Blood Enchanted (Blood Enchanted, Book 1): A Vampire Hunter Paranormal Romance Series (2 page)

I
told
myself it wasn't the ghoul's fault. Well, not entirely. He had no way of knowing that mentioning
that
name would make me so mad. But I am my father's daughter after all and anyone who knows me
knows
not to mention
that
name.

But not this ghoul. Obviously.

I twisted a little harder and heard his finger snap, followed by a whimper and a disgusting snot-laced snort.

"I swear it's all I know," he whined. "But Reggie’s got it happenin’; if anyone knows where your brother is, it'll be him."

"I know Reggie," I spat back. I'd be seeing Reggie soon enough, I didn't need this pathetic excuse for a body pointing me in that direction. "I believe the information
I
have provided warrants a little more than that."

Ghouls traded in knowledge, their currency of choice was information. Not cash. I'd just disclosed a little gem to this trader, now it was his turn to pay up in kind. If he didn't, I'd have to plan on visiting Frank, head of the ghouls here in Auckland. And a visit to Frank was not at the top of my favourite things to do.

"So, what have you heard?" I asked in a sweet voice, nabbing a second finger in a vice-like grip. Incentive always goes a long way when fishing for info.

The stupid thing is a ghoul could fight back with a simple shrug of his shoulders. They are particularly strong. That is their weapon; strength and a hardened intelligence that often meant they outwitted their opponent with ease. But this ghoul was neither strong nor clever. That's why I'd chosen him. He was the bottom feeder of a group of supernatural bottom feeders. But that didn't mean he didn't hear things.

"I ain't heard nothin’," he ground out through gritted teeth.

So, I broke his second finger.

"Ow, shit! What didya do that for? Are you mad or somethin’? Frank's not gonna like this."

"Frank's not going to like you avoiding paying up your share of an info exchange." It would be a sully on the ghouls' reputation if this one chose not to complete our little trade.

He bit his lip and cradled his hand. I think I had made my point. He did look a little pathetic sitting there, hunched over himself in the filth of a backstreet alley in one of Auckland's more nefarious neighbourhoods. Ghouls weren't out of the closet yet, not like vamps and fairies. They tended to scuttle around like cockroaches in the background, listening undetected, watching from the shadows, but never actually being seen. The humans had enough of a problem accepting blood suckers, there was no way they were going to readily accept the re-dead and their penchant for fresh flesh - preferably still running.

He glanced up at me with hound dog eyes, his gaze flicking to the
Sigillum
on my left wrist automatically. He couldn't see it in its entirety, I kept it well hidden most of the time. It was too identifying. Right now it would be a vibrant, electric blue colour, indicating my incredulity. I snorted and crossed my arms over my chest, then tapped my foot impatiently on the pavement. He should have known better. The skin-tight black leather pants, tight singlet top, matching fitted leather jacket and thick-soled boots gave you a hint that I meant business. Not to mention the two silver stakes visible at my hips and sheathed sword down my back. Imbecile.

He swallowed visibly under my blank stare.

"OK, OK. I heard he got himself into some trouble." This, unfortunately, wasn't a surprise. My brother always got himself into trouble. It's not as though he went looking for it, just somehow trouble always found him. Of course that probably had something to do with the fact that he spent an inordinate amount of time working for my father's spy master. Luc had decided at the ripe old age of five that he wanted to be a spy when he grew up, and since then had never left Alain alone.

Alain should have been his betrothed kindred Nosferatu, not mine.

"And?" I offered into the ensuing silence from that last statement.

"You don't look surprised?"

"Luc is a Durand. We court danger and trouble." I shrugged. "It's nothing new."

He nodded as though this made complete sense. It did. I cleared my throat and cocked my head at him. The night was running out. Dawn was still a few hours away but the busiest part of a vamp's day was almost over, if I had any chance of finding my wayward brother, I needed to get a move on. Reggie's bar would be winding down in another hour and I had high hopes for a lead there.

The ghoul sighed. "All right, but this will make us even." I didn't bother replying. I'd know soon enough if payment was acceptable. "There's a new vamp in town, pullin’ in big at the arenas. Never seen nor heard of him before, but he sure as hell knows what he's doing. He's done the whole circuit and made more in the past week than you have in the past month."

This was news. I was, without doubt, the most prevalent and successful fighter on the arena scene. It's not that I have a big ego, but when you're the daughter of the top Nosferatin, otherwise known as the Prophesied, and the Champion of the
Iunctio
, then you're gonna pack a punch. Lucky for me, my bank balance didn't suffer from this unusual genetic combination. And I wasn't above utilising it either.

Fighting was what I did best. And not always when hunting a rogue vampire. Most of the underbelly of Auckland knew this, but also knew if they let it slip to my father, they'd not be long for this world. In order to reign supreme in the brutal supernatural fighters' arenas dotted here and there, I'd had to be pretty devious and cut-throat.

"What's this got to do with Luc?"

"He challenged him. Didn't do so well."

I uncrossed my arms, Luc never fought in the arenas. It wasn't his style. "What do you mean, he didn't do so well?"

The ghoul shrugged. "I just heard he ended up owin’ this new vamp big bucks and the vamp took his payment the only way he could." I glared at him. He swallowed again at whatever he saw on my face. "I don't know what he did, but the word is your brother belongs to him now."

Oh shit. "What's this new vamp's name?"

"I don't know." Then when he yelped at my sword tip under his throat he went on in a rapid stammer, "Well, at least, I... I don't know his full name. Just that they call him Hakan."

“Hakan." I said the name, tasting it on my tongue.

My sword was sheathed in the next second. "OK, we're square. Payment made."

I hadn't even gotten the words out and he'd scampered. Ghouls could move when they really wanted to.

I let a slow breath out and watched as it misted on the cool night air. Luc had been missing for one week. It wasn't strange for him to disappear on occasion, no doubt doing something or other for Alain and his crew, but we'd had a date set for the night after our twenty-fifth birthday. Luc would never miss a date with me if he could help it. It was to be our last ditch effort to rebel against the system, twins out to wreak havoc, before we faced the reality of joining with a kindred Nosferatu.

We may have been born of a vampire and a vampire hunter marriage, but we were all Nosferatin. Apart from a few more unusual talents inherited from our father, our skill-set was most definitely on the vampire hunter side. And as such, one month past our twenty-fifth birthdays we would die, if we didn't join with a kindred Nosferatu.

Our father had secured two very trustworthy and powerful vampires for us both to join with. For me, it had been Alain Dupont, Papa's Second, his spy master and a level one
Sanguis Vitam
Vampire. I liked Alain, I really didn't have any beef with him, apart from the fact that he’d agreed to join with me because my father had asked. Not because he loves me. Not because he wants to double his power once the joining is complete. Not even because it was his idea. But because my father, his master, the vampire who he would gladly die for if it meant Michel Durand would live, had requested it of him.

I kind of hated Alain for that. And the fact that he thought of me as a little sister. Argh!

I'd grown up in a loving family environment. If you discounted the fairy wars and rogue vampire attacks and the inevitable disclosure of my father's kind to all humanity - that did not go down well - it was full of fun and laughter and love. My father's love for my mother. Hers in return for him. Their kindred joining was based on love. I had always thought mine would be too.

But although I've had my fair share of courters, I have not been in love. And now I am twenty-five and time is up. I may not have wanted to join with Alain, but at least I knew he would treat me well. And a kindred joining didn't have to be all about love. I could still find The One, and be joined to Alain for eternity.

I kept telling myself that, but it was getting a little old, truth be told.

I looked up to find myself outside Reggie's Bar. A popular haunt for all supernaturals, but not all of them got to sit in the front, where the Norms frequented and paid through the nose for a beer. When the vampires came out of the shadows - forced I should say - the humans baulked. Fairies disclosed their existence at the same time, deciding it was better to get it out there on their terms rather than be cornered into it like the vamps. For them it worked. The Norms worshipped them. Who wouldn't be bowled over by the god-like glamoured appearance of a member of the Fey.

But the vampires didn't fair so well. Humans hunted them, despised them and feared them most of all. There was no way to pleasantly spin fangs, blood and the inevitable connection of both. There were groupies, there always have been, even before vamps were openly walking the streets. But on the whole vampires were not even tolerated. And as such, Reggie's Bar restricted vampire attendance to the arena out back. Not anywhere near the front of the bar where Norm patrons would run screaming and he'd miss out on fleecing their wallets.

Reggie wasn't exactly prejudiced, he made a lot of money off vampires in the arena, but he did nothing to bridge the gap that stood between humanity and the Nosferatu. I stood on that bridge, slap bang in the centre. Humans thought Nosferatins were on their side, and in a way we are. We kill those vampires who have gone rogue, hunting indiscriminately on the innocents. But we also live in the Nosferatu world. We have to join with them or die. Of course, that little gem has been well hidden from the press. It was bad enough to have the vampires being staked by humans, even
they
agreed the Nosferatins needed to be spared that injustice.

I took a deep breath in and walked into the bar. It was still packed, so I wasn't too late. Loud thudding music pounded out of the speakers, the air smelled of sweat and cologne and beer. Not an altogether unpleasant smell. Humans stood shoulder to shoulder with fairies; laughing, talking, flirting. And in the case of the
Dökkálfa
, also feeding. I shuddered at the look of rapture on the faces of their prey, but who was I to judge? My father frequently fed off humans, when my mother was not around to see.

I spotted Reggie over at the bar talking animatedly with a group of young and pretty humans. They didn't know he was a ghoul. Not that he'd eat them, well, not unless they pissed him off. But still it irked me that the ghouls refused to come out; we'd all been through it, even the shape shifters had laid down the first hints that they lived in our world. Humans aren't stupid, they see the signs. It's whether they are ready to accept them or not that matters, and they had accepted fairies like delicacies at a wedding. Devoured them. Savoured them. Delighted in them.

Who was to say they wouldn't love ghouls too?

Yeah.

I walked straight up to the pain-in-my-butt ghoul as he regaled the girls that surrounded him of his latest flash purchase. Car, boat, holiday home. Who cared? Something meaningless and fake. Reggie may have had money, but he had zero style.

"Reggie!" I pushed past a tall brunette and shouldered between a blonde and a redhead. All three dwarfed me. Reggie liked long legs. "What's this about a new vamp in town?"

"Ah, Ellie!" he cried and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. "Sweet, sweet, Ellie. I've been expecting you." He leaned in and whispered angrily, "You've not been here for two weeks. Patronage is down. What the hell's with that?" Then turned a beguiling smile on the women at my back. "Ladies, this won't take long. Have a free drink on me."

They tittered and giggled as he blew them all a kiss - individually - and then sashayed over to Reggie's guy at the bar. Then Reggie turned steel cold eyes on me.

"We had an agreement. Once a week and I give you ten percent of the takings. That agreement is now void." He led the way through a door behind the bar and down a dark hallway to his office. It was a shoebox. He didn't normally entertain here. Only those people he didn't need to impress.

I shoved a pile of crap off a chair and slumped into it, lifting my booted feet to his desk and crossing them at the ankles.

"So, who's the new guy? What do you know?" I demanded.

"Make yourself at home, why don't you," he muttered. "And you answer my question first. Where have you been?"

"Busy," I replied, succinctly.

"What about our agreement?"

I shrugged. "I figured you didn't want to see me for a while after last time." Last time had been when Reggie tried to set me up, rigged a fight and had to do a major overhaul of the arena after I spat the proverbial dummy. "We both needed to cool off."

"You cost me ten thousand dollars. Those cages don't come cheap."

"You should have thought of that before you allowed a fairy magic in a sword fight." There were three ways you could fight in the arena. Magic. Hand to hand. And by the sword. None of them crossed over and I never,
ever
, used magic. To use magic would be to disclose how powerful I am. I didn't need that kind of a headache. I always fought either hand to hand or with a sword. Reggie knew this, he was goading me into a mistake, a show of my hand.

There have been rumours of what I can do, but no evidence. I preferred to keep it that way.

"That was an error, the master of ceremonies forgot to band him," he said with a shrug. A band would have contained the fairy's magic; I had been banded, but Reggie did not know I could've still called on magic with a band in place. As it was I almost did, that fairy just about killed me. "It wasn't intentional," he added.