skip ahead here and there to indicate the passage of time. And you will see a few scenes you’ve encountered before. These were, after all, pivotal moments in Cliff’s life that I believe were integral to his story. In Cliff’s Descent, however, they’re either told from a different perspective or expanded to shed new light on those events. And don’t worry. There is a lot you haven’t seen before, too.
Although I know I could’ve begun Cliff’s story in medias res, as my literature and creative-writing professors would say (which just means in the middle of things), I chose to start at the very beginning, where we first encountered Cliff in the series.
I hope you enjoy it.
Best,
Dianne Duvall
Prologue
“Awaken, vampires!” Bastien bellowed. “The immortals have found us!”
Cliff jerked awake. Bolting upright in bed, he glanced over at Vince and Joe.
Both vampires sat up and regarded him with wide eyes.
Boots pounded through the subterranean tunnels at preternatural speeds.
“How many did you count?” Someone with a… British…? accent asked grimly somewhere outside.
“Fifty-seven vamps below,” another man—this one definitely British—replied. “Four humans above.”
Cliff rolled off the cot he’d claimed and grabbed his blades while Vince and Joe did the same.
Bodies raced past the doorless entry to their room. Other members of Bastien’s vampire army, snarling and growling like animals.
“If you can prevent Roland from killing Sebastien,” the first Brit said, “do so.”
“Oh shit,” Cliff whispered. The Immortal Guardians had discovered Bastien’s home. Or his lair as some of the vampires housed here called it. Had Bastien’s quest to kill Roland—the Immortal Guardian who had brutally murdered his sister and her husband—led them here despite the care they’d all taken not to leave a trail?
Cliff loved Bastien like a brother. The elder vampire had found him shortly after Cliff’s transformation and had taken him under his wing. The psychotic bastard who had transformed Cliff had disappeared before Cliff even fell ill and had been so deranged when he’d reappeared some weeks later that Cliff had wanted nothing to do with him. Bastien, on the other hand, had given Cliff shelter and guidance and helped him come to terms with his frightening new reality.
And Cliff was not the first. Bastien had done the same with nearly a hundred others, feeding them and sheltering them and doing everything he could think of to help them stave off the insanity the peculiar virus that infected them seemed to spawn. He even provided them with lists of pedophiles they could drain so they wouldn’t do what so many other vampires did and kill innocents.
Cliff respected the hell out of Bastien. But since he had launched this war against the Immortal Guardians, intent on killing the man responsible for his sister’s death as well as all the other Immortal Guardians who brutally preyed upon vampires…
Well, there had been instances when Cliff had worried that Bastien’s thirst for revenge might have outfitted him with blinders.
“Go on,” a female with a French accent said upstairs. “I’ll see to the humans.”
A barrage of gunshots broke out above, followed by the thuds of bodies hitting the floor.
Cliff seriously doubted those were Immortal Guardians falling.
The murmur of the female’s voice confirmed his fears as the sounds of battle erupted in the basement, drowning her out. The shicks and tings of blades meeting blades competed with thuds and cries of pain.
“What do we do?” Joe blurted.
Cliff shook his head. “Protect Bastien.” Judging by the fear that filled his friends’ faces, they held as little hope as he did that they’d succeed.
Lunging through the doorway, Cliff led the other two through the winding hallways. Every vampire who lived here had helped dig and shape these tunnels. Four of them branched off the original basement the farmhouse above them had boasted. One led to whatever room Bastien rested in. Cliff had never seen it since Bastien forbade them all entry.
Cliff didn’t blame him for taking that precaution. Bastien had slain several vampires during Cliff’s acquaintance when the insanity those men suffered drove them to defy his orders and attack humans who weren’t on the lists provided. It only took a few years for the madness to seize total control of those infected. So the vampires who were well on their way down that path and worried they might be the next to lose their head—literally—at the edge of Bastien’s sword sometimes tried to sneak up on him while he rested and behead him first.
They didn’t know what Cliff had already divined: that the tunnel that led to Bastien’s room