Karhi Emelyn

As long as the magic courts had existed, there had been a class system like there was in any society.  Vampires, shifters, and mages were the “high class”, the fullmagics.  They had a lot of magic with which to work, and they lived for a long time.  Mages had human blood, but the magic in it made the point moot.

Halfvampires, halfshifters, and paramortals were the “low class”, the halfmagics.  They were the human-based magics, for lack of a better term.  Halfvampires and halfshifters were the products of a human and a fullmagic.  Paramortals could pop up in any random sample of the human population, though there were strong genetic predispositions.

But all of them were deemed “too human”.  Halfmagics had never been considered part of any court.  Being “too human”, they were under the purview of the human courts.  And that was a problem when, historically, fullmagics loved to kill halfmagics.  And the human courts had no way of protecting halfmagics.  Or even knowing that they existed.

Hazel was over a thousand years old, and when she first became a vampire, there was no House of the Living Vampires.  They were scattered like every other species of vampire was.

Over the past millennium, Hazel had, through methods that had always been a bit fuzzy on the details to Karhi, wrangled the living vampires to bow to her.  As with any empire, Karhi had to imagine that the methods used were unsavory at best. 

At this point Hazel and one other living vampire were the only representatives for the living vampires in the vampire courts.

Wrangling those vampires, and having a child who was a halfvampire, Hazel had set up protections within her own house for halfvampires.  They weren’t protected by the courts, but they sure as hell were protected by Hazel.

And she had been amassing contracts with other halfmagics to give them similar protections.  Rumour had it, she even had some contracts with anthroshifters.  Karhi had heard about it here and there—primarily through Ilona’s griping about it.  She always thought Hazel was plotting some sort of power grab against Ilona, even though the woman had no interest in human vampires or Ilona.

Hazel had a solid base in the US, Europe, and the Middle East and she was working to branch out globally.  She, Matadi, and her children had regular speaking engagements, for lack of a better term, all over the world to pitch their contracts.

Karhi’s understanding of the contracts was that they were a system of favours and payments.  Like Mira’s.  She could ask things of the Ruaidhrí House like protection, or shelter, or any number of things, and she would owe the house a favour. The Ruaidhrí House could ask for anything like access to her abilities or contacts or whatever resources she had, and they could either pay her or owe her.  And his understanding was that if the Ruaidhrí House asked for something, Mira could turn it down without a penalty.  And the reverse was also true, but rare.

The other contracts that Hazel offered were more of the same.  There were a lot more nuances to it that he didn’t know, but he also didn’t really need to.  He was a fullmagic and had no reason to make any sort of contract with Hazel.

But what they were doing tonight didn’t entirely make sense to him.

“We’re meeting mages tonight, your majesty?” he asked Hazel as they pulled into the smallest mountain town that he’d seen outside of Europe.  He, Hazel, Mira, and one of Hazel’s guards were in a town car together.  Hazel sat in the front with her guard acting as driver, while Karhi and Mira sat in the back.  “I thought your goal was underrepresented populations?”

“That is the primary goal,” Hazel replied.  “Contracts like what I have with Mira.  But having contracts with mages, other vampires, and shapeshifters are infinitely useful.  For example, I’ve worked with a lot of mages to set up the protections on our castle as well as other places. And shapeshifters tend more towards blue collar work since the vast population of them tend to live in rural areas and have the strength to back it up.  Most of our builders, electricians, and other contractors are shapeshifters.  And vampires tend to have connections and wealths of knowledge that I myself wouldn’t be able to get my hands on because of my status.”

Karhi thought about how Lunette was the foremost expert in a lot of niche fields including a specialty in animal criminal trials.  That checked out.

“She had my house warded,” Mira murmured from where she sat gazing out the window.

They parked next to a small building with a sign on the grass in front of it that read, “East Glen Town Hall and Recreation Center”.  It was easily over a hundred years old.  It was located at the singular intersection with a stop sign in the town.  Light leached out from the windows of the town hall—the only light around.  There was something about it that seemed unwelcome.  The rest of the town of East Glen was asleep except for this building.

Matadi, Aoife, and two more of the Royal Guard met them at the front of the building.  Matadi and Hazel led the way into the building, followed by Aoife, Karhi, and Mira, and then the three guards.  One guard held a briefcase.

They entered a lobby with a small counter for a receptionist.  It smelled like old paper and the faint sour, musty smell of mould in places it shouldn’t be.  A hall on the left led outside to basketball courts.  The hall on the right led to closed doors that spoke of conference or practice rooms.  Karhi saw instrument cases on tables outside one room.

Hazel led them to the room at the end of the hall.  It was open to reveal a mahogany table that took up most of the room.  Two white boards had been mounted on the wall behind the table.  There were some half-erased arithmetic problems written on them.

The guards remained outside while the rest of them filed in, Aoife closing the door behind them.  She had taken the briefcase.  Almost a dozen mages already sat at the table.  All but one mage was grouped towards one end.

“Good evening,” Hazel said, settling herself next to the mage that wasn’t seated next to the others.  Matadi sat on Hazel’s other side.  Mira followed, then Karhi, and then Aoife.

There was a shuffle of hellos and polite greetings that Karhi tuned out.  His focus was on the mage that was an outcast from the others.

She was a necromancer.

The mage courts were broad and encompassed all magic that mages could manifest.  However, certain magics required their own governing body on top of the general governing body that made up the mage courts.  Necromancy was one of those few magics.

Necromancers were few and far between.  Partially because necromancy was a rare magic to manifest, and partially because so many died before they could become full-fledged mages.  Necromancy was a specialty that lent itself easily to corruption.  The ability to interrupt the normal process of death wasn’t an easy burden to carry.

Nor was it an easy way to make friends, as evidenced by the not-so-subtle glares coming from the other mages towards the necromancer.

She looked young, but that didn’t mean much.  She could have been thirty-something or three-hundred-something.  Necromancers didn’t age much and lived longer than most mages.  It had something to do with their line of work.  Being close to death all day, they built up some small immunity. 

She wore a light blue blouse with ruffles down the front and a black jacket that matched black slacks.  Her wavy blonde hair was pulled back in a barrette.  She wore glasses that adjusted to the light over brilliant crystal blue eyes.  Her skin was flawless and bright. 

Hazel took over, interrupting all the glares and furtive glances.  “Thank you all so much for being here.  I’ve brought the contracts I discussed with you all on the phone, and I’ll be passing them out to discuss.”

Aoife set the briefcase on the table and opened it with sharp snaps of the clasps.  She pulled out stacks of documents, each bound with a black bulldog clip.  She and Hazel passed them around the table, a final contract, thicker than the others, handed to the necromancer.

“Let us begin,” Hazel said.

Hazel’s offer to the mages was very similar to her offer to Mira, boiling down to favours for favours and favours for payments.  There was also a clause stating that anyone under contract with Hazel was safe from any vampires in her house, and that any vampire in her house was safe from a contractor.

After Hazel had put up her offer, the necromancer was the first to ask a question.  Her name was Raiyn and her voice was deep, like a jazz singer’s.  “This means that no matter where I am in the world, if a vampire of your house attacks me, I am under no penalty for what I do?”  Karhi wasn’t entirely sure if she meant that she would use its body for her own purposes or not. 

“If it’s in self-defence, yes,” Hazel affirmed.  “And if you attack a vampire of my house, they will not be under penalty for what they do to you.”

Raiyn merely nodded.  “That will not happen.”

Hazel nodded and looked at the other coven leaders.

“Nothing in the contract restricts our powers in any way, shape, or form?” a dark blonde witch in a dark green jacket asked.  Her tone asked silently, Not even the necromancer?

Karhi had known Hazel for five centuries.  He had worked with her and had gotten to know her methods of communication and how she reacted.  He knew, from the way she blinked twice in rapid succession, that she was annoyed by this question.

“My intention with these contracts is to have access to a wide variety of skills outside of my house.  It would be inappropriate for me to try to impose any sort of restrictions outside of any work I have asked of a contractor.  It would also be ineffectual, as I cannot try to enforce laws that your own courts do not enforce.”

Did she basically just say, why the fuck would I try to tell mages what to do with their magic in their private lives?

Karhi barely held back a jump at the sudden voice speaking in his head.  It wasn’t his own, but he had encountered it before.  He glanced at Mira out of the corner of his eye before saying, Yes.

Mira didn’t say anything else, and Karhi tuned back in to the meeting.

The questions continued.  There was one mage, a lawyer according to someone, who spoke the most.

When the questions were winding down, the necromancer asked, “Have any of the Praecantrix sisters signed the agreement?”

Hazel’s expression did not change though Karhi knew there was some bewilderment behind it.  She answered anyway.  “Two years ago, we tracked each of them down.  They all signed this same agreement.  We have not called them in for any reason other than to lay spells for us.”

Raiyn nodded.  She pulled a pen out of a small purse by her feet.  She signed it with a flourish in green ink and passed it to the queen face down.  Hazel did not turn it over to look at it. 

The rest of the witches and wizards spent about an hour longer on the contract, asking questions.  Finally, the lawyer said, “We will each take the contract back to our families to discuss.”

“Thank you,” Hazel said, taking the contract Raiyn had signed and placing it in the briefcase.  “If that’s all, then I would say that this discussion is over.”

The mages wasted no time leaving the room, throwing back dirty glances at Raiyn.  The necromancer was the last to leave, letting every other mage go ahead.

Karhi exited with the living vampires and Mira twenty minutes later. 

The parking lot backed up onto forest.  Leafless birch and maples grew together, their density shrouding the forest in darkness.  It was deserted except for the two cars in which they had arrived and a Jeep. 

The necromancer stood in front of the Jeep, fiddling with her keys to get inside.  Karhi didn’t know what car he thought necromancers drove, but it definitely hadn’t been a Jeep Wrangler.

The snow in the parking lot had been ploughed, but the drifts still came up to Karhi’s shoulders in some area.  The ground was covered in packed snow and hard ice.  The only light now came from one mounted on the side of the town hall, reflecting off the bright snow to shine on them all with a cold, milky brilliance.

The light went out and the stench of rotting flesh hit Karhi’s nose and a cold current of electric alarm ran down his spine.

Aoife hissed a curse in Irish.  The necromancer, who had finally gotten her car open, looked up.  She exhaled a deep breath and put her purse in the Jeep before closing the door and leaning against it, waiting.

The forest unleashed a swarm of original vampires, grey-skinned monstrosities whistling through teeth dripping with saliva.

Before Karhi could do anything to prepare for a fight, Hazel’s guards surged forward to meet them.  Three vampires against a tide of horrors.  There was no way they would be enough to—

The wave of vampire broke against the three guards.  Clouds of ashes exploded into the air, unholy and inhuman screams filling the night.

Karhi heard Mira shout in surprise, and suddenly Aoife was at his side, Mira in her arms.  She set Mira next to Karhi.  “Queen’s orders are for one of us to be with Mira at all times,” she murmured.

“You could have just asked me to walk over here,” Mira grumbled, straightening her shirt.

“You move too slow,” Aoife replied, turning to watch Hazel’s guard.

Karhi had never seen the Ruaidhrí guard in action before.  Normally the work he did for Hazel involved something covert and nonviolent.  Hazel preferred to use her own guard for anything else.  She was always so confident in the men and women who served her, but until now, he hadn’t really had the chance to appreciate it. 

Of course, they had speed and strength.  The original vampires did, too.  But the living vampires had so much more.  They moved with the simplest strikes that they could.  Where the original vampires used large, lunging attacks, the living vampires met their aggression with short, targeted hits.  He saw one woman shove her palm clean through the ribcage of a vampire.  It turned to dust around her hand, but she didn’t even seem to notice, already turning against another vampire.

“What is this?” Karhi murmured, watching the scene unfold before their eyes.  “Some of their movements are familiar but . . .”

“Krav Maga,” Aoife answered.  “It’s a relatively newer fighting technique.”

He nodded slowly.  He did not keep up with any sort of combat knowledge.  He knew how to defend himself and others, but a lot of his power came because he was faster, stronger, and more experienced than most vampires.  He had picked up a lot over the years.

“They attack and defend simultaneously and move with simple but easily repeatable attacks,” Aoife explained.  “It was developed for the Israeli Defence Forces in the 1940s.  All of Hazel’s guards are now taught Krav Maga in combination with specialized combat defence designed for fighting in protection of other people.  They’re also taught combat with humanoid and non-humanoid creatures.  One of our generals wrote an entire book about the history of fighting in the vampire courts, and it’s mandatory reading now.”

“That’s—”

“Yay, combat history,” Mira interrupted.  Her words were quick, almost panicky.  “Why does it look like there aren’t any less vampires?  Especially when they all turn to dust once they die?”

Karhi had been so in awe of Hazel’s guard and how they moved together, he hadn’t noticed that for every vampire that vanished into an explosion of dust, another one took its place.  Sometimes two took its place.  A Hydra of original vampires.

Before Karhi or Aoife could answer, Hazel was at Mira’s side.  “How many?” she asked.

Mira shook her head.  “Their heads are too . . . wrong.  I can’t get an idea of how many there are because I can’t even tell any apart from the other. But there are . . . a lot.  There are at least this many still waiting to emerge from the forest.”

“Is it normal for them to act this much in unison?” Karhi asked.

“No,” Aoife answered.  Her voice was hard.  “And we—”

They only had a shout of warning before something slammed into Karhi from above, knocking him to the ground.

Claws tore into his back, mashing him into the asphalt.  Fire seared across his spine, and he froze.

He knew pain.  He had spent months—years, even—of his life in agony.  Ilona had made it her mission to learn new and creative ways to torture him.  Fire and knives and blunt objects—anything and everything had been on the table.  Often, literally.

And he was punished if he ever fought back.

Karhi!

Mira’s voice cut through the paralyzing thoughts of Ilona, breaking him from his trance.  He curled his legs under him, scraping his knees, and heaved up.

The thing on top of him fell to the ground.  Karhi spun to see a vampire scrambling to get back on its feet.  He lunged at it before it could react and tore its head from its body.  The pain subsided from his back as he moved, the cuts healing.

He could fight back now.  His life was in danger and any pain that came of this was all in the service of fighting for his life.  He could fight for that.

Movement out of the corner of his eye caught his attention.  He ducked before another vampire could knock him down.  He batted it to the side, putting his weight into it.  The blow rung up his arm unpleasantly, but it got the vampire off.

Another vampire barrelled into him from the side, knocking him down.  His head cracked against the asphalt, and he saw stars.

Mismatched teeth snarled in his face, saliva dripping onto him.  He grimaced and struck his palm into the area where he thought its chest was.

It collapsed beneath his strength like the bone was made of glass.  The ugly thing cried out in pain and Karhi dug in and crushed its heart.  It turned to dust above him.

Karhi rolled to his feet and blanched for a split second.  A horde of vampire surrounded them.  Black, slimy things poured in from the forest, closing in on their group of eight.

He didn’t see how the fight ended.  There were too many.  He saw Aoife and Hazel back-to-back, Mira between them.  They moved fast, and they killed every vampire that came towards them, but Mira was a weak point.  She anchored them to one spot.  They couldn’t dart through the mass of vampires or move from their spot or Mira would die.  They were pinned in on all sides.

A vampire lunged at Karhi, tearing his shirt open and leaving a slash of red across his chest.  Before he could react, another hit him from behind, knocking him off balance.

A third used him as a vault and knocked him to the ground.

Four vampires bore down on him, claws tearing into flesh.  He elbowed one in its hind leg, shattering its knee.  It howled in pain and fell to the ground, but the move didn’t stop it from biting Karhi’s forearm and snapping the bones.  Karhi screamed.

He couldn’t fight four against one.  Not from the ground.  He was going to die by the hands of fucking original vampires.

A warm burst of power flooded Karhi’s senses, like the first ray of sunshine after a storm.  The pain eased, and the originals scrambled away from him like roaches under light.

Karhi struggled to get to his feet.  He had to before the vampires came back.  But his world lurched as he stood, and he just barely made it up.  His legs shook.

An inky black rope as thick as his wrist coursed through the parking lot.  It hovered a few feet off the ground.

It was black power—magic.  A sense of wellbeing filled him looking at the magic, his dizziness disappearing.  It was warm and inviting.  He felt like, if he were to touch it, it wouldn’t hurt.

He had never seen anything like it before.

The black power pierced through the ears of over a dozen original vampires.  They were connected in a chain like the shackles on prison workers’ ankles at the side of the road.  They weren’t moving, their faced slack-jawed, eyes vacant, staring up at the sky.  Those that hadn’t been caught stared at their captured allies in fear.

He searched for the source of the power.

The necromancer stood by her car with her hands clasped together.  Her eyes had gone white.  She was mouthing something to herself that he didn’t catch.

Karhi had never seen a necromancer work before.  He had heard stories that they could control vampires, but he had always assumed those were myths.

The vampires erupted into dust and those that hadn’t been caught in her spell fled.  In seconds, they were alone.

The white in the necormancer’s eyes faded, and she looked to the queen, who was failing to hide her awe.  Raiyn didn’t say anything, just waiting for Hazel to compose herself.

“Thank you,” Hazel finally said.  “That was . .  amazing.” 

Raiyn nodded.  “My first favour is owed.”  She got in her Jeep and left without another word.

Everyone had survived, all checking each other over for injuries.

Karhi looked down at where his own broken arm throbbed.  His arm was buckled in towards him, the bone tenting to one side.  He couldn’t throw up but seeing it did make him feel vaguely nauseous. 

It would heal, but he also needed to splint it. 

He pulled the remains of his shirt off and used it to wrap his arm.  He hissed as bone ground against bone, but he wrapped it tight enough to hold it in place.  It didn’t need to be perfect, just straight enough.  It would heal faster if his body didn’t have to reorient the bones into the proper spot. 

He heard a whine of pain.  Looking up, he saw Mira alone in the middle of the parking lot.  Hazel was attending to Matadi, and Aoife was setting a broken leg in one of the guards.

Mira was trying to stand up but every time she put weight on her right leg, she’d collapse onto the ground.  No one even seemed to notice her.

He was at her side in an instant.  “Are you okay?”

“Aoife pushed me down to keep me from getting hit, and I rolled my ankle,” she said, voice tight from pain.  There were scrapes on her face and arms from the asphalt.

He held out a hand to her.  “I’ll help you into the car.”

She looked at her ankle before huffing.  “Yeah, I guess.”

He helped her up, and she balanced on one leg.  He couldn’t pick her up with his broken arm, but he could support her with his other arm as they walked to the car.

The door was unlocked, and Karhi helped her get into the backseat.  She moved gingerly.  When she was arranged as comfortable as she could be, he closed the door and went to join her on the other side.

As soon as he sat down and closed the door, Mira caught his eye.  She tapped her forehead with a raised eyebrow.  It took him a second but when it clicked that she was asking if she could talk to him telepathically, he nodded.

Something weird is going on, she said.

He had felt that something was off, but he couldn’t quite place what it was.  He didn’t think it was a coincidence that Sloane had stumbled on the living vampires and been attacked by originals.  And then they had come across more originals tonight.  Why were you asked to Montana?

Originally, just this.  But it’s changed in the past week.  Now it’s interrogations, she replied.  But Aoife and Hazel are too old for me to get specific thoughts.  Just emotions and intentions.  And Matadi is good at masking his thoughts, which isn’t common.

He knew Matadi had some ability to block out neuropaths.  What kind of interrogations?

I don’t think I can tell you that, but I can say—someone has betrayed her trust, and she’s ferreting them out.

Hazel and Aoife joined them back in the car, Aoife taking the wheel.  Matadi went with the other three guards.

“Mira, are you okay?”Aoife asked, turning around to look at Mira. 

“Sprained ankle.  Get me a brace when we get back.”

“Can do,” she said.

“You don’t have a first aid kit in here?” Karhi asked.

“Not used to having humans around.”

Karhi didn’t like that answer.

Aoife passed Karhi a piece of fabric.  “We keep spare clothes in all the cars in case something like this happens.”

Karhi took it to see it was a plain white T-shirt.  He pulled it on.

Aoife started the car and pulled out of the parking lot.  When they were on the road, Karhi said, keeping his tone respectful but cool, “Hazel, I think we’ve been very patient.”

Hazel grimaced.  “You have.  There is someone trying to pull apart my kingdom.  We’ve had several attempts on my life, as well as my husband’s and my children’s, in the past four months.  I have no real leads on who, yet.”

“Why did we travel two hours from the castle if this is an issue?  Why are you leaving the castle?”

“I couldn’t cancel.  This meeting had been scheduled for months in advance.  Cancelling would make me look weak and insincere.  And trying to reschedule to one of my hotels would have had the same effect.”

She wasn’t wrong, but Karhi still didn’t like it.

“If you plan on doing this again,” he said, “you need to have more adequate protections in place for Mira.  This was an attack from at least a hundred original vampires.  She needs her own guards that can protect her at all times.  What you did tonight wasn’t enough.”

“Are you implying that Aoife and I are not capable?” Hazel challenged.

“I’m outright telling you that just Aoife and you was not enough.  You could have been fighting in the fray—two of the oldest vampires in existence with centuries of combat experience?  We wouldn’t have been so disadvantaged if Mira had had her own guard.  And then you wouldn’t be distracted.  It doesn’t matter how strong you are if you can’t see an attack coming because your back is turned.

“Mira was lucky tonight, but she needs more protection.  What you’ve provided wasn’t enough.  And you must keep a first aid kit around if you expect to be employing a human.  You should have at least had access to a wrap for Mira’s ankle tonight.”  He had come to appreciate a well-stocked first aid kit after watching everything that had happened to Sloane’s family back in October.

Hazel looked between Karhi and Mira, her expression unreadable.  Finally, she turned back to look out the windshield.  “Unfortunately, you are right.  Mira, I’m sorry I didn’t recognize this sooner.  I apologize for putting you in danger.”

Mira didn’t say anything.

“I do not often work with humans, and I did not account for what you would need to be safe and healthy.  That is unacceptable.  I will assemble a guard for you that will accompany you anywhere we go outside of the castle.  I will also make sure that we have bandages and anything you would need if you were injured with us.”

He heard Mira breathe out a small sigh of relief.  “Thank you, your majesty,” she murmured.

“Do not thank me.  I’m rectifying a mistake.”

Good.