Ancient Blood: The Fallen (11 page)

Thirty seconds later, swallowing half a glass of juice and the pills, I could think of nothing more inviting than returning to bed, covering my head and tossing up a prayer that no one would disturb me for the rest of the day.

Ha! As if I need worry about
that
, I thought grumpily. However, the grueling pain in my head continued to be a cruel master, and I found myself making it no further than the table and chairs that shared a space on the thick carpeting as, with butt planted in one of the hard wooden chairs, forehead pressed against the coolness of the table, and arms wrapped around my head in hopes to keep it connected to my shoulders, I began to plot the arrangements for my funeral in between each excruciating pang.

Slowly, in immeasurable pain filled minutes, the medicine began to take effect, the ache sneaking back out of my head a little at a time as it stealthily crept in reverse along the nerves and tissues of my brain until finally, like the slimy criminal I had come to think of it, it slipped away into obscurity.

In all, no more than twenty minutes had passed however to my exhausted and weary mind, days had.

Gingerly lifting my head from the table, I jumped, giving a startled squawk as I made to vacate my chair, only to do a double take and pause as I gazed at the man in the chair across from mine.              

Beautiful was the first thing that popped into my head as I gazed at his startling good looks. At the smooth silky fall of blonde hair that fell the length of his back, the deep brown eyes, and the square, angular jut of his cleanly shaven jaw, a perfect frame for the bottom lip that was slightly fuller than its upper counterpoint.

Suddenly however, a toe-curling scream ripped forth from me as he lunged in my direction.

I jerked backwards, the chair beneath me, upset by my sudden movement, lost the precarious two-legged balance, and toppled over taking me, still screaming, with it.

Then, paying no attention to my bone-wrenching landing, I began scrambling backwards, frantically trying to disentangle myself from the chair.              

When I was finally free, I came up off the floor at a run, Holy mother of God, what is
wrong
with these people, my mind frantically screamed.

Suddenly several people were running through the doorway towards me, their eyes widening as they landed on me, and then the man behind me, and though I gazed in their direction, I only paused on them with a frantic glance, setting my sights on Dante as he came barreling through the small gathering, never once doubting, that if I could just reach his solid strength, I'd find the safety I sought.

I was within several yards of gaining that goal when I felt the grip upon my shoulders, a grip that was a death knoll, bearing down upon my tender flesh.

My eyes filled with tears, and great, gasping sobs escaped from between my lips at the realization that the sanctuary I craved wasn't to be gained. I began to fight, vainly trying to push forward a surge of fire, only to find the weapon I sought lacked any snap and pop. Its voice only a whisper, revealing in its softness the weakness of its strength as things around me grew dim, distorting, causing me to feel as if I were swimming under water, weighted and sluggish, suffocating in my struggle to breath.

Each effort of pulling air within my lungs seemed to take hours instead of seconds as the oxygen depleted, the tightness within my throat ever increasing as the man who held me hostage looked straight at Dante and sneered sarcastically, “all for not, huh Dante?”

Even through my blurring vision I could see the dark and deadly look that came upon Dante's face. An expression I had never seen upon his features before as he snarled deep and low, “let her go Jabar” then he leaped forward, a fierce growl erupting from between his lips as his feet left the ground, and he flung himself in our direction.

Dante’s body hit ours, sending all three of us to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs as a blast of oxygen hit my lungs, and suddenly I became aware of an unimaginable pain roaring across my senses, as what felt like the scissor sharp edge of a blade ripped at my shoulder.

Then Dante was jerking me away from the man, and with just the slightest of turns, he bodily tossed me across the room like a sack of flour.

I landed hard on the floor, becoming aware of the warm, sticky liquid that oozed down the side of my arm, and a fresh wave of fear, strong and unabated, shot throughout my system as my mind frantically grappled with the fact that it was blood…
my
blood!

Clutching at my shoulder, I struggled to find the source of what was causing the free flow. However, my fingers were rapidly desensitizing, numbing to a state of useless.

Panicked now with desperation, I dropped my arm and began pushing myself upright, the task much harder than it should have been as I was growing increasingly weak and dizzy, the pain emitting from my shoulder almost paralyzing.

I felt myself grow nausea's, the foul taste of bile rising and burning the back of my throat at the sight of the layer of red that covered my arm and hand, at the cloying coppery smell that floated up and assaulted my nostrils, at the blood that seeped into the carpeting, filling the narrow caverns between the spread of my fingers.

Blinking, I tried to remove the haze from my vision, my sight growing dimmer with each pump of my heart, an action that was forcing the life giving liquid to spill forth, changing the blue of the carpeting to a deep purple that, even through my decreased sight, I could see was becoming an ever-widening stain.

Helplessly transfixed, I watched the very essence of my life ebb out into the plush fibers.

Whimpering weakly, I felt the last of the strength leave my body. Then, no longer able to hold myself up, I collapsed to the carpeting, unaware of the sudden presence of the man that came rushing up beside me, or of his jerking my body up against his, a feral growl issuing from between his lips as he turned, and with me cradled protectively within his arms, Dante begun to run through and out the other side of the room, for as the blood flowed freely from my wound, so was life seeping from my body.

              Strange, disjointed images played across the internal workings of my mind. Flashes of unknown places, unknown faces, nightmarish visions of pale and bloodied features from a type of death I couldn’t fathom, I wanted to reject the images, however could do nothing to stop them, as next came the figure of a dark haired man, slumped and weeping over a woman, a woman with long flowing strands of caramel colored hair.

Hair that mated with golden sands turned red beneath her, her features pale and still, the man's cry of grief wrenched my heart, his utterance the most anguished cry I’d ever heard.

Yet, more of the gruesome images flashed before me. Images that declared a path of destruction that caused me to struggle within the bondage of the depictions that held me securely within their grasp as, greedy, selfish to the point of madness, they tortured me.

However, with time I climbed above their stagnant depths, depths that had held me captured within their mire, and I continued to climb above their reach, until finally there was nothing for them to torture, as my mind recoiled from all it had been subjected to, slowly forcing itself to heal inwardly as my body healed outwardly.

How long I lay within my restorative cocoon I had no idea, as I was oblivious to all, but at some point, I slowly began to edge toward consciousness, riding just on the hump, awareness just a grasp away, and as I floated, I recalled at some point hearing Dante cry, “there
must
be
something
else
we can do to
help
her…”

Time passed, and again I received the nudge to wake, however though I wasn’t quite ready to reach out and grab the offer, I found I had no choice, for I was suddenly and rudely, jerked into wakefulness from the angry lash of raised voices.

Voices pitched in anger, one overriding the other, as if each individual felt what they had to say more important than the others words.              

Slipping from the bed, I weakly tested my strength, finding that though my legs were shaky and felt as if they belonged on someone else, I was nonetheless, capable of managing under my own steam.

I made my way over to the door, where partially opening it, I peered out, gaping disbelievingly at the sight before me as Dante squared off against a mass of people, people that eyed him as though vultures hunting their prey as he stared back.

I could see the unrest written clearly on the faces of the others as Dante’s own features became harsher, his eyes turning nearly obsidian, barely resembling those of the man I knew as he snarled, “don’t you
get
it…it has never
been
about
us
…!”

* * *

I sat cross-legged in the center of the bed, my upper body rocking in a soothing rhythm, swaying forward, then back, forward, then back again, obsessively repeating the action.

              I didn’t understand, didn’t understand any of what was going on! All I knew was that my world was becoming something that made little sense, a living nightmare in fact, one that had nothing what so ever to do with sleep, but one I wished to God I would awake from.

Chaos reined on the other side of the door I had quietly pushed to behind me before stumbling my way back towards the bed, where, even with my hands over my ears, I could still hear muffled shouting through its wooden bulk, and Dante’s was the most frightening of all as it carried such a strong flavor of leashed anger.

Suddenly, everything grew eerily and intensely quiet before the door of the room flew open and a large, male body stomped its way through the opening, slamming the wooden structure shut with such angry force I flew off the bed in alarm, as my eyes searching for a weapon, I finally settled on a shiny metal object that was lying nearby.

Picking it up I brandished it at the intruders back as I yelled, “Stay. The. Fuck. Back!”

Slowly the figure before me turned to where he faced me. Recognizing the features of Dante as he advanced in my direction, I watched his steps slow, then falter, before halting all together as his face transformed, becoming comical in its expression of stunned incredulity as he murmured, “what the hell are you going to do with
that
?”

Glancing at what I held in my hands, I suddenly realized how pathetic my weapon of choice was. Had I
really
expected to inflict damage with a bedpan?

With a smooth even stride he walked over, and easily took the pan from me, staring at it for a second before shaking his head as he sat it back on the table, then snarled, “Kira, I really need you to listen to me!”

An hour later found me with eyes slit in suspicion, wondering just what the hell Dante was about, for he’d launched into what was boiling down to be a science lecture, when suddenly his words trailed to an abrupt halt as a powerful gust of wind from outside caused the windows to rattle, and the walls to shake in a creaking, groaning fashion.

My eyes shot open wide, and I watched in alarm as cracks formed across the ceiling. Dust and plaster slithered out of the gaps and sensuously fluttered and turned in an erotic dance, mating with the disturbed flow of air that assaulted the room.

Suddenly Dante erupted with a snarl and leaped, his frame impacting that of another whom I’d been unaware of having even entered the room with us.

Then both bodies tumbled to the floor as I uttered a scream of sheer terror at the clash that ensued before me, a confrontation of force and will in an explosion of deadly intent.

Both were exhibiting abnormal strength as each took turns tossing the other about like a rag doll, their bodies impacting with such force that it should have caused massive bruising and shattered bones, but instead only seemed to fuel the rage that tempered the battle between them as both went after the other with an undeniable blood-lust.

Then in a flash of movement it was silent, and Dante stood quivering over the now still frame of the other as I felt my stomach revolt and then heave, forcing me to my knees as I emptied its contents where I knelt.

I could hear Dante moving, but didn’t lift my head, not wanting to see the figure sprawled upon the floor. However, the odor that was coming from the puddle before me had me shifting, and on hands and knees, I began to crawl.

I only wanted to hide, to disappear if possible somewhere within the room.

Yet, I found the task to be nearly impossible as the room began to sway. Tiny black spots floated before my eyes, as microscopic shards of gray and white light danced around the spots, then in an instant everything came into sharp focus as oxygen blasted through my lungs.

The draw of air reemerged in a frantic scream, that dwindled into tiny mewling sounds. Sounds that issued from between pale lips as my face turned beyond white to ashen, any drop of color within my features wiped clean, the rich green of my eyes standing out in deep contrast to the pallor of my skin as terror dilated my pupils to an enormous size.

From someplace deep inside, I recognized that Dante was kneeling beside me, and I began to scramble backwards, the movement somewhere between a crab walk and a backstroke as I shrieked, “ge…get
away
from me!”

However, he continued to follow me wherever I crawled until my back was resting against a wall, his large frame preventing any further escape, my body shaking as though having just been pulled from the frozen depths of a river.

I wanted to deny what I’d seen, but I couldn’t, couldn’t deny what seemed to be burnt within the eye of my mind, couldn’t get away from the image of the dead man, nor the skill Dante had used as he'd accomplished it.

Slowly I wrapped my arms around my balled frame, my limbs quivering with reaction as I stuttered, “you…you…holy
fuck
…you
killed
him!”

The only sound to be heard in the room was my own harsh breaths of fright as Dante snapped “it was that or
be
killed Kira!”

Part of me wanted to look, to assure myself that everything I'd seen and been through was nothing more than a bad dream. A nightmare that would end just as soon as I awoke…but I was afraid, afraid to look, because I knew to do so meant I could no longer deny that the man whom I had known since I was twelve, the man that I loved and adored...
was
a
killer.

Finally, with a shuddery breath, I slowly lifted my head to gaze at Dante, and found myself looking into the depths of his eyes, eyes that bore out no softness, nor understanding, in fact were again, the eyes of a stranger, and jumping to my feet, needing time, space to come to terms with my own uncertainty as to whom stood before me, I found that my legs had not fully recovered from being ill, nor of the shock I’d endured, and I stumbled.

Unsteady and uncoordinated, I lost my balance and fell, a whimper shuddering out from between my lips as I verged on the edge of tears. However, as I sucked in a breath to hold them at bay, the door flew open and Arreon skidded to a halt just inside the entrance, his eyes falling upon the figure across the room, then swinging back in our direction, a lopsided grin curving up the edge of his lips at my squeaked words of, “where the
hell
have
you
been
” before I fainted.

* * *

We were lost, or so I suspected, as I had no clue where we were!

We'd been traveling for hours, and I was weary. My mind exhausted from the battle within my heart at what I now knew of Dante for, unlike most normal humans that would have found his unusual strength enough in itself something to fear, I, on the other hand, found that part of what had occurred somewhat comforting.

Though different from my own ability, I could easily accept the oddity. It was the other that had me unsettled, nearly sick with confusion, for though I’d had enough time to analyze what had happened, enough time to realize that it
had
been an act of kill or be killed, it was the ability I had witnessed in Dante as the deed was done, that had my heart and mind struggling.

Finally I just gave up, as I could find no way to appease either, and found, for the moment, I had no other alternative but to accept what I couldn't understand, or go insane trying.

Neither brother had spoken more than half a dozen words among themselves, or to me as the miles passed, and within the interior of Arreon's pickup, the atmosphere was wrought with tenseness.

However, that silence was finally broken when my stomach, finally giving up on the light hunger pains it had been sending in my direction for the last hour, rather emphatically stated that it couldn't remember the last time I'd put anything in it. Letting loose with a loud roar of insistence, it caused both men to glance simultaneously towards me, where I sat, squirming uncomfortably between the two.

With an embarrassed shrug I muttered, “okay, so I’m hungry.”

A look of irritation flashed across Dante’s features, and Arreon, a small smirk curling up the edge of his lips murmured, “you’ve always had rotten timing Kira!”

With a small smile of my own I breathed, “well, anyway, that can wait, however, there is a…uh…more pressing matter that I don’t think will!”

Jerking the wheel, Dante let loose with a curse as he swung the pickup off the road, and after several moments of bouncing and jarring across the rougher terrain, which didn’t help the situation any for me, he stood on the brakes and roared, “just hurry the fuck up okay” as the pick up came to a shuddering stop.               Smarting from the heat of his tongue, I hissed, “a person can only pee so fast you know” then shoving on Dante’s arm, I growled, “now get the hell out of my way!”

Hastily he swung the pickup’s door open and, with every move clearly expressing his irritation, Dante ripped himself off the seat and out of the truck as he stood, arms crossed and lips pulled taught, waiting on me to exit the cab as well.

I was stomping my way through the tall grass and weeds of the ditch grumbling to myself when I heard Dante bark my name, and jerking around I saw something come flying through the air in my direction.              

Reflexively I raised my arms in an effort to keep from having it smack me in the face, and felt the thud of the items impact against my palms.

However, the object bounced backwards and hit the ground, rolling several inches before I got the chance to see what it was.

When it finally came to rest, partially covered in the overgrown grass, I found myself gaping in stunned surprise before I began to giggle as I laughingly exclaimed, “you carry toilet paper in your truck Arreon, really?”

With an embarrassed shrug, Arreon muttered defensively, “it was in there when I bought it!”

Still giggling to myself I dipped forward, snagging the roll off the ground before straightening and turning, I continued my excursion deeper into the bushes.

Several moments later I was kneeling, uttering a soft moan of relief as I emptied my bladder, and another of frustration for no matter how I tried, I found it nearly impossible to deafen my ears to the bickering between Dante and Arreon.

Suddenly I felt my senses go on full alert at the rapid and abrupt halt of the heated words between them, and within a matter of seconds I heard Dante’s voice blast across the airwaves as he roared, “we need to go…
now
Kira!”