughts,” Sasha said.

  “Right, because that makes that statement so much better. You all could off him—though the others have to put their heads together to figure it out—but instead of putting on your big girl panties, you’re dumping it on the mortal instead. Real mature.”

  “Smart asses get eaten.”

  “Not if Lu kills me first,” I grumbled as I marched to the door.

  I called a taxi, then left the house and stood on the sidewalk waiting. As the taxi pulled up, I sighed out and slipped into it. I gave the man behind the wheel the address, then watched from the back seat as Sasha’s safe house faded into the distance.

  How many ways had she said to kill a vampire? Sixteen?

  Sixteen ways to kill a vampire and the Council, until that night, had only known of one. Those who knew how to kill another of their kind simply were not talking. Safer to keep quiet than to draw the eyes of Death.

  Thirteen ways under the appropriate moon, Quin, Sasha, and the tool.

  “Shit, I should have asked about this month’s moon,” I said quietly to myself.

  “Pardon, ma’am?” The driver asked.

  “Nothing, I just forgot to do something before leaving the house. It’s fine,” I said with a weak smile.

  Suddenly my brain tried to tick off through the list of things I might need, except the only one that was there, was my tablet around my neck. My mind still spun around wallet and keys even though I had no need for either of those things, and no place to put them besides the purse, which only contained the money Sasha had given me and the phone Quin had left behind.

  Shoes.

  I looked down and grimaced, biting back a curse. I hadn’t felt the cold of the pavement under my feet.

  As we pulled up to the park, I checked the meter and pulled out the appropriate amount, handing it to the man, then stepped out of the vehicle.

  A group of women was jogging by, so I flagged them down.

  “Give me your shoes,” I said. “Someone with size seven feet. Quickly, no questions.”

  One of them rea
ched down and pulled off her shoes, handing them to me. All of them stared at me in a mute fashion, as if waiting for me to tell them what to do.

  How did I know that would work?

  “You never saw me. She lost her shoes in a puddle.”

  “But she’s not wet,” someone said.

  “So, make her wet,” I said. “Duh.”

  The group of women flinched as I knelt and pulled on the shoes. They were not the most comfortable things, but they’d work. I just needed something on my feet because mortals didn’t go around bare foot. Baby vampires went barefoot, but they also got their head and heart ripped from their bodies, making them dead for good.

  I’d have to ask Quin about why my feet seemed to be numb. Or at least, suddenly hardened to walking across gravel and cement. I could feel, of course.

  Such as, I could feel the damned shoes pinching my toes and rubbing against my heel with every step I took.

  Taking a long breath, I pulled out my phone and texted Quin. A moment later he texted me with his location, and I began walking towards it.

  The spot was a bench in a secluded portion of the park. As I stepped up to it, I knew there was a problem.

  For starters, there was nothing wrong with the bench. When I say nothing wrong, I mean that it, and the area around it, looked like a regular park and bench combination. There was no blood or scattered bits. No one was near that area of the park.

  Also, Quin was missing. Suddenly I wondered why he would call me to a park to witness his violent side. It seemed a little public to be torturing someone. Sound carried well in the park. Most of the shrubs and bushes were kept low, which helped sound move across the lawns.

  There was motion behind me.

  I turned and came face to face with Lu. The old man sneered at me, and I struggled to not return the look with a sneer of my own. Everything in me wanted to howl and attack.

  The only reason I beat it back was because a mortal wouldn’t think that, wouldn’t do that. A vampire, a predator would attack another.