Drake Chronicles: 02 Blood Feud (14 page)

CHAPTER 12

LOGAN

I wasn’t about to let Isabeau go off without me.

I didn’t care how long she’d known Magda, didn’t even care that she was going back home to the tribe she loved. Her shield had cracked and I couldn’t forget the glimpse I’d seen. And I hadn’t been feeding her a cheap line when I’d told her I felt as if we already knew each other. Something in me recognized something in her.

But I wasn’t stupid.

I knew she’d never admit to it—and not only because I was a Drake and royalty.

It stil felt weird to think of myself as royalty. I was just one of many Drake boys with a handsome face and a smart mouth. I didn’t stand out particularly; I didn’t have Connor’s knack for computers, Quinn’s right hook, or Marcus’s gift for negotiation. I just dressed better.

“Can I assume you’re not trying to kil me?” I asked as we ran on, leaving the dog’s paw behind.

“I didn’t make that charm,” Isabeau said. “But I damn wel want to know who’s trying to muddy my name.”

“And kil me,” I reminded her dryly.

She looked remote and cool, but I could see the strain of worry under her polite mask. I’d never known anyone more self-contained than she was, running with her giant dog loping at her side, her sword strapped to her back. Magda sent me another glare, which I ignored. Someone materialized at my side.

“Jen, stay here,” I told her. The last thing we needed was a hothead like her barging into Hound territory. She was armed to the teeth, stakes lining the leather strap that fit tight between her breasts, and there were daggers on her belt.

“Someone has to watch your back,” she said stubbornly.

“I’l be fine,” I insisted, annoyed. It wasn’t like I was Solange with some deranged vampire lusting after me, or a little kid. I could take care of myself. I was eighteen years old, for Christ’s sake.

“You’re royalty,” she told me, fol owing me out into the dark forest. “I’m a royal guard.”

I sighed irritably. I didn’t have time to charm her or to shake her loose.

“Fine,” I snapped. “But we’l be guests of the Hounds, so don’t pick a fight.”

“As long as they don’t start anything, I won’t either.”

“I need your promise.”

Her blue eyes sparked. “You have it.”

“Less talking,” Isabeau cal ed back to us. “More running.” She was shooting through the woods like a star, her skin pale and glowing faintly when the moonlight found its way through the thick leaves. She had no idea how beautiful she looked, even grim and deadly as she was right now.

grim and deadly as she was right now.

And I probably shouldn’t be watching her ass quite so careful y but I couldn’t help myself.

The forest went quiet at our approach. Five vampires moving quickly wil silence even the cicadas. An owl rustled in a tree overhead but didn’t fly away. I didn’t know what to expect in the Hounds’ caves. No one had set foot there uninvited in nearly a century even when they were backup caves and not the main residence. I’d been hearing stories about the savage Hounds since I was little. Isabeau had been a surprise to al of us. So had Finn, come to think of it, since he wasn’t technical y a Hound at al . He’d
chosen
to al y himself with them and they’d let him. I wasn’t sure which part was more rare.

We stayed close to the mountain, skirting the huge pine trees. The wind was warm, even here. August was nearly finished, soon the leaves would change colors and fal away. It made it harder to stay undetected in the forest, but not impossible.

“Do you smel something?” Magda asked suddenly, slowing to a stop and frowning. She sniffed the air like a suspicious cat.

Her expression went flat. “Blood.”

My nostrils flared. Definitely blood. A lot of it. Despite the situation, my stomach grumbled. My fangs extended instinctively.

“And something else,” I added, hearing a soft tinkling sound, like ice in a glass. “Did anybody hear that?” Isabeau nodded grimly. I shifted to be closer to her, even though Magda tried to block me. She acted like I was a threat, like I was planning to stake Isabeau when she wasn’t looking.

As if I ever would, and as if Isabeau couldn’t stop me. I don’t know what it said about me that it kind of turned me on that she could probably kick my ass if she wanted to. She might look like a porcelain dol , but I knew from experience that she was tough as iron nails. I’d have to find a nicer way of tel ing her that. I didn’t think she was used to compliments. I may as wel start getting her comfortable with it, because I planned to compliment her a lot. Just as soon as she stopped looking at me like she was trying to figure out what I real y wanted.

Which was her. Just her.

I nearly groaned out loud. Having an aunt who’d slept with Byron and insisted we read al the Romantic poets had evidently addled my brain. My brothers would never let me live it down if they found out I’d fal en in love with a Hound princess after a single night without even kissing her. Like I had any intention of tel ing them. You didn’t survive five older brothers and a younger one by running your mouth off about stuff like that. Basic survival skil .

We crept around a copse of stunted oaks and into a narrow clearing. It was the same one where we’d eavesdropped on the wounded Host after Solange received Montmartre’s “gift.” That couldn’t be a coincidence. I saw the flicker of recognition on Isabeau’s face.

But we didn’t have time to discuss it.

At first, none of us knew what to say. I’d never seen anything like it. The smel of blood was so strong I actual y had to cover my nose until I got used to it. The muscles in the back of my my nose until I got used to it. The muscles in the back of my neck tensed up.

The long grass was undisturbed, dotted with wildflowers. The moon made everything silver, as if it were wet. There were no bodies, no drained humans or animals, no sign of struggle.

Just open uncorked bottles everywhere, dangling from string and wire from the branches. The sound I’d heard was the clinking of glass touching glass when the breeze rattled the macabre wind chimes. There were dozens of them.

“What the hel is this?” Jen muttered.

Every single one, from green wine bottles to jam jars, were fil ed to the rim with blood. Fresh, warm blood. Al of our fangs were out now, Isabeau’s double ones, even Finn’s ancient opal-sharp ones. I took a step closer to a juice bottle, swal owing thickly. I could al but taste it. Jen’s hand slapped my arm, forcing me back.

“Could be poisoned,” she said.

She was right. We al froze. Isabeau turned a slow circle on her heel.

“It smel s familiar, but it’s not poisoned,” she said final y, a kind of horrified awe in her French voice.

“It’s not?” I echoed.

She shook her head. “It’s a trap,” she said. “Like a bowl of sugar water to draw the bees away from the kitchen.” I frowned. “A trap for who? Us?”

“
Oui
.” She reached for her sword just as Charlemagne growled in the back of his throat.

Hel-Blar
.

They were everywhere. We would have smel ed them if it hadn’t been for the blood-saturated air around us. They had a very distinctive stench: rot and mildew and mushrooms. Their blue-tinted skin made them look bruised. Every single tooth in their mouth was a fang, sharpened to a needle’s edge. And their bite was contagious.

And they were coming at us through the trees like spring rivers rushing into the same lake, like deadly blue beetles on fal en fruit.

Hel if I was going to be some ripe piece of apple waiting to be eaten.

“Shit.” I reached for one of my daggers. I hadn’t stopped to grab a sword, which was stupid. I’d thought a dagger and a handful of stakes would be enough.

Real y stupid.

There was no sense in running since there wasn’t a clear path out of the meadow. We could hear them growling and hissing, spitting like rabid animals. It made my jaw clench tight.

The blood wasn’t just tempting them the way it tempted us, it was driving them mad.

“Someone wanted them to attack us,” I snapped at the others. “Someone knew we’d be coming this way.”

“Host,” Isabeau agreed in a voice like winter in the steppes.

“Whoever attacked Kala must have set this up.” I leaped toward her, landing behind her to guard her back before the
Hel-Blar
reached us. She shot me a half-surprised, half-grateful glance. The moon glinted on her sword and the chain mail sewn into the leather of her tunic, over her heart.

“Stay close,” I told her.

She snorted. “I have a sword and you have a butter knife.

Staying close is about your only option.”

And then there real y wasn’t any more time for witty banter.

The unnerving sound the air made as it sliced around them made me understand the old superstitions about vampires turning into bats. I bared my fangs. I had every intention of plucking them right out of the sky if I had to. The first wave hit hard, but at least half of their numbers were distracted by the bottles swinging over our heads. They drained them, gulping frantical y as if they were frat boys at a kegger. Blood ran down their chins, dripped into the flowers. It was only a very brief moment though and then they al wanted the kil and wouldn’t be deterred by bottles of cow blood.

The fight was fast and feral. We had skil on our side but we were outnumbered. And the
Hel-Blar
had battle frenzy down to an art. I kil ed one before he could get too close, but lost my stake in the long grass. He was too far for me to reclaim my weapon without leaving Isabeau unguarded. I had two more stakes.

“Shit, don’t be a martyr,” Jen yel ed at me through her teeth.

She tossed me one of her swords. She stil had one in her hand and one at her hip.

“Thanks!” I caught it, grinning. I felt better already. I leaped over the thrust of a rusty rapier.

“Royal plums for the picking,” one of them sneered. An empty bottle crunched under his boot. “Is this the way you decorate for your fancy parties?”

So they hadn’t been sent after al , only lured and manipulated without their knowledge.

That was something to think about.

A stake grazed my left shoulder, leaving a raw burn in its wake.

Later.

“Damn it, Logan,” Isabeau shouted. “Pay attention.

Franchement
,” she added in French. I could tel by the tone that it wasn’t a lover’s endearment.

She swung hard and blocked the attack of a screeching
Hel-Blar
. His arm, now unattached, sailed through the air and landed with a thud. It was stil clutching a long stake soaked in poison. I could smel it, like salt and iron and rust. I kicked it aside.

Jen had dispatched two of them and Magda was shrieking back at one like a psychotic banshee. She might look like a flower fairy but she had wicked good aim. Dust puffed in front of her and she turned to the next one. Jen was nearby, hacking away with deadly arrogance in every swing.

A
Hel-Blar
thrust her dagger at me. I kicked out, snapping her wrist. The knife tumbled and she howled, then leaped at my head. We sprawled on the ground. A bottle snapped from its tether and landed by my head. Blood seeped into the ground.

The
Hel-Blar
bared her fangs. They gleamed like needles. I cracked my elbow under her jaw and she nearly bit her tongue off. Saliva hit my neck. I fought harder until I managed to get my leg up enough to dislodge her. She hit the tree beside us and my stake dug into her papery heart before she could recover.

She crumpled.

I leaped to my feet. Later, I’d feel bad I’d had to kil her. Right now, my mother’s training was too strong, stronger even than the gentlemanly courtesies the rest of my family had instil ed. I might wear frock coats and recite poetry better than sports stats but I knew the rules: you fought, you survived. And
Hel-Blar
took no prisoners.

Jen was proof of that.

I had time only to turn and the
Hel-Blar
she’d been fighting took her legs out from under her and buried the sharpened end of a staff in her chest.

“Son of a bitch,” I yel ed, using Jen’s borrowed sword to cleave his head right off his shoulders. Then I stabbed him in the heart, pushing through his rib cage. But Jen was reduced to gray ash in a cup of primrose petals and clothes patterned with the Drake crest. I couldn’t even stop to mourn her or hate myself for being the reason she was here in the first place.

Isabeau was tiring. I could see it in the arc of her sword arm, stil deadly but infinitesimal y slower. Magda was limping, holding herself up on a stolen broadsword, her hair matted with blood. We couldn’t keep this up much longer.

“We have to get out of here,” I said to Isabeau. “Now. Up into the trees maybe.”

“Charlemagne can’t fly,” she said, and I knew that was the end of that half-formed plan. Isabeau would never leave her dog. She’d lie down and get staked first.

“Fine,” I said, grabbing Jen’s sword from under her empty clothes and surreptitiously slipping a bottle of blood into my shirt. “Then we do it another way.” I stepped out of the safe ring Isabeau, Magda, and I had formed. Isabeau hissed at me.

“What are you doing?”

“Saving your very cute ass,” I hissed back. Then I smirked my most arrogant smirk at the
Hel-Blar
. “Did you know royal blood tastes sweetest?” I dragged the blade across the inside of my forearm, biting back a curse. In the movies, no one ever mentioned how much cutting yourself open real y freaking
hurt
. I held up my arm, blood dripping down to my elbow and spattering over the ground. Most of the
Hel-Blar
paused, turning to stare at me hungrily.

For this to be a rescue mission and not a suicide mission I was going to have to move
fast
.

“Come and get it,” I shouted at them before throwing myself into the shadows between the trees, away from Isabeau and the mountain caves. I heard her litany of curses, al in French and al at the top of her lungs. Most of the
Hel-Blar
fol owed me, driven by bloodlust. They weren’t stupid exactly, just mindless when it came to feeding. Only a few stayed behind to fight the others, which I felt certain they could handle.