by Scott, Talyn
Nor was he required to. Dru was not a Master vampire, much less a Coven Master. “Understood, but not my point.” Words laced with urgency, he said, “Sample Dakota.”
“You think she is -”
“Now.” Maestru curled his fist on his desk, pushed his chair back, and then stood. No other would hear of her predicament, especially in this house, if one existed at all. His eyes flicked between Dru and the main hall, which led upstairs to his closest guest suite, Dakota’s current room. Without another word, his doctor moved through the corridor and up the stairs, following her scent, her stabilizing heartbeat.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
A sound driving him to madness, he wondered, not for the first time, what Dakota would taste like. Everywhere. Maestru maintained his distance, trailing several feet. Stopping a few times, his breaths left in short bursts, his hands clenching the thick wooden banister with each step.
In all his years, Donor blood stayed far from his fangs. Any addiction created weakness. Weakened Coven Masters would never remain Masters of their subjects.
Since seeing Dakota’s face on that hard drive together with Blythe, he wondered if Dakota was another Donor. If so, how much time would pass before a Lovec scented her?
From what he had learned over his recent investigations into those missing, most Donors with human blood usually migrated to other Donors, unconsciously befriending one another as humans do, as though numbers could provide them with strength. Laughable, since Donors could not fight off the weakest of vampires – the freshly made Undead.
Respectfully, Dru remained outside her door until Maestru reached the second landing.
Maestru gestured for him to go inside. “No, I’ll stay here.” Sick possessiveness rolled over him in staggering waves. Although Dru was her doctor, one Maestru had chosen himself; he knew he could not watch Dru bite her. Drinking was bad enough, biting was just short of claiming. If Maestru witnessed such biting, he had a terrible feeling that he would kill him instantly in a vampiric rage.
“Okay.” Dru slipped inside, shutting the door behind him.
Maestru walked the second landing, facing an arched window framing the sun. Although he wanted Dakota out of this strange coma, still, he hoped that she would stay asleep throughout the day. Luisa was away from the house, and if Dakota were to choose this day to stir, he did not want to come to her room and soothe her. It was too domesticated, and he had long left those intimate places. His life remained one of solitude, leading his race without any hindrances, such as…
“I need a blade,” Dru said, suddenly gliding behind him. “Or I’ll have to mist back to the house and grab my medical bag.”
Maestru looked him over. Dru didn’t look hungry, but still. “You need to feed before you bite her? Then take from your Master.”
“I appreciate your generous offer, my Master, but I fed from Bane already today. It’s just…may I speak freely?”
“Yes, you may.”
“I don’t think I want to die today, and if I bite Dakota I feel that you may -”
“A blade we will find, then.” Without wasting time, he waved his hand. “In fact, I have an idea, which may aid in our investigation.” His bedchamber opened before them, the double doors straining wide in welcome. Lifting his palm upward, a small drawer opened inside his weaponry cabinet revealing a solid, silver Dirk handcrafted in Scotland. When used properly, and one pierced the heart precisely, this particular blade killed most werewolves – even ones descending from Alpha and Beta bloodlines. The powerful weapon landed perfectly in his hand, felt at home there. Wasting no time reaching out for an alternative, he used his ability to lift the next blade. A wooden dagger blessed by a Druid priest to kill most vampires, including Dynasty Vampyrs, came to him. When his opposite hand received that blade, it turned. Its raw wood spiraled hues of midnight no human eye could interpret. With that echo of black magic, Maestru’s arm ached to distraction.
Not that a little pain ever hurt anyone.
In an elegant flurry, he entered Dakota’s chamber. Although a Floridian afternoon was warm by anyone’s standards, a limestone replica of the fireplace found in France’s Amboise Castle stood lit, its low flames heating her chilled flesh.
Maestru walked to a fifteenth century tester bed he had brought from his last home. There she slept, resplendent. Staring down at her, a thousand dark fantasies flashed through his mind, none of them worthy of her. One of many reasons he would keep his distance. Some dreams should stay in dreams. Dakota’s golden hair spread out over silk covered pillows. Since her attack, without firelight’s aid, pale blue tinged Dakota’s skin.
Dru glanced at the fireplace and then up at the Late-Gothic tracery in the wooden valence. “My mother slept in a bed like this,” he whispered. “It’s a good thing you had the linen curtains removed, though, I don’t trust that fireplace.”
Most creatures from centuries past did not trust fireplaces. Many lost their families to immortal fire due to the vampire wars. Dakota, however, could die from the simplest of fires. So fragile, a butterfly’s lifespan was the sum of her time upon this earth. No opportunities for eternity unless…
No.
Bracing himself for the scent of her essence, Maestru lifted her fragile arm, his body tensing at the sight of her blue veins traveling underneath her skin. There were so many to choose from yet he wanted to sink his fangs into each one! Just one taste… Without losing another second, he made a small slice below her inner elbow with the wooden dagger. He watched in fascination as her blood slid down the blade. Barely snapping out of a near trance, he placed it on a bedside cabinet. Lifting the silver blade, he pressed the same wound, coaxing out more of her tempting scarlet. When the second blade dripped, he settled it next to the first.
Maestru did not have to wait long. With practiced eyes, he could see that her blood had not reacted with either blade. “Not vampire or werewolf lineage, you think?”
“Maybe not,” Dru answered, “depending on how sensitive the spells were when applied to those blades.”
Raising an insulted brow, Maestru replied, “The best spells were applied to these blades.” Running his index finger over her bleeding wound, without thinking, he then lifted it to his mouth. Stopping just short of savoring her, he shoved that telltale hand in his pocket and looked at Dru squarely. “You will not discuss this with another. Ever.”
“What is there to discuss?”
Next, Dru was at Dakota’s side, lowering his head to her arm. When Maestru heard Dru swallow, it took everything holy and unholy to hold himself back from killing the doctor. Since when was he so territorial about what his Species constituted as property? “Your verdict,” he asked in a strained voice, one he did not recognize as his own.
“She feels human on my tongue, but not.” Dru pulled away anxiously.
“Dakota tastes nothing like Blythe?”
“Yes and no.” Dru sounded frustrated. “She’s, yeah,” he stopped, taking a deep breath and walking away from her sleeping form, “addictive….damn it.” A shuddering breath racked him. “Dakota’s hitting my palate in a euphoric way…like the wildest of…aphrodisiacs.”
Addictive blood that doubles as an aphrodisiac? Oh, this was looking bad for Dakota. Maestru slid his phone from his pocket. He could call Sixten, but they would have to wait for a Vojak to come and guard Blythe. “Kash,” he said when his Vojak answered, “mist to your Master’s location.” It took no more than three seconds before Kash appeared. With blades in each hand and his knees bent, his stance was battle-ready though Maestru could see the warrior had been up all night. “All’s good. Put your weapons away.”
He did, averting his eyes from the bed. “How may I serve you, my Master? Greetings, Dru.”
“Afternoon, Kash.” Dru took several steps away from Dakota, his cheekbones sharpening against his skin.
“You’ve misted Blythe, tasted her,” Maestru inquired. “Is this true?”
Kash’s face paled, but he answered truthful
ly. “I’ve tasted, not fed.”
“Compare Dakota’s blood to Blythe’s.” Maestru took a deep breath, wanting to kill Kash before he started.
Without questioning his Master, Kash went to it, wrapping his lips across Dakota’s laceration. His mouth suctioned without biting. Not even thirty seconds in and the Vojak shivered, nearly burying his fangs into her, but managed to pull back without Maestru uttering a word or lifting a claw in warning.
“Both of you reform inside my library.”
After misting down to the library, Dru spoke first. “Relating Blythe and Dakota, I cannot make such comparisons beyond the addicting qualities of their blood. Highly addictive, that is. Considering when I tasted Blythe, she was anemic and still unbelievably extraordinary…”
Blythe was quite a unique female. Maestru knew this. According to Sixten, none other than a Lovec sired Blythe, and they both agreed that the fewer who know about that potential sinkhole the better. “Go on.”
“Dakota’s not anemic, and like I said, she’s addicting in a very personal way…but something’s different about her.”
“Doctor,” Maestru pressed, losing patience, “you said human on your tongue, but not. Explain.”
Dru shrugged helplessly. “I’m puzzled.”
Kash stopped in front of an original Simone Martini, circa early thirteen-hundreds. “Dakota, well, it’s as though she’s mimicking human blood. Such as a counterfeit does for the original. It’s there and yet it’s not.” His pupils dilated much in the way a cat’s does at night, forming expanding black circles inside lavender-colored irises, Dakota’s blood still calling him back to her. “The lines, the shapes, and even the colors are there, almost perfectly so, but a proficient eye can see a hairbreadths difference. Or rather, a proficient tongue can taste it. I don’t taste vampire or werewolf…but something immortal. Something I’ve never tasted before.”
Maestru neared the masterpiece, its copy hanging in a forgotten museum somewhere. “The Miracle of a Child Falling from the Balcony,” he whispered the title aloud. “The miracle of creating life in test tubes and beakers inside vile laboratories hidden underground, but they are oh so close.” His hands fisted at his sides. “Obviously, by the reactions of you two, Dakota’s a Donor, but I’ll be damned if those monsters are getting their hands on her.”
Kash’s eyes flipped back to the painting. “I hope she never goes through what Blythe and the other females have.”
“Parasites,” Dru muttered warily.
“We have to find a lab those bastards haven’t yet destroyed,” demanded Maestru, finding thoughts of anyone taking Dakota from him unacceptable. “Go through every square inch of it and find a way to bring them down.”
“My Master,” Kash said with frightening stillness, “I’ve been in their demolished labs…the funds they’ve invested is unimaginable, even by a vampire’s standards.”
“Medically speaking, an operation like theirs,” Dru agreed, “would demand an incredible budget.”
“We’ve have to find the source of their income,” insisted Kash, “and cut it off. When they’re scrambling, we find their jugular and take them out once and for all. It can be done. It has to be done.”
Meaning Sixten would have to locate that damned wormhole - their jugular. Not another Habaline could arrive in this realm. Since all other creatures were already at great risk of subjugation, mainly humans. “Kash, you and Sixten put the wheels to our hunt. Everything else is second, got it?”
“On it, Master."
“Speaking of Donors, I want to see that hard drive, please. If you have it,” Dru requested. “Oycher brought a copy to me, said my brother-n-law was on it with Blythe, Dakota, and many others. Obviously, when I looked it over, I was very ill from the shifter attack. I would like another look at it. I don’t see how there’s any way Terje is a Donor.” He shook his head. “Not a Nordic pure blood werewolf, he can’t be.”
Maestru moved to his desk. “Terje is still off continent with Renee and Arian, yes?”
“For now.”
Maestru spun his laptop around, sitting on the desk’s edge. It wouldn’t take him long, considering vampiric speed and the simple fact that he’d already downloaded a handy copy. When he opened the file, he clicked through in fluid haste. Terje was the only male on the disc, wouldn’t be hard to locate. A few more clicks and… “There he is.”
“No.”
“No?” Maestru and Kash echoed simultaneously.
“I see the resemblance is uncanny, remarkably uncanny, but Oycher is mistaken.” Dru shook his head. “My Master, whomever that is, he is not my brother-n-law.” A deep line marred his forehead. “Zoom in on his eyes, please.”
Kash did, expanding the picture until it pixelated. “I’ll have to agree, Doctor. Those eyes don’t belong to a Nordic Were Beast.”
Maestru couldn’t believe what he saw, couldn’t believe he missed it earlier. “A Lovec.”
Dru asked, “Why would they make a hard drive with pics of Donors and a Lovec?”
“They didn’t make it. Blythe’s brother did,” Kash spoke up. “Stupidly, Anthony would have used it as an insurance policy…but his best bet would have been to sell it to the Dynasty. Doesn’t matter, he accomplished neither before Poison killed him.”
“Okay.” Maestru scrubbed his hands down his face. A few hours of sleep would ease him before a long working night, which loomed ahead. “That’s item one thousand and one on our list, Kash. Go and get with Sixten. Currently, your task is most important.” Kash inclined his head, misting.
“Doctor, will Dakota require you tomorrow?”
“Undoubtedly, she will.” A shiver ran over him. “Not to worry, I’ll feed from Bane again before I arrive. You know, as a precaution.”
“Few I trust, Dru, one of them would be you. Again, I ask why she has not pulled through these injuries yet.” He placed his palm against the desk, its coolness seeped into his hand. “After I fed Dakota, her throat closed right away, yet she maintains weakness.”
“I’m certain she’ll come around, though I cannot say when.” Dru leaned against the desk, crossing his ankles. “Let’s just hope that she doesn’t remember anything, and she lives her life as a human should live it.”
“Until she’s hunted by Lovci, you mean.” Maestru bit back a strangled hiss. “Or better yet, until a shapeshifter smells her again.”
“Rock killed the shapeshifters who fed from her.”
“Before her placement inside the joint faction facility, she had open wounds while being carried by Rock through the city. Certainly, others lingered, scenting her. I’m sure of it.” Most immortals had loads of patience, were willing to wait for something entirely worth it. And Dakota? She was definitely worth it. “I’m so sick of power toppling power. The biggest shovel in the sandbox wins all. Innocents, such as Dakota, always lose when faced with the powerful. And the ones who don’t deserve power to begin with are the worst offenders.”
“Yes,” agreed Dru, his expression unreadable.
“Go home and rest, Doctor.”
“Good day, Master.”
Maestru dissolved when Dru did, heading straight to his bed for a few blissful hours of sleep before nightfall.
An opaque mist left the darkened corner in parts of three, a section reforming inside Maestru’s foyer. “I think we should pay a visit to the Master’s house guest and see how she’s coming along.”
Chapter Seven
“I think you’re burning.” Rock waved the sunscreen in front of her face, hunger and thirst simmering in the depths of his eyes, not for food or drink.
“Dark complexion, remember?” Blythe slid her phone in Rock’s pocket, since she didn’t have a purse. She knew Sixten was lying to her. He wasn’t doing any ambassador work, and by his weary tone, he’d been fighting before answering her call. God, she missed him something fierce. However, she would force herself not to call him anymore, didn’t want him to answer her and miscalculate a move, ending up dead. With
a sigh, she brought her new shades over her eyes, courtesy of Rock, and closed her lids. This is relaxation. Though the beach was exceptionally crowded, especially with overbuilt men, everyone granted them a wide berth. Good thing, too, an open space was what she needed.
“Still, I’m a little concerned,” Rock said innocently, though his smile was purely wicked. “Your cheeks seem flushed.”
Waves crashed in and then rolled out, a few gulls bickered over a dying fish, and volleyballs bounced back and forth behind her. Even so, the most significant sound she caught was Rock’s breathing. It started picking up about fifteen minutes ago, when the sun dropped low in the sky. “I don’t do sunburns, especially in this one piece you chose. I swear you had this hidden in a trunk somewhere, probably belonged to your grandmother or one of your lovers from the eighteenth century.”
The sunscreen hit the sand. His hands found her hair, thrusting through until he cupped her head. When between his big palms, she felt more of his power, his unyielding strength. As if she were nothing, Rock could crush her. However, Blythe understood that she was the most important thing in this world to him, and by the look on his face, Rock would protect her for always.
“Lover from the eighteenth century, you say?” Lips swept across her throat. “If I said it was a hand me down, baby, would you be jealous?”
“Jealous?” Blythe grew damp, needy from his simple touch. “Try disgusted. Though I’d be more inclined to believe you if the tags weren’t still on the swimsuit, and by the way, you really overpaid.”
With a voice made of black velvet, he picked one word out of her rant. “If you’re really disgusted, I think I can change your mind about me in less than five minutes.” One hand slid to the back of her neck, holding her. The other lowered and wrapped around her wrist, covering her watch. “You can start timing me.” He pressed that wrist to the sand, held it there. “Now, Blythe.”
His beard tickled her throat as his mouth dropped to her shoulder, teeth scraping over her collarbone. Correct that, canines caressing her in the most sinful way. They were longer, more pronounced than they had been during the afternoon. With a gentle suction, he brought the skin he’d scraped into the warmth of his mouth, tugging. A sudden pull in her abdomen caused her clit to throb mercilessly, her vagina tightening…empty…craving to be filled. Body tingling everywhere, Blythe went hot, cold and back to hot again.
