“You’re unnatural,” Tanish said admiringly. “Are you this fast in a fight?”
“You’ve seen me fight many times,” Larten said.
“Drunken skirmishes, yes, but never in a real battle. Have you ever fought to the death?”
Larten shook his head. “Not since I was blooded.”
“You mean you killed before?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Oh-ho! Quicksilver’s hiding a secret. Tell me. I won’t leave you in peace until you do.”
“This is not a topic for discussion,” Larten said softly, and although there was no menace in his tone, Tanish knew immediately that the orange-haired vampire was serious. He snorted as if he didn’t care, then focused on the cards.
As they played and the others stirred around them, a man approached across one of the fields of carnage. He was moving faster than a human and was sheltered beneath a heavy cloak. Larten assumed it was another Cub coming to join the pack. The newcomer would be disappointed—by the diminished sounds of battle, it seemed that the soldiers had spent the worst of their anger. The war was winding down.
The man slowed when he spotted the vampires under the tree. He studied them, his face masked by the shadows cast by his cloak. Then he came forward. When he was at the edge of the tree’s reach, he let his cloak drop.
“By the black blood of Harnon Oan!” Wester roared, leaping to his feet, gaping at the stranger with disbelief.
The newcomer was no human, but he wasn’t a vampire either. He had light red hair and fingernails and a pair of burning red eyes, and his skin was a purplish shade.
“I am Randel Chayne of the vampaneze,” he said as the rest of the Cubs leapt up like the shocked Wester. “I come to seek a challenge.”
Nobody spoke. They were astonished. Challenges between the two tribes of the night were nothing new, but Cubs were normally ignored in favor of Generals. This was the first time most of them had seen one of their estranged blood-cousins.
Randel studied the dumbstruck vampires, his eyebrows arching. “If this is how vampires react in the face of a challenge, perhaps you are not worth fighting.”
“We’ll teach you about worth, you scum!” Wester screamed, lunging at the vampaneze, hands twisted into claws, hatred darkening his features.
Larten grabbed his friend and held him back. “No,” he snapped. “You’re not ready for this. He’ll kill you.”
“Let me go,” Wester snarled as Randel laughed cruelly. “You have no right to get in my way. I’ll rip his throat open, and if you try to stop me, I’ll –”
“He’ll break your neck before you can lay a hand on him,” Larten said coldly. “He’s not an assistant, you can tell by the dark color of his skin. He’s a full vampaneze. He must be a vampire-hater or he wouldn’t have bothered with Cubs like us. He’s not looking for a challenge—he just wants to rack up an easy kill.
“That’s it, isn’t it?” Larten shouted at the vampaneze. “You don’t dare face one of our Generals, so you hunt among the inexperienced Cubs. You’re a coward.”
Randel sneered. “I’ve fought and killed Generals, and one night I will fight and kill a Prince if the gods are good to me. I have nothing to prove and I don’t react to the insults of curs like you. But today, to pass the time, I want to face a Cub. I’ve been told you’re slow and soft. Can any of you prove me wrong?”
Wester’s eyes flashed and again he tried to strike. Larten blocked him and said without emotion, “If you fight, he’ll slay you and you’ll never be able to take revenge on the one who murdered your family.” Then he stood aside, letting Wester make the final decision, as was his right.
As Wester agonized – he wanted more than anything to kill the stranger, but he knew Larten spoke truly – Randel gazed with disgust at the war pack. “Surely you have a leader,” he teased. “Vampires love to be led. Will not even the mighty pack leader meet my challenge?”
All eyes turned to Tanish. He had demanded the right to rule and they’d granted it. If he didn’t meet this challenge, he would be disgraced. Any vampire of good standing in his position must step forward. Even the wayward Cubs had standards to uphold. The members of the pack expected Tanish to face this purple-skinned villain, put up a good fight and die with honor.
But Tanish didn’t move. His cheeks were burning and he stared at the ground as if he could never look up again. When they realized he wasn’t going to react, their faces hardened. Several puffed themselves up for battle – even the wounded Jordan struggled to his feet – but Zula Pone was the first to step forward.
“I will face you, Randel of the vampaneze,” Zula said, taking off the overcoat in which he had been sleeping. “And when I kill you, I will honor your corpse and say a prayer to the vampire gods to accept your wayward soul.”
Randel laughed, but the sneering tone was gone from his voice when he said, “I accept your challenge. But I’ll not ask for your name or make pleas on your behalf to the gods when this is over. That’s not our way. We simply kill or die. The glory lies in the battle, not what is said or done afterwards.”
Randel edged away from the shelter of the tree, into the deadly sunlight. Like vampires, he couldn’t comfortably stand exposure to the sun. But fights between children of the night seldom lasted more than a minute or two. One way or the other, he wouldn’t have to tolerate the irritation for long.
The squat, ugly Zula followed Randel into the clearing. He went calmly, eyes clear and steady, ready to accept whatever came his way. In that moment he was a true vampire, nobler than any of the Cubs watching him, and all of them felt humbled.
“What is your choice of weapon?” Zula asked as they squared up to each other.
“Hands are fine by me,” Randel said, flexing his fingers.
“As you wish.”
Zula lashed out, five sharp nails guaranteed to cut through almost any material on Earth, including the flesh of a vampaneze’s throat. But Randel blocked Zula’s arm and kicked him in the stomach. Zula grunted and fell back. Randel could have pressed after him, but he held his ground and waited for the vampire to attack again.
Flushed, Zula darted at his foe, then stopped and took a deep breath, regaining his composure. When he was in control of himself, he advanced slowly, studying Randel’s eyes for warning signs of what his intentions might be. Larten had thought that Zula was doomed when he accepted the challenge, but watching him now, he believed that maybe the Cub had a chance.
When Zula was within reach, Randel swung a fist at him. Zula blocked it and kicked at Randel’s shin. He connected and Randel went down. The vampires roared with excitement, but their cheers were short-lived. As Randel fell, he caught Zula and twisted him around and down. Zula realized too late that his opponent had anticipated his strike. Before he could adjust, he landed heavily on his back—and on the outstretched fingers of one of Randel’s hands, which the vampaneze had slyly slid beneath him.
Zula cried out as the vampaneze’s nails ripped into his lungs. Then he stiffened, his breath catching in his throat. His legs spasmed, but his arms were strangely still by his sides. He gulped a few times, blood exploding from his mouth, eyes widening, staring at the sun. He had always thought that he would die by the light of the moon. It seemed unfair that a child of the night should perish this way, before the sun had set. He wished Randel had come a few hours later, so he could at least have counted the stars one last time.
And then he wished no more.
Randel shoved the dead vampire away, wiped his hand clean on the grass and stood. He didn’t even glance at Zula, but he did cast an eye over the pale-faced vampires sheltering beneath the tree.
“You’re a disgrace to your masters,” Randel growled, then picked up his cloak, settled it over his head and moved on.
The Cubs stared after the departing vampaneze and watched in silence until he flitted out of sight. Then Larten and Jordan went to fetch the body of Zula Pone. They would burn it later or launch it down a river,
depending on what the majority thought the ugly vampire would have preferred.
Tanish was sitting by himself when Larten returned. He had his back to the rest of the Cubs and nobody went near him. They ignored their fallen leader, treating him with the scorn he deserved. Larten felt sorry for his friend, but it couldn’t be helped. One of the first things Seba had taught him was that every man made his own decisions in life, and each must stand by the consequences of those choices.
As the sun set, Tanish stood and set off. He didn’t say good-bye and nobody asked where he was going. He took nothing, even dropping his expensive coat and discarding his silk shirt. Larten knew, as he watched the disgraced Tanish leave, that this was probably the last they’d see of him. Tanish Eul was no longer part of the clan. He wasn’t a traitor, but the Cubs would never mention his name again, and if anyone ever asked about him, they would respond with a simple, damning, “He walks with the humans now.”
Part Two
“If the entire clan stood against
her, we would fall.”
Chapter Six
The American Civil War was the bloodiest waste of life Larten had yet to witness. Vampires had known about America long before Europeans discovered it. One of the clan had sailed with Leif Ericson and thirty-four others early in the second millennium, and before Paris Skyle became a Prince he stayed Columbus’s hand when the human had lost hope and was on the verge of turning back. The elderly vampire would have been saddened to see what had become of the country, but not surprised. Why should these tribes be any different from those they had left behind? People might speak of it being a New World, but they were the same old humans.
Larten watched from a distance as thousands of young men clashed and went to an early grave. He, Wester and Seba had made camp on a hill out of the way of the fighting a few nights earlier. Since then they’d kept vigil, leaving only to hunt and stretch their legs.
The pair of Cubs had abandoned the war packs and returned to their master a few years after Tanish’s fall. They had never been able to lose themselves in warfare and other petty pursuits in quite the same way after that dark day. They felt shamed, and the Cubs they cavorted with were a constant reminder of what had happened.
Seba never asked his assistants why they had returned. He was surprised to see them come back to him so early – he hadn’t expected them for another decade – but a master didn’t need to know everything about his students. He let them keep their secrets and focused on their training.
Seba didn’t humiliate them as he had before, or give them tasks they couldn’t complete. The pair had changed, Larten in particular, and Seba now deemed them worthy of respect. He believed they were ready to undertake the testing trials that would decide whether or not they were capable of playing an active role in the affairs of the clan.
As Larten studied the warring American factions, he wondered again why Seba had brought them to this place. Their master had never shown an interest in the affairs of humans and hadn’t even glanced at the soldiers since they’d arrived. What could have lured him to this maelstrom of slaughter?
Wester stepped up beside the man he thought of as a brother and watched for a while with him. Both were thinking of Tanish Eul.
“How much longer do you think we’ll be here?” Wester asked, but Larten only grunted in response. “Did you smell the war pack last night?”
“Aye.”
Larten’s senses had improved greatly in recent years. He’d been aware of the other vampires for the past two nights but had avoided them, staying by Seba’s side, ready to obey his master’s orders.
“I miss being part of a pack,” Wester sighed. “Feeding on the battlefields was barbaric but exquisite.”
“I am sure reformed opium addicts miss their pipes,” Larten said drily. “It does not mean they should return to their old ways.”
“It wasn’t that bad,” Wester said.
“No?” Larten shrugged. “I have often told myself that there was nothing wrong in what we did, since so many other vampires were reveling in the bloodshed. But that is no excuse. Humans might not deserve our respect, but they do not merit our contempt either.”
Wester smiled. “You sound just like Seba.”
Larten winced and scratched his nose, then his ears. He had tried to copy Seba’s way of speaking in the past, and Seba had simply corrected him when he made a mistake. But since he’d returned from his time with the Cubs, Seba had taken it more seriously. He had asked Larten if he truly wished to master his vocabulary. When the unsuspecting assistant confirmed that he did, it was the beginning of a new phase, one he had come to despise. He had often begged Seba to stop, but the ancient vampire wouldn’t relent.
Under the new regime, when Larten said “don’t” or “can’t,” Seba plucked hairs from his student’s nostrils, which was far more painful than Larten would have imagined. After a year of that, he’d tried to outfox his master by burning the hairs from his nose, but Seba set his sights on the hairs in Larten’s ears instead, and that was even worse! The orange-haired assistant had learned swiftly in the face of such punishing lessons. He suffered an occasional lapse, but only rarely. It had been weeks since Seba had felt obliged to pluck any hairs.
As Larten and Wester stood watch, Seba joined them and stretched, enjoying the weak evening sun. It had been nearly half a century since he’d met a scared boy in a gloomy crypt and taken him on as an assistant. Seba had aged a lot in that time. His long hair was mostly gray now. He’d shaved his beard and the skin around his throat was dry and wrinkled, covered with old scars and blotches. He looked battered and weary, and groaned if he moved too quickly.
Yet he could set a pace his assistants struggled to match, and he was as light of foot and fast of hand as ever. He often spoke of being near to his end, but Larten suspected his old master might see out this century and perhaps a couple more. Not that he ever said such a thing—he didn’t want to invite bad luck.
“Wester thinks I sound like you,” Larten said.
“He must be going deaf,” Seba huffed. Shading his eyes, he studied the soldiers. They had concluded their killing for the day and were limping back to camp, dragging the wounded, leaving the dead for the creatures of the night that they could sense circling them. “Such noble fools,” Seba sighed. “One war should be enough for any race. Why do they go on and on?”
Neither Larten nor Wester tried to answer. They hadn’t been vampires anywhere near as long as their master, but as young as they were, both found it hard to recall the time when they had walked as humans, or how their thoughts had functioned in those less blood-riddled days.
“We will move on tonight,” Seba said. “Just a few miles. I would be obliged if you carried my coffin.”
Larten and Wester fetched Seba’s coffin from the rough shelter they had made, then followed him down the hill and around a field of corpses. The younger vampires had not yet developed a taste for coffins. They’d slept in many while traveling with Seba, holed up in crypts or tombs, but when given a choice they preferred beds. Their master, however, only felt snug with pine walls encaging him and a lid overhead. He had tried several coffins since they’d landed in America. When he finally found one to his liking, he claimed it for his own and begged pardon of the skeleton he’d evicted. His assistants had been carting it around after him ever since.
As the trio followed the course of a small stream, someone called out abruptly from a tree on the other side. “Same old Seba Nile, always has to have the modern conveniences. Can’t settle for a stone floor and a roof of sky.”
Larten and Wester set the coffin down and squinted. Larten knew the voice, but couldn’t place it. As he tried to put a face to it, a shabby vampire dropped from the branches. He was dressed in animal hides and had a couple of belts strapped around his chest, throwing stars hanging loosely from them. He had long green hair. He spat into the stream as he crossed and Larten was fairly sure he heard the General break wind, though it might have been the
creaking of the trees.
“Vancha March,” Seba smiled. “I wondered where the foul stench was coming from.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Vancha scowled. “I bathed last spring, even though I didn’t need to.” He frowned. “Or was it the spring before?” With a laugh, he tossed a salute to Larten and Wester. “Still hanging around with this old vulture?”
“Someone has to look after him,” Larten said.
“He’s too weak to carry his own coffin,” Wester added.
Larten and Wester hadn’t seen the filthy General since their first meeting in Vampire Mountain, so there was much to catch up on. But before they could ask questions, Seba pointed to his coffin and coughed purposefully. Groaning, they picked it up and followed behind at a respectable distance as their master strolled with Vancha and the pair discussed business that was not for the ears of the young.
In time they turned a bend and Larten caught sight of a tent. He might have dismissed it as the camp of a human officer, but Seba and Vancha were heading for it, so he adjusted the coffin on his shoulder and stole a closer look.
The tent was like none he’d seen so far. It was circular, tall and wide, adorned with beautiful, stitched patterns of water flowers and frogs. It looked a bit like the tent in which the Cirque Du Freak performed, but nowhere near the same size. There were three smaller tents around it and a clothesline stood behind them, hung with a variety of dresses and women’s undergarments.
A confused Wester nudged Larten, who frowned at the feminine clothes and said, “What sort of a woman would pitch her tent at the edge of a battlefield?”
The answer came to both of them at the same time, but Wester was the one who exclaimed, “A woman of the wilds!”
Sharing a thrilled look, they bustled after their master and his foul-smelling ally, heading for the tent of the woman who – if they had guessed right – was as powerful and as crucial to the fate of the vampire clan as any goddess of legend.