The Fifth Clan (9 page)

I had successfully been ignoring the wolves howling in the background, but her comments brought to home that if we waited long enough the wolves would get over their natural fear of humans and descend on us in their hunger for the kill. They wouldn’t attack us unless we tried to keep them from the buck I’d dropped but it was better to avoid the risk entirely and get the animal out of there.

Ghost and I quickly dressed it while Ash went to get the wagon we’d stashed a few hundred yards away. She pulled up just about the time that we finished and we loaded the dressed and wrapped meat onto the bed and climbed on for a pleasant and short ride back into the small village.

Don’t ask me its name or where it’s located. It no longer exists today and I can’t remember anyway. I might, if I went back, be able to find the foundations of the Stone Inn where Ghost and I stayed.

“Good afternoon Gabriel,” he said from the fence surrounding the inn’s courtyard. He stood at a height of six feet, long wavy white hair reaching to his shoulders and a heavy European broadsword hung from the sword belt wrapped around his waist. His clothes were all shades of white or grey from his boots to the light cloak he had clasped about his neck.

“Threntü,” I said warily as we pulled to a stop at the entrance. “To what do we owe the pleasure of this visit?” He’d made a habit out of making my life difficult and I didn’t exactly appreciate his efforts in most cases. I was actually beginning to become disillusioned with the entire idea of the Brotherhood and the leadership role I was supposedly being groomed for.

“Just checking in on you my boy, just checking in. I wanted
to make sure you were keeping up with your training and see if you were having any difficulty fitting into the human world again.” He nodded to Ash. “Lovely as always my dear,” he said to her.

She frowned at him and crossed her arms under her breasts as a breeze kicked up out of nowhere and ruffled the loose and flowing blouse she wore.

“Cut it out Threntü. Aren’t you above cheap thrills like that after all your years?” I asked him.

“Never, Gabriel. It is the little things in life that bring the most joy. Hence why one must enjoy them to the fullest extent possible.”

“Do those little things that you enjoy so much include running other peoples lives for them?”

“On occasion. It depends on the life I’m running.”

He turned to Ash. “Come with me my dear, I must speak with you.” He turned and walked away without another glance or a moments hesitation. As if he knew his orders would be obeyed immediately and without question. It’s unfortunate that he was right.

Ash nodded silently and climbed down from the wagon, following
Threntü around the corner of the large stone building.

I swore and slammed my fist against the wooden railing.
There was a loud, splintering crack and the wood snapped under the force of the blow. I ignored Ghosts questioning look.

“What’s wrong Gabe?” he asked.

“Nothing.” I clucked my tongue at the horses and shook the reins. I didn’t want to talk about what was bothering me. Ghost wouldn’t understand and there’s nothing he would be able to do about it anyway so it was pointless for me to burden him with my mental meanderings.

I was in love. Or if not actually in love I was really beginning to fall for the fiery red haired vampire that so calmly and obediently followed that old, perverted, shit licking asshole off without a word or even a sign of protest. It disgusted me the level of control he held over the members of his clan.

Ash, was a wind vampire. Threntü had already had me train for seven years minimum with a highly skilled member of each of the other clans. It was now his clans turn and Ash was there as my trainer, my mentor, and my tormentor. Her purpose was to ensure that I learned as much as she could teach me about the wind clans abilities and how best to utilize them and control them.

I was being slowly forged into the most highly trained weapon in Threntüs’ arsenal. I knew it, and he knew it. Neither
of us ever spoke of it.

Ghost had been my friend from five years after my turning when Threntü brought him to me and told us that we would be training together under Grim. Grim taught us. Me to fight, Ghost to protect me as my personal bodyguard and soldier.

I don’t think he’d quite counted on us becoming friends. Threntü didn’t seem to understand any emotions other than desire and ambition. He had no friends that I knew of. No close acquaintances. He spent time with many, very lovely, ladies but only in his bed and they were rapidly escorted out of his estates the next morning. If they were lucky. Some were turned out in the dead of night after he was finished taking his pleasure from them. Others were never seen again until the bodies needed to be buried.

It disgusted me the level of control he held over his clan. What disgusted me even more was that he held nearly the same level of control over me. A control that was so ingrained into my psyche that by this time, when I was starting to wish to throw it off, it was too late. It would take something very drastic before I would be able to shrug off the harness that the old wind bag had placed around my neck.

Even after Japan. That still wasn’t enough.

“I’m heading upstairs,” I muttered curtly to Ghost as I
directed the horses towards the stables. “Would you take care of things here?” I asked as I jumped down from the wagon. I looked up at him and he nodded silently.

“Do what you have to, Gabe. I'll handle everything here.”

“Thank you, Ghost. I appreciate it.”

“What are friends for, Gabe?” He responded and took hold of the reins. As he clucked at the horses and started them on their way I sighed.

“Yeah. What are friends for, Ghost?”

I turned and went inside, my eyes and my heart downcast.

Ok, I know that was a really sappy sounding line but bear with me please I’m still new at this whole writing thing.

I ignored the various patrons and employees of the Inn and wandered out the front door, instead of taking the stairs as I’d told Ghost. I hadn’t lied to him really. I had had every intention of going upstairs when I first walked into the Inn. It wasn’t until I saw the stairs leading up that I changed my mind and decided to go out to the woods to train for a bit.

About a hundred yards outside the little village the tree line started. It was an odd sensation because it wasn’t a sharp demarcation, but you entered the trees so gradually that one moment you felt as if you were in open country, the next, you’re surrounded by massive, high reaching spruce and oak trees.

As soon as I was out of sight of the village I tapped into the well of power within me, drastically lightening the weight of my body and a slow breeze started to blow through the trees. The wind slowly lifted me and I floated gently towards the tops of the trees. I kept my body as light as possible, the same technique that allowed me to walk on soft snow without leaving any footprints a few years before in Japan, and let the wind carry me.

“Not yet, Sir. He isn’t quite, pliable, enough. That and he has this irrational dislike of you right now that strikes me as very unusual. Doesn’t everyone like having their lives run for them and their decisions made without so much as consulting them?”

I cut my control over the wind and let it die away, dropping silently into the branches of a tree high above the forest floor. Below me, and about fifty feet away ahead of me, stood Threntü and Ash. Ash’s arms were crossed beneath her breasts again and Threntü faced her, leaning casually against a nearby tree, hand resting lightly on the hilt of his sword.

“I can very much do without the sarcasm little Fire Dove,” he admonished her.

“My apologies, Sir. The point remains that Gabriel is too strong willed, I haven’t enough control over him to make him
do what it is you want him to do. Not without playing our hand too early and being forced to take blatant physical and emotional measures against him. If you want him to do anything, and think it’s his idea to begin with, I will need more time to work on him.”

“You’re supposed to be the best any of the clans have to offer, my luscious flame,” he sneered at her, reaching out to squeeze one breast. “Why are you having so much trouble with one, weak youngling?”

“Young, yes. Weak? You have no idea how powerful that boy is. I’ve never met anyone so strong willed. Anyone else would have broken a year ago but he holds onto this hatred of you. The event in Japan that he sometimes mutters of in his sleep… what exactly happened there?”

“Nothing that you need to concern yourself with,” he snapped and his hand came up to slap her across the face. The force of the blow sent her sprawling to the ground and I leaped into the air, letting the wind take me back towards the village. I didn’t need to hear anything else.

I didn’t particularly want to.

* * * * *

???? Mexico: February 7, 2005

Rachel was waiting rather impatiently for us when we got back to the compound in the early evening. I’d had no idea that just five miles on the other side of Ghosts property was a very good sized town. He’d actually picked a great location; I never had understood why some wolves and vamps insisted on finding the remotest possible location to live in, thus making it difficult to find food.

“What the hell is the big, fucking idea leaving me alone?” she snapped at me.

“Sorry, Rache,” I said, smirking at her. “I was hungry and needed to grab a bite. Ghost was nice enough to show me where I could get some food.”

“Did you not think that maybe I was hungry? I might have wanted to go with you.”

“I wasn’t aware that you’d taken to drinking human blood,” I said, flashing my teeth at her. “Next time I go out for a bite to drink, I’ll be sure to invite you along sweet cheeks.”

She glared at me. Or attempted to, despite looking just a bit green. “Whatever. Did you at least think to bring me back anything palatable to humans?”

“I did not. We’re going to cook something here.”

Ghost looked back and forth between Rachel and I during the conversation and suddenly started chuckling quietly.

“What are you so cheerful about Chuckles?” I asked him.

“I think it’s quite funny, how far you’ve fallen.”

“Fallen?”

“A three hundred and thirty year old vampire letting a young human woman push him around”

“Three hundred and twenty seven,” I snapped at him. “And I’m not letting her push me around. We’re… debating.”

“Is that what they’re calling it these days?”

“Shut it, Puppy.”

Ghost and I both turned and stared at Rachel. She glared at Ghost. “You heard me. I’ve had it up to here,” she held her hand about a foot above her head, “with this bull-shit and I just want to know how I’m going to get back to my life instead of running around the backwoods of Mexico with a vampire and a FUCKING WEREWOLF!”

Ghost and I both clapped our hands over our ears and winced as her volume level shot through the roof.

“Rachel, calm down,” I tried.

“Calm down? Calm down! I AM CALM!” she screeched.

“We’re waiting for them.”

She stopped mid tirade.

“What? Waiting for whom?”

“Waiting for the next attack. We’re expecting them to attack within a few hours or possibly by tomorrow morning at the latest.”

“Why are you just waiting for them?”

“Because I’ve got a plan. Trust me, I know what I’m doing here and I know what we need to do.”

“Bullshit, Gabe,” Ghost butted in. “You’ve got no idea what you’re up against and you’ve got no clue what it is you’re doing. I worked with you for over 80 years. I know how you operate and this is your ‘we’re fucked, so let’s fire every bullet we have and hope something dies,’ frame of mind. You’re going to get yourself killed if you don’t sit down and draw up an actual plan.”

“Like what, Pup?”

He surged to his feet and bore down on me, grabbing me by the front of my jacket before I had time to blink and slammed me up against the wall, my feet dangling a good six inches off the ground. I saw stars as my head bounced off the steel wall and my spine creaked when I hit.

“Last time I’m gonna tell you, Gabe,” he growled, spittle flecking my cheeks. “Stop, calling me, Pup.”

“So, you are still alive,” I said, smiling through the
rapidly diminishing pain as my body healed the minor bruises caused by my encounter with the wall.

“What’re you talking about?” he snarled.

“I was beginning to wonder if the hot head I grew up with had died and just left behind this paranoid shell that I found when I got here.”

“Paranoid?”

“Your security is ridiculous, dude,” I pointed out as he dropped me and stepped back. “You’ve got surveillance everywhere, bugged so many of the higher ups and for what? Have you been feeding information to anyone, or planning any campaigns or battles? You’ve been hiding out here for nearly thirty years and you haven’t done anything.”

“I don’t give a flying, chocolate, monkey fuck about saving the world, Gabe. I look after myself, and that’s all.”

“You used to look after me, old friend,” I said sadly. “Come on, Rachel. We’ve got a lot of ground to make up. Sorry I wasted your time coming here.”