Night Kings: The Complete Anthology (27 page)

Elsa made it up the stairs with some delay.
She was light in the head, numb to her hands on the railing, and
barely able to push open the door to her bedroom. When she finally
managed this feat, Elsa flopped down onto her bed. Sleep hit her
quickly while she waited for Gemma’s call. That call would come as
expected, but neither her father nor she would be there to
answer.

Had Elsa Dukane been in the right mind she
would’ve noticed the dark presence outside her bedroom window.
Corina Petravic lay outside, ten feet above the ground, with eyes
locked on the woman she’d seen in the young werewolf’s mind. Eat or
be eaten, Corina would choose the former every time the option
presented itself, many times without even that.

What would this young woman choose?

“Eat or be eaten,” said the dark princess,
“and choose wisely, little girl, because I can assure you the feral
werewolf will choose the former.”

Chapter Forty Six

Night Kings: Darkest of Depths

Gregory Blackman

Caged

Lukas Wendish spent the night of the full
moon locked in the secret chamber of a woman he still couldn’t
comprehend. Whatever she wanted he didn’t possess it. Whatever she
needed Lukas would never, could never give it.

He felt the full moon approach within his
bones and in less than an hour the beast would awaken, forcefully.
He’d lose himself in the river of blood Corina mentioned and there
wasn’t anything in this world he could do to stop it.

The muffled sounds of movement from the other
side of the hatch brought him to his feet. Lukas waited, bided his
time, and hoped that he might catch her unaware with the
change.

He would take his chances while they were
still his to take. Not hers.

“Back the fuck up, you mangy dog,” Corina
barked at him from behind the hatch door. “You’ve got company.”

A terror stricken Lukas Wendish watched as
his closest friend entered into his cell. She entered not of her
own will, but of the masochist that carried her. Elsa was tossed to
the floor as if she meant nothing, but in truth, to Corina Petravic
she was less than nothing. She was the means to an end.

“Not a chance.” He tried to rush the dark
princess, but was halted by his iron shackles. Still, he tried to
fight with everything he had left to give. It amounted to little
and quickly he was silenced by a backhand from Corina. He made no
move to defend himself from another onslaught. All he cared about
was the one down on the floor beside him. Lukas moved to Elsa’s
side and cupped her head in his hands. The dark princess be damned,
his friend would always come first.

“What did you do to her?”

Corina scoffed at the implication. “If I had
done
something you would know. I think she was given a
sedative by her deliciously overprotective father. Made my job
slightly easier, I’ll admit, but it wasn’t
nearly
as
fun.”

She moved forward and threw Lukas against the
wall on route to the unconscious Elsa Dukane. That’s when Corina
Petravic’s many fangs descended from her mouth.

“Better late than never,” the dark princess
said.

She proceeded to tear into the neck of Elsa
with fiery passion. Lukas tried to stop her, but like all his
previous attempts, he was shut down before he could land a
blow.

Corina didn’t even look back at him while she
put him down to the cement floor. Not while she was teeth deep in
his best friend. She was swept up in her bloodlust and lost to her
emotions. It dulled her senses and made the slight different in
taste harder to detect, but it was there and after some time she
found that out for herself.

“Son of a Cerberus!” Corina Petravic pulled
back sharply from Elsa’s touch. “What in hell do we have here?”

The startled princess looked back at the
woman she accosted in the hopes her neck would be ripped wide open
and this matter resolved. What she saw was an entirely different
story. For Elsa Dukane it was as if the attack never happened; but
for the perverse royal in red and black it appeared to have just
begun.

The blood poured from her thinly sealed lips
and cascaded down to the floor, all while she stared back at Elsa
Dukane with curious eyes. “It looks like this one might choose to
eat, after all.”

When the sadistic princess saw a flicker of
movement from the eyelashes of Elsa, she moved to the doorway,
placed a hand on the circular handle, and said, “I want the two of
you to have a nice evening.”

“Let her go,” Lukas pleaded on his hands and
knees in surrender. “Put her in another room. Do
something—anything—I don’t care! Just don’t leave her with me! I’ll
do anything you want!”

“I won’t and you will,” said Corina Petravic
with a sneer in disapproval, “for you’ll have no other choice in
the matter. Blood comes to Salem, my dear mutt, whether you want it
to or not and it comes tonight. I only seek to make sure you’re
prepared.”

As the hatch slammed shut Lukas dropped to
the ground in agony. The ringing of steel echoed around in his
head. It was too loud, too powerful, and brought Lukas to his hands
and knees. He felt the change come for him, faster than he
anticipated. Locked in this cell his wolf couldn’t wait any longer
to come out. They had run out of time.

“Are you okay?” a wide eyed Elsa Dukane
asked.

She appeared to have recovered from her
afflictions. How much she knew was still in question. It was all a
blur to the unknown girl, half human, half monster, and in a world
well outside her jurisdiction. The only thing of certainty to Elsa
was that her closest friend writhed in agony beside her.

“Damn it, Lukas,” cried Elsa as she rushed to
his side. “I’m here and it doesn’t look like I’m going anything.
How about you tell me what the
fuck
is going on?”

It was the true monster behind Lukas Wendish
that he tried desperately to push back. The one he never wanted her
to see. It might’ve been Corina Petravic that arranged this
meeting, but Lukas knew the truth behind the matter.

This moment had been coming since they first
met. Now it was here and they’d find out, once and for all, where
this friendship was headed.

Chapter Forty Seven

Night Kings: Darkest of Depths

Gregory Blackman

Crow Bait

A dark shadow had been cast of the Dukane
household. When Victor came to bid his slumbering daughter
goodnight, possibly goodbye, he discovered that she’d been taken in
the night. An open window provided the only clue, but the bedroom
was on the second story with no lattice below. That left only one
of the Salem races able to carry out such actions.

He thought the man in black the guilty party,
but when Victor went to the manor he found the vampire king tended
to nothing but a sad, lonely kingdom. There no guards lined the
outer walkways, no supporters beckoned in the courtyard. It was a
quiet place where not a soul rested, save the man in black and his
shadow army.

That meant another took her, so Victor set
forth to all the vampire dens on his nefarious list. He found that
each of the dens he visited was the same story reenacted. The
houses were vacant, filled only with bullet-ridden furniture and
coffins.

He was to know where these dens were, but not
to act upon that knowledge. Not until the lady in red wished it
so.

Months back, before the reaper was found,
Xenia came to him in the dead of night. Together they joined in a
secret union, one unknown to the witches and the werewolves. His
motives were pure on that fateful night, but ever since he’d become
tainted by dark forces he couldn’t begin to understand.

When not a single vampire could be found in
the city of Salem it then Victor Dukane had to face the prospect
that it was the
others
, the ones he feared most of all,
that’d taken his daughter from him.

In his panic to find out more information,
Victor returned to their gated community where his notes were
compiled. His neighbors didn’t know the truth behind the evils they
faced tonight, but even their dulled, human senses could detect the
dark presence that waited outside their homes. That made for
quieted streets, stirred only by the flapping wings of a
thick-billed raven. It landed on the home of Victor Dukane,
watched, and waited until the time was right. No different than the
times before.

Victor opened the front door of his home in
full stride. He wasn’t sure of what he searched for. He only hoped
that somewhere, in some document, there was an answer to his
problems.

A stifled noise from the family room across
the hall caught his attention. Had his daughter returned while he
was out? That was the question that stirred in the pit of Victor
Dukane as he entered the darkened room. He would soon find out the
answer was far more complicated.

“The werewolves believe the full moon was
meant for them alone,” the hoarse voice of Hans Brackhaus rang out
through the family room. “Brutish animals that care little for
those that came before them. They think themselves above us, Homo
superior or something of that ilk. Foolish, that’s what they are,
and young,
too
young, to know truth behind those moon gods
of theirs.”

Hans stood masked in the shadows of Victor’s
front bay window. With his back turned to Victor, he looked out the
window to the front yard where not even a raven watched this night.
“They deserve everything that comes to them.”

Victor hands trembled in rage and he
approached the man before him, but as he grabbed hold of Hans’
shoulder he was overwhelmed by a sense of dread.

“I don’t know what you think—.”

“I think you
do
,” Hans replied with
cold eyes that refused to back down. “I think you know better than
you let on. I came to you all those years ago because I saw
something in you. Yet, for the life of me I can’t remember what
that something was. You’ve grown weak, accustomed to the power
you’ve been given, but it would’ve all been forgiven had you not
been complacent to the enemies we face. To my people that’s the
most unforgiveable sin of all.”

“It could’ve been anyone,” Hans trailed on,
“but the others decided that man would be you, Mr. Dukane; and for
that I think they deserve a modicum of respect. Wouldn’t you
agree?”

“I’m still that man. I can still bridge that
gap.”

“Are you? Can you, really?” Hans asked with a
peculiar glint in his eyes. “A rabid band of werewolves approaches
the town as we speak. Open your eyes. Salem’s lost to us. This
alliance you made only served to deepen their roots in the
community. There isn’t a block in the city of Salem where their
dark ties don’t run. Are you that blind? Are you that
arrogant?”

Victor wanted to fight back with every fiber
of his being, but in the face of the truest evil he’d ever known,
nothing he could fathom would be enough to stem the tide. With only
the safety of his daughter in mind, he clasped his hands together,
and pleaded, “It’s not too late—.”

“But it is, brother,” said Hans, turned to
face his onetime associate. “Charleston is in flames and soon a
similar fate will befall Salem.”

“It could all have been prevented,” Hans said
with a step forward. “If only you’d heeded my warnings and stopped
this alliance before it got off the ground. You condemned this
city, Victor, and all who dwell within… even your precise, little
girl.”

Suddenly it became clear to the embattled
mayor. At last, Victor saw the man before him for what he really
was, what he had been since day one.

“It was
you
,” an addled Victor said.
“You killed the reaper. You flushed the vampires from their dens…
our people could’ve been killed in those damned assaults!”

Hans waved his finger from side to side,
sinewy grin plastered on his face. There was only one man in this
city that could stand toe to toe with Hans Brackhaus. No matter how
brawny he made himself appear, that man wasn’t Victor Dukane. That
man was Bernhard Wendish, a man now six feet under the vampire
queen’s heel.

“But they aren’t
my
people, Mr.
Mayor,” said Hans through pursed lips. “These are your people, the
whiny, gluttonous lot of them.”

“Why did you do it?” Victor asked. “The
reaper’s death put this all in motion. You caused this! You’re the
one who brought Hell to Salem!”

“Don’t be melodramatic.” The dark robed
councilor hadn’t once taken his eyes off the embattled mayor. His
stare was haunting, but his opponent was hardened after so many of
their meetings and held his ground admirably. In the end Victor
would crack, as had everyone before him. “What happens next was
predetermined a millennium ago. Though, I’ll admit the discovery of
a reaper in Salem moved our plans forward a few years…”

“Who do you work for?” Victor asked. “I want
the real name behind the attack. Not the name I was given all those
years ago.”

“You know,” said Hans as he turned back to
face the bay window, “the reaper asked the same thing before I beat
him to death. What makes you believe your luck any better than
his?”

“You stood against a reaper on equal ground?”
Victor balked at the thought. He would’ve been in stitches had this
man not sent a shiver down every bone in his body. “I think
not.”

“It’s true,” Hans said. “I wouldn’t want to
meet one in a dark alley. I also wouldn’t want to meet one in a
fair fight. Luckily, neither of those events happened. I lured him
to the forests where I had some disgruntled werewolves and junkie
vampires laying in wait. I even let him kill off all but a few of
the warrior caste before I stepped in to finish the deed.”

Hans Brackhaus became a different man
overnight. Maybe it was the man he always was, before he came to
the New World, now shown in true color to the man he worked
alongside for decades. When Victor was approached by Hans it was
under much different circumstances than the ones they now found
themselves. He was young, eager to make his mark on the world; but
the world wanted nothing to do with him. It made Hans’ offer for
power all the more tempting to take.