Bloodliner

Chapter 9

Chapter 9Genghis laughed as Thomas drained the blood from the vampire's corpse sprawled over the church pew. "You and your sloppy seconds!" He ruffled Thomas' hair.

Thomas looked up, his fangs and lips dripping with blood. "I'm not letting perfectly good juice go to waste!"

Shakespeare's impulse was to tear the boy from his feast and put him through a wall.

Raised by the most degenerate of our kind, this child is little better than an animal. If he can drink our own dead with such zest, there is nothing he won't do.

But Shakespeare didn't follow his impulse. He saw Genghis watching for his reaction, but he didn't give him the satisfaction.

In the interest of preserving the truce, I shall hew to the business at hand. Time enough later for the storm.

"Three of our own lost here," said Shakespeare, covering a second body with a white cloth he'd found in the sanctuary. "Four so far this night, in all. Yet I have a feeling the price of our prize shall rise further still in days and nights to come."

"Gee." Genghis made a face at him, crossing his eyes and rolling his head to portray stupidity. "Ya think so?"

Shakespeare ignored his mockery. "The stories we've heard do not come close to reality," he said. "This Stanza is indeed an elemental force. Were we truly placed in opposition, she would prove a worthy adversary."

"For a china doll like you, maybe." Genghis laughed and waved a hand at him dismissively. "She wouldn't even make a light snack for natural born killers like Thomas and me. Right, boy?"

Thomas whirled from his meal and roared, contorting his bloody face in a mask of savage fury.

Shakespeare looked to James for his reaction. Though James kept a poker face in place, Shakespeare knew him well enough to read the underlying currents.

He's confused and frightened. Seeing a monster whose face could be his own, he fears what that monster might do to him...and likewise fears that he himself might be a darker monster than he has ever guessed.

"James," said Shakespeare. "Here." He tossed a folded white cloth, and James caught it. "Cover that body, else the vermin defile it further."

James stood in place and watched Thomas continue to lap blood from the corpse's wounds.

Courage, boy. Now's your chance to light the flame, else this cur sip your blood next...or worse, a self-fulfilling terror drives you to become a monster, too.

"Now, James," Shakespeare said firmly. "That man is part of Cruentus Estus, as are we. He died to bring us closer to the prize. Let us treat him not with disregard but honor."

Still, James hesitated. He met Shakespeare's gaze, then looked at Thomas, then back. Finally, he swallowed hard, clenched his jaw, and walked toward Thomas and the corpse in the pew.

"Move," said James. "Let me cover the body."

Thomas just kept gulping blood.

"That's enough." James kicked Thomas' foot. "Now move."

Still, Thomas ignored him.

James waited a moment...then jumped in and heaved Thomas off the body. "I said move!"

Thomas hit the floor and instantly leaped to his feet. He lunged at James, stopping inches away, and glared with murderous, animal rage.

Steady, James. This moment decides it.

Thomas darted forward, howling and snapping...but James did not budge. When Thomas lashed out a bloody hand to claw his face, James caught and held it fast.

Shakespeare held his breath as he watched. If the two flew into full-blown battle, he could not guess the outcome. If they fought to the death, only one thing would be certain.

Brother would kill brother.

What an awful fate that would be—brothers separated for a lifetime, raised in feuding camps, and brought together only long enough for one to kill the other. It would be an ending fit for one of Shakespeare's tragic plays, if he still wrote them.

I only hope some flicker of loving memory does not stay James' hand or leave him open to the killing strike.

James and Thomas stayed locked together for long moments, bodies perfectly still but wills clashing like ships on a wild sea, every cannon blasting.

Finally, Thomas broke away, wrenching his hand from James' grip and bumping shoulders as he shoved past him. "I'm done eating, anyway."

Well done, James.

Shakespeare wanted to go to James and pat him on the back. Congratulations were in order...and relief, for Shakespeare knew how near a thing it had been.

But now is not the time for celebration. Balance has been struck, but we have yet to win the war and make a brother from a monster.

Just then, Shakespeare felt Genghis' arm slide around his shoulders. "He's saving him for later," said Genghis. "So he can savor every bite."

Shakespeare turned away as James covered the body in the makeshift shroud. "I'm doing the same for you," he said, smiling at Genghis. "It gives me something to look forward to and plan in great detail."

Genghis laughed and slapped him on the back. "What a sense of humor! I really should be writing all this down."

"Excellent idea," said Shakespeare. "You have a lot to learn about the spoken word. The grunts and growls you favor will not get your point across in civilized company."

"But I want nothing to do with civilization," said Genghis, "except bring it to its knees and drain every last drop of its lifeblood."

Shakespeare met his gaze. Down the long centuries of his half-life, he had encountered all manner of undead creatures...but Genghis was unique.

Like the first of a horrible new species, he strides upon the Earth, consumed with dreams of slaughtering all but those few servants and foodstuffs required to raise his monstrous young.

"I wonder," said Shakespeare. "What will you do when you enter the paradise we seek? The prize the rabbits we pursue shall find and open?"

"Take all the power it has to offer." Genghis' high-pitched voice was a hiss. "Use it to turn the rest of the world into Hell."

How I wish we'd never signed this vile treaty.

Suddenly, sirens wailed in the distance.

"Time now to get us gone from here, I think," said Shakespeare. "Return to the trail of our rabbits three and urge them onward with our shadows."

Without being asked, James stepped up and rattled off a report. "The advance team is still following Mavis' vehicle." James pressed the cell phone earpiece further into his ear and listened carefully. "She and the others are heading for the desert."

"Let's join the chase, then." Shakespeare took off his robe as he marched out the door. He transformed along the way, his skin turning pale gray with fine, white fur.

The sirens continued to get closer.

Huge, leathery wings unfolded from Shakespeare's back. "We shall take to the skies," he said, "follow where Stanza leads, and in so doing take the next steps toward our prize."

Before Shakespeare could get off the ground, though, Thomas charged out past him, wings flapping, and launched ahead of everyone.

"Screw the prize," said Thomas. "I just want some more corpses to drink."

Genghis followed, shifting into his red hawk form and brushing back Shakespeare with great sweeps of his wings.

"I might just go home soon," said Genghis. "The boy can handle all of you on his own, I think."

Then, with a laugh that became the keening shrill cry of a giant hawk, Genghis took to the sky. The lights of the approaching police cars flashed red-blue-red on the undersides of his vast, feathered wings.