Richard: Blood Brotherhood – Erotic Paranormal Dark Fantasy Romance (2 page)

Rick had been staying with his brother and his family last night or he might not have been able to pull his brother from the burning shell. He had no idea if a stray ember from the fires from the night before had started the blaze, or if someone had dropped a candle. As it was, his brother’s lovely wife had been killed by a stake through the heart, more than likely from falling timber, before he could get to her. Rick didn’t know why; if it was set, who would do this to his brother and his wife? But he was going to find out.

Turning when someone said his name, he looked at his only friend.

“You must go to ground, my friend. Should you stay out here longer, you will join your sister-in-law in the afterlife, and she will be most upset with you should you not avenge her death.” Janell looked around, then back at him. “I will find she who has done this. And when I do, I will make sure that she suffers greatly for it.”

“You know that it was set then?” She nodded at him. “Then I have no wish for you to get into trouble either. Nay, do not do this for me. I shall take care of it. Besides, you know as well as I that it was Lucia.” Janell said nothing, not even to acknowledge what they both knew. “She meant to destroy him for a reason that I cannot know.”

“It is said that Mary was to die in childbirth and Lucia was to be Malcomb’s second mate. I do know that the earth says this, but I cannot believe that such a match would have been correct. Your brother is a good man, kind and full of life. While Lucia is—”

“She’s a bitch and a murderer. And should she find out that I am the one that turned her in for her crimes all those weeks ago, I will be next on her list. I don’t even know why she bothered with poor Malcomb. He leads such a quiet life, not even bothering to be involved in family much. He is so timid and afraid of things.” Janell smiled at him. “You find this funny?”

“Nay, my lord, I do not. But she is with the Council as we speak. She sits in a cell awaiting her fate. The Council has found her guilty of the charge and she will be punished. I know not which charge, but it is said to have her behind bars until such time as things can be carried out.” He asked her how long that would be. “I do not know that either, my lord. The Council has their own rules and secrets, and my kind, or any kind of being, is not privy to them. I only know that she was taken before them and that she was found guilty.”

Rick felt somewhat better, even relieved, but his brother and his family had suffered at her hands and he wanted revenge. But it had been taken out of his hands now. She would die quickly and not suffer in ways that he was…or his brother.

When he felt something akin to a blade into his heart, he fell to his knees. He knew what it was immediately. Malcomb was no more.

“My lord?” He waved Janell away, his heart tearing apart, because as surely as he was standing here, he knew that his brother had met the sun. His pain for the death of his wife was just too much. “My lord, you’re frightening me. Come away from there and tell me....” When she paused, he knew that she was as aware, if not more so, of what happened as he was.

“He’s dead.” Janell put her arms around him and helped him to an area in the yard that had not been a part of the devastation. “Malcomb hurt terribly. Even when I tried to help him out of the burning house, he begged me to leave him behind. Now…now he is gone from me.”

“It is the way of your kind.” He sat there thinking of his kind. The way that they took mates to make them stronger, yet it killed a part of them when their mates were gone. “Your own mate, she is coming too. Her love will mend you. I know this.”

“I’ve no wish to meet her.” Janell said nothing. “What should happen to her? When I cannot care for her the way that I did my brother?”

“I cannot tell you of that future. You know this. I only know that she comes to you. That is more than you should know of this.” He did know it, but it wasn’t something that he liked. “I have given you a part of me, my lord. You can now be in the sunlight because of our bond. This will keep you safe. And once you have taken your bride, she too will enjoy the benefits that come with you being her other half.”

As he sat there, Janell fussing with him about what he was doing, he looked down and saw the faerie garden that he had sat on. When he looked at her, he could see her shock and tried to stand up to move. He felt the pain almost as soon as he opened his mouth to ask her where he was, on whose garden he had lain.

His back and neck burned as if someone was setting hot stones to his skin. Even as he cried out that he wanted help with it, he knew that Janell couldn’t help him. Wouldn’t be able to, because she knew, just as he did, what was happening to him. Someone was killing him.

As he cried out over and over with the pain of it, he saw the blood as it ran down his body and covered his chest and arms, as whatever was going on with his body was diminishing. When it was over, the pain was less and he could feel that whatever had happened had created a marking on his body that would never leave him.

“She is a great and powerful being, the woman you have brought awake.” He looked up, seeing Janell bowing before a being that was as pure white as his blood was red. “You must stand and thank her, my lord. She has given you a great gift.”

“I hurt too badly for me to consider this a gift.” The laughter had him looking up again. He felt himself being pulled to the woman—for he had no doubt that was what the being was—his feet not touching the ground that neither of them stood upon, his pain gone. “Thank you, my lady. But since I think you hurt me, I think you owe me as well.”

“I have given you all that I can, Lord Richard James.” He felt his heart pound in his chest and wondered at it. “You will face many things in your life. A great many deaths yet, some that will bring you yet again to your knees. But know that as you stand before me, you will survive. Nothing will kill you.”

“The sun, it cannot, but a sword can remove my head.” She told him no longer. “I am but a mere vampire, my lady. Subject to the ways of my kind.”

“I have chosen you, with the help of your friend here, to help me with a great project. It will be many years from now. Decades will pass…centuries before she comes to you.” He asked her who. “A being so strong that she will give you more than you have ever seen. A power that will dominate all that bow before you. And a love that will know no bounds. A love that will last you both until the end of all time.”

“I’m not deserving. I think you...perhaps you meant my brother, Malcomb. He was a man to deserve such a gift. Not I.” She smiled at him and turned to look at Janell. It was then that he saw the jagged scar on the woman’s face. It marred her from hairline to chin. “Who would dare do such a thing to you?”

“It is of no consequence now that I have found you, Lord James. She will suffer greatly for hurting me thusly. When you meet a woman of great humility, you will save her for me. She will give you her heart, but not easily. Her body will be the greatest gift that a man can receive. Yet before she comes, there will be much death; you will witness many lives being taken in the name of greed. This woman and those that you are with will gain all that I have given you this day.”

He closed his eyes when she asked him to. When he opened them again Rick could see it then, markings all around his neck and down his back. He knew that magic had put them there. Because of what he was, there should have been no magic to mark him so. Magic, very strong and powerful magic, had done what nothing else could. He looked at her when she said his name.

“What is this?” She only smiled at him. “You’ve marked me as belonging to you. What if I...? What would you do should I try and end my life?”

The sword was in her hand before he could blink. She swung it around, cutting into his throat as soon as she lifted it to her shoulder. He felt it slice through him. Grabbing his neck to try and stop the flow of blood or his head from falling, he felt nothing. Not a drop of his blood, nor even a small tear to his flesh. And there was no pain. He asked her if she’d missed.

“Nay, I do not miss when I wield the sword of my kind.” Again, he asked her what she was. “You will live as I have decreed. And this favor I ask of you, you will carry it out for me and things will...the earth and the inhabitants of it will thank you for it.”

“Why me?” She only smiled at him again. Rick had a feeling that even if he were to ask her a million times, he’d not get an answer from her. “My lady, I just want to live my life as a vampire. I have no desire to find a mate. I don’t want anyone in my life that.... Well, I should like to join my brother. And there is a woman who will wish me dead soon enough. I would rather not subject a mate to such—”

“The matter is closed.” He felt his anger take him, burn over him like acid. But when she laughed, he knew a new kind of pain, consuming him in ways that had him thinking the marking of his body had been mere child’s play, his body stiff with it. “’Twill do you not one bit of good to try and harm me, Lord Richard James. Should you try, even thinking that I will end this between us, it will not work. You belong to me. And until you have completed this favor, you will be alive and healthy no matter what things come your way. Even during what you think of as your blackest times.”

When he was dropped to the ground, he stayed where he was. He knew her to be gone. The magic that had brought her to him was gone as well. But not the feeling that he’d been had. That he’d been tricked. He looked at Janell then.

“Nay, whatever goes into your head, I had nothing to do with it. When I sat you there, the ground was clear of any garden. It was not until I saw what you were about that I realized that it was someone’s magic.” He knew that. She could no more lie to him than he could her. “You have been chosen, my lord. A great gift was given to you as well.”

“I don’t think of it as a gift, Janell. Did you not hear her say that a great many people would die? That I would have my heart broken many times while I waited for my mate to come to me?” She nodded. “Will you remain with me? Not leave my side while I have to go on living?”

“I must take to the ground for a time.” He asked her why. “I need to rest. I have been, as were many other beings here, drained so that you might speak to the lady as you have. To hold her image for you is very taxing to my kind.”

“What was she? And why did she pick me?” Janell said nothing. He wasn’t sure if she was trying to keep from telling him the truth or if she didn’t know. “How long will you leave me? When will you return?”

“I know not.” He nodded and stood up. “You are lord now. You are aware of this, are you not? When your brother died, his lands and monies, they came to you.”

“I’ve no wish of it.” He didn’t need it, either. What use could he have for lands and monies? “Take it for yourself.”

“I shall protect it from others. I will rest on the land where he has died. The connection to the rest will be there for me.” He didn’t care and said as much to her. “You will someday, my lord. If for no other reason than when you take a mate.”

“I won’t. Not ever.” He knew it for the lie that it was. “The lady, she said I was to have pain, pain that would bring me to my knees again. I won’t have it, Janell. I can’t stand pain like this again.”

He wondered if his own mate would die before he could convert her, and decided that he wasn’t going to worry over something that was never going to happen. As he gathered what he could from the house, he made his way to talk with his parents. They would know that Malcomb was gone, as well as Mary, but he wanted to be with them. He would not talk of the lady that had come to him. Nor the magic that she’d given him. He would mourn the loss of his brother and then move on. Life was going to be on his terms, not that of a woman who had no name.

Chapter 1

“What have you found out? And if you give me an answer that I don’t like, I’m going to put you into irons again, and this time I might forget all about you.” Lucia waited for her sister—the fucking cunt was what she called her most of the time now—to say something. Anything. But she stood there, glaring at Lucia like she really didn’t care if she did what she threatened.

As much as she hated to admit it, Lucia couldn’t go very long without Ryiah around. There was something that she had, some sort of magic that sustained her. Not that she’d ever tell her sister that, but she needed her. The fucking cunt was going to pay someday. But for now, Lucia would let her think she was going to live as long as she did.

“You asked me to find him for you. I did that. There were no other orders given to me. So if you’re finished, I’d like to go back to what I was—”

“Why the fuck would I have you find him if I didn’t want you to tell me anything about him?” She slapped Ryiah across the mouth before she could think better of it. The pain on her own face nearly took her to her knees, but she’d not fall front in of Ryiah. There was no way she’d let her see her pain. “Get out of my sight. And don’t come back until I call for you.”

Hatred. There was so much of it coming off Ryiah that she thought she could bathe in it. When she finally turned and left, Lucia leaned back in her seat. Rubbing her cheek, the same side as the one she’d hit Ryiah on, burned in pain.

It was exhausting being around her sister, almost as much as it was fun. To see her hate so much, her loving and sweet sister, to be so angry all the time. It was almost worth pissing her off to see it. But she was no closer to knowing anything about Richard.

He was her mate. Lucia had been trying to end his family for centuries, and this one man had kept her from her goal. Every single time she had him in her sights, he’d manage somehow to get out of it with nothing more than a scorched shirt or a nick to his flesh. Never had one man vexed her as much as this single one had. She’d come to the conclusion that he was her mate. It only stood to reason that was why she couldn’t harm him, and it was impossible for her to murder him.

“This ‘causing no harm’ rule is making me look bad.” She looked at the man who was standing guard over her, and he didn’t even look her way. She wondered if she were to send him after her betrothed whether he would have any better luck than she had in killing him. More than likely not. No matter what she threw at him, Richard would never fucking die.

She could kill his family. That had been no problem, and she’d done that, easily. Killing his first mate had been just as easy as ending the life of any human. The big bad Richard had been powerless to stop her from that. Murdering Angelica at her rest had been boring actually, but she had died. It had been Lucia’s hope that, like his brother, Richard would not be able to stand the pain and would kill himself. Vampires could not live without their mates. But apparently he could.

There were other things that she’d tried as well, like catching him in his lair. The man didn’t appear to have one. Nor did he need to rest during the daylight. And with his age, she’d not been able to guess when he’d need to feed next. He could go weeks before needing to find a human, and after a short time of watching him, she’d grow bored and miss it. The son of a bitch was not helping her out of this situation one bit, it seemed.

Getting up, she went to the window. Creatures were in the yard now, but most of them were dead or dying. Several weeks ago she’d been overrun with the things, all bent on coming into her compound. Now there were only a few, one or two a day. And even they seemed to be lackluster in their attempts to get at her. Even when she was in the yard, they were slow to move, as well as stupid. Whatever had made them had done a piss poor job of it.

Lucia knew that had she been in charge of such beings, she would have done things differently. First and foremost, they needed to be better dressed. They all looked the same, from their clothing to their facial expressions, which told her that they were monsters. Had they been in better clothing and even combed their hair, she was sure they could have ended the human race by now. Instead, they were only centering on one area, and even that didn’t have nearly the amount of people that the rest of the world had in it. Maybe she’d go and find this leader and have a talk with him. Or perhaps not. If he were this stupid about creating things, she’d not want to speak to him. He’d give her a headache, and she had enough going on that was doing that to her at the moment.

Watching the yard, she noticed her sister there. What she was doing was a mystery to her. Not that Lucia cared, but if Ryiah was having fun or enjoying something, Lucia would put a stop to it. Lately, that had been harder to do. Her sister didn’t seem to enjoy anything anymore.

“Serves her right in not dying when I wanted her to.” Wiping at the window, Lucia pretended to remove Ryiah’s head. “If only it were so easy, I would have done it long ago and be in full power with her magic.”

Lucia looked around, and when she saw no one near her, she sat down and let her fear take her. She was very afraid of Ryiah. Terrified that someday she’d figure out that Lucia was the younger of them and not the oldest by the hour that really separated them. Her mother had had a plan, one that she was sure now she’d meant to profit from.

Her mother had told Lucia that if she wanted to get ahead, she must make her sister heel to her. For Ryiah’s power was going to be great, and that once she came to her own, it would destroy all that Lucia wanted. Men would not adore her, nor would she be able to have the finest of things. And Lucia, even then, had wanted it all. The pretties that should be hers, her mother told her. Jewels and money, more than she’d be able to spend, would be hers for the taking, but only if she would take the place of her sister. Lucia hadn’t understood that until Ryiah came into her power on their thirteenth birthday first. It had been something so grand and amazing that Lucia had been sorely disappointed when her turn came.

Hers had no bright lights before her eyes as her sister’s had. No marking on her body had come to her, and no magic had come to her from the earth. Lucia was given more magic, yes, but not on the scale that her sister had. Lucia had been devastated. But her mother once again had stepped in and helped her.

Shutting her away in the shed, her mother told Ryiah and anyone else who asked that Lucia was overwhelmed by the magic that had come to her, and she needed quiet to deal with it. When she’d been freed of her confines, people were disappointed that she looked no different. But Mother had said it was because Lucia was so beautiful, and that her magic wasn’t something to take away from that.

It had broken Lucia’s heart when she’d had to have her mother murdered by the Council. But she simply knew too much. Even when her mother told them what she’d done, screaming at Lucia to tell them, she’d turned her back on her only ally and decided that with her gone, there wasn’t anyone to gainsay her on killing Ryiah. But that hadn’t worked out either.

But by then she’d taught her sister that she was the stronger and by far more magical than Ryiah would ever be. Lies and deceit seemed to be easier for Lucia than telling the truth and being nice to Ryiah. Thankfully her sister had been beaten down so much over the previous years that Lucia hadn’t had to do much to keep her there. Had she not done what she had, Lucia would be the one trailing after her sister, doing the worst jobs possible and hating her to the point where murder would be all that she thought about. Looking down at her sister now, Lucia saw her sit in the grass and look out among the trees, and she wondered what other things she could do that Lucia could not.

“She would never have treated me the way I do her. Her heart, at one time, was soft, and she too kind. Because she’s a sap, I would have gotten some of what I wanted, but not all. Ryiah would have been kind with her magic. Sharing what she had with me. Keeping me in the manner that I wanted, and she’d never have harmed anyone.” Lucia laughed. “She’s very lucky that I was smart enough to know that to get ahead in this world, you have to cut a few heads off.”

But what to do with Richard.

His family had been a pain in her ass since she was young. His brother first. Malcomb had shunned her twice when she’d gone to him about becoming his lover. Yes, she was younger than him, but she’d been beautiful. The magic that had been put on her to drive him crazy with lust had done nothing but anger him. He had a mate, he had told her, and she should go away.

It had been nothing for her to get someone to go and kill him. No one that worked for her would ever say no to her. But killing him had been...easy, she thought. Or at least his mate had been. Then Malcomb had done her a favor by killing himself. It was then that she found out about Richard, a brother that she never knew he had.

Trying the same magic on him had been useless. First of all, she had a difficult time finding the man. Then when she had, he’d been too busy to notice her. It had taken her nearly a century to find him after Malcomb had done her a favor and taken his own life. But by then Richard had come into his own.

His parents had met the sun, leaving Richard as the only heir to their vast estate soon after Malcomb was dead, and Lucia had wanted that as well. It could all be hers if she could only get him to acknowledge her as his mate. And now, it seemed, that was turning out to be a fact. Richard was her mate, damn it all to hell. Now she realized why she could not kill him as she wished. But the money would be hers, and that, for the moment, could keep her happy.

The plan had been simple. The paperwork and wills that had been made leaving her everything he had were perfect. All she needed to do was kill him, any way she could so long as he was ash and not around to gainsay her plans. Their names had been bound together by a faerie that was now long gone, and not there to say anything different. The faerie had signed the necessary things to say that they were mates and had bonded and mated. And once Richard was gone, she would bring the will and other paperwork before the Council, then claim his estate. It would go a long way to making sure that she had everything and anything she wanted. Even enough to hire someone to murder Ryiah once and for all.

The money that his family had and the magic that would come to her by taking him as a mate had made her reckless and foolish, she knew this now. Even when he’d taken another woman for his mate, someone so boring that Lucia had thought it a mistake, she plotted and planned. But when she’d gone into the bedchamber to drive the stake through both their hearts, it was to find a beauty lying next to Richard, and her jealousy had made her pause.

Richard had attacked her even as she shifted to another being to hide who she was from him. It had been all she could do to keep her head. As it was, she’d been hurt badly and had gone to ground soon after. But his mate was no more. She was sure that was going to be the end of the James family.

“My lady?” Lucia tore her eyes from the scene below her, not really seeing it any longer anyway. Her mind jerked from her memories as she stared at the woman in the doorway. She was confused for several seconds and had to have her repeat what she’d said to understand.

“So you’ve located him. When do you bring him to me?” The woman told her it wasn’t possible. “What do you mean, not possible? I want him here. That alone should give you good reason to do as I say. Get him now.”

“There is a spell around the dwelling where he is.” Lucia looked at the ground below her where Ryiah was and then back at the woman. For the life of her, she had no idea what her name might be. “Nay, my lady. This is not the doing of Ryiah. This is a powerful magic that I have never encountered. Whatever it is, it is nothing that any of us have ever felt before. There is also a curse around it. One that says if there is ill will in your heart, you will not be able to cross the barrier.” When she said no more, Lucia wondered if everyone was working against her in every little thing she had to do.

“So? If that’s all it takes, then think of something else other than getting him for me. Think of...Christ, I don’t know. Something. Anything that will get what I want.” The woman shook her head and backed up when Lucia stood. “Do not tell me no. You know what that does to my temper. Go there, get him, and bring me Richard James today.”

“I know the plan, my lady. It will know, this magic, that I’m there for a single purpose. I need only try to step my foot over the barrier and it will kick me back. Some have been killed for trying too many times.” Lucia waited and crossed her arms over her chest when she did so. “You do not expect me to do that, do you, my lady? To get myself killed for you?”

“I expect you to do as you’re told and to bring me Richard now. I don’t want to hear excuses, and I certainly don’t want to hear how you aren’t giving it your best. Get him.” As the woman turned and walked away, Lucia shouted to her, “You belong to me and you will do as you are told.”

Sitting in her chair, Lucia tried to think how she was going to rid herself of Richard and his soon to be attachment to her. She couldn’t kill him, much less harm him, so she had to think of a way to kill him once and for all. Ryiah would have to do it. That was the only way she could be assured of him being killed, and perhaps her sister being killed in the process. But how to make it come about? How to make her sister hate the man as much as she did and have her kill him?

“Perhaps I can pretend that he means something to me. That should get her motivated.” No, that would work for her, but not Ryiah. She was simply too nice. “I shall send her for him. If she cannot get by the barrier, then she will die. One of them dead will suit me, and I can blame her death on Richard to the Council. It would be a win-win for me.”