Final Days (23 page)

TWENTY TWO

  
 
Five months later

April.  Flowers were in bloom again.  At least the early arrivals that often peeked out while little snowfalls still came. 
Spring.  A lovely time of year.

Koen had adjusted, though, to winter and the colder temperatures.  He liked the frosty bit
e of Chicago’s lake-borne winds.   And although he didn’t mind the milder weather sneaking in now that spring had arrived, he would miss the invigorating winter air.

Samson liked the warmer nights.  He was prancing anxiously for their first walk along the river they
took most nights when Koen rose after sunset.

Grabbing a bag of chips, since vampires were always ravenous upon rising, Koen opened the apartment door and Samson bolted out.  It wasn’t necessary to restrain the dog anymore.  He and Koen had bonded on a level so
deep, Koen could communicate with him at a rudimentary level.   Samson stayed by Koen’s side wherever they went, and that was most of the time.  They had become inseparable.

Samson waited at the door to the stairwell while Koen paused to check his messages from the teams he’d had in active searches for over six months now. 
Nothing new.

And even though that was precisely what he usu
ally found when he checked for any information, each time he opened up his phone and found no new information on Alisa, his heart clinched.  Hope might spring eternal, but it was killing him, one day at a time.  He wasn’t a healthy man right now.   For all of the seven months she’d been gone, he’d eaten well under the required calories for a vampire of his size and power.  And slept less than he needed.

Hope was beginning to flounder.  Just a little bit.  He would never give up, but it was getting harder to expect he would find her.

It was as if she fell off the earth.  Koen knew first blood magic was responsible.  Windari had masked Alisa and her location, the same way the village at Victoria Falls was masked from the world.  Between that and the fact that they had no leads, his teams were really just watching every camera feed and physically watching streets in many cities for any sign of her or Windari.  Because Windari had disappeared too. 

Four months ago, Windari had fallen off the
grid, too, obviously aware her time was running out.   Because just before she had disappeared, Koen had been ready to try to force her to reveal Alisa’s whereabouts.

A bark brought him back to the impatient dog.

“Sorry, buddy.  All right, go on.  I’ll be right behind you.”

Koen op
ened the door and the dog flew down the first flight.  Koen leaned against the brick wall for a moment, his eyes closed, and did what he always did as soon as he rose…summoned Alisa’s image and told her he loved her.

“I’m still looking, baby,” he whispered, and then raced down the stairs to take Samson on a long walk.  Out of everything in his life now, he enjoyed these quiet walks the most.  Little else brought him joy, except for when Park and Bas brought Cairine to visit.

His granddaughter was now nearly two years old, advanced beyond that of a human child, and just as precocious and beautiful.  Park always pulled the little girl’s pale ginger hair up into a cap of cascading curls, the softest thing Koen had ever felt.  This child was third generation first blood, and already showing her abilities. She exhibited some of her innate powers and they were impressive.

Samson hurried out the door at the main level of the apartment building when Koen opened it onto the street.  But he stayed right at Koen’s side as they crossed and headed down to the
riverwalk.  The air smelled different tonight, although he barely noticed.  He remembered Park telling him he was like a zombie at times, and he couldn’t dispute it. 

Without Alisa, his life had returned to the days before he found Park, when it felt like it just wasn’t worth going through all the pain it took to make it through a day.  And it wasn’t that his family didn’t make him happy, they did, but he just couldn’t stand being here without her.  Being in this apartment, in Chicago,
in this world
, knowing he may never hold her again. 
He missed her!

And he had failed her. 

Although seven months weren’t much time to an immortal, it was the world when you spent it missing someone.   All he’d done was assault poor Tim, who was as good as it got with computers, and yet hadn’t found any leads in all these months. 

He’d kept in touch with Ahmose.  The baby had been born.  
Ahmose’s child with the lovely little vampire Starla had been born healthy after all the trauma.  A first blood child who arrived on the edge of magic and science, Starla, newly made vampire, inseminated with the seed of a first blood.  It was the first time for such a procedure, aided by his daughter, who had been a genetic researcher before she discovered she was a first blood vampire.

Koen watched as Samson carefully checked out the scent of something in a hollowed out fallen tree, then looked across the mirror shiny water.  He was ashamed of himself for not going to see the new first blood child.  But he hadn’t been able to let himself leave Chicago since Alisa’s abduction.   In case someone found a lead. In case she showed up.   He nodded to the night.   Soon, he would fly back to South Africa to meet the boy.
  The first blood community had recently been gifted with children, something so rare, they had almost thought it impossible.

But in the past two years, there had been Park, a lost child who had been found as an adult. 
His own daughter thought deceased before she could ever be born.  Then she had borne his granddaughter, his friend Eillia became pregnant by a human male, and had a son with him.   Now Ahmose, leader of a very powerful community of first bloods who called themselves children of the moon, was a new father, with two more children destined to arrive within a few years. 

The world was changing.  Koen sensed it, and so did many of the first bloods.  What had seemed a constant for the first thousand years of his
life, was no more.  That was why he had to get Alisa back.

If she was still alive.
 
The words burned his soul.  He hated to ever think them, but the truth glimmered along with the hope…it was very possible…she was no longer alive and he was missing a ghost.   He couldn’t,
wouldn’t,
accept that possibility.

Samson showed up at his feet, whining.

“I’m sorry, boy.  I’m a morbid mess tonight.  Let’s go for a run and then we’ll get breakfast.” 

The dog reared up, excited and took off down the path with Koen jogging behind him.  He went faster and faster, the dog struggling to keep up.  So he had to make himself slow his pace, both mentally and physically.  It was going to be fine.  It had to be.

Warm air blew in off the Pacific Ocean.  On her stomach, stretched out in a cushioned lounge, Windari watched the sun drop into the sea.  Number Four was giving her a full body massage while the remnants of the sun’s rays warmed her face.  He was nervous.

“Mistress, I thought you couldn’t be anywhere near the sun.”

“I am a child of the moon.  Our clan can tolerate small amounts of low level sun exposure, like the beginning or the end of a day.  But I risk it sometimes.  I know my limit, but I push it.  It’s a game.  These days, I find I am bored more easily, so I flirt with danger just for a little adrenaline kick.”

“I will service you as soon as I am finished with this massage, if you would like.”

She glanced back at him.  He’d been an excellent blood-bond.  Compliant, sexy, learned very quickly, and performed perfectly.   But she was even bored with him lately.  And the sex was feeling underwhelming.  What she really wanted was a good fuck with a first blood male.  She wanted Ahmose.

“I wonder…” she said suddenly.  Number Four leaned over.

“I’m sorry, Mistress.  What did you say?”

“Nothing.
  I’m just wondering if I can get one more concession from someone.  If I give a particular vampire something he wants, I wonder if I can bargain for something else I need.”

Number Four had no idea what to say, so he just dug in deeper and tried to please her.  It was getting harder to do these days.  Number Three had pissed her off about four weeks ago and he hadn’t seen him since.  It worried him.

Eillia put her son in his crib.  The cell was chiming, Daniel was yelling up the stairs, and she’d spent the night worrying about Koen.  She was exhausted.

Tamesine looked up from the balcony where she had been sitting watching a beautiful clouded sky cover and uncover a nearly full moon.

“Would you like me to take him?” she asked.

Eillia smiled and nodded.  “Would you?  Thanks, Tam.  I need to get the phone and see what my husband is yelling about.”

Tamesine got up and strolled over to the crib to pick up the plump baby boy who was closing in on his first birthday in a few months. 

She was stunning.  Long and lean, with full breasts and long natural blonde hair, she moved with grace and confidence that she had only recently rediscovered.   Until just before this child was born, Tamesine had
been full blown mentally ill.  Even on her best day now, she herself wasn’t certain she really was better.  She still had moments when she panicked and thought she was going to go over the edge again.  Coping with life had become too difficult for her over centuries of chaos.

This little baby boy had changed it all.  From the moment her lifeforce sensed his, knew he was there, a connection began that had only grown stronger.  In her state of psychotic confusion, he had reached to her and let her know she was loved.  And that it was going to be okay.  Tamesine had believed him, believed
in
him, and began to believe in herself again.

She would give her life for him.

“Come on, Cade.”  She lifted him with gentle hands and took him back out onto the balcony with her as his mother hurried down the stairs.

Lighting up the white clouds from behind, the moon was the ultimate night-light.

“Look at your world, little man.”  Tamesine held him up to look at the changing sky as the clouds moved across the brilliant glow.   He watched with her, his eyes following the swirling patterns.  Anyone watching his bright eyes would wonder how much he understood.  Tamesine thought he could see all the knowledge of the universe.

“He’s been here before,” she had told his parents one night six months ago.
  “Caedmon is an old soul.”

Eillia never disputed anything Tamesine said.  While
Tam sometimes still said things that sounded a little insane, Eillia had learned that insanity could have a very close relationship with truth.  

Taking a seat on a wide wood rocking chair, Tamesine held the baby close. 

She knew many of those in this household were afraid of her.  She didn’t blame them…she’d been sick for a long time.  And she’d hurt a lot of people.  Luckily, Caedmon trusted her completely and gave her another chance at life.  She would never let him down. 

She began to sing an old lullaby to him while he fingered a long blonde curl.

“Um, um, sandman’s a’ comin,’ and he’ll be here, mighty, mighty soon, and if you don’t cry, he’ll be droppin’ by with a great big lollipop moon.”

Caedmon giggled.  He liked the sound of
Tamesine’s voice.  She tickled him under the chin.

Eillia called from the edge of the room.

“Tam, could you bring Caedmon?   Park wants to talk to us.”

Tamesine pulled him close and got up to follow Eillia down to the main floor of Koen’s villa.

She loved her life here, loved these people who had embraced her in spite of her awful past.   Less people were living here now that Koen’s daughter and her family had moved to their own villa just up the street.  Park’s daughter was as close to Caedmon as Tamesine was, and she loved the little girl almost as much as she loved this little boy.  Tamesine hoped no one would ever try to make her leave.  
She couldn’t
.  She could never leave this first blood baby.   It was her only worry in the world.

On the ground floor, the household was gathering in the breakfast room where the vampires usually dined right after rising for the night.  She noticed snacks behind each chair even though they had dined just a few hours earlier.

Daniel watched Tamesine carry his son in, and although he trusted his wife’s judgment, Tamesine knew he still felt uneasy with her around his child.   Smiling at him, she carried the baby over and put him in Daniel’s arms. 

Daniel looked up and smiled his appreciation at her.  She smiled back.  Tamesine had always liked Daniel.  It made her sad that he still didn’t think she was well enough to be near Caedmon.  Time was all she needed to prove that she was good for him.  She looked over at Eillia,
who nodded her head in approval for taking the boy straight to his father.  It would help seal the fracture he felt about Tamesine.