Absolution of Fate (Fate Series Book 3) (25 page)

He laid there on top of her as they panted together, relishing the amazing thing that was their bond. Finally he rolled away and sighed. She reached for his lingering erection and stroked him as she kissed his chest. “We must get ready to go and join the others,” he groaned. She replied by kissing his cheek and speeding off to the bathroom. He smiled at hearing the shower start as she shouted, “Then we’ll have to multitask!”

CHAPTER 19 -
The Battle Begins

“Take your time, pet.” Lucias said, stopping to admire Molly’s naked beauty sprawled out on the bed. She smiled lazily and sat up. Christopher was standing behind him, already showered and dressed. Lucias fastened the last buttons on his shirt while Molly crossed to the bathroom.
 

“The sun will be going down in about an hour. I have decided to accompany my men this evening and I would like very much for you to come and enjoy the victory with us as well.”

“I wouldn’t miss it,” Molly drawled and slipped through the door.
 

“I understand now why you’re so fond of her, Lucias” Christopher whispered against the back of his neck. “She is rather magnificent.”

“If you’d like, you can go rest in my private quarters. I have business to attend to with our secret weapon.”

“I would prefer to remain by your side. I have spent enough time away from you, Lucias.”

“Very well,” he replied before they sped down the corridor to the area where Kaleb and Anna were being held.

The two guards outside Kaleb’s door moved to make room for Lucias and Christopher. “Retrieve Asana and take her to Chloe’s quarters immediately,” he ordered one of them, while the other opened the door.

“Follow me,” Lucias commanded into the darkness without greeting or even bothering to look at his only living son. He was a tool to force Chloe’s obedience, nothing more.

A few minutes later, with Anna in tow, they arrived at Chloe’s quarters. Lucias pushed through the door unannounced, not that Chloe needed it. She’d sensed them coming shortly after Asana arrived.

Chloe’s heart pounded in her chest as she stared at Kaleb, silently willing him to look at her. Instead, his eyes remained downcast, his expression devoid of any emotion. The same was true for Anna and her mother, who stood helplessly beside Chloe.

“We will be leaving when the sun sets,” Lucias began. “The two of you will accompany me, with the understanding that I require absolute obedience.” Chloe stared back at Lucias, her expression passive, but there was a fire burning behind her eyes. “To ensure that you don’t get any ideas out there, my dear Chloe…” he said, stepping to his son. He placed his hand under his chin and lifted his gaze. “Kaleb, if Chloe fails to follow any command I give from this moment forward, or attempts to harm me in any way, you are to kill Anna and Asana, and then you will take your own life.” Chloe gasped behind him and tears of anger filled her eyes. Her power began to rise and she trembled against its force, at once wanting to unleash it on Lucias and hold it at bay.

“There now,” Lucias said as if he’d just tidied up a small mess rather than ordered his own son to commit suicide. “Anna, Kaleb, this way,” he said, gesturing to the door. “As for you two, be at my door in thirty minutes.”

The door clicked shut and Asana crumpled to the floor and began to sob. Fighting against her own emotions, Chloe kneeled beside her and pulled her close, wrapping her arms around her friend’s shoulders. “Shh, Asana. He has not won yet,” she whispered.

“Have, have you seen what is to come?” Asana stammered through her cries.
 

“No, but if we do what he says, everything will be fine,” Chloe lied aloud to avoid revealing anything to Lucias through his surveillance equipment.

I have seen enough to know hope is not lost. Lucias means to use me to defeat The Elite, but he is foolish, power hungry. It will not be enough to defeat them. He wants to demonstrate the might of his army first; that will be our chance. I promise you I won’t let anything happen to you or Anna. I swear it.

“
Come; dry your tears, Asana. We must not be late.”

✧

I’m scared.
Asana said, looking across the space in the back of the limousine to where Anna and Kaleb were seated off to one side. Lucias was directly across from her and Chloe, with Molly and Captain Erikson on either side of him. From the looks of him and his two companions, you’d think they were heading into the city for dinner and a show rather than following an army into battle.

It’s going to be fine; just stay close to me.
Chloe sent back. She avoided looking at Lucias and Kaleb, not wanting Lucias to see her fear, so she instead let her gaze drift to the front of the vehicle. She’d been shocked to find that the driver was human, but Asana explained that Lucias had a number of loyal humans working for him. She wasn’t really sure what motivated them before, perhaps fear; but now with Chloe’s ability, Lucias had a lot more to offer them. A quick peek into the man’s mind revealed that Lucias had already made him the promise of immortality. It seemed the egotistical vampire couldn’t resist showing off.

Chloe could sense Lucias’s excitement, and his thoughts were centered on his victory and the grand speech he had planned when he assumed rule over The Elite. He believed a broadcast was in order, like the one The Agency had tried to use against him. Counting on her family’s presence in the camp, Lucias had ordered his men to capture the High Commander alive. Using him as a bargaining chip, he would take over The Agency and systematically use their network, his virus, and Chloe to bring the entire world to its knees.

“We’re nearly there,” Captain Erikson announced, looking out the window. In his earlier mission, he’d managed to devise a route to the facility that would allow the entire army of nearly thirteen-hundred to travel through the country virtually unnoticed. The car rolled to a stop a few miles from The Elite camp where, as commanded, the generals were waiting just inside the tree line.

“The scouts just returned to report that there has been no change since the photographs were taken this morning. We estimate the same number of men and they are fairly exposed, with the exception of the wooded area on the other side of the factory. If they are cowardly enough to flee, many of them could escape that way. It would be impossible for us to send a unit to intercept before the initial strike without detection.”

“The priority is the lab,” Lucias replied, sliding out of the vehicle behind Captain Erikson. “I want it all destroyed after a sample is acquired.” In discussions with the scientist who developed his virus, a man who, like Asana, was forced to serve Lucias to protect his family, he learned that with a sample of the antiserum to work with, they might be able to alter the virus to render it ineffective and perhaps even find the key to why it didn’t work on the turned humans.
 

“Signal to the men; let it begin,” Lucias ordered. Mason and the other generals disappeared into the forest. “Kaleb, Anna, you are to remain close to me at all times. Asana, stay with Anna; that will simplify things if Chloe tests me,” he continued with a sneer as he stared Chloe down. “And you, my dear, are not to leave my side unless I command you otherwise, understood?”

“I understand,” Chloe replied, her expression stoic.

✧

The army broke off into units and headed for the camp; quietly moving as close as possible without being detected. Lucias watched with barely-contained delight as his men approached the unsuspecting camp where Elite soldiers were going about their business completely unaware.
 

Chloe scanned the area, unsure how much distance her telepathy could cover, but she had to warn them if she could. She was sure she could reach the nearest Elite soldier, but somehow was only met with silence as she zeroed in on him. Something wasn’t right. Before she could investigate any further, shots rang out into the night as the first unit of turned humans sped across the distance towards the camp of Elite soldiers. Within seconds, wave after wave of the infected appeared out of the trees and followed.

“This will be over quickly,” Lucias said with satisfaction, before speeding off behind the army to get a closer look at the action. Chloe and the others, as commanded, stayed right beside him, running through the night with preternatural speed.

And then the soldiers slowed and stopped. “What’s happening?” Lucias asked of no one in particular since they happened to be in a patch of low ground and none of them could see past the wall of infected. There was a cacophony of the infecteds’ murmurs as the crowd split and Mason appeared.
 

“Mason, what the fuck—”

“Sire, they aren’t here,” he rushed out.

“What do you mean they’re not here? I saw the camp with my own eyes!” he spat.

“When the first men reached the edge of the camp, where the trail crosses the field, they just disappeared; everything disappeared; the men, the lights, the equipment, all of it’s gone.”

“What of the lab? Did you check inside?” Lucias yelled as his anger continued to rise, fueled by his confusion and frustration.

“They wouldn’t leave it unguarded,” Captain Erikson interjected.
 

“It could be a trick; an illusion to protect it so they could send their forces elsewhere! How did you not see this?” he screamed, grabbing Asana by the arms and shaking her with each word. “You become less useful by the minute,” he said, tossing her to the ground as he attempted to regain control. “Press forward to the building and check inside. The cure is there,” Lucias ordered and Mason knew better than to question him.

“Perhaps we should leave; it may not be safe for you here out in the open, Lucias,” Christopher said, placing a tentative hand on his shoulder.

“I will see what is inside that building with my own eyes and not a single man will leave here until I do,” he stated, his tone calm again; but his rage was a constant undercurrent, simmering just below the surface, waiting to be unleashed.

“It appears you are correct, Sire. The building is sealed tight with what appears to be a highly-sophisticated security system. I didn’t attempt to enter and risk setting it off without talking with you,” Mason said when he returned through the swarm of infected.

“Excellent,” Lucias replied before he sped off on the path through the center of his army. He stopped a couple of yards from the entrance to the building and the others appeared immediately beside him.

Chloe looked around, recognizing the faces of many, if not all, of the humans she’d turned surrounding the area. Lucias’s plan had been to send them into the fray first, assuming The Elite would be lacing their ammunition with antiserum, the same as he had done with his virus. As she continued to take in her surroundings, she realized it was more than their faces she recognized.

I’ve seen this place,
she sent to Asana and Molly. Both women looked to her just as flashes of fire sparked from the darkness of the trees around them.

✧

“We will hold until most of them cross,” Claesson whispered into his radio, though it was unnecessary with the veil produced by Martinez, which was being amplified and bent by the witches to cover the whole of The Elite forces; the infected wouldn’t have heard him if he’d shouted at the top of his lungs. The illusion that enticed Lucias to show up with his entire army was also courtesy of the witches.

Right beside him, Cami carefully watched the first group that had run through the border of the spell as they waited. Something was off about them, but she wasn’t quite sure what it was.

“Can you see Chloe anywhere?” Alexa asked Ethan. Cami looked at her brother as his green-gray eyes scoured the crowd and it hit her. Their eyes.

“Commander, look at them, all of those men closest to the building; they’re not infected. Look at their eyes.”

“Shit. It looks like there are at least a couple hundred civilians down there,” he responded, scanning row after row of vampires before he found a set of red eyes. “How the hell did he get that many civilians? I could see a few, but we would have heard about that number before now.”

“We have to be missing something,” Cami said as the crowd started to part and they slowly advanced toward the old factory. A single man appeared and flashed around the perimeter of the structure before disappearing back down the path he’d cut through the men.
 

“All right people,” Claesson spoke a little louder, wanting to be certain everyone could hear him loud and clear. “We’ve got friendlies at the front of the crowd, so save the antiserum rounds for the bodies further back. As soon as—” he stopped when Lucias appeared in front of the building, with Erikson right by his side. William growled at the sight of the man he’d once considered a friend. Alexa gasped, seeing Chloe behind him. Claesson turned to Alexa and the rest of her family as he released the button on his radio. “All of you hang back here until we draw most of the men back from the building. Lucias will want to stay close to cover and he won’t let her out of his sight.”

They all nodded their understanding. Neither Alexa nor Ethan took their eyes off of Chloe.
 

“On my signal, I want a layer of antiserum rounds laid down on the back half before we move. When you’re out of those, switch to silver. I Tranquilizers only from my position forward; we don’t want to risk hitting Chloe or the civilians, and keep the fire concentrated on the infected unless those civilians engage. Snipers hang back and continue with the antiserum rounds until you run out.” He looked at Cami. She nodded. “Ready, Fire!”

Infected soldiers down each side of the formation fell as antiserum rounds cut through the crowd. The Elite rushed out from behind the veil, continuing to shoot as the infected started returning fire. The Elite, who managed to avoid the rounds whizzing by, reached the line, having to jump over the writhing bodies of the infected being cured as the gunshots slowed and the clang of steel joined the cacophony of the battle. With all of The Elite being vaccinated against infection, those who were hit with the virus- laced rounds retreated to the cover of the trees while their bodies healed before they returned to the fight.