Chapter 13: A Dream Come True

GENISIS

Genisis takes control, shifting with ease. We dart through the trees toward our prearranged spot, three vampires hot on our trail. Once we reach the perfect location, I shift back and wait for them to catch up.

They don’t take long. As soon as they arrive, they begin to gloat.

“No place to run now, Princess,” one hisses.

I brace myself for their attack, adopting a defensive stance and flashing them a cocky grin.

“We have you now, bitch!” another snarls, his red eyes raking over me. “Your little boy toy can’t save you now. I hate the taste of wolf’s blood, but for you, I’ll make an exception. You look absolutely delicious.”

I cock my hip and keep grinning.

“I can’t wait to wipe that smile off your face,” the last vampire declares.

“Awe, what? No foreplay? No wonder you don’t have any females to fondle you. Personally, I can see why though. Neither of you are attractive. Kinda second-rate. No wonder your king set you up as bait,” I taunt.

That’s when all three lunge at me with vampire speed. I shift into smoke, and they blow past me, barely stopping before they fly over the cliff.

I shift back as they quickly turn to see me standing there with a huge smile on my face. “Sorry boys. You missed me!”

I pull the sword from my back and behead the first one who charges at me. Then, grabbing the cord on the ground and pulling it, the vampire in the middle flies into the air in the net and is suspended, losing his mind.

The third tries to surprise me with an attack, but I am ready for him. I step up into his face and drive my fist into his chest, wrapping my hand around his heart and extracting it. A scream is frozen on his lips as he disintegrates into dust.

~“Vic. Come help me take this jerk down. Bring the sedative Lira made to knock him out,”~ I mind-link Victor.

~“On my way. By the way, the chopper will be here in about seven minutes, and Andrei is still frozen. What the hell did they do to him?” ~

“I have no idea, but I’ll get to the bottom of it through this bloodsucker,” I reply, looking up at the struggling vampire. He is growling and going crazy.

The spelled net holds him prisoner when normally he would have easily escaped. “Relax, jerk! You’re not going anywhere until I take you,” I yell up at him.

“I’m going to kill you, bitch!” he screams. “You killed my brothers!”

“I sure did. Call it luck of the draw. It could have been you dead and any one of them in your predicament. I didn’t give a damn which one of you I caught. You made it so easy too.”

The net starts swinging as he struggles harder and growls his frustration.

Victor approaches with the dart gun and loads it with the tranquilizer dart. He fires it up and we watch the vampire fall into unconsciousness.

“Okay, lower him and let’s get him loaded into the chopper,” Victor says.

Victor slings the net-wrapped vampire over his shoulder fireman-style and we head to the location where the chopper is meeting us.

Andrei is lying on the ground and Reuben is standing close by. I quickly move to Andrei’s side and press my finger to his pulse.

Which, come to think of it, is stupid because they don’t have a pulse, but I do notice his chest is moving so he is still breathing.

“Has he moved or…I don’t know, blinked?” I ask Reuben.

“Nothing. Just frozen. I did see a tiny speck of blood on his shirt right over his heart. I couldn’t find anything though,” Reuben replies.

Victor throws his burden down on the ground none too gently and looks toward the horizon. “Chopper at nine o’clock.”

We all watch as the chopper finds level ground and lands. We throw our gear in one compartment then load the vampire in too.

Reuben stabs his leg with one more dart to keep him from waking while in flight. He uses the net to bind up his body tightly to keep him from thrashing around.

We lift Andrei into his seat and buckle him in, then we all board, and the chopper lifts off and we head back to the Royal Pack.

While in flight, I take out my cell phone and ask my brother to meet us with Lira. I explain I am coming back with one ancient and one frozen Andrei and I am going to need Lira’s help fixing Andrei.

***

We land and guards hustle the vampire off to the dungeons. A gurney carries Andrei toward the hospital where Lira and Boris are waiting for us.

Lira strips his shirt from his body and starts running her hands over him, asking questions as she does her mental scan.

“And you say one of the vampires shot something at him from a blow pipe and he instantly froze up and that was it?” she asks again.

“Yes. He was talking, then nothing.”

A wrinkle furrows on Lira’s brow. “I can’t find anything. I don’t detect any magic either,” she says, looking perplexed.

I step closer to Andrei. I sniff. I take in his scent and then Genisis moves forward. “His scent is off,” she tells me. “Sniff closer to his heart.”

I lean in closer and sniff. My nose picks up on a strange scent, one I have never smelled before.

I look closer to the area I get the scent from. A very small spot is noticeable, like a small wound.

“Here!” I tell Lira. “Something went in here. Into his heart.”

Lira steps closer and holds her hand over the spot. She closes her eyes, and the scent becomes stronger. She catches a whiff and gasps. “Dragon’s blood!”

“What?” I ask.

Boris moves closer. “What does that mean?” he asks.

“The dragon’s blood tree is becoming rare. Its sap is very powerful in magic. It’s a positive element in most cases, but for the vampire not so much. If they injected a sliver into Andrei’s heart, he is in stasis. He can’t be awakened. I imagine they were placing him in stasis to be able to drain him without struggle,” Lira explains, looking at Andrei with worry.

“I have no idea how to bring him out of this.” She meets Boris’s eyes. “I have no magic for this.”

I turn and stare down at my frozen mate on the gurney. Tears track down my cheeks. How could I lose my mate, yet still have him here?