Chapter 26
CHAPTER 26
Seamus parked the car in the middle of a dark field. They’d crossed the border to Indiana some time ago, but Zack wasn’t sure exactly where they were. The farthest he’d ever been from his parents’ house had been Taliville, but that was farther south in Tennessee. This random field was, in theory, as close as some of his relatives in Wisconsin were, but he’d never traveled this way. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to recognize some isolated barn far off the interstate anyway.
“What errand could you possibly have out here?” Zack demanded.
“The kind you’ll enjoy.” Seamus opened the car door and stepped out. “We need to clean out a poachers’ lair.”
Zack scrambled out of the car and started to swing the door shut.
Seamus zipped over and caught the door. He eased it shut rather than allowing it to thud. In a whisper, he said, “Stealth, Zackery.”
“What do you mean ‘poachers’ lair?’” Zack said under his breath.
“You were paying attention in the meeting last night, weren’t you?” Seamus pulled Zack’s sheathed dagger out from his jacket and offered it out.
“Of course,” Zack snapped. He took the dagger from Seamus. Without a belt, he couldn’t slide it into place, but he could slip it free from the sheath and attempt to stab Seamus. What if he has something set up where if he doesn’t call, Takashi dies? “But nobody said anything about poachers. Why would we give a shit about people killing animals? Unless—wait, you mean vampires .”
“Precisely.” Seamus nodded toward a barn down the field from them. “Now, do you remember what Leopold and Benedict’s complaint was?”
“A vamp nest situated almost perfectly between their territory. Leopold was complaining that Benedict should take care of it because its location, Benedict claimed Leopold should handle it because they were stealing the humans from his territory,” Zack said quietly. They were a distance away from the barn. How good was vampire hearing?
How good is mine? Zack stretched his senses. The interstate was pretty far, but he swore he still heard the rumble of a semi going past. From the barn’s direction, he heard … talking. Music. Slurping. Some other noises that made him decide to close off his hearing after all.
“But they didn’t know where it was,” Zack said. “How did you find it so fast?”
“I didn’t. At least, not on my own,” Seamus replied. “You’ve been tracking this nest’s activity for weeks in one of your notebooks. You nearly had them pinpointed.”
The urge to call bullshit died on Zack’s lips because he could feel a weird pressure building in the magnetic pull in his core. During the drive, Seamus had blocked him, but he was letting Zack glimpse at some of his fears and desires. No doubt this was still some trick, some modified response to make him look good, but Seamus was oozing the desire for connection. He wanted to guide Zack and seemed scared that Zack would never like him.
Like he honestly gives a shit whether or not I approve of him . Zack clenched his free hand.
What if he does? the strange, echoey Seamus voice responded.
What does it say about me if the monster wants me to like him ?
Maybe he’s not the monster you think he is , the echo-Seamus said.
That didn’t sound like one of his thoughts at all. Zack glared at Seamus. Note to self, prioritize research on whether vampires can have telepathy .
“You are, without a doubt, the cleverest sireling I’ve made since Anton,” Seamus said. “However, everyone has always relied on that side of you and ignored the side I know exists.”
“What side is that?” Zack tightened his jaw afterward. He was getting too loud.
Seamus turned toward him. “The ruthless killer.”
“I am not ?—”
“I felt you last night.” Seamus stepped closer so that he and Zack would share breath if either of them had needed air and lowered his voice to a sterner pitch. “I saw how you took after that girl last night and how you drank from the one at the mansion. More than that, I know how the urge to kill me burned through you the night I gave you my blood. I can feel you stamping down upon that desire tonight.
“Your problem is with killing mortals? Fine. You aren’t the first sireling I’ve taught that needed to abandon that peculiarity. I can’t make you accept that you have moved higher up the food chain. But—” He motioned at the barn. “—that nest is doing damage. They are killing humans and risking the existence of our kind.”
“Our kind is all over social media,” Zack replied.
“Few mortals outside of our community believe it real,” Seamus said. “Nests like this one could ruin that for us. Then we won’t have just hunters to contend with but governments. Chaos would ensue. People would die. Your loved ones might be first. So, you can pout like a little boy, or you can use your new gifts to do what you’ve always longed to do and take care of a batch of blood-thirsty bastards.”
Seamus had a point. The argument about whether or not the rest of humanity needed to recognize the existence of the supernatural was a hot debate in the hunter community as well. Sure, if governments knew, there could be the opportunity to do their work with better funding. On the other hand, there was a conflicting belief that vampires and other supernaturals would sway public opinion and governments to their side and protect them. Zack’s mom was passionately against that.
Zack hadn’t really formed an opinion on the matter, but as a vampire, he didn’t like the idea of police raiding vampire homes and putting them down. He had killed humans, but he couldn’t really stop himself from doing it. Did he deserve to go to jail for that?
I’m going to give myself a migraine if I keep thinking about that . Zack slipped his dagger out of its sheath and placed the sheath on the hood of the car behind him. The runes down the length of his silver dagger glowed with the faintest red light. Great, even my soul doesn’t think he’s that much of a danger to me anymore .
He took three steps toward the barn and realized Seamus was staying behind. He glanced over his shoulder. “You’re not coming?”
“You’re my progeny. They are nest rats weaker than the average new fledgling. I’m certain you’ll be fine.” Seamus relaxed against the hood of his car and motioned for Zack to go on. “I’ll be listening. Say my name if you need me.”
I’d rather fucking die .
Would you really, though ? the echo-Seamus asked.
Well … it’s not going to matter. I’ve got this .
Zack set off across the dark field. If the nest was smart, they’d have some sort of lookout. Rather than relying on his speed, he ducked lower and made his way forward with a delicate swiftness instead of rushing ahead like a bull. He searched for any sign of movement and started tracking the different sounds coming from around and inside the barn. The music was loud—which would work for him—and he picked out multiple voices. Someone shrieked, and that was met with laughter from at least five voices.
His dagger glowed a little brighter. Zack hid it behind his back as he approached the barn. As far as he could tell, there was no sentry. While still at a short distance, he circled the building. A few lights illuminated the interior, and that spilled light out into the night, particularly the very open barn doors on the north side. He stayed out of that brightness and went around the other way to complete his evaluation. Scents of old wood, fresh blood, cold dirt, and a reek of sex wafted out.
The vamps had been holed up in this place for a little while. They’d grown comfortable.
Easy . Speed and surprise would be the best method. Zack spotted a place higher up the barn, where a few boards had fallen away and left a gap. Quick and quiet, he scaled the side of the building and lifted himself up onto the gap.
Just below him was a loft that overlooked the rest of the barn. A dead man was staring off to the side. Less than three feet away from him, two vampires were fucking as if they were the only creatures left on the planet. Their moans and slaps of flesh meeting were growing louder. One was shouting about how close an orgasm was.
Zack dropped onto the loft beside them as soft as a cat stalking a mouse. Swiftly, he moved forward and buried his dagger into the heart of the vamp on top. The other one noticed him, started to sputter, but Zack yanked his dagger free of the first, then slit the second’s throat before shoving his dagger deep in his chest. The silver burned the vampire’s heart out, and his skin grayed.
The first vampire was starting to recover, the wound healing, so Zack pinned her to the floor and stabbed her again. He snarled and twisted the blade deeper into her chest, ensuring that the silver burned out her heart. Her color drained faster, but something clicked inside Zack when she was truly dead. Both of the vampires had had bursts of the desire to live. Somehow, he felt when they died creeping through his hand from the dagger.
“Hey, you two finished up there?” someone called out. “Gail brought us some prime fresh meat!”
Introspect later . Zack pulled his dagger free and slunk off to a shadow. The blood on his blade seeped into the runes and turned the light to a deeper red. Nope. Not analyzing that either. Let’s see where the next one is .
He crept to the shadowy side of the loft and slipped forward to the edge to gain a better view of the party below. Three vampires were feeding on a single victim whose eyes were growing glassier by the second. Another two were standing beside the open back doors of a black panel van. Inside it were four bound and blindfolded humans. Their fear was a beacon, a bright distraction in the mess of the party. Zack put them out of mind and focused on the vampires. They were the priority. Once he killed them, he’d care about the humans.
Another vampire—mouth, chin, and clothes covered in blood—was dancing by himself beside a phone blaring out music. And a final one was roaming out from underneath the loft, shouting upward again. “Hey! We’re not going to save any for you!”
The final vampire spotted Zack. Her eyes went wide in surprise, and she opened her mouth to shout.
Zack dropped to the ground and sank his blade into her chest before she had the chance to speak. He snarled as he slammed her down and held the blade in place. Her skin began to gray. When he pulled his blade out, a thin red mist of energy followed upward and sank into the runes. That’s new .
The remaining six vampires stopped what they were doing and hissed at him. They spread their hands like each finger was tipped with a claw, but nails weren’t a threatening weapon to him. The boldest of them launched herself toward Zack.
But she was clumsy, slow, and telegraphing her strike. Zack slipped inside her attack, knocked her arm farther off target, and sank his blade into her heart. Instantly, the magic in her faded and abandoned her body. Four down, five to go .
He had been waiting for this fight for his whole life. Training. Preparing.
The five still standing rushed toward him.
He grinned.
His new strength made snapping bones and crushing flesh easy. As he relied upon his supernatural speed, they seemed to move like a video on buffer, fits and bursts but nothing that caught up to where he was. Another dropped; another heart burned out by his silver. Five down .
Everything he had ever practiced had never felt so simple. He became living ice, cold and sharp and brutal. He broke one vampire’s head clean off its body. Six down.
Then seven.
Eight.
The last vampire finally grasped how badly the fight was going and ran for the open barn doors while Zack was twisting his blade into the heart of his eighth kill. Before he could escape, Seamus sauntered into the light and plunged Cal’s dagger into the would-be escapee’s chest.
This was supposed to be his hunt. Zack shouted, “He was mine !”
Seamus smiled at him with a warm pride Zack hadn’t seen from Thomas in years.
The rational part of Zack’s mind had gone silent during the fight. Every part of him had thrown himself into that moment. Adrenaline didn’t course through him, but the come down from action still lightly shook him. He waited for some rogue thought to ruin his moment.
The only ones that circled were demands that Seamus would pay for taking what was his.
Seamus took a handkerchief out of his back pocket and cleaned Cal’s blade. “Forgive me. I’ve had a few grueling nights myself. I wanted in on the fun.”
“Fun,” Zack repeated. The word had never felt completely wrong and right at the same time. His heart was racing in his ears.
Not my heartbeat . Zack swallowed and slowly spun toward the van. Now that he was aware of the mortals again, he could hear their breathing, pick out the individual rhythms. Could taste their fear on his tongue like a rim of salt on glass.
The burning hunger inside him dried his throat and his eyes. His trembling grew, and his knees buckled. He started to plummet toward the ground.
Seamus caught him by the arm and held him up. In a soothing voice, he said, “Our strength comes at a price.”
With his arm around Zack, Seamus guided him over to the van, where the four mortals were tied up. The effort to struggle would take too much precious energy that he didn’t have. The lore he’d learned from his family joined the growing need for blood. Vampires needed several pints of blood a night, enough that feeding from one mortal meant killing them. Younger vampires tended to need more, but Zack had always suspected that was from a lack of knowing how to drain a victim rather than the need.
The facts helped stabilize his control so that he didn’t launch himself at the helpless people in front of him. But they were breathing. They had heartbeats. They had blood . He was thirsty.
“Take your pick.” Seamus nudged Zack closer to the open van doors.
Zack braced himself on the edge of the van, arms spread wide like he was holding himself over an infinite abyss. “I … I can’t.”
“Why not?” Seamus said patiently. He was at Zack’s ear.
Zack tightened his grip. Metal crunched under his fingertips. “These are … innocent people … We should let them go.”
“How do you know they’re innocent?” Seamus put his hand on Zack’s shoulder. “And why does that matter at all? They’re food . You need to eat.”
“I don’t want to be a monster,” Zack said desperately.
“Monsters only exist in fairy tales.” Seamus squeezed his shoulder. “If it helps, know that whoever survives us will go to Steward’s Garden.”
“We should let them go .”
“Why?” Seamus asked.
Logic felt like a singular sticky note inside a pile of loose paper pages four feet deep. Zack had to push and fight to find it. The reason. There had to be a reason not to do this. One came to him, and he looked over his shoulder at Seamus. His voice was weak even in his own ears. “Because it’s the right thing to do.”
“Says who? Your human parents that abandoned you? The hunters who would plunge their weapons through us simply for what we are? Humans who would claw and kill each other to survive if they have to?” Seamus asked. His voice was calm, and that held a soothing appeal.
He’s tricking me .
Tricking you into surviving? How dastardly , his practical voice replied.
“No matter what I do, they’re dead?” Zack whispered.
“Yes. You may as well take what you need.”
One of the humans whimpered, and that drew Zack’s attention. The tang of his own fear was on the back of his tongue, but he was thirsty and before him was exactly what he needed. I can have control over my feeding or go into a blood frenzy. And this way, they won’t suffer . He grabbed the feet of the nearest man, hauled him out of the van, and sank his teeth into his neck.
Seamus stroked his hair as he fed and murmured, “That’s my boy.”