Righteous

He cannot win. I won’t let him.

When Igor sacrificed himself to save me, he unwittingly left his eldest son as the paterfamilias of the most lethal of vampiric bloodlines. Now Dracula commands more than a few surviving sycophants. He has an entire army at his command, and they’re all coming for me.

But when they find me, I won’t be alone. Together, hoods, wolves, and slayers will don our cloaks, take our fur, and call upon the power of the sun itself to defeat him. Vlad Tepes wanted to enslave the slayers and unmake the wolves. He wanted to take me away from Tobias and use our daughter as a tool. He'll choke on each of his ambitions as I stuff them down his throat. Three bloodlines flow through my veins, and each has a cause for revenge. I will make this world safe for all the creatures of the night.

Even if I have to deceive those I love to do so… But what did they expect from the namesake of the Betrayer?

“BUT YOU MUST SEE that the best way forward is together. If we don’t ally as one nation against the Dracule, then…

Mother’s words cut off as hysterical curses poured over the phone line. She passed a look around the Council Table in the Schloss’s former throne room. Instead of other matrons, however, only Markus and I were seated there to lend silent sympathy.

With a huff, Brünhild continued, “I would remind you, Yanyu, that regardless of half of the Council’s retreat from Germany, I am still Grand Matron. Think of that twice before threatening me again.”

Once upon a time, I would have believed in fairies before the idea that someone would try to out-bitch Brünhild Kline. Now, our allies in the Hood Houses had fallen away like flies. The first to bolt: no surprise. My mother had barely finished decreeing that all asenaics were now recognized members of the community when the House of White’s matron showed Schloss Wolfsretter her backside. The Greens followed in her wake fast enough to share a cab to the airport, taking away the Atlantic seaboard on both sides of the ocean as safe zones. God willing, Vlad didn’t decide to head to NYC because the Big Apple was now a Brünhild-Kline-can-suck-it designated zone.

Pressing her forehead against a balled-up fist, Mother waited for the other voice to a give her an opening, and then…

“Of course, I understand that what I’ve done has gone against centuries of tradition by treating werewolves as our equals, but we both knew the day was coming. When the most powerful and vicious vampire in the history of creation declares war, you find your allies where allies are to be had. What better time to move us forward? And if you’d just listen to reason, then…”

The other side went dead.

Markus’s words wrapped around the lollipop he sucked. “Guess the House of Orange is a no?”
Brünhild closed her eyes. “Indeed.” She cycled a breath, then turned to me. “Where does that leave us?”
I examined my notes. “So… pretty much all of Asia and the UK have told us to go to hell. Casa de Amarillo is still with us, though that’s probably more because they’re the ones who helped hide the asenaic line all these years. And… the blues are confirmed, so if the vampires invade either the Fjords or Minnesota, we’re golden.”

My attempt at comedy was a drop of water on a hot stove. Pushing off my sarcasm, I set aside my notebook. “It’s a fifty-fifty split, but Mädchen, that’s more than enough. There are only three ravens left, and Vlad’s just one vampire against, what, a few hundred of us?”

“He’s not just one vampire, Gerwalta. He is the vampire. And with Igor Karmarov dead, he’s now the paterfamilias of his bloodline. It’s a position many still revere.” Brünhild let out a long exhale as she planted her hands on an old, ornately carved chair and leaned into a stretch. “And I fear he may be targeting the other asenaics now.”

Behind us, sitting on the side of the room, Tobias coughed a laugh.

The Matron spun. “Something amusing you, Mr. Kline?”

“Mr. Kline? My name is…” Tobias’s face screwed up. “No. No dice. You are not going to stick me with my mate’s family name just because you decided it’s convenient if I’m one of you now.”

I crossed my arms. “And what’s wrong with taking the wife’s name? Or did you assume that because you’re a man, I’d take yours automatically?”

“Why wouldn’t you want to be a Somfield? It’s a great name. Geri Somfield. Gerwalta Somfield. Mrs. Somfield. Rolls off the tongue like sugar now, don’t it?” He stood, walking… no, stalking toward me. Tobias raised his hand to trace a finger down the bridge of my nose and over my lips. “Don’t you want to be my missus, Mrs. Somfield?”

Behind me, my mother chocked on her annoyance. “You two must learn quickly there is more to marriage than constant sex.”

“I’m a slow learner, Matron.” The corner of Tobias’s mouth pulled up. Given only a few days, he’d learned all the best ways to piss my mother off. “But I do hear it also comes with tax benefits in your country. Maybe even a green card.”

The chair legs groaned as Brünhild pushed them into the table. “I hope that at least you’re using protection. This is hardly the time to knock up my daughter.”

And she, it turned out, had learned how to push all of Tobias’s buttons.

“You’re very crass for an old autocrat, you know that? What I was laughing at,” he said, like that part of the conversation had been on pause and all he had to do was hit play again, “what made me so giddy, is that I guess it should come as no surprise that there are other asenaics you know about and we don’t. You were covering up quite a few things, it seems.”

“Yes, I was.” Brünhild crossed her arms. “If I didn’t, old school traditionalists like Zhu and Smyth of the House of Green would have hunted them down and killed them long ago. So, you’re welcome, Tobias, for my efforts which kept you and your family alive all these years.”