Shadows of Mist, page 22
part #8 of The Vampire Gift Series
That means the fire came from me.
The handle on the vault door spins. I turn my head. My body follows.
The door opens, and Victoria runs inside.
She is on me before I can react. She throws her arms around me in a monstrous hug. When she pulls back, I notice her eyes are red.
“Have you been crying?” I ask.
She slaps me. Hard. Hard enough to whip my head to one side.
I scowl at her. “What was that— ”
She cuts me off by grabbing my head and kissing me. I’m too dumb to react. But I like it.
She lets go. I smirk. “If that’s your apology, I’ll take it.”
“Don’t make me hit you again,” she warns.
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” I swear. I take another look at her. Her hair is a mess, her clothes are wrinkled, and her eyes are definitely red.
“You’ve been worried about me,” I say.
She gives an incredulous laugh. “Worried? Worried doesn’t begin to describe it. Do you know how long you’ve been here? Do you know what we had to do to get you here?”
“Tell me,” I say, following that with, “What is this place?”
“A nuclear bunker, deep underground. Part of The Crusaders network beneath their compound.”
“Why am I here?”
“After you defended April, magic took hold of you. I’ve never seen anything like it. We already knew your ability is triggered by anger. But what you did there was incredible… horrifying. What do you remember?”
“The tank,” I say. “I destroyed the tank. Somehow, I redirected the power raging through me toward it. I felt a… chasm, open up, here.” I touch my chest. “Such power flowed out from it. I could guide it, direct it one way, but I had no control.”
“Yes,” she says. “And past that? What happened?”
“The chasm closed. I fell to my knees. You came to me. And then I passed out.”
“You’ve been out for nearly a week since,” Victoria says.
Alarm grips me. “What? Then I must get out of here. I need to go with Smithson to—”
“He has already left,” she tells me. “He took Paolo and April. He only wanted Paolo, but the vampire refused to let April out of his sight. He’s very protective of her.”
“So, then it’s you and I,” I say. “And Paul. Where is he?”
“A few levels up,” she says. “You had to be brought here.”
“Why?”
“Because mere minutes after you passed out, you started lashing out. With magic. Your body underwent seizures. We could not do anything to stop them. Each time they came, torrents of power burst out from you. You nearly destroyed the entire facility upstairs.”
“I… what?”
“I’ve never witnessed anyone command so much power. You pulled on the entirety of the Elemental Forces around us. It’s a wonder we remained untouched.”
“A whole week,” I mutter, shaking my head. “Unbelievable. You say I lashed out even more?”
“It was madness. You destroyed most of the equipment up there in your first seizure. I managed to deflect the worst of it from us as a last-ditch effort.”
“How?” I ask. “If the magic from me was as strong as you make it seem, how were you able to stop it, given your strength?”
“It wasn’t easy, I’ll tell you that,” Victoria admits. “But I think what happened is that the force you were controlling—”
“I didn’t have control,” I say. “I was unconscious.”
“Yes, right, you know what I mean. I think the force felt the presence of other sentient beings. It felt our organic matter. In a way, I think it knew what it wanted to do, and that was not to kill us. I created a protective shield. The moment I did, your attacking force evaded it. It avoided it entirely.”
“What does that mean?”
“That even unconscious, you still had control. But the power built up within you needed an escape. Otherwise…” she hesitates. “Otherwise, it would have burned you to a crisp.”
“It’s like you said before, about a witch drawing too much magic,” I reply, thinking hard. “You said you’d burn out, lose your ability forever.”
“Except with the amount you were using, you would have lost your life.”
I swallow.
“So how did you get me down here?”
“Paul quickly made another set of obsidian orbs,” she says. “These were done in haste. We knew we did not have much time.”
“You said the equipment was destroyed.”
She nods. “Yes. But a few pieces of obsidian remained. Paul sketched the patterns into them by hand, going from memory. Lucky for us, they worked. We surrounded you with them, cutting you off from the source. It was enough for your mind-magic connection to calm. You hit a deep sleep, and while you were in it, we rushed you down here.”
She swallows. “The seizures came on again mere moments after we got you into this room. You lashed out with ever-greater power.” She motions at the wall. “All that damage is from you.”
I look around the room another time. “This bunker wasn’t empty at the start, was it?”
“No. Your magic destroyed many things. We took them out so you wouldn’t hurt yourself, when we deemed it safe. I brought you the bed.”
I whistle. “That’s quite a tale.”
“How do you feel?” she asks.
“Normal,” I say, after a brief pause. “I feel completely… normal.”
“Hungry?” she asks. “How is your thirst?”
I shake my head. “Nonexistent.”
“That’s interesting. Your body went through a lot. You should be famished.”
“And yet I’m not.”
“It must come later.”
I take a deep breath. “So, you’re telling me we lost a week?”
“Well,” she says slyly. “I wouldn’t exactly call it lost.”
I quirk an eyebrow in question.
“Come upstairs,” she says. “I’ll show you what I mean.”
I follow her out the room, giving a shudder when I cross the doorway. Floating around in that unconscious space is not a pleasant memory. The farther I get from the physical space where it happened, the better it will be.
We climb up a narrow flight of stairs and emerge a few stories up. Victoria pops her head out first, then jumps out and looks around. She offers me her hand.
I take it, if only to feel her skin. Something about the way she was worried about me is very endearing.
I might have to bed her quite soon.
We walk down a metal hall lined with all sorts of doors. After passing a particular one, I stop.
“There are humans inside,” I say softly.
“Yes,” Victoria smiles. “You’re right. Keep going.”
I walk with her to the main door. She opens it, and I find an enormous control center greeting us.
Paul spins around in his chair and instantly rises. He beams when he sees me. “Glad to have you back.”
“Careful,” I warn. “Don’t forget that you’re the one who caused this.”
A look of confusion passes over his face.
“You overfed on April,” I remind him, “which made me lose control.”
“Ah, yes, that.” He waves his hand in dismissal. “Water under the bridge. I explained to her how the bloodlust took over. She accepted my apology.”
“She is more forgiving than I,” I say darkly.
He laughs. “Why such a foul mood, James? We have something wonderful to show you.”
I come up to where he’s sitting and look at the screen. There are multiple windows open, each showing a video feed from a camera.
“These,” he says, motioning at the rooms, “are all the rooms you passed.”
I see that a few of them have people inside, looking quite destitute.
Paul points them out. “These are The Crusader generals who refused to take us up on the offer. And these…” he presses a button, and a wide steel door starts to slide up one wall, “are all the ones who accepted.”
No sooner than the door is lifted, I feel the presence of many new vampires. They all range in strength, as per the usual bandwidth of fledglings.
What surprises me is how many there are.
My eyes scan over the heads. I estimate there to be at least fifty. The moment the door stops at the very top, the vampires march out. Precise, trained, professional—and they go to one knee on the floor, clap a fist to their chest, and say, all at once, “We pledge allegiance to you, James Soren, as our leader, our maker, and the King of the Nocturna Animalia!”
I can’t help it. My lips curl up in a smile. I spy Victoria from the corner of my eye. She is barely suppressing a gleeful grin.
I turn to her, only vaguely conscious of the bedsheet I have wrapped around me, compared to the fine uniforms of my new generals. “You made so many?” I ask.
“No,” she says. “They are all yours. The first was converted by Paul, who is your original fledgling. His fledgling made the next, and the next one made the next, so on and so forth, all the way down the line.” She smiles. “We’ve solved the problem of too many fledglings draining your strength. This still ensures they are all descendants from you.”
“Brilliant,” I whisper.
I approach the men. They look at me with deep respect in their eyes. They can feel the full force of my strength through the natural hierarchy.
I come to their front line. “You may stand,” I say.
They rise at once.
“Very impressive,” I murmur. Much more impressive than the first ragtag crew of humans I added to my coven, all those Fang Chasers who were then poisoned by the Narwhark.
I walk along the front line, memorizing each vampire’s face. When I finish with them, I turn back to Paul.
“Beast isn’t here.”
“No,” he agrees. “He isn’t. He is one of the few who refused.”
“What happened to him?”
“You can find him in the rooms outside. I am still hopeful we can persuade him.”
“I’m not,” I mutter. I remember the absolute hatred he had for vampires.
It would do me great pleasure to crush his skull with my bare hands.
I turn to the new vampires. “Give me your names,” I tell them. “One by one.”
“Connor Lazar,” the first vampire says.
“No,” I interrupt. “When you join the ranks of the Nocturna Animalia, you forsake any former familial ties. You may only have one name. No surname attached. Make it whatever you will, this is your chance to rebrand yourself, if you so wish it. One name. It’s all you get.”
“Then I’m Lazar,” he says.
“Good enough,” I approve. “Next?”
One by one, the others give me their names, some keeping their first, some keeping their last, yet others selecting wholly new ones.
I put each of the names in my mind, linking it to the face. I’ve never had any problems memorizing such things.
“Excellent,” I say when they’re finished. “I take it you’ve all been fed?”
“Not… exactly,” Victoria admits, coming beside me.
I turn to her. “What do you mean? If they haven’t fed yet they would not have such discipline. They would be going crazy for blood.”
“Consider it a demonstration of the rigor of their training,” Paul says, pride feeding his voice. “The vampires before you have each had half a cup of blood, perhaps less.”
“We were waiting for you to decide who they should feed on, James,” Victoria says. “That’s why we’ve kept the prisoners.”
“Well, let them at them!” I exclaim. “How many men are in the rooms? How many refused the offer?”
“About sixty, all in all,” Paul says. “Half of those I believe can be made to yet come over to our side. The other half?” He shakes his head. “They’re a lost cause.”
“Where are they now?”
“The ones who absolutely refused are gathered together in a large storage room. Come. I’ll show you.”
I walk with Paul back to his computer. He taps the keyboard and a video feed of a barren garage comes up.
Sure enough, there are about thirty men there, some huddling together in conversation, others looking absolutely indignant.
“How did you distinguish between these and the others?” I ask.
“We interviewed them,” Victoria says.
“Did they understand what refusal would bring?”
“Yes. But perhaps some did not think us serious.” She glances at Paul. “They may have thought this was some sort of test, to guarantee their loyalty to the Crusaders.”
“Who interviewed them?”
“I did,” Paul says. “Victoria helped. I know my men, remember.”
“And you’re sure these men won’t come over to our side?”
“We can make them into vampires, James. But why? Already we have many times the number we expected. Those who accepted the gift will be loyal. Those forced to it could later rebel.”
I give a small laugh. “You think a fledgling rebellion scares me? Most of the vampires in The Haven did not want to be turned. Mother did it anyway. They fought against their instincts, fought against the blood lust. They were not killers before. They did not want to be made into killers.
“But once they were, the dark instincts won out.”
“You sound like you’re interested in sparing their lives, James,” Paul notes.
“Nonsense,” I say. “I just don’t see the point of wasting so many capable men. These are the ones who were the leaders in your organization. The generals, the lieutenants, all those in posts of command, yes?”
“Not all of them,” Paul says. “We could not leave the Crusaders without leaders. But the majority, yes. When the new vampires return to their posts, we will bring in the rest.”
I tap my fingers against my lips. “On the one hand, this is a much better turnout than expected. On the other, if we throw those lives away—” I nod at the screen, “we will lose a whole lot of good men.”
“You’re being greedy, James,” Victoria says.
I turn to look at the fledglings, all standing in line, and ignore her. “And yet these vampires need to feed.” I sigh. “So be it. Paul, you are sure the men you’ve collected there won’t have their convictions changed?”
“Positive,” he says. “If you convert them, you will undermine the chain of trust that exists between us all. It is the basis on which the Crusaders were built.”
I rub my eyes. “Fine. Thirty men, fifty vampires. Let them at them.”
Paul smiles. “Very well.”
I address the fledglings. “When you drink,” I say, “leave enough for your brothers. The more different sources of blood you get, the faster your strength will develop. A sip from the necks of ten men does you more benefit than draining one man dry. Do you understand?”
They give a perfect salute and a shout of acknowledgement.
“Victoria,” I say. “You know this compound well enough to bring our vampires to the humans?”
“Yes,” she says.
“Then you lead them there. I want a private word with Paul while you’re gone.” I give her a secretive smile. “And don’t be shy to take some blood for yourself, either.”
She smirks, nods, and runs off. All the vampires follow her in perfect formation.
“Impressive structure,” I say, after they’re all gone. “Do you have any damn clothes in here?” I gesture at the bedsheets. “Hard to be taken seriously like this.”
“There are closets with uniforms nearby. I can take you there.”
“Please,” I say.
As we leave, I glance back at the screen, and see the first of the vampires start to feed on the humans.
I smile to myself. The carnage will be both a beautiful and horrendous sight.
Paul leads me past the first few doors, then sticks a key into a specific one and pushes it open.
“Clothes are in there,” he says, nodding to the side. “I’ll leave you to change.”
I’m out a second later. “What happened to my own clothes?” I ask, after I’m dressed.
“Destroyed in your magic outburst,” he says. “Singed and burned and rendered useless. Victoria threw them out.”
“Fine,” I say. “I want this uniform fitted to me.” I shrug my shoulders. “It has to be a perfect fit.”
“That won’t be a problem, James.”
I eye him up and down. “You’ve become particularly deferential. Why?”
“Do I need more reason outside the hierarchy?”
“You resented me before.”
He chokes back a laugh. “Resented? Hell, no. You gave me my life. I could not sense you, so at the beginning, it was hard taking orders from one so young.” He clears his throat. “I mean, one who looks so young. I’ve led a long life. Subordination does not come easy to me. But once I knew your power, it all clicked, and accepting my place was no longer a struggle.”
I consider the explanation for a few moments and decide it genuine.
“Very well,” I say. “When were you last in contact with Smithson? Is he on his way back?”
“Smithson… ran into some trouble,” Paul says.
I frown. “What do you mean?”
“We heard from him yesterday. The store of obsidian has been moved. Somebody in the Order did it without his knowledge.”
“What?”
“He says not to worry. He will make it to us in time.”
The tenor of Paul’s voice betrays his lack of confidence.
“Paul,” I say slowly. “You must understand. It is of utmost important that we get that obsidian. Cierra—you cannot imagine what she is capable of.”
“I’ve seen what you can do,” he says dryly.
“That is different,” I snarl. “I cannot control it. I know not how to control it! Cierra gave me thirty days, and that was two weeks ago! Time is running short to mount our defense. We need Smithson back. We need the obsidian!”
Paul appears uncomfortable seeing me so distressed.
“Never mind,” I say, shaking my head. “If Smithson says he’ll be back on time, then he will be. He knows the importance of this as much as I do.” I scrub a hand through my hair. “I just wish Melvin were still alive.”
“My son was a fraud,” Paul sneers. “All those things he tinkered with, all to absolutely no end. How does someone like that fall so far from grace?”
