Radiance (Brotherhood of the Blade Trilogy #3) (7 page)

I heard the wolves howling as they ran by.

I couldn’t sleep and I was too distraught to help anyone, not even myself…

I spent a few days with the heavy bag in our gym and swam endless laps in the heated pool as the shocking realization dawned on me that I was in charge of the Brotherhood of the Blade and the Sisterhood of the Scythe.

The second realization that came to me was that we didn’t have enough vampire hunters left to launch a sustainable offense against Nero, who had probably already figured out that Delilah wasn’t coming back. I assumed he had made a grab for Kristin. This thought chilled me to my core:
We are in big, big trouble.

After about four days, I finally slept in my bedchamber, for about eighteen hours.

Almost a week had passed since Daphne and Lucas had been killed and I woke up one evening with what I hoped was a brilliant idea to save us as a group.

I texted Ambra:

Can you meet me in the library? 8 p.m. Important.

She texted back almost immediately:

Oui.

I got dressed, went downstairs to the big kitchen and put some coffee on. I set water to boil for tea and got out the tea tins and lots of mugs. I made a fake continental breakfast for everyone—budget hotel-like fare of breakfast muffins from a mix in the back of the pantry, pounds of sausages that I microwaved straight from the freezer and cut-up fruit from the last of what we had fresh. I laid it out like I had seen Daphne do, in a self-serve buffet style with plates, utensils and napkins. I added a big box of muesli cereal and a pitcher of cream from the walk-in cooler. Corbin was the first one into the kitchen and took about a third of the sausages on his plate, as I had seen him do before. The werewolf certainly liked his meat.

“Evening,” he said. “You cooked breakfast for everyone.”

“
Tried to. I’m not as good at these things as Daphne is…
was
. Corbin, when everyone comes down, will you tell them to help themselves? I need to go to the barn and feed the dairy cow and the chickens, whatever we have out there that she used to take care of.”

“
Way ahead of you, Rand. Already taken care of this morning and every morning since we lost Daphne. I fed the chickens and milked the cow, scalded the milk, strained it through cheesecloth and put it in that pitcher.” He angled his head to the pitcher I had found in the fridge. “You don’t feed farm animals at night. Just so you know. They are not nocturnal.”

“
Of course not. What was I thinking?” I felt my face getting hot.
City boy.

“
No problem. I’ll try to cover for Daphne, but it’s a big job. Except for the full moon, when obviously, I am banished from the barn areas, I’ll keep the animals fed and their areas clean, but we’re going to need to hire outside help. We’re down about as far as we can go in warm bodies before this whole thing falls completely apart.”

“
I know. It’s very serious. I’m on it and thanks for pitching in.”

“
I didn’t know you could cook, Rand.”

“
I can’t. I’m totally faking it. You’ll find that out if you hit the muffins.”

“
Surely, you jest. I eat meat, meat, and more meat.”

“
I know by your breath,” I joked. “It’s like trying to keep meat in the house for a dire wolf.”

Corbin smiled. “I’ll take that as a compliment. Are you going to recruit new people soon?”

“Yes.”

“
Good. Any werewolf chicks?”

“
I’ll certainly let you know if any female werewolves submit their resumes.”

Corbin took a deep breath and let it out. “Am I forgiven yet? For the incident with Ambra?”

“Yes, by me, but I can’t speak for her. Am I forgiven for stabbing your wolf body in the shoulder with my silver blade?”

“
Yes. I’m all better now. Werewolves are fast healers. Thank you for not killing me.”

“
Thank you for not making my girlfriend into a werewolf. It would have been problematic.”

“
I know that now.”

We shook hands and Corbin ate a couple more sausages. “I’m serious about the werewolf woman assistant. As the wolf pack gets larger, I really need a full-time assistant to help me with some research and care of the pack.”

“I know we can afford it. Before I make inquiries, do you know any werewolves at all? Anywhere in the world?”

“
Sadly, not still living, thanks to werewolf hunters. I don’t really want to jump species for an assistant.”

“
Understood. I’ll see what I can do for you. For an assistant.”

“
Who are you going to call to find a female werewolf who wants to move to Switzerland and be my lady friend?”

“
This isn’t a dating service. She’d be an employee. The personal interaction would be up to the both of you. Or not,” I said.

“
Right. Just so you know, I haven’t had a mate for many years. It was the desperation of loneliness and the comfort of familiarity that made me latch onto Ambra’s arm that terrible night. I mean, I love her, but I am not in love with her.”

“
I’m aware. You do know she and I are in a relationship.”

“
We all know. She’s just my closest, dearest friend. Or was. It just seemed like a short leap, lad.”

I pointed at him with both my index fingers. “You won’t take that leap again, right?”

“No. You have made your territory clear. So has she. She won’t even ski with me anymore. I’ve lost her trust. Possibly forever.”

I nodded. “I can’t speak for Ambra, but I do want to be your friend, Corbin.”

“You are. You saved me from Delilah. In my mind, that sort of evens it up in the grand scheme of things. Most werewolves are fiercely loyal, did you know that?”

“
I guessed as much from the way you follow me around now and wag your tail when I say your name.”

“
Very funny. If you can find me a female werewolf, I would be further indebted. Just to have someone of my own kind to be with would go a long way toward improving my emotional state. You can’t imagine how isolated I feel,” Corbin said. “No one here is remotely like me. They even make fun of me. I’m a true pariah.”

“
I’m sorry. You never complain about things and I guess I just never thought to ask you what you needed or wanted. Anyway, what happened to your wife, if you ever had one?”

“
I’ve had six. Over many years, of course. No divorces or devourings.”

“
Good to know. Werewolf wives?”

“
Not all were werewolves, but my last wife was a werewolf. It was good with us. Very good.” He paused. “Werewolf hunters killed her, in Scotland, a long, long time ago. I fled to Switzerland and have been here at the castle ever since. No werewolf hunters have come after me and I have lived a peaceful life by not killing anything with less than four legs. No one bothers me and I try to fade into the woodwork.”

“
I don’t expect you to fade into the woodwork. Be true to yourself, Corbin.”

“
I try, and I know I might seem okay, outwardly, but inside, I’m empty and yearning to be filled. I want to share my life with somebody. You know what I’m talking about, man to man?”

“
Sure I do. It took a lot of trust for you to tell me all this. I already told you I would see what I could do toward hiring you an assistant of your own kind.”

“
Really?”

“
Yes. I don’t want you to be this unhappy. I haven’t gotten to it yet, but just be patient. I know it takes away from the strength of the group if one of us is in such a state as you were the night you tried to turn Ambra.”

“
If I could take back that night, I would.”

I nodded. “We all would. Even though I killed Delilah, it set in motion unexpected things.”

“Rand, thank you for understanding.” He paused. “Can you please make more sausages tomorrow?”

“
I’ll see what I can do. We’re running low on supplies. I’ve been here all this time and I don’t even know where the groceries come from.”

“
Daphne used to go to local farmer’s markets in Zürich and to Aligro in Schlieren. She had told me it’s like your Costco stores in the U.S.”

“
That’s perfect. Do they deliver?”

“
Do you think this is Los Angeles?”

“
No deliveries to a remote castle? Okay.”

Everyone else except Ambra came down the stairs and filled up their plates and sat down to eat. It was a subdued group just trying to get their bearings again after the deaths of Lucas and Daphne.

I cleared my throat. “Training is suspended for today and we aren’t going on any missions for a week or two.”

Everyone looked at each other.

“So,” Nariko said, “we’re officially taking a break?”

“
It seems timely.”

She nodded.

“In that case, do you mind if I go to a medical convention?” Griff checked something off on a list in front of him. “I want to go to a hematology seminar. It’s something that might help me in the research of vampire biology. A blood replacement product company sent me an email and I was already going to ask you if I could get away.”

“
Of course, Griff. And you don’t have to explain, though it does sound cool. Where is it?”

“
Germany.”

“
All right. Email me your dates and whip out your company credit card. Just be prudent with it.”

“
Always.”

“
Can I take a week of vacation?” Jade asked. “I need to go toast myself on a beach somewhere and not think about vampire hunting.” She looked at me with pleading in her eyes.

“
Absolutely.” I paused. “You’re our network administrator, so I need to ask you this. You’re coming back, right?”

“
Yes, I’m coming back. I just need to decompress. Obviously, I won’t use the company credit card for my vacation.”

I smiled. “Is there anything I should know in your absence besides that Control-Alt-Delete should be the keys to press should anything go awry with the server?”

“Please don’t do that to my server.”

“
I was joking.”

She paused. “The big black notebook with all of the passwords and related stuff is in Lucas’s safe. Well, it’s
your
safe now. Everything should be fine and if it’s not fine, I have the system set up to send me an email with an attached trouble log and I will fix things remotely, if necessary. You won’t even know I’m doing it.”

“
Very nice. Thanks for telling me.”

Jade added, “If anything ever happened to me, everything in that black notebook will help a new network administrator get up to speed in short order.”

“You’re irreplaceable.”

“
No one is,” she said. “If they go away, they are missed, but somehow, the ones who are left make a life without them.”

I nodded. “If anyone else wants to take a short vacation, this is a good time for you to take a break. I want to rearrange some things and get back on track as a cohesive group, but it might take me a week or two to get some things done.”

“I want to go to the beach, too,” Nariko said. “Where are you going?”

“
Aruba. I hear it’s vampire-free and there’s going to be an eclipse. Come with me,” Jade said.

“
Yay!” Nariko smiled. “Is it okay with you?” she asked me.

“
Yes. Go, but just come back safely, you two.” Nariko looked at Mikhail and I saw the look that passed between them that let me know they were in a relationship of some sort. “Do you want to come?”

“
I don’t like getting sunburned. Have a good time, girls.” He winked at Nariko and she smiled back. She and Mikhail were close. As close as Ambra and me.

Joan said, “I’m going to sit tight here, use the heated swimming pool and write the curriculum for our advanced fencing classes, now that you are all up to speed in intermediate techniques. I also want to bake and freeze a bunch of stuff. This is a carb-intensive group and pretty soon, if we don’t get some goodies in the freezer, we are going to have to resort to the American boxed macaroni and cheese at the back of the pantry. I have no idea how long it has been there or who brought it to Switzerland, but we can’t resort to eating garbage.”

“Bless you,” I said. “Truly. I don’t know if I have said it often enough, but I value your fencing expertise, Joan. Actually, all of you are very precious to our mission and to me personally. You are my family, my friends, and…my life.”

“
We’ll find Kristin,” Griff said. “The world isn’t that damn big that a little girl can be hidden forever.”