Vampire Cursed (Northern Creatures Book 2), page 1
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Epilogue
Vampire Cursed
Northern Creatures Book Two
Kris Austen Radcliffe
Copyright 2017 Kris Austen Radcliffe
All rights reserved.
Published by
Six Talon Sign Fantasy & Futuristic Romance
Edited by Annetta Ribken
Copyedited by Juli Lilly
“Northern Creatures” artwork created by Christina Rausch
Cover to be designed by Lou Harper
Plus a special thanks to my Proofing Crew.
Copyright notice: All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events, programs, services, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Warning: the unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.
For requests, please e-mail: publisher@sixtalonsign.com.
First electronic edition, November 2017
Version: 10.21.2017
ISBN: 978-1-939730-53-4
Contents
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Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Epilogue
Elf Raised
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Chapter 1
She told me her name was Ellie Jones and that I wouldn’t remember her in the morning. She smiled a small, sad smile when she said it, one of those knowing smiles that made me believe she had lost hope. Ellie Jones believed that no matter what happened, come morning, she would be an afterthought.
Magic wafted around her like thin wisps of blue, purple, and green smoke. Not strong, obviously organized magic, but where she walked, subtle sheets of Aurora Borealis energy trailed.
The same magic that moved her to this place. Magic hurt her friend and it hurt her. It picked her up and it thrashed her against the rocks of my shore.
The magic meant she spoke the truth. Only magic could enchant and conceal—and wipe memories. Only magic could weigh on someone’s shoulders the way it weighed on hers.
“I will remember you,” I said. There were ways around enchantments.
I came to this side of my lake—through the woods of the peninsula to the span of water out of view of my home—looking for my lost dog.
I found him, and he’d found Ellie.
Marcus Aurelius, in his grand hound way, found her alone and in pain. He stayed at her side and he led her down to the water.
The lake lapped the shore under the morning sun, and crisp early-autumn air cleansed away most of my vampiric problems from the night before, but it did little for Ellie.
She tugged on her hoodie, then pushed her enticing, shimmery, auburn-red hair behind her ear and looked down at the pebbles under her feet. Marcus Aurelius barked. And I think I fell in love.
Such a stupid thought. Such an utterly immature reaction to an unknown woman. I should damned well know better.
“You won’t,” she said. “The enchantments are layered.”
No one deserved to drown under concealment enchantments or to vanish into the mist of spells woven expressly to obscure. No one.
She teetered on the slick pebbles and I stuck my hands into my pockets to keep from offering an uninvited touch.
Yet she moved as if her leg carried the majority of her pain—as if the magic that moved her here had settled in her thigh.
No more. I would not allow it to make her vanish—or be hurt—yet again.
I wanted to pick her up and carry her to the flat and stable trail, and to get her the help she needed for her wounds. To help and to make sure she no longer suffered.
But that would be presumptuous.
She dug in her hoodie’s front pocket. “I…” Her expression opened, then closed, then opened again, as if she could not decide if trusting me was wise.
I almost reached for her again, but exercise and the sun had yet to fully warm my cold body. The last thing I wanted was to frighten her more with my corpse-like touch.
She peered at the tattoo on the side of my head. “I have an ash tree in my garden,” she said in an offhand way.
From the lower muscles of my neck to the protection spells tattooed along the shaved scalp above my ears, the World Ash Yggdrasil climbed my scars and spread her branches. The elves had gifted me the magicks I wear—the protections, the tracer spells along the inside of my forearms, Yggdrasil’s symbolism of unity and life.
And Ellie Jones spoke of an ash tree in her garden.
We did have a connection. But again, I would not be presumptuous.
“My friend,” she said. “The one I lost. She took this photo.” Ellie pulled from the pocket of her hoodie a daguerreotype photograph sheathed in a soft, sigil-marked sleeve.
She handed me the plate. “Have you ever met a seer?” she asked.
Seers carried witch blood, yet the subtle aurora of magic encircling the plate did not indicate witch. None of Ellie’s magic twitched. Nothing snatched. Ellie Jones was not corrupted.
“Yes,” I said as I took the plate. I’d met many seers in my two hundred years, but none of them had carried the beauty or sadness of the woman before me.
She tapped the sleeve. “Do you know what a daguerreotype is?”
Daguerreotype plates were the most-used photography method when I fought for the Union during the Civil War. “I haven’t seen one in ages.”
“Some seers use cards. Some crystals. I take and read photos.”
I peered at the sigil on the sleeve. “That’s complicated, isn’t it?” Most seers used instant-read methods—tossed bones, tea leaves, cards and crystals, like Ellie said.
“The photos allow me to see magic,” she whispered.
I’d never before met anyone who also saw magic. My ability was most likely an accident manifesting from my patchwork nature and my father’s genius—if unholy—rewiring of my re-animated body. Ellie needed tools, but still, we walked this common ground.
And I would not remember her in the morning.
I had to remember her. I had to.
“The photo in that sleeve needs rinsing. I couldn’t at my cottage. My pump isn’t working,” she said.
She needed my help. “Do you want me to look?” I could do this for her.
Her eyes widened. “If you would.”
“I should take it out of the sleeve and wash it in the lake?”
She nodded yes.
I squatted next to the water and pulled the plate from the sheath. Like all daguerreotypes, its silver coating shimmered in the sunlight. Ellie had already developed it, and fixed the image, and now it needed a good rinse to make it visible.
I dipped the plate into the water once, then twice, but I still could not quite make out the image. I dipped it again.
I had no idea what I was looking at other than a clear image of a magical distortion wave moving through a room in what must be Ellie’s home.
In the photo, her body radiated agony. The wave must have also hurt her friend, who was behind the camera and
Behind Ellie, the wave built what magic always built—some sort of sigil- and sign-based gearwork structure. Except…
I stood and showed her the photo. “Here,” I drew my finger up and outward. “And here.” I moved my finger again, but in the opposite direction. “Looks like a tree.”
It looked like the ash on the side of my head. “The world tree is not a symbol of death,” I said.
She touched her lips.
“The enchantments may have hurt you, but I don’t think the tree would show if someone died,” I said.
Her friend was okay.
Ellie hugged me. She curled her arms around my waist and pressed her face against my chest. She touched me and did not recoil from my cold flesh.
“Thank you,” she said.
And again, I wanted to pick her up. I wanted to make sure she understood that neither Marcus Aurelius nor I would forget her. That come tomorrow, we would both remember.
“Would you like to get some coffee?” I pointed toward town. “There’s a place called Lara’s Café not far from here. You can tell me about your friend.”
She looked away. “You won’t remember me tomorrow.”
Yes, I will, I thought. “If I don’t, Marcus Aurelius will remind me, won’t you, boy?”
My dog emperor barked.
“I’d like to learn about your friend,” I said. I wanted to learn about her, to help me remember.
She extended her hand.
No fear radiated off her body. Her magic twisted and wavered like silk in a breeze. Hope had returned to her eyes.
She offered me a touch.
I curled my palm around her fingers. “Come, Ellie Jones.” I bowed. “The emperor and I will keep you company until we can no more,” I said.
I would break the enchantments hiding her from the world. No matter what happened—even if she decided I was too cold or too large or too ugly. Even if we spent the rest of our days as only friends.
I would do my best.
Chapter 2
I fell for a woman once, long ago. An elf. She still lived in Alfheim.
We don’t talk.
Ellie rolled down the passenger window of my truck and closed her eyes. She faced the breeze as if she’d never ridden in an automobile before.
Marcus Aurelius poked his head between the seats.
She laughed and scratched his ears. “Did I take your spot?” she asked my dog.
My big dog—Marcus Aurelius outweighed my eight-year-old elf-niece, Akeyla—whimpered and tried to crawl over the gearshift and onto Ellie’s lap.
“Hey, hey.” I put my hand out. “You’re too big for that.” My truck was big, too—at almost seven feet tall, I find driving a sedan not only uncomfortable but nearly impossible—but the cab only had so much room.
Marcus Aurelius whimpered again and settled for rubbing his big golden head against Ellie’s elbow.
“So you think a cell phone might bypass the enchantments?” she asked. A bag with her new phone sat on the floor between her feet. I’d added her to my plan at the store and picked up a nice unit with lots of memory for photos and videos for her to use.
There’d been a small argument. We’d just met and having a man she didn’t know hand her a new cell phone raised her hackles. But we both understood that because of the enchantments, she couldn’t hold a contract. Plus, her line showing up on my bill might be enough to cut through the fog and help me to remember.
So she let me set her up. She didn’t have to use it if she didn’t want to, but at least she had access now, in case of an emergency.
I added my number, and Ed’s, and Axlam Geroux’s after I texted her and asked if it was okay. As one of the Alfheim Pack’s Alphas, Axlam understood helping skittish people for whom magic had laid down a blister. She’d agreed immediately and without a lot of explanation.
Many magicals found werewolves too volatile and worked toward their eradication, but to Alfheim, the pack was a blessing.
Ellie spent a lot of time staring at the phone in the bag.
“It’s worth a try.” I’d lost my phone the night before chasing down my murderous vampire brother. All Ellie knew so far was that I’d been involved in a vampire-caused emergency and that it was now under control.
Mostly under control. We still did not know where Alfheim’s two local vampires had gone, or if the “brother” creature my arrogant father had built out of vampire parts was dead or hiding in the underbrush somewhere in the forest.
Not that I was hiding information from Ellie. She hadn’t asked for specifics, and right now, seeing her happy about maybe bypassing her concealment enchantments trumped any need to bring her up-to-date on her new home’s magical particulars.
And Alfheim was most definitely her new home. Seemed that not only did magic toss her into a new location, it also moved her cottage. Actually, physically moved her and her home from one location to another. Yesterday she’d woken up in Tokyo; last night she’d fallen asleep in a meadow under a Minnesota sky.
I signaled and pulled the truck onto the road leading toward one of Alfheim’s mainstays—Lara’s Café. The restaurant itself might be boarded up while they fixed the damage from the explosion, but the owners had pulled their food truck around front, serving fritters and coffee.
I glanced over just as Ellie pushed a strand of hair off her forehead. Her skin glowed in the morning light—she wasn’t quite as pale as an elf, but she did look as if she carried northern European ancestry. Mostly, with her hair and her green eyes, she looked Irish to me. Irish in that she carried bits of all who had come to the Isle—the original Gaelic plus a touch of the Norse and some Anglo-Saxon mixed in.
Ellie Jones, a woman of the Isles, and the seer who used Victorian-era daguerreotype photos as her stone.
I had so many questions.
She lifted her chin and inhaled the fresh Minnesota breeze. “Chihiro tried saving photos on her phone,” she said.
Chihiro, the friend she’d left behind in Tokyo—and the friend who had figured out how to at least somewhat bypass the enchantments. Ellie was not sure how. But Chihiro was proof bypassing was possible.
Marcus Aurelius nudged Ellie’s elbow. She laughed and rubbed his head.
She really was beautiful.
I returned my attention to the road. Best not to be distracted and get us into an accident.
I would talk to Ed Martinez—Alfheim’s sheriff—to see if we could track down Chihiro. It would be a good test of the boundaries of Ellie’s concealment enchantments, and a nice surprise for her if it worked out.
“Did it help?” I asked.
Ellie frowned. “You know, I’m not sure.” Her frown deepened. “Sometimes I think the enchantments conceal parts of my life from me as well as concealing me from the world.”
Not good, I thought. When she told me that the enchantments were layered, I figured she meant in the outward progression the way most complicated magicks built upon each other. A spell that warped Ellie’s memories in a different way added a whole new level of intricacy to a gearwork that was already much more intense than any I’d seen an elf produce.
And all this without leaving obvious traces of magic around its primary target.
Only natural-looking wisps of magic flittered around Ellie. They reminded me of the inborn, normal hints that surrounded all of the elves and the born-wolf werewolves. The wisps weren’t controlled magic, but a hint that magic was controllable for the person they surrounded.
The elves could often tell if someone was magical with a first impression, even though they did not see magic the way I did. Dagrun Tyrsdottir—Alfheim’s Queen—once told me that she “felt” magic when it moved along her own, like silk touching silk. I see that “silk.”
