Blood Enthralled (Blood Enchanted, Book Three): A Vampire Hunter Paranormal Romance Series Page 2

  I stared at Hakan’s bare legs under his own Mhachkay warrior garb. He hadn’t bothered with the girly dress.

  “Hayatim,” he murmured, so low I was sure no one else had heard. “You are not helping.”

  “Just an observation,” I muttered. “Who is he?”

  “Our King.” He’d said the word in Turkish. Kral. This vampire who walked towards us was King of the Mhachkay. How was he related to Hakan?

  “Nephew,” the King said. Maybe he could read my mind, too, then. Not a pleasant thought.

  “No,” Hakan murmured and then louder greeted the King. “Uncle. You have risen.”

  “You think you are the only one to have been awoken by the Enchanted.” His eyes landed on me. Then shifted back to Hakan as if I didn't really matter.

  I arched my brow and cocked a hip, letting the Kilij swing in lazy circles from my seemingly loose grasp.

  The King’s eyes tracked the movement reluctantly.

  Six leather-clad warriors stepped out of the shadows. None of them wore fancy-arsed robes either.

  I stilled the Kilij. The guards stopped advancing. I swung the sword again, because, come on! Of course, I’d test my ‘power’. The guards stepped forward in a synchronised march.

  The Kilij came to rest, point tip to chipped tiled floor. Everyone stopped moving.

  “Interesting,” I said into the silence.

  “You have Entwined her blood,” the King declared, ignoring me completely. “Good. No Enchanted should be left uncontrolled.”

  Excuse me?

  The ribbons told me to remain silent. I seethed internally at them.

  “We always knew this would happen,” the King added. I waited for Hakan to talk, but my warrior said nothing. “But now we are here; we must take what was promised.”

  Oh, that didn't sound good, did it?

  “There were two?” the King asked.

  “Yes,” Hakan replied steadily. His body thrummed. He was fuming, I realised. And wasn’t it interesting that I could read that in his immobile and apparently relaxed stance? Clearly, the King couldn’t.

  “Where is he?” the Kral asked.

  Hopefully miles away from here. I let a little of my Light out and tried to sense Luc’s and Alain’s Dark. If my brother and Papa’s spymaster were nearby, they were cloaked. Or they hadn’t survived crossing a portal onto Earth. I tried not to let the worry show on my impassive façade. The recently joined kindred pair could be anywhere. Outside of my ability to seek them with my Light.

  I could only hope.

  “You will contain this one while my guards search out the other,” the King proclaimed. “For now, I will not mete out punishment. You are of royal blood, after all,” he sneered. “But cross me again, Hakan Iskender Bahar, and I will have my pound of flesh.” His eyes landed on me once more, the implication obvious.

  He could fucking try. I stared back, letting him see my defiance. Letting him see I could hold his gaze - well, sort of - and not fear being glazed by it.

  His eyes flashed candy apple, then settled into a glacial blue. His fists clenched. He showed too much emotion.

  Been asleep too long, old man. I smirked. Hakan laughed.

  The air hung heavy.

  “What is so funny?” the Kral demanded.

  “My hanımefendi,” Hakan said. “She thinks you’ve lost your touch. I agree with her.”

  The King flashed fangs. I snorted.

  “Really?” I said voice raised only slightly. “That’s the best you’ve got?”

  “Discipline your Enchanted,” the King growled. “Or I will do it for you.”

  Ediz roared, bursting into his Erbörü form on a hiss that sent goosebumps down my arms. Six Erbörü stepped out of the shadows and crouched by the guards. Razor sharp claws clicked on tile, fur-covered arms bulged with barely restrained muscle, their muzzle-like maw dripping saliva.

  Diplomacy had always been my downfall. I raised the Kilij. Hakan’s fangs came down. Goran stepped forward, flanking my free side. The Hyrða carried two blazing Fey swords.

  So much for glamour.

  “You think me unprepared, nephew?” the Kral snapped. “Maybe it is you who has lost their touch.”

  The King snapped his fingers and shuffling and scraping followed. Then out of the shadows flowed two more guards, their gauntleted hands wrapped around the collar of an unconscious figure. Two feet dragged through the dirt. A mop of dirty blond hair stuck out of a lolling head. Muscular arms hung limply between the Mhachkay goons.

  Arms made strong from constant use when legs no longer worked to move you.

  “Travis,” I muttered, taking a step forward, moving to pass Hakan until he stopped me with an arm around my waist.

  “Wait,” he murmured.

  “You recognise him?” the King asked. Of course, I recognised him. He was my friend. My human friend. “He has told us much about the world as it is now. About your father.” I felt sick.

  Sweat beaded my brow, my eyes all for Travis. The last time I’d seen him had been in his hideout in Auckland, sitting in his wheelchair before his high-tech equipment. The last time I’d seen the hideout it had been a crater in the ground.

  “You took him,” I growled. “You worked with that fucking fairy.” The fairy who had initially abducted me and stolen my Sigillum’s power.

  The King smiled. “War is never pretty, Enchanted. The first lesson you shall learn as our silah. One must do things during war that one does not necessarily like.”

  Silah, my mind told me, that new understanding of Turkish proving helpful, meant ‘weapon.’

  My eyes flicked to Hakan’s. The King laughed.

  “You haven’t told her? Oh, how delightful. Allow me.” Hakan growled. The King held up a hand and a sword tip pierced into Travis’ neck. My old friend groaned and bucked, but the sword only dug in deeper.

  I clenched my fists but remained where I was at Hakan’s side. My Light thrummed; its presence was reassuring.

  I had to time this just right.

  “At the moment of our imprisonment,” the Mhachkay King said, “we were granted one boon for our compliance. Can you guess what that might have been?”

  I wasn’t up on my Mhachkay history. There’d barely been time to get to know Hakan, let alone seek answers to the many questions I had regarding his unique vampire heritage. I knew the Mhachkay heralded from the Ottoman Empire. I knew my father and the ancient two soul beings had a strained relationship. I also knew the Ottoman Empire had invaded Wallachia where my father had gone to when he’d first been Turned over five hundred years ago.

  There was a story there, a violent one, but I was not privy to it.

  I am a Durand. I never show fear. Or that I’m behind the eight-ball. I bared my teeth and snarled.

  “Feisty,” the Kral said. “How enchanting.” Prick. “No guesses?” he added. “Then let me enlighten you.” He was really getting on my last nerve. “We were promised the next Enchanted. For our acquiescence and internment the Mhachkay Kral” - he pointed to himself with a smirk - “would Entwine his blood with the first born since the dark ages.”

  The King stared at me.

  “Are you the firstborn, Enchanted?”

  I wasn’t. Luc was. By about a minute.

  I reached out to Hakan with my mind and found his open and waiting. A connection so grounding I felt like the world could blow apart, and neither of us would shift an inch from where we were standing.

  Ready? he asked as if he knew exactly what I had planned and backed me completely.

  What had he said? You alone are my match in this and all worlds.

  Well, he was my match, too.

  “Yes,” I said to the King of the awoken Mhachkay. “I am the firstborn.”

  And then I struck.

  2

  The New Mhachkay Era

  Light blazed in the crumbling courtyard. Hisses and roars rent the still dawn air. Swords met in a clang of ringing metal. Sanguis Vitam washed across the
cracked stone floor and pounded against my shields.

  There were more of them than us, and they had Travis.

  But the Kral had underestimated me.

  I spun through the air, shards of debris floating all around me, little pinpricks of pain as they slashed at my cheeks. I ignored the distracting sensation and concentrated on the Nosferatin spin. Wielding Light and spinning at the same time wasn’t such a hard thing to do, but doing so when surrounded by a dozen horror-like shapeshifting monsters and their evil overlord with his crew of sycophants was a struggle.

  Mhachkay reached out to grab me. One even connected the tip of his fingers to my hair. I felt a tug; my spin went off track, and then I landed on the rubble-strewn ground, tucking into a roll. I was up and spinning again in the next instant, but the Mhachkay were getting more determined to reach me.

  The fact that my Light had only dazed them left me confused. I’d packed a punch into that blast, and yet they were still standing. Some had lost their balance but quickly regained it. Some had shaken their heads as if clearing a fog from their vision. The Kral had held motionless throughout it all.

  I could hear Ediz growling, the growl tapering off to a hiss at the end. I could see Goran dancing through the throng on light feet, spinning and dodging and offering up a gauntleted fist to vampire cheeks. The fire blazing on his twin Fey swords caught my eye. But it was Hakan, in full warrior garb and mode, that truly stole all attention.

  He was magnificent in action; fighting four of the Kral’s vampires at once. He ducked and dodged, and twirled out of arms’ reach, then rolled and delivered a cutting slice across the stomach of one. The hilt of his sword swept back in the next heartbeat, connecting with the nose of a vampire who had the audacity to come up unseen behind him.

  But there were so many. Four of us. At least twelve of the Mhachkay now. And each one commanded an Erbörü. I hadn’t realised the relationship between Mhachkay and Erbörü was so formal. Hakan had called Georgia my familiar. I’d dismissed the term at the time as I’d had more pressing things to consider. But perhaps to the Mhachkay familiars were normal.

  I didn’t have time to contemplate the thought further as I landed in the middle of three Mhachkay of my own. Spinning is a handy little Nosferatin trick during battle. But no spin is indefinite, and mine had been miscalculated due to the distraction of Hakan fighting.

  I growled low in the back of my throat, calling myself every name I could think of under the sun in my mind. Which made me check the location of the sun now. It was peeking above the horizon. We had only a few minutes to hold out before the sun would do its damage. Mhachkay magic or not, I didn’t think the ancient vampires could withstand sun indefinitely.

  Had we been in Faerie, perhaps it would have been different. But we were on my turf now.

  I blocked a sword blow from the side and swept out with my free hand, the one now holding a silver stake, with the other. Part of me wished I was holding my Svante and not the Kilij, but the ribbons twisted and turned and told me to keep fighting with my vampire’s sword. I wondered if its place on Hakan’s ceremonial weapons wall had meant more than I realised.

  A Mhachkay parried a thrust of the Kilij, his eyes trailing over the blade and hilt and then flicking to my face. It was enough to blast him with my Light and then slice across his neck with the sword he so admired.

  I spun and faced another, who stepped back and with a flick of his fingers, sent his Erbörü familiar into the fight. Bastard. Not that I’m incapable of fighting shapeshifters, but even I tried to keep the number of confrontations in the arena back home to a minimum when it came to the furred and fanged variety.

  The Erbörü let out an earsplitting growl and then swiped at me with his razor-sharp claws. The rising sun glinted off green eyes, caught the drool that dribbled out of his mouth, and the blood that coated his claws now. I realised he’d connected. I hadn’t even felt it, but I felt the sting now.

  I didn’t show any weakness. Now more than ever my mother’s mantra would mean the difference between winning or losing this fight. We circled each other. The Mhackay who I’d landed in the middle of all stood back and watched, no doubt expecting a quick fight. I let my gaze wash over them, the extended battle, the Kral watching with hunger in his eyes. And then I smiled.

  The Erbörü hissed and gathered himself in a crouch, ready to pounce.

  Ediz never gave himself away like that. If he were hunting something, like he’d hunted my friend Georgia back in Auckland, then he’d simply throw himself at his target without stopping to think his actions out. This Erbörü was either out of practice or more circumspect than Ediz. Either would not serve him well in this fight.

  My fingers flexed around the hilt of the Kilij, the ribbons twisting and turning in anticipation of the oncoming fight, and then I stepped forward.

  And the Erbörü split into three.

  I was so stunned that I stopped all forward motion. I blinked at the sight of triplicate monsters before me, expecting them to move in unison, or maybe for me to wake up and feel lightheaded but the triple vision to subside. Instead, I received a raking of claws down my left side, making me lose my grip on the stake.

  As the stake hit the tiles, I spun away. I hadn’t planned the flight; I’d just reacted. Something I hadn’t done since I was young and inexperienced in battle. Alain would be appalled if he saw me now. I shoulder charged a Mhackkay. Kicked out at an Erbörü. Hip bumped something else. None of it was pretty. All of it looked desperate.

  Fear coated the back of my mouth.

  Hakan roared.

  Ediz hissed.

  The Kral laughed.

  And then something snapped around my neck from behind.

  I landed in an undignified mess at the feet of a Mhachkay vampire, who looked down at me and sneered. I blinked up at him, my free hand already testing the collar at my neck, my other hand, the one still holding the Kilij, raised as if I could fight him from my inferior position.

  The Mhachkay stared at the sword and then lifted arrogant eyes to my face.

  “He lets you handle his blade?” he said in a smooth voice that belied the frightening look on his face.

  I smirked. I was in no position to smirk. I did it anyway.

  “It’s a nice blade,” I said. “Long, hard, big. More than you could handle, vampyre.”

  He leaned down, his eyes dark and narrowed, and then backhanded me across the face.

  Why I was surprised, I don’t know. This was battle. I’d lost and then smart-mouthed the victor. Anything goes.

  But I hadn’t expected the Mhachkay to mistreat their Enchanted.

  I wanted to look toward Hakan. To see if he was still fighting. To see if the man I had entwined my blood with was like the monster before me. I did nothing. Just held the dark-eyed stare of the Mhachkay before me with defiant eyes.

  “Good work, Ekrem,” the Kral said as he approached. He was speaking in Turkish again. “We will have this contained before the sun fully rises.”

  Ediz roared in the background. I was afraid his roar was one of failure. I couldn’t hear Hakan or Goran. And from where I sat, surrounded by Mhachkay and Erbörü, I could not see them fighting either.

  “You spin well, Enchanted,” the Kral said. “But you have not met our kind before. It was inevitable that you would falter.”

  I had faltered. One look at the multiplying Erbörü and I’d stumbled; lost all semblance of warrior calm and thrown the battle. I was ashamed. I was furious. I let the King see only my rage.

  The world narrowed to just him and me. A long-lost King from a long-lost time and the daughter of the Champion. I lifted my chin, aware of the sensation of the collar tightening. I didn’t know yet what it did, but as my ribbons had gone quiet and I couldn’t sense any Dark around me, I was reasonably sure it had locked down my talents and possibly even my Light. I hadn’t reached for it yet; I’d been zapped before when banded in Álfheimr. I wasn’t about to weaken my already weakened position by writhing
around on the Sultan Ahmed Mosque’s floor.

  But I had been raised in the cutthroat arena of vampire politics. I knew when to show no fear, never give an inch, and always stay on guard.

  This vampire would get nothing of weakness from me.

  “You have made a grave mistake,” I said, voice cutting. “Do you realise who I am?”

  “An Enchanted. The first Enchanted born since the end of Mhachkay rule. Ours,” he said with finality.

  “I am the daughter of the Champion,” I announced, sitting straighter, glaring daggers from my eyes. “The daughter of the Prophesied. The goddaughter of the Enforcer. The goddaughter of the…”

  The Kral flicked his wrist and Travis was thrown at his feet, right before my eyes.

  My friend stirred. Bruises blossoming all over his pale skin. His legs lay in a twisted, crooked mess. His chest rose on a startled breath of air. He lifted his head. Blurry eyes blinked at me.

  “El?” he groaned.

  I made to move toward him, and the collar tightened. I tried to suck in air, but air was denied me. I clawed at the restriction around my throat, my nails scraping skin, my mouth open on a silent snarl. Tears welled in my eyes. I blinked them away frantically even as I struggled to free myself from the collar’s grasp.

  The Kral leaned down and wrapped his meaty fist around Travis’ hair, lifting my friend up off the ground as if he were nothing more than a slab of meat. A blade appeared in his hand; one similar to the Kilij I’d been using of Hakan’s. So similar in fact, I wondered for a moment if it was his.

  The King brought the sharp edge of the weapon against my friend’s exposed throat.

  Travis’ wide eyes met mine.

  “Ellie,” he said, and there was knowledge there, history filled with horror. And acceptance. He knew he was going to die.

  I stopped struggling with the collar and reached out to him. My arm outstretched, my fingers grasping only air. Tears blurred my eyes. But I saw everything. I saw it all.