by Laken Cane
He handed a small vial to Jin and my stomach flip-flopped as I imagined him alone in his room, milking his virginal, powerful cock to get his part of the potion.
“I wish I could have helped you with that,” I said.
Anticipation was in his slow smile. “Soon. Very soon.”
I could hardly wait.
“Once we connect,” I asked him, “could your power, your beast, or whatever it is, could it help us defeat the rifters?”
The others stilled to listen, as curious as I was.
Rhys shivered, as though his unseen power slid through him. “Absolutely. Absolutely, Trinity.” And that was all he was willing to say.
There were still two hours of daylight left, and that meant two hours to eat, rest, and recover. Two hours of peace, we hoped. We needed a little while to relax.
Ten minutes later, Alejandro arrived with Jamie Stone in tow. “I’ve come to help fight. If the rifters arrive tonight, I want to lend a hand.”
“You’re human,” I said regretfully. “And you’re not a hunter. You can’t fight the rifters.”
He only smiled. “I’m going to fight.”
I looked to Rhys for help, but he shrugged. “He knows what he’s doing, Trinity.”
We sat at the huge kitchen table eating dinner, all of us becoming jumpier as the day waned and the heaviness of night loomed.
“I know how the Wall of Elders cracked,” Alejandro said suddenly. “And I want to give you the information before the vampire master finds out. He’s going to be angry.”
I put a hand to my chest and stared at him. “Amias?”
He nodded. “The rifters are the biggest enemy the vampires have ever had or will ever have again. The one responsible for freeing them will…” He shrugged. “Incur his wrath, to put it mildly. He may feel bound to eat the one who started this mess.”
We all leaned closer to Al, shocked, afraid. Disbelieving.
“Tell us,” Rhys said. “What have you done, Alejandro?”
Someone knocked on the kitchen door and I jumped up, but Jin rushed into the room and made a beeline for the door. “Oh, my,” he said. “This is unexpected.”
He pulled the door open and then folded his long body at the waist, groveling as he waved Himself and Nadine into the room.
There was a flurry of movement and grating noise as we shoved our chairs back and stood, watching the ancient, powerful man walk slowly and carefully toward us. Nadine was at his slightly bent back, as regal and frightening as ever, but I thought the lines on Himself’s weathered, wrinkled black skin were a little more pronounced, his eyes a little more sunken.
I hurried to pull a chair out for him.
“Thank you, Caretaker.” With excruciating slowness, his old bones creaking and his knees popping, he wrapped both hands around his walking stick and lowered himself into his seat.
Nadine cocked her hand and gestured at the suddenly pale Alejandro. “Go on, then,” she said. “Tell the story of how we’ve arrived at death’s door. Tell us who has brought the rifters upon us. Tell us who will feel the elders’ displeasure. Tell us wh—”
“Nadine,” Himself interrupted. “Hush.”
But in the corner where Al had stashed him, the collared and leashed Jamie Stone crashed to the floor as he fainted.
And just that quickly, I understood.
“The explosions on Byrd Island,” I murmured. “Jamie freed the rifters.”
“Not exactly,” Al said, watching as Jin nudged Jamie with a long foot.
Angus placed a glass of water in front of Himself then pulled out a chair and sat beside me. “Tell us everything, Alejandro.”
Al took a deep breath. “Once upon a time,” he said, then quickly dropped his smile when Nadine growled. “Sorry. Jamie’s father had relations with a witch in his prison. She got pregnant with Jamie.
“His indiscretions with a supernat prisoner would have been overlooked. His falling in love and having a child with one would not. The warden cared very much about appearances. He also cared about keeping his wife. He’d have been divorced by her and humiliated by the city had he been found out. He also would have lost his job.
“He could have killed her when he discovered she was pregnant. Instead, he locked her away in a private—and hellish—brick cell behind the prison, surrounded her with iron, and waited for her to give birth to his child.”
Jamie lay where he’d fallen. He was awake—I saw him blink—but he did not move. He listened as his story was told to strangers.
“The witch—”
“Loretta,” Jamie murmured.
“Loretta,” Al said, his voice gentle with the name, “lost her mind. The man she loved and trusted locked her away, stripped her of her ability to use her power, and ripped her baby from her arms. Any one of those things would have created a fertile ground for insanity. He gave the child to his wife to raise—claimed the woman who’d given birth to the boy had been pregnant upon intake. He’d also had the child tested, and there were no powers, or so he was told, lying dormant within the child’s blood. He was told wrong.”
My heart broke for the witch. What a horrible fate. “Why didn’t he kill her?”
Al opened his mouth to answer, then closed it. Finally, he said, “Because he loved her. And he loved his son.” When I said nothing more, he continued. “He refused to allow her to see or speak with another being for twenty-three years. He and an old caretaker of the grounds were the only two people to ever take her food or supplies.”
“Until Jamie found her,” I said.
He nodded. “When Jamie was born, before she was completely devoid of magic, she created a spell to bond them. He would always hear her. If she called, he would feel the pull. It wasn’t until he began to come to work with his father and then to eventually work there himself that she began to reel him in.”
“Don’t say it like that,” Jamie said hoarsely. He lifted his head and banged in on the floor. Hard. “Don’t ever—”
“Jamie,” Al said quietly. “You will calm.”
Jamie seemed to melt into the floor. He curled his body into a fetal position and didn’t say another word.
And I began to understand why he’d wanted Al when he’d first seen him at the prison. Al’s expression didn’t change as he returned his attention to us and the story.
I glanced at Himself, then nearly cried out. He stared in Al’s direction, but his eyes had rolled back in his head. Only a milky white showed.
He wasn’t just hearing the story, he was living it. He was the witch, the warden, and the child.
He would see exactly what had happened.
I shuddered and looked away.
“I think her hunger for revenge was the only thing that kept her alive,” Al said. “And her desire to see her child. Months after he discovered his real mother was actually a tortured prisoner on Byrd Island, Jamie began to help her plan to destroy the prison and his father.”
“But there was something more,” Himself said, startling me. I shot him a look, relieved to see his eyes were once again normal. “One of the vampires’ elders lay in the earth of the island, his mind part of the tapestry of magic that confined the rifters in their prison.”
“Yes,” Al said.
“And Loretta knew this. She had discovered the elder years before meeting her son. He was directly beneath her prison, only one of a pattern of elders all around Red Valley.”
“There’s one in Bay Town,” I realized. “Beneath the way station.”
“Yes, yes,” Nadine answered, impatient. “Be quiet.”
Al picked up the tale. “Loretta began to woo her son. She breathed life into the weak magic that lay inside him. There wasn’t a lot, but it would be enough to create the stones she would have him plant across the island. There would be enough to blow everything to bits.”
“Enough to kill the warden,” I said.
“Oh, no,” Himself said. “Loretta did not need magic to kill that man. Jamie put the warden into
the cell with Loretta before he escaped the island.”
“He left her there to die?” I asked, as though the damaged young man wasn’t lying on my floor listening.
“Loretta would die with the warden,” Al said. “That was her wish. Only the swirling remains of magic that sparked inside the cell allowed her to breathe. If she’d left the building, her lungs would have collapsed. She knew she was dying long before she met Jamie. She knew she would never leave her cell.”
“Fucking sad,” I whispered. “But why would she want to send the rifters to kill the world?”
“She didn’t, really.” Al’s voice was as full of sadness as mine. “She simply wanted to free them from their cage.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Natural Born Rifter-Killers
“I have come,” Himself told us, “because the rifters are close to breaking free. You will live in misery like you’ve never known if they are not conquered. And there is only one way to begin their defeat.”
He looked at me.
I blanched. “What do I do?” I asked. Not because I wanted to know, really, but because I had to.
“You will feed the earth your pure blood,” Himself said. “You will awaken the vampires. The true vampires. They are the only ones who can crush the enemy. They are the only ones who can set things right.”
He looked around the room, then settled his gaze on Rhys. “You must do many things. You know them all. And you know the order in which they must be completed.”
Rhys nodded somberly. “I’m weakened by the shifts.”
“I will lend you what I can but even I am limited by your curse.”
Rhys stood, almost as slowly as Himself had sat, and walked to the king. He gave him his hand, and then, with a laboriousness that was hard to watch, he knelt.
I saw it happen. I saw Himself share power with Rhys. I saw Rhys brighten, and I saw his energy return. At least some of it.
When he stood, it was as though he’d never been hurt—but I had no idea how long it would last.
Himself looked at me. “You have your hunters, and you have your master. Natural born rifter-killers all.”
Clayton caressed Blacklight’s gleaming hilt, and there was a fierce, strong pride in his eyes.
“She has given you the silver horn,” Himself told Angus. “The rifters are immune to silver, but they will not be immune to yours.”
He stood and stared down at all of us, Nadine looming and quiet behind him. “You have chosen wisely,” he told me. “Even when you did not know that you were choosing. Go into Willow-Wisp just before the sun is gone tomorrow and release your blood into the earth. Your master will pull you back before you fall. Trust him. Call them. Call them all. The elders believe their prisoners will break free tomorrow night. And we will fight the battle of our lives.”
Himself and Nadine left the same way they’d arrived, leaving a roomful of silence and dread behind.
No one spoke.
Everyone knew we might not survive the battle—at least not all of us.
And then I looked at Shane and began to shake, because when I looked at him, I saw death in his face. And I couldn’t bear it.
Darkness had barely fallen before Amias came into the way station. “Tomorrow, you will come into Willow-Wisp,” he told me. He didn’t approach me. Didn’t try to touch me. Just told me what would happen. “You will bring them back.”
He was shaking, as well. But he trembled with joy. With pure happiness. His eyes were lit with it. His vampires were coming home—alive, healthy, his.
Whatever else loomed, that imminent resurrection was bigger than anything else.
“Amias.” I held out my hand. “I…” I’m sorry I didn’t consider your loss. I’m sorry I didn’t comfort you. I’m sorry I didn’t really understand your grief. “I’m sorry.”
He took my hand, then pulled me to him.
“Why not raise them tonight?” Leo asked.
“Because the humans are going to need at least one night of peace,” I said. “I need to tell them all what’s coming and help them make plans to stay as safe as they can.”
“The humans are not the reason we wait,” Amias told me. “When my children get the first taste of your blood and rise from their deaths, their sickness, and their prisons—from their despair—they will be at their most powerful. That is when they will fight.” He clasped his hands over his chest. “They will be bursting with life and pure blood and eagerness to once again face our most hated enemy.”
And then, he looked at Jamie. He hissed and flashed his fangs, and the sudden power surge in the room caused the lights to flash.
Al stepped in front of him. “He belongs to me. I won’t allow him to be hurt.”
I grabbed the master’s arm and pulled him around to face me, taking his stare off Jamie and Al.
I ran my thumb over his lips, catching the pad on one of his sharp fangs. His nostrils flared at the scent of the blood that beaded on my skin, and I eased my thumb into his mouth. “There is a much more important fight ahead and it doesn’t matter who freed the rifters. Jamie Stone is the reason your vampires are coming back to you.”
He watched me, flicking his tongue over the tiny wound, pulling the taste of my blood into his mouth, into his brain. Finally, he smiled and let my thumb slip from between his lips. “Of course, my love.”
“Get Jamie out of here,” Angus told Alejandro.
“Like taming a wild beast,” Shane said. “Wave some bloody meat under its nose, and you own it.” When Amias shot him a narrow-eyed glare, he shrugged.
Al hurried Jamie from the way station. When he returned to fight, he would leave Jamie at home. “Why did he bring Jamie?” I wondered aloud. “He knew it’d be dangerous.” I glanced at Amias. “Lucky for him you only flashed the lights instead of putting him through a wall.”
Amias lifted an eyebrow. “My power didn’t flash the lights, Trinity. The witch’s did.”
“What? He’s not powerful enough for that.”
“That’s why his master brought him here. He wanted him to absorb the power of the way station. The power of us.”
“Jamie’s ability started to awaken when he used it for his mother,” Leo said. “Alejandro wants to help strengthen it.”
“Yes,” Amias agreed.
I frowned. “Jamie needs a teacher, then. Not a human dominant.”
“Alejandro will handle it,” Rhys assured me. “Don’t worry about Jamie.”
“We need the last two ingredients,” Jin said. “We must finish the potion.”
Amias pulled a tiny wrapped bundle from his pocket and gave it to the impatient Jikininki. “Now the blood,” Jin said. He pulled a small knife from his pocket. “I will take it.”
“No,” Amias said. “I will.”
Jin pursed his lips. “It belongs in the vessel, not in your mouth.”
“I know where it belongs,” Amias said dryly. “I can make it feel good. She would prefer pleasure over pain.”
“Not always,” Shane said, offering me a wink.
Angus sighed. “Somebody get the fucking blood.”
I strode forward, grabbed the blade from Jin, and dragged it over my palm. “There you go.”
The men gathered around as my blood dripped into the vessel. The instant it hit the other ingredients, they began to smoke, then to melt, and finally, to combine with the blood in a thick, boiling soup.
Jin stirred enthusiastically, lips tight, jaw clenched, eyes bright, and I wondered if he might try to steal a taste if he got a chance.
“That is all we need,” Jin told me. “Tend your wound.”
Clayton walked with me to the sink, where he gently washed the blood from between my fingers, then pressed a cloth to the wound. “It doesn’t want to stop bleeding.”
“I will stop it,” Amias said. He took my hand from Clayton, and my breath caught as he ran his tongue over the wound. It sealed with a hiss and a quick, cold burn, but he didn’t release my hand. He kissed my fin
gers, not taking his stare from mine.
“The beauty of you shines from your eyes,” he said quietly. “Even without our bond, I would have loved you.”
There was something new in the master’s eyes. Something enticing. Not vampire allure, but pure seductive male heat.
But still, the sadness remained. Sadness for me.
When I returned to the table and peered into the pot, I saw that the soup had become a thick, somewhat fluffy mass that resembled dark red clay. Jin broke off pieces and handed each of us a chunk. “You have only to pinch off a small piece and fling it at a demon. It will stick to him and will be impossible for him to detach. He will not trouble you further. Store it somewhere safe, and carry a small amount with you always. You will need it at unexpected times.”
“Can we make something to defeat the rifters?” I joked. “With their power, we may need a little extra help.”
“You’ll have it,” the giant said. “There is no rifter that can stand against me.”
But Leo’s power wouldn’t differentiate between friend or foe. In a battle where vampires fought rifters, Leo couldn’t use his power to kill rifters without also killing vampires. And that was the weakness of his ability.
Still, it was magnificent, and if we got an advantage over the rifters, it would likely be because Leo fought with us.
“I’ll be careful,” Leo said, as though he’d read my mind.
I nodded. “I need to let the humans know we defeated the demons and prepare them for tomorrow night.”
“We all have to prepare,” Rhys said. Then he looked around, catching each of us in his glance. He didn’t have to say what he was thinking.
That moment right there might very well be the last moment we were all together, all safe, all alive. We weren’t being pessimistic. It was simply a grim truth.
Rhys leaned forward and kissed me. He gave me a kiss that made me forget I was in a hurry to get to the city.
I held his face between my palms and pressed my body against his, but even as I felt him begin to grow hard against me, he pulled away.
“I’m tired of waiting,” I murmured.
“Our time will come, love.” He put his lips against my ear. “We are so fucking close.”
