He would never be alone again.
I will show you forever, he told her, his heart to hers. And we will rule it together.
He pulled back, breaking the kiss, and exposed his fangs. Her eyelids fluttered, long lashes brushing against her cheeks as she opened her eyes to gaze up at him.
So beautiful….
With a gentle grip beneath her chin, he tilted her head, exposing the long, slim column of her throat. One last kiss, one final piercing of flesh. As he swallowed her down, her precious heart would slow. When it came to a stop, she would cease to be the young girl, the student in a small-time town, the unsung hero, and the writer whose words are never read.
She would become his queen.
Sam felt his body go rigid, each of his stolen human muscles flexing in preparation for the rush of pleasure he knew he would experience. His heart quickened, his breath stilling in his lungs as he opened his mouth and hovered over Logan’s throbbing vein. His grip on her tightened as he moved in, pressing the razor tips of his fangs into her neck.
He heard the softest sound come from her lips and felt her fingers curl into his waist. Her touch electrified him. He wanted to demand she touch him more, to shout to the world that she alone would ever lay a finger on him – and that he alone would ever do so to her. He wanted to own her, claim her, make her his in every way.
With barely contained desire, Sam sank his teeth deeper.
And then he froze. Alarm shot through him, red hot and wrong. Pain reverberated through his core, burned his blood in his veins, and forced him to retreat. He yanked his teeth from Logan’s throat and backpedalled, releasing her.
Agony enveloped him, casting his vision into stark, pulsing reliefs of red and gray and black. He cried out and clutched at his stomach and head as both suddenly felt like they would explode.
Logan leaned against the tree trunk, shocked and dazed, one hand pressed to the side of her throat. She stared at him through glassy, confused eyes, a part of her clearly in pain. From where it hung around her neck, the Celtic life pendant Lehrer had given her days ago pulsed a bright green warning.
He’d forgotten about the pendant. How could he have forgotten about it? He’d been so wrapped up in Logan, he’d forgotten about everything.
And now it glowed emerald with pure protective power, its magic sparing the life of the one who wore it and keeping her from the destiny Sam had chosen for her.
A growl arose from deep within Samhain. It shook the ground he stood on. Nearby in the forest, a flock of ravens took to the pre-dawn sky in fright.
He’d pierced her skin, but spared her vein. He’d stopped short of taking her blood and taking her last breath. He couldn’t kill her – not as long as she wore that necklace.
Fury swirled in his midsection, rose into his brain, and fired away like shooting stars behind his eyes. The pain he’d experienced ebbed and receded, replaced by an ever growing rage. He straightened and leveled his gaze on his prize, knowing the red glow he could feel pulsing through his stolen eyes would only scare her.
It couldn’t be helped.
He had to get that pendant off of her. Right now. He raised his right hand palm-up. A light pulsed above it, and when the light receded, he held a dagger firmly in his grip. He would cut the pendant’s cord just as he had with Dominic Maldovan’s.
As he took his first step toward Logan with plans to do just that, another light sliced through the forest, this one much brighter. Sam stopped and turned. A car horn sounded loudly in the night, and the lower bushes and trees a few yards away suddenly exploded outward as a ruby red Volkswagen Beetle burst into the forest clearing.
Sam’s eyes widened. The car’s headlights zeroed in on him, and the vehicle suddenly picked up even more speed. Without thinking, he leapt to the side, barely rolling out of the way in time as the car rushed him. He dropped the dagger in the process.
The car sped past, dirt clods spraying and leaves flying. Sam rolled to a stop, looked up, and watched as the Beetle came to a skidding, messy halt just before it would have slammed into several trees. He heard the gear being shoved into reverse.
A blurred motion to his right drew his attention from the vehicle. Sam glanced over to find Logan diving for something on the ground. She got to her feet again and metal flashed in her right hand. It was the dagger he’d just dropped.
He stood. “It’s no use, Logan,” he told her while he hastily decided what he had to do. “You can’t beat me, and you wouldn’t want to harm this body anyway.” Anger made his tone harsh. Disappointment coiled inside of him like a lead snake.
He raised his left hand, spoke a series of ancient, powerful words, and without taking his eyes from Logan, he opened a door into another realm.
Thirty-Eight
Wind rushed across the clearing, the sound howling through branches and whispering through fallen leaves. A few yards from the red Volkswagen, a rip appeared in space and time. It wavered and warped, like soft-edged lightning, and the wind grew stronger. Sam immediately felt the drain of power from his body and mind. It nearly buckled his knees, it was so sudden and so severe. Somehow, he remained standing.
He could sense the driver of the Volkswagen, Katelyn, watching the opening portal as it slowly pulsed and grew, expanding the passage he would take into October Land. Dizziness swept through him and his head felt light, but he remained focused on Logan. “Drop the dagger and come to me,” he told her.
If he hadn’t been so suddenly weak, he would have simply willed the knife out of existence. But he could not afford to waste any more power. This portal was not supposed to exist. Not now. Opening it was unnatural, and Nature wasn’t pleased.
“Get out of Dom’s body, you coward,” Logan hissed, clearly no longer even slightly under his influence.
“There’s no time for this,” Sam hissed, feeling the weight of time pressing in on him. He needed to get Logan through the portal.
He started once more toward her – and like a bloody nightmare, the red Volkswagen again came roaring after him. This time, it sped toward him in reverse, Katelyn behind the wheel, teeth clenched, arm slung over the back of her seat. She glared at Sam as she floored the gas pedal, and Sam dove wildly for safety.
The car missed him by a hair this time, sending dirt, leaves, and small rocks cascading over him in a painful shower. He covered his face and head, gained his bearings, and shot once more to his feet.
The portal wavered, shrank a touch, and held steady.
Sam rushed toward Logan, ignoring the dagger.
“I’m sorry, Dominic!” Logan cried as Sam reached her in a blur of vampire-laced speed and she lashed out with the weapon in her hand.
Shock rang through Sam. He came to a skidding halt and faltered. It took him a moment to realize that she’d actually hit him. Blood welled up like a fountain, drenching his black clothing and gluing it to his skin. She’d sliced cleanly into him, swiping the dagger across his midsection to dig in deep.
If he’d been human, the wound would probably have killed him. As it was, he was having difficulty coping with the idea that she’d been so desperate to escape him, she’d been willing to sacrifice Maldovan’s body to do it. It gave him pause.
Which he had no time for.
He would heal. As long as he made it through the portal and away from Logan’s crazy friends and insane history teacher, he could heal anything.
All hint of patience officially gone, Sam grabbed her weapon arm by the wrist and twisted. Logan cried out as her arm was sprained and the dagger dropped heavily to the ground. From across the clearing came the sound of a car engine shifting gears.
Logan struggled in Sam’s grasp. He reached back with his free arm and backhanded her with brute strength.
Now unconscious, Logan’s body dropped limply into his arms. He adjusted his hold on her, scooped her up tightly against his blood-drenched chest, and turned toward the portal.
The last thing he saw as he traversed the opening into October Land an
d left the mortal realm behind was a bright red Volkswagen Beetle’s driver side door opening.
And then he was all the way through and closing the portal behind him.
*****
“No!” Katelyn scrambled from the driver’s seat of the car, barely remembering to slam the vehicle into park before she got out. The portal behind Sam pulsed once, twice, and then shut completely with a zzzzap. The air thundered a bit, like a storm not too far away, and Katelyn stared at the space where Logan had been only moments before.
“No,” she whispered. She couldn’t believe it. Sam had actually won.
Not only had he taken Logan away, he’d take Dominic as well. And everyone he had hurt in her world, everyone he’d killed? They were doomed.
She ran from the car toward the emptiness where the portal had been. “Logan!” she screamed into the forest.
Through the trees came the slightest streams of morning light as the sun came up on the horizon. The beams caught motes of dust and pollen that she’d kicked up with her car. It looked like fairy lights, calm and beautiful. In the aftermath of what she’d just seen, it was wrong.
“Where is she?” came a familiar voice from behind her.
Katelyn cried out in surprise and spun, her heart racing, her cheeks wet with tears. On the opposite end of the clearing stood Meagan, but she wasn’t alone. Accompanying her was a man Katelyn had never seen before.
And a monster.
She stared wide-eyed at the tall, broad-shouldered beast beside Meagan. He was humanoid, but only if a human were on serious steroids. His skin was the color of rock, his eyes were a strange multi-colored hue of gold and red and green, and fangs and tusks protruded slightly from his broad mouth. Words escaped her. Breath very nearly escaped her.
As if realizing what it was that was terrifying Katelyn, Meagan hurriedly stepped forward, holding her hand out in placation. “No, don’t worry Katie,” she said. “Believe it or not… this is Mr. Lehrer.”
“It’s true, Katelyn,” the beast agreed, speaking in what was most certainly Mr. Lehrer’s voice. “It really is me.”
Katelyn had nothing to say to that. She was still trying to process it when Meagan again asked, “Katie, where is Logan?”
Katelyn tore her eyes from Mr. Lehrer’s transformed figure and felt despair tug at her heart once more. “She’s gone,” she said softly. “Sam took her to his realm.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Dietrich felt the world drop out from under him. “And Dominic?” he asked softly, his voice catching on impending grief.
“He was Sam,” Katelyn said, shaking her head in disbelief. “All along.”
Dietrich recognized the hopelessness on his student’s features. Katelyn was feeling despair. He knew it because it was, to some degree, what he was feeling in that moment as well.
This couldn’t be over. Not like this.
Dominic and Logan had both been taken. Dietrich and two other students had been transformed into monsters. And Alec Sheffield was dead.
Katelyn walked to the car, her movements like those of a zombie. She got in, turned the car off, and got back out again, shutting the door. Her gaze was unfocused, her cheeks streaked with the salt of tears.
“They were fighting,” she told them. “Logan actually attacked him with a dagger.” She proceeded to tell them everything that had happened up till then, from the meeting at the railroad tracks to the point where Sam slipped through the portal carrying Logan’s unconscious body.
Over the course of the story she relayed, Dietrich and the others found places to rest, sitting on tree stumps and boulders not far from the clearing. The sun had come up. The air was cool and crisp, and the smell of Fall was all around them.
When the topic of conversation turned to what Meagan had experienced with Shawn Briggs, the newcomer Hugh Draper spoke up as well, filling in details from his perspective. And Dietrich realized where he’d heard that name before. Draper.
“Oh my,” he said softly, interrupting the conversation and drawing everyone’s attention. “I know who you are. You’re the man who disappeared from the Tower of London hundreds of years ago.”
Draper stared at him, blinking. And then he grinned widely. “Well, what do you know? It would seem I’ve made history.” He chuckled and said, “Actually, for me it was only a few hours ago that I left the Tower, but I’m glad to know that my story remains an interesting mystery.”
“So this is what happened to you. All along, it was time travel.”
“Indeed,” Draper admitted. “I’ve been traveling for many years.”
“Why?” Dietrich asked. And then, “How?”
“The ‘how’ is simple enough,” explained Draper. “It’s a spell. Albeit, a complicated spell and one that took several of my people thirty years to complete. I was chosen from a group of twelve to be the traveler. Thus far… I seem to have let everyone down.”
“And that would be the ‘why’ part,” nudged Dietrich.
“Yes. We come from a time and place where our kind are not accepted. In the hopes of saving my people from a foretold absolute destruction, we devised this spell, and now I search for another time and place, one in which my people will be safe.”
“If you find this time and place, you will go back and retrieve the others?” Dietrich asked.
Draper nodded. “I will. I must ask,” he said, going tentative, “You are magic users?”
“Normally,” said Dietrich. “More or less.
“Then it is accepted in your time?”
Dietrich thought about that. The truth? If people knew he was capable of performing what they would consider real magic, there might be serious trouble. Who knew what people would think? He could be “collected” by government officials for research purposes. He could be dissected. Or, with the religious intolerance abounding the span of the globe of late and the unfortunate return to dogma in times of financial and government crisis, it was quite possible society would be no more prepared to accept him as they were his predecessors in times gone by. He could literally be burned at the stake. The gods knew that worse than that was happening already in the form of rape as an act of war and other such atrocities against humanity.
“No,” he finally replied. “Not exactly.”
Draper looked honestly set back at that, and Dietrich shared in his sadness. It was depressing to have to contemplate how messed up the human condition still was. It was uncomfortable to fully realize just how far you’d come and see that it wasn’t very far at all.
“I see,” Draper finally said. “Then I shall remain long enough to help you set things right with Samhain, since this can have a profound effect on magic for generations.” He sighed. “And then I will move on.”
“Excuse me,” Meagan interrupted a touch impatiently. Dietrich turned to her and she flinched. No doubt she was still trying to get used to the way he looked. “This whole thing with your time travel is really cool and I’m sure it would make a wonderful detail in one of Logan’s stories, but speaking of Logan, can we please get back to the subject of what the hell we’re going to do now?”
Dietrich cleared his throat and would have blushed if he’d been human.
“My apologies,” said Draper, speaking for them both.
“Are we going after them?” Katelyn asked, giving voice to the question Dietrich figured everyone there wanted to ask.
For a minute, no one answered. Katelyn looked from face to face. Meagan did the same. Finally, Dietrich sighed. “I honestly don’t see how, though I don’t see how he took living mortals with him into his world either. It isn’t supposed to be possible for a living being to enter the Realm of the Dead.”
Meagan made a frustrated sound and stood up. “You can’t stay looking the way you look. I mean, what the hell are you anyway?”
“I believe he is a goblin,” said Draper.
“Goblins are little warty things with rows of sharp teeth and mischievous streaks,” said Katelyn. “He can’t be a goblin
.”
“On the contrary, my dear girl, goblins are no such thing. They’re enormous, powerful beasts – no offense, sir – with enough strength to defeat nearly any other magical creature. It’s why they were relegated to their own realm long ago. They were deemed too dangerous to interact with others.”
Everyone stared at Draper. Then they stared at Dietrich.
He couldn’t disagree with the other wizard. He’d known that the Hell Hound’s bite was poisonous and that it caused some kind of transformation, but no one seemed to have personally witnessed an attack before.
Now he knew.
“Okay,” Meagan said numbly. “You’re a goblin.” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “This is my fault. I messed up the spell. So what if I cast it again? What if I do another one?”
“It doesn’t work that way,” said Dietrich. The magic was specific to the first day of October. That was just how the spell was aligned.
Meagan turned, black hair flying, and eyed the opening to the clearing a few meters away. She walked over to it, leaned against a large, peeling tree trunk, and stared at the space where, according to Katelyn, Samhain had opened a portal and slipped on through.
The forest around the clearing had been abused by Katelyn’s car; the mud and ground cover had been torn up and thrown about and many low-lying branches were broken and oozing sap.
So much effort to fail anyway. Dietrich had a feeling that’s what Meagan was thinking as well. He stood up, brushed off his pants, which had magically grown to transform along with him, and made his way to Meagan’s side.
He gently placed a big, clawed hand on her shoulder. The others joined him, all four of them staring at the empty space.
“You’re right that he couldn’t have taken her or the boy into the Realm of the Dead. However, he could have taken them into October Land,” said Draper.