by L. A. Banks
Carlos stared at her, almost numb. He pushed her away from him, his expression hardening, his eyes narrowing shrewdly.
“Cut the bullshit and tell me what you’d really get out of hooking up with me. And don’t even bother trying to stroke my ego. I’m a businessman, baby, and I can smell shit all over this sweet little deal you’re offering.”
She stepped back from him, glaring at him in annoyance. Carlos waited.
“I can’t leave the region,” she finally said. “When I took the were-demon to the vanishing point, I gained daylight, but I lost the ability to move about freely.” She looked uncomfortable. “There have also been some other side effects. Sometimes, the were-jag qualities threaten to . . . take over. There are some nights it’s difficult for me to turn back into my natural form.” She stared up at him. “I can take you to the V-point and gift you with daylight, but I need you to flat-line me when you do so. It has to also be a total black blood exchange and it must be one with a master vampire.” She licked her lips. “Please.”
Carlos stared at the beautiful, twisted creature and knew he was going to have to dust her.
“If you want me to cast the illusion of the current Neteru for the task, to make it easier for you—”
“No!” Carlos stepped back from her. “Are you crazy?”
“Are you?” She moved closer and stared at him hard. “I offer you the chance of an unending lifetime. Through me, and only through me, you can have everything you want—a Neteru, an empire, light invincibility . . .” She outstretched her arm, motioning toward the horizon. “The world, in daylight, Carlos. Me, at your side, forever—we could rule, and no other master vampire could ever rival you, no human could vanquish us, and I—”
“Enough! Shut up! Don’t even go there.” He paced away from her, the temptation of what she’d just offered, along with the thick scent she was producing again, was all too dangerous, but too practical a solution to his many problems to consider.
“Tell me you don’t want that, never considered having a Neteru by your side for eternity? Tell me that and I’ll be gone.”
For a moment, he couldn’t answer, then found his voice. “Not like this. I didn’t want it like this.”
She shook her head.
Carlos shut his eyes tightly and walked farther from her and sat down hard on the grass. The images scrambling her brain were so terrible that his head dropped between his bent knees in the darkness. None of what she said was a lie, and he could hear a child’s screams echoing on the night air. Could see a mother-seer guardian in abject pain, hidden in the bush, too much of a warrior to surrender to death . . . even at the piteous shrieks of her own child being repeatedly raped by conquistadors . . . her limp little body fed to crocodiles to draw the team out. A mother-seer so devastated because her Neteru didn’t come at the ultimate cries of an innocent. But she stayed in the brush guarding the entry to the compound. For the cause. For the tribe. For her people. Protecting her Neteru at all costs, not knowing the Neteru had already been killed by disease.
She neared Carlos, but stood just out of his reach. “Don’t judge me so harshly, Carlos Rivera. What I am now is nothing in comparison to the conquistadors! Don’t even judge that guardian team. Her child, her mother, her sisters . . . her guardian sisters, each killed, bodies desecrated . . . Her mother-seer could bear no more. And for a warrior to fall to a disease that puts hideous bruises and sores on her face, stealing even her Neteru’s dignity in death? From her mother-seer’s perspective, she was already an ugly, dying creature with no honor, no people, and nothing to lose. What was a soul worth at that moment, if it could not right a wrong so great?”
“Smallpox,” Carlos whispered. His mind wrapped around of all things, a prayer. Dear God in Heaven, men of the church did this? Yet, a man of the church had told him the kinds of things the demon realms sent to break a guardian or Neteru’s spirit. Damali entered his mind as he looked at this crazy, yet beautiful, female vampire, wondering her age. But that information was so cloaked he couldn’t even sense it. She looked Amazon, and he wondered where Nuit had found her.
He stared at this gorgeous but crazy female vampire near him. He owed her a lot, because she’d given him a sense of what the demon realms had planned. He immediately thought of Damali in contrast with the ancient Neteru. They had broken the ancient one’s back, taken everything, and left her spirit to perish. Like Father Patrick had warned—first her mind, then her body, and ultimately her spirit. The screams of her people and her mother-seer’s child ate away at her mind, the smallpox ate away at her body, and on her deathbed, this woman had given up hope and surrendered her spirit into the light—only to have a dark ritual desecrate her body . . . misguided hope for justice violating everything she stood for, and the atrocity was committed by one of her own . . . from within her ranks, one of her most trusted.
It was a warning, a sign. It gave him serious pause as he sat by this tortured creature that was his simply because of geography. She had shared so much knowledge. It had been a true gift, because it shed so much light on the Neteru he had to protect. How long would it be before the dark forces came after Damali, if they didn’t think he had her on lock? The negative energies had already begun swirling around her, stripping away her protective layers one by one.
They sat on the grass together, quietly—him deciding, her waiting. There was much to consider on both sides of this equation.
He had been Damali’s primary guardian; her destined life-mate, but had gone dark. It had almost ripped her heart out and stolen her hope. Marlene, her mother-seer, had almost been broken by the screams of her child being taken by a predator. Jose had been crushed emotionally by the loss of Dee Dee. Rider had lost Tara to a turn, but had never had the heart to kill her . . . that story was locked in his territory, he knew it the moment he did a roll call inventory of the available territory females while sitting on a monk’s cot killing time. But that was also about a man loving a woman, so he’d just let Rider’s personal business be.
The other guardians had had their trials, too. Shit, Big Mike almost took a turn in New Orleans—the female in that region was still messed up behind that. But mild panic washed through Carlos when he thought of how close he’d come to turning Damali on so many occasions . . . How different was he than that grieving, pain-riddled mother-seer who simply wanted her beloved Neteru to live forever? Not much. Love was complex, and could easily get twisted.
He glanced at the female beside him who was breathing hard and still shuddering from images. He put his arm around her and pulled her close, allowing her to lean against him and she closed her eyes. The quest for power had fucked her up good. Judge not, lest ye be judged, slipped into his mind. Were he in the same situation, would he have given in to the same temptation? Who knew?
He stood, slit his wrist, and offered it to her. Compassion tore at him as she hungrily siphoned the vein. He watched her close her eyes, take a sip, and grimace on the first swallow as a shudder ran through her, connecting them. She pulled away for a moment, breathing hard and grabbed her stomach as though she’d been punched. Total awe claimed him as she went back to the vein and pulled harder on it, sending more terrible images up his arm and into his mind. But it was so bizarre. Within those images were shock waves of dark pleasure as her saliva entered his bloodstream . . . violent, bestial, torrid images that almost swayed him where he stood.
“I am so sorry the product did this to you, baby.” Carlos shook his head and looked up at the sky. “Rule the world. To what end? Damn.”
She got up and began walking in an agitated circle around him, counterclockwise to his wary moves when he slowly matched her orbit . . . her entire being naked, pained, gorgeous. Begging him to side with her cause with her eyes. “Power needs no explanation. It is the purest substance in the universe!”
“Let me give you some more to bring you down,” he said quietly, slitting his wrist again harder with his nail, and then pumped his fist.
“You can fl
at-line me, then you won’t have to worry about it.” She straightened and walked over to him slowly, the noise of the jungle, his blood dripping into the grass, and their breathing the only sounds to be heard.
As she neared him, he saw the image in her eyes and heard the threat to his life in his mind. She’d what? Rape him? If it wasn’t so ridiculously off the wall, he might have laughed. But the dead-serious look she gave him almost made him bulk for battle. There was a maleness in her imagery of coming out of the vanishing point that disturbed him. It was definitely time to bring her down. This was why he never touched his own product . . . and after seeing this, not to mention gaining a conscience, he wasn’t in the business anymore. After tonight, he was definitely out.
Carlos continued to let his blood splatter that ground to signal her, now or never. He was two seconds from sealing his vein and walking.
She dropped to her knees and it took everything in him not to kneel with her and stroke the pain away from her head. But there was something that registered caution within him. It was the underlying violent image she’d sent that kept him on guard, standing, and in a power position the way the throne dictated feeding lower generations.
He forced himself to watch her from a detached place in his mind as she took his wrist hungrily. He winced when she locked her lips around his flesh and began to suck so hard it was almost painful. Yet, he was also mesmerized as he watched her take from him, his ruby blood turning black on her mouth as it dribbled down her chin and mixed with the air. He’d never fed a naked vamp female from his wrist before. The process was deep. He had so many responsibilities to truly internalize in his role as a territory master. All he could do was watch as she siphoned him, looking up every few seconds, and then going back to the open vein. Seeing the wild look in her eyes was so horrifyingly erotic that he almost snatched back his arm, but he didn’t have it in him to deny a creature so wounded.
Carlos was numb. He understood there was nothing he could say to a being so mentally twisted by a narcotic, so right, yet so wrong. She was on a real bad trip and was going to have to ride it out alone. There was nothing more he could do for her.
Father Patrick’s words echoed in his skull as he slowly blocked this tortured beauty from further access to his mind. He had been her. There was only one difference . . . somebody with light in her soul had gotten to him first. Karma. He was looking at a female version of himself. Her rage was magnificent.
And, at the same time, he knew that Damali, safely stowed in his lair, was only safe for the moment. This female would go after Damali, when Damali came after her. It was in their nature.
“You have a great expanse in your heart,” she said, finally standing with effort, wiping her mouth, and walking away.
Carlos cocked his head to the side. Her vocabulary had changed. The street slang she’d dredged from his mind was replaced by the syntax of her era.
“You would have been a good companion warrior in my time. But I will settle for you being a good one-time lover—it must be. We are equals. We understand each other.” She sighed. “In one night, perhaps two, then there will be no choice. Get rid of the young huntress. She’ll come for my territory and try to send me back from whence I came—and we cannot allow that to happen. Bring me the Isis, so that I know your word is your bond.” Then the look in her eyes became deadly.
“You said ‘we’?” Carlos stayed calm, trying to measure his words as her form got smaller. This was too serious, too dangerous. Now she was talking about killing D? Uh, uh . . . she’d better walk that fucking high off fast. Things had kicked up a level. Strip Damali of the Isis, and do her—or protect her life by taking this babe to the vanishing point? The only reason he didn’t smoke this crazy bitch on the spot was because she had said “we.”
She turned and looked at him squarely and then laughed. “You even have the conquistador’s name and language upon you, Master Rivera. But I look in your eyes, and I see my people in them. You were stolen, oppressed, too. I will give you back to yourself. Freedom. Power. The sun. We.” She paused. “Don’t make me have to deal with her. There are a lot of females in this section of your territory that do not appreciate this new Neteru.”
“On my orders—you and every female vampire in my territory—stay away from Damali, her guardians, that whole team! I will not have it—you hear me? You rush her, you die! The only reason I’m letting you walk is because you’re high. Tomorrow night, we’ll discuss this whole daylight bullshit. We clear?”
She blew him a kiss and vanished. He remained on the hillside, a dead water buffalo at his feet. The intoxicating scent of mature Neteru and sulfur wafting toward him from a black forest before him. Damali seemed so far away. Far away from his reality, and this older woman who had blown his mind. This lair queen knew what the bitter side of life tasted like. Shared his darkness. Stoked it. Made him wonder. Made him weigh the scales of right versus wrong. Took gray matter out of the equation. Had opened his nose, and gotten a fingernail beneath the edge of his heart, threatening to flip it. He’d wanted to weep for her because she was so utterly insane. Had made him want to take her in panther form, primal. Had let him know that under no uncertain terms, she’d wanted him.
She had made him an offer. Daylight—the ultimate gift. Could pace herself and be patient. Had power. Had self-control. Was mature. Had suffered the abominable. Was probably turned during the era of chaos she’d shown him. Had witnessed death and destruction that he’d only seen once dead. Was overtaken by the spirit of a Neteru at least five hundred years old, because she’d eaten tainted flesh. Had made semen spill from the tip of his quivering member just talking about going to the vanishing point with her. With Damali, that could never happen. With this queen, topside and subterranean were up for grabs, due to a fluke. A variable. And his blood had made her worse, not better.
Carlos closed his eyes and rubbed his hands over his face, and sealed his wrist wound. Oh . . . shit . . . his old guardian traits and a residual of a soul hanging in the balance had kicked this bullshit in her up a notch. He was the insider; the one that had tipped the balance with a misguided act of compassion that would hurt the living Neteru . . . for all the wrong reasons, at a very bad time.
The older female’s logic was twisted. So was his. But was it? She had a just cause to return the lands to their rightful owners, but her methods . . . Vampires were not the rightful owners of this land. They’d colonized it, too.
She’d opened her legs for him, as well as her mind, and arched up to him to save her world as though she were a Neteru, and wanted to save the vamp empire in the same breath. She was so confused it made him shudder. She was right; they were both cut from the same cloth. He wanted to live in both worlds, too. She had made him think of things he was afraid to admit to himself. Had whispered of unparalleled power into his ear while stroking his chest with her hands. Had served indescribable options on a silver platter while nude. Had made him want to protect her, as much as he wanted to push her twisted being away and stake her . . . as much as he’d wanted to mount her and ride her hard.
He had a problem. A dilemma. Damali had a problem. A threat. He had a soul in the balance. The woman, who posed an offer, didn’t have one to worry about. His was slipping into darkness fast as he walked slowly away from the dead carcass. He still wanted her, but knew he shouldn’t. His body said one thing. His mind said something else. His intellect was torn. His heart was unsure. It didn’t even beat—that, too, was dead, no wonder. He was a vampire. She was one, too. Damali was a human, Neteru notwithstanding. He had to make a decision and quickly. This mysterious older female had made him think about his future, and hope for it, while fearing it.
And yet, he still didn’t even know her name.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
DREAD WAS a constant companion as Damali got up from the bed and walked over the little indoor footbridge at the base of the futon. She peered at the stream that separated the room into two sides, knowing that she, too, was stuck in the midd
le. What more was she than a small bridge between desire and the solid material worlds on the other side of a stream that beckoned? What more had she been to Carlos?
From her raised vantage point above the blue water, she could see out to the stars and the full moon past the deck. Sheer white curtains floated toward her like ghosts. Maybe they were no more than her memories, caught on the night air, hopelessly flailing against the wind. She was caught between the supernatural and natural, fighting against the wind, too. How did you fight nature, basic instinct?
Under any other circumstances this place would have been paradise. The calls of night birds and insects, sounds of the cycle of life, filled the sweet night air, blowing into the cliff lair on the breeze. She breathed in deeply, willing away the grief. Her best friend was no longer her best friend, he had dark secrets. Her lover was no longer her lover; she feared him. Hope was dying like the embers in the fireplace. You cannot bring something back from the dead. It is beyond mortal control.
