Cursed (32 page)

If not… he wasn’t invincible. Greyvian would do what he must.

“Come,” his father’s command finally rang out into the silence, moving Katarina to open the door and step out into the clearing behind the mansion.

Sunlight streamed through the opening, the earthy scent of the forest came with it, along with a dozen or so foreign bodies and a whole lot of iron and steel. His father’s warriors were indeed armed to the teeth. Perhaps it was a little foolhardy to go out unarmed?

“Hello, Father,” Katarina said. “Do you promise not to shoot?”

“Come,” his father ordered again.

Looking out into the backyard, as much as you could call the grass clearing behind his mansion a backyard, Greyvian spotted his father walking slowly to the centre of the clearing. Two warriors stood behind him—the same two that had been Kobus’s bodyguards for the past few centuries. The same two that had almost killed him numerous times in the century he had run from his father. Strangely, he bore them no ill will. Nor his father for that matter. They were just doing what they thought they must.

“How’s Mother?” Katarina asked their father conversationally as she faced the warrior.

“Worried about you,” Kobus replied sternly. “As am I,” he added in a gentler tone. Then, with frustration, he added, “Now will you please stop this foolishness and come home?”

Katarina had always been Kobus’s favourite. It was the only reason Greyvian had allowed her to go out alone.

“What do you intend to do here?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest as if she already knew the answer.

“The human must die, Katarina,” their father replied with steel in his voice. “The threat of her existence cannot be allowed to remain. I won’t allow it.”

“What if she promised never to have children? Would you allow her to live then?”

“Humans breed, Katarina. It’s what they do.”

His sister snorted in derision. “And how many offspring do you and Mother have now? Twenty and counting?”

Kobus’s expression darkened. Greyvian shook his head. Katarina had never been the greatest negotiator—her tongue was too sharp.

Stepping out into the yard, he ignored the fact that every warrior in the vicinity snapped gun-sight to eye and walked towards his father slowly, but deliberately, hands out where they could see them. For the length of time that it took him to make the distance, the forest around them was dead still, eerily quiet, as if it were holding its breath for what was to come. Senses more alert than ever before, he knew where every warrior was, could hear every breath they took. If one of them moved, he felt like he would know it a split second before they made it.

Coming to rest beside Katarina, he looked Kobus in the eye for the first time since the male had found him covered in blood and surrounded by human casualties. He was much as Greyvian remembered. The Warrior Father—tall, broad shouldered, grave expression—but there was something in his eyes that he’d never truly seen before. Fear. He’d seen a hint of it that day so long ago, but it was nothing compared to what he saw now.

Breathing in his father’s scent, Greyvian could almost taste the acrid nature of it. His father was terrified. Of a human. Only because Greyvian knew the exact reason for it, was he able to target his appeal.

“Sienna’s parents are dead, and she has no siblings.” What better way to start, than by easing that fear? “Her Awareness cannot be passed on by touch or bodily fluids. If you allow her to live, she will have the ability to create life removed. Is this satisfactory?”

He was fairly certain that Sienna would agree to that if it meant her life.

Kobus’s gaze searched his face, looking for who knew what. When his father finally replied, it was as if he hadn’t heard a word of what Greyvian had said.

“You look good.” His father’s eyes travelled his body and then back to his face. “Civilised. Sane.”

“As I have been for quite some time,” he replied, wondering if his father was playing games, trying to unbalance and distract him.

“But you are still feeding on humans,” Kobus said in stern disapproval.

It wasn’t a question, but he answered in the affirmative anyway. “Yes. My dietary requirements have not changed. Merely the amount.”

His father nodded distantly as his eyes travelled over Greyvian’s face.

“And you have a son who looks just like you.” There was something wistful in Kobus’s voice that didn’t make sense. “A half-breed?”

“You know that he is,” he replied, still trying to work out what his father was playing at. It didn’t make sense that Kobus would ignore the topic of Sienna when he was so terrified of her existence.

Unless he was stalling.

*  *  *

Jacob was worried about Sienna. She was sweating up a storm, but kept shivering; she’d drunk about a litre of water in the past few minutes and then asked for more; and she kept drifting in and out of consciousness. Even if Greyvian and the others managed to stave off Kobus, there was no guarantee she wouldn’t die from the aftereffects of severe blood loss—or whatever the hell this was.

As he watched her, more concerned about her well-being than the fact that there was a troop of warriors outside probably trying to kill them all as he sat there, a violent shiver coursed down her body and she moaned as if in pain, shuffling around on the sofa like she couldn’t get comfortable. He wished it were possible to get her to a hospital. He didn’t like seeing her like this.

If only his blood could heal her. Maybe if he licked her like a cat his saliva would seep through her skin and do its thing?

He was seriously considering it when her eyes suddenly popped open, along with her mouth, and a god-awful scream of agony burst forth into the quiet room. Sucking in a breath of shock, he was suddenly hit with a nose full of Eau-de-Burnt-Coffee, the scent coming from out of nowhere.

“Holy shit! You’re transitioning? How the hell is that possible?” he asked, even though he knew she couldn’t reply because of the pain she was in. He should know—he’d been through it and well-remembered his inability to form a coherent thought.

Sienna might not have been able to reply, but he wasn’t as alone in the room as he had previously thought.

“Perhaps she is a late bloomer?” a completely dead voice replied from the doorway.

Whipping around, he found the zombie, Rayven, standing in the doorway. The male’s black eyes were fixed on Sienna in an unblinking stare that sent a shiver of unease down Jacob’s spine.

“How long have you been standing there?” he accused, hating that the male had snuck up on him.

Rayven didn’t look at him as he replied, “I was not counting the time so I cannot tell you.”

With a roll of his eyes, Jacob dismissed the freak and turned back to Sienna who was now thrashing around on the sofa as if her entire body was on fire.

What the hell did he do? Greyvian’s blood was the pre-trans elixir of strength, but the male was outside, probably in the heat of battle. Looking down at his wrist, he wondered if his blood would be just as good.

“Stand aside half-breed,” a rough voice boomed from the hallway. “I’m only after the human. You need not die along with her.”

Spinning around, he saw that Rayven was doing as told, allowing the stranger into the room without a fight. He would have called the bastard a coward, but Xavior had shown him to comedic effect just how well Rayven took orders without comment or hesitation and knew it was not because the vampire lacked courage. That didn’t mean that Jacob was going to stand aside quietly.

Not that he had to. He realised a split second later as he prepared to go head to head with the huge male that stood before him, dripping with weapons and purpose, that Sienna was no longer human. The warrior also seemed to realise this as he glanced over at the sofa and saw her now curled into the foetal position, whimpering in pain.

The male frowned and sniffed the air.

“I was led to believe she was human,” he said, seemingly nonplussed as he stood in fighting stance, knives at the ready.

“You and me both, buddy,” Jacob replied, keeping his guard up just in case the guy decided to kill her anyway. “But then—I always thought 
I
 was human up until a little while ago.”

The warrior searched Jacob’s face, maybe looking for the truth, and then nodded, relaxing his posture and slipping his knives away with deft movements.

“Father will be pleased,” he said with a slight smile. And then he turned and walked back the way he had come, stepping past Marcus, who had appeared suddenly in the doorway.

Jacob frowned as he watched the male go. Was that solid wall of muscle… his uncle?

Another loud moan from Sienna refocused his attention on his best friend. Sienna was transitioning. She was going to be a half-breed, like him. Immortal.

A grin split across his face. Best friends forever just took on a whole new meaning. But—only if she survived the transition.

*  *  *

“You’re stalling,” Greyvian accused after his father announced that he would like to meet Jacob. When Kobus’s eyes darted towards the mansion, he knew he was right.

The mansion was locked down tight, the only door without locks engaged being the one he’d just come out of, but it wasn’t impenetrable to someone skillful enough to get past the meagre amount of security he had employed. Greyvian had never had cause to rely on anything other than his own senses to keep him alive, and had never had to protect anyone other than himself before, so it hadn’t seemed overly necessary prior to now. Something he would have to rectify if they all made it out of this alive.

Terrified that he was too late, he spun towards the house but stopped dead when he saw a warrior striding across the lawn from the side of the building. Something in the male’s pleased expression caused Greyvian’s blood to freeze. That look could only mean one thing.

In an instant, the ice turned to fire and he roared with fury, bolting for the full-blood so that he could tear the male’s head off for killing the only good thing in his life.

Surprised but quick to react, the warrior dodged Greyvian’s attack, retreating to a safe distance time and again as Greyvian attempted to end him in as bloody a fashion as he could manage. After the fifth failed attempt, Greyvian’s mind finally focused on the fact that the warrior was just as fast as he—perhaps a touch faster, even—and that he wasn’t attacking in return. An even more surprising realisation struck him as they faced each other—none of the other warriors had made a move against him. In fact, everyone seemed to be in a state of stasis as they waited on the outcome of their private battle.

Was this how his father normally approached his enemies? Greyvian had expected to be dodging bullets long before now. Perhaps it was the fact that Katarina still stood not far from them.

“You’re fast,” the warrior noted, a strangely amused look in his eye. “If you’d like to know why, then you really shouldn’t try to kill me.”

Narrowing his eyes at the male, Greyvian finally started to note details about the warrior’s features: light grey eyes, black hair, square jaw—all traits of his father’s bloodline—but the nose and shape of the eyes were from his mother’s. The full-blood was clearly his brother and just as obviously gifted with the same speed as Greyvian, but that didn’t sway him in his need to kill. Nor did the hinted knowledge behind their abilities. He couldn’t care less right now as to why the male was so fast.

“You killed her,” he hissed, trying again to get his hands on the male.

“On the contrary,” the warrior said, twisting away once again and smiling as if he were enjoying himself, “she’s very much alive.”

Feigning shock and disbelief—as he knew the full-blood had to be lying, for there was no way Kobus would let her live—he stared at the warrior until the male dropped his guard. In the instant of that opening, Greyvian launched himself at the warrior, knocking the male’s larger body down to the ground and slipping one of his knives free of his boot. He thought he had him, but the warrior was able to get a hand around Greyvian’s wrist as he pressed the sharp point of the knife to the male’s jugular. As it turned out, the two were matched for strength, even though the warrior was larger and seemed more muscular than he, and the attempt to slit the male’s throat turned into a stalemate.

“Your human is not a human,” the warrior grunted, speaking in a voice loud enough for Kobus to hear whilst continuing to fight against Greyvian’s knife hand. “She is transitioning at this very moment.”

He didn’t believe him. Couldn’t. But when he looked into the warrior’s eyes—the colour so perfectly matched to his—he knew without doubt that the male was telling the truth.

“He’s not lying, Greyvian,” Knox’s voice called from off to his right. “Marcus just went and checked on her. She smells like burnt coffee and is writhing in pain. Jacob is feeding her, but…”

The half-breed didn’t have to finish. Greyvian knew what the chances were and that only his blood had seemed to make the difference. Even if Jacob was his son, there was no proof that his blood would work just the same.

Locking eyes with the warrior, they shared a look that was part apology, part respect, and about a half dozen other unnameable emotions that had a lot to do with brotherly bonding for lack of a better description. Sheathing his dagger, he got to his feet and had to force himself not to run past his father on the way back inside.