Moonlight Calls (Demon's Call Series Book 1) (34 page)

“As for that
other matter,”  Alexander said carefully.  “We’ve attempted to track our prey,
but no luck just yet.  It seems magic is involved.”

Christian nodded
thoughtfully.  “The vampires are also hunting.  They are taking the matter
seriously.”

“Yes,” Ivan said
softly.  “We ran into their hunters.”

Christian
glanced at me, and away.  “I will handle this from here.  You may stop hunting,
for the time being.”

After the
meeting, we headed back to our log and got dressed.  I sat on the tree watching
Christian tie his shoes as I mulled over the night’s events.  “Just now, you
were talking about vampires.  What is it that you are both hunting?”

He sighed.  “A
vampire.  A rogue that has killed humans.  The vampires are hunting him too. 
It is only a matter of time before he’s caught.”

I was silent. 
If he had told me this yesterday, I would have been up in arms.  But now I
could see why it was important that the wolves stay out of the human radar.
Their world was beautiful and natural.  Humans would destroy that.  Better that
they police themselves, if need be.  We stood and headed into the woods. 

“Christian,” I
finally asked, not knowing how to phrase the question, but knowing I had to
ask, “there is something about last night that I don’t understand.”

He glanced at me
and nodded.  “Ask away little wolf,” he teased.

I looked down at
the ground and gathered my courage before rushing on.  “Why did you bite me?” 
His startled green eyes looked into mine for a moment in surprise.  He hadn’t
been expecting that.

“I don’t know,”
he said softly, brushing aside my worry.  “Wolves take blood from time-to-time,
just like vampires.  We just don’t need it to live.  And also… the others will
know my mark and know you are mine.”

I let out a
breath.  “So, I’m not…I won’t…”

“Turn into a
wolf?”  He laughed.  “No.  There is no chance of that.”  He squinted at my face. 
“Although now that you mention it, you do look a little bit…fuzzy.”  I slapped
him on the arm and shifted my backpack to sit more comfortably. 
Ass
.

I took his
explanation at face value for now, but I hadn’t missed the way he had looked
away when he was speaking.  I had the feeling there was something he wasn’t
telling me, but I let it go for now.  I rubbed a hand softly over the rapidly
healing crescent shaped bite on my neck.  I was going to have an obvious scar. 
Just the memory of his teeth sinking into me in the moonlight was giving me
goose bumps.  He probably had a good reason for not telling me.  

We arrived at my
house to find Ailis waiting like an anxious mother hen.  She immediately
noticed my new bite mark and shot a shocked glance at Christian before turning
to head inside, reassured that I was at least in one piece, if missing a little
bodily fluid.

Now that I was
back in my natural environment, all of my worries returned.  I had so many
questions about what was going on in my life, and absolutely no answers.  Where
did my powers come from?  It would be nice if I could talk to my parents. 
Maybe they would know.  I didn’t like the way I had responded to the cult’s
“blessed” handcuffs.  I had asked Ailis if it was possible to be part human and
part supernatural.  She said that it was impossible, as vampires and humans
couldn’t produce mixed offspring.  Even the rare wolf and human offspring would
be either one or the other, wholly were or wholly human. 

I wanted
fiercely to believe her, but Dominic had been there at the time and I had seen
his eyes go distant in memory, as if there was an answer dancing just out of
his reach.  I had seen that look one other time, when he was speaking of the
way my blood smelled.  Was I really half vampire?  I had to admit to myself
that I really knew nothing about my parents.  Was there anything strange about
them?  I had been too young to pick up on anything like that.

After my little
outing in the woods, I felt better able to deal with it, somehow.  Sure, my
life was just getting weirder by the minute, but for a moment I felt alive, and
powerful, and able to deal with just about anything.  I hadn’t realized until
then just how chaotic my life felt right now.  I felt like I was being rushed along. 
It was like starting down a steep hill at a walk, only to realize that the only
way to keep your feet on the way down was to descend in a mad run, grasping at
anything you could reach to help slow you down.  I only hoped I would reach the
bottom of the slope intact.

To make matters
worse, Dominic and Ailis decided to throw a wrench into the works a couple of
days after my return from the hippie forest frolic.  I had thought that I was
about to undergo a normal tutoring session with Dominic that night, but
apparently they had something else in mind.

Christian was
allowed to stay.  The vampire/werewolf hostility was well known to me by now,
but I had gotten used to the friendship between Christian and Ailis.  Dominic
was another story.  If I had any doubt in my mind that tonight was serious
business, seeing the two men in a room together cleared that right up.  The
strained civility between Dominic and Christian had me on edge.  I really hoped
no one ended up bleeding all over my floor tonight.

We all gathered
around the dining room table, where Dominic had once again spread out a giant
map.  This time, though, it was a blown up view of the city and its outskirts
with quite a lot of detail.  He took my hand in his as we sat and I cast a
nervous glance toward Christian.  He seemed to be willing to tolerate Dominic’s
familiarity- for now.

“We have a job
for you Mya,” Dominic said softly, his silky voice almost hesitant.  “It’s time
you put that power of yours to work.”  His blue eyes were serious.  This was
not going to be pleasant.

Ailis sat down
across from me, her gaze intent.  “We need to find a vampire,” she said
slowly.  “Dominic and I have been assigned to dispatch him, but we can’t
find
him.”  The frustration was evident in her voice- that she hadn’t been able to
complete her job was really gnawing at her.  I wondered exactly what kind of
vampire could give two powerful people like Ailis and Dominic the slip.

“This is the one
the wolves were looking for?”  I glanced at Christian and he nodded.

I shrugged.  So
they wanted me to find a vampire outlaw-big deal.  Sure I would be working for
Argenou, but if it meant one less vampire in the world that was a good thing,
right?  Dominic squeezed my hand.

 “This isn’t
going to be easy.  We think he’s shielded somehow.  Some powerful magic is
keeping us from sensing him in the usual way.”

I looked at the
map and then to Christian for support.  “But I can’t find someone I don’t even
know.  I only located Christian because I had an emotional link to him.  I don’t
even know this guy.”

Dominic nodded. 
“You are exactly right, Mya.  We think you need that emotional link in order to
be successful.  Unfortunately, the emotion involved this time is not going to
be nearly as pleasant.”  His rich voice was grim.

I remembered
exactly what had happened last time and looked away, my face growing hot.  That
was supposed to have been pleasant?  I had almost ended up as a snack.  This
was going to be terrible.  I glanced at Christian again and he arched an
eyebrow at me, clearly wondering what I was blushing about. 
Oh great.

Once I consented
to this farce, Dominic began to prepare me for the task, never letting go of my
hand as his soft, steady voice jerked my emotions into play.  It turns out the
little boy I had seen on the news a while back hadn’t been kidnapped by a
random human psycho.  There had been a recent rash of disappearances and tiny
little bodies were beginning to show up where they would be easily found-
drained of all their blood.  I shook my head, horrified.

“Why?”  I asked
shakily.  “Why would a vampire do this?  I thought your kind preferred to stay
hidden from humans.”  I shook my head again, unable to fathom the cruelty. 
“And why children?”  I whispered.

“He wants to
die,” Ailis said softly, her eyes distant.

“He was turned
against his will,” Dominic explained.  “That is never a good idea.  The new
vampire is bound to be unstable.  He abhors what he has become.  Argenou
refused his request for elimination, but he knows we’ll have to destroy him if
he is a threat to our race- that’s what he wants.”

He paused for a
moment, shaking his head in regret.  “He wants to expose us all before we take
him out.  So he’s doing something that he knows will shock and alarm the human
community and lead them to believe that we are all evil.”

Tears stung my
eyes.  I couldn’t imagine being brought into that world against your will,
waking to find yourself a monster.  That didn’t make what he was doing right. 
I remembered the little boy I had seen on the news and tried not to imagine how
he had died.  Christian drew a small newspaper clipping from his pocket and
handed it to me, reluctantly.

“We think he has
her now,” he said, his voice flat.  I knew Christian loved children and though
I had never asked, I realized he may have fathered a quite a few in his time. 
This was killing him.  I could see him vibrating with the need to do something.

I took the small
scrap of paper and found myself staring into the most precious face I had ever
seen.  It was black and white, so I couldn’t tell the color of her hair and
eyes, though they were dark.  Her face was alive with happiness as she smiled
into the camera.  She couldn’t be more than five or six years old.

I crumpled the
paper and threw it away from me.  I bent my head to hide the tears that I shed
for a child I had never known.  “How many?”  My voice shook with restrained
emotion.  “How many of them has he killed?”

Dominic shook
his head again.  He still held my hand and his thumb lightly stroked my
knuckles as he spoke.  “We think he has taken somewhere between six and ten. 
It’s hard to tell, because children go missing so often.”  He paused for a
moment.  “We have only found five bodies.  He may be saving the others,
stringing it along to give the human police time to figure it out.”

“He can’t
possibly think this will work,” I said in disbelief.  “The humans are just
going to assume it’s some sick schitzo who’s seen one too many horror movies.”

Ailis shook her
head.  “The humans may be slow at times,” she said with a wry half smile, “but
they get very close every once in a while.”

Dominic leaned
forward intently.  “Mya, we cannot let this get out.  It would be a disaster.”
 I looked away, thinking furiously.  Should I be helping them?  I felt like I
was betraying my own kind by helping to cover this up.  Humans had no idea that
they were constantly in danger, stalked and used as food, and disregarded in
the casualty counts of the supernatural creatures around them.  Most vampires
and weres thought of humans as livestock, if they thought of them at all.

On the other
hand, I could see Dominic’s point.  Even if my fellow humans were able to
believe in what they were seeing, it would be horrible.  I could see the
headlines now.  The mass hysteria would sweep every corner of the globe.  A lot
of people would die.  And we would probably still lose.  What were a hundred
humans against someone like Christian, or Dominic?

That just
brought me to an even more difficult realization.  Humanity would think in
black and white and, that was a very dangerous road.  How many decent creatures
like the ones at my side would be murdered just because they were different.

I took a deep
breath and let go of Dominic’s hand.  Turning to face the map, I braced my
hands on the table.  I cleared my mind and focused on my feelings.  I felt
anger.  I felt sadness.  I felt despair for the children I couldn’t save.  I
forced myself to feel hope for the ones that might still be alive.  My unstable
power swirled in my stomach.  Tears coursed down my cheeks as my emotions tore
me apart.  Finally, I lifted a shaking hand and touched the map.  I traced my
fingers along the paper with my eyes still closed.  I found that the feelings
of despair and sadness intensified when I moved in certain directions and
lessened in others.  Using this sort of hot/cold method, I found him.

My roving finger
touched a spot on the map that made me sob in pain.  I knew it was his pain. 
Pain for what he was, pain for what he was doing in his quest for justice.  He
was there.  And so was she, a soft wavering light amid all the suffocating
despair.

Dominic took my
hand in his again as he gazed at the spot I had touched.  The overwhelming
emotions slowly drained away, leaving me with a slight headache.

“We’ve been near
that warehouse a million times, but we’ve never been inside,” Ailis said in
wonder.  “For some reason, we have skipped over it every time.  Whatever is
shielding him must be powerful.”

I tried not to
think about what could be more powerful than Ailis and Dominic.

“Well what do we
do now?”  My voice was shaky and I took a breath to steady myself.  “When do we
leave?”

Dominic looked
at Ailis meaningfully.  “Argenou will want to speak with her first.”