H.T. Night's 8-Book Vampire Box Set (136 page)

But I no longer had a soul.

“Anything,” she whispered in my ear, and her
breath was like the fresh spring breezes of my nearly forgotten
youth. It had been so very, very long ago.

“Okay,” I said.

I was Spider. That’s the way I rolled these
days.

“You can help me study for the history
test,” I said. “We’re in night school, remember?”

She moved away a little.

Not too much, but just enough.

The night stretched out before us, and all
the miles, the endless, endless miles.

The End

Return to the Table of Contents

Also available:

A Vampire and Werewolf Love Story

by H.T. Night

(read on for a sample)

Chapter One

I looked over the Lady’s sleeve and drank in
my beautiful city. The stunning fireworks had finished, and once
again, I was left overwhelmed at the majestic magnitude of the
city. The party boats had left the harbor with their floodlights,
raucous cheers, and commotion that commemorated the first
anniversary of the renaming of the city. What was once named
Manhattan had been replaced by the name Verona.

I stood by the silent, virtuous Lady, just
on her left shoulder. Balancing my feet on such a great statue was
always tricky. I could taste her overwhelming wet, coppery scent in
my nose and mouth. The aroma was reminiscent of fresh blood, not
altogether unpleasant.

I looked up into the dark cold night. It was
unusual to see stars over our city, but the night was crisp with
them, twinkling sparks on a black velvet nightscape, such a clear
night that diamond rays from starlight illuminated the night sky
like Jacob’s ladders extending from deep sky to tall buildings. It
was a radiant night.

We were fortunate to have most of our land
bought out for re-gentrification by a billion-dollar Prince. Prince
Escalus. His very surname as a visionary developer was a legend in
his own time. Not only was he rich, he was powerful, and masterful
at rejuvenating entire cities. His approach into developing cities
and remaking them was that his philosophy was simple: Keep the
peace.

There was no place that needed peace more in
this time than New York City. More specifically…Manhattan.

As I looked out from my 300-foot-high perch
in the night shadow of the bosom of the lady, I marveled at the
beauty of my Verona. My city was like a beautiful woman to me and
my city had two competing lovers and a divided heart. I was
reminded of which immortal species ruled these parts. Vampires and
werewolves were as legendary and infamous in these parts as
celebrities. In fact, we even had our own media network.

Verona was run, in part, by the two immortal
families: the Capulets and the Montagues. They couldn’t have been
more different in their culture and in their immortal forms.
Montagues were from the wrong side of the tracks: a ruthless,
cutthroat band of scorned misfits who succeeded anyway, with all
the odds against them. They were crass and abrupt, and they always
needed a shave, a bath, and a good haircut. But that came with the
territory. The Montagues were cursed by a comedy of errors but
brazenly got to their feet, every time.

Now the Capulets, they were cultured and
liked the finer things in life: big houses, expensive cars, and
especially, flaunting it to the Montagues.

As different as the two sides were in
culture, they stood even further apart in their unlike immortality.
The Capulets had chosen to live their remaining years here in
Verona—it could be a million years, as they were long-lived as
vampires. It fit their smug elitist attitudes to be so long in the
tooth and aggravated the Montagues that there was no way to get rid
of them.

The Montagues lived their days as
werewolves: meat-eating, ass-kicking, moon-howling werewolves who
lived day by day, close to the earth, as close to raw passion as
creatures could ever get. Montagues were warm-blooded and
therefore, had passion soaring through their veins. The Capulets
had to take their blood from others, like the leeches on society
that they were, by virtue of their curse. Most of them, save her,
were passionless, elitist, and cold. Only she was different. I
swore inside of me that I had never laid eyes on a wonder of the
world more captivating than she.

The problem was twofold. Immortality,
dominance, and bloodlines separated Verona into two sides, nearly
split right down the middle at Times Square. There were two
immortal families in my city, bloodthirsty rivals who gave each
other no quarter, and none was asked. They mostly kept to their own
turf, and to their own kind. The two families were split along
Times Square.

To the north of Times Square in the Upper
East Side, the Capulets had bought out mansions that were turned
into apartment buildings…that were now turned back into mansions.
The family owned just about every building and had turned the
section of the city into a place that turned up their noses at the
Hamptons.

To the south of Times Square, and all the
way down to the Financial District, was where the werewolves
roamed. They were definitely not as rich as the Capulets, but they
lived better than most folks. If werewolves were roaming, then one
would likely see a Montague in their midst. Nearly all Montague men
had chosen to live their days as werewolves. Montague families were
spread out pretty evenly among Chelsea, and the East and West
Villages. One could even find families in SoHo and Chinatown.

Until now, there had only been small
skirmishes between the two dissonant factions, but my extraordinary
senses of premonition and danger detected that all hell was about
to break loose in a populous that was deep in celebration about the
rebirth of art, culture, education, and creativity. A resurgence of
passion for the city swept like a fiery new religion into the
corners of every borough. It was as if people were crying out for a
deeper purpose. I knew I was.

Things in this part of the world had been
quite different for some time. In reality, the entire world was
different. A hundred years ago, there had been a technology
revolution that spurred the inevitable. We’d touched the moon and
the planets with our humanity and our machines shot into outer
space, and could go no further without bankrupting every country. A
realization set in that we now needed to get in touch with our
mortality, our inner space.

It was time for the world to turn on its
fulcrum. I felt it. Time for the immortals to take their rightful
place as the world’s muscle and minds. Religion and politics tried
to prevent it from happening, but eventually, immortality reigned
over mortality. Now, just two immortal factions stood at the helm
of society, glaring at each other from opposite corners of the
city.

In the madness, I had been given a gift from
the gods. I had been given visions of a wondrous place. A place of
peace, of hope and love. I had only seen it in my dreams, but on
this night, I felt that my special place was near, as if I could
almost touch it with my hands. Of late, something had come over me
and it was only intensifying. I looked up at the stars and the full
moon that pierced my mind’s eye with a pull that I knew well. I
howled into the night sky. I howled from my deep place, where I had
only seemed to been able to howl from as of late. I had been told
that my howl was unique in that it had both the sounds of music
playing and the reverence of a man crying out in prayer. It was a
howl that had reduced some to tears when they heard it, such was
its unique vibration, timbre, tone, and range. It was a yodel from
across the Alps, a chorus of angels with one harmonized chord. My
howl is my prayer and my song of all that I was, all that I am, and
all that I shall be. Inside of me roiled a yearning for something
more, hungering for something more. I howled in agony and ecstasy
until tears dripped from my face and wet my body like scorching
rain.

When I was finished, I looked over my city
of Verona and cried out so loud that my throat roared, “My name is
Romeo Montague and I am a Werewolf!”

A Vampire and Werewolf Love Story

is found in:

What the Night Knows: Three Novels

Also available:

A Young Adult Series

by H.T. Night

(read on for a sample)

Chapter One

It was the last day of summer and I was
going into the sixth grade. I woke up feeling pretty impatient, as
I always did on the day the school posted the classroom lists. Each
year, the day before Wenchester Elementary School began, the school
posted a list for each classroom so that the students could see
which class they would be in during the year.

For some reason this had always been a huge
event in my life. I anticipated it the way little children
anticipate Christmas morning.

This year would be a tad different. I had
finally made it. I was at the top. I was a sixth grader!

At Wenchester, there were two sixth-grade
classrooms. The teachers were Mr. O’Neil and Mrs. Phyllis. Mr.
O’Neil was tall, slender, and non-threatening in his appearance. He
had a reputation of being real strict. Mrs. Phyllis, on the other
hand, was simply young and beautiful. She had blonde hair and blue
eyes that hid behind red glasses that made her look like a
secretary. So, given the two choices for having a teacher, I
thought it was fair to say I would rather be in Mrs. Phyllis’s
class.

“Wake up!” screeched a female voice outside
my room.

“You actually thought I might be asleep?” I
yelled back.

“Mom wants us to walk to the store and get
lunch.” With that, she threw open the door. It was my sister,
Carrie. Everyone said we looked alike. We would both argue to our
deathbeds that we didn’t. She was a year younger than I was. The
sad part about it was we were in the same grade. I was held back a
year by my mother. She said it was for emotional reasons. If you
ask me, I thought my mother wished she had given birth to twins.
She figured that even though we didn’t come out at the same time,
she would make us go to school at the same time.

I used to live in Arizona with my mother and
father. My parents divorced when I was three years old. My dad
moved to Texas with his girlfriend a year later. I would only speak
to him about four times a year. I saw him once at Christmas time
when I was seven years old. We didn’t have much of a father-son
relationship. I was supposed to love him because he was my dad. It
was hard to love someone you never saw, especially when that
someone chose not to see you.

My mother, sister and I live in Southern
California. The three of us moved here after my mom and dad
divorced. I figure I’ll probably leave California someday when I’m
older, but, for now, it’s an okay place to live, I guess.

“Blayne called, he said he’ll meet you at
the basketball courts at two o’clock,” Carrie said with a smile. My
sister has a crush on Blayne since we were little kids.

“Did he mention if Timmy would be there?” I
asked.

“What am I, your personal answering
service?”

“You are when Blayne calls.”

“I don’t like Blayne,” she protested. “You
always say I like Blayne. I might have thought he was cute when I
was little, but I don’t like him anymore.”

“Whatever,” I said, pushing her out of my
room.

It was hard not to be overly excited knowing
that the classroom lists were going to be posted. I wanted to have
five people in my classroom. I wanted Blayne Ward and Timmy Lawson
because they were my two best friends. I also hoped to have Tanya
Taylor and Ali Moore because they were the two prettiest girls in
the sixth grade.

Then, there was the new girl. She moved here
at the end of the year. She wasn’t in my class.

Her name was Sarah Davis. She was the type
of girl who seemed very mysterious. She didn’t say much. She would
just keep to herself at recess. I always paid attention to her
though. We walked home in the same direction from school.

On the last day of school, I decided to do
something that was very unlike me. That day I decided to pass my
house and go to the market and get a candy bar. I was curious to
see where Sarah lived. I walked behind her for about a mile. She
happened to walk into Pete’s market. It was the only place to go,
aside from the Laundromat.

I walked in after her and grabbed a bag of
chips and a soda. I noticed Tommy Madkins was in there with a
couple of his friends playing video games. Tommy was by far the
biggest bully to ever go to Wenchester Elementary School. He
started to get a reputation when he was in fourth grade. It was
fair to say we had a lot of jerks in the sixth grade.

I walked up to the counter and Sarah was in
front of me. All she had in her hand was a loaf of bread. She was
much shorter than me and had sandy brown hair. Her eyes stood out
the most. She had these big green eyes.

I stood behind her, admiring her, when I
heard, “Greer!” I hated when someone called me by my last name. I
turned around to see Tommy and his clan of jerks laughing. “Is that
your girlfriend?” Tommy asked, laughing even harder. This made
Sarah turn around and look at us.

“No,” I said, “I don’t even know her.” I
felt stupid. It was the truth though. I had never even spoken a
word to her.

She looked at me and gave me the most
innocent smile.

I smiled back. However, whenever someone
caught me off guard with a smile, I would try to smile back but it
usually looked odd, like I was posing for a toothpaste commercial
or something. She paid and went out the door.