Dragon Heat (6 page)

up at him. Terrified, she started shaking uncontrollably. He bent over

slightly, took a deep breath, and smiled. Yes, one more for his collection.

The faint smell of urine invaded his nostrils.

‚Fuck! You made her piss herself!‛ his associate said with a

snorting laugh.

Shutting the trunk, he turned around and grabbed his soon-to-be

former associate by the throat and squeezed. He saw his eyes bulging with

surprise and then terror. The brainless moron hopelessly tried to punch

and kick him, and that tickled a little bit, so he lifted the human off the

ground and put more pressure on his grip. He didn’t want him to die too

soon, though. He enjoyed seeing his victims’ eyes just before he squeezed

all existence out of them. They held a remarkable glow that slowly, oh so

slowly, dimmed until there was nothing. Curiously, it was always

inversely proportional to their desperation level. The more the glow

dwindled, the more desperate their feeble attempts to escape became.

After all these years, it still fascinated him.

He dumped his associate’s lifeless corpse farther down the alley,

got in the driver’s seat, and left the area, the smell of urine still lingering in

his nostrils.

By the time Dyam and Joel arrived at the headquarters, Hikuro was

coming around. They had to dematerialize to a secure location about

thirty minutes out of town, then took the Porsche Cayenne, which was one

of the several all-wheel drives that were always ready and blasted up the

hill. Twenty minutes later, they reached the main entrance.

At first glance, one would think it was the beginning of just another

wild forest with its high balsam firs, red spruces, and thick oaks. Only a

trained eye would notice the small boxes imperceptibly attached against

each trunk.

Hikuro saw Dyam stop the Porsche Cayenne and swipe his digital

key against the camouflaged brown box clipped to a large oak tree. A

second later, a bright red light flickered between the two trunks in front of

the car. The flickering intensified and expanded to encompass every single

tree in the vicinity. In a few moments, a vast laser fence was displayed

before their eyes. Red beams crisscrossed between tree trunks forming a

crimson security net. With a second swipe of the digital key, the laser

beams directly in front of the car disappeared, shaping a narrow pathway.

Dyam put the car in first gear and started forward. As soon as the car

passed the first row of trees, the laser beams automatically turned on

again, reforming the security net mile by mile. After a few minutes on the

dirt road, they reached the main gate and parked the Porsche along the

outside walls, side by side with a black Jaguar, a dark blue Ferrari, and a

charcoal BMW X6.

Hikuro was still a bit shaken, his legs were not yet fully responding

to his neural commands, but he did not accept Joel’s offer to help him out

of the car. A retinal scan and voice recognition later, the gates were open,

and the three friends walked to the mansion.

Hidden from preying eyes by the woodlands and the tall fence, the

mansion looked like a great medieval fortress. Completely built of stone, it

stood at the top of a hill that overlooked New York City.

Before they had reached the entrance, the door opened, and an

elderly man appeared in front of them. ‚His majesty is expecting you in

the library.‛

‚Thanks, Arthur,‛ Hikuro managed to say it with a nod. His head

was still thumping from whatever happened to him. What the fuck had

happened anyway? He remembered kissing the girl, Sam, in his private

quarters at the Cascade; then she said something and bam! His muscles

started spasming, his heart stopped beating for a second and the feeling of

being fried from the inside out overtook him. He had not seen any

weapons, any devices on her that may have caused such a massive

electrical shock. And there was no doubt it had been massive because just

a handful of things in this world had the power to knock out a

three-hundred-year-old vampire like him.

He crossed the ample foyer and turned left toward an open door.

Even though it was ajar, he knocked before entering. Joel and Dyam were

right on his heels. The room was large with a tall ceiling. Bookshelves

covered two walls from top to bottom; the third wall housed a fireplace

made of light brown sandstone. Two sets of black sofas were placed in

front of it. The beautiful view could be seen through the fourth wall, made

of thick bulletproof glass.

The king was sitting behind the large mahogany desk located

between the fireplace and the glass wall. He was staring at the view of the

New York City night below.

The three friends bowed deeply. Hikuro rose and met his king’s

eyes. ‚Good evening, King Tardieh.‛

Tardieh was apprehensive. From what his most trusted friends

were telling him, someone had just gone through a lot of trouble to make

that attempt on Hikuro’s life. But why? He looked at Hikuro while Dyam

was describing the female with olive skin he believed was behind the

attack. ‚So there were two women, then.‛

‚Yes, my lord. The blonde one who introduced herself as Sam and

the olive skinned one. We do not know who she is.‛ Hikuro's voice

contained an edge. His jaw was so tight that Tardieh was amazed his teeth

hadn’t splintered already.

‚But from what you are telling me,
you
approached the blonde

woman. Are you sure she was human?‛

‚I am not certain because I did not taste her blood, but she smelled

like a human. However<‛ Hikuro hesitated for a second. Tardieh nodded

to his friend, encouraging him to carry on. After taking a deep breath, he

continued, ‚She glowed.‛

Silence descended upon the room. Tardieh raised an eyebrow and

looked at Joel and Dyam, who had the same confusion mixed with

incredibility stamped on their faces.

Joel was the first one to recover. ‚Okay, I think the fall hit you

harder than we thought, buddy.‛

Tardieh could not stop his lips from curling up. Joel could be the

most serious and focused fighter he’d ever known, but he had the worst

timing.

As expected, Hikuro did not like the comment and said between

clenched teeth, ‚This is not a joke, Joel. I’m not kidding. She had this glow,

like a blue light dancing around her.‛

‚What of the other female? Are you sure they weren’t working

together?‛ This story had so many loose ends, it was giving Tardieh a

headache. How had the blonde female managed to strike when it was

Hikuro who had approached her in the first place? And why? She’d had

enough time and opportunity to kill him by decapitation, but she had

chosen not to. Her intent had clearly been to just stun him. For what

purpose? What about the olive-skinned female who Dyam is so sure was a

jungle animal? Tardieh had never heard of shifters in this part of the

world, let alone someone who would shift into a jungle animal. There

were some occasional werewolves here and there, but contrary to the

human folklore, werewolves and vampires had no quarrel—as long as the

fucking dogs stayed on their side of the country.

‚I am not positive, my lord. But I traced her scent to the third floor.

It was very distinct. And there’s one other thing.‛ Dyam took a small

envelope out of his back pocket and handed it to Tardieh. ‚This was on

top of Hikuro when I found him.‛

Ignoring Hikuro’s low growl, Tardieh opened the envelope to find

a yellow piece of paper with just a few words inside. His blood ran cold.

He read the message again, then took a deep breath.

‚Do you understand the meaning of this message, my lord?‛ Dyam

asked, narrowing his eyes.

Tardieh could not respond. He read the message for the third time.

‚‘From this night onward, you will always have an ally in my kingdom.

400404251N74023W.’‛ He raised his glare to meet three pairs of eyes very

intent on him. ‚I believe I know who is behind this attack.‛

After summarizing his ordeal back in the war and how he had been

saved by the draconian demigoddess Zoricah, Tardieh set upon them the

task of deciphering the message.

‚What about a Morse code?‛ Hikuro asked, his face hopeful.

Tardieh started decoding but soon realized it did not make any more

sense than that whole attack. Half an hour for human standards is not

much, but the same time span on a fast-paced high-wired vampire brain

was a lifetime. They were all getting fidgety and annoyed. Hikuro sat on

the black leather armchair by the fireplace, Joel was sprawled on the floor

in front him after having tried every other piece of furniture in the room,

and Tardieh was sitting next to Dyam on the leather couch.

Dyam stood up and started pacing. ‚What if they are geographical

coordinates?‛

‚We’ve already covered that one, man,‛ Joel said impatiently,

staring at the ceiling. ‚The four hundred number does not fit in.‛

‚Yes, but what if the last combination of numbers are separate from

the 400 one?‛ Everyone stopped and looked at Dyam. It could actually

make sense. ‚If the 404251N74023W are coordinates, they could mean

forty degrees, forty-two minutes and fifty-one seconds north<‛

‚And seventy-four degrees, zero minutes, and twenty-three

seconds west,‛ Tardieh finished.

‚Oh, fuck me sideways!‛ Joel said throwing his hands up in the air.

‚Now we have to find out where these coordinates lead us to.

Hikuro—‛ Tardieh didn’t have to finish his request, his tech-genius friend

was already typing on his smartphone.

A few seconds later, Hikuro announced, ‚They correspond to a

spot in the middle of Prospect Park in Brooklyn.‛

Joel sat up straight saying. ‚Brooklyn? As in Brooklyn, New York?‛

‚Yep,‛ Hikuro confirmed.

‚And maybe the four hundred is not a lock combination as we

thought before. What if it is a specific time?‛ Everyone stared at Tardieh,

considering his last remark.

‚Do you think the message is a meeting arrangement, my lord?‛

Dyam asked.

‚It’s got to be,‛ Tardieh replied, checking the time on his

smartphone. It was three a.m. If he was right, they had exactly one hour to

go to the spot and find out what the hell was going on.

It was Hikuro’s time to get restless. ‚I don’t like this. It has ambush

written all over it.‛

‚Zoricah’s message was intended to reignite the tie between us. I

don’t think this is a trap.‛ Or at least Tardieh hoped it wasn’t because he

would have liked to have a few words with the demigoddess.

‚And why would this Zoricah go through all of this engineered

trouble to get the message to the King to then set up an ambush?‛ Joel was

already holstering his guns. Tardieh knew he was dying for some action.

‚Hikuro may be right. It is best to take precautions, my lord, just in

case.‛ Dyam stood by the desk with his arms crossed over his chest.

Standing like that, he reminded Tardieh of Dyam’s father, a Native

American shaman from one of the most powerful Cherokee tribes of the

nineteenth century.

Tardieh considered the possibilities. Yes, it could well be a trap.

Zoricah could have told someone about their encounter over two hundred

years ago and that person could be using it now to allure him to his death.

The Soartas only knew how often he'd had attempts on his life since being

crowned. But then, it could be her. It could very well be Zoricah herself

trying to get in touch with him.

His blood boiled in his veins, a deep hatred overtook his usually

serene countenance. Images of that dreadful night when Zoricah had

supposedly saved him from his fate, came flooding in his mind. He

remembered arriving at his father’s castle to give him the news that he

had been freed.

The castle was quiet, too quiet. There was no one on the main

entrance to meet him as was customary. A gush of wind blew with the

opening of the front door, and the strong smell of blood invaded his

nostrils. Vampire blood. Lots of it.

Without wasting any time, Tardieh ran up the main stairway in a

desperate search for his father. Several decapitated bodies were sprawled

throughout the entire mansion. Tardieh recognized a few servants, royal

guards, and dracos among them. Crimson pools marked the way to his

father’s chambers as if in a macabre version of ‚Hansel and Gretel.‛