The four vampires were unconscious, each laid out in an orderly fashion within a floating and glowing bubble of power, the like of which Dior had never seen, within a small room that, from the line of beds each with a curtain around it, and the glass fronted cupboard which displayed an array of medicines and bandages, must act as the school’s infirmary.
“What is this magic that you have used?” Dior was intrigued.
“A suspension spell. We have a variety of different spells around the premise, to capture intruders and to keep the students safe. The vampires walked straight into them,” Theo shook his head with almost paternal disappointment. “A child could avoid those spells, and yet, here we are, with three sleeping vampires.
“We were,” he added. “Debating what to do with them before your arrival. These two,” Theo pushed on the glowing bubbles and sent them swaying slightly in the air, like rocking the cradle of a baby, Dior thought. “In particular are troublesome. Not just because of who they are and who they are mated to, but because both have magic of their own. The female almost managed to repel the magic, something I would have thought impossible had I not seen it with my own eyes.
“But we had thought that she might offer a solution to our problem. Raiden Grenmeyer’s only child would have the means by which to contact the pack, and where-ever Raiden is, my son is,” Theo concluded.
“You did not wonder why they were here?” Dior asked.
“Obviously that question did arise,” Theo agreed. “But, the way Elior is spreading his influence in this city, we assumed he was simply uprooting potential threats and removing them. Four vampires, two of which are mutants, would be sufficient to uproot a girl’s school of witches. Elior’s vampires would not know that there were other members of the coven in this location so would not be expecting trouble.”
“Can you transport them this way?” Dior asked.
Theo raised his eyebrows. “You do not wish for me to free them of the spell?”
“Eventually,” Dior replied. “But they will be angry and alarmed when you do so and will probably damage your furniture and waste our time. If they are freed where Elior is, they will be less destructive.”
Theo tilted his head to the side and regarded the lion gargoyle with the green eyes that he had passed to his daughter, however where Verity’s eyes were compassionate and gentle, this man’s eyes were cold and hard. “What are you proposing, Dior?”
“We both want to locate Verity,” Dior pointed out. He heard the shuffle of movement behind him as his mates shifted position, listening with avid attention. “If you were not responsible for the portal, it is logical that her brother was. If Alatar is where the werewolf pack is, then we share the common goal of locating the werewolves. Ashlynn is our method of doing so, but we will need her cooperation. She will be more inclined to assist us, if she wakes in the vampire’s strong hold with her mate, Elior, at her side.”
“And if she refuses?” Theo pointed out. “We will have lost the opportunity to use her connection to the werewolves.”
“She will not refuse,” Dior was confident in that. The vampires wanted Verity’s blood, but he did not think it necessary to share that information with the cold-eyed man. “The vampires want to defeat the winged invaders. If your coven has a plan on how to do so, then they will want to hear it. As,” he considered the man. “Do I.”
Theo sucked on his teeth as he turned over his options. “Very well,” he decided. “It is likely we will need the vampires aid anyway.” He made a gesture with his hand, and the floating vampires pulled towards him like the cabooses of a train. “Shall we?”
They filed through the hallway to the front door. There was a flurry of motion on the stairs as they drew near, and the girls ran back up to the landing above amidst giggles. Dior exchanged a look with Etienne and raised his eyebrows. Blaise however grinned and blew them a kiss as he passed.
“Do not toy with the young ones,” Dior reprimanded him as they stepped out into the cold of the day.
“There is no harm to flirting with the little chickens,” Blaise replied defensively. “I am not about to take any of them into the nest.”
“Hmm,” Dior was not mollified, looking behind him to see where the warlock was. Theo stepped out with a witch and a warlock flanking him, and the chain of vampires drifted out behind them. The elegantly dressed woman who had opened the door to them smiled cheerfully as she closed it behind the last vampire bubble.
“Lead on,” Theo said to Dior.
The lion gargoyle turned and led his mates out of the fenced yard onto the street.
“The times in which we live,” Etienne observed falling into step beside Dior. “Pigeons attack from burning skies, and vampires float.”
Dior’s snorted his laughter. “It will be a story to tell our young.”
“Je ne fais pas confiance au warlock,” Etienne murmured. “He is as slippery as a snake. It is hard to believe that he sired our Verity.”
“Mhm,” Dior agreed. “Nous garderons un ? il sur lui.”
“We will keep both eyes on him,” the griffin concurred. “What do you think the warlock plans?”
“It will be interesting to find out,” Dior replied. “But first we need to retrieve Verity.”
“Mmm,” Etienne rubbed the heel of his hand against his sternum. “I feel the ache of her absence.”
“Yes,” Dior murmured. He had been feeling it too, the subtle discomfort within his ribs, as Etienne had said, an ache of absence. “The mate bond is too fresh for this absence,” he said with concern. “We are not meant to part from our mate so soon so long. We will find her, and we will bring her back to the nest and keep her there until she is swollen with our young.”
“Et mon pigeon,” Etienne’s grin was wicked.
“Et notre pigeon,” Dior chuckled casting a glance over his shoulder to where Blaise maintained a constant flow of conversation, his arm around Charon’s waist. The winged man scowled at the ground but had not pulled away from the goat. “Hmm,” Dior adjusted his trousers.
“The pheromones,” Etienne observed with amusement. “Are potent.”
They were beginning to enter the more populous city streets and their procession was greeted with stares. Dior was not surprised when Nate and a party of vampires surrounded them within a block of the vampires’ stronghold.
“What is this, Dior?” Nate demanded, his hand on his weapon.
“Your family is unharmed,” Dior assured him. “And they will be released. We are returning them to Elior. The warlocks and the witch are with us voluntarily.”
“Elior is not going to be happy,” Nate observed and jerked his head at his company of vampire soldiers. They fell into step behind the floating vampire prisoners. Dior saw Nate’s eyes lose focus and a muscle in his jaw twitch as he passed on the news to the vampire leader. “Nope,” he murmured. “Not happy. You had better know what you are doing, Dior,” he added sliding his eyes towards Blaise and Charon. “Elior is not reasonable when it comes to Ashlynn and Cael.”
“Very few people are reasonable when it comes to their mates,” Dior was not concerned about the vampire. “Ashlynn and Cael are unharmed, as you can see. They triggered some defensive magic of the coven when we went to investigate. We have not released them, as we thought they would be reassured to awake in Elior’s presence, rather than elsewhere.”
Nate raised an eyebrow. “Elior says that you lost the slippery little healer,” he said with enjoyment. “I did warn you.”
“Verity did not seek to flee us, but rather was stolen.”
“The same result,” Nate was smug. “An empty cage, and no healer blood for the troops.” They approached the vampires’ building, the soldiers on the street opening a path for the odd parade. “Home sweet home,” Nate commented, his eyes going to where Blaise and Charon followed. “We have an empty cage below if you wanted to store your prisoner there.”
“Charon is not our prisoner, Nate,” Blaise said firmly his grip on the winged man tightening, and the goat gargoyle’s skin losing tone as he started to shift in response to the threat. “He is our mate.” He managed to get his shift under control, skin colour returning. “Be polite.”
“Do you find all your mates in our cages?” Nate said sourly to Dior.
“It appears so,” Dior was amused. They crossed a suddenly silent and still foyer, all the vampires that had been busy in that space stepping aside to watch their passage to the elevator. Nate selected the elevator call button.
“We will not all fit at once,” Nat observed. “I suggest that Dior, you and Etienne take Ashlynn and Cael up with one of the wizards, and I will follow with Blaise and bird-man, Jacinta and Rebecca.”
The elevator bell was overloud as the doors opened, and Dior stepped in with Etienne, Theo, Ashlynn and Cael. It was a tight fit, with the floating vampires taking up much of the space.
“This spell was not designed with elevators in mind,” Theo said as Dior selected the top floor, and the elevator began its slow rise through the levels. “What did the sour faced vampire mean by no healer blood for the troops?” He added. “I presume he was speaking of my daughter.”
“The vampires discovered that Verity’s blood has healing properties for them,” Dior admitted. “They intend to process it into pills that can be easily carried and administered as first aid.”
“Isn’t that interesting,” Theo was intrigued. “They are quite enterprising, these vampires, are they not? I guess that is what happens when your species is led by a used-cars-salesman.”
“I do not think that Elior has ever sold cars,” Dior frowned.
“It is a saying, a human saying,” Theo told him. “A description of a certain type of personality.”
“Hmm,” Dior did not think it was a flattering description from the warlock’s tone.
The elevator doors opened, and they stepped out into the foyer of the building, where the two heavily armed vampire guards waited, and, in the open doorway, so did Elior, the vampire’s eyes flashing red with his Other.
“What have you done to my mates?” The leader of the vampires demanded harshly.
Theo made a gesture with his hands, and the bubbles of energy encasing Ashlynn and Cael burst, dropping the vampire hybrids to the floor. Cael landed in a crouch, and Elior caught Ashlynn, preventing her from hitting the floor hard. The three vampires snarled in unison, rounding on the warlock.
“There we are,” Theo announced, unperturbed dusting his hands off against each other. “Safely delivered back where they belong. You ought to put collars on your dogs, Elior, if you intend to let them stray into coven territory. It would make returning them easier.”
“Who the f-k are you?” Ashlynn demanded, her brows pinching over her nose. “You look familiar.”
“I believe you are friends with my son, Alatar,” Theo provided helpfully. “And maybe you encountered my daughter, Verity.”
“So, she actually is his sister,” Ashlynn grimaced. “That is going to get me into shit with my dad.”
“Theo is seeking Alatar as the coven believes they have a way to end this war,” Dior informed them. “Alatar, apparently, has absconded with most of the coven, and they need them in order to do whatever it is that they believe they can do.”
“And what is it that you think you can do?” Elior demanded, still furious about his mates.
“Two things, really,” Theo replied calmly. “We can disrupt the portals they attempt to open here causing them to,” he pulled a slight face. “Go astray and we can open our own portals into their realm, giving us the ability to return the attack.”
“Ah,” Elior’s expression shifted from fury to thought and his eyes slid to Cael. It was not, Dior thought, the first time that the vampires had discussed using portals to return attack.
“That is interesting. And what do you want from us?”
“My son and his following departed with the Grenmeyer pack,” Theo’s voice carried his opinion of this transgression. “And have not been in contact with anyone here since, other than Verity, assuming that he was responsible for her abduction, which seems likely. Odd but likely,” he added, and then paused. “Unless he has a used for her healing ability. That might explain why he would bother himself with her.”
“You want me to speak to my father?” Ashlynn seemed dubious.
“I think it would be better if I spoke to my son face to face,” Theo replied. “Our last parting wasn’t on the friendliest of terms, and he would probably be inclined to tell me where to go, if a message was passed along. However, face to face, I can probably persuade him to assist us.”
“You want me to betray the runs?” Ashlynn’s eyebrows lifted and she laughed derisively. “No.”