“Then why are you here?”
“Because I want my life to matter. I want to be the one who holds back the darkness. I want to dedicate myself to something greater. Every man must have a purpose. I have found my legend. I have found a person who is a beacon of light.”
Uh-oh. I needed to put an end to this once and for all.
“Look, I’m not qualified to be a queen or a legend. I don’t want to rule. I don’t wish to impose my will on anyone. I don’t need fame or lullabies with my name attached to them. Right now, I just want to get to where I’m going and rescue a kid from some dickhead who may or may not be a god.”
The vampire gave me a big smile.
“What?”
“Asul, the Revered One, the first Sharratum, was the guardian of children. Parents lit incense and fragrant oils in her honor, for when a foreign invader had raided our lands and taken an entire generation of children for their slave pens, she rode into their capital, plunged her sword into their king’s heart, and brought the children home.”
I groaned.
“Fight against it, rage against it, it doesn’t matter. You cannot stop people from following you, no more than you can turn down people who come to you for help. Everything you have done exemplifies the standard to which a queen should aspire, for you are the servant of your people. You help them selflessly without restraint.”
“For the last time, I do not have a ‘people.’”
“The nephew of a craftsman who is working on your house is taken. You will recover him asking nothing in return, and his family will be loyal to you for all eternity…”
“You are seriously misinterpreting this.”
“They will tell stories about you to their children. You will inspire them, so when they see injustice, they will choose to make a stand just as you have done. Try as you might, you cannot change who you are.”
“Watch me.” Oh, that was a clever comeback. What did I even mean by that? I liked who I was.
The vampire scuttled a few steps ahead and bowed. Cuddles stopped, unsure if she should deliver a stomp to the head.
“I, Rimush, son of Akku and Saile, the Seventh Blade, pledge myself to you, Sharratum. I will serve you in all things, for I have witnessed your deeds and you are worthy of my loyalty.”
Great. Just great.
“My family are your eyes, ears, and blades. Call on us in your time of need.”
The undead lifted its head, bowed again, and took off down the road back toward the Farm.
Damn it.
6
Curran
I leaned on the textured parapet of the front wall. Night had fallen, and the moon was out, big and bright. Behind me, on the other side of the fort, the sea glowed silver, reflecting the moonlight. Here and there the water sparkled when an odd bioluminescent creature rose to the surface, drawn by the stars and the moon.
In front of me our front lawn stretched, a killing zone of three hundred yards, as flat and clear as we could make it. Beyond it the maritime forest rose, a dark wall of stunted live oak, loblolly pine, wax myrtle, and yaupon holly, wedged together, compacted, and pruned by wind and salt into an impenetrable barrier slanted away from the ocean. A road leading to our front gate cut its way through it and vanished in the gloom, where it would eventually join Fort Fisher Boulevard.
The forest was impassable. I had cut several trails through it, but you would need a shapeshifter’s nose to find them. When Red Horn came, they would take the road.
Paul’s family had gotten in two hours ago, seventeen people total. Of those, seven were children and five were too elderly to fight. We had put them in the main building with two capable adults to guard the door. The three remaining adults, Paul, his wife, and her brother, came armed with crossbows. They were on the wall now, to my right, waiting. Paul’s brother-in-law had also brought a longbow. Not something I’d seen often. It took a particular skill set to draw and fire it correctly. Most people couldn’t even sight the target with them because the draw was too strong. They drew and fired in a fraction of a second.
The wind floated in, bringing in a layered mix of scents.
“Dad?” Conlan’s voice was barely above a whisper.
“Yes. I can smell them.” Shapeshifters. Closing in, moving quietly.
“Is it them?” He sounded a little scared.
“Let’s hope not.”
I wasn’t exactly thrilled about it either. The walls were built to keep out humans, but shapeshifters, even a small group of them, changed things. It wasn’t about if I could take them. It was about how many of them would get past me before I did. Conlan wasn’t strong enough to stop two or more grown shapeshifters. Not yet.
Another whiff of the breeze, and a familiar scent came through loud and clear. Damn it.
The shapeshifters emerged from the gloom of the forest, running along the road in a column. Seven in total, guarding a human between them. The leader, a short but powerfully built man paused, silhouetted in the moonlight. A ridiculously large sword hung diagonally across his broad back. If he carried it vertically, the damn thing would have dragged along the ground. Of all the people in Wilmington, she found the one guy we’d agreed to avoid at all costs.
The swordsman yanked his sword free and knelt, driving the blade into the packed dirt of the road.
“Hail Beast Lord!” His voice boomed impossibly loud in the quiet night.
Fucking fantastic.
I turned toward Conlan and said very quietly, “Not a word.”
Conlan’s eyes got really big.
I leaned on the parapet. “Evening, Keelan. Rise and approach.”
The last thing I wanted to do was to waste time bellowing back and forth when people were about to attack us.
The shapeshifter group trotted closer. I recognized the human now. Thomas. Where was Kate?
Keelan stopped about ten yards away from the wall. Of the six shapeshifters with him, I knew two. Both had been in their teens when we had separated from the Pack, and, like Keelan, they now stood straight, almost at attention, as if waiting to be inspected. There was a particular look on their faces. I hadn’t seen that look for a long time.
“What brings you to this neck of the woods?” I asked.
The werewolf alpha stood up and shrugged. His shoulder muscles rose above his nonexistent neck and drew even with his ears. “Well, my lord. It’s like this. We ran into the Consort, and she asked us to see this man safely to your home.”
Thomas gave me a little wave.
“Did she now?” She’d waded into something dangerous enough for her to send Thomas here, out of harm’s way. Mostly.
What have you walked into, baby?
“Keelan, where did you happen to run into my wife?”
“Oh, nowhere special.”
“We were at the Farm,” Thomas volunteered.
Fucking hell!
Keelan gave Thomas a reproachful look.
“Why were you at the island stronghold of the People?”
Keelan cleared his throat. “Just a bit of harmless craic with a couple new lads. Sort of an initiation, you could say.”
“Not you, Keelan. I really don’t want to know what you were doing there. Thomas, why were you and my wife at the Farm?”
Thomas hesitated.
“The man asked you a question,” Keelan told him, clearly eager to be off the hot seat.