Chapter Twenty-Three

EOGHAN

Eoghan and Ari crouched just outside the large hole they’d cut in the barbed wire fence that separated the Navajo reservation from King John’s fenced complex. When they’d arrived at ten o’clock that evening to get into place, they’d only known what they were about to find and how to approach because of Joe and Alo’s tremendous groundwork over the last twenty-four hours.

The barbed wire was new and shiny —it hadn’t been necessary previously. Before his overthrow and the bloodbath that killed his family and the loss of his throne, the only boundary between the two reservations had been the desert itself… That and a hundred yards of unguarded space separating the two neighbors. The king had gasped in dismay the first time he’d caught sight of the fence.

Everyone had vampires in their group. Five of Elora’s vampires had accompanied the king, Eoghan, Ari, and the chief to the eastern boundary of the reservation on foot along with five members of the Tahoe shifter clan. Elora, her vamps, and Joe Two Trees’ shifters took the western boundary. Joe and Alo, the south. Finally, Severin and Invictus were watching from their vantage point up above to make sure no one escaped by way of the blood plant, immediately south of King John’s reservation.

They lay in wait, watching the vampire guards driving the one-mile fence line on a newly-built road just inside the barbed wire. They behaved just like soldiers on patrol, driving from one end to the next, turning, and then going back again. It took them no more than a minute or two to travel the mile from one corner to the other. Using the night vision goggles Joe and Alo had provided, Eoghan could see that the Jeep they drove carried two vampires but was also probably packed with automatic weapons, just in case the fangs they all had, failed to do the trick on any and all intruders.

“Why aren’t they just running the patrol?” Ari asked.

“They’re most likely stocked with weapons,” the chief pointed out just as Eoghan had speculated. She turned toward the others. “Are you ready?” Eoghan heard it in his earbud as well as the sound of affirmatives from the teams at the other access points, even as he turned to see the serious expression on the chief’s face along with that of the man he loved speaking his own soft yes.

“Yes, Chief,” Eoghan reiterated along with all the others.

“We’ll go on my mark,” she said, looking at her watch as Eoghan checked his own. Elora had actually been the one who’d thought of passing out synchronized watches to all the team leaders and the chief had been very grateful. It read exactly midnight, and in other cities in neighboring states, operations just like this were happening at exactly this moment. He said a silent prayer for all the friends they’d made, brave men and women putting their lives on the line for King John and his clan. He watched Priest look up, watching the vehicle returning to the corner nearest them, waiting until they’d turned and were driving back down the two-mile boundary before she gave them the go order.

“NOW! Go…go…go…”

Everyone was on their feet and running at once. Elora’s vampires sped ahead, as did King John, disappearing in the blink of an eye. The rest of them ran. In the distance, Eoghan watched the Jeep with Bradshaw’s vamp be overtaken by vampires. Snarling, growling, and then wet sounds happened as the king had his revenge on the guards who’d either willingly or unwillingly had become a part of Tillis Bradshaw’s evil machine. Watching the king and the other vampires work, made him realize that Ari had been right when they’d talked about why they were doing this at night. It would have been easier to invade a vampire space during daylight hours and catch them off guard while they slept. But Ari said as an Army Ranger, one of the hardest things he’d had to learn was to let the native Afghans who were with them on missions take their revenge on the enemy when they rooted one out. It didn’t happen every time but it did, quite often. The Afghans had watched the Taliban destroy their country, subjugate their women, and roll their lives back to the Stone Age.

They deserved to execute retribution on their subjugators when the Americans were in agreement. In these cases, the Americans were there only as backup. It was hard but it was a lesson well learned and after he’d explained it, Eoghan realized Ari was right. King John had earned the right to take out Tillis Bradshaw with his own two hands and fangs. They’d destroyed his life, not only taking his throne, but his beloved Rudy and their progeny. And he’d waited a long time to avenge their murder.

Eoghan and Ari kept going, running past the carnage taking place at full speed with the shifters by their side. As far as the shifters were concerned, Eoghan had been surprised and relieved to find a large, black wolf, three huge grizzly bears, and a sleek cat he assumed was a cheetah, run apace with the rest of them after they’d shed their clothing out in the desert and shifted.

Eoghan guessed that the cheetah could have left them all in the dust but chose not to show off. She’d introduced herself to him the moment they’d met at the truck stop’s staging area the night before…and he’d been utterly charmed. Her name was Clarice and like her namesake from Silence of the Lambs , she was small but determined. And Eoghan guessed…just a little bit brave, having volunteered for the cause as soon as Two Trees asked his clan.

The grizzlies were big, hulking Native American men who’d introduced themselves with one-word hellos and several grunts which were probably not meant to make him and Ari feel at ease. That was fine with Eoghan. He’d needed to be on edge with all the waiting and infinite patience that had been required in this case.

The wolf was an entirely different sort altogether. He’d walked over to them and shaken their hands, smiling shyly at Ari who stood almost a foot taller than he was. The man was a petite version of a librarian sort with thick, round glasses and a bit of a limp when he walked in human form. As a wolf, he was smaller than any wolf Eoghan had ever seen but what a magnificent creature he was, sleek and black and stunning as he ran, limp completely absent.

As the sounds of the vampire revenge faded, they made it to the wall of the first building they’d come into contact with. During their infinite preparations, King John had sketched a crude floorplan of his reservation and the buildings on it. There weren’t a lot. Other than two residential streets with homes and one large apartment building, the palace itself took up most of the real estate in the town.

There was a post office, movie theater, and a bowling alley. The single store in town that sold food, had been filled with refrigerators stocked with synthetic blood. Their small health center served as a place where live donors filled the eight beds when it was fully operational and underway. There were two bars, one was nicely appointed with a large dance floor apparently and the other one catered to vampires who wanted to get their drink on and pick up a partner for the evening. It was aptly named Quick and Dirty. Eoghan remembered thinking how weird it was to see the map of an entire town without one single restaurant…not one.

It had already been decided that King John, Eoghan, Ari, Deputy Chief Priest, Elora’s five vampires, and the shifters running alongside them, would head directly for the palace. The king knew a secret tunnel which would take them directly into the throne room where they all agreed Bradshaw would probably head once he realized what was going on, if he wasn’t in one of the other buildings. The rest of Elora’s shifters along with the balance of Two Trees’ shifters would clear all the other buildings along with Joe and Alo and the vampire leader herself. Eoghan really hoped they’d have enough manpower to stop Tillis Bradshaw and put an end to everything.

The wall they ran up against was the movie theater, silent and empty at this time of night. They crept along toward Main Street and waited until Priest motioned for them to go. She ducked around the corner and they all followed.

Almost instantly the vampires and shifters in their party were fighting, snarling and growling as they were set upon by vampires who either happened to be in their path or were lying in wait.

At this moment, holding his gun and firing lethal vampire rounds at targets who moved faster than he could track with his naked eye, Eoghan could think of only one thing.

They’d been betrayed.

ARI

He couldn’t believe his eyes. One moment everything had been quiet and the next, the screams of the fight and the dying were all around him. They’d stocked up on lethal vampire rounds, filling their tac pants with as many clips as they could hold but it felt like the vamps were coming out of every building all along the street, heading right for them. Memories of being back in Afghanistan were forefront in his mind as the attack went on. He kept Eoghan in his peripheral vision for the first few seconds of the ambush and then grabbed him, pulling him behind an open door.

“You wanna fight?”

“What? Of course I want to fight,” Eoghan shouted over the sound of gunfire.

“Then you stay by my side. Hear me?”

“Yes, but—” Whatever Eoghan was going to say was cut off when a vampire rushed into the room and grabbed him, aiming a mouthful of fangs for his throat.

The vampire round Ari emptied into his skull, dropped the vamp to the ground in a gory display and then they were both out of the doorway and in the street, back into the mix of it all. Several shifters had joined in the melee, not the ones they’d brought with them, meaning the ones fighting vampires out in the street were from Two Trees’ pack. He’d never seen so many predatory beasts fighting vampires in his life, then again, he hadn’t known about paranormals before taking this crazy job at the I.S.R.

He turned and shot a vampire as he rushed him. The vamp instantly hit the ground and Ari barely had time to leap over him to shoot another one sneaking up on Eoghan’s back, before another came at him. There were so many. He hadn’t expected this, not at all. Whatever had happened here, whoever had shared their plans to attack the seat of Bradshaw’s power, with the false king himself, was a mystery to Ari.

He couldn’t stop and think about it too long. Right now, they were in a fight for their lives. When a sudden high-pitched yelp of pain drew his attention, he turned just in time to see the small, black wolf fly into the air and hit a brick wall. Ari’s first instinct was to run to the beautiful wolf’s aid, but the animal got to all fours almost immediately, shook himself, and then leapt back into the fray.

Eoghan was magnificent, shooting vamps faster and hitting them as accurately as Ari could. His man had always been a good shot but seeing him take out one vampire after another as they came at him was a sight to see. The fighting wore on for what seemed like hours when Ari knew it had only been minutes. When he finally came up for breath, and the vampires coming at them slowed to a trickle with a single gunshot here or there to take one out, he glanced around, taking stock of the carnage that lay all around them in the street.

Eoghan and the chief were still standing, filthy and covered with blood but alive, and from what he could determine, most, if not all the shifters they’d brought with them, were also alive. Joe Two Trees, Alo Uwaite, King John, and several others were standing around the town square where the majority of the fighting had taken place about a block away. Ari walked over to Eoghan and slung an arm around him.

“You okay, baby?” Eoghan asked, offering up a smile. It looked stark white through the grime and blood that caked it.

“I’m okay,” Ari said. “I’m good, love.”

The chief walked over, reloading her gun as she stepped over the body of a dead female vamp. “You two all right?”

“Yeah, we’re good. You?” Ari asked, still holding onto Eoghan.

She gave a clipped nod as Joe, Alo—shifted and naked—walked up. The king was with them. “You okay, Your Highness?” the chief asked.

“Yes,” he growled, hissing as he looked down at his bare forearm where a huge gash was knitting itself together right in front of their eyes. “But I’d really like to know who tipped Bradshaw off about our plans.”

“We need to find him and find him fast,” Two Trees said, glancing around.

“What is it?” Alo asked.

“Where’s Elora?”

Ari and Eoghan looked around. She was nowhere in sight, nor was she among the dead in the street. “She’s not here,” Ari said, grinding his teeth together as he realized she had to have been on Bradshaw’s side, probably the whole entire time.

“She’s our traitor, I’d swear it,” King John said. “I knew I should never have trusted her. She’s always been out for herself.”

“Well, wherever she is, I’d venture to say it’s the same place we’ll find Tillis Bradshaw,” Eoghan said.

“My palace,” the king said. “Let’s go.”

Ari looked around at Elora’s vampires who were listening to all of this intently. Their numbers were roughly half of what they had been. “Do we trust her vampires?”

“Look around at our fellows,” a tall, blond vampire said, holding out a hand to show that several vampires who Ari recognized from Elora’s group were among the fallen on the streets which ran with blood. “Kill us if you don’t believe me, but my brothers and sisters lay among the dead. If we had been on Bradshaw’s side, would they be dead and bleeding on the street?”

The wolf shifted and stood there naked, dripping in the blood of those very vampires the blond had been talking about. “If anyone wants to know my opinion, they’ve only to count Elora’s dead on the ground here. I agree with this vampire. I don’t think any of them knew she was a traitor or that she would betray us in order to save herself and join a murderer and his filthy minions.”

Ari looked at the chief. She glanced around, most likely doing the math and hoping the same way Ari hoped that they wouldn’t be outnumbered this way when their diminished numbers entered the palace for the final assault on Tillis Bradshaw. Could they trust these remaining vampires to bolster their own numbers.

“Fine. Yes. I agree. You couldn’t have known,” she said. “What’s your name?”

“Fiodor.”

“Fine then. You’re the new leader of Elora’s vampires, Fiodor,” she said. “Let’s go get this asshole so we can go home in one piece tonight. I need a bath.”

Ari chuckled but they all turned toward the palace for the final showdown.

As it turned out, getting to the king’s secret passageway wasn’t necessary now that it was well known that they were there on the reservation. They still made their way, checking doorways of what appeared to be abandoned buildings and empty stores, homes, and commercial businesses. It was so strange not to be attacked by vampires who lay in wait as they passed by. He and his Army Ranger team had cleaned out a lot of towns going house to house and clearing boobytraps as they went to accomplish a mission, so he’d expected the unexpected. But, as it turned out, when they finally made it to the palace, they’d walked the easiest gauntlet Ari had ever experienced.

“Welcome, John,” a deep, insolent voice said the moment they stepped into the palace.

Ari, Eoghan, and the chief were flanked on both sides as well as the rear by their friendly vampire contingent and the shifters they’d brought along. Joe and Alo had returned to their predator shifter forms where they were most comfortable fighting…and the deadliest.

Being one of only three humans in the room, made Ari feel quite vulnerable. He knew Eoghan was feeling it too, though, oddly enough, Priest didn’t seem the least bit bothered by it. He still kept close to Eoghan, needing to make sure that he was okay as he slowly swept his weapon back and forth. King John walked ahead of all of them, set on where he was going.

When they’d entered his formal throne room, Ari wasn’t the least bit surprised to see the large, ugly form of the biker he knew from pictures as Tillis Bradshaw. The man sat on a red throne, surrounded by enormous wealth, gilded furnishings, and red velvet draperies. The throne room could easily have come right off the set of Viking vampire Eric Northman’s club, Fangtasia, in True Blood , Ari thought. The only thing missing was the scantily clad vampires doing pole dances as music played.

He wasn’t really surprised to see Elora standing behind Bradshaw’s throne, stroking his long, silky hair. She smiled and let her eyes flare bright red as she spotted the king. At Bradshaw’s feet sat Katerina Rojas, looking just as sexy as she could possibly be. The picture of the snow leopard half-breed hadn’t done the woman justice. She was a stunning example of womanhood with her long legs stretched out before her on the steps leading up to the throne. Bradshaw stroked her hair, and she smiled sweetly at them. Ari glanced around the room, mindful that the three villains seemed to be the only ones in the room besides them.

“I see you’ve brought friends,” Bradshaw said. “I have to hand it to you, this was well played, John.”

“What was well played, scum of the earth?”

“The whole escape, hiding out in a garlic field, and somehow managing to recruit such perfectly capable warriors to your side,” he said, looking around at all the shifters. His lips curled. “I never thought you’d resort to bringing shifters into the mix. That’s something…unexpected.”

“Where are the rest of your vampires?” the chief asked.

“What?” He laughed, stood, and held out his hands. “You’re looking at them. Me, my beloved Elora, and of course Katerina.” He looked at the two women before pivoting back around. “You killed all the rest,” he let out an inhuman snarl that sent shivers down Ari’s spine. He couldn’t imagine that was true.

“Katerina is a shifter. How can she be a vampire?” the chief asked, sounding hesitant.

“I’m not a shifter anymore,” Katerina said in a heavily-accented Russian accent. When her mouth opened showing rows of fangs, Ari shivered.

“How is that possible?” Priest asked. “I didn’t think a half-breed could be turned.”

“A half-breed is still half human, silly marshal,” she said. “The human half can be turned. The shifter half simply goes along with the process. It’s really quite simple when you think about it.” She glanced over at Bradshaw. “At least that’s what my maker said.”

“Your maker?” Eoghan asked, watching the exchange between the two of them as Ari did the same.

The truth sank in. “You’re her maker?” Ari asked Bradshaw.

“Yes,” he said, setting a hand on the top of Katerina’s dark hair. “Isn’t she beautiful?’

“She’s a freak,” Ari said, pointing his gun directly at the bitch sitting on the steps. “One I’m sorely tempted to end right here and right now.”

“I wouldn’t say that about my grandchild if I were you!” Elora shouted from where she stood behind the throne.

“Grandchild?” Fiodor asked. Ari turned toward the vampire they’d met on the street. He looked furious. “You’re responsible for this creature? This Bradshaw whose upended our lives, destroyed all my brothers and sisters who lay dead out there on the street? You did this?”

“I made Tillis in my image,” she purred.

“You’re sick, lady!” Priest exclaimed.

“Maybe, but it is what it is,” Elora said, examining the back of her hand and her long nails before blowing an invisible speck of dust off them. She yawned as if bored as hell. “Now, if you’re about finished, we were about to sit down to a meal.

“A meal?” Ari asked. He looked around, spotting no one.

“Our dinner,” Elora said, smiling evilly before ducking down behind the throne and then yanking a struggling, bound, gagged, terrified man to his feet. She held a knife to his throat as Ari swallowed hard.

“Kellen!” Eoghan shouted.

“McGillis!” the chief said. “How?”

Kellen shook his head frantically, as she yanked him by the chain around his neck until they’d rounded the throne. He wore only a pair of black, silk boxer shorts and sported bite marks all over his bleeding flesh. She shoved him to his knees beside Bradshaw who grabbed him by his hair, pulled him off the floor, and drew him up until Kellen’s torso was pressed against his. Tillis reached up and pulled the gag out of his mouth with a long fingernail. Kellen instantly let out a blood curdling scream which only made Bradshaw grin. The multiple rows of razor-sharp teeth in his mouth made Kellen scream a second time, and struggle to get away.

“Kellen, I don’t understand. What happened?” Priest asked, seeming frozen in place.

Kellen turned wide eyes on her, looking wild and terrified, like a trapped animal. Bradshaw’s hand only tightened in his hair.

“They promised me immortality if I would help them,” he cried. While Ari had nothing but disgust for Kellen, watching him sound beside himself with pain and quaking with fear brought an unexpected pang of sympathy. “They promised if I spied on you and those two in the office, one of them would be my maker, Chief. All the sex and debauchery I crave was promised. Wealth, immortality. Everything I could ever want if I helped them.” He was openly sobbing, tears pouring down his face.

“But then, after everyone was gone and you disappeared, I came to them and they took me prisoner.” He hung his head. “They lied to me. When I got here, they told me they already knew everything that was about to go down…and that they were trapped here with no way out. They said they needed to feed one last time before they died the true death.” He shook his head. “That’s when you came.”

“Oh, Kellen,” Eoghan said, sighing deeply, sounding exhausted. “You should have come to me. I would have done something.”

“What, Eoghan?” Kellen asked defiantly. “What could you have ever done for me? Nothing. You didn’t want me. No one wants me,” he said bitterly.

“Enough talk. Let’s eat,” Elora said, flashing over to stand beside Bradshaw.

Ari was watching Eoghan watch Kellen. He saw the pain for the man he’d once cared deeply for, and it broke his heart. Eoghan shook his head, and Ari suddenly knew there was nothing any of them could do to save Kellen. He was a dead man. Those vampires were too close to him. As he stood there, feeling time slipping away, Ari felt the slightest change in the atmosphere. He slowly looked around and was shocked to see the barest hint of a tall shadow moving along the far wall. The figure moved in the shadows, easing his way around the wall toward the back of the throne and then ducking behind the curtain.

He heard a sharp intake of breath at the same time the three vampires on the dais seemed to feel something was awry in the room. All three suddenly went on guard, stiffening, and looking around them.

The moment they took their eyes off Kellen, and Bradshaw loosened his hair, Eoghan screamed, “Kellen! Drop!”

As if in slow motion, several things seemed to happen at once. For the first time in his fucking life, Kellen did as he was told without being a dick about it. He dropped like a sack of potatoes, rolling away from Bradshaw and scrambling off the steps toward the safety of the gathered shifters and friendly vampires. Severin and Invictus suddenly burst onto either side of the dais at the same time. The disoriented vampires failed to move an inch, standing stock still as if paralyzed as the dragons shifted, dwarfing them.

The split second it took them to realize what they were looking at was all the dragons needed to open their mouths and breathe fire at the evil trio. They were instantly turned into vampire candles, setting the stairs, throne, and velvet hangings behind them on fire. Ari’s felt his eyes widen as he stared in horror at the crispy critters as they writhed on the stairs, screaming as they burned. They finally fell into smoking, smoldering heaps of raw meat, and rolled down the stairs, landing at their feet.

Ari and Eoghan moved as one, rushing the stairs, and dragging the curtains down, stomping on them before the whole place when up.

“Jesus Christ, I’ve never seen anything like that before,” Priest said.

“Really something isn’t it?” Eoghan asked.

Ari chuckled. “It never gets old,” he said, stomping out the last of the flames.

The chief smiled and turned toward the king as the shifters began their shifts back to their human forms and the vampires left the throne room, no doubt wanting to get as far away from the possibility of more fire as they could.

“Well, King John,” the chief said, “how does it feel to have your home back?” she asked, laying a gentle hand on his arm.

The king turned to her with tears in his eyes. “I have my kingdom back, Deputy Chief, but my family is gone.” He looked around. “And my people?” He shook his head, looking bereft. “We’re too late…there’s no one left.”

The moment he said it, the doors to the throne room where thrown open, and vampires rushed in. Ari didn’t recognize any of them, but the king certainly did. He let out an inhuman hoot of joy and rushed over to them even as they converged on him, throwing themselves at his feet and prostrating themselves before them, crying and laughing all at the same time.

Ari couldn’t keep the smile off his face as he watched the king hug one of them tightly before putting her down.

“Adeline, you’re alive,” he said, tears pouring down his face.

“I’m alive. We’re all alive,” she said enthusiastically. “But there’s nothing to eat and we’ve been reduced to slaves, serving Bradshaw just to get a small ration of blood a day to keep us alive to serve him one more day.” She turned and looked at the three humans in the room. The look in her eyes was pure hunger.

“Here, Adeline,” the king said, reaching for her chin and pulling her face around to him. “The humans and shifters are not to be touched. I’ll have food brought from the blood plant right away.”

The vampire nodded. “Is it true, Highness?” she asked. “Is Bradshaw dead like those strange vampires outside said?”

“Yes, my child,” King John said, stroking her hair before pulling her to him and hugging her again. He looked over at Ari, Eoghan, and the chief. “I don’t even know what to say to thank you for everything you did.” He let go of Adeline and walked over to the chief. “And you. You believed me from the very beginning.”

“You gave me every reason to believe you, Highness, and we only did the right thing. I just wish we could have done more.”

He nodded then looked around the room, stopping on the melted mess his golden throne had become. When he turned back around and looked at her, he was grinning. “Well, I could use a new throne.”

Everyone laughed.

When Ari glanced at Eoghan he must have had the same idea. He was looking at him with more love than he could have ever imagined.