Blood Bride (Aarabassa World) (16 page)

Heather’s numbed body felt the coldness creep in. Slowly she became conscious. She felt an urge to feed, it was a strange sensation as she did not crave food to fill her stomach. She desired a warm beast so she could drink from its pumping veins. Surely, this would give her strength.

A lonesome basca stood beside her, left behind because of its broken wing. An injured basca was no longer of any use to a vamplin. The basca lowered its head to see if this vamplin would want to fly. She stroked his beak and lowered her head to its neck.

‘I need to feed, creature. You must help me.’

Sinking her teeth into a throbbing vein, she experienced her very first feed of warm pumping blood. It was exquisite. Warmth ran through every vein in body. Exquisite. Her muscles felt strong. Her mind sharp. She felt alive and powerful. As the beast’s heart rate slowed, she pulled away. She had no desire to kill the creature. The basca had never been used in this way other than by an occasional hungry vamplin hound. He was confused. He turned to leave.

‘No, basca, please stay. I will not do that again, I needed desperately to feed.’

Too late, the basca followed his own instincts of survival and rushed away, using half flight and half hopping with its strong legs. It rushed to create a distance between itself and this vamplin.

Once again Heather was alone.

A storm was stirring and she knew she needed to find shelter. Something inside her stirred and she shivered, not at the cold but at the feeling of something unknown. Her instincts were becoming ever strong.

With icy fingers she continued to dig, hammer, shape and build the soft snow. To survive she must find refuge. It was not perfect but it would provide some form of protection from the increasing wind and snowstorms of the mountains. She was in a weakened state but the feeding from the lamed basca had cleared her mind. She must survive.

Settling inside the finished ichale, she shivered. She knew that it was not too late to Change, this would guarantee her survival, but this she could not do. Her hands rested on the sides of her stomach. Nothing yet moved, it was too soon, but life was there within her. She must protect her unborn. Changing would kill the innocent life that nourished from her womb.

She thought of Fiendrac. He would look for her, of this she never doubted. She could even try to reach for his thoughts. In her weakened state, she knew she could only afford one attempt at magic. One of the first lessons taught at the Academy was that of self-healing. 

She thought of her father. He had taught her well though she had never acknowledged this before.  She knew what must be done to survive this bitter loneliness. She missed the warmth of her mother and the tender routine of her nursemaid Gloria. All of this seemed in another life, another time.

She thought of Leon, tender Leon, her childhood sweetheart. How would he feel seeing her in the form of a vamplin? 

It must be done now, the time was here. All her strength must go into her attempt at saving her and her unborn child. She closed her eyes. The coldness still bit at her thick pale skin. A human would never survive in this world. She reached deep within herself. Her attention swirled as she slowly sank into the shadowy pits of darkness, deep, resonant and bottomless. She could no longer think of those who she loved, she had locked away the vulnerable depths of her thoughts. Her heartbeat slowed almost to a stop. Her body temperature cooled to match the air that surrounded her. Still her hands rested on her stomach as if she embraced the child to keep it warm. Heather had entered a magical trance that would allow her body to hibernate. Her child would nourish within and remain blissfully unaware of the dangers it would soon face in this new world.

Lord Fiendrac awoke with a sudden start.

‘Who drugged me to slumber?’ he demanded.

‘Are you ready to do battle my Lord?’ Commander Vendring asked of him.

‘I must find her,’ he remembered. ‘Then I will find the Emperor and put an end to this madness.’

‘Lady Vatara has fed on her blood. You must know that your sister plots against you and follows the Emperor with an army.’

‘It is she who has taken my wife.’ Fiendrac’s anger was quickly increasing. ‘My child will be the next ruler, not that traitorous female. My sister will pay for her blundering mistakes.’

‘Calm yourself my Lord,’ Vendring advised. ‘You have your own army at your disposal. You must act as a leader, not as a lovesick youngster.’

‘My son is the next leader of our people. I must save her, then I save my son.’

‘You cannot even be sure she is with child let alone with a son.’

‘Upon my life I know this to be. We must take the armies that are loyal to the old ways and put a stop to this Emperor’s rule. It can only lead to the destruction of life as we have known.  Then I must find my wife and child.’

‘She is not your wife, my leader.’

‘In my heart she is my soul mate.’

Lord Fiendrac wasted no more time and ordered his commanders to break camp, his mission: to destroy the enemy, the monshaads.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Catherine lives on the borderline of North and West Yorkshire, the gateway to the Yorkshire Dales in England.

She is a mother of 4 children and a grandmother of 2 grandchildren. She has an array of dogs and a cat. Her wonderful husband assists her with the complicated world of computers that enable her to publish her works for the world to view.

Her reading is dedicated to the worlds within Fantasy Adventure, Urban Fantasy and Historical English Crime. Occasionally she turns to English Classics with Charles Dickens and the Bronte sisters being favourites.

By day she sells antique and vintage items. By night she is busy creating and writing towards her new Fantasy series, Aarabassa World.

Aarabassa World Website:

http://www.onewomansquest.co.uk/index.html

Author’s Blog:

http://onewomansquestuk.blogspot.co.uk
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Author’s Facebook

https://www.facebook.com/catherinelvickers

Look out for Book 4 in the upcoming

Aarabassa World series.

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