Blood Shadow: Book of Ariel

from that of a couch potato to a boot camp-worthy form. The changes were so dramatic that the only people that would recognize her were her grandmother and the woman that gave birth to her.

  “Who do you have there, Samuel?” Hartwell asked, as he nodded to Daniel to give the girl a quick scan.

  People rarely were allowed access into Hartwell’s house because of the incumbent danger associated with such a breach. Claire Vinson surveyed the room and then anticipated Daniel’s next moved by altering his thoughts.

  “She’s clean,” Daniel said to Hartwell internally, as not to rouse suspicion for both guest and family alike.

  Hartwell thought, “That still doesn’t explain why this girl showed up on our property with worn clothing, bare feet, but not a single mark on her,” but then his thoughts were converted over to these actual words, “She seems nice enough. We should give her a chance.”

  Samuel was set to answer Hartwell’s initial question, but he didn’t know the girl’s name. He looked at her and turned all read, which was a direct result of his lack of experience with the opposite sex. Although he was 18 years old internally, his new friend had almost 18 years of real life experience to stack up against only a few weeks for Samuel.

  “Claire Vinson,” she stated. “My name is Claire Vinson.”

  Just as she was introducing herself to the group, a disturbing presence came across her radar screen. The sudden urge to act overcame her.

  “Hello, Claire!” the much more jovial than usual group said in unison.

  She shifted gears abruptly but her curtness went unnoticed, “Can you direct me to the nearest bathroom?”

  Belinda replied, “Down the hall and to the left.” Belinda was about to say, “Here, let me show you,” but that was quickly replaced by the urge to merely stand in the same spot and wait for Claire to come back in the room.

  Andrew had remained with Abraham Ellison in the chi room to sort of keep an eye on him.

  Daniel said to Drew a few minutes earlier, “We should keep an eye on him.”

  Drew smiled, “I’m good at keeping an eye on people,” harkening to his strength as a hunter.

  Claire started walking down the hallway and then her feet left the ground and she was gliding. She located Ellison and then dispatched Drew to leave his post and go outside and chase after his imaginary tail. He followed the directive and spun around until he got dizzy and then fell to the ground.

  Ellison was sitting down with his back to the doorway as Claire talked to him internally as she approached.

  “Were you Alexander Lowery’s protector?”

  “Yes.”

  “What happened yesterday?” she asked.

  “I knew his hunter was coming and I stepped aside and let him get killed for the 100th time.”

  “And this made him mortal?” she questioned.

  “Yes.”

  She was most interested in the answer to her next question.

  “What happened this morning?”

  This was the one question that she was actually aware of that she was asking. She was hovering in front of Ellison for a reason and needed answers.

  “I waited for Lowery to wake from his death, because I knew that he would be coming back as a mortal. There was no way I could take the chance of him ever becoming a vampire again, so I took my sword, and…”

  Claire knew where the confession was going and wanted the noise from this infernal traitor to stop. She instinctively extended the nail on her left index finger and then efficiently swept it through the hitting zone. Ellison’s head separated from his body and then rolled back into the doorway. Claire glided out of the room and spent a few seconds in the bathroom intently cleaning her bloody nail, before emerging and returning to the main room.

  The message “Clean up in the chi room,” was sent to Brandon Justice and he turned to his wife Valerie and said, “We have to check this out.”

  She said, “Viking Funeral,” on the way to the room and Brandon replied, “What a great idea!”

  Before long, everyone in the room was excitedly chatting up an event that was apparently long overdue.

  “I’ve never been to a Viking Funeral before,” Maxwell said.

  Carla asked Nicole, “I wonder what you need to hold such an event.

  Thaddeus chatted with Garrison, “We should start building that boat.”

  Then Gary said to Aaron, “We’re going to need a few gallons of gasoline and a torch.”

  Fifteen minutes later, Ellison’s remains were wrapped neatly and placed in the middle of a boat on the shore next to Hartwell’s house. The entire family was outside, including Claire, who had been bestowed the honor of giving a man she had just beheaded, his eulogy.

  As usual, what she said was a lot different than what the group actually heard.

  Claire said, “This man, Abraham Ellison, was a traitor and a murderer, so it was with just cause on this day that his head was separated from his body and he was permanently removed from the ranks of the living.”

  Everybody heard this eulogy: “This man, Abraham Ellison, was a loyal guardian and protector of everything that is important in our world. So, we shall celebrate his life and not is passing on this day.” She was then at a loss of what to fill in next, so she said, “And let us all say, amen.”

  The group said, “Amen,” which was an extreme oddity from the pack of non-believers on this day of transition.

  THREE

  Claire was in such a revengeful mood that she rewound the tape and stripped every family member of most of their powers, except for the core abilities inherent with their being. This meant that vampires were now back to being simply vampires, the way Hartwell was most of his death. Daniel, Maxwell and even Samuel, who was always cozied up to Claire, would have start from the beginning and experience their vampiracy without unique abilities for the first time. It also meant that Sharon, who was a life-long protector before falling in love with Cal and becoming a hunter, would initially lose touch with her favored aquatic side. She always loved being in the water and was cherishing every moment of her rediscovered abilities.

  Only basic changes were to be allowed in the new restrictive environment. Vampires could use their blinding speed, sharp teeth and extra-long fingernails only during nightly battles. The protectors and hunters were also limited to their set changes only after midnight. Protectors confined to house cat, wolf, hippopotamus, bottle-nose dolphin and Orca killer whale, while the hunters fell back on their pit bull, ram, grizzly bear and hawk roots. So, Cal and Hartwell went over to the boxing gym as two men, not two supernatural beings that could deliver and withstand almost unlimited levels of punishment.

  Hartwell was the taller of the two men and would have a decided reach advantage over Cal Brewster, who was a back-alley brawler in every sense of the expression. Brewster got by on guts and determination, which was at the core of his broad array of fighting skills, and Hartwell had a thunderous left hook and equally as devastating right cross.

  Daniel and his cousin Andrew came along to watch the fight and be seconds in the corner for their Hartwell and Cal, helping them drink water between rounds. Since the vampires could not veil their actions from the rest of the people inside of the gym, it meant that Hartwell couldn’t take drinks of blood between rounds to help him maintain his energy. This lack of reinforcement leveled the competition on a more even plane, and even gave Cal a slight advantage because he was a better boxer.

  Cal’s old trainer Mortie was always hanging around the gym, training young fighters and giving tips to anyone who would listen to this old, miniature dinosaur with a raspy voice. His watery eyes lit up when he saw Cal walk in with Hartwell.

  “Champ! You’re back!”

  He was also glad to see Hartwell, who was the perfect match in style to Cal. Their previous fight in the gym was an instant classic, and would have gone viral on Youtube if someone had the foresight to record it.

>   “Clear the main ring!” the prickly gym rat yelled at the two fighters that were sparring. The two men were annoyed at first to be asked to cut their sparring session short, but moved quickly through the ropes at the sight of seeing the two boxing legends walk through the airless gym.

  Both of these men were extraordinary athletes whether they were fully powered up or completely powered down, as was the case on this morning. Mortie supplied both men with waist gear to protect their most vital of organs, as well as headgear to protect their currently underutilized hard drives. Cal was lacing up his well-worn boxing shoes, while Hartwell stood close to him with his eyes closed.

  “Meditation is not going to help you today, my friend,” Cal said in his usually cocky tone of voice.

  Hartwell remained calm and kept his eyes closed, “I’d be worried less about my methods and more about more right hand if I was you, Calvin.”

  Cal grunted in laughter and would have jumped the vampire if he didn’t respect the sport he loved so much. Besides his wife Sharon and his family, boxing was the one safe place he could always go to work out his problems or making a good day even better.

  The rivalry between Thomas Hartwell and Calvin Brewster was as contentious this day as it was in the first day the squared off against each other. Hartwell’s vampirical world had been fairly tight the first 20 years or so since he was introduced to his protector Garrison Phillips and the hunter that would track him until the ends of the earth,