Chapter 26
Alexander
The light pulsed in the night, casting red and yellow tones across the street and bathing the vampires beneath it in an orange glow. The vampires were large and menacing.
Alexander could smell the stench of sex in the air. The place was a sex den.
“Why the hell did you let him go in there?” Alexander asked, scanning the area. He did not want to start anything with the families.
“I didn’t. He used his magic to disappear. I couldn’t follow him. Then he called and told me where he was, said he was in trouble,” Greer said, clearly agitated.
“Why would he go in there anyway when he knows the kind of trouble it would cause?”
“He had a vision,” Greer said, turning to face Alexander. “He said he saw Drago, but he wasn’t sure. He needed an excess of sexual energy to feed on so he could induce another vision.”
“He saw Drago? He’s alive?” Alexander asked.
“That’s what he said,” Greer replied. “He wouldn’t risk it if it wasn’t important.”
He wouldn’t have. Blade was responsible and would not take stupid risks. He must have seen Drago in his vision.
Alexander stared at the four heavily built turned vampires at the door for a second, then slapped Greer on the back.
“Let’s go get him,” he said.
“Do you have a plan?” Greer asked as he fell into step beside him while they crossed the street.
“No,” Alexander said. He itched for his sword, but he had not thought to go home first. “We might have to fight our way in.”
“Yeah. Or you could tell them you’re their king and they should show you some respect,” Greer offered.
“That did not work before. What makes you think it is going to work now?”
“It is worth a try,” Greer said as they came to a stop in front of the vampires.
Their eyes widened as they took Alexander in. They clearly recognised him, but they still did not move aside.
“Would you let us in?” Greer snarled beside him. “We need to meet someone inside.
“You are not allowed in here,” one of the vampires said.
“We do not have time for this,” Alexander said.
He drove a fist into the nearest vampire’s jaw, dropping him instantly. Greer took out the second one, while Alexander turned to the third.
The fourth vampire spun and ran inside.
“Shit. Get him,” Alexander ordered as he finished the third.
Greer rushed in after him, and Alexander followed.
He blinked, adjusting to the sudden darkness. Thumping music hit him from all sides, loud enough to disorient him for a moment. He ran a hand along the wall until he found a door and pushed it open.
A large room stretched out beyond it, packed with people dancing under flashing strobe lights.
“Blade,” he called over the music as he moved through the crowd, scanning every table. “Blade.”
Greer waved to him from the other side of the room. Alexander made his way over, weaving between drunk patrons.
There were far more humans than vampires. The vampires who noticed him went still, watching him as he passed.
“He is in the back,” Greer said, moving a black curtain that, a moment earlier, had looked like a solid wall.
Alexander stepped through into a well lit hallway lined with doors on either side.
Was this where all the sex happened?
“He is in this room,” Greer said, rushing ahead.
Alexander followed, but something slammed into the back of his head.
He staggered and hit the wall hard. Pain flared, but he shook it off and turned, grabbing the metal bat from the vampire who had attacked him.
The vampire looked young, wide eyed and frightened, but he suddenly became brave when more of them stepped forward.
“We need to get Blade out of here,” Greer said behind him.
Alexander glanced over. Blade was trembling, incoherent words slipping from his mouth as he clung to Greer, clearly fighting whatever vision had taken hold of him.
“Stay close,” Alexander said, turning back to the vampires. “I do not want any trouble. I only came here for him. If you let us leave, I will not forget it. But if anyone else tries to stop us,” he said, pointing the bat at the one who had hit him, “you will regret it.”
“There are so many of us and only one of you.”
“And you think that matters?” Alexander snarled. “You want to learn the hard way, fine.”
The vampires moved as one. In the cramped hallway, it was difficult to fight them all at once, but Alexander made every strike count.
A strange sensation crawled along his spine. His fingernails tingled, a familiar pressure building in his head. Irrational rage threatened to take over. He had to end this quickly before he lost control.
When he had woken up from his long sleep, he had been on the edge, but he had managed to keep the fury contained. Kept his sanity. But the violence around him might just take him back.
Something sharp sliced across his side. Alexander growled as pain tore through him. Warm blood spilled, soaking his clothes.
He surged forward moving through the vampires like a demon from hell. Screams filled the hallway, clashing with the muffled music from the other room.
When the last vampire dropped to the floor unconscious, Greer grabbed him and pulled him away.
“Are you okay?” Greer asked as they made their way out. “You are hurt.”
Alexander glanced down at the rip in his shirt. It was darkening quickly, blood soaking through and dripping to the floor.
“I’m fine. I will heal,” Alexander said, reaching for Blade. “I’ll meet you at home.”
He took off at a run down the street, ignoring the pain in his side as he headed toward the mountain.
Using his supernatural speed, he moved over fallen trees and rough terrain until he reached the castle.
He shoved the front door open, startling the young vampire on guard, and rushed up the stairs toward Blade’s room.
“Turn the heat up,” he said when Greer entered a few seconds later. “And bring more blankets. He is shivering.”
“Yeah,” Greer said, already turning to go.
“What is wrong with him?” his mother asked, suddenly appearing beside him.
“He is having a vision,” Alexander said, rubbing Blade’s hands to try to warm them.
Greer returned with more blankets and they layered them over Blade, tucking him in as best they could. Alexander tried to catch fragments of what Blade was mumbling, but none of it made sense.
“Can I help?” his mother asked, concern in her voice.
“No. All we can do is wait for the vision to pass,” Alexander said.
He wanted to tell her about what Blade had seen before, about Drago. But he could not.
What if Blade had been wrong?
***
Blade
The thin veil between worlds rippled before him. Strong winds tore at his clothes and hair, and the sky above churned dark and restless, as though a storm was gathering.
Whenever Blade entered his visions, he paid attention to the weather. It always hinted at what was coming. And this was not good.
Earlier, when the vision first hit him, he had only seen still images, fragments of everything, including Drago. But now, fueled by the excess sexual energy he had fed from, it was different. It was like a film playing behind his eyes.
The veil pulsed, then turned almost transparent. Beyond it, he could see the other side. The underworld.
Blade stepped closer. A lizard-like figure stood near the veil, its slit eyes scanning the space as though it could sense something on the other side.
Blade followed a faint scar along the veil, where the chasm had formed.
At the very top, it had not sealed properly.
A small opening fluttered in the wind, as if the veil itself was breathing in the world of the living.
No. This could not be happening.
Blade took a step back, fear striking through him like ice.
Before he could retreat further, the vision shifted. Suddenly he was no longer watching from a distance. He was in the underworld, seeing everything through the lizard’s eyes.
It inhaled slowly. Its chest tightened as a scent reached it.
Blood.
His gaze dropped briefly to the wooden stake on the other side, still wet, blood dripping from its tip and sinking uselessly into the earth. In the underworld, that same blood would have been consumed instantly.
But the stake was not what held his attention.
His focus shifted upward again, locking onto the opening.
He watched as thin strands of dark, almost blackened blood lifted from the stake, rising slowly through the air and drifting toward the tear in the veil.
Inch by inch, the opening began to grow.
The underworld responded at once. It pulled at the wisps of corrupted blood like something starving, consuming them greedily until, on the other side, the wooden stake finally crumbled into ash.
“Master!” the lizard cried, excitement thrumming through its entire body.
It dropped to all fours and moved with startling speed across the cracked wastelands of the underworld, dragging Blade’s awareness along with it. Everything blurred as it raced forward.
The barren land suddenly broke into a line of twisted trees, separating the wastelands from grassy plains that appeared beyond. As they passed through, the terrain shifted again. Grass gave way to cobbled stone paths, and towering buildings glinted in a ghostly red light.
The structures loomed overhead, vast and menacing from the creature’s perspective. Demons moved through the streets, their feet dangerously close, but the lizard wove between them with single minded determination.
It slipped through a crack in the stone path and rushed into what Blade could only assume were the sewers of hell. Dark water sloshed around them, but as this was a vision, he could not smell or feel it. He was grateful for that. He did not want to know what the filth of hell truly smelled like.
They emerged into what looked like a courtyard of a castle carved directly from the face of a mountain. Smooth black rock rose four storeys high, imposing and ancient.