Blood Will Tell (Warriors of Ankh #1) (18 page)

“
Look, I know you don’t want me to talk to you ever again, blah de blah blah,” he growled, “But let me at least put you at ease.”

Her look said she found it highly doubtful he could ever do that.

“
The questions about Stellan…” he trailed off as she stiffened. He exhaled and turned, leaning against the car, the side of his body pressed against hers. “It wasn’t about judging you. It was about determining the depth of your human emotions even with your soul eater half intact.”

Noah’s words relaxed her a little. “You mean it was a good thing?”

“
Yeah.”

“
Oh.”

He nudged her again and she felt him grin. “But you know what? It wouldn’t have mattered anyway what he thought. Cyrus is doing this with or without Darius’ approval.”

“
I find that hard to believe somehow.”

“
Don’t.”

“
But I thought Darius was Cyrus’ superior?”

“
He’s older than him. And he’s stronger. But they’re friends, not master and subordinate.”

“
Oh.”

They were quiet a moment as a car pulled in next to them and a couple got out. Eden’s ears rang with their musical accents, some words she totally understood, others well…

But it wasn’t the accent that got her. It was the strength of her need for their souls. The further they drew away from them, the hunger lessened, but Eden swore under her breath.

“
What?” Noah frowned, concern creasing his brows.

She scowled at his concern. “Darius woke up the beast. Do you think it’s safe to take another dose?”

Noah shrugged. “I suppose not.”

“
What the hell is he anyway?” she snapped, irritated. “I mean that energy… Jesus Christ, I’ve never felt anything like that in my life before.” When he smirked, she exhaled wearily. “OK, just tell me, ‘cause I’m sick of the cloak and dagger crap.”

“
Fine.” Noah grabbed her arm and opened the passenger side door of one of the cars. “Get in.”

“
Why?”

“
Privacy.”

Not really wanting anything that amounted to privacy with Noah, but too damn curious for her own good, Eden did as she was told. She waited impatiently for Noah to get into the car and then turned to him in exasperation. “Well?”

“
Well,” he began. “Darius is kind of different from us.”

“
Like how?”

He smirked again. That smirk was really starting to drive her crazy. “There are some people who believe what I’m about to tell you is a legend. Others even believe Darius is dead because he’s like a ghost among us...”

“
And the truth?”

“
What they believe is legend, is true.”

“
And what is that exactly, Mr ‘Don’t I know how to drag out a conversation with an unwilling participant’?”

Blood Past - Coming August 2011

Read a sample of Moon Spell: Part One in The Tale of Lunarmorte trilogy…

War

The war had been raging for centuries; a war that breathed beneath human reality, lost in the labyrinth of their legends and folklore. It was a silent war of soundless screaming and invisible bloodshed.

And like many wars it was built upon a mindless prejudice.

The ancient Greeks had it right. They were not naive enough to believe they actually had any control over their fate. No. They knew the gods controlled all. They didn’t believe a good crop that year had anything to do with luck in a poorly cultivated land - no, it was Demeter who’d blessed their farm. They didn’t believe that one man was far superior in battle than another, thus tipping the scales of a battle in their favour - no, it was just that Athena took a liking to him, and so aided the warrior. Yeah, the gods were capricious, unmerciful, loving, and selfish; there was nothing that contented them more than making the human world their chessboard and humans their own personal chess pieces.

They gloried in their own supremacy.

But one day… the gods of ancient felt a pierce in each of their hearts. It was the day humans, who had once been under their thrall, who had loved them, and feared them, and prayed to them, turned their back upon the gods and their heart to a new one. As the centuries passed the gods were no longer worshipped by any human, no longer feared, or loved, or prayed to. The barrier of space that had allowed them to come down from their mountain, and interfere in the lives of humans strengthened as time forgot them. Indeed, their very existence would have been expunged from earth if not for their legacy: their children, the supernaturals of their own creation that still looked to the heavens and believed in them. They are the children of Gaia: Mother of all the gods.

Her children were the culprits of the silent war waging beneath the humans’ very noses.

On one side of the war were the true instigators, those who called themselves the Midnight Coven: a community of magiks who believed above all in their own superiority. Gaia, perhaps in her infinite wisdom, had long ago blessed a number of humans by allowing them a taste of her blood, so that as the years turned a generation of magiks arose; witches and warlocks with elemental power, a race of children who would forever pray to her, and through them time would never forget her. They believed, however, that those lesser supernatural beings were abominations not fit to live side by side with humans, much less themselves. Their distaste for lykans (like me) and vampyres not only enraged those they sought to exterminate, but also their own kind: magiks who believed in the equality of the races. We call ourselves the Daylight Coven. You see, to our mind, Midnights hunted not abominations, but their own people, humans transformed and blessed by the gods, creatures descended from Gaia herself. This gaping split in beliefs between the dark and light Covens was shared by their contemporaries, the faeries of Hemera. As a primordial deity, the Goddess of Daylight and Sun, her children were almost equals to that of Gaia’s. They were descendants of a young queen, who had sold her soul to her favourite goddess for the opportunity to take on the form of any living thing she wished, so that she would always know her enemies, and they would never know her. From her, to Hemera’s delight, sprang a race of shapeshifters who held the power to take on the appearance of anything born of nature. They’re mischievous and tiring, but useful spies on either side of the war.

Hades, God of the Underworld (and grandson to Gaia), created a race of children familiar to humans within their folklore: vampyres. His children were the souls who passed through the River Styx without toll, and whom Hades returned to earth to extort in blood, payment from those who dared to leave them to travel into the underworld without coin.

And the youngest of the children of the gods are the lykans: we are fierce, strong wolves consecrated with the power of regeneration. In the dying years of the ancient gods, Artemis, Goddess of the Moon, the Hunt and of Beasts, was called down to earth by the last human who prayed to her. His son was dying from his battle wounds, and Artemis in gratitude for his loyalty, replaced his son’s wasted heart with that of a wolf’s. To her supreme pleasure, for she had always been a competitive goddess, her own race of children was born, and she too was remembered by us.

In the early years of our existence, we children of the gods, cousins, wandered the world of humans at peace with one another. But the ages passed, and our forms changed - lykans producing lykans by humans, diluting the werewolf blood, and eventually becoming a non-violent breed of our original selves.

In other words, this rational (most of the time), articulate lykanthrope narrator before you is an evolved version of my ancestors.

Anyway, because of the vengeance taken upon Hades for his kidnapping of her daughter Persephone, the goddess Demeter changed the course of the vampyres, blessing them with fertility and diluting their undead souls with the light of humanity, until eventually adhering to the laws of the Daylight Coven, they withheld from killing humans.

The last century had seen calm before the storm. The Midnight Coven had dissipated into a mist, a near invisible layer of destruction that touched those who did not seek it. We Daylights waited with bated breath, aware that our enemy had retired a fearsome aggressive strategy. The Dark Coven had become wary of the war spilling over into the world of the humans, and instead had embraced a far more threatening silence.

But the attacks started.

The subtle desolation of individual supernaturals: communities of vampyres, and packs of lykans; packs like mine, who wanted nothing to do with the war and had lived in relative peace until that point.

Other than the faeries who share their beliefs, only the daemons, the beasts created from Midnights own magik, are allied with the Dark Coven. The Daylight Coven, with her allies of faeries, lykans and vampyres, could only hope to act fast enough to discover the target of the next Midnight attack in order to prepare the target for war.

Some supernaturals escaped disaster.

Others slipped through the cracks - targeted without warning, without preparation.

That’s how the war stood.

Unbeknownst to me at the time, Gaia, already grown weary of being called down upon both sides of the war, had set her plan for its end in motion many generations before.

My pack, Pack Errante - untouched by the war, unpolluted by the world – were pulled into this chaos. My name is Lucien Líder. I am Alpha of Pack Errante and our story begins in 2010.

There we were going about our business, living in the world of humans, keeping our secret. Little did we know that from the heart of us, would spring the culmination of all Gaia’s designs.

1 - Hidden

Caia recognised his ruddy face and chocolate eyes from long ago memories; memories that poked and prodded her heart and set it racing, her ears burning hot with the sudden onslaught of blood rushing to them.

Life was going to be very different from now on.

His dark eyes settled on her only companion these last ten years, Irini, and shifted from soft concern to steely determination.

“
It’s finally safe for you to return her, Irini.” His gaze flickered back to Caia as if trying to gauge a reaction. He would get none.

Irini sagged down into the sofa beside her as her wide eyes flew to his face. “Dimitri, please promise this is for real.”

He smiled gently. “I know you have lived alone for a long time… but it’s finally time to come home.”

“
What happened?” Irini breathed in disbelief.

Dimitri managed to fold his huge, muscular body into the small armchair before them. He looked to be somewhere in his forties but she knew he must be much older than that. He was an Elder after all.

“
Lucien returned five years later to reclaim the pack.”

She looked to Irini and then to Dimitri. She had been seven when she was taken from the pack but she still remembered Lucien, a young headstrong male, who had fallen out with his family and ran from the pack at seventeen. A year later, Lucien’s father Albus, Pack Leader, had been killed by The Hunter.

Irini looked shocked at this news. “And the pack welcomed him with open arms?” She shook her head.

“
After Albus’ death, no one else tried to track The Hunter. Everyone was far too caught up in who was going to be Pack Leader, what with Lucien being AWOL. Whilst you were stuck in this goddess-forsaken place under Marion’s protection, we were trying to reassemble our lives. Then Lucien returned. He didn’t give us much of explanation…but he told us what he had been up to.” Dimitri’s eyes narrowed. “He killed The Hunter, Irini.”

His eyes went to Caia as did Irini’s. She was puzzled by their guarded looks. Shouldn’t they be happy? The Hunter had killed her father and mother and had wanted to murder her as well. If it hadn’t been for Irini taking her into isolation, The Hunter would have killed her. As it was, Albus, a beloved leader, was gone because of his determination to see herself and Irini returned to the pack. After all, her father had been Albus’ greatest friend.

“
I suppose that gained him his rightful place then?” Irini sneered.

Dimitri shook his head. “No. Magnus and I were willing to see him take up the mantle of Pack Leader-”

“
How could you after-”

His hand came up between them shushing her accusation. “Irini, he is extraordinary. Everything his father was and more. He just … needed time.”

“
Time?”

“
Time.” He sighed and then narrowed his eyes. “Of course there were others, some of the younger males who felt the need to challenge him. We felt it only right that those who challenged him were truly willing to risk everything for the mantle …”

“
A Lunarmorte?” Irini breathed.