Alliances (Guardians of White Light, #1)

by F. J. Gale

  “Of course,” he assured her.

  Her anxiety over sharing a bed with him was intriguing. He couldn’t help teasing her a little. “Besides, you don’t do vampires, right?” he said, echoing her words earlier in the parking lot.

  “That’s right,” she said with a laugh.

  He laid his head on his pillow and relaxed into the bed. He watched her out of the corner of his eye. She climbed onto the bed. She was so cautious about it, so uneasy. She lay down and edged as far away from him as the width of the bed would allow. She fumbled with the blankets in an effort to cover herself up as quickly as possible.

  “Here,” he said, giving her more.

  “Thanks,” she mumbled, pulling the covers up over her chest.

  “I’m not going to bite you,” he told her, gesturing to the choker that she still wore around her neck.

  “It’s not…I know…”

  Mathias’ brow furrowed with curiosity. She touched her guarded neck protectively. And that was when he realized why she wore it.

  “Let me see.”

  He rolled onto his side. She pressed her hand to his arm defensively, preventing him from coming any closer.

  “See what?”

  Her warm hand on his cold skin was like freezer burn. It was so intense. He could feel her pulse racing. Once again the same overpowering sensation he had felt earlier returned. Damn, what is it? He couldn’t place it. This time, he let himself feel it, scrutinize it. He had to figure out what it meant. It was unnerving as it compromised his normal unwavering self-control over his demon side. When he was close to her, for some reason, his vampiric instincts rose to the surface.

  And then he had it!

  Her blood was pure. She was innocent, a virgin.

  No wonder being close to her was so intoxicating. The blood of a virgin was the most coveted, the richest and most tempting of all human blood. It all made sense now. His reactions to her. Her nervousness. Her anxiety and reluctance to lie beside him, to let him see her stripped down. Luke had been right; he really had been apart from the world. A few years back he would have made the connection in mere moments.

  “What?” she demanded.

  He realized he had been staring at her for a good many seconds. She started to move away but his hand stopped her, gripping her arm. “Show me.”

  She met his imploring gaze and then her expression softened. She removed the choker and placed it on the bedside table beside her. And then she nodded her permission. He moved closer until their bodies were touching. His fingers gently brushed her hair aside. She flinched from his icy fingers against the side of her neck. She felt him trace his index finger over the scar there.

  “I thought you didn’t fuck vampires, my dear?”

  “I don’t,” she snapped, incensed by the accusation.

  “This scar says otherwise. Someone has clearly had their fill of you.”

  “It wasn’t by choice. I was attacked.”

  “What?” he asked, incredulous.

  “I was attacked by one of your kind,” she said again. “I’m a slayer. Why are you so surprised?”

  He drew back, shocked at what she was claiming. “Because, it’s unheard of. There are only two scenarios where a vampire will only graze and draw a limited amount of blood without killing the human in question: feeding and sex. When a vampire is biting to kill, it is impossible to stop—to withdraw fangs. The action is too intense. As soon as the bite is made, the victim is already as good as dead. What you are telling me is not possible...I have never heard of this before.”

  “Well there’s a first time for everything, I guess. Because here I am. Alive.”

  “When a vampire is about to feed he's at his strongest. His strength exceeds a human’s tenfold, Jenna.”

  “I'm a slayer. It’s my job to kill them, not the other way around.”

  “Slayers rarely make it to your age, because when it comes down to it, no matter how well trained they are, they cannot match our strength. They're only human, not supernatural.”

  She pulled away. “Let’s just sleep. I’m tired.”

  Mathias saw something in her eyes. She was holding back information from him. There was more to this than she was willing to share. He needed to know. He couldn’t risk working with someone he knew so little about. He glared at her, willing her to tell him.

  After several minutes elapsed with him refusing to break his almost hypnotic gaze, her agitation reached fever pitch and she blurted out, “I’m The Hunter.”

  She watched his expression morph from one of intrigue, to disbelief and all the way up the scale to outrage. His eyes flashed with betrayal and a flicker of hurt.

  She gasped as he suddenly lunged at her and grabbed her left arm roughly. He gripped it, pinching the skin as he examined it. She knew what he was looking for. The mark. Word had spread over the years. She knew he was well aware that the supposed myth of The Hunter was anything but.

  A three-inch scar etched into her inner forearm stared blatantly back at him. A simple outline of a circle with a jagged line cutting right through it. It was the mark of one affected by the magic of the Sorceress—an infamously powerful sorceress who dealt in both white and black magic. The mark symbolized an interruption to the normal circle of life. The power the Sorceress had bestowed upon Jenna was an abomination to the natural flow of things. It was a slap in the face to Mother Nature and her natural order. Jenna was the only living example, making her all the more infamous, not just in the vampire world, but the entire supernatural realm. Some referred to the magic as a blessing, a gift. Others condemned it as a curse. To Jenna, it was both.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” Mathias demanded, his eyes still fixed on the scar.

  “You know why.”

  She pushed him away, giving him a brief taste of some of the power that she had been holding back.

  “Because you’ve slain some of my allies?”

  “Eternus soldiers. They were supposed to be extinct. Not the case. I found out the hard way.”

  “I trained those soldiers. They were my brethren,” Mathias told her, finding it difficult to accept the fact that his new ally had now revealed she was actually his natural enemy.

  “I’m aware,” she responded drily.

  Agitated by the situation and her lack of reaction, he jumped out of bed. He ran his fingers through his hair as he struggled to absorb the shocking revelation. With his back to her, he ordered, “Tell me what happened.”

  Jenna eased herself up in the bed. “I was on a mission to intercept a truck full of new Immortalia recruits at a city border. Eternus crashed my party. They sensed I was human and a half dozen of them attacked me. I killed them. I kept one alive to pass a message to their leader, warning them that the same fate would befall any more of their men who tried to cross The Hunter. I don’t think they realized who I was until that vamp gave them my message.”

  Her explanation made sense. Mathias knew the mission she was talking about. He also knew how Eternus would react to a human suddenly appearing on the battlefield. She was telling the truth.

  “I ordered them to intercept that transport. It was a favor to me.”

  “I had it covered,” she said, shrugging her shoulders unapologetically.

  “You know that you’re wanted? Not just by them. By Immortalia. By me. By Legion. You’ve pissed off a lot of vampires, Slayer,” he told her as he approached her side of the bed like a predator. His eyes communicated a warning to her that he could pounce at any moment.

  But she knew he was just trying to intimidate her. She met his gaze and smiled slyly. “I guess I’m doing my job well then.”

  He perched beside her. “Our partnership isn’t going to sit well with my comrades.”

  “You need my strength to succeed. You won’t find a more powerful ally than me.”

  Without warning he pounced, gripping her arms and pinning her beneath him. He snarled and lowered his lips to her exposed neck. He breathed in her scent. He could hear
her heart thundering against her chest. Her body warmed. But it wasn’t fear. It wasn’t adrenaline. It was excitement. She was aroused by the situation. He couldn’t claim that he was above it either. His initial intention to demonstrate his strength in comparison to hers as an angry warning slipped into the background. A burgeoning desire replaced it. It threatened to devour all reason and all self-control. He could feel her body’s reaction and it mirrored his thoughts. His tongue tasted the unscathed side of her neck. So sweet it was. But it was too dangerous. For both of them. As fast as he could kill her if the will to bite overcame him, she could do the same.

  He pulled back and rolled over to his side of the bed.

  “We have a mission,” he choked out.

  “Good,” Jenna replied, breathlessly as she willed her body to come down from its heightened state. God, she moaned inwardly.

  “Who bit you?” Mathias asked suddenly, trying to alleviate the tension between them.

  “The son of your arch nemesis.”

  “Arthur? Of course. I heard about his run in with The Hunter. His failure to kill you after making the bite was a huge embarrassment to Silas.”

  “He doesn’t have enough self-control,” she said, throwing him a knowing look.

  Mathias got it. Arthur had been overcome by her purity. His bloodlust for her virgin blood had got the better of him.

  “I see.”

  “I know you sensed it about me. I could see you fighting yourself.”

  A wave of realization betook him. “You use it to draw them to you? To entrap them?”

  Jenna grinned. “A sound tactic, wouldn’t you agree?”

  “That’s why you haven’t…” He trailed off as his close proximity to her once again threatened to overwhelm him.

  “Partly, yes.” She broke eye contact and looked down at her hands, reverting to the shy persona that he had witnessed when she’d first climbed into bed. “My life isn’t geared for…interactions like that.”

  He understood. “You walk in a vampire’s world. You live in the shadows.”

  “That’s right.”

  “But you don’t do vampires?”

  She looked up at him and caught the huge grin across his face.

  “Are you trying to use those infamous seduction techniques of your kind to tempt me into making an exception?” It won’t work on me, vampire.

  They locked eyes. The heat between them was undeniable. But they had a mission.

  “Not after you let my arch nemesis drink from you,” he joked.

  “I was a little distracted by a knife in the gut at the time.”

  “He fights dirty.”

  “I let my guard down,” she said regretfully.

  “You’re too cocky,” he threw at her.

  He moved to get up but her hand wrapped around his arm like a vice. “What did you say?”

  “You’re cocky. It exceeds your abilities. You think you’re invincible.”

  “We have that in common then.”

  “Maybe, but I’m immortal. Are you?”

  Jenna broke her grip and eyed him soberly.

  He gestured to the fresh scar etched into his upper arm. “This would have killed you. A knife to the artery. Mere seconds and you would have bled out. You need to be more cautious in battle. As a human you’re more fragile than your enemies and they know it well. Your defense needs to equal your offense.”

  Jenna nodded as she took his words in. He knew what he was talking about. She was aware that he had trained the infamous Eternus and even commanded the army at one time. When it came to the specifics of battle and combat, he was the guy to listen to.

  “Noted,” she said. “Why are you fighting them? Word is that you were a recluse, cut off from the demon world until a few days ago. What made you come out of the shadows?”

  He looked hard at her. “Because, I have the power to stop them.”

  “Their war favors vampires. Despite your personal distaste for Silas, their success wouldn’t harm your kind.”

  He rolled onto his back, staring pensively at the ceiling. “The world would be their own playground of death. Their rules, their way. There would be no beauty, no hope, no comfort in knowing—although I could never witness it with my own eyes—that the light would always return. They would drain the lifeblood from this world leaving nothing but hollow despair. That’s not a world I want to live in. Many of my kind feel the same. Immortalia represents only a select few. They are fundamentalists. Their views aren’t shared by the general populace.”

  “But humans hunt you now.”

  “Because they're afraid of Immortalia and Silas’ very public demonstration of vampiric power. They’re afraid of war. Their hunting is a preemptive strike.”

  She nodded, taking his words in. “You walk in the demon world but you don’t belong to it. You’re on the edge of both,” she realized sadly.

  “It seems we have that in common.” He looked her over for a moment, before asking, “What was the price for the magic she gave you?”

  “This,” she said gesturing around the room, “this…life.”

  “You live like a vampire. Always in darkness. Never stepping into the light.”

  “Until Immortalia is destroyed.”

  “Then what?”

  Jenna took a deep breath and looked away, disturbed by his question. “Then, I’m done.”

  “You’ll die?”

  She nodded and bit her lip to suppress the emotion that rose to the surface from hearing someone else speak the words that she dreaded, that she never let herself think about.

  “Things have to balance. She gave me unnatural power to aid me in my quest to destroy them. When it’s complete, she has to take it back and restore the natural order of things.”

  “But it won’t kill you. It’ll just reduce your strength to that of a regular human woman,” Mathias said, not understanding.

  Jenna shook her head. “The human body can’t withstand the retraction process. I won’t survive it.”

  Mathias tried to speak but he hadn’t the words.

  “Don’t pity me. I knew the price when I made the deal.”

  Mathias couldn’t believe the irony. If they succeeded and destroyed Immortalia, an innocent slayer would perish.

  “Maybe I’ll let you bite me before it happens,” she joked. “As long as you vow not to turn me. I’ve had enough of the dark.”

  Mathias managed a bittersweet smile. “I’ll discuss it with Jax when we get there tomorrow. There might be a loophole.”

  “There isn’t.” She got comfortable under the covers and let out a yawn. “Forget it.”

  “There might be,” he insisted.

  “Why do you care? I’m a slayer. You’re a vampire. We’re supposed to kill each other. I’m wanted by you and your allies. The only thing standing in the way of that is that we have a common enemy.”

  “Because…I…” he trailed off, realizing that he couldn’t actually answer her question. She was right. It was odd that he cared. But he couldn’t shake the nagging feeling. What was this woman doing to him?

  “Go to sleep. I don’t want to worry about you being awake and getting the urge to bite me while I’m sleeping.”

  “You’re not my type,” he told her.

  Jenna smiled. “Good.” She closed her eyes.

  Lies, he thought to himself as he watched her body finally relax as sleep took her.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Jenna eyed the abandoned cathedral ahead. The moonlight illuminated the magnificent golden structure, casting a bright light into the heavens above. But the building had lost a lot of its former glory. Its stained-glass windows were now boarded up. A ten-foot high stone wall encircled the entire building and its grounds.

  She followed Mathias to the gated door a few feet away. She watched him reach for a buzzer beside what appeared to be some sort of telecom security system. Moments later, a rush of static cut through the dead quiet of the night, followed by a terse, “Speak!”

&
nbsp; “We are more than death, but eclipsed by life,” Mathias responded.

  “What?” Jenna asked.

  He smiled slyly. “I wouldn’t expect a human to understand.”

  Before she could respond, she jumped at the sudden abrasive sound of the gate screeching open before them. Mathias gestured for her to follow him.

  “I can’t believe a vampire lives here. A cathedral? I thought you were kidding when you pulled the car in here,” Jenna said.

  “Jax is being ironic.”

  His know-it-all tone coupled with his curt responses to her questions was getting on her nerves. What is his problem? After her reluctant revelation to him last night that she was no ordinary slayer and was instead The Hunter, his long-time enemy, she’d thought that the air had been cleared between them. He had accepted it and they had both agreed that the mission transcended all that. But since he had awoken, he had been standoffish, bordering on antagonistic. They had barely spoken in the hours that it had taken them to reach their destination. Trying to understand his—a vampire’s—reactions was beyond her. Nor did it matter. They just had to work together. They didn’t need to like one another more than that. Of course, she had to release her frustrations with him in some small ways. It was important to maintain a level-head after all. And so, when the opportunity arose, she had to take it.

  “I thought vampires burst into flames the second they stepped into a church.” She eyed him eagerly.

  He stopped abruptly and grumbled under his breath. “A myth. Just like the coffin thing.”

  “So, you don’t normally sleep in a coffin then?” she asked, knowing full well that only the classicists did that. She was also well aware that vampires did not burst into flames when they set foot on holy ground. But after his underhanded dig at her being unable to understand because she was human, how could she not try to piss him off a little when the opportunity arose?

  He glared at her. He was pissed.

  “Did you just growl at me?” she asked, sure she had heard just that.

  “I hate those stereotypes. I thought a slayer would know better, especially The Hunter.”