The Fallen One (Sons of the Dark Mother, Book One) (44 page)

He shook his head. They had
somehow made it this far—against an old vamp that had lived through
almost two millennia of war. They now had the vaccine—the means
to
actually destroy him.

And they
also
had a means of actually
injecting the vaccine
into
the vamps.

But what they did not have was
important and vital—the missing information
about the vaccine itself.

Justice carefully set the blowgun
dart back into the box with the rest.

The small crew that had been left
behind to work with the vaccine had been able to give them one
piece of information that might be good news—yet it had come with a
warning.

Justice didn’t dare to hope that
the first piece might actually prove itself true

But the second part—he could only
shake his head.

They had said that there were
no
real tests
of
any long-term effects of this vaccine. The job of simply keeping it
out of the hands of their enemy—who had been actively working to
get his hands on it ever since he had been told of its
existence—had prevented them from performing such tests.

They knew nothing about how it
would affect the fledgling vamps—other than it might
possibly
kill them outright.

Yet, killing fledgling vamps was
something they had
already
been forced to do.

This alternative might actually
save them.

But at what cost?

They didn’t know what the vaccine
would actually do. Even if they had been able to do the necessary
testing, Justice couldn’t imagine who they might have tested it on
anyway.

Who was going to volunteer for a
test with those sorts of risks?

A fledgling vamp?

Ha
!
Justice thought.
Not
likely
!

And if they had been forced to
choose a test subject, how could anyone have justified the test?
Wasn’t that exactly the type of thing that the Fae found wrong
about what the humans were capable of doing?

Wasn’t that
why
the humans had not been allowed
to know that they most certainly were
not
alone on Mother Earth? Because
they would run tests on the other races—out of fear?

Fear was a dangerous thing. It
caused living beings to justify horrific acts.

The one test subject that had shown
just exactly how dangerous the vaccine might be for the vamps, had
also proven that it might be a Godsend for the humans.

And that most certainly had
not
been done on
purpose.

They had administered the vaccine
to a volunteer—a human—a vampire hunter who knew about the
different races—thinking that it would protect the
human.

And it had.

It was only when the human was bit
by a vamp that they had learned the vaccine had… other
ramifications: the ones that Lucius had told them about when they
had used it with Mia—to try to bring down Constantine.

When they had discovered this, well
… no vamp they knew had been a willing test subject. Instead, they
had actively worked to make an antidote. It was when they had made
the antidote that they had discovered a vaccine that could increase
the powers that the vampires already had so significantly that it
would give the vamp god-like powers—at least, he would appear like
a god to the humans.

They wouldn’t have any more
choice.

Powerful vamps, who sought the
power only to control—beings like Constantine—would make their
choices for them.

Still, Justice knew that
Constantine was not in this only for power—but primarily for the
challenge of it.

He was bored.

He did this because he sought an
enemy that was so powerful—they might actually make
Constantine
work
to win a battle. He did this only for the thrill of a perhaps
gaining a worthy enemy, who might actually prove to challenge
him.

And that was what made him
a
very
dangerous
vamp.

Yet, if this vaccine were to get
into the wrong hands… There would be others who would seek to gain
this power. History had always proven that true. And whoever these
others were, they might not stop with simply starting wars—or
winning battles.

No. Other beings would likely seek
out the vaccine for the same reason the vamp sought it out now—to
rule mankind like a god—become a modern-day Zeus.

As Justice was thinking about these
things, he found himself walking toward the Sisters of Three’s
ritual room and was soon standing in front of their door. The
guard—who sat in his chair against the wall at the end of the hall,
about ten or twelve feet away—watched him, probably wondering why
Justice was just standing there staring at the door.

Justice gave him a hard stare until
the guard looked away, and then he knocked lightly on the
door.

He knew they were as prepared as
they could possibly be, but after the way that Constantine had
swatted them aside during last battle, he wasn’t going to take a
sure victory for granted. It was five in the morning. The sun was
about to come up. And he was standing in front the Sisters of
Three’s ritual room door waiting to see Jes.

The sisters had finished their
ritual, and they opened the door for him. Micah was just coming
down the hallway, and he and Mira quickly left, hand-in-hand. Dara
took one look at Justice and headed down the hall to find
Dracon.

Justice moved inside the ritual
room doorway and closed the door upon the guard sitting out in the
hall. He had no sooner closed the door then he picked Jes up,
kissing her with such intensity that she moaned out
loud.

She ran her hands up his back. He
had never kissed her like this before, always careful not to invoke
this type of power into their time together. She had almost been
afraid of what would happen when he came to her with the intensity
of the Jaguar.

Almost.

This was her mate. This was what
bound them like nothing else could. This was the call of the
Jaguar.

He picked her up, tossing her onto
the bed, and she came up on all fours, tearing the sheets with her
claws, fighting to stay human, while half of her embraced the
animal energy he was arousing in her.

All of her welcomed him when he
entered her, screaming her desire. And it was getting dark before
her sisters were able to reenter the ritual room.

Chapter Fifty

Jes

Jes closed her eyes.
Ever since Justice had connected with Mia—she
could also feel her. Jes turned and faced the window. She couldn’t
put her finger on it, but something had changed. She had tried,
several times, to talk to Mia about it, but it hadn’t done any
good. She couldn’t get Mia to talk about what was bothering
her.

Jes didn’t know what had happened.
But something was different about her best friend.

She turned toward the opposite
wall. She should be sleeping. Instead, all she could do was toss
and turn. Yet, who could blame her?

She wondered if Justice had felt it
too.

She didn’t have the heart to bring
it up to him. She was sad. She didn’t want to worry him about his
sister, not after Constantine had kicked all of their butts all
over the hillside that day so that now Justice had to worry about
what would happen when they met up with him next.

Whenever she closed her eyes, she
could sense Mia, and it was like a shadow had fallen over her
friend. Frankly it scared her a bit. It wasn’t natural, as humans
would consider natural; but then humans felt that anything they
couldn’t see—or more specifically anything they couldn’t
understand—was in some way unnatural.

However, this felt more as though
something were trying to warn her, not threaten her.

But warn her about what?

What was it that she was missing?
Or should she ask, what was it that she
didn’t understand
?

The harder she tried to concentrate
on it, the farther away it seemed to slip, until she started to
believe she had imagined it all.

She wanted to ask her sisters
about it. But how was she supposed to ask her sisters to help, when
she didn’t know
what it was
she needed help with?

Jes hadn’t managed to pull herself
out of the slump she had sunk into, even though the sun was shining
high in the sky when she had decided to take a walk. She enjoyed
watching the sun dapple the grass through the leaves as the wind
twisted them, the sun peaking through—and the wind chasing light
and shadow across the meadow.

She liked the peaceful feel of the
warm sun, and watching the people move around the city as they
carried on with their day: the bikers pedaling along, young couples
out shopping, old couples holding hands, and always someone out
taking a dog for a walk.

The city was bustling, oblivious to
anything—or to anyone, as it was in this case—that might be lurking
to take them with that violence that could only be born from the
need to harm.

Someone—like
Constantine.

And whatever it was
he had done to Mia.

Jes scowled. She was more
convinced than ever that he
had
done something to Mia. She didn’t know what that
something was; she only knew that he
had
done something.

She could feel it.

It was like an elusive
thread—tugging at her mind—leaving her with the feeling that if she
could just grab hold of that loose thread, she could unravel the
whole sordid puzzle.

And she was certain it
was
sordid.

She had the feeling that
Constantine was a lot more evil than any of them had believed. So
far everyone had given him the respect he had earned; everyone
thought of him as a great conqueror. They respected for his
prowess, someone who wielded a lot of power, who could be
victorious in any fight.

But Jes had a feeling he had lulled
them all. Perhaps this is what had really earned him his
reputation. Perhaps, he played an open battle, an open war, the
kind of war that humans were used to—while he had a much more
sinister plan going on than the simple takeover of the humans for
his own personal blood bank.

Perhaps the battle he really
fought—was one that wasn’t so easily
seen.

As
if
turning humans into his own
private cattle herd, and turning the rest of the world into his
slaves, wasn’t an evil-enough plan.

And yet, she just couldn’t shake
the feeling that he had been leading them on, letting each battle
play out like chess pieces on a chessboard, while he played out a
much deeper, and darker, plan behind the scenes.

And if she was right, then this was
so much worse than any of them could have imagined.

But then, how did those who didn’t
possess an evil mind ever
imagine
what went on inside of that mind? It was almost
impossible for someone normal to imagine the workings of a mind
that only developed the most sinister of plans.

The average, living being never
truly thought that way—couldn’t imagine how anyone could. It
usually took a great, rude awakening—and living through a
nightmarish situation—to teach someone of what atrocities
evil
was truly
capable.

No one wanted to think about those
things. It felt too horrible. Yet, how else could you fight
something that was capable of such horror, other than by taking
yourself to a deep, dark place: a place where you could imagine the
horror that the average mind couldn’t conjure.

Things of which Constantine was
easily capable—of that Jes had no doubt.

What had they let Mia get herself
into?

Jes found herself in front of the
lake before she even realized the direction in which she had
traveled. She stood there now, staring out across the lake,
wondering—not for the first time—how it was that a fresh lake this
size could smell so much like the ocean, let alone how it looked so
much like one, since you couldn’t see across it and the waves
rolled in like any ocean beach she had ever seen.

The sheer size of it made her feel
as though she was standing on the beach staring at the ocean, and
it was one of the finest attractions that Chicago
offered.

Jes wasn’t crazy about cities
generally.

But she
was
crazy about
this one.

The Windy City just had this
wonderful feel to it, and she had fallen in love with it over time,
until one day she realized that if she were to never see it again,
she might never again feel so complete.