Bloodbreeders: Seeking Others (15 page)

I woke to the sounds of chains rattling and banging, making me think for just an instant that I was back in the dungeons of Cuba. With that one thought my eyes flew open to find that I, just like everyone else, was heavily chained and not going anywhere anytime soon. I called out Jacob’s name, but didn’t see him anywhere and that’s when the panic set in. I began trying to crawl across the room to the still sleeping Cates, who had three times the amount of chains on him, only to find that I couldn’t move more than a few feet.

“Cates,” I whispered.

“They have Jacob. Still yourself or you will be next,” he whispered back.

The door that Jacob said was securely locked started to open. I dropped my head like a rock and did as Cates had told me to. Two skinny men drug Jacob, chains and all and dropped him next to me and then started checking to see if any of the rest of us had woken.

“Not yet,” one of them said.

“We will check back after the sun sets,” the other replied, then both went up and out of the basement.

“Jacob?” I whispered as soon as the door closed. “You’re hurt!”

“They thought us to be the rogues. I’m afraid I didn’t have much luck in convincing them otherwise.”

“Are you okay?”

“I am. But, these are a strange group of breeders.”

“What do you mean?”

I was cut short by the door opening and a woman’s voice yelling down the stairs.

“I know there is more than one elder. I can feel it in my head, and the girl, she is no normal breeder.”

“Yes, Merna,” one of the men said coming back down the stairs in front of her.

“Take this one with the long hair in the room. She will wake soon enough.”

“Leave her be,” Cates said fighting the heavy chains.

“See you fools. Knock him back out,” she ordered then squatted down by me. “Come to destroy my home have ya?”

“Merely seeking shelter from the rogues who chased us here,” Jacob replied.

“You would say anything to save your life. I know you are the rogues that have been trying to smell us out. My magic may have failed, but your life in return will be a great payment I should think,” she retorted rolling me onto my back.

“Touch him again and you’ll wish we were those nasty things you call
rogues
,” I said kicking off the wall and knocking her back with my arms.

“You are a feisty thing aren’t you?” she growled as one of the men stomped on my stomach.

“Your death is mine!” Jacob yelled.

“And your mine if you open that mouth again!” Merna yelled back.

“If you are not the rogues why have you broken into my home?” Merna asked, pulling my head back by using my hair. 

“He already told you, to get away from those things that you keep calling rogues.”

“How can I believe you?”
“Because they will return,” Cates said breaking one of the chains.
“Merna?” one man yelled.

She sat back on her heels, looking from Cates to me then back at Jacob. I watched as the knowledge ran through her mind that she may indeed have the wrong group of
breeders chained to the floor. She was an older woman close to my mother’s age, wearing very much the same style that my great grandmother would have worn in her very early years, down to the button up shoes that showed under her full length skirt, while she was squatting down by me. I heard movement in the corner and knew that my little ones were waking up, which also meant they would be extremely confused as to why they were chained to the ground. I was about to ask her to just listen, to try and understand that we only needed refuge from the light of the day, not only from those who tried to attack us, but the basement door flew open and the other skinny man all but fell down the steps. He was screaming about movement that he had seen when he looked out after the sun had set.

“What’s going on, Renee?” Derek asked with pure panic in his voice.

“Just stay calm, there’s been a big misunderstanding, hasn’t there Merna?” Cates spoke calmly as he broke another chain.

“You broke my ward when you kicked in my door. They will surely make entrance now,” she mumbled.

“Then remove these blasted chains, so we can fight, woman!” Cates yelled breaking yet another, growling his frustrations as he did it.

She stood up and pulled a set of keys out of her pocket. “I have your word? You mean us no harm?” she asked looking over at Cates.

“You have more than that. You’ll have my life if the rogues get through that door.” She quickly walked over and unlocked the chains that bound him first. As soon as Cates was free he yanked the keys from her hand, sending her into the arms of the skinny man. Cates unlocked Jacob, and then the rest of us. Jacob stood and walked over to one of the skinny men and knocked him smooth out.

“Your word,” Merna said.

“I gave you nothing,” Jacob replied. “Now where are our weapons?”

The skinny man standing next to her pointed at the door that they had brought Jacob out of. He stormed back in, bringing every one of our weapons back out using a blanket he found in the room. By the time he had them laid out, Cates had us all free from the binding chains. Merna now stood at the back of the room with the one man standing at her side and the other pushing himself up into a sitting position. Cates took off up the
stairs with all the boys behind him. Tammy and I went up last followed by Merna and her men.

Once I got up there, Cates and the boys were peering out trying to spot the rogues. Cates turned and asked Merna if she knew how many there were, and she said that she had felt a group much the size of ours, which was the reason that she thought we were them. Derek hit Cates in the arm and pointed out the small crack by the china hutch. “There by the big tree to the left.” Cates nodded then pushed the hutch back in place.

“We need a way to get out the back,” he said turning around.

“The door has a ward much like the front did,” Merna replied. “If you open it we will be vulnerable to the likes of them.”

“Upstairs love,” the skinny man by her side added. “The window that overlooks the garden.”

“Yes, Alec. I completely forgot. It is a long drop, but it would do nicely and leave my wards in place.”

“Can you reset the ward on this door?” I asked walking back to her.

“Not with any of you in my house,” she replied looking at the ground.

“Why?”

“We have given ourselves over to a different side of the dark, child. It keeps us safe from slavers and rogues alike, but it also keeps us in the boundaries of our domain.”

“How do you feed?” Derek asked joining our conversation.

“I drop the ward every other month. Hunting is something we do well. And the blood of one deer fills us three nicely for a good time.”

“Her magic is a source of feeding, my wife is good with the craft,” Alec added stepping closer to her.

“So, you are a witch then?” I asked, stepping back.

“Don’t look so surprised. Did you think me to have a green face and maybe horns?”

“I think maybe I did.”

“The window,” Cates interrupted.

“Yes, of course. Alec, show them the way.”

“Set your wards as soon as we are out,” Jacob said as he sprinted up the stairs behind the others.

“We’ll do our best to take care of these rogues, Merna.”

“Here take this, but do not touch one drop on yourself, or it will go right through you like water through bread.”

She didn’t need any better explanation than that. I took the clear liquid that she gave me and stuck the small glass bottle in my pocket. She said to use it on any breeder that got too close. I nodded, and then went to find the others. “Don’t forget we are here.” I stopped halfway up and looked back down at her.

“My name is Renee Lebrun. One day you won’t have to hide from slavers anymore, Witch Merna. I plan on killing each and every one of them.” Then I smiled and took off after my little ones.

I found them in a lavish bedroom made up like that of a king, or maybe I should say, queen. Silk curtains hung from the double French style doors that over looked a balcony. The bed was a large four poster, covered to over flowing with different colored throw pillows. One wooden chest sat at the foot and one single vanity with a black velvet bench sat opposite from the fireplace. Cates went to open the French doors when Alec yelled for him to stop, and then explained that that wasn’t the window in which they had spoken of. He turned and moved a painting as tall as myself and revealed a single window that no one would have even known was there had he not moved it.

Tammy was the first to look out then she started shaking her head. “I can’t get through that, much less drop from this height.” It was then that we learned of her fear of heights, because we all knew she would fit through the window. True, she would have to readjust her breasts a few times when sliding out feet first, but it was doable either way. One by one, we made our way out the window leaving Cates, Tammy, and myself standing in the room with Alec, who stood there and watched as we argued about who went next.

“If I go there is no way in hell that you’re going to talk her down so just go, Cates,” I said stepping up to the big man.

“I will not leave any behind in this place.”

“I’m not worried about it anymore, so just go,” I said getting madder by the minute.

“Stubborn woman!”

“Stubborn jackass!”

While we were going back and forth neither of us noticed as Tammy tried to work her bottom half through the open window, going feet first and on her stomach. “I’m stuck!” she yelled, getting our full attention. We both looked at each other, me shrugging my shoulders and Cates taking on an even colder expression. He took her arms while I tried to push her shoulders. It was her enormous breasts that had her stuck. The moment her lower body took the weight of hanging out the window, her breasts became lodged on the sill of the window’s ledge. She tried desperately to lift herself up, but her luck was failing fast.

“Cates, you’re going to have to lift her by her breasts,” I said not thinking that anyone would be offended.

“I will do no such thing!”

“Please, just get me out of this damn window!” Tammy cried now t
rying to pull herself back in.

I reached down and took one breast in each hand and pushed up and forward with all my might. She popped free and fell to the earth with a scream and a thud. I looked back at Cates who now looked mortified at my grabbing her breasts and was speechless for the first time in the short time that I had known him. I went to the opening and jumped down right beside Tammy, who was clutching her chest. I felt someone yank me backwards as a loud thud hit right where I was standing. I looked back to see Cates going from a half kneeling stance to a full prone position in one smooth stand. He was so huge that the earth actually shook when his feet hit the ground, or so it seemed.

“We have to move,” Jacob said releasing my arm. “Sydney and Garvin are making their way to the boat.”

“What about the rogues?”

“They can take care of themselves,” he replied reaching down and helping Tammy to her feet.

“No…I’m not going to leave them to do things like eat other breeders.”

“Renee, we are other breeders,” Jacob added swiftly turning to look behind him. “We must go now!”

“Then go! I’ll not leave them here to hurt Merna and her husband.”
“For the hell damn, woman. Do you wish us all dead?”

I swallowed back the laugh at Jacob’s poor attempt at cursing, and quickly averted my eyes elsewhere.

“They could have killed us, but they didn’t. Now they could die because we entered her domain, breaking what she calls her
wards
.”

“She also said she could replace it,” Cates added stepping over by Jacob.

“If you boys can’t handle a good fight then run, just get,” I said pulling my blade.
“I’m not going anywhere,” Derek added stepping to my side, holding his blade.

“Same here. It’s what we do, Jacob. Kill off the bad so the good will have a chance in this jacked up world,” Brandon so elegantly put what I was thinking.

“Sorry, I’m with them. I want to agree with you, Renee, but these things you want to go up against have no stopping point, they’re hungry all the time and their want and need to feed, makes them manic.”

“Looks like it’s us three,” I said looking over at Derek and Brandon. “Y’all go back to the boat with the others. If we don’t show up before the sun rises you’ll know what happened.”

Cates growled a loud, long guttural sound and then slammed his fist into the back of the house, splitting a perfect crack up the face of the wall. Jacob hung his head and shook it. Tammy just let out a deep breath and looked at me. But no one had a chance to say anything else because Garvin and Sydney came racing around the house at top speed. “Run!” And run we did, deep into the forest behind Merna’s house.

“We saw eight all together. Four of them were watching the front of the house, waiting I think for us to come out I think, and four more are trying to sink my boat,” Sydney said with anger boiling over like molten lava.