Final Days (3 page)

FOUR

Dawn, when the day awakens and stretches its arms to envelop the world,
was the quietest time in the village.  It was when the vampires turned in to sleep and the human blood-bonds had yet to rise. 

Ahmose loved this part of the day most.  He could walk it, briefly, until the relentless ultraviolent overcame his limited ability to tolerate that spectrum of light and he had to turn in like all the others.  But that tiny strip of time, for him, was a bit of the magic that weave
d through the lives of the first blood vampires on this dark continent.  His clan had lived here in Zambia in South Africa for over a thousand years.  Happily. 
Safe
.

All beings, human, or super-naturals, animals and insects, were children of the
Mother Earth, born to thrive on this planet of plenty.  But his clan of vampires, all born vampires, rather than made like most who lived all over the world, were called the children of the moon because of their connection to that celestial satellite.  It moved through the beautiful skies of the Mother and brought power to the children of the moon.  He was leader of this group of forty first blood vampires.  They had been forty-two at one time, but two had been lost to the outside world and no one had seen them since.

Ahmose moved to the door of his dwelling as his skin began to heat. 
His home sat at the highest point in the village, a large yurt like most of the villagers lived in.  Although, as leader, his
was
the grandest.

It was time to go in and sleep until darkness came again.  He would, anyway, even if his skin could take the daylight.
  A vampire was anthropologically wired to tire intensely at daybreak and need to seek shelter and rest.

Just reaching his door, he opened it and was about to close it behind him when he caught movement outside and stopped to look.

Windari, a first blood as old as he was, stood outside her yurt, her face to the coming day.  He watched, sheltered from the direct light inside his doorway, as the sun moved across her face.

She spread her arms, and turned directly into the white light, her face and hands going bright red.

He felt a moment of alarm and started forward when her eyes shifted and she looked directly at him.  She smiled and backed into her home, closing the door silently.

What the hell?
  He closed his door, too, and slid the protective shield over it, then turned into his living area.

Was she considering seeking the light?  Ending her life?

He sighed as he dropped his clothes on the floor and headed to his bed.  Tonight he would find Windari and there would be a discussion.

Before he got into his bed, he poured a glass of his favorite spiced wine and sat on the edge.  It was cozy and extremely comfortable, but missing one thing that would make it perfect.  A mate. 
Shoazan
.  A woman capable of bringing vampire children into the world, the rarest thing on earth.  In all his many years he had never met her.  Destiny promised that the leader of the children of the moon, he himself, would bring forth a new generation.  But he had been denied that destiny for so many years, he began to believe it was false.

Draining the glass, he stretched out on the plush mattress, pushing the satin top-sheet aside.  It was warm tonight, even with his
environmentals set on cool temperatures, because Mother Earth was warm this time of year and his people were connected to her.  He wished he could sleep outside where the natural air would cool his skin, but he was vampire and that would never happen.  Even first blood vampires, as powerful as they were, could not control the earth and the moon.

His hand slipped down to run over his cock, erect now because he’d thought about his phantom mate.  He’d
have to bring one of his favorites in after he rose tonight to take care of the over-active organ.  Vampires by their very natures were extremely sexual, but lately he’d been excessively needy.  He wondered if perhaps it was because of his dreams.

Erratic, intense, he’d been dreaming quite a lot for several months that something was coming to his village.  Blessing or disaster, he did not know. 
The portents were there in the dreams, vague as usual, so he had to try to interpret the meanings.  He couldn’t.  But he worried that it was something bad.

He needed a seer
, a first blood with the talent to read the portents and divine the future.  The village had one a long time ago, but she was one of the missing.  So Ahmose was left to interpret the odd images and events in a dream-world he was not familiar with.  Time would resolve the question, but he wished he could be more prepared for whatever would come.  For now, he would sleep and try not to dream.

Windari watched Ahmose as he entered his dwelling.  Such a magnificent man.  Their leader, functionally and spiritually.  The son of the moon and father of the new generation, someday, if the right woman would be found.  It pissed her off that he never considered
her
for his mate.

She turned and prepared her dwelling for rest and caught her image in the wall of mirrors along the side of her rest suite.  Smiling, she watched herself as she slipped out of the sheer dress she liked to wear.  It covered little.  Why not?   Her body was incredible.  Vampires had amazing bodies, but hers was exceptional.  And that face.  Her mother couldn’t have graced her with a more beautiful visage.  She was stunning and powerful, the perfect mate for their king, and he barely noticed her.

Standing, her legs spread, her fingers traveled along her shape, tracing perfect breasts, flat belly, and into the folds between her legs. 
Ahhh.
  That was the spot. 

She liked to make herself come.  And watch.  If she’d been able to get Ahmose in here, she would have loved to have him fuck her in front of these mirrors.  But none of her subtle invitations had been accepted.  Subtle, because it was considered disrespectful to be forward.  Otherwise, she would have thrown him in here and mounted him long ago.   And if that had happened, he would never have left her.

Now, though, she reached for a large vibrator and sat down on a velour couch she placed in front of the mirrors for the very reason of getting herself off.  She hadn’t had a regular lover in centuries.  A few blood-bonds for their skills with their tongues, but no intercourse.  She was waiting for Ahmose.  Only a king would do.

The mechanical toy worked wonders and she screamed in release just minutes after insertion.  Modern technology had much to commend it, she thought, as she placed the long device back on a shelf with a variety of other sex toys she had ordered from a place in Germany.

With a satisfied sigh, she threw herself down on her pink satin sheets.  Her eyes searched the darkness after she turned off the lights.  Something was in the air.  She felt it whenever she was around Ahmose.  Something was coming.  It concerned her, but made her hope that things between them may yet change.  Windari fell asleep on her stomach dreaming of Ahmose’s cock moving inside her and his fangs at her throat.

FIVE

 
Some distance away in Southern France

Koen crawled out of bed, wishing he felt rested.  He didn’t and he knew it was because there was a problem in his household.  When there was a problem, sleep had to wait until it was resolved.  He’d been like that through most of his ten centuries of life.  Had never learned to just let things go.  He was a fixer, especially when it came to family.

And the two missing vampires were family.  Or close enough.  Jacob had been with his new son-in-law, Bas, for two hundred years.  Now that Bas and Koen’s daughter, Park, had moved into his villa in the south of France, Jacob had come too. 

Koen admitted he liked the man quite a lot.  They’d gone to town together a few times to share blood meals and find women for the sex vampires needed almost as much as they needed blood. 

And Starla, the
cute girl from Alaska that had come up missing in the first place, causing all this trouble, now a brand new vampire, was a friend of Eillia.  Eillia was important to him, so the little vampire Starla was too.

Still, he was exhausted,
most of the time lately, but this issue of disappearing vampires needed to be addressed immediately.   Things had gotten out of control last year, and by fuck, it wasn’t going to happen again this year. 
If he had anything to say about it
.  And he usually did.  He was an ancient first blood vampire.  Usually, the world around him bent to accommodate his desires.

Since first blood vampires were born as vampires, they were much more powerful than vampires made by infusing a human with enough vampire blood to trigger a conversion.  Changing the base DNA structure of the human’s body,
the blood infusion would painfully rewrite that human, who would live as vampire for the rest of their life.  But would never have the skills and powers a first blood had naturally.  

Essentially, first bloods were the parents of any vampire that lived in this world.  And there were very few of them.  To Koen’s knowledge, only about twelve existed, mostly in this part of the world.  He conceded that it was possible there may be others elsewhere, but since a first blood emitted life signals through their lifeforce that other first bloods could read, he doubted it.  It was true that they could mask that lifeforce, if desired, but there would be no reason for them to do so.  He felt confident that the dozen or so he knew of now were all that survived.

He and his clan lived amongst the humans undetected, maintaining anonymity and peace.  Their homes, often compounds, were usually elaborate and isolated, so no one realized that the residents there did not age or die.  Any vampire could use compulsion to control humans or erase inconvenient memories. 

First bloods could control or compel
anyone,
  including “made” vampires.   And although first blood vampires had talents, they were not all the same. 

Eillia, his oldest and dearest friend, had the gift of empathic connections.  Her lifeforce could interact with another person, vampire or human, and journey with them into their lives.  She was one of the most beautiful souls he had ever known.

This past year, amidst heartbreak and chaos, she had found her mate, and was due to give birth soon to one of the rarest of creatures on this world…a first blood vampire child.  He knew how remarkable it was personally.  His daughter had been the first vampire born in centuries, and her child, his granddaughter, the second.  Eillia’s son would be only the third.

Tonight, they would go to Paris.  Eillia and her mate Daniel, along with Koen, would follow a lead for the two missing vampires to the home of another
vampire just outside the city.  Unfortunately, it was an arrogant first blood vampire named Xavier.

Xavier and Koen had been raised as brothers over a thousand years ago, and although they had been estranged for several centuries, they struggled to repair the relationship during this one.   The uneasy truce would hopefully hold out as they questioned him about the missing people.

Reaching for a cup of stale coffee that had been sitting on a night stand all day, Koen yawned and chugged it.  He just wanted to get this over with and get back home.  Maybe tomorrow he could get a good ten, twelve hours sleep.

Paris.  How she loved this beautiful city.  In the center of downtown, a small hotel Alisa always chose when she came to France offered a bed and breakfast type service by an older couple she considered close friends after her visits here over so many years.  The food was
exquisite.

No longer concerned about health or calories, Alisa ate every damn thing she wanted.
The sweet couple smiled and brought her anything she asked for, amazed that their little guest could put it all away in that small body. 

She went to two
pâtisseries
she normally never would have visited, bought two bags of pastries, and took it straight back to her hotel room that first night.   Sitting on her soft bed, watching an old French film, with a pot of coffee, she indulged herself as she never had in her life with every damn sugared thing in both bags.  The next morning, as she nursed the worse stomach ache of her life, she admitted it was worth it.

Alisa
didn’t want to visit museums, but rather the things that made this city so special, the smell and soul of the city, the streets, the art, the people.

And of course, the greatest symbol of all for this city of lights and love
…The Eiffel Tower.

When s
he took the elevator for her final view from the top of the tower, she traveled with a group of tourists on their first trip to Paris.  What a pleasure to get to see this special city through their eyes, always best dressed when it was lit up at night.  Afterward, she joined two of the young boys from the tourist group as they got into a fountain in a public park to dance in the water, and crawled out soaked and laughing twenty minutes later before the
gendarmes
came.

She slept all day the next day
, and woke refreshed, but hungry on her last night in Paris.  After living strictly on sugar for the past twenty-four hours, she was starving for some real food.

So many favorite choices in this
city!  How could she choose when it was her last dinner in Paris?  While she considered her choices, she wandered around the streets.  It was a warm Friday night, and the partiers were out, locals and tourists jamming the streets.

I
t struck her that there was only one place she wanted to be tonight.  

Alisa
ended up on
la rue Moufftard
, a pedestrian street filled with cafes, clubs, local artisans, and restaurants.  She wanted to be around young and vibrant people, drinking, laughing, searching for love or loving the one the one they were with. 
Long years yet to live, such exciting moments ahead
.  Now that she had accepted her situation, she found joy in watching others making their lives.

After ordering a bottle of her favorite Pinot Noir, s
he sat at a little café table for an hour, watching the people, and still hadn’t eaten much.   She needed to decide where to eat, the wine on an empty stomach going to her head.   She glanced up at the waiter who watched her closely.  Ah, he needed her table.  She nodded to him as she gathered her huge bag and positioned it on her shoulder.  Everything she carried with her on this journey was in that bag.  She’d realized she needed so little, that anything else she might need on the journey she could just buy it, and leave it behind for someone else who might be able to use it later.  But the bag was oversized and a little awkward.

After leaving a nice tip, she stood
too quickly and stumbled, her legs hesitating to do what she asked of them.  The bag slipped, she glanced down to reposition the strap as she stepped out past the café into the street, and was broadsided by someone passing by.

She didn’t see who hit her, but whoever did was
much bigger and heavier, and she went down hard.  Luckily, she landed on her bag and it absorbed most of the impact.

Alisa hit the ground
with enough force she lost her breath and saw stars for a moment, but all she wanted to do was laugh.  Clumsy and inelegant was her new normal.  She looked up to see someone reaching for her, and gratefully put her hands into a man’s larger ones.

It wasn’t his fault, she
’d stumbled and hadn’t been looking where she was going, so she looked up at him to tell him so.  And couldn’t speak. 

T
he face above her was extraordinarily handsome with startling green eyes that took her breath away again.  He had been reaching down to her, she assumed to help her up, but he stopped moving and just stared at her as well.  She understood how he felt.  He stunned her, too. 

Never in her life had she felt anything like this.  He was just so
beautiful! 
This man, this stranger, within seconds, it felt as if he captured her soul.  She wondered how she had lived all her life without seeing that face.

She smiled, and
curled her fingers around his.