“We have to go
now
,” she said. “We’re running out of time.”
Nanping
Fujian Province
China
November 2010
Beatrice woke with a burning in her throat. She rose from the bed in the plane, baring her fangs as her eyes darted toward the door. In a heartbeat, she had the handle half turned and Giovanni at her back. He locked an arm around her throat and threw her on the bed.
“You’re up early.” He fell on top of her, pinning her to the mattress and pulling her mouth to his neck. She struck hard and fast, the thick taste of his blood slaking her instinctual hunger, though it didn’t kill it completely.
“Shhh,” he soothed her, stroking Beatrice’s hair until she was calm again. As soon as she was thinking rationally, she took a deep breath, only to be hit with the unremitting scent of sweet human blood. She could even hear the pump of the pilot’s heartbeat, though she realized, for the first time, that the bloodlust was not overpowering.
“Where are we?” she grunted out after she took one last draw from Giovanni’s vein.
“A small airfield outside Nanping. Tenzin says it’s the closest to the monastery, but we will have to go upriver. It’s an hour and a half until sunset, so we can’t leave the compartment.”
She felt like weeping. “So I have to smell the pilot for another hour and a half?”
“Shh,” he whispered again. She buried her face in his neck, sealing the bite marks she had made and trying to block the smell of human with her mate’s own, smoky scent. “If it helps, Tenzin is more miserable than you. This is her first time in a plane, and I’m surprised she hasn’t peeled the walls off yet, despite the threat of sunlight.”
She tried to laugh, but it only exacerbated the burning.
Giovanni continued, “You’re beginning to wake earlier and earlier. Just like your father and Tenzin. You’re awake ten minutes earlier than last night, and that was ten minutes earlier than the night before.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that unless something changes, soon you will need as little sleep as Tenzin and your father. Maybe only a few hours.”
“But that’s less than you!”
“I know.” He did not sound displeased. “That’s means your amnis is already very strong, and growing stronger by the day. This is good. Eventually, you won’t need sleep at all.”
It also meant that for a good portion of the day, she would be without the support she had come to depend on from her husband. If Giovanni was not awake to distract her or stop her, Beatrice feared what she was capable of.
As if reading her mind, he spoke in a soothing voice. “Don’t worry. We’ll figure something out. Perhaps your father can stay with us for a time, or Tenzin. One night at a time, Beatrice. Don’t borrow trouble.”
“Okay,” she whispered, burying her face in his skin again.
“Let me up, and I’ll get you some blood. That will help your thirst. We have some in the main cabin, I was just about to get it when you woke.”
“Have someone block the door.”
“Of course.” He rose and paused over her, examining her eyes, which were still hazy with hunger.
She gripped the sheets and nodded. “I’m fine. Go.”
Giovanni rose, pulled on a pair of pants, then darted out the door in the blink of an eye. In a few seconds, he was back with three pints of blood, cool, but still smelling fresh. He tossed one to her and she caught it with one hand, piercing it with her fangs before she sucked it dry. By the time she was finished with the third bag, she realized that, though the pilot’s blood still called to her, with some effort, she could think around it.
“How long?”
“Will the bloodlust last?” He took the bags from her, placing them on the small bedside table before he slid next to her. He wrapped a steadying arm around her waist. “If you progress the way I expect you to, within a year, you’ll be able to be around people with ease as long as you feed when you wake.”
She took a deep swallow, still distracted by the burning sensation at the back of her throat, though the ache in her gut had been satisfied. “That’s not too bad.”
“It will pass more quickly than you can imagine.”
Beatrice closed her eyes and bit her lip. “Unfortunately, the next hour and a half is going to be torture.”
“Well, we can’t leave the secured compartment until the sun falls, which means we have no way of making the pilot leave until then. I’m afraid there no escaping the scent, but…”
She looked up to see a smile teasing the corner of his lips.
“What?”
He leaned down to nip at her ear.
“Let’s see if I can’t distract you, hmm?”
T
hough she had to admit Giovanni did an excellent job distracting her, there was also a hint of desperation to their coupling. She knew they would be plunged into the most dangerous race she could imagine as soon as the sun crept below the horizon, and she had no idea what to expect. Her
dao
sat propped by the door in the sling that Baojia had fashioned that would allow her to carry it while swimming.
She lay across his chest in the last minutes before sunset. “Am I going to be distracted by humans while I’m in the river?”
He frowned as he ran his fingers up and down her back. The water had been drawn to her skin as they made love, so his hot fingers left trails of steam where they touched.
“You’ll be fine. The water will help your control. And I doubt there will be many humans in the river after dark. I’ll tell your father and Baojia to watch out for you. Any animals should be fine, they won’t smell as appealing.”
“I don’t want to slow anyone down.”
“The key is to let your amnis connect with the water the way it wants to, then allow it to move you upriver. It will be instinctual, so don’t try to control it too much. Just let it happen. The way you move already and the way you fight, I think you’ll be very fast as long as you allow yourself.”
“Okay.”
“But I’m going to tell Baojia to swim as fast as he can. If you fall behind, Stephen will stay back with you. I’m sorry, Beatrice, but the priority—”
“Is the monks.” She nodded. “I understand, Gio. They’re defenseless against Lorenzo. Of course they’re the priority.”
They both fell silent then, and Beatrice’s eyes darted to the clock that hung on the wall. They had ten minutes till sundown.
“We should get dressed,” she whispered.
He held her tight to his chest for a moment before he pulled her up and kissed her. They stared at each other for a few more minutes before she rose from the bed. Beatrice focused on the task at hand, pushing the still-present scent of the human to the back of her mind. Giovanni watched her dress in a slim pair of jeans and a tight T-shirt that would not drag in the water.
“Beatrice.”
She looked up. “Hmm?”
“I love you.”
Her breath caught, and her heart gave a quick thump. “Don’t say that like you’re saying goodbye.”
He frowned and shook his head quickly, but she could see him blink away a red gleam in his own eyes. He rose and dressed in the black combat pants he wore when fighting and nothing else. Though the pants were fire treated and would usually stand up to his element, any other clothing would be nothing but ash, so he did not waste time with it. Giovanni strapped a curved dagger to his thigh and he was ready. He helped her buckle her sword onto her back, making sure she could easily draw it to fight.
Five minutes.
She began to feel a pressure in her chest. “I love you, too,” she whispered.
He moved to stand in front of her. “This is no longer sparring. These vampires will kill you, and you must not allow that to happen,” he murmured. “There will always be war. It is your job to survive it. No matter what. That is your victory, do you understand?”
Beatrice nodded, staring at his chest and wishing she could bury her face in it to avoid the coming bloodshed. Giovanni grasped her face in his hands and forced her to look at him. He did not look at her with the soft eyes of her lover; he wore the fierce expression of a soldier.
“You must survive, Beatrice. Do you understand? Do
not
sacrifice yourself for any other. Do
not
be meek in battle. Do
not
hesitate to kill anyone that threatens you. Eliminate them swiftly and without remorse. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
A desperate light came to his eyes and his hands tightened on her jaw. “Do you understand?” he asked again.
She reached up and put her hands over his as she stared into his eyes. “Nothing will keep me from you.”
They stared at each other for a minute more before Giovanni pressed his lips to hers in a single, fierce kiss before he drew back and reached for the door. He pulled it open and everything seemed to happen at once.
They rushed into the main compartment. Tenzin had the door open and waiting for them. Baojia streaked out, followed by Stephen and Giovanni carrying Beatrice in a headlock as they passed the human in the cockpit. As soon as they reached the deserted runway, Tenzin sealed the door, eliminating the alluring scent of blood; then she grabbed Giovanni and took to the sky in one sweep. Giovanni and Beatrice’s fingers touched for only a second before he disappeared into the night.
Beatrice turned to Baojia, but the vampire had already bolted toward a thick stand of forest calling, “This way!” as he ran.
Stephen grabbed her hand, and Beatrice ran at full speed for the first time in her immortal life. Her heart pounded in excitement. The wind rushed around her and, if she had been human, it would have stolen her breath. She squinted her eyes, closed her mouth and ignored the swarm of insects she swam through as she and her father rushed to keep up with Baojia. She could only assume he had been briefed during the plane trip and knew where they were going.
They darted through the thick stand of trees, dodging around tree trunks and skipping over rocks with a swift grace she tried not to think about. The less she allowed her mind to analyze how fast she was going, the easier it was. Her heart pumped, but not with effort. It was pure excitement.
Later, Beatrice would realize she had never truly understood instinct until the moment the scent of the river hit her nose. The rushing water called to her, and when she saw Baojia leap into its depths, she followed without hesitation, her father close on her heels. She had no need to hold her breath; she simply closed her mouth and let the water envelop her, keeping Baojia’s murky form in front of her as they sped up the rushing stream.
Beatrice struggled for a moment to keep up with him, trying to force herself forward under her own preternatural power until she remembered what Giovanni had told her.
“…let your amnis connect with the water the way it wants to… allow it to move you… it will be instinctual…”
She forced the thought of kicking from her mind and focused on the rush of amnis over her skin. The moment she did, it was almost as if her energy unfurled into a thousand long tendrils, spreading out in the water as it reached to push her upstream. She had no conscious thought of maneuvering around rocks or the odd raft she came across, she had only to think of where she wanted to go and her amnis reached out to bring her there.
After a few moments, she was fully enveloped in the ecstasy of the river, moving with a single thought just under its dark surface as she tracked Baojia. She barely registered her father trailing behind her or the bends and creases of the river as it wound up and through the deep river valleys of the Wuyi Mountains. She could feel the energy signatures of the fish and small animals that darted away from her, but their blood did not distract her as human blood did. She felt the water shallow out before it grew deeper again.
They sped upriver for miles, and Beatrice had little sense of time. She knew only the water, her amnis, and Baojia’s faint shadow in front of her as she followed him. After what could have been hours or minutes, she felt him slow, and she moved silently behind him along the edge of the river. Her eyes broke the surface as they approached the bank where a long bamboo raft was pulled up.
Baojia held a hand out for silence as they walked to the edge of the riverbank. Beatrice could feel the mud between her toes and fought the instinct to remain in the safety of the water. She felt Stephen pick up her hand and tug her along when she hesitated.
None of them said a word as they walked along the muddy bank, finally stepping onto the soft grass that lined the clearing on the edge of the forest.
Baojia smelled it first, and his gaze lifted toward the rise of ancient stone stairs and the scent of blood and smoke. Both hit Beatrice’s nose at the same moment, and her eyes darted around, looking for danger. The smell of blood and fire surrounded her.
“The monastery is in flames,” Stephen whispered. He looked over her shoulder to a set of stairs buried in the hill. They led up into the dark forest and Stephen started for them before he was pulled back by Baojia.
“We need to find the source of the blood. Di Spada and Tenzin are already up there, I’m sure of it.”
Stephen shook his head. “Of course.”
Beatrice’s nostrils flared. “It’s not human.”
“No.”
They walked cautiously toward where the scent was strongest. As they breached the laurel trees on the edge of the riverbank, she saw them. A mass of twisted bodies and rolling heads, Zhongli’s guards were piled into a low depression just beyond a clearing. Their blood sprayed across the dead leaves and detritus that layered the forest floor, and Beatrice gagged at the tangled bodies of the dead vampires.
“Lorenzo must have had men following them,” Baojia said.
“But how?” Stephen looked up in confusion. “They flew.”
“I don’t have any idea, but we’ll talk about it later. Take Beatrice back to the river, and I’ll go up to the monastery.”
“I don’t want to wait by the river!”