Chapter 9

William watched him from the doorway, nodding sharply when their eyes met, then he shifted to a massive white wolf whose back stood taller than Jameson’s mother’s full height. The wolf loped out the door, fully expecting Jameson to follow.

Jameson kissed his mother on the cheek. “I shall find you as soon as this duty is done. Tonight, tomorrow morning at the latest. Run true.”

She nodded sharply, pushing him toward the door, her face set, her eyes scared. “I love you,” she whispered. “Your father loves you. You are a good pup, and always have been. Run true.”

Jameson tried to whisper back to her, but tears choked his throat. He shifted instead, licked her face roughly, then followed his uncle out the door, into the sowed field that was their farm land, surrounded by the forest. Hunting land.

He ran, nose to Uncle’s tail, wondering that the smell of the vampires could carry so far. Pine, the scent was all around him all the time, but the vampire pine was different than the woods pine. His father had described it once as, “more still,” and Jameson had never understood what that meant, but now that he smelled his first vampire, he did.

The pine smell of the forest was alive, swirling with varied additions and concentrations, ebbing and flowing like particles and wind were one. But vampire pine? It smelled of a flat and dead wall of pine that sat in one spot and never moved. Always the same. Unchanging. Hostile and begrudging.

As he ran, he realized the bitter herb smell he’d been told of was also there. Under the pine, or perhaps behind it. Overwhelmed.

Mayhap the blood of vampires was fragrant enough to cause the smell to carry on the wind, and the faraway battle was spilling gallons of the stuff. Could it be almost over, already? He hoped so, fiercely, even as he marshaled his strength and stamina to keep his Uncle’s pace.

They followed the family’s footpath up the bluff toward the horse trail that wound through the Natanhala forest, both to Five Hills and to the neighboring towns. Wolf shifters never rode horses and there were no humans in Five Hills or the forest, but the deer shifters used horses to transport goods from the forest to the town. Jameson was glad for the wider and well maintained trail. They could go fast, finish whatever they were doing, and he could head to Asheville.

The Instinct reared inside him, letting out a single soulful howl that split Jameson’s mind in two even as his feet thundered on. William’s colossal wolf heard his own version and faltered on the path, tripping and rolling before somehow landing back on his feet and continuing his run. Mud clung to the fur on his back. His ears pointed behind him as he shifted his attention to Jameson, to hear what he would do. Follow, or not?

Jameson could not follow. Someone in his immediate family had died, and duty was the last thing he could think of.

The howl had been the Instinct mourning the loss, leaving Jameson bereft.

Jameson kept his speed and curved to the left, his claws churning the mud, his still-sleek wolf shooting between trees and hurdling fallen logs, till he reached the edge of the bluff. He skidded to a stop. His house sat below in the valley. The front door stood open as he had left it. It looked normal, quiet, but then the back door shot open and five large, dark males strode out. Vampires! He’d never seen one before. They all had wicked-looking knives in their hands, their clothing dark and lush, thick cloaks streaming behind them.

The Instinct had already quieted. It didn’t waste words, or grief, apparently.

Jameson cut off the howl of grief that tried to climb up his throat, replacing it with a snarl the likes of which he’d never heard. He crouched, ready to shoot himself off the bluff. If he landed true, he would tear through those vampires in only a few moments.

No! William’s voice rang through his head, even though they were shifted. Your mother knew that what we embark on was more important than the lives of one family. She wanted you to do your duty.

Jameson never faltered. This was a day of firsts, but even hearing the voice of the other white wolf would not keep him from killing every vampire, no matter that there were five of them. He would slaughter them, or die with his family. He should have been there to defend them, to go down fighting before them. To give them a chance to run.

His body arced in the air, whistling through slim branches and the needles of young, mangled trees, growing from the side of the bluff in an unnatural manner. As he almost flew, he marked the leader of the vampires. The one that was slightly in front. The one with blood on his blade, his chin, his dark shirt. If any of that blood belonged to Adelia and Augustus, his younger brother and sister, the vampire would suffer before Jameson tore it to pieces so small, they would never regenerate. Only a switch could kill vampire flesh for all, but shifters had their own way of stopping a vampire for good.

The vampire was bigger than the others, and older, his black hair had a single wide streak of pure white down the middle, and was perfectly cut in a Caesar style, laying forward on his scalp in glossy waves. His face was impossibly cruel, with glowing red eyes that slanted strangely at the corners. He stood on two legs, his form an approximation of any other person. But his angular body held none of the warmth and softness that Jameson had known from others his entire life. Hugging him would have been like hugging an axe blade.

Jameson hit the ground, the slope of the bluff and the way he had leapt causing his back paws to strike first, the claws there slicing through thick foliage before it could trip him. He landed well and was running immediately, running true, closing the distance between him and the bloodsuckers swiftly.

The leader sensed him, turning, an evil smile gracing his lips, but then Jameson was almost upon him, leaping from ten feet away, aiming for his throat. He would rip it clean through, would take the head off and eat it. The body could wander for millennia and that would not be torture enough, but it would have to do.

The other vampires still had not even noticed him, but Jameson would clear them all easily. The lead vampire moved with an uncanny speed, even as wind whistled in Jameson’s ears and his heartbeat slowed with anticipation of his first kill. Too young he was, but too old now, also. His mother…

The vampire squared with him and arced his blade hand through the air. Jameson would reach his throat, but the blade would slice him through at the same time. Acceptable. Jameson’s fangs throbbed, swelled, and the snarl that erupted from him echoed through the small valley, bouncing off his home that he would never live in again.

From behind, a white blur passed over him, strong jaws snatching him around the neck, pulling him from the trajectory of his death leap, tossing him in the air like he was still a pup of forty pounds.

William. The Keeper, bigger somehow, had come from behind, leapt, and pulled him away from the vampire’s blade, but also from his throat. Jameson hit the side of his house hard, his head connecting with a round stone from the chimney. His vision blurred and he dropped to the ground, stunned.

The white wolf gained its feet and turned to face the vampires who were falling upon them in a tight group, knives or claws extended. William snarled at them, a noise that made the two youngest vampires falter. One of them turned to run. The big vampire with the skunk-stripe through his hair grabbed him by the throat and tossed him at William. “Run not. Cowardice against those who are of no lasting danger to you will never be allowed.

The vampire twisted through the air, trying to grab hold of nothing. William’s beast grew larger still, until he was as big as the largest bear Jameson had ever seen. Jameson tried to get up. He threw up nothing, and fell to the ground again, his white legs splayed out. William snatched the vampire from the air, clamping his massive jaws around the male’s waist and biting through. The lead vampire frowned, but gripped his knife tighter. He sent three more vampires at William. The meadow ground ran red with blood.
Blackness closed around Jameson, and as he fell down the rabbit hole, he realized some of the blood had been William’s.

Jameson voice threatened to break so he stopped talking, even though there was more story to tell. He’d failed to protect his mother and siblings, but had not caused their death like he’d caused William’s. His fault. (life endures. blame is pointless.) His skin crawled and he shuddered, shaking it off.

All shifters in the room were silent, watching him solemnly. The female shifter’s eyes crinkled in sympathy. Her brother leaned forward, almost off the edge of his chair. Flint’s hands were curled into bloodless fists.

Jameson cleared his throat. No one had ever heard the full story before. Could he even finish? “Um, shit.” He rubbed the back of his head and tried to pick up the thread of a story he’d hoped never to revisit. “My family was dead. All of them. I, ah, I’d blacked out, and when I woke up, William was still alive, but just barely. Bits and pieces of vampire bodies littered the ground, but only four. The leader had gotten away. Phazed, maybe.”

Jameson shuddered at the memory of trying to piece those vampires back together. Someone’s questioning grunt made him backtrack and explain. “Phazed. Some vampires can do it. You know, just… disappear. Only the strongest ones, and shifters who are as strong can hold them in place.”

A few males looked away from him, shifting nervously in their seats. Shit, he’d gone too far. It was 2017, they all knew teleportation was impossible. Science had proved it, he was sure. Not that science had ever gotten ahold of a vampire. Shit, he had to reel them back in.

He spoke quickly. “William spoke a few words before he died, but none of importance. None that told me what the job of a Keeper was, or how to wake the Steward, or even what the Steward was. I wandered the forest for months as the white wolf. My wolf had gotten bigger overnight, probably because I had become the Keeper. I never did see another vampire, but it didn’t matter. All the switches and shifters were dead. The forest was littered with their bodies, and when I couldn’t take it anymore, I, ah.”

Jameson rubbed a hand over the back of his neck again, feeling the shortness of his hairline, trying to pull himself together. “Ah, I hit the railroads. I left Five Hills.”

He took a deep breath and told the truth. “I ran like the scared child I was.”

The scent in the room deepened to sympathy, making Jameson’s guts wither. The hundreds of times he had imagined this moment, he never realized he’d have to tell the whole truth. How had he not realized that?

“When my grief quieted and I’d grown into an adult, I returned. I’ve been here since, waiting, watching, gathering information, and trying to do my duty, although I’m still not sure of what it is. The Steward is lost to time. I search for the resting place every year, taking a month to traverse the forest on foot. I’ve investigated every Natanhala forest legend myself, camping out, looking for caves, looking for the kernel of truth hidden in the story. I have never found any sign of the Steward, and I fear I never will.”

His voice grew stronger. “That’s why I called this meeting. The Steward isn’t returning. Neither are the switches. But we shifters still have a duty to act-”

A male in the front row interrupted him. A Five Hills cop named Dario something. Jameson didn’t know him well. “The Steward, is it a person?”

Jameson nodded. He knew that much. Had heard disjointed conversation and speculation his entire childhood from others who’d heard tell of the Steward’s previous wakings. Indeed, most shifters had not fought in the vampire wars. Their sole job had been to breed, to make more shifters who could be entwined by fate to a destiny beyond their imagination.

The cop stood and held his hand a foot above his head. “Is he big?”

Jameson nodded again. “By all reports, yes. Seven foot tall.”

“His eyes go creepy black when he gets pissed?”

Jameson shuddered, but nodded. He’d heard it said.

“He’s in the Five Hills cellblock. We arrested him yesterday for trying to destroy what he called a vampire in a storefront TV.”

Words failed Jameson, and so did his muscles. He caught himself heavily on the table, then recovered and rushed out of the room without another word.