Blood Sacrifice (The Astral Chronicles #1)

Chapter ThirtySalvator

Chapter Thirty

Salvator

Wolves liked to be free, to feel the wind around them, and sense the moon above them. The tunnels closed in around me and there were times I found it difficult to breathe as we made our way through the narrow and winding pathways that led to the large corridors into the residential areas.

“Is it just me or are these things getting narrower?” Jethro asked in a low voice. “I swear those drones were wrong because it feels like we’ve been down here for hours.”

I glanced at my watch. We’d been down here fourteen minutes.

“It’s the dog in you,” Dominic replied from behind us. “Vampires had to live underground for centuries to avoid the sun, war, and persecution. We adapted while you were all outside frolicking through daisies.”

I stopped just so I could turn around and glare at him. “If my mate didn’t view you as family, I’d leave you to sunbathe for a few hours to test a hypothesis.”

The ancient vampire shrugged. “I’ve had worse done to me. Move along before they detect we’re here and flood these tunnels with water or sewage to flush us out.”

I had to wonder what was worse than being a vampire and left out in the sun to bake.

“I can almost hear your brain whirring,” Dominic said. “In medieval times, some of our kind were discovered by scientists. They experimented with our ability to heal, and operated on us repeatedly, removing organs to see if they would regenerate.”

“Evil has always walked among us,” I replied. “Out of morbid curiosity, do your organs regenerate?”

“Nothing survives without a heart.” His tone brooked no further discussion.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Jethro said after what felt like an eternity. “We’ve all lost friends to madmen and the evil that dwells within the human world.”

It was why we tended to live in the shadows and only interact with our own kind.

A glimmer of light appeared further up ahead, brightening as we continued to walk.

“Corridor ahead clear,” Tarrack said in my ear. “Proceed with caution.”

We had drones in this underground world, but that didn’t mean we had seen everything that was down here. My ears extended when my wolf emerged without my permission as he strained to hear what was happening in the distance. I had been trying to avoid using any of my wolf senses, as there was magic associated with them that I didn’t want detected.

“There are heartbeats up ahead,” I said into the communications device in my ear, as I tried to ascertain what they were saying.

“At least three,” Dominic said. “Right hand side of the corridor. One of them is A-negative blood type.”

“What the fuck do we need to know that information for?” Jethro demanded in a low hiss.

“Blood grouping is important information to vampires,” Dominic replied. “It could mean the difference between having your head ripped off, and being kept as a pet for many years and fed the best diet.”

“Too much information,” I intervened. “For the purpose of this mission, there will be no pets, no mercy, and no survivors.”

“Duly noted,” Dominic replied, and I rolled my eyes.

The closer we got to the light, the more I could ascertain. Drones didn’t have the ability to sense or smell, but there was an unmistakable odour of decomposition in the air, a humid heat that made your clothes stick to your skin, and an oppressive feeling that made my claws lengthen and my canines throb in my gums.

“More heartbeats,” Dominic said. “These are not human, they sound more animalistic in origin.”

“Lycans?” Jethro asked.

“Perhaps, although a lycan has a heavier heartbeat. Sounds more like a feline shifter, maybe a big cat?” Dominic stopped for a moment, his fingers braced on the wall beside him. “There are hidden compartments in the walls.”

I slid my weapon out, my wolf senses fully alert since we had a welcoming party ready to jump out at us.

“I suggest you allow my warriors to go first. They will not be expecting vampires,” Dominic suggested, moving in front of me, his eyes flashing silver in the dim light. “There are not many covens in this part of the world.”

I nodded slowly, taking in all the different scents and sounds. “We’ll be right behind you,” I replied, fighting the urge to be the first into battle. Luna had told me to trust Dominic’s instincts since she had fought beside him for decades if not centuries.

He waved his people forward, and I watched as they agilely used their claws to climb the walls. If our enemy was standing on the ground, they would never see them coming.

Jethro threw me a what the fuck look and I shrugged in reply. Our territory had been spared from the vampire-lycan war, and not for the first time I wondered if it had been due to magical intervention. None of us had faced the stealth and predatory nature of vampires, and how they fought in battle. They disappeared at the end of the tunnel into the wider corridor, and if I hadn’t known they were there, I doubted I would have seen them.

The familiar sensation of magic touched my skin, and I wanted to recoil away from it. I saw Jethro shake himself to my right side, Paulo growling lowly behind me. We’d all spent too many years being suppressed by magic. Repulsion festered inside me, and I wanted to destroy those who sought to oppress me.

The strategist in me had envisaged the vampires descending from the ceiling into the opening to annihilate those waiting for us, but I had underestimated them.

Instead, screams echoed from the walls, the type that meant souls were dying. A door that even our high-definition drones hadn’t identified slammed open about two meters ahead of us, and a man was forcibly tossed out, followed by another a few seconds later.

No survivors.

I didn’t think twice about using the blade that ran down my spine to dispatch the first one while Jethro dealt with the second. I used hands signals to send some of my team into that room, and the screaming intensified.

“Check the walls, Tarrack,” I instructed. “There are rooms that we know nothing about.”

A drone flew into the open doorway.

Dominic stepped out of the room, straightening the cuff of his long, black jacket before he wiped blood from his mouth. I refused to react even though my stomach roiled at the thought of feeding on blood.

“How did you get in?” I asked, nodding to where he had emerged from.

“There were air ducts on the ceiling. You can hide a room, but it still needs ventilation. Everything needs to breathe.” He cracked his neck from side to side before bringing his attention back to me.

“Those air vents were too small for my drones,” Tarrack said.

Dominic’s lips tipped up in a terrifying grin. “Not all the rumours are fake,” he replied. “We might not explode into a thousand bats, but…” He shrugged and walked on.

“Are you fucking telling me that they can turn into bats?” Tarrack almost screamed into my ear. “How cool would that be?”

“Not as cool as a wolf,” I muttered.

“Wolves can’t fly,” Dominic called over his shoulder.

I popped my head around the door to find more operatives dead, their computer stations left unmanned. “Maddox, get Tarrack access to their system,” I commanded. Each of our groups had a tech expert in it. “Tyler, stay with him.”

The two men entered the room, lifting a dead man off a chair so they could work.

“Keep in contact,” I said, stepping to the side to allow Jethro to drag one of the dead men from the hall inside so they could close the door to try and give the impression that it hadn’t been discovered.

“I’m in the ventilation system,” Tarrack said. “Dominic was right, there are rooms that are not connected to anything apart from the air supply.”

“Can you guide us?” I asked. Each of us carried something that looked like a phone but was really a device to allow us to be able to see in the dark.

“Yeah,” Tarrack replied. “I’ll start guiding you in as we go, but the vamps have taken all the rooms in this area out.”

“We need their ability to tell others about us taken offline,” Jethro said. “All we have is the surprise of our attack to keep us alive.”

“Maddox has already inserted one of my flash drives that will allow me full access to their system. I’m logging in as we speak.” I could hear Tarrack typing in the background as he spoke.

“Roger that,” I replied. “Everyone, keep moving forward.”

The first main chamber we arrived in smelt of death and desperation. Corpses were piled up in a corner, some human and others lycans and magic users. I gave them a cursory examination, and they all had catastrophic damage to their skulls that could only be caused by a bullet wound and close impact.

A lycan could live forever if they stayed away from fighting and violence. Some had lived in the rainforests and mountains for centuries, never aging a day.

“Looks like we have a psychopath in our midst,” I said, crouching down to move one of the bodies. “This one has bruising and cuts around the wrist that indicates they were restrained prior to death.”

I walked away, carrying out a cursory search of the living area. This chamber appeared to be abandoned, which explained why someone had decided to store their kills in it.

“Keep moving,” I instructed. “There’s nothing we can do for the dead.”

Another corridor swept around in an arc under the city until we reached another chamber. Voices echoed into the tunnel, and the smell of an open fire made my nose twitch. I studied the images from Tarrack’s drone on my device. It looked like a normal village scene of people preparing and cooking food, while others sat and chatted in the background.

I had hated destroying villages on Balor’s command, but I knew these men would slaughter every single man in my army. It was the reason we put a no survivors plan in place before we left. We couldn’t be compassionate or show remorse.

It was easy to kill an enemy in battle, but not as simple to look an unarmed man in the eye and pull the trigger. Being in a kill squad had made me into a monster that was able to suppress my emotions. That creature of darkness crawled out of the cavern I tried to keep him in, and an icy calm washed over me.

I turned toward Jethro, and witnessed all his emotions draining from his face as he also became the killer he needed to be today. These were the people who had interfered with our free will and had been manipulating us in the background.

My wolf became alert, his hackles raising as his hatred at those who sought to control us came to the forefront. He had no problem with slaughtering the people who had lied and kept us from our mate.

The vampires crawled up the walls, and wolves around me shifted to their hybrid form. The magic users from Luna’s organisation began to cast behind me, their energy creeping forward like a malevolent mist rising from the ground. I had never witnessed the true force of a magic user beside us in battle, and I was beginning to realise that Aisha had been fooling us for years. Their power wasn’t in an offensive attack, but by controlling the elements and emotions of those they were about to attack.

I continued to move forward, all my senses on high alert. Those living in this area jumped to their feet when we emerged, frantically searching for weapons while the warlocks threw energy balls with spells in them in our direction.

There was no time to think, only react. Balor was only as strong as the warlocks he had accumulated in his army, so those were the first I targeted. We forged forward in a united line, destroying everything in our path. The vampires dropped from the ceiling, swooping down on the unsuspecting victims below. They were vicious and relentless, moving so fast that I could barely track them.

How did the lycans survive in a war with them for centuries?

I recognised one of the warlocks as being directly associated with Balor, so I changed direction to prevent him from leaving. “Target identified,” I said, pushing my way through the mass of bodies fighting.

“I see him,” Tarrack replied. “He is heading toward the south exit.”

“Don’t let him escape, I can’t risk him finding Balor before Luna reaches the volcano.” I shoved a soldier out of my way, no longer paying attention to the fighting.

As he was about to run into the corridor, Dominic landed in front of him as he fell from the sky. “I’m afraid I can’t allow you to leave,” he said politely, holding his hands up.

“Get out of my way.” The warlock tried to push past, but Dominic grabbed his arm, twisting it up his back until a loud crack sounded and the warlock screamed.

“I hope you don’t mind that he is a little damaged,” Dominic said, shoving him in my direction as I arrived.

“Not at all. I only require his knowledge, you can rip all his limbs off for all I care.” The warlock’s eyes widened and he looked between both of us, his forehead furrowing in concern.

“You’re a vampire,” he stuttered over the last word. “There are wards to prevent you entering this province.”

Dominic’s right eyebrow rose, but it was his only reaction to the claim. It hadn’t occurred to me that they had been actively repelling vampires from Peru.

“You were one of Balor’s trusted priests,” I said, grabbing him by the scruff of the neck and dragging him into the corridor and away from the sound of fighting. “Why are you here and not with him?”

He tried to shrug me off, but his broken arm was hanging at his side. “Fuck off.”

“Why can people not be more imaginative with their insults?” I asked. “Tell me what I want to know or—”

“Or what?” he interrupted. “You couldn’t even protect yourself or your people from being spellbound.”

I slapped him so hard the noise echoed down the corridor toward the next chamber. “I have no problem taking you apart piece at a time until you tell me what I want to hear.”

“This is going to take all day, and we no longer have time for pleasantries,” Dominic said, waving me aside. “I wouldn’t believe a word that came from his mouth anyway. Men like him tend to lie to get what they want.”

I was about to ask what he intended to do when Dominic lifted the warlock’s uninjured arm, his fangs piercing deep into the flesh of his wrist. His eyes glowed crimson, and the warlock screamed as if I was torturing him.

I stepped back when Dominic spat the blood on the floor, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“He hasn’t seen Balor for years, as he is in hiding. They scattered about a century ago after an attack, and he has been on the run since.” Dominic retrieved a handkerchief from his pocket to wipe his mouth again. “I fucking hate having to do that, especially tasting the blood of someone like him.”

“What exactly did you just do?” I asked, more confused than ever.

“Watched his memories through his blood,” Dominic said. “Blood is the answer to most questions in this world. Want to know how someone feels? It’s in their blood. Need to see who is telling the truth? It’s in their blood. I can select memories or manipulate their thoughts as well.”

“That is terrifying,” I said, returning my attention to the warlock. “What the fuck happened?”

“Everything we thought was wrong,” he replied in a dull voice. “The prey was the predator, and the innocent were murderers.”

As if ghostly hands reached out, his neck suddenly snapped and he fell to the ground.

“Fuck!” I said, staring at the body at my feet.

“There is more going on than we know about,” Dominic said, pulling his phone out of his pocket and rapidly typing as he snapped a picture of the body. “Nothing seems to be what we expected.”

“Who broke his neck?” I demanded, crouching down to examine the body.

“A rare creature that can reach out through time and space,” Dominic replied. “I believed soul walkers were eradicated a long time ago.”

I stared up at him in confusion. “So, there is a creature out there that can kill you without being in the same room as you?”

“It’s complicated, but it certainly explains why they were looking for hairs and nails.” The ancient vampire nodded slowly as he spoke.

An overwhelming fear spiked up my spine at the thought of my mate out there without my protection, and a madman who could kill from another location stalking her.