Shadow Phantoms - H.P. Mallory Page 0,29
the idea of hunting down the Vryloka made my blood stir in my veins. It had been so long since I had found myself in gainful employ. I could practically hear the sounds of battle. It would be like the old days, when I hunted my prey, when I killed without conscience, when each day seemed like its own little adventure. Those days were long gone now and I would not want to go back to the time when I killed indiscriminately—I had changed too much for that. But the Vryloka were killers, themselves. Thus, taking them out would not be murder, but public service. If someone did not do it, then who knew what they might do? Visons of glorious campaigns marched before my eyes; of victory, of blood, of death.
I had to still the battle cry in my throat.
But of course, not all of that death would be theirs. Was this what it meant to be a leader? Was this how poor Jolie had felt all the time? There was nothing I wanted more than to get out there and put my life on the line to take down an evil enemy. But Laucian was not talking about me, he was talking about my people, my vampires. Few of them had the fighting experience I had. How many would be turned to soulless Vryloka before the war finished? And that was another subject of note: our dead would increase their numbers. My job, whether I liked it or not, was to keep my vampires safe. And I had done that already by putting them on these ships. Laucian did not care about my people, he just wanted the Vryloka dead. A decade ago perhaps I would have been on his side, but now I had new responsibilities.
Still, perhaps I would have talked myself around to his way of thinking, if his attitude had not continued to rub me the wrong way.
“It is time for your vampires to re-enter the world,” Laucian continued. “And they will need a bit of training if they are to be of any use to us at all.”
Perhaps if he had made the offer a few minutes earlier, I might have said yes. But I was hardly going to listen to him pour scorn on the Vampire Coalition and then roll over. ‘Much to learn from me and mine’ he had said. How dare he? I had saved the vampire world from itself, and all I got was condescension from a walking antique.
“My vampires will need training to re-enter the world?” I demanded, glaring at him. “You came here on a clipper ship! Is that what you plan to teach my vampires? How to sail?” I folded my arms. “We are not going anywhere. My job now is to keep my people safe and there is nowhere safer than here. If you and yours would like to join us, then you are welcome.” I paused. “But you will have to trade in your glum demeanor. No one wants to spend any time with a bore.”
He returned my glare. “I would no sooner live upon this… this floating sex party than stake my own heart.”
“Well, there you have it, then. And I apologize that your delicate sensibilities have been thus offended.”
“We have to work together, Sinjin, for all our sakes.”
I laughed, grimly. “You and I are not natural allies, Laucian. I find your version of vampirism ridiculous, and you find mine degenerate. How do we work together?”
“Well,” Laucian began, diplomatic but with a definite edge, “I was hoping that, in the circumstances, you might recognize the superiority of my ‘version’ of vampirism. My people are ready to fight. Only by taking vampires back to the clean, pure version of what they once were can we hope to have any chance against this enemy.”
“In other words; abandon everything we have learnt in the past two hundred years.” I shook my head, laughing again at the arrogance of the man. He was almost as bad as me. “And with it, everything we learnt as part of the Underworld.”
“Quite so.”
I frowned at him. “How many vampires do you count among your followers Laucian? Ten? Twenty?”
“I have fewer than you do, yes.”
I shook my head. “The Underworld taught us to live together, to work together and to fight together. If you think there is not a lesson there that might help us against the Vryloka, you are even more deluded than I thought you were and, believe me, that