The Lockwood Chronicles Episode 9: Everything to Fight For

The Lockwood Chronicles

Episode 9: Everything to Fight For

by Katrina LaFond

copyright 2017 Katrina LaFond

Smashwords Edition

Edited by: Laurie Williams

Cover by Abstractionz

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As always, it was the blood that reached for him. It called to him, singing in the veins of the people around him. Its scent was cloying, sweet, beckoning, and he woke with a raging hunger, fangs exploding into his mouth. The need ripped at his insides, the pain tearing at him, driving him through the layers of dirt, slashing at it with clawed hands. He dug upward until the fresh air washed over his face, bringing with it the smells of the living beings around him, the sounds of their voices, soft and murmuring in the darkness. He burst through the last layers of soil and out of the ground in a geyser of dirt. It showered back down around him as he stood there in the blackness, his eyes seeing perfectly despite the lack of light.

The large fire kept the darkness at bay, warm and comforting to the humans gathered there. Instinct kept them close to it, ingrained into their natures down through the centuries that fire brings safety, keeping away wolves and other predators that might see them as food, but nothing would keep away the killer that now stalked them. Gliding toward their little camp on silent feet, shedding dirt from his clothing as he walked, shaking it from his hair, his glowing red eyes were sharp, missing nothing. Something in the primitive area of the humans’ brains warned them, set off alarms in their bodies. Adrenaline pumped into their systems, triggering the fight or flight reaction, but each of them ignored it. They ignored the hairs standing up on the back of their necks, the crawling skin, their growing nervousness. They ignored it all, dismissing it as hypersensitivity, silliness brought on by the ghost stories they’d told earlier. There was safety in numbers. Besides, they had the fire.

He walked right into the middle of their campsite, eyes blazing red like the pits of hell, fangs overextended and glistening in the firelight. He snarled at them, and for a moment, the three couples were frozen in place, eyes huge in terror, unable even to scream. Finally, one of the women let out a bloodcurdling screech and pandemonium erupted. The men were the first to die as they tried to protect the women. The vampire moved among them with cold purpose and blood sprayed into the air and over the campsite, staining the tents, soaking into the ground. He plunged his fangs into their vulnerable throats, tearing through flesh and sinew, gorging himself on their life’s blood. It flowed hot down his throat, quenching the terrible bloodlust, engorging starving cells, returning his power to him. He reveled in the adrenaline laced blood, drinking far more than necessary, killing for the sheer joy of it.

He dropped the fifth victim carelessly at his feet, her body broken, her eyes open and staring. He didn’t care. He didn’t even cast her a cold glance as he turned to the last surviving woman. She stood among the carnage, splattered with the blood of her fallen friends, her dark eyes huge in her face, staring at him in mute terror. As he approached her on silent feet, she desperately wanted to run, to turn and flee into the darkness of the woods around them. Nothing she’d find there could be any worse than the monster before her. Her slender body began to tremble but she couldn’t move, no matter how she tried.

He reached out a bloody, clawed hand and touched her face, smearing blood and her tears down her cheek. She whimpered, a pitiful animal sound, but she could do no more. Her mouth refused to open and she wasn’t sure she remembered how to scream, anyway. The vampire sneered at her, his mouth and teeth stained with blood, and she shuddered.

You are absolutely beautiful, he said.

Immediately, she forgot about the horror around her, the carnage, the blood. His voice was compelling, beautiful, pure velvet, and she wanted to hear more of it. Her trembling stopped and her entire body went still, leaning slightly toward him, everything in her hoping he’d speak again.

I’m Darius, he told her. And what is your name, my sweeting? he asked.

Mary, she whispered immediately.

Darius drew her into his arms and bent her backward, his mouth closing over hers in a demanding, grinding kiss. His hands were rough as he tore her clothing from her body but she didn’t notice, her mind completely gone to his control, to the compulsion in that velvet voice. Decades had gone by while he was buried in the ground, sleeping the years away. It had been dreamless and timeless, but he’d woken with more than a raging bloodlust. The woman stood before him, mute, her eyes open and staring blankly, her body bathed in the soft glow from the fire, the light dancing over firm curves and intriguing hollows, and his body clenched painfully. He shoved her to the ground beneath him and thrust into her, forcing his way past her meager barrier. A virgin! he realized with pure joy. She was hot and tight around him and he went wild, plunging savagely again and again, tearing through tender tissue, not caring that she was limp and unresponsive beneath him. When he reached climax, he threw his head back and shouted his satisfaction to the heavens, then he collapsed atop her slender form, crushing her into the ground. Still, she didn’t move, didn’t speak, her eyes blank and empty.

Darius lay limply upon her for a moment then lifted his head to look at her thoughtfully, debating on whether to keep her or not. He got up, leaving her lying there, and gazed at her while he fastened his trousers. She was young and beautiful, and she looked strong and capable, but could he really take care of a slave right now? No, he decided, he didn’t want to commit to anything yet. Stand up, he ordered.

Obediently, Mary got to her feet and waited silently for more commands. Darius took a handful of her dark hair and wrenched her head back. She didn’t struggle or cry out. She didn’t gasp in pain when he tore into her throat with his fangs and drank deeply. She didn’t sob or beg as the blackness descended upon her. Mary went out of the world silently, in a stupor, and never once pleaded for her life. One moment she was alive and vibrant, and in the next she was gone, her body tossed aside by her killer with all the care he’d show a rag doll.

Darius glanced around once more at the remains of his savage bloodlust, the massacre of the three couples, and he smiled a cold, satisfied sneer. Quite the reentry to the world, he gloated, and he looked forward to the destruction he’d visit upon the very first village he came upon. Without another thought for the six young lives he’d snuffed out he took to the air, transforming on the fly into a large, black bird of prey.

* * * *

The wash of power sweeping over the castle woke Lucian instantly, but he remained motionless, without even the twitch of a muscle to betray him. In his arms, Elisabeth slept, curled against him, her head over his heart. She was breathing deeply, murmuring softly, one hand laid against the smooth skin of his chest. Lucian dropped a light kiss on her golden head and she shifted position slightly and whispered his name, content and secure in the safety of his embrace.

Lucian was listening, tracking the progress of the nearly overwhelming power as it passed over his family’s ancestral home. It brushed against him, probing, testing his strength, but he remained calm and masked his power, unwilling to reveal himself until he was certain who it was…. what it was. Elisabeth squirmed as it moved over her and his arms tightened on her, just enough to reassure her that he was there. She was still human, but she’d drunk from Lucian often enough that she’d been changed, given a heightened sense, adding to her own innate power to sense vampires, so he knew she felt what he did. Finally, the invading power dissipated and moved on toward the village at the base of the hill.

Lucian waited, hearing nothing but insects and the occasional owl. He’d just decided that he was worrying for nothing and was about to go back to sleep when a shriek pierced the calm of the French countryside. Elisabeth jerked awake immediately. What was that? she whispered.

I’m not certain, he told her.

She watched as he climbed out of bed and began to get dressed. The commotion from the village was only growing louder, screams and crashes, dogs barking and gunshots, and Elisabeth’s heart skipped a beat. You’re going down there, aren’t you?

Of course I am, he said. It’s my responsibility to protect the village. My family has watched over them for generations.

Elisabeth scrambled out of bed and pulled on her jeans. She was