Night Kings: The Complete Anthology (23 page)

“Akil Fayed,” Remus said. He rose from his
throne and cast a wide shroud of darkness around him as if it were
a cape he’d fastened to his neck. “You know what must be done?”

“I do,” he replied.

“Then let us delay your punishment.” With a
wiry grin on Remus’ face he slumped back into this chair and kicked
his feet up on the armrest. “I’ve a hunch you’ll prove useful in
the coming nights. When all is said and done we shall speak on the
duration of your slumber.”

“As you command,” said Akil as a slow sigh of
relief crept across his face. “In the meantime, your majesty, there
are matters of more importance that should be brought to your
attention.”

Remus waited for these matters to be
addressed, but the younger vampire in front of him seemed confident
he had finished what needed to be said.

“Well?” Remus asked.

“I cannot say.” Akil looked deep into the
king’s black eyes, but not once did his lips waver when he
spoke.

“I’m not one for games, Mr. Fayed,” a less
than amused man in black said. “If you won’t speak when spoken to
then whom am I supposed to deal with?”

“Well, my liege,” said a noticeably nervous
Akil, “
that
would be the only one left that matters.”

Chapter Thirty Eight

Night Kings: The Red River

Gregory Blackman

Wendish No More

Ramsey pride ran deep within the werewolf
community by the time the full moon approached. By next nightfall
the pack would be his. They would be cleansed in the blood of their
enemies, reborn anew, pack master and all.

Most of the wolves lived in isolated trailer
parks and farms far from the city streets. It wasn’t that Bernhard
Wendish didn’t provide for his pack. It was that they believed
themselves apart from the people that dwelled within the concrete
jungle. They were meant to run free in the fields, the forests, and
mountains to the west.

This led to a divide amongst the werewolves
and the city they called home. They came to detest the humans that
lived in their lavish mansions and high-rise apartments. The
werewolves thought the humans weak, helpless, and without their
grandiose machines they would undoubtedly fall prey to the beasts
that lay on the horizon.

Many in the warrior caste believed those
beasts to be them. They were a higher order of man, Homo superior,
the ones meant to inherit. With sentiment like that it proved
easier than Kaleb thought to strike a match under his fellow
warriors. He went from trailer park to trailer park, farm to farm,
all in search of those that would stand beside him.

But what of the ones that wouldn’t stand
beside him? Those were the ones his sister, Leanne Ramsey, worried
about in these most decisive of times.

“You can’t do this!” she cried, standing in
front of a trailer with arms raised in defense. “I won’t let you!
The
others
won’t let you!”

“What others?” Kaleb scoffed in response. In
one of his hands was a half empty bottle of vodka, rag stuffed in
the top, and in the other hand, a lighter. “Aubrey Wendish doesn’t
scare me and her runt doesn’t either. I’ll run down anyone that
doesn’t accept the new law of the land. Don’t let that be you, dear
sister.”

Behind him stood a dozen of the warriors
recruited into his ranks. Together there was no accumulation of
werewolves in this town that could stand against him. The choice to
strike against his people wasn’t one taken lightly, but he couldn’t
afford a war on both fronts. This was a threat that needed to be
taken care of before his ascension became complete. Anything less
would mean his failure as a leader. Desperate times called for
desperate measures, and there was no wolf more desperate than
him.

“Your laws?” Leanne barricaded the front door
with her hands and refused them entry into the werewolf-filled
trailer. “You mean, he who is strongest is fit to rule? Goddamn it,
Kaleb, those aren’t new laws! They’re the ones our people left
behind centuries ago!”

“Don’t do this,” Leanne pleaded. “There are
wolves in this home; wolves that never spoke against you. They
simply want to live their life as they choose. Do
not
take
that away from them.”

“Stand back,” he growled. “This isn’t your
fight.”

“And it isn’t yours, brother,” cried a
Leanne, at her wits end and unable to reach her brother inside.
“You must listen to reason—!”

The lighter moved from one side of Kaleb to
the other and he set fire to the gasoline soaked rag in his hand.
The flames missed her by only a few inches as the Molotov cocktail
soared past her head. It smashed into the trailer’s front window
and within moments the insides erupted into flames.

Leanne was forced to the steps when the fires
proved too heated to defend. She looked up to her brother, but it
wasn’t his eyes that flickered in the fires. He appeared as if
possessed by a demonic spirit, unable to control himself, and
unwilling to break from his dark bonds.

Unlike Lukas and his lady in red, Kaleb was
possessed by his innermost demons. The future he always dreamed of
was right there before his eyes. All he need is to seize what was
there before him.

He stood motionless against the flames that
burned through the trailer home as the sounds of cries, both human
and werewolf, could be heard from inside. They cried to Leanne for
help, for salvation, and at the end they cried out for
vengeance.

There was no reason for this fight. No reason
for them to see their brethren go up in flames. Yet, it happened
all the same. Leanne would survive this night. Her brother would
make sure of it. But it wasn’t living. Not while she remain
suppressed in action and in voice.

Leanne would have to find the mother of the
pack, and all those Aubrey kept safe and sound. She couldn’t do it
out in the open. Not while her brother prowled the grounds. She
would have to become the predator she loathed so much; all for the
chance to help displace her brother from the throne.

How things could progress this far in such a
short span was a testament to the brutality they were born from.
Kaleb would take what he wanted tonight. He would mourn for the
loss of his soul another day. When that day came Leanne would be
there for her brother. She might be the only one.

“This is nothing more than survival of the
fittest,” he said gruffly with a hand extended to his sister, “the
beast that lurks inside every sentient being on this planet. It
pushes us forward. Makes sure we’re capable and strong. My hand
serves only to speed that process along.”

Leanne refused Kaleb’s hand and saw it
rescinded with a look of frustration, and then one of pain. She
shared his frustration. She shared his pain. The one thing she
didn’t share was her brother’s bloodlust.

Kaleb turned from his sister and walked
towards his bloodthirsty pack mates. Upon each of their faces were
twisted grins and eyes that flickered red from the flames. It was
the beginning of a new age for the werewolves of Salem. Those that
refused change would find themselves left buried in the old
age.

Chapter Thirty Nine

Night Kings: The Red River

Gregory Blackman

Titular Kingdom

Some kindred believed the throne room or the
lavish dining hall were the crowning achievement of Blackrose
Manor. To the lady in red it had always been the courtyard that
stood above all the wings of her estate.

Since the manor’s construction in the mid
18
^th
century Xenia had personally tended to the flowers
in this courtyard. Many were exotic to the region, brought in from
lands far away, and meticulously cultivated until they could
sustain whole patches. The lady did this to show human and
supernatural alike this was her home and she wasn’t going
anywhere.

It was one of the few traditions Remus
decided to keep and now that the festival of the moon was over the
garden could return to its unnatural splendor. It was there Remus
and Akil decided to wait for the guest that never seemed to
arrive.

“Am I to wait all night?”

Akil looked from one side of the courtyard to
the other, and said, “You know how she is.”

“Better than anyone, I’m afraid,” said the
man in black. “Just so you’re aware, it’s considered improper to
keep the king in wait. The lady in red would’ve let heads roll for
this.”

“You’re a benevolent king,” Akil said,
dryly.

A wiry smile cut a swath across Remus’ face,
but it was swiftly removed as the presence of another entered into
the courtyard.

“I see he wears the crown with pride,” a
woman’s voice said from the shadows. “I never thought I’d see the
day.”

“Corina Petravic,” Remus growled in
response.

“Is that how you address me,” the woman asked
as she stepped from the darkness and into the light, “your flesh
and blood?”

Unlike the man in black her skin was flushed
and full of life, though possibly only from the contact high
brought on from her multi-colored hair and wardrobe. Only on one
night of the year could a woman such as her blend into a crowd—the
night devoted to ghosts and goblins. This was a woman that wanted
to be seen, noticed, and remembered by all that passed by.

“Oh, relax,” she said to a visibly stiff
Remus. “I already know it was you that killed our mother. If I
wanted you dead I wouldn’t have sent for Akil to arrange a
reunion.”

Corina passed the man in black without so
much as a glance and moved to her on and off again lover’s side.
She placed a gentle hand on Akil’s neck and moved behind him in a
suggestive manner. She wanted Remus to know who really commanded
his heart and mind.

“I’m not upset,” she continued. “Surprised
maybe, but not upset. It’s our way, after all.”

“Why are you here?” Remus asked, coldly. He
was many things to the vampire princess, first child to the lady in
red. Friend was not among them.

“To see the emperor,” she said, “I hear he
wears new clothes.”

“Must we continue this dance we do?” Remus
asked. He’d played enough games with the sadistic temptress to last
a lifetime. One more just wouldn’t do. “I’m undead, Corina, not
oblivious to the passage of time. Cut the shit and we’ll see this
conversation over before the sun rises.”

Corina flashed a sadistic smile in the king’s
direction. She was insane, lost to her bloodlust, and to be trusted
by no one. Remus had known this for some time. Now it was Akil’s
turn to find out how ruthless she could be.

“I’ve always enjoyed our conversations,
brother,” she said. “Pity our beloved queen had to pack up and
leave the Old World when things were getting interesting. Sure, I
understand her reasons. That doesn’t mean I agree with them.”

Remus grunted in disapproval and turned from
his sister’s sight. “You would’ve stayed and fought the reapers,
the shamans of Africa, and the Catholics, with their holy knights
and Templar?”

“I would have,” she answered.

“Then you would’ve died a fool,” said Remus,
“and the crown would’ve fallen to me by default.”

Her smile turned to a restrained grimace. In
her younger years Corina was often placated by the queen. It was a
means by Xenia to toughen her up, but it only served to temper her
resolve, drive her towards the path to insanity.

“Over a king’s dead body we may one day find
out,” she said through clenched teeth.

“I will ask again.” Remus was undeterred by
her forceful demeanor and continued the passive resistance to her
arrival. “Why are you here? Must you always go where you’re not
wanted?”

Corina stuck her tongue out and puffed her
cheeks in dissatisfaction. “You haven’t been fun since you
relinquished your duties as executioner and right hand to the
queen.”

“Why are you here?” Remus bellowed at the top
of his lungs. It saw the birds from their trees and the critters
from their burrowed holes, but it didn’t unseat the frustrated
Croatian from her narrowed warpath.

Corina moved from Akil’s back to a bed of
azure roses in the middle of the courtyard. She knelt down, but as
Corina looked ready to pluck one from the garden, she stomped them
down with her fist.

“Our mother took care of these flowers until
the day she died,” said Corina, “and not once did she speak of a
fondness for flowers. You ask me why I’m here, my brother? I’m here
to finish what our maker started.”

Remus knew of what she truly spoke and it
wasn’t the flowers or the vampires. He looked for something to grab
hold of. Something not of this world, but merely imprinted on it.
He searched for a shroud powerful enough to quell his older
sister.

“Back off,” he growled through clenched .

“Or you’ll do what?” Corina asked. She sliced
through the air straight towards the man in black and grabbed him
by the throat before he could use the shroud against her. “What
will be done to me that hasn’t been done a hundred times
before?”

Remus struggled to free himself from Corina’s
grasp, but his older sister was stronger than he expected and he
was tossed to the ground in defeat.

“You’re not fit to wear the crown,” Corina
scoffed as she turned her back to her vampire king. She wanted to
show him that she wasn’t afraid of his retribution. It was the
single most humiliating act one kindred could do to another in
battle. “I’ll continue the lady’s work unopposed. What will
you
do, Remus? Why, if I were you, I’d start by gathering up
your forces and dealing with whatever shit this town’s got going
on.”

Remus had no answer for the undead princess.
He was defeated, shamed, and no matter what he said in defense it
wouldn’t be enough to quiet Corina Petravic. There was nothing he
could say that she’d want to hear.

Remus melted from the courtyard back to the
shadows he knew so well. Only in the shadows would the man in black
be free from those that wished him harm and those that wished him
to be the savior to all of their problems.